G. J. Mattey's Notes on Hume's Treatise, Book 2, Part 3, Section 5

Notes on Hume’s Treatise

by G. J. Mattey

Book 2
Of the PASSIONS
PART 3
Of the will and direct passions.

Sect. 5. Of the effect of custom.

1. Although emotions can increase and diminish passions and convert pleasure to pain and vice versa, custom and repetition do so to the greatest effect. They operate in two ways: by facilitating the performance of an action or conception of an object, and by afforing a tendency or inclination toward the performance of that action or conception of an object. These are “original” effects that custom and repetition have on the mind. [If you repeat an action many times, it is easier to do, and moreover, you are more inclined to do it.]

2. If we are not accustomed to something, there is a stiffness or lack of pliability, which the author locates in the difficulty of the animal spirits in moving a new direction. Working on the stiffness enlivens the mind to a moderate degree, producing pleasure. This is how novelty produces the passions of surprise and wonder. On the other hand, pleasure is easily converted into pain, as every emotion that attends a passion is easily convertible. So a surprise can augment pain as well. [Think of discovering your partner to be unfaithful by surprise, as opposed to discovering this after accumulating much evidence. The pain that “strictly speaking, naturally belongs to it” is augmented.] Novelty wears off after a while, and then “we survey objects with greater tranquility.]

3. Gradually, repetition produces facility, which, if moderate, also produces pleasure. Because repetition produces an “orderly motion” in the animal spirits, it tends only to increase pleasure, and in fact is capable of converting pain into pleasure.

4. There is a way, though, that some passions become converted to their unpleasant counterparts. If we have an agreeable passion toward the opposite sex, for example, and it becomes dulled through repetition, it can become painful. But if there is no initial passion, as in contemplation of the clouds, for example, pain will not be produced.

5. The other original effect of custom is a tendency and inclination to repeat the action to which one has become accustomed. The author applies this to an observation of Bishop Butler, that custom increases “active” habits but diminishes “passive” ones. In the latter case, the mind is slowed down more by repetition, while in the former, new force is imparted to it.