How we cite our quotes: Section.Part (if applicable).Paragraph
Quote #7
To the most careless observer there appear to be such dispositions as benevolence and generosity; such affections as love, friendship, compassion, gratitude. These sentiments have their causes, effects, objects, and operations, marked by common language and observation, and plainly distinguished from those of the selfish passions. (AII.6)
To support his argument that we're not totally selfish, Hume believes that we only need to look to ourselves and our everyday lives and emotions. It's a good point: we don't have to be a philosopher to see that kindness, friendship, love, and all kinds of other positive emotions influence how we act and that they've led to common ideas and language. Maybe Barney was right after all.
Quote #8
Tenderness to their offspring, in all sensible beings, is commonly able alone to counter-balance the strongest motives of self-love, and has no manner of dependance on that affection. What interest can a fond mother have in view, who loses her health by assiduous attendance on her sick child, and afterwards languishes and dies of grief, when freed, by its death, from the slavery of that attendance? (AII.9)
Still convinced that we're driven by selfishness? Hume isn't giving up. Here, he uses the love of a parent for their child to prove his point. Imagine that someone spends all their time and energy looking after a sick kid—they're clearly doing so out of love rather than just self-interest. If we think about other acts of kindness, love, and friendship, we can see this isn't just a one-off and that benevolence is part of our nature (well, unless you're a complete Grinch).
Quote #9
Now where is the difficulty in conceiving […] that, from the original frame of our temper, we may feel a desire of another's happiness or good, which, by means of that affection, becomes our own good, and is afterwards pursued, from the combined motives of benevolence and self-enjoyments? (AII.13)
Here's another instance where Hume refuses to see benevolence as being a disguise for selfishness. If another person is happy, then our natural sympathy transfers this to us. From then on, we experience a double-whammy of self-interest and benevolence. As with the role of sentiment in morality, Hume believes this should be pretty obvious—why do some folks still insist on this "selfish hypothesis"? Hume has a total facepalm moment here.