SOURCE: Gunn, J. A. W. “‘State Hypochondriacks’ Dispraised: Mandeville versus the Active Citizen.” In Mandeville and Augustan Ideas: New Essays, edited by Charles W. A. Prior, pp. 16-34. Victoria, Canada: English Literary Studies, University of Victoria, 2000.

In the following essay, Gunn analyzes Mandeville's distanced and detached perspective on public affairs.

Mandeville as a thinker has always resisted easy labelling; were this not so, his place as a continuing focus for scholarly attention would be less easy to understand. Especially susceptible to exaggeration and plain misreading is his role as the apparent advocate of individual self-seeking. As I argued in an earlier encounter with this figure,¹ the portrayal of Mandeville as an extreme individualist fails to come to terms with the fact that his famous formula of “private vices, public benefits” is dependent upon a very conventional notion of what constituted a benefit to the public. This may occasion...