 The outcome of these procedures is the refinement of the theory of human nature. While exploring exceptions and eliminating superfluous conditions it turns out, for example, that some principles of human nature are universal, some others are particular (THN 1.4.4.1). Some principles of imagination are then constitutive of human nature, but some others are just contingent on culture or history, or even idiosyncratic, and can lead to local superstitions or philosophical chimeras, like presupposing “substance” as the bearer of properties in scholastic metaphysics. The universal principles provide the fundamental framework of determinable human properties that are actually determined by social and historical circumstances. This explains why certain virtues, like courage, are evaluated differently in different historical periods (EPM 7.11–14), and also why a creature without sympathy, however contingent its degree and direction may be, would count as a “monster” and not a “man” (EPM 6.1–2). Sympathy is a universal principle of human nature, but the principles of the degree and direction of its sensitivity are determined by the conditions within which it is developed and refined through social interaction (EPM 5.41–42). This amounts to saying that Hume’s account of human nature has both universalistic and contextualist elements, and this is the outcome of his experimental methodology: it is through a series of successive approximation through a comparative study of changing circumstances that the universal and contingent principles of human nature can be distinguished.