book xiii

. c. 9.

[25] As the chief English casuists we may mention Perkins, Hall, Sanderson, as well as the more eminent Jeremy Taylor, whose _Ductor dubitantium_ appeared in 1660.

[26] This influence was not exercised in the region of ethics. Bacon's brief outline of moral philosophy (in the _Advancement of Learning_, ii. 20-22) is highly pregnant and suggestive. But Bacon's great task of reforming scientific method was one which, as he conceived it, left morals on one side; he never made any serious effort to reduce his ethical views to a coherent system, methodically reasoned on an independent basis. The outline given in the _Advancement_ was never filled in, and does not seem to have had any effect on the subsequent course of ethical speculation.

[27] He even identifies the desire with the pleasure, apparently regarding the stir of appetite and that of fruition as two parts of the same "motion."

[28] In spite of Hobbes's uncompromising egoism, there is a noticeable discrepancy between his theory of the ends that men naturally seek and his standard for determining their natural rights. This latter is never Pleasure simply, but always Preservation--though on occasion he enlarges the notion of "preservation" into "preservation of life so as not to be weary of it." His view seems to be that in a state of nature _most_ men _will_ fight, rob, &c., "for delectation merely" or "for glory," and that hence all men must be allowed an indefinite right to fight, rob, &c., "for preservation."

[29] It should be noticed, however, that it is only in his treatment of Equity and Benevolence that he really follows out the mathematical analogy (cf. Sidgwick's _History of Ethics_, 5th ed., pp. 180-181).

[30] It should be observed that, while Clarke is sincerely anxious to prove that most principles are binding independently of Divine appointment, he is no less concerned to show that morality requires the practical support of revealed religion.

[31] Three classes of impulses are thus distinguished by Shaftesbury:--(1) "Natural Affections," (2) "Self-affections," and (3) "Un-natural Affections." Their characteristics are further considered in the _History of Ethics_, p. 186 seq.

[32] In a remarkable passage near the close of his eleventh sermon Butler seems even to allow that conscience would have to give way to self-love, if it were possible (which it is not) that the two should come into ultimate and irreconcilable conflict.

[33] It is worth noticing that Hutcheson's express definition of the object of self-love includes "perfection" as well as "happiness"; but in the working out of his system he considers private good exclusively as happiness or pleasure.

[34] Hume's ethical view was finally stated in his _Inquiry into the Principles of Morals_ (1751), which is at once more popular and more purely utilitarian than his earlier work.

[35] Hume remarks that in some cases, by "association of ideas," the rule by which we praise and blame is extended beyond the principle of utility from which it arises; but he allows much less scope to this explanation in his second treatise than in his first.

[36] In earlier editions of the _Inquiry_ Hume expressly included all approved qualities under the general notion of "virtue." In later editions he avoided this strain on usage by substituting or adding "merit" in several passages--allowing that some of the laudable qualities which he mentions would be more commonly called "talents," but still maintaining that "there is little distinction made in our internal estimation" of "virtues" and "talents."

[37] It is to be observed that whereas Price and Stewart (after Butler) identify the object of self-love with happiness or pleasure, Reid conceives this "good" more vaguely as including perfection and happiness; though he sometimes uses "good" and happiness as convertible terms, and seems practically to have the latter in view in all that he says of self-love.

[38] E.g. Reid proposes to apply this principle in favour of monogamy, arguing from the proportion of males and females born; without explaining why, if the intention of nature hence inferred excludes occasional polygamy, it does not also exclude occasional celibacy.

[39] We may observe that some recent writers, who would generally be included in this school, avoid in various ways the difficulty of constructing a code of external conduct. Sometimes they consider moral intuition as determining the comparative excellence of conflicting motives (James Martineau), or the comparative quality of pleasures chosen (Laurie), which seems to be the same view in a hedonistic garb; others hold that what is intuitively perceived is the rightness or wrongness of individual acts--a view which obviously renders ethical reasoning practically superfluous.

[40] The originality--such as it is--of Paley's system (as of Bentham's) lies in its method of working out details rather than in its principles of construction. Paley expressly acknowledges his obligations to the original and suggestive, though diffuse and whimsical, work of Abraham Tucker (_Light of Nature Pursued_, 1768-1774). In this treatise, as in Paley's, we find "every man's own satisfaction, the spring that actuates all his motives," connected with "general good, the root whereout all our rules of conduct and sentiments of honour are to branch," by means of natural theology demonstrating the "unniggardly goodness of the author of nature." Tucker is also careful to explain that satisfaction or pleasure is "one and the same in kind, however much it may vary in degree, ... whether a man is pleased with hearing music, seeing prospects, tasting dainties, performing laudable actions, or making agreeable reflections," and again that by "general good" he means "quantity of happiness," to which "every pleasure that we do to our neighbour is an addition." There is, however, in Tucker's theological link between private and general happiness a peculiar ingenuity which Paley's common sense has avoided. He argues that men having no free will have really no desert; therefore the divine equity must ultimately distribute happiness in equal shares to all; therefore I must ultimately increase my own happiness most by conduct that adds most to the general fund which Providence administers.

But in fact the outline of Paley's utilitarianism is to be found a generation earlier--in Gay's dissertation prefixed to Law's edition of King's _Origin of Evil_--as the following extracts will show:--"The idea of virtue is the conformity to a rule of life, directing the actions of all rational creatures with respect to each other's happiness; to which every one is always obliged.... Obligation is the necessity of doing or omitting something in order to be happy.... Full and complete obligation which will extend to all cases can only be that arising from the authority of God.... The will of God [so far as it directs behaviour to others] is the immediate rule or criterion of virtue ... but it is evident from the nature of God that he could have no other design in creating mankind than their happiness; and therefore he wills their happiness; therefore that my behaviour so far as it may be a means to the happiness of mankind should be such; so this happiness of mankind may be said to be the criterion of virtue once removed."

The same dissertation also contains the germ of Hartley's system, as we shall presently notice.

[41] It must be allowed that Paley's application of this argument is somewhat loosely reasoned, and does not sufficiently distinguish the consequence of a single act of beneficent manslaughter from the consequences of a general permission to commit such acts.

[42] This list gives twelve out of the fourteen classes in which Bentham arranges the springs of action, omitting the religious sanction (mentioned afterwards), and the pleasures and pains of self-interest, which include all the other classes except sympathy and antipathy.

[43] In the _Deontology_ published by Bowring from MSS. left after Bentham's death, the coincidence is asserted to be complete.

[44] It should be observed that Austin, after Bentham, more frequently uses the term "moral" to connote what he more distinctly calls "positive morality," the code of rules supported by common opinion in any society.

[45] In the before-mentioned dissertation. Cf. note 2 to p. 835. Hartley refers to this treatise as having supplied the starting-point for his own system.

[46] It should be noticed that Hartley's sensationalism is far from leading him to exalt the corporeal pleasures. On the contrary, he tries to prove elaborately that they (as well as the pleasures of imagination, ambition, self-interest) cannot be made an object of primary pursuit without a loss of happiness on the whole--one of his arguments being that these pleasures occur earlier in time, and "that which is prior in the order of nature is always less perfect than that which is posterior."

[47] It may be observed that in the view of Kant and others (2) and (3) are somewhat confusingly blended.

[48] Singularly enough, the English writer who approaches most nearly to Kant on this point is the utilitarian Godwin, in his _Political Justice_. In Godwin's view, reason is the proper motive to acts conducive to general happiness: reason shows me that the happiness of a number of other men is of more value than my own; and the perception of this truth affords me at least _some_ inducement to prefer the former to the latter. And supposing it to be replied that the motive is really the moral uneasiness involved in choosing the selfish alternative, Godwin answers that this uneasiness, though a "constant step" in the process of volition, is a merely "accidental" step--"I feel pain in the neglect of an act of benevolence, because benevolence is judged by me to be conduct which it becomes me to adopt."

[49] In Kantism, as we have partly seen, the most important ontological beliefs--in God, freedom and immortality of the soul--are based on necessities of ethical thought. In Fichte's system the connexion of ethics and metaphysics is still more intimate; indeed, we may compare it in this respect to Platonism; as Plato blends the most fundamental notions of each of these studies in the one idea of good, so Fichte blends them in the one idea free-will. "Freedom," in his view, is at once the foundation of all being and the end of all moral action. In the systems of Schelling and Hegel ethics falls again into a subordinate place; indeed, the ethical view of the former is rather suggested than completely developed. Neither Fichte nor Schelling has exercised more than the faintest and most indirect influence on ethical philosophy in England; it therefore seems best to leave the ethical doctrines of each to be explained in connexion with the rest of his system.

[50] Cf. A. Seth Pringle-Pattison, _The Philosophical Radicals. Martineau's Philosophy_, p. 92.