Progressive Morality: An Essay in Ethics

the result of a logical process of reference to a class or of association with similars. This particular action is like certain other actions, or belongs to a class of actions, which we habitu

rule of right and wrong to be found in the human mind itself. If there is such a rule, it must be derived from some external considerations, and, if there is no such rule, then morality must be, to a large extent, a matter of prejudice, fancy, and caprice. Now I conceive that there is a simple mode of ascertaining whether there is any test of actions other than the merely subjective determinations of our own minds, or, in other words, whether there are any reasons or external considerations by which the mind guides itself in its decisions on matters of conduct. Do our moral opinions merely vary, or do they grow? Is there any progress to be traced in morality, or does it simply oscillate, within certain limits, round a fixed point? If some 'simple' and 'innate' idea of right, or some universal sense, were the test of morality, then we might expect that the moral decisions of all men would be uniform, or, at least, approximately uniform; if, on the other hand, there were no test at all, or, what amounts to much the same thing, a merely personal test, then we might expect that the moral judgments of mankind would vary arbitrarily according to the disposition and temperament of each individual man. But, if there be a test derived from external considerations and capable of being applied to particular cases by the ordinary processes of reasoning, then we may fairly expect that, as the opportunities of observation and experience increase, the test will be applied more widely and more accurately, and that the science of conduct will grow, like all other sciences, with the advance of knowledge and of general civilisation. Now, what, as a mutter of fact, has been the case? Can anyone affect to doubt that the morality of civilized countries is far higher and purer, and far better adapted to secure the preservation and progress of society, than the customs of savage or barbaric tr

A man who is tormented with the recollection of having committed a great crime will, as the phrase goes, 'take pleasure in nothing;' while, similarly, a man who is enjoying the retrospect of having done his duty, in some important crisis, will care little for obloquy or even for the infliction of physical suffering. Making this admission, then, as well as recognising the fact that our pleasures differ in quality as well as in volume, so that the pleasures of the higher part of our nature, the religious, the intellectual, the moral, the aesthetic, the sympathetic nature, affect us with a different kind of enjoyment from the sensual pleasures, or those which are derived from them, we may rightly regard the tendency to produce a balance of pleasure over pain as the test of the goodness of an action, and the effort and intention to perform acts having this tendency as the test of the morality of the agent. But when we enunciate the production of pleasure as our aim, or the balance of pleasure-producing over pain-producing results as the test of right action, we are not always understood to have admitted these explanations, and, consequently, there is always a danger of our being supposed to degrade morality by identifying it with the gratification, in ourselves and others, of the coarser and more material impulses of our nature. Though, then, if due distinctions and admissions be made, the tendency to produce, in the long run, the greatest amount of happiness or misery, pleasure or pain, may be taken as the test of the goodness or badness of an action, the phraseology is so misleading, and so liable to frustrate the practical objects of the moralist, that it is desirable, if possible, to find terms not equally lending themselves to misinterpretation and perversion. Let us now, then, consider whether we are supplied with such terms in the phrases 'perfection' or 'development' of 'character.' It is a noble idea of human action to suppose that its end is the perfection of individual men, or the development of their various capacities to the utmost extent that is available. And yet, as the phrases 'pleasure' and 'happiness' are apt too exclusively to suggest material well-being and the gratification of the more animal parts of our nature, so the phrases 'perfection' or 'development' of 'character' are apt altogether to keep out of sight these necessary pre-suppositions of a healthy and progressive condition of humanity. Unless there were some standard of comfortable living, and a constant effort not only to maintain but to improve it, and unless some zest were given to every-day life by the gratification of the appetites, within reasonable limits, and the endeavour to obtain the means of indulging them, men, constituted as they are, would be in danger of sinking into sloth, squalor, and indigence, and, to the great mass of mankind, the opportunity of developing and perfecting their higher nature would never occur. We seem, therefore, to require some term which will not only suggest the highest results of moral endeavour, but also the conditions which, in the case of humanity, are essential to the attainment of those results. Moreover, to a greater extent even than the words 'pleasure' and 'happiness,' the expressions 'perfection' and 'development' of 'character' are in danger of being supposed to imply an exclusive reference to self. It is true that we cannot properly develope our characters, much less attain to all the perfection of which they are capable, without

me shape, the welfare of himself or others. If he follows the opinion of others, it is plain that their opinion, so far as it has been formed independently, has been formed in the manner above described. The only alternative, therefore, is between the acceptance of existing opinions, without any consideration or examination, and their reference to the conception of well-being, or however else the idea may be expressed, as a measure of their appropriateness and sufficiency. The idea of well-being itself may be inadequate, and even in parts incorrect, and, as society advances, it is undoubtedly undergoing a constant process of expansion and rectification; but it seems to me that this regard for their own welfare or that of others, however we may phrase it, is the only guiding-principle of conduct, in the light of which men can reconsider and review their rules. Unless they follow the mere blind impulses of feeling (in which case they do not follow rules at all, but simply act irrationally), or else observe implicitly the maxims of conduct which they find prevalent around them, they must, and can only, ask the question whether it is possible to alter their conduct for the better, that is to say, whether they can better promote their own welfare or that of others by some modification of their actions. Take the case of Slavery. There was a time when savage or barbaric tribes, moved by a regard to their own interests, and also, we may trust, touched by some compassion for their victims, began to substitute, for the wholesale butchery of their enemies defeated in war, the practice of retaining some or all of them for the purposes of domestic or agrarian service. Again, there came a time when, viewed by the side of other forms of service which had meanwhile come into existence, slavery, with its various incidents, began to shock the philanthropic sentiments of the more civilized races of mankind, while the question also began to be raised whether slave-labour was not economically at a disadvantage, when compared with free labour, and the result of these combined considerations, often aided by a strong and enthusiastic outburst of popular feeling, has been the total disappearance of slavery amongst civilized, and its almost total disappearance even amongst barbaric or semi-civilized races. Take, too, the revolting pr

they may be altered, and the like. In fact, the considerations which he urges may all be included in the one argument that the existing rules are opposed to the well-being of the state, and that the advantages resulting from their abrogation will more than compensate for any disturbance of existing relations which may ensue from the change. Apart from force, or mere rant, rhetoric, or imposture, it is difficult to see what other resource the reformer has open to him. And, in those cases where there is no accumulation of antiquated rules and no need of the individual reformer, but where society at large has the happy knack of imperceptibly accommodating its practice and principles of action to altered circumstances, there can be no doubt that it is by considerations of well-being, half conscious though the process of application may be, that the change is directed. The plastic power by which men accommodate their actions and even their maxims of conduct to modifications in surrounding circumstances is one of the advantages which they gain by the progress of civilisation. In ancient society the tyranny of custom is often almost abso

eir own good, comprehending, as it does, not only ease, personal comfort, and gratification of the various appetites and desires, which, in the early stages of society, are the preponderating considerations, but also those higher constituents of welfare, both individual and social, which attain an ever-increasing importance as society advances, such as are the development of the moral, the intellectual, and the aesthetic faculties; the purification of the religious sentiments, the expansion of the sympathetic feelings, the diffusion of liberty and prosperity, the consolidation of national unity, the elevation of human life. This principle works throughout the community, actuating some men in its higher, others in its lower forms; but, except where the force of tradition or prejudice is too strong for it, invariably moulding conduct into accordance with the more complex requirements of advancing civilisation. It

s, if the fact come to their knowledge, think the worse of him. The character and consequences of the action are not obvious, and hence they do not perceive what, on reflexion, or, if guided by proper instruction, they could hardly fail to realise, that the act is really a theft, only practised on the community at large instead of on an individual member of it, and that, if every one were to act in the same way, the collection of taxes and, consequently, the administration and defence of the country, the maintenance of its army and navy, its police, its harbours and roads, would become an impossibility, and it would quickly relapse into barbarism. Other familiar instances of the advantage to be derived from the conscious and intentional application of the reasoning powers to matters of conduct may be found in the successive reforms of the penal code of any civilized country, or in the abolition of slavery. Punishment is, in all very early stages of society, capricious, mostly unregulated by any definite customs or enactments, and, consequently, often disproportioned, either in the way of excess or defect, to the character of the offence. As the community advances in complexity and intelligence, successive reformers arise who attempt, by definite enactment, to regulate the amount of punishment due to each description of offence, and, from time to time, to increase or diminish, as occasion seems to require, the severity of the existing code. The considerations by which, at least in our own time, these reforms are determined are such as these: the adequacy or inadequacy of the punishment to deter men from the commission of the offence, the tendency of excessive punishment to produce a reaction of sentiment in favour of the criminal, and a reluctance on the part of the judge or jury to convict, the superfluous suffering inflicted by that part of the punishment which is in excess of the requirements of the case, due publicity and notoriety as a means of warning others, the reform of the criminal himself, and so on. All these considerations, it will be observed, are derived from tracing the effects of the punishment either on the criminal himself, or on persons who are under a similar temptation to commit the crime, or on the sentiment of society at large, or of that portion of society which is connected with the administration of justice, and it is only by the exercise

ong-suffering, and self-denial, which are pourtrayed in the Christian teaching and have, ever since th

ent one. When the average moral sentiment on a particular point of conduct has been consciously raised, and the change is fully realised, it seldom happens that it afterwards recedes, though the automatic or semi-conscious adaptations of society to new needs and circumstances, when regarded from a more general point of view, are not infrequently found to be regressive as well as progressive. Thus, though we may imagine the distinctions between the different classes of society becoming more numerous or more accentuated (as I believe to have actually occurred in

other reason, this presumption ought to be made on the practical ground that a disturbance of the moral sentiment on one point is likely to weaken its force generally, and, before we expose men to this danger, we ought to have some adequate justification. But there is also the speculative ground that any given society, and indeed mankind generally, has been engaged for ages in feeling its way, instinctively or semi-consciously, towards a solution of the self-same problems which the philosopher is attempting to solve consciously and of set purpose. That, on the whole, a society has solved these problems in the manner best suited to its existing needs and circumstances may fairly be taken for granted, and, even where the ethical stand-point of the reformer is very superior to the stand-point of the society which he wishes to reform, he will be wise in endeavouring to introduce his reforms gradually, and, if possible, in connexion with principles already acknowledged, rather than in attempting to effect a moral revolution, the ultimate results of which it may be impossible to foresee. The work of the moralist is, therefore, best regarded as corrective of, an

oes to the plainer and more direct applications. Thus, if it can be shewn, as it undoubtedly can be, that smuggling falls under the head of stealing, and holding out false hopes under that of lying, the moralist need take no account of the lax moral sentiment which exists with regard to these practices, though, of course, in estimating the guilt of the individual as distinct from the char

our sympathetic feelings are wounded by an injury done to another, or our self-regarding desires are frustrated by an injury done to ourselves; when, in fact, any emotional element in our nature is, by the intentional intervention of another, disappointed of attaining its end. Each of these groups of feelings admits of being studied apart, though in the actual conduct of life they are seldom found to operate alone, and each, under the continued action of reason, assumes a form or forms in which its various elements are brought into harmonious working with each other, so as best to promote the ends which the whole group subserves. These forms, thus rationalised or moralised, if I may be allowed the use of such expressions, are, in the case of the self-regarding feelings, self-respect and rational self-love; in the case of the sympathetic feelings, rational benevolence; in the case of the semi-social feelings, a reasonable regard for the opinion of others; and in the case of the resentful feelings, a sense of justice. These higher forms of the several groups of feelings themselves require to be harmonised, before man can satisfy the needs of his nature as a whole. And, when co-ordinated under the control of reason, they become a rational desire for the combined welfare of the individual and of society, or, if we choose to use different but equivalent expressions, of the individual considered as an unit of society, or of society considered as including the individual. In a settled state of existence, the interests of the individual and of society, even leaving out of account the pleasures and pains of the moral sanction, are, for the most part, identical. If an individual pursues a selfish course of conduct, neglecting the interests and feelings of others, he is almost certain to suffer for it in the long run. And the prosperity and general well-being of the community in which they live is, to citizens, living a normal life and pursuing ordinary avocations, an essential condition of their own prosperity and well-being. On the other hand, it is by each man attending to his own business and directing his efforts to the promotion of his own interests or those of his family, his firm, or whatever may be the smaller social aggregate in which his work chiefly lies, that the interests of the community at large are best secured. Men whose time is mainly taken up with philanthropic enterprises are very likely to neglect the duties which lie immediately before them. 'To learn and labour truly to get mine own living, and to do my duty in that state of life, unto which it shall please God to call me' is a very homely, but it is an essential lesson. That the great mass of the citizens of a country should lay it well to heart, and act habitually on it, is the first condition of national prosperity. Of course, this primary regard to our own interests, or those of the persons with whom we are more immediately connected, must be limited by wider considerations. A man has duties, not only to himself and his own family, but to his neighbours, to the various institutions with which he is connected, to his town, his country, mankind at large, and even the whole sentient creation. How far these should limit each other or a man's individual or family interests is a question by no means easy to answer, and is the main problem which each man has to be perpetually solv

rs, but, as a fact, we know that they are by no means easy. The conception of social well-being must be more or less vague, because we are constantly filling it up by experience; it is not a fixed, but a growing conception, and, though we may be certain of the character and importance of many of the elements which have already been detected in it by the experience of past generations, it seems impossible to fix any limits to its development in the future history of mankind. Man will constantly b

tween clashing duties, the realisation of our obligations to the community at large, require for their appreciation a large amount of intelligence and an accumulated stock of experience which are not to be found in primitive societies. Hence, the rules of conduct, which at first are few and simple, gradually become more numerous and complex. Nor have we yet arrived at the time, nor do we seem to be within any appreciable distance of it, when the code is complete, or even the parts of it which already exist are altogether free from doubt and discussion. In the simpler relations of life, he that run

tify his interests with those of the larger organism of which he is a part. It is thus that we may justify the peculiar characteristic of the moral sentiment, indicated in the last chapter, which seems, in all acts of which it approves, to demand an element of sacrifice, whether of the lower to the high