The Data of Ethics

But there is another element – the element of coerciveness. This originates from experience of those several forms of restraint that have, as above described, established themselves in the course of civilization – the political, religious, and social. To the effects of punishments inflicted by law and public opinion on conduct of certain kinds, Dr. Bain ascribes the feeling of moral obligation. And I agree with him to the extent of thinking that by them is generated the sense of compulsion which the consciousness of duty includes, and which the word obligation indicates. The existence of an earlier and deeper element, generated as above described, is, however, I think, implied by the fact that certain of the higher self-regarding feelings, instigating prudence and economy, have a moral authority in opposition to the simpler self-regarding feelings: showing that apart from any thought of factitious penalties on improvidence, the feeling constituted by representation of the natural penalties has acquired an acknowledged superiority. But accepting in the main the view that fears of the political and social penalties (to which, I think, the religious must be added) have generated that sense of coerciveness which goes along with the thought of postponing present to future and personal desires to the claims of others, it here chiefly concerns us to note that this sense of coerciveness becomes indirectly connected with the feelings distinguished as moral. For since the political, religious and social restraining motives, are mainly formed of represented future results; and since the moral restraining motive is mainly formed of represented future results; it happens that the representations, having much in common, and being often aroused at the same time, the fear joined with three sets of them becomes, by association, joined with the fourth. Thinking of the extrinsic effects of a forbidden act, excites a dread which continues present while the intrinsic effects of the act are thought of; and being thus linked with these intrinsic effects causes a vague sense of moral compulsion. Emerging as the moral motive does but slowly from amidst the political, religious and social motives it long participates in that consciousness of subordination to some external agency which is joined with them; and only as it becomes distinct and predominant does it lose this associated consciousness – only then does the feeling of obligation fade.

This remark implies the tacit conclusion, which will be to most very startling, that the sense of duty or moral obligation is transitory, and will diminish as fast as moralization increases. Startling though it is, this conclusion may be satisfactorily defended. Even now progress toward the implied ultimate state is traceable. The observation is not infrequent that persistence in performing a duty ends in making it a pleasure; and this amounts to the admission that while at first the motive contains an element of coercion, at last this element of coercion dies out, and the act is performed without any consciousness of being obliged to perform it. The contrast between the youth on whom diligence is enjoined, and the man of business so absorbed in affairs that he cannot be induced to relax, shows us how the doing of work, originally under the consciousness that it ought to be done, may eventually cease to have any such accompanying consciousness. Sometimes, indeed, the relation comes to be reversed; and the man of business persists in work from pure love of it when told that he ought not. Nor is it thus with self-regarding feelings only. That the maintaining and protecting of wife by husband often result solely from feelings directly gratified by these actions, without any thought of must; and that the fostering of children by parents is in many cases made an absorbing occupation without any coercive feeling of ought; are obvious truths which show us that even now, with some of the fundamental other-regarding duties, the sense of obligation has retreated into the background of the mind. And it is in some degree so with other-regarding duties of a higher kind. Conscientiousness has in many outgrown that stage in which the sense of a compelling power is joined with rectitude of action. The truly honest man, here and there to be found, is not only without thought of legal, religious, or social compulsion, when he discharges an equitable claim on him, but he is without thought of self-compulsion. He does the right thing with a simple feeling of satisfaction in doing it; and is, indeed, impatient if anything prevents him from having the satisfaction of doing it.

Evidently, then, with complete adaptation to the social state, that element in the moral consciousness which is expressed by the word obligation, will disappear. The higher actions required for the harmonious carrying on of life will be as much matters of course as are those lower actions which the simple desires prompt. In their proper times and places and proportions, the moral sentiments will guide men just as spontaneously and adequately as now do the sensations. And though, joined with their regulating influence when this is called for, will exist latent ideas of the evils which nonconformity would bring; these will occupy the mind no more than do ideas of the evils of starvation at the time when a healthy appetite is being satisfied by a meal.

§ 47. This elaborate exposition, which the extreme complexity of the subject has necessitated, may have its leading ideas restated thus:

Symbolizing by a and b, related phenomena in the environment, which in some way concern the welfare of the organism; and symbolizing by c and d, the impressions, simple or compound, which the organism receives from the one, and the motions, single or combined, by which its acts are adapted to meet the other; we saw that psychology in general is concerned with the connection between the relation a b and the relation c d. Further, we saw that by implication the psychological aspect of Ethics, is that aspect under which the adjustment of c d to a b, appears, not as an intellectual co-ordination simply, but as a co-ordination in which pleasures and pains are alike factors and results.

It was shown that throughout Evolution, motive and act become more complex, as the adaptation of inner related actions to outer related actions extends in range and variety. Whence followed the corollary that the later evolved feelings, more representative and re-representative in their constitution, and referring to remoter and wider needs, have, on the average, an authority as guides greater than have the earlier and simpler feelings.

After thus observing that even an inferior creature is ruled by a hierarchy of feelings so constituted that general welfare depends on a certain subordination of lower to higher, we saw that in man, as he passes into the social state, there arises the need for sundry additional subordinations of lower to higher: co-operation being made possible only by them. To the restraints constituted by mental representations of the intrinsic effects of actions, which, in their simpler forms, have been evolving from the beginning, are added the restraints caused by mental representations of extrinsic effects, in the shape of political, religious, and social penalties.

With the evolution of society, made possible by institutions maintaining order, and associating in men's minds the sense of obligation with prescribed acts and with desistances from forbidden acts, there arose opportunities for seeing the bad consequences naturally flowing from the conduct interdicted and the good consequences from the conduct required. Hence eventually grew up moral aversions and approvals: experience of the intrinsic effects necessarily here coming later than experience of the extrinsic effects, and therefore producing its results later.

The thoughts and feelings constituting these moral aversions and approvals, being all along closely connected with the thoughts and feelings constituting fears of political, religious, and social penalties, necessarily came to participate in the accompanying sense of obligation. The coercive element in the consciousness of duties at large, evolved by converse with external agencies which enforce duties, diffused itself by association through that consciousness of duty, properly called moral, which is occupied with intrinsic results instead of extrinsic results.

But this self-compulsion, which at a relatively high stage becomes more and more a substitute for compulsion from without, must itself, at a still higher stage, practically disappear. If some action to which the special motive is insufficient, is performed in obedience to the feeling of moral obligation, the fact proves that the special faculty concerned is not yet equal to its function – has not acquired such strength that the required activity has become its normal activity, yielding its due amount of pleasure. With complete evolution then, the sense of obligation, not ordinarily present in consciousness, will be awakened only on those extraordinary occasions that prompt breach of the laws otherwise spontaneously conformed to.

And this brings us to the psychological aspect of that conclusion which, in the last chapter, was reached under its biological aspect. The pleasures and pains which the moral sentiments originate will, like bodily pleasures and pains, become incentives and deterrents so adjusted in their strengths to the needs that the moral conduct will be the natural conduct.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SOCIOLOGICAL VIEW

§ 48. Not for the human race only, but for every race, there are laws of right living. Given its environment and its structure, and there is for each kind of creature a set of actions adapted in their kinds, amounts, and combinations, to secure the highest conservation its nature permits. The animal, like the man, has needs for food, warmth, activity, rest, and so forth, which must be fulfilled in certain relative degrees to make its life whole. Maintenance of its race implies satisfaction of special desires, sexual and philoprogenitive, in due proportions. Hence there is a supposable formula for the activities of each species, which, could it be drawn out, would constitute a system of morality for that species. But such a system of morality would have little or no reference to the welfare of others than self and offspring. Indifferent to individuals of its own kind, as an inferior creature is, and habitually hostile to individuals of other kinds, the formula for its life could take no cognizance of the lives of those with which it came in contact; or rather, such formula would imply that maintenance of its life was at variance with maintenance of their lives.

But on ascending from beings of lower kinds to the highest kind of being, man; or, more strictly, on ascending from man in his pre-social stage to man in his social stage, the formula has to include an additional factor. Though not peculiar to human life under its developed form, the presence of this factor is still, in the highest degree, characteristic of it. Though there are inferior species displaying considerable degrees of sociality, and, though, the formulas for their complete lives would have to take account of the relations arising from union, yet our own species is, on the whole, to be distinguished as having a formula for complete life which specially recognizes the relations of each individual to others, in presence of whom, and in co-operation with whom, he has to live.

This additional factor in the problem of complete living is, indeed, so important that the necessitated modifications of conduct have come to form a chief part of the code of conduct. Because the inherited desires which directly refer to the maintenance of individual life are fairly adjusted to the requirements, there has been no need to insist on that conformity to them which furthers self-conversation. Conversely, because these desires prompt activities that often conflict with the activities of others; and because the sentiments responding to other's claims are relatively weak, moral codes emphasize those restraints on conduct which the presence of fellow men entails.

From the sociological point of view, then, Ethics becomes nothing else than a definite account of the forms of conduct that are fitted to the associated state, in such wise that the lives of each and all may be the greatest possible, alike in length and breadth.

§ 49. But here we are met by a fact which forbids us thus to put in the foreground the welfares of citizens, individually considered, and requires us to put in the foreground the welfare of the society as a whole. The life of the social organism must, as an end, rank above the lives of its units. These two ends are not harmonious at the outset; and, though the tendency is toward harmonization of them, they are still partially conflicting.

As fast as the social state establishes itself, the preservation of the society becomes a means of preserving its units. Living together arose because, on the average, it proved more advantageous to each than living apart; and this implies that maintenance of combination is maintenance of the conditions to more satisfactory living than the combined persons would otherwise have. Hence, social self-preservation becomes a proximate aim taking precedence of the ultimate aim, individual self-preservation.

This subordination of personal to social welfare is, however, contingent: it depends on the presence of antagonistic societies. So long as the existence of a community is endangered by the actions of communities around, it must remain true that the interests of individuals must be sacrificed to the interests of the community, as far as is needful for the community's salvation. But if this is manifest, it is, by implication, manifest, that when social antagonisms cease, this need for sacrifice of private claims to public claims ceases also; or rather, there cease to be any public claims at variance with private claims. All along, furtherance of individual lives has been the ultimate end; and, if this ultimate end has been postponed to the proximate end of preserving the community's life, it has been so only because this proximate end was instrumental to the ultimate end. When the aggregate is no longer in danger, the final object of pursuit, the welfare of the units, no longer needing to be postponed, becomes the immediate object of pursuit.

Consequently, unlike sets of conclusions respecting human conduct emerge, according as we are concerned with a state of habitual or occasional war, or are concerned with a state of permanent and general peace. Let us glance at these alternative states and the alternative implications.

§ 50. At present the individual man has to carry on his life with due regard to the lives of others belonging to the same society; while he is sometimes called on to be regardless of the lives of those belonging to other societies. The same mental constitution, having to fulfill both these requirements, is necessarily incongruous; and the correlative conduct, adjusted first to the one need and then to the other, cannot be brought within any consistent ethical system.

Hate and destroy your fellow-man is now the command; and then the command is, love and aid your fellow-man. Use every means to deceive, says the one code of conduct; while the other code says, be truthful in word and deed. Seize what property you can and burn all you cannot take away, are injunctions which the religion of enmity countenances; while by the religion of amity, theft and arson are condemned as crimes. And as conduct has to be made up of parts thus at variance with one another, the theory of conduct remains confused.

There co-exists a kindred irreconcilability between the sentiments answering to the forms of co-operation required for militancy and industrialism respectively. While social antagonisms are habitual, and while, for efficient action against other societies, there needs great subordination to men who command, the virtue of loyalty and the duty of implicit obedience have to be insisted on; disregard of the ruler's will is punished with death. But when war ceases to be chronic, and growing industrialism habituates men to maintaining their own claims while respecting the claims of others, loyalty becomes less profound, the authority of the ruler is questioned or denied in respect of various private actions and beliefs. State dictation is in many directions successfully defied, and the political independence of the citizen comes to be regarded as a claim which it is virtuous to maintain and vicious to yield up. Necessarily during the transition, these opposite sentiments are incongruously mingled.

So is it, too, with domestic institutions under the two régimes. While the first is dominant, ownership of a slave is honorable, and in the slave submission is praiseworthy; but as the last grows dominant, slave-owning becomes a crime and servile obedience excites contempt. Nor is it otherwise in the family. The subjection of women to men, complete while war is habitual but qualified as fast as peaceful occupations replace it, comes eventually to be thought wrong, and equality before the law is asserted. At the same time the opinion concerning paternal power changes. The once unquestioned right of the father to take his children's lives is denied, and the duty of absolute submission to him, long insisted on, is changed into the duty of obedience within reasonable limits.

Were the ratio between the life of antagonism with alien societies, and the life of peaceful co-operation within each society, a constant ratio, some permanent compromise between the conflicting rules of conduct appropriate to the two lives might be reached. But since this ratio is a variable one, the compromise can never be more than temporary. Ever the tendency is toward congruity between beliefs and requirements. Either the social arrangements are gradually changed until they come into harmony with prevailing ideas and sentiments; or, if surrounding conditions prevent change in the social arrangements, the necessitated habits of life modify the prevailing ideas and sentiments to the requisite extent. Hence, for each kind and degree of social evolution determined by external conflict and internal friendship, there is an appropriate compromise between the moral code of enmity and the moral code of amity: not, indeed, a definable, consistent compromise, but a compromise fairly well understood.

This compromise, vague, ambiguous, illogical, though it may be, is nevertheless for the time being authoritative. For if, as above shown, the welfare of the society must take precedence of the welfares of its component individuals, during those stages in which the individuals have to preserve themselves by preserving their society, then such temporary compromise between the two codes of conduct as duly regards external defense, while favoring internal co-operation to the greatest extent practicable, subserves the maintenance of life in the highest degree; and thus gains the ultimate sanction. So that the perplexed and inconsistent moralities of which each society and each age shows us a more or less different one, are severally justified as being approximately the best under the circumstances.

But such moralities are, by their definitions, shown to belong to incomplete conduct; not to conduct that is fully evolved. We saw that the adjustments of acts to ends which, while constituting the external manifestations of life, conduce to the continuance of life, have been rising to a certain ideal form now approached by the civilized man. But this form is not reached so long as there continue aggressions of one society upon another. Whether the hinderances to complete living result from the trespasses of fellow-citizens, or from the trespasses of aliens, matters not; if they occur there does not yet exist the state defined. The limit to the evolution of conduct is arrived at by members of each society only when, being arrived at by members of other societies also, the causes of international antagonism end simultaneously with the causes of antagonism between individuals.

And now having from the sociological point of view recognized the need for, and authority of, these changing systems of ethics, proper to changing ratios between warlike activities and peaceful activities, we have, from the same point of view, to consider the system of ethics proper to the state in which peaceful activities are undisturbed.

§ 51. If, excluding all thought of danger or hinderances from causes external to a society, we set ourselves to specify those conditions under which the life of each person, and therefore of the aggregate, may be the greatest possible, we come upon certain simple ones which, as here stated, assume the form of truisms.

For, as we have seen, the definition of that highest life accompanying completely evolved conduct, itself excludes all acts of aggression – not only murder, assault, robbery, and the major offences generally, but minor offences, such as libel, injury to property and so forth. While directly deducting from individual life, these indirectly cause perturbations of social life. Trespasses against others rouse antagonisms in them; and if these are numerous the group loses coherence. Hence, whether the integrity of the group itself is considered as the end, or whether the end considered is the benefit ultimately secured to its units by maintaining its integrity, or whether the immediate benefit of its units taken separately is considered the end, the implication is the same: such acts are at variance with achievement of the end. That these inferences are self-evident and trite (as indeed the first inferences drawn from the data of every science that reaches the deductive stage naturally are) must not make us pass lightly over the all-important fact that, from the sociological point of view, the leading moral laws are seen to follow as corollaries from the definition of complete life carried on under social conditions.

Respect for these primary moral laws is not enough, however. Associated men pursuing their several lives without injuring one another but without helping one another, reap no advantages from association beyond those of companionship. If, while there is no co-operation for defensive purposes (which is here excluded by the hypothesis) there is also no co-operation for satisfying wants, the social state loses its raison d'être– almost, if not entirely. There are, indeed, people who live in a condition little removed from this: as the Esquimaux. But though these, exhibiting none of the co-operation necessitated by war, which is unknown to them, lead lives such that each family is substantially independent of others, occasional co-operation occurs. And, indeed, that families should live in company without ever yielding mutual aid, is scarcely conceivable.

Nevertheless, whether actually existing or only approached, we must here recognize as hypothetically possible a state in which these primary moral laws are conformed to; for the purpose of observing, in their uncomplicated forms, what are the negative conditions to harmonious social life. Whether the members of a social group do or do not co-operate, certain limitations to their individual activities are necessitated by their association; and, after recognizing these as arising in the absence of co-operation, we shall be the better prepared to understand how conformity to them is effected when co-operation begins.

§ 52. For whether men live together in quite independent ways, careful only to avoid aggressing; or whether, advancing from passive association to active association, they co-operate, their conduct must be such that the achievement of ends by each shall at least not be hindered. And it becomes obvious that when they co-operate there must not only be no resulting hinderance but there must be facilitation; since, in the absence of facilitation, there can be no motive to co-operate. What shape, then, must the mutual restraints take when co-operation begins? or rather – What, in addition to the primary mutual restraints already specified, are those secondary mutual restraints required to make co-operation possible?

One who, living in an isolated way, expends effort in pursuit of an end, gets compensation for the effort by securing the end, and so achieves satisfaction. If he expends the effort without achieving the end there results dissatisfaction. The satisfaction and the dissatisfaction are measures of success and failure in life-sustaining acts; since that which is achieved by effort is something which directly or indirectly furthers life, and so pays for the cost of the effort; while if the effort fails there is nothing to pay for the cost of it, and so much life is wasted. What must result from this when men's efforts are joined? The reply will be made clearer if we take the successive forms of co-operation in the order of ascending complexity. We may distinguish as homogeneous co-operation (1) that in which like efforts are joined for like ends that are simultaneously enjoyed. As co-operation that is not completely homogeneous we may distinguish (2) that in which like efforts are joined for like ends that are not simultaneously enjoyed. A co-operation of which the heterogeneity is more distinct is (3) that in which unlike efforts are joined for like ends. And lastly comes the decidedly heterogeneous co-operation (4) that in which unlike efforts are joined for unlike ends.