LITERATURE

"We think utility or happiness much too complex and indefinite an end to be sought except through the medium of various secondary ends concerning which there may be, and often is, agreement among persons who differ in their ultimate standard; and about which there does in fact prevail a much greater unanimity among thinking persons, than might be supposed from their diametrical divergence on the great questions of moral metaphysics" (Essay on Bentham).

These secondary ends or principles are such matters as regard for health, honesty, chastity, kindness, and the like. Concerning them he says in hisUtilitarianism(ch. ii.):

"Mankind must by this time have acquired positive beliefs as to the effects of some actions on their happiness; and the beliefs which have thus come down are rules of morality for the multitude and for the philosopher until he has succeeded in finding better.... To consider the rules of morality as improvable is one thing; to pass over the intermediate generalizations entirely and endeavor to test each individual action directly by the first principle, is another.... Nobody argues that the act of navigation is not founded on astronomy, because sailors cannot wait to calculate the nautical almanac. Being rational creatures, they go to sea with it already calculated; and all rational creatures go out upon the sea of life with their minds made up on the common questions of right and wrong, as well as on many of the far more difficult questions of wise and foolish."

Empirical Rules Run into Fixed Customs.—It cannot be denied that Mill here states considerations which are of great value in aiding present judgments on right andwrong. The student of history will have little doubt that the rules of conduct which the intuitionalist takes as ultimate deliverances of a moral faculty are in truth generalizations of the sort indicated by Mill. But the truth brought out by Mill does not cover the ground which needs to be covered. Such rules at best cover customary elements; they are based upon past habits of life, past natural economic and political environments. And, as the student of customs knows, greater store is often set upon trivial, foolish, and even harmful things than upon serious ones—upon fashions of hair-dressing, ablutions, worship of idols. Coming nearer our own conditions, past customs certainly tolerate and sanction many practices, such as war, cruel business competition, economic exploitation of the weak, and absence of coöperative intelligent foresight, which the more sensitive consciences of the day will not approve.

Hence are Unsatisfactory.—Yet such things have been so identified with happiness that to forego them means misery, to alter them painful disturbance. To take the rules of the past with any literalness as criteria of judgment in the present, would be to return to the unprogressive morality of the régime of custom—to surrender the advance marked by reflective morality. Since Bentham and Mill were both utilitarians, it is worth noting that Bentham insisted upon the utilitarian standard just because he was so convinced of the unsatisfactory character of the kind of rules upon which Mill is dwelling. The "Nautical Almanac" has beenscientificallycalculated; it is adapted rationally to its end; but the rules which sum up custom are a confused mixture of class interest, irrational sentiment, authoritative pronunciamento, and genuine consideration of welfare.

Empirical Rules Also Differ Widely.—The fact is, moreover, that it is only when the "intermediate generalizations" are taken vaguely and abstractly that there isas much agreement as Mill claims. All educated and virtuous persons in the same country practically agree upon the rules of justice, benevolence, and regard for life, so long as they are taken in such a vague way that they mean anything in general and nothing in particular. Every one is in favor of justice in the abstract; but existing political and economic discussions regarding tariff, sumptuary laws, monetary standards, trades unions, trusts, the relation of capital and labor, the regulation or ownership of public utilities, the nationalization of land and industry, show that large bodies of intelligent and equally well-disposed people are quite capable of finding that the principle of justice requires exactly opposite things.

Custom still forms the background of all moral life, nor can we imagine a state of affairs in which it should not. Customs are not external to individuals' courses of action; they are embodied in the habits and purposes of individuals; in the words of Grote (quoted above, p. 173), they "reign under the appearance of habitual,self-suggestedtendencies." Laws, formulated and unformulated, social conventions, rules of manners, the general expectations of public opinion, are all of them sources of instruction regarding conduct. Without them the individual would be practically helpless in determining the right courses of action in the various situations in which he finds himself. Through them he has provided himself in advance with a list of questions, an organized series of points-of-view, by which to approach and estimate each state of affairs requiring action. Most of the moral judgments of every individual are framed in this way.

For Customs Conflict.—If social customs, or individual habits, never conflicted with one another, this sort of guidance would suffice for the determination of right and wrong. But reflection is necessitated because opposite habits set up incompatible ends, forms of happiness between which choice has to be made. Hence the need ofprinciples in judging. Principles of judgment cannot simply reinstate past rules of behavior, for the simple reason that as long as these rules suffice there is no reflection and no demand for principles. Good and evil, right and wrong, are embodied in the injunctions and prohibitions of customs and institutions and are not thought about.

Moral Import of Principles is Intellectual, Not Imperative.—This brings us to the essential point in the consideration of the value of general principles.Rules are practical; they are habitual ways of doing things. But principles are intellectual; they are useful methods of judging things.The fundamental error of the intuitionalist and of the utilitarian (represented in the quotation from Mill) is that they are on the lookout for rules which will of themselves tell agents just what course of action to pursue;whereas the object of moral principles is to supply standpoints and methods which will enable the individual to make for himself an analysis of the elements of good and evil in the particular situation in which he finds himself. No genuine moral principle prescribes a specific course of action; rules[165]like cooking recipes, may tell just what to do and how to do it. A moral principle, such as that of chastity, of justice, of the golden rule, gives the agent a basis for looking at and examining a particular question that comes up. It holds before him certain possible aspects of the act; it warns him against taking a short or partial view of the act. It economizes his thinking by supplying him with the main heads by reference to which to consider the bearings of his desires and purposes; it guides him in his thinking by suggesting to him the important considerations for which he should be on the lookout.

Golden Rule as a Tool of Analysis.—A moral principle, then, is not a command to act or forbear acting in a given way:it is a tool for analyzing a special situation, the right or wrong being determined by the situation in its entirety, and not by the rule as such. We sometimes hear it stated, for example, that the universal adoption of the Golden Rule would at once settle all industrial disputes and difficulties. But supposing that the principle were accepted in good faith by everybody; it would not at once tell everybody just what to do in all the complexities of his relations to others. When individuals are still uncertain of what their real good may be, it does not finally decide matters to tell them to regard the good of others as they would their own. Nor does it mean that whatever in detail we want for ourselves we should strive to give to others. Because I am fond of classical music it does not follow that I should thrust as much of it as possible upon my neighbors. But the "Golden Rule" does furnish us apoint of view from which to consider acts; it suggests the necessity of considering how our acts affect the interests of others as well as our own; it tends to prevent partiality of regard; it warns against setting an undue estimate upon a particular consequence of pain or pleasure, simply because it happens to affect us. In short, the Golden Rule does not issue special orders or commands; but it does simplify judgment of the situations requiring intelligent deliberation.

Sympathy as Actuating Principle of a Reasonable Judgment.—We have had repeated occasion (as in the discussion of intent and motive, of intuition and deliberate calculation) to see how artificial is the separation of emotion and thought from one another. As the only effective thought is one fused by emotion into a dominant interest, so the only truly general, the reasonable as distinct from the merely shrewd or clever thought, is thegenerousthought. Sympathy widens our interest in consequencesand leads us to take into account such results as affect the welfare of others; it aids us to count and weigh these consequences as counting for as much as those which touch our own honor, purse, or power. To put ourselves in the place of another, to see from the standpoint of his purposes and values, to humble our estimate of our own claims and pretensions to the level they would assume in the eyes of a sympathetic and impartial observer, is the surest way to attain universality and objectivity of moral knowledge. Sympathy, in short, is the general principle of moral knowledge, not because its commands take precedence of others (which they do not necessarily), but because it furnishes the most reliable and efficaciousintellectualstandpoint. It supplies the tool,par excellence, for analyzing and resolving complex cases. As was said in our last chapter, it is thefusionof the sympathetic impulses with others that is needed; what we now add is that in this fusion, sympathy supplies thepou stofor an effective, broad, and objective survey of desires, projects, resolves, and deeds. It translates the formal and empty reason of Kant out of its abstract and theoretic character, just as it carries the cold calculations of utilitarianism into recognition of the common good.

LITERATUREFor criticisms of Kant's view of reason, see Caird,Philosophy of Kant, Vol. II., Book II., ch. ii.; Paulsen,System of Ethics, pp. 194-203 and 355-363; Fite,Introductory Study, pp. 173-188; Muirhead,Elements of Ethics, pp. 112-124.For intuitionalism, see Calderwood,Handbook of Moral Philosophy; Maurice,Conscience; Whewell,The Elements of Morality; Martineau,Types of Ethical Theory, Vol. II., pp. 96-115; Mezes,Ethics, ch. iii.; Sidgwick,Methods of Ethics, Book I., chs. viii.-ix., and Book III. entire, but especially ch. i.;History of Ethics, 170-204, and 224-236, andLectures on Ethics of Green, Spencer, and Martineau, 361-374.For the moral sense theory, see Sidgwick,History of Ethics, p. 189; Shaftesbury,Characteristics; Hutcheson,System of Moral Philosophy.For casuistry, see references in Rand'sBibliography, Vol. III., Part II., p. 880.For the variability of moral rules, see Locke,Essay on the Human Understanding, Book I.; Bain,Moral Science, Part I., ch. iii.; Spencer,Principles of Ethics, Vol. I., Part II.; Williams,Review of Evolutional Ethics, pp. 423-465; Bowne,Principles of Ethics, ch. v.; Schurman,The Ethical Import of Darwinism; the writings of Westermarck and Hobhouse elsewhere referred to, and Darwin,Descent of Man, Part I., chs. iv.-v.For the nature of moral judgment and the function of reason in conduct, see Aristotle, Book III., chs. ii.-iii., and Book VI.; Ladd,Philosophy of Conduct, ch. vii.; Sharp,Essay on Analysis of the Moral Judgment, in Studies in Philosophy and Psychology (Garman Commemorative Volume); Santayana,Life of Reason, Vol. I., chs. x.-xii.; Bryant,Studies in Character, Part II., chs. iv.-v.For the social character of conscience, see Cooley,Human Nature and the Social Order, ch. x.For sympathy and conscience, see Adam Smith,Theory of Moral Sentiments, especially Part III., chs. i. and iv., and Part IV., chs. i.-iii.; Stephen,Science of Ethics, pp. 228-238.

For criticisms of Kant's view of reason, see Caird,Philosophy of Kant, Vol. II., Book II., ch. ii.; Paulsen,System of Ethics, pp. 194-203 and 355-363; Fite,Introductory Study, pp. 173-188; Muirhead,Elements of Ethics, pp. 112-124.

For intuitionalism, see Calderwood,Handbook of Moral Philosophy; Maurice,Conscience; Whewell,The Elements of Morality; Martineau,Types of Ethical Theory, Vol. II., pp. 96-115; Mezes,Ethics, ch. iii.; Sidgwick,Methods of Ethics, Book I., chs. viii.-ix., and Book III. entire, but especially ch. i.;History of Ethics, 170-204, and 224-236, andLectures on Ethics of Green, Spencer, and Martineau, 361-374.

For the moral sense theory, see Sidgwick,History of Ethics, p. 189; Shaftesbury,Characteristics; Hutcheson,System of Moral Philosophy.

For casuistry, see references in Rand'sBibliography, Vol. III., Part II., p. 880.

For the variability of moral rules, see Locke,Essay on the Human Understanding, Book I.; Bain,Moral Science, Part I., ch. iii.; Spencer,Principles of Ethics, Vol. I., Part II.; Williams,Review of Evolutional Ethics, pp. 423-465; Bowne,Principles of Ethics, ch. v.; Schurman,The Ethical Import of Darwinism; the writings of Westermarck and Hobhouse elsewhere referred to, and Darwin,Descent of Man, Part I., chs. iv.-v.

For the nature of moral judgment and the function of reason in conduct, see Aristotle, Book III., chs. ii.-iii., and Book VI.; Ladd,Philosophy of Conduct, ch. vii.; Sharp,Essay on Analysis of the Moral Judgment, in Studies in Philosophy and Psychology (Garman Commemorative Volume); Santayana,Life of Reason, Vol. I., chs. x.-xii.; Bryant,Studies in Character, Part II., chs. iv.-v.

For the social character of conscience, see Cooley,Human Nature and the Social Order, ch. x.

For sympathy and conscience, see Adam Smith,Theory of Moral Sentiments, especially Part III., chs. i. and iv., and Part IV., chs. i.-iii.; Stephen,Science of Ethics, pp. 228-238.

FOOTNOTES:[158]"Any one can be angry: that is quite easy. Any one can give money away or spend it. But to do these things to the right person, to the right amount, at the right time, with the right aim and in the right manner—this is not what any one can easily do."—Aristotle,Ethics, Book II., ch. ix.[159]Compare the sentence quoted on p. 268 from Hazlitt.[160]This means Duty. This phase will be discussed in the next chapter.[161]Kant's Theory of Ethics, trans. by Abbott, pp. 47-51.[162]In last analysis Kant is trying to derive moral enlightenment from the most abstract principle of formal logic, the principle of Identity, that A is A![163]A student in an ethics class once made this remark: "Conscience is infallible, but we should not always follow it. Sometimes we should use our reason."[164]Compare Locke,Essay on the Human Understanding, Book I., ch. iii.[165]Of course, the word "rule" is often used to designate a principle—as in the case of the phrase "golden-rule." We are speaking not of the words, but of their underlying ideas.

[158]"Any one can be angry: that is quite easy. Any one can give money away or spend it. But to do these things to the right person, to the right amount, at the right time, with the right aim and in the right manner—this is not what any one can easily do."—Aristotle,Ethics, Book II., ch. ix.

[159]Compare the sentence quoted on p. 268 from Hazlitt.

[160]This means Duty. This phase will be discussed in the next chapter.

[161]Kant's Theory of Ethics, trans. by Abbott, pp. 47-51.

[162]In last analysis Kant is trying to derive moral enlightenment from the most abstract principle of formal logic, the principle of Identity, that A is A!

[163]A student in an ethics class once made this remark: "Conscience is infallible, but we should not always follow it. Sometimes we should use our reason."

[164]Compare Locke,Essay on the Human Understanding, Book I., ch. iii.

[165]Of course, the word "rule" is often used to designate a principle—as in the case of the phrase "golden-rule." We are speaking not of the words, but of their underlying ideas.

Conflict of Ends as Attractive and as Reasonable.—The previous discussion has brought out the contrast between a Good or Satisfaction which is suchdirectly, immediately, by appealing attractively to desire; and one which is such indirectly, through considerations which reflection brings up. As we have seen, the latter must, if entertained at all, arouse some direct emotional response, must be felt to be in some way satisfactory. But thewaymay be quite unlike that of the end which attracts and holds a man irrespective of the principle brought to light by reflection. The one may be intense, vivid, absorbing, passing at once into overt action, unless checked by a contrary reason. The good whose claim to be good depends mainly on projection of remote considerations, may be theoretically recognized and yet the direct appeal to the particular agent at the particular time be feeble and pallid. The "law of the mind" may assert itself less urgently than the "law of the members" which wars against it.

Two Senses of Term Duty.—This contrast gives rise to the fact of Duty. On one side is the rightful supremacy of the reasonable but remote good; on the other side is the aversion of those springs to action which are immediately most urgent. Between them exists the necessity of securing for the reasonable good efficacy in operation; or the necessity of redirecting the play of naturally dominant desires. Duty is also used, to be sure, in alooser and more external sense. To identify the dutiful with the right apart from conflict, to say that a man did his duty, may mean that he did right, irrespective of the prior state of his inclinations. It frequently happens that the wider and larger good which is developed through reflective memory and foresight is welcomed, is directly appreciated as good, since it is thoroughly attractive. Without stress and strain, without struggle, it just displaces the object which unreflective impulse had suggested. It is the fit and proper, the only sensible and wise thing, under the circumstances. The man does his duty, but is glad to do it, and would be troubled by the thought of another line of action. So far as calling the act "duty" brings in any new meaning, it means that the right act is one which is found to meet the demands, the necessities, of the situation in which it takes place. The Romans thus spoke of duties asoffices, the performance of those functions which are appropriate to the status which every person occupies because of his social relations.

Conscious Conflict.—But there are other cases in which therightend is distinctly apprehended by the person as standing in opposition to his natural inclinations, as a principle or law whichoughtto be followed, but whichcanbe followed only by constraining the inclinations, by snubbing and coercing them. This state of affairs is well represented by the following quotation from Matthew Arnold, if we take it as merely describing the facts, not as implying a theory as to their explanation:

"All experience with conduct brings us at last to the fact of two selves, or instincts, or forces—name them, however we may and however we may suppose them to have arisen—contending for the mastery over men: one, a movement of first impulse and more involuntary, leading us to gratify any inclination that may solicit us and called generally a movement of man's ordinary or passing self, of sense, appetite, desire; the other a movement of reflection and more voluntary,leading us to submit inclination to some rule, and called generally a movement of man's higher or enduring self, of reason, spirit, will."[166]

We shall (I.) present what we consider the true account of this situation of conflict in which the sense of duty is found; (II.) turn to explanations which are one-sided, taking up (1) the intuitive, (2) the utilitarian theory; and finally (III.) return with the results of this criticism to a restatement of our own theory.

Ordinary language sets before us some main facts: duty suggests what is due, a debt to be paid; ought is connected with owe; obligation implies being bound to something—as we speak of "bounden duty." We speak naturally of "meeting obligations"; of duties being "imposed," "laid upon" one. The person who is habitually careless about his duties is "unruly" or "lawless"; one who evades or refuses them is "unprincipled." These ideas suggest there is something required, exacted, having the sanction of law, or a regular and regulative principle; and imply natural aversion to the requirements exacted, a preference for something else. Hence duty as a conscious factor means constraint of inclination; an unwillingness or reluctance whichshouldbe overcome but which it is difficult to surmount, requiring an effort which only adequate recognition of the rightful supremacy of the dutiful end will enable one to put forth. Thus we speak of interest conflicting with principle, and desire with duty. While they are inevitably bound together, it will be convenient to discuss separately (1) Inclination and impulse as averse to duty, and (2) Duty as having authority, as expressing law.

1. Inclination Averse to Duty.—Directly and indirectly, all desires root in certain fundamental organic wants and appetites. Conduct, behavior, implies a living organism. If this organism were not equipped with an intense instinctive tendency to keep itself going, to sustain itself, it would soon cease to be amid the menaces, difficulties, rebuffs, and failures of life. Life means appetites, like hunger, thirst, sex; instincts like anger, fear, and hope, which are almost imperious in their struggles for satisfaction. They do not arise from reflection, but antedate it; their existence does not depend upon consideration of consequences, but their existence it is which tends to call out reflection. Their very presence in a healthy organism means a certain reservoir of energy which overflows almost spontaneously. They are impulsive. Such tendencies, then, constitute an essential and fundamental part of the capacities of a person; their realization is involved in one's happiness. In all this there is nothing abnormal nor immoral. But a human being is something more than a mere demand for the satisfaction of instincts of food, sex, and protection. If we admit (as the theory of organic evolution requires) that all other desires and purposes areultimatelyderived from these tendencies of the organism, still it is true that the refined and highly developed forms exist side by side with crude, organic forms, and that the simultaneous satisfaction of the two types, just as they stand, is impossible.

Organic and Reflectively Formed Tendencies Conflict.—Even if it be true, as it may well be, that the desires and purposes connected with property were developed out of instincts having to do with food for self and offspring, it is still true that the developed desires do not wholly displace those out of which they developed. The presence of the purposes elaborated by thought side by side with the more organic demands causes strife and the need of resolution. The accumulation of property mayinvolve subordinating the immediate urgency of hunger; property as an institution implies that one is not free to satisfy his appetite just as he pleases, but may have to postpone or forego satisfaction, because the food supply belongs to another; or that he can satisfy hunger only through some labor which in itself is disagreeable to him. Similarly the family springs originally out of the instinct of reproduction. But the purposes and plans which go with family life are totally inconsistent with the mere gratification of sexual desire in its casual and spontaneous appearance. The refined, highly developed, and complex purposes exact a checking, a regulation and subordination of inclinations as they first spring up—a control to which the inclinations are not of themselves prone and against which they may rebelliously assert themselves.

Duty May Reside on the More Impulsive Side.—It would be a great mistake, however, to limit the need of subordination simply to the unruly agencies of appetite. Habits which have been consciously or reflectively formed, even when in their original formation these habits had the sanction and approval of reason, require control. The habits of a professional man, of an investigator, or a lawyer, for example, have been formed through careful and persistent reflection directed upon ends adjudged right. Virtues of painstaking industry, of perseverance, have been formed; untimely and unseemly desires have been checked. But as an outcome these habits, and the desires and purposes that express them, have perhaps become all-engrossing. Occupation is preoccupation. It encroaches upon the attention needed for other concerns. The skill gained tends to shut the individual up to narrow matters and to shut out other "universes" of good which should be desired. Domestic and civic responsibilities are perhaps felt to be insignificant details or irritating burdens unworthy of attention. Thus a reflective habit, legitimate in itself, right in its right place, may give rise to desires and ends which involve a corrosive selfishness.

Moreover, that the insubordination does not reside in appetites or impulses just as appetites and impulses, is seen in the fact that duty may lie on the side of a purpose connected with them, and be asserted against the force of a habit formed under the supervision of thought. The student or artist may find his pursuit makes him averse to satisfying the needful claims of hunger and healthy exercise. The prudent business man may find himself undutifully cold to the prompting of an impulse of pity; the student of books or special intellectual or artistic ends may find duty on the side of some direct human impulse.

Statement of Problem.—Such considerations show that we cannot attribute the conflict of duty and inclination simply to the existence of appetites and unreflective impulses, as if these were in and of themselves opposed to regulation by any principle. We must seek for an explanation which will apply equally to appetites and to habits of thought. What is there common to the situations of him who feels it his duty to check the satisfaction of strong hunger until others have been properly served, and of the scientific investigator who finds it his duty to check the exercise of his habit of thinking in order that he may satisfy the demands of his body?

Statement of Explanation.—Any habit, like any appetite or instinct, represents something formed, set; whether this has occurred in the history of the race or of the individual makes little difference to its established urgency. Habit is second, if not first, nature. (1) Habit representsfacilities; what is set, organized, is relatively easy. Itmarks the line of least resistance. A habit of reflection, so far as it is a specialized habit, is as easy and natural to follow as an organic appetite. (2) Moreover, the exercise of any easy, frictionless habit is pleasurable. Itis a commonplace that use and wont deprive situations of originally disagreeable features. (3) Finally, a formed habit is an activetendency. It only needs an appropriate stimulus to set it going; frequently the mere absence of any strong obstacle serves to release its pent-up energy. It is a propensity to act in a certain way whenever opportunity presents. Failure to function is uncomfortable and arouses feelings of irritation or lack.

Reluctance to the right end, an aversion requiring to be overcome, if at all, by recognition of the superior value of the right end, is then to be accounted foron the ground of the inertia or momentum of any organized, established tendency. This momentum gives the common ground to instinctive impulses and deliberately formed habits. The momentum represents theold, an adaptation to familiar, customary conditions. So far as similar conditions recur, the formed power functions economically and effectively, supplying ease, promptness, certainty, and agreeableness to the execution of an act.

But if new, changed conditions require a serious readjustment of the old habit or appetite, the natural tendency will be to resist this demand. Thus we have precisely the traits of reluctance and constraint which mark the consciousness of duty. A self without habits, one loose and fluid, in which change in one direction is just as easy as in another, would not have the sense of duty. A self with no new possibilities, rigidly set in conditions and perfectly accommodated to them, would not have it. But definite, persistent, urgent tendencies to act in a given way, occurring at the same time with other incompatible tendencies which represent the self more adequately and yet are not organized into habits, afford the conditions of the sense of restraint. If for any reason the unorganized tendency is judged to be the truer expression of self, we have also the sense of lawful constraint.The constraint of appetite and desire is a phenomenon of practical readjustment, within the structure of character, due to conflict of tendencies so irreconcilable in their existing forms as to demand radical redirection.

When an appetite is in accord with those habits of an individual which enable him to perform his social functions, or which naturally accrue from his social relations, it is legitimate and good; when it conflicts, it is illicit, it is lust; we call it by hard names and we demand that it be curbed; we regard its force as a menace to the integrity of the agent and a threat to social order. When the reflective habits of an individual come into conflict with natural appetites and impulses, the manifestation of which would enlarge or make more certain the powers of the individual in his full relations to others, it is the reflective habits which have to be held in and redirected at the cost of whatever disagreeableness.

(2) The Authority of Duty.—A duty, in Kant's words, is acategoricalimperative—it claims the absolute right of way as against immediate inclination. That which, on one side, is the constraint of natural desire, is, on the other, the authoritative claim of the right end to regulate. Over against the course of action most immediately urgent, most easy and comfortable, so congenial as at once to motivate action unless checked, stands another course, representing a wider and more far-reaching point of view, and hence furnishing the rational end of the situation. However lacking in intensity, however austere this end, it stands for the whole self, and is therefore felt to be rightly supreme over any partial tendency. But since it looks to realization in an uncertain future, rather than permission just to let go what is most urgent at the moment, it requires effort, hard work, work of attention more or less repulsive and uncongenial. Hence that sense of stress and strain, of being pulled one way by inclination and another by the claims of right, so characteristic of an experience of obligation.

Social Character of Duties.—But this statement describes the experience only on its formal side. In the concrete, that end which possesses claim to regulate desire is the one which grows out of the social position or function of the agent, out ofa course of action to which he is committed by a regular, socially established connection between himself and others. The man who has assumed the position of a husband and a parent has by that very fact entered upon alineof action, something continuous, running far into the future; something so fundamental that it modifies and pervades his other activities, requiring them to be coördinated or rearranged from its point of view. The same thing holds, of course, of the calling of a doctor, a lawyer, a merchant, a banker, a judge, or other officer of the State. Each social calling implies a continuous, regular mode of action, binding together into a whole a multitude of acts occurring at different times, and giving rise to definite expectations and demands on the part of others. Every relationship in life, is, as it were,a tacit or expressed contract with others, committing one, by the simple fact that he occupies that relationship, to a corresponding mode of action. Every one, willy-nilly, occupies a social position; if not a parent, he is a child; if not an officer, then a citizen of the State; if not pursuing an occupation, he is in preparation for an occupation, or else is living upon the results of the labors of others.

Connection with Selfhood.—Every one, in short, is ingeneral relations to others,—relationships which enter so internally and so intimately into the very make-up of his being that he is not morally free to pick and choose, saying, this good is really my affair, that other one not. The mode of action which is required by the fact that the person is a member of a complex social network is a more final expression of his own nature than is the temporarily intense instinctive appetite, or the habit which has become "second nature." It is not for the individual to say, thelatter is attractive and therefore really mine, while the former is repellant and therefore an alien intruder, to be surrendered to only if it cannot be evaded. From this point of view, the conflict of desire and duty, of interest and principle, expresses itself as a conflict between tendencies which have got organized into one'sfixed characterand which therefore appeal to him just as he is; and those tendencies which relate to the development of a larger self, a self which should take fuller account of social relations. The Kantian theory emphasizes the fact brought out above:viz., that duty represents the authority of an act expressing the reasonable and "universal" self over a casual and partial self; while the utilitarian theory emphasizes the part played by social institutions and demands in creating and enforcing both special duties and the sense of duty in general.

"Accord with" Duty versus "from" Duty.—Kant points out that acts may be "in accordance with duty" and yet not be done "from duty." "It is always, for example, a matter of duty that a dealer should not overcharge an inexperienced purchaser, and wherever there is much commerce the prudent tradesman does not overcharge.... Men are thus honestly served; but this is not enough to prove that the tradesman so acted from duty and from principles of honesty; his own advantage required it" (Kant's Theory of Ethics, Abbott's translation, p. 13). In such a case the act externally viewed is inaccordancewith duty; morally viewed, it proceeds from selfish calculation of personal profit, not from duty. This is true in general of all acts which, though outwardly right, spring from considerations of expediency, and are based on the consideration that "honesty (or whatever) is the best policy." Persons are naturally inclined to take careof their health, their property, their children, or whatever belongs to them. Such acts, no matter how much they accord with duty, are not donefrom duty, but from inclination. If a man is suffering, unfortunate, desirous of death, and yet cherishes his life with no love for it, but from the duty to do so, his motive has truly moral value. So if a mother cares for her child,becauseshe recognizes that it is her duty, the act is truly moral.

From Duty alone Moral.—According to Kant, then, acts alone have moral import that are consciously performed "from duty," that is, with recognition of its authority as their animating spring. "The idea of good and evil (in their moral sense) must not be determined before the moral law, but only after it and by means of it" (Ibid., p. 154). All our desires and inclinations seek naturally for anendwhich is good—for happiness, success, achievement. No one of them nor all of them put together, then, can possibly supply the motive of actingfromduty. Hence duty and its authority must spring from another source, from reason itself, which supplies the consciousness of a law whichoughtto be the motive of every act, whether it is or not. The utilitarians completely reverse the truth of morals when they say that the idea of the good end comes first and the "right" is that which realizes the good end.

Dual Constitution of Man.—We are all familiar with the notion that man has a dual constitution; that he is a creature both of sense and spirit; that he has a carnal and an ideal nature; a lower and a higher self, a self of appetite and of reason. Now Kant's theory of duty is a peculiar version of this common notion. Man's special ends and purposes all spring from desires and inclinations. These are all for personal happiness and hence without moral worth. They form man's sensuous, appetitive nature, which if not "base" in itself easily becomes so, because it struggles with principle for the office of supplying motives for action. The principle of a law absolutely binding, requires the complete expulsion of the claim of desires tomotivateaction. (SeeKant's Theory, pp. 70-79; 132-136; 159-163.) If a man were an animal, he would have only appetite to follow; if he were a god or angel, he would have only reason. Being man, being a peculiar compound of sense and reason, he has put upon him the problem of resisting the natural prompting of inclination and of accepting the duty of acting from reverence for duty.

Criticism of Kant's Theory.—There is an undoubted fact back of Kant's conception which gives it whatever plausibility it has—the fact that inclinations which are not necessarily evil tend to claim a controlling position, a claim which has to be resisted. The peculiarity of Kant's interpretation lies in its complete and final separation of the two aspects, "higher" and "lower," the appetitive and rational, of man's nature, and it is upon this separation, accordingly, that our discussion will be directed.

I. Duty and the Affections.—In the first place, Kant's absolute separation of sense or appetite from reason and duty, because of its necessary disparagement of the affections leads to a formal and pedantic view of morality. It is one thing to say that desire as itfirstshows itselfsometimesprompts to a morally inadequate end; it is quite another thing to say thatanyacceptance of an end of desire as a motive is morally wrong—that the act to be right must be first brought under a conscious acknowledgment of some law or principle. Only the exigencies of a ready-made theory would lead any one to think that habitual purposes that express the habitually dominant tendencies and powers of the agent, may not suffice to keep morally sound the main tenor of behavior; that it is impossible for regard for right ends to become organized into character and to be fused into working unity with natural impulses. Only a metaphysical theory regardingthe separation of sense and reason in man leads to the denial of this fact.

Between the merchant who is honest in his weights and fixed in his prices merely because he calculates that such a course is to his own advantage, and the merchant (if such a person could exist) who should never sell a spool of thread or a paper of pins without having first reminded himself that his ultimate motive for so doing was respect for the law of duty, there is the ordinary merchant who is honest because he has the desires characteristic of an honest man. Schiller has made fun of the artificial stringency of Kant's theory in some verses which represent a disciple coming to Kant with his perplexity:

"Willingly serve I my friends, but I do it, alas with affection.Hence I am plagued with this doubt, virtue I have not attained!"

to which he received the reply:

"This is your only resource, you must stubbornly seek to abhor them;Then you can do with disgust that which the law may enjoin."

These verses are a caricature of Kant's position; he does not require that affections should be crushed, but that they should be stamped with acknowledgment of law before being accepted as motives. But the verses bring out the absurd element in the notion that the affections and inclinations may not of themselves be morally adequate springs to action,—as if a man could not eat his dinner simply because he was hungry, or be amiable to a companion because he wanted to be, or relieve distress because his compassionate nature urged him to it.

It is worth while noting that some moralists have gone to the opposite extreme and have held that an act is not right unless it expresses the overflowing spontaneity of the affections; that a man's act is only imperfectly right when he performs it not from affection, but from coercion by duty. Thus Emerson speaks of men who "do by knowledge what the stones do by structure." And again, "Welove characters in proportion as they are impulsive and spontaneous. When we see a soul whose acts are all regal, graceful, and pleasant as roses, we must thank God that such things can be and are, and not turn sourly on the angel and say, 'Crump is a better man with his grunting resistance to all his native devils.'" The facts seem to be that while, in a good man, natural impulses and formed habits are adequate motive powers under ordinary conditions, there are times when an end, somewhat weak in its motive force because it does not express an habitually dominant power of the self, needs to be reënforced by associations which have gathered at all periods of his past around the experience of good. There is a certain reservoir of emotional force which, while far from fluid, is capable of transfer and application, especially in a conscientious person. Kant criticizes the moral sense theory on the ground that "in order to imagine the vicious man tormented with a sense of his transgressions, it must first represent him as morally good in the main trend of his character" (Abbott, p. 128). Well, a man who is capable of making appeal to the sense of duty in general, is the one in whom love of good is already dominant.

II. Tendency to Fanaticism and Idealization of Authority.—Kant's theory of fixed and final separation between desire and reason leads us into a fatal dilemma; either a right end is impossible, or any end is right provided we fall back on a belief that it is our duty to perform it. Kant holds that every concrete end, every definite purpose which we entertain, comes from desire. Law utters no specific command except "do your duty"; it stamps an end of desire as right only when it is pursued, not because it is an end of desire, but "from duty." The actual end which is before us is, in any case, supplied through inclination and desire. Reason furnishesprincipleas amotive. We have here, in another form, the separation of end and motive which has already occupied us (p. 248). End and motive are so disconnected, so irrelevant to one another, that we have no alternative except either to condemn every end, because, being prompted by desire, it falls so far short of the majesty of duty; or else fanatically to persist in any course when once we have formally brought it under the notion of duty.

The latter alternative would be the one chosen by a truly Kantian agent because it is alone possible in practice. But the moral fanatic does about as much evil in the world as the man of no moral principle. Religious wars, persecutions, intolerance, harsh judgment of others, obstinate persistence in a course of action once entered upon in spite of the testimony of experience to the harm that results; blind devotion to narrow and one-sided aims; deliberate opposition to art, culture, social amenities, recreations, or whatever the "man of principle" happens to find obnoxious: pharisaical conviction of superiority, of being the peculiar, chosen instrument of the moral law;—these and the countless ills that follow in their wake, are inevitable effects of erecting the isolated conviction of duty into a sufficient motive of action. So far as these evils do not actually flow from an acceptance of the Kantian principle, it is because that has been promulgated and for the most part adopted, where reverence for authority and law is strong. In Germany the Kantian philosophy has, upon the whole, served as a help in criticizing law and procedure on the basis of their rationality, while it has also served as a convenient stamp of rational sanction upon a politically authoritative régime, already fairly reasonable, as such matters go, in the content of its legislation and administration.

III. Meaning of Duty for Duty's Sake.—It is a sound principle to do our dutyasour duty, and not for the sake of something else. "Duty for duty's sake" means, in truth,an act for the act's own sake; the gift of cold water, the word of encouragement, the sweeping of the room, the learning of the lesson, the selling of the goods, the painting of the picture, because they are the things really called for at a given time, and hence their own excuses for being.No moral act is a means to anything beyond itself,—not even to morality.But, upon Kant's theory, duty for duty's sake means a special act not for its own sake, but for the sake of abstract principle. Just as the hedonists regard a special act as a mere means to happiness, so Kant makes the concrete act a mere means to virtue. As there is a "hedonistic paradox," namely that the way to get happiness is to forget it, to devote ourselves to things and persons about us; so there is a "moralistic" paradox, that the way to get goodness is to cease to think of it—as something separate—and to devote ourselves to the realization of the full value of the practical situations in which we find ourselves. Men can really think of their "duty" only when they are thinking of specific things to be done; to think of Duty at large or in the abstract is one of the best ways of avoiding doing it, or of doing it in a partial and perverted way.

Summary of Criticism of Kant.—To sum up, the theory which regards duty as having its source in a rational self which is independent of and above the self of inclination and affection (1) deprives the habitual desires and affections, which make the difference between one concrete character and another, of moral significance; (2) commits us to an unenlightened performance of what is called duty irrespective of its real goodness; and (3) makes moral principle a remote abstraction, instead of the vivifying soul of a concrete deed. Its strongest point, its insistence upon theautonomouscharacter of duty, or that duty is organically connected with the self in some of its phases or functions, will appear more clearly as we contrast it with the utilitarian theory.

Problem of Duty on Hedonistic Basis.—The utilitarians' explanation of the constraint of desire by the authority of right is framed to meet the peculiar difficulty in which their hedonistic theory places them. If pleasure is the good, and if all desire is naturally for the good, why should desire have to be constrained? How can such a thing as "duty" exist at all? For to say that a man is obliged or bound to seek that which he just can't help seeking is absurd. There is, according to the utilitarian, a difference, however, between the pleasure which is the object of desire and that which is the standard of judgment. The former is the person's own pleasure; it is private. The happiness which measures the rightness of the act is that of all persons who are affected by it. In view of this divergence, there must, if right action is to occur, be agencies which operate upon the individual so as to make him find his personal pleasure in that which conduces to the general welfare. These influences are the expectations and demands ofothers so far as they attach consequences in the way of punishment, of suffering, and of reward and pleasure, to the deeds of an individual.

In this way the natural inclination of an individual towards a certain pleasure, or his natural revulsion from a certain pain, may be checked and transformed by recognition that if he seeks the pleasure, others will inflict more than an equivalent pain, or if he bears the pain, others will reward him with more than compensating pleasures. In such cases, we have the fact of duty or obligation. There is constraint of first inclination through recognition of superior power, this power being asserted in its expressly declared intention of rewarding and penalizing according as its prescriptions are or are not followed. These are the factors: (1) demands, expectations, rules externally imposed; (2) consequences in the way of proffered reward of pleasure, and penalty of pain; (3) resulting constraint of the natural manifestation of desires. In the main, the theory is based on the analogy of legal obligations.[167]

(a) Bentham's Account.—Bentham dislikes the very word duty; and speaks preferably of the "sanctions" of an act. The following quotations will serve to confirm the foregoing statements.

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