Enkidoodle

The altruistic sentiments of mankind will be treated at {113} length in subsequent chapters. We shall find reason to believe that not only maternal, but to some extent, paternal and conjugal affection, prevailed in the human race from ancient times, and that social affection arose in those days when the conditions of life became favourable to an expansion of the early family, when the chief obstacle to a gregarious life--scarcity of food--was overcome, and sociality, being an advantage to man, became his habit. There are still savages who live in families rather than in tribes, but we know of no people among whom social organisation outside the family is totally wanting. Later discoveries only tend to confirm Darwin's statement that, though single families or only two or three together, roam the solitudes of some savage lands, they always hold friendly relations with other families inhabiting the same district; such families occasionally meeting in council and uniting for their common defence.[11] But as a general rule, to which there are few exceptions, the lower races live in communities larger than family groups, and all the members of the community are united with one another by common interests and common feelings. Of the harmony, mutual good-will, and sense of solidarity, which under normal conditions prevail in these societies, much evidence will be adduced in following pages. Mr. Melville's remark with reference to some Marquesas cannibals may be quoted as to some extent typical. "With them," he says, "there hardly appeared to be any difference of opinion upon any subject whatever. . . . They showed this spirit of unanimity in every action of life: everything was done in concert and good fellowship."[12] When a member of the group is hurt, the feeling of unanimity takes the form of public resentment. As Robertson observed long ago, "in small communities, every man is touched with the injury or affront offered to the body of which he is a member, as if it were a personal attack upon his own honour or safety. The desire of revenge is communicated from breast to breast, {114} and soon kindles into rage."[13] Speaking of some Australian savages, Mr. Fison remarks:--"To the savage, the whole gens is the individual, and he is full of regard for it. Strike the gens anywhere, and every member of it considers himself struck, and the whole body corporate rises up in arms against the striker."[14] Nobody will deny that there is a disinterested element in this public resentment, even though every member of the group consider the enemy of any other member to be actually his own enemy as well, and, partly, hate him as such.

[Footnote 11: Darwin, _op. cit._ p. 108.]

[Footnote 12: Melville, _Typee_, p. 297 _sq._]

[Footnote 13: Robertson, _History of America_, i. 350. _Cf._ Clifford's theory of the "tribal self" (_Lectures and Essays_, p. 290 _sqq._). He says (_ibid._ p. 291), "The savage is not only hurt when anybody treads on his foot, but when anybody treads on his tribe."]

[Footnote 14: Fison and Howitt, _Kamilaroi and Kurnai_, p. 170.]

Our explanation of what has here been called "sympathetic resentment," however, is not yet complete. This emotion, as we have seen, may be a reaction against sympathetic pain; but it may also be directly produced by the cognition of the signs of anger. In the former case it is, strictly speaking, independent of the _emotion_ of the injured individual; we may feel resentment on his behalf though he himself feels none. In the latter case it is a reflected emotion, felt independently of the cause of the original emotion of which it is a reflection--as when the yells and shrieks of a street dog-fight are heard, and dogs from all sides rush to the spot, each dog being apparently ready to bite any of the others. In the former case, it is, by the medium of sympathetic pain, closely connected with the inflicted injury; in the latter case it may even be the reflection of an emotion which is itself sympathetic, and the origin of which is perhaps out of sight. In an infuriated crowd the one gets angry because the other is angry, and very often the question, Why? is hardly asked. This form of sympathetic resentment is of considerable importance both as an originator and as a communicator of moral ideas. To teach that a certain act is wrong is to teach that it is an object, and a proper object, of moral indignation, and the aim of the instructor {115} is to inspire a similar indignation in the mind of the pupil. An intelligent teacher tries to attain this end by representing the act in such a light as to evoke disapproval independently of any appeal to authority; but, unfortunately, in many cases where the duties of current morality are to be enjoined, he cannot do so--for a very obvious reason. Of various acts which, though inoffensive by themselves, are considered wrong, he can say little more than that they are forbidden by God and man; and if, nevertheless, such acts are not only professed, but actually felt, to be wrong, that is due to the fact that men are inclined to sympathise with the resentment of persons for whom they feel regard. It is this fact that accounts for the connection between the punishment of an act and the consequent idea that it deserves to be punished. We shall see that the punishment which society inflicts is, as a rule, an expression of its moral indignation; but there are instances in which the order is reversed, and in which human, or, as it may be supposed, divine, punishment or anger is the cause, and moral disapproval the effect. Children, as everybody knows, grow up with their ideas of right and wrong graduated, to a great extent, according to the temper of the father or mother;[15] and men are not seldom, as Hobbes said, "like little children, that have no other rule of good and evill manners, but the correction they receive from their Parents, and Masters."[16] The case is the same with any outbreak of public resentment, with any punishment inflicted by society at large. However selfish it may be in its origin, to whatever extent it may spring from personal motives, it always has a tendency to become in some degree disinterested, each individual not only being angry on his own behalf, but at the same time reflecting the anger of everybody else.

[Footnote 15: _Cf._ Baring-Gould, _Origin and Developwent of Religious Belief_, i. 212.]

[Footnote 16: Hobbes, _Leviathan_, i. 2, p. 76.]

Any means of expressing resentment may serve as a communicator of the emotion. Besides punishment, language deserves special mention. Moral disapproval may {116} be evoked by the very sounds of certain words, like "murder," "theft," "cowardice," and others, which not merely indicate the commission of certain acts, but also express the opprobrium attached to them. By being called a "liar," a person is more disgraced than by any plain statement of his untruthfulness; and by the use of some strong word the orator raises the indignation of a sympathetic audience to its pitch.

All the cases of disinterested resentment which we have hitherto considered fall under the heading of sympathetic resentment. But there are other cases into which sympathy does not enter at all. Resentment is not always caused by the infliction of an injury; it may be called forth by any feeling of pain traceable to a living being as its direct or indirect cause. Quite apart from our sympathy with the sufferings of others, there are many cases in which we feel hostile towards a person on account of some act of his which in no way interferes with our interests, which conflicts with no self-regarding feeling of ours. There are in the human mind what Professor Bain calls "disinterested antipathies," sentimental aversions "of which our fellow-beings are the subjects, and on account of which we overlook our own interest quite as much as in displaying our sympathies and affections."[17] Differences of taste, habit, and opinion, are particularly apt to create similar dislikes, which, as will be seen, have played a very prominent part in the moulding of the moral consciousness. When a certain act, though harmless by itself (apart from the painful impression it makes upon the spectator), fills us with disgust or horror, we may feel no less inclined to inflict harm upon the agent, than if he had committed an offence against person, property, or good name. And here, again, our resentment is sympathetically increased by our observing a similar disgust in others. We are easily affected by the aversions and likings of our neighbours. As Tucker said, "we grow to love things we perceive {117} them fond of, and contract aversions from their dislikes."[18]

[Footnote 17: Bain, _Emotions and the Will_, p. 268.]

[Footnote 18: Tucker, _Light of Nature Pursued_, i. 154.]

We have already seen that sympathy springing from an altruistic sentiment may produce, not only disinterested resentment, but disinterested retributive kindly emotion as well. When taking a pleasure in the benefit bestowed on our neighbour, we naturally look with kindness upon the benefactor; and just as sympathetic resentment may be produced by the cognition of the outward signs of resentment, so sympathetic retributive kindly emotion may be produced by the signs of retributive kindliness. Language communicates emotions by terms of praise, as well as by terms of condemnation; and a reward, like a punishment, tends to reproduce the emotion from which it sprang. Moreover, men have disinterested likings, as they have disinterested dislikes. As an instance of such likings may be mentioned the common admiration of courage when felt irrespectively of the object for which it is displayed.

Having thus found the origin of disinterested retributive emotions, we have at the same time partly explained the origin of the moral emotions. But, as we have seen, disinterestedness is not the sole characteristic by which moral indignation and approval are distinguished from other retributive emotions: a moral emotion is assumed to be impartial, or, at least, is not knowingly partial, and it is coloured by the feeling of being publicly shared. However, the real problem which we have now to solve is not how retributive emotions may become apparently impartial and be coloured by a feeling of generality, but why disinterestedness, apparent impartiality, and the flavour of generality have become characteristics by which so-called moral emotions are distinguished from other retributive emotions. The solution of this problem lies in the fact that society is the birthplace of the moral consciousness; that the first moral judgments expressed, not the private emotions of isolated individuals, but emotions which were {118} felt by the society at large; that tribal custom was the earliest rule of duty.

Customs have been defined as public habits, as the habits of a certain circle, a racial or national community, a rank or class of society. But whilst being a habit, custom is at the same time something else as well. It not merely involves a frequent repetition of a certain mode of conduct, it is also a rule of conduct. As Cicero observes, the customs of a people "are precepts in themselves."[19] We say that "custom commands," or "custom demands," and speak of it as "strict" and "inexorable"; and even when custom simply allows the commission of a certain class of actions, it implicitly lays down the rule that such actions are not to be interfered with.

[Footnote 19: Cicero, _De Officiis_, i. 41.]

The rule of custom is conceived of as a moral rule, which decides what is right and wrong.[20] "Les loix de la conscience," says Montaigne, "que nous disons naistre de nature, naissent de la coustume."[21] Mr. Howitt once said to a young Australian native with whom he was speaking about the food prohibited during initiation, "But if you were hungry and caught a female opossum, you might eat it if the old men were not there." The youth replied, "I could not do that; it would not be right"; and he could give no other reason than that it would be wrong to disregard the customs of his people.[22] Mr. Bernau says of the British Guiana Indians:--"Their moral sense of good and evil is entirely regulated by the customs and practices inherited from their forefathers. What their predecessors believed and did must have been right, and they deem it the height of presumption to suppose that any could think and act otherwise."[23] The moral evil of the pagan Greenlanders "was all that was contrary to laws and customs, as {119} regulated by the angakoks," and when the Danish missionaries tried to make them acquainted with their own moral conceptions, the result was that they "conceived the idea of virtue and sin as what was pleasing or displeasing to Europeans, as according or disaccording with their customs and laws."[24] "The Africans, like most heathens," Mr. Rowley observes, "do not regard sin, according to their idea of sin, as an offence against God, but simply as a transgression of the laws and customs of their country."[25] The Ba-Ronga call derogations of universally recognised custom _yila_, prohibited, tabooed.[26] The Bedouins of the Euphrates "make no appeal to conscience or the will of God in their distinctions between right and wrong, but appeal only to custom."[27] According to the laws of Manu, the custom handed down in regular succession since time immemorial "is called the conduct of virtuous men."[28] The Greek idea of the customary, [Greek: to\ no/mimon], shows the close connection between morality and custom; and so do the words [Greek: e)/thos, ê)/thos], and [Greek: e)thika/], the Latin _mos_ and _moralis_, the German _Sitte_ and _Sittlichkeit_.[29] Moreover, in early society, customs are not only moral rules, but the only moral rules ever thought of. The savage strictly complies with the Hegelian command that no man must have a private conscience. The following statement, which refers to the Tinnevelly Shanars, may be quoted as a typical example:--"Solitary individuals amongst them rarely adopt any new opinions, or any new course of procedure. They follow the multitude to do evil, and they follow the multitude to do good. They think in herds."[30]

[Footnote 20: _Cf._ Austin, _Lectures on Jurisprudence_, i. 104; Tönnies, 'Philosophical Terminology,' in _Mind_, N.S., viii. 304. Von Jhering (_Zweck im Recht_, ii. 23) defines the German _Sitte_ as "die im Leben des Volks sich bildende verpflichtende Gewohnheit"; and a similar view is expressed by Wundt (_Ethik_, p. 128 _sq._).]

[Footnote 21: Montaigne, _Essais_, i. 22 (_[OE]uvres_, p. 48).]

[Footnote 22: Fison and Howitt, _op. cit._ p. 256 _sq._]

[Footnote 23: Bernau, _Missionary Labours in British Guiana_, p. 60.]

[Footnote 24: Rink, _Greenland_, p. 201 _sq._]

[Footnote 25: Rowley, _Religion of the Africans_, p. 44.]

[Footnote 26: Junod, _Ba-Ronga_, p. 477.]

[Footnote 27: Blunt, _Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates_, ii. 224.]

[Footnote 28: _Laws of Manu_, ii. 18.]

[Footnote 29: For the history of these words, see Wundt, _op. cit._ p. 19 _sqq._ For other instances illustrating the moral character of custom, see Maclean, _Compendium of Kafir Law and Customs_, p. 34 (Amaxosa); Macpherson, _Memorials of Service in India_, p. 94 (Kandhs); Kubary, _Ethnographische Beiträge zur Kenntniss der Karolinischen Inselgruppe_, i. 73 (Pelew Islanders); Smith, _Chinese Characteristics_, p. 119.]

[Footnote 30: Caldwell, _Tinnevelly Shanars_, p. 69.]

Disobedience to custom evokes public indignation. In {120} the lower stages of civilisation, especially, custom is a tyrant who binds man in iron fetters, and who threatens the transgressor, not only with general disgrace, but often with bodily suffering. "To believe that man in a savage state is endowed with freedom either of thought or action," says Sir G. Grey, "is erroneous in the highest degree";[31] and this statement is corroborated by an array of facts from all quarters of the savage world.[32] Now, as the rule of custom is a moral rule, the indignation aroused by its transgression is naturally a moral emotion. Moreover, where all the duties incumbent on a man are expressed in the customs of the society to which he belongs, it is obvious that the characteristics of moral indignation are to be sought for in its connection with custom. The most salient feature of custom is its generality. Its transgression calls forth public indignation; hence the flavour of generality which characterises moral disapproval. Custom is fixed once for all, and takes no notice of the preferences of individuals. By recognising the validity of a custom, I implicitly admit that the custom is equally binding for me and for you and for all the other members of the society. This involves disinterestedness; I admit that a breach of the custom is equally wrong whether I myself am immediately concerned in the act or not. It also involves apparent impartiality; I assume that my condemnation of the act is independent of the relationship in which the parties concerned in it stand to me personally, or, at least, I am not aware that my condemnation is influenced by any {121} such relationship. And this holds good whatever be the origin of the custom. Though customs are very frequently rooted in public sympathetic resentment or in public disinterested aversions, they may have a selfish and partial origin as well. At first the leading men of the society may have prohibited certain acts because they found them disadvantageous to themselves, or to those with whom they particularly sympathised. Where custom is an oppressor of women, this oppression may certainly be traced back to the selfishness of men. Where custom sanctions slavery, it is certainly not impartial to the slaves. Yet in the one case as in the other, I assume custom to be in the right, irrespectively of my own station, and I even expect the women and slaves themselves to be of the same opinion. Such an expectation is by no means a chimera. Under normal social conditions, largely owing to men's tendency to share sympathetically the resentment of their superiors, the customs of a society are willingly submitted to, and recognised as right, by the large majority of its members, whatever may be their station. Among the Rejangs of Sumatra, says Marsden, "a man without property, family, or connections, never, in the partiality of self-love, considers his own life as being of equal value with that of a man of substance."[33] However selfish, however partial a certain rule may be, it becomes a true custom, a moral rule, as soon as the selfishness or the partiality of its makers is lost sight of.

[Footnote 31: Grey, _Journals of Expeditions in North-West and Western Australia_, ii. 217.]

[Footnote 32: Tylor, 'Primitive Society,' in _Contemporary Review_, xxi. 706. _Idem_, _Anthropology_, p. 408 _sq._ Avebury, _Origin of Civilisation_, p. 466 _sqq._ Eyre, _Journals of Expeditions into Central Australia_, ii. 384, 385, 388. Curr, _The Australian Race_, i. 51. Mathew, 'Australian Aborigines,' in _Jour. and Proceed. Roy. Soc. N.S. Wales_, xxiii. 398. _Idem_, _Eaglehawk and Crow_, p. 93. Taplin, 'Narrinyeri,' in Woods, _Native Tribes of South Australia_, pp. 35, 136 _sq._ Hawtrey, 'Lengua Indians of the Paraguayan Chaco,' in _Jour. Anthr. Inst._ xxxi. 292. Murdoch, 'Ethnological Results of the Point Barrow Expedition,' in _Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethn._ ix. 427 _sq._ (Point Barrow Eskimo). Holm, 'Ethnologisk Skizze af Angmagsalikerne,' in _Meddelelser om Grönland_, x. 85. Nansen, _First Crossing of Greenland_, ii. 295. Johnston, _British Central Africa_, p. 452. New, _Life, Wanderings, and Labours in Eastern Africa_, p. 110 (Wanika). Scott Robertson, _Káfirs of the Hindu-Kush_, p. 183 _sq._]

[Footnote 33: Marsden, _History of Sumatra_, p. 247.]

It will perhaps be argued that, by deriving the characteristics of moral indignation from its connection with custom, we implicitly contradict our initial assumption that moral emotions lie at the bottom of all moral judgments. But it is not so. Custom is a moral rule only on account of the indignation called forth by its transgression. In its ethical aspect it is nothing but a generalisation of emotional tendencies, applied to certain modes of conduct, and transmitted from generation to generation. Public indignation lies at the bottom of it. In its capacity {122} of a rule of duty, custom, _mos_, is derived from the emotion to which it gave its name.

As public indignation is the prototype of moral disapproval, so public approval, expressed in public praise, is the prototype of moral approval. Like public indignation, public approval is characterised by a flavour of generality, by disinterestedness, by apparent impartiality. But of these two emotions public indignation, being at the root of custom and leading to the infliction of punishment, is by far the more impressive. Hence it is not surprising that the term "moral" is etymologically connected with _mos_, which always implies the existence of a social rule the transgression of which evokes public indignation. Only by analogy it has come to be applied to the emotion of approval as well.

Though taking their place in the system of human emotions as public emotions felt by the society at large, moral disapproval and approval have not always remained inseparably connected with the feelings of any special society. The unanimity of opinion which originally characterised the members of the same social unit was disturbed by its advancement in civilisation. Individuals arose who found fault with the moral ideas prevalent in the community to which they belonged, criticising those ideas on the basis of their own individual feelings. Such rebels are certainly no less justified in speaking in the name of morality true and proper, than is society itself. The emotions from which their opposition against public opinion springs may be, in nature, exactly similar to the approval or disapproval felt by the society at large, though they are called forth by different facts or, otherwise, differ from these emotions in degree. They may present the same disinterestedness and apparent impartiality--indeed, dissent from the established moral ideas largely rises from the conviction that the apparent impartiality of public feelings is an illusion. As will be seen, the evolution of the moral consciousness involves a progress in impartiality and justice; it tends towards an equalisation {123} of rights, towards an expansion of the circle within which the same moral rules are held applicable; and this process is in no small degree effected by the efforts made by high-minded individuals to raise public opinion to their own standard of right. Nay, as we have already noticed, individual moral feelings do not even lack that flavour of generality which characterises the resentment and approval felt unanimously by a body of men. Though, perhaps, persecuted by his own people as an outcast, the moral dissenter does not regard himself as the advocate of a mere private opinion.[34] Even when standing alone, he feels that his conviction is shared at least by an ideal society, by all those who see the matter as clearly as he does himself, and who are animated with equally wide sympathies, an equally broad sense of justice. Thus the moral emotions remain to the last public emotions--if not in reality, then as an ideal.

[Footnote 34: _Cf._ Pollock, _Essays in Jurisprudence and Ethics_, p. 309.]

The fact that the earliest moral emotions were public emotions implies that the original form of the moral consciousness cannot, as is often asserted, have been the individual's own conscience. Dr. Martineau's observation, that the inner springs of other men's actions may be read off only by inference from our own experience, by no means warrants his conclusion that the moral consciousness is at its origin engaged in self-estimation, instead of circuitously reaching this end through a prior critique upon our fellow-men.[35] The moral element which may be contained in the emotion of self-reproach or self-approval, is generally to such an extent mixed up with other and non-moral elements, that it can be disentangled only by a careful process of abstraction, guided by the feelings of other people with reference to our conduct or by our own feelings with reference to the conduct of others. The moral emotion of remorse presupposes some notion of right and wrong, and the application of this notion to one's own conduct. Hence it could never have {124} been distinguished as a special form of, or element in, the wider emotion of self-reproach, unless the idea of morality had been previously derived from another source. The similarity between regret and remorse is so close, that in certain European languages there is only one word for both.[36]

[Footnote 35: Martineau, _Types of Ethical Theory_, ii. 29 _sqq._]

[Footnote 36: As, in Swedish, the word _ånger_.]

* * * * *

From what has been said above it is obvious that moral resentment is of extreme antiquity in the human race, nay, that the germ of it is found even in the lower animal world, among social animals capable of feeling sympathetic resentment. The origin of custom as a moral rule no doubt lies in a very remote period of human history. We have no knowledge of a savage people without customs, and, as will be seen subsequently, savages often express their indignation in a very unmistakable manner when their customs are transgressed. Various data prove that the lower races have some feeling of justice, the flower of all moral feelings. And the supposition that remorse is unknown among them,[37] is not only unfounded, but contradicted by facts. Indeed, genuine remorse is so hidden an emotion even among ourselves, that it cannot be expected to be very conspicuous among savages. As we have seen, it requires a certain power of abstraction, as well as great impartiality of feeling, and must therefore be sought for at the highest reaches of the moral consciousness rather than at its lowest degrees. But to suppose that savages are entirely without a conscience is quite contrary to what we may infer from the great regard in which they hold their customs, as also contrary to the direct statements of travellers who have taken some pains to examine the matter. The answer given by the young Australian when asked by Mr. Howitt whether he might not eat a female opossum if the old men were not present,[38] certainly indicates conscientious respect for a moral rule, and is, as Mr. Fison observes, "a striking instance of that 'moral {125} feeling' which Sir John Lubbock denies to savages."[39] Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden asserts that, among the people whom he had in his service, he found the Negroes, in their sense of duty, not inferior, but rather superior to the Europeans.[40] Mr. New says of the Wanika:--"Conscience lives in them as the vicegerent of Almighty God, and is ever excusing or else accusing them. It may be blunted, hardened, resisted, and largely suppressed, but there it is."[41] M. Arbousset once desired some Bechuanas to tell him whether the blacks had a conscience. "Yes, all have one," they said in reply. "And what does it say to them?" "It is quiet when they do well and torments them when they sin." "What do you call sin?" "The theft, which is committed trembling, and the murder from which a man purifies and re-purifies himself, but which always leaves remorse."[42] Mr. Washington Matthews refers to a passage in a Navaho story which "shows us that he who composed this tale knew what the pangs of remorse might be, even for an act not criminal, as we consider it, but merely ungenerous and unfilial."[43]

[Footnote 37: Avebury, _Origin of Civilisation_, pp. 421, 426.]

[Footnote 38: See _supra_, p. 118.]

[Footnote 39: Fison and Howitt, _op. cit._ p. 257 n.]

[Footnote 40: Hübbe-Schleiden, _Ethiopien_, p. 184 _sq._]

[Footnote 41: New, _op. cit._ p. 96.]

[Footnote 42: Arbousset and Daumas, _Exploratory Tour to the North-East of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope_, p. 322.]

[Footnote 43: Matthews, 'Study of Ethics among the Lower Races,' in _Journal of American Folk-Lore_, xii. 7.]

A different opinion as to the existence of moral feelings among savages has been expressed by Lord Avebury. To him even modern savages seem to be "almost entirely wanting in moral feeling"; and he says that he has "been forced to this conclusion, not only by the direct statements of travelers but by the general tenor of their remarks, and especially by the remarkable absence of repentance and remorse among the lower races of men."[44] The importance of the subject renders {126} it necessary to scrutinise the facts which Lord Avebury has adduced in support of his conclusion.

[Footnote 44: Avebury, _op. cit._ pp. 414, 426. Lord Avebury quotes Burton's statement that in Eastern Africa, as also among the Yoruba negroes, conscience does not exist, and that "repentance" expresses regret for missed opportunities of mortal crime. Speaking of the stage of savagery represented by the Bakaïri, Dr. von den Steinen likewise observes (_Unter den Naturvölkern Zentral-Brasiliens_, p. 351), "Goodness and badness exist only in the crude sense of doing to others what is agreeable or disagreeable, but the moral consciousness, and the ideal initiative, influenced neither by prospect of reward nor fear of punishment, are entirely lacking." Lippert maintains (_Kulturgeschichte der Menschheit_, i. 27) "dass sich das Gewissen beim Naturmenschen nicht als 'Selbsttadel,' sondern nur als Furcht zeigt."]

Mr. Neighbors states that, among the Comanches of Texas, "no individual action is considered a crime, but every man acts for himself according to his own judgment, unless some superior power--for instance, that of a popular chief--should exercise authority over him." Another writer says, "The Redskin has no moral sense whatever." Among the Basutos, according to Casalis, morality "depends so entirely upon social order that all political disorganisation is immediately followed by a state of degeneracy, which the re-establishment of order alone can rectify." Similar accounts are given as regards Central Africa and some other places. Thus at Jenna, and in the surrounding districts, "whenever a town is deprived of its chief, the inhabitants acknowledge no law--anarchy, troubles, and confusion immediately prevail, and till a successor is appointed all labour is at an end." The Damaras "seem to have no perceptible notion of right or wrong." The Tasmanians were "without any moral views and impressions." Eyre says of the Australians that they have "no moral sense of what is just and equitable in the abstract"; and a missionary had very great difficulty in conveying to those natives any idea of sin. The Kacharis had "in their own language no words for sin, for piety, for prayer, for repentance"; and of another of the aboriginal tribes of India Mr. Campbell remarks that they "are . . . said to be without moral sense." Lord Avebury in this connection even quotes a statement to the effect that the expressions which the Tonga Islanders have for ideas like vice and injustice "are equally applicable to other things." The South American Indians of the Gran Chaco are said by the missionaries to "make no distinction between right and wrong, and have therefore neither fear nor hope of any present or future punishment or reward, nor any mysterious terror of some supernatural power." Finally, Lord Avebury observes that religion, except in the more advanced races, has no moral aspect or influence, that the deities are almost invariably regarded as evil, and that the belief in a future state is not at first associated with reward or punishment.[45]

[Footnote 45: Avebury, _op. cit._ p. 417 _sqq._]

Many of the facts referred to by Lord Avebury do not at all presuppose the absence of moral feelings. It is difficult to see why the malevolence of gods should prevent men from having notions of right and wrong, and we know from the Old Testament itself that there may be a moral law without Paradise {127} and Hell. The statement concerning the Comanches only implies that, among them, individual freedom is great; whilst the social disorder which prevails among various peoples at times of political disorganisation indicates that the cohesiveness of the political aggregate is weak, as well as a certain discrepancy between moral ideas and moral practice. In Morocco, also, the death of a Sultan is immediately followed by almost perfect anarchy, and yet the people recognise both the moral tenets of the Koran and the still more stringent tenets of their ancient customs. As to the Basutos, Casalis expressly states that they have the idea of moral evil, and represent it in their language by words which mean ugliness, or damage, or debt, or incapacity;[46] and M. Arbousset once heard a Basuto say, on an unjust judgment being pronounced, "The judge is powerful, therefore we must be silent; if he were weak, we should all cry out about his injustice."[47] Moreover, a people may be unconscious of what is just "in the abstract," and of moral "notions," in the strict sense of the term, and at the same time, in concrete cases, distinguish between right and wrong, just and unjust. Of the Western Australians, Mr. Chauncy expressly says that they have a keen sense of justice, and mentions an instance of it;[48] whilst our latest authorities on the Central Australians observe that, though their moral code differs radically from ours, "it cannot be denied that their conduct is governed by it, and that any known breaches are dealt with both surely and severely."[49] As regards the Tonga Islanders, Mariner states that "their ideas of honour and justice do not very much differ from ours except in degree, they considering some things more honourable than we should, and others much less so"; and in another place he says that "the notions of the Tonga people, in respect to honour and justice . . . are tolerably well defined, steady and universal," though not always acted upon.[50] The statement that the American Indians have "no moral sense whatever," sounds very strange when compared with what is known about their social and moral life; Buchanan, for instance, asserts that they "have a strong innate sense of justice."[51] Of course, there may be diversity of opinion as to what constitutes the "moral sense"; if the conception of sin or other theological notions are regarded as essential to it, it is probably {128} wanting in a large portion of mankind, and not only in the least civilised. When missionaries or travellers deny to certain savages moral feelings and ideas, they seem chiefly to mean feelings or ideas similar to their own.

[Footnote 46: Casalis, _Basutos_, p. 304.]

[Footnote 47: Arbousset and Daumas, _op. cit._ p. 389.]

[Footnote 48: Brough Smyth, _Aborigines of Victoria_, ii. 228.]

[Footnote 49: Spencer and Gillen, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_, p. 46.]

[Footnote 50: Mariner, _Natives of the Tonga Islands_, ii. 159, 163.]

[Footnote 51: Buchanan, _Sketches of the History, &c., of the North American Indians_, p. 158.]

Of many savage and barbarous peoples it is directly affirmed that they have a sense of justice. Mr. Man says concerning the Andaman Islanders, "Certain traits which have been noticeable in their dealings with us would give colour to the belief that they are not altogether lacking in the sense of honour, and have some faint idea of the meaning of justice."[52] Colonel Dalton states that, among the Korwás on the highlands of Sirgúja, when several persons are implicated in one offence, he has found them "most anxious that to each should be ascribed his fair share of it, and no more, the oldest of the party invariably taking on himself the chief responsibility as leader or instigator, and doing his utmost to exculpate as unaccountable agents the young members of the gang."[53] The Aleuts, according to Veniaminof, are "naturally inclined to be just," and feel deeply undeserved injuries.[54] Kolben, who is nowadays recognised as a good authority,[55] wrote of the Hottentots, "The strictness and celerity of the Hottentot justice are things in which they outshine all Christendom."[56] Missionaries have wondered that, among the Zulus, "in the absence for ages of all revealed truth and all proper religious instruction, there should still remain so much of mental integrity, so much ability to discern truth and justice, and withal so much regard for these principles in their daily intercourse with one another."[57] Zöller ascribes to the Negro a well-developed feeling of justice. "No European," he says, "at least no European child, could discriminate so keenly between just and unjust punishment."[58] Mr. Hinde observes:--"One of the most marked characteristics of black people is their keen perception of justice. They do not resent merited punishment where it is coupled with justice upon other matters. The Masai have their sense of justice particularly strongly developed."[59] Dieffenbach writes of the Maoris, "There is a high natural sense of justice amongst them; {129} and it is from us that they have learnt that many forbidden things can be done with impunity, if they can only be kept secret."[60] Justice is a virtue which always commands respect among the Bedouins, and "injustice on the part of those in power is almost impossible. Public opinion at once asserts itself; and the Sheykh, who should attempt to override the law, would speedily find himself deserted."[61]

[Footnote 52: Man, in _Jour. Anthr. Inst._ xii. 92.]

[Footnote 53: Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 230.]

[Footnote 54: Veniaminof, quoted by Dall, _Alaska_, p. 398.]

[Footnote 55: Theophilus Hahn remarks (_The Supreme Being of the Khoi-Khoi_, p. 40) that Kolben's reports have been doubted by European writers without any good reason.]

[Footnote 56: Kolben, _Present State of the Cape of Good Hope_, i. 301. _Cf._ _ibid._ i. 339.]

[Footnote 57: Quoted by Tyler, _Forty Years among the Zulus_, p. 197.]

[Footnote 58: Zöller, _Kamerun_, ii. 92. _Cf._ _Idem_, _Das Togoland_, p. 37.]

[Footnote 59: Hinde, _The Last of the Masai_, p. 34. _Cf._ Foreman, _Philippine Islands_, p. 185.]

[Footnote 60: Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 106.]

[Footnote 61: Blunt, _Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates_, ii. 224 _sqq._]

Much less conspicuous than the emotion of public resentment is the emotion of public approval. These public emotions are largely of a sympathetic character, and, whilst a tendency to sympathetic resentment is always involved in the sentiment of social affection, a tendency to sympathetic retributive kindly emotion is not. Among the lower animals this latter emotion seems hardly to occur at all, and in men it is often deplorably defective. Resentment towards an enemy is itself, as a rule, a much stronger emotion than retributive kindly emotion towards a friend. And, as for the sympathetic forms of these emotions, it is not surprising that the altruistic sentiment is more readily moved by the sight of pain than by the sight of pleasure,[62] considering that its fundamental object is to be a means of protection for the species. Moreover, sympathetic retributive kindliness has powerful rivals in the feelings of jealousy and envy, which tend to make the individual hostile both towards him who is the object of a benefit and towards him who bestows it. As an ancient writer observes, "many suffer with their friends when the friends are in distress, but are envious of them when they prosper."[63] But though these circumstances are a hindrance to the rise of retributive kindly emotions of a sympathetic kind, they do not prevent public approval in a case when the whole society profits by a benefit, nor have they any bearing on those disinterested instinctive likings of which I have spoken above. I think, then, we may {130} safely conclude that public praise and moral approval occurred, to some degree, even in the infancy of human society. It will appear from numerous facts recorded in following chapters, that the moral consciousness of modern savages contains not only condemnation, but praise.

[Footnote 62: _Cf._ Jodl, _Lehrbuch der Psychologie_, p. 686.]

[Footnote 63: Schmidt, _Ethik der alten Griechen_, i. 259.]

CHAPTER VI

ANALYSIS OF THE PRINCIPAL MORAL CONCEPTS

WE have assumed that the moral concepts are essentially generalisations of tendencies in certain phenomena to call forth moral emotions. We have further assumed that there are two kinds of moral emotions: indignation and approval. If these assumptions hold good, either indignation or approval must be at the bottom of every moral concept. That such is really the case will, I think, become evident from the present chapter, in which the principal of those concepts will be analysed.

Our analysis will be concerned with moral concepts formed by the civilised mind. Whilst the most representative of English terms for moral estimates have equivalents in the other European languages, I do not take upon myself to decide to what extent they have equivalents in non-European tongues. That all existing peoples, even the very lowest, have moral emotions is as certain as that they have customs, and there can be no doubt that they give expression to those emotions in their speech. But it is another question how far their emotions have led to such generalisations as are implied in moral concepts. Concerning the Fuegians M. Hyades observes, "Les idées abstraites sont chez eux à peu près nulles. Il est difficile de définir exactement ce qu'ils appellent un homme bon et un homme méchant; mais à coup sûr ils n'ont pas la notion de ce qui est bon ou mauvais, abstraction faite de l'individu ou de l'objet auquel ils appliqueraient l'un ou l'autre {132} de ces attributs."[1] The language of the Californian Karok, though rich in its vocabulary, is said to possess no equivalent for "virtue."[2] In the aboriginal tongues of the highlanders of Central India "there seem to be no expressions for abstract ideas, the few such which they possess being derived from the Hindí. . . . . The nomenclature of religious ceremony, of moral qualities, and of nearly all the arts of life they possess, are all Hindí."[3] On a strict examination of the language of the Tonga Islanders, Mariner could discover "no words essentially expressive of some of the higher qualities of human merit, as virtue, justice, humanity; nor of the contrary, as vice, injustice, cruelty, &c. They have indeed expressions for these ideas," he adds, but these expressions "are equally applicable to other things. To express a virtuous or good man, they would say, _tangata lillé_, a good man, or _tangata loto lillé_, a man with a good mind; but the word lillé, good (unlike our word virtuous), is equally applicable to an axe, canoe, or anything else."[4] Of the Australian natives about Botany Bay and Port Jackson Collins wrote, "That they have ideas of a distinction between good and bad is evident from their having terms in their language significant of these qualities." A fish of which they never ate, was _wee-re_, or bad, whereas the kangaroo was _bood-yer-re_, or good; and these expressions were used not only for qualities which they perceived by their senses, but for all kinds of badness and goodness, and were the only terms they had for wrong and right. "Their enemies were wee-re; their friends bood-yer-re. On our speaking of cannibalism, they expressed great horror at the mention, and said it was wee-re. On seeing any of our people punished or reproved for ill-treating them, they expressed their approbation, and said it was bood-yer-re, it was right."[5]

[Footnote 1: Hyades and Deniker, _Mission scientifique du Cap Horn_, vii. 251.]

[Footnote 2: Powers, _Tribes of California_, p. 22.]

[Footnote 3: Forsyth, _Highlands of Central India_, p. 139.]

[Footnote 4: Mariner, _Natives of the Tonga Islands_, ii. 147 _sq._]

[Footnote 5: Collins, _English Colony in New South Wales_, i. 548 _sq._]

{133} Considering, moreover, that even the European languages make use of such general terms as "good" and "bad" for the purpose of expressing moral qualities, it seems likely that, originally, moral concepts were not clearly differentiated from other more comprehensive generalisations, and that they assumed a more definite shape only by slow degrees. At the same time we must not expect to find the beginning of this process reflected in the vocabularies of languages. There is every reason to believe that a savage practically distinguishes between the "badness" of a man and the "badness" of a piece of food, although he may form no clear idea of the distinction. As Professor Wundt observes, "the phenomena of language do not admit of direct translation back again into ethical processes: the ideas themselves are different from their vehicles of expression, and here as everywhere the external mark is later than the internal act for which it stands."[6] Language is a rough generaliser; even superficial resemblance between different phenomena often suffices to establish linguistic identity between them. Compare the rightness of a line with the rightness of conduct, the wrongness of an opinion with the wrongness of an act. And notice the different significations given to the verb "ought" in the following sentences:--"They ought to be in town by this time, as the train left Paris last night"; "If you wish to be healthy you ought to rise early"; "You ought always to speak the truth." Though it may be shown that in these statements the predicate "ought" signifies something which they all have in common--the reference to a rule,[7]--we must by no means assume that this constitutes the essence of the moral "ought," or gives us the clue to its origin.

[Footnote 6: Wundt, _Ethik_, p. 36 (English translation, p. 44).]

[Footnote 7: _Cf._ Stephen, _Liberty, Equality, Fraternity_, p. 343 _sq._]

Discarding all questions of etymology as irrelevant to our subject,[8] we shall, in our analysis of moral concepts, {134} endeavour to fix the true import of each concept by examining how, and under what circumstances, the term expressing it is generally applied. We shall restrict ourselves to the principal, typical terms which are used as predicates in moral judgments. If we succeed in proving that they are all fundamentally derived from either moral indignation or moral approval, there can be no reasonable doubt as to the origin of the rest.

[Footnote 8: The attempt to apply the philological method to an examination of moral concepts has, in my opinion, proved a failure--which may be seen from Mr. Baynes' book on _The Idea of God and the Moral Sense in the Light of Language_.]

The tendency in a phenomenon to arouse moral indignation is directly expressed by the term _bad_, and a disposition of mind which is characterised by some special kind of badness is called _vice_. Closely allied to the term "bad" is the term _wrong_. But there is a difference in the use of these words. Whilst "bad" may be applied both to a person's character and to his conduct, only his conduct may be said to be "wrong." The reason for this is that the concept of moral wrongness is modelled on the idea of a moral law, the breach of which is regarded as "wrong." And, by laying down a moral law, we only enjoin a certain mode of conduct; we do not command a person to have a certain character.

The moral law is expressed by the term _ought_, a term which, in modern ethics, generally occupies a central position among moral predicates. The notion which it embodies is frequently looked upon as ultimate and incapable of analysis--"too elementary" (to quote Professor Sidgwick) "to admit of any formal definition."[9] This view, I think, instead of simplifying the matter, has been one of the chief causes of the prevailing confusion in ethical thought.

[Footnote 9: Sidgwick, _Methods of Ethics_, p. 33.]

Far from being a simple notion, "ought" appears to me clearly decomposable, even though it have a special flavour of its own. First of all, it expresses a conation. When I feel that I ought to do a thing, I experience an impulse to do it, even though some opposite impulse may finally determine my action. And when I say to another man, "You ought to do this, or that," there is certainly implied {135} a purpose to influence his action in a certain direction. In the notion of _duty_, the ethical import of which is identical with that of "ought," this conative element is not so obvious.

Closely connected with the conative nature of "ought" is the imperative character it is apt to assume. But, though frequently used imperatively, "ought" is not necessarily and essentially imperative. Even if the "ought" which I address to myself, in a figurative sense, may be styled a command, it is hardly appropriate to speak of a present command with reference to past actions. The common phrase, "You ought to have done this, or that," cannot be called a command.

The conation expressed in "ought" is determined by the idea that the mode of conduct which ought to be performed is not, or will possibly not be, performed. It is also this idea of its not being performed that determines the emotion which gives to "ought" the character of a moral predicate. The doing of what ought not to be done, or the omission of what ought not to be omitted, is apt to call forth moral indignation--this is the most essential fact involved in the notion of "ought." Every "ought"-judgment contains implicitly a negation. Nobody would ever have dreamt of laying down a moral rule if the idea of its transgression had not presented itself to his mind. We may reverse the words of the Apostle,[10] and say that where no transgression is, there is no law. When Solon was asked why he had specified no punishment for one who had murdered a father, he replied that he supposed it could not occur to any man to commit such a crime.[11] Similarly, the modern Shintoist concludes that the primæval Japanese were pure and holy from the fact that they are represented as a people who had no moral commandments.[12] It is this prohibitive character of "ought" that has imparted to duty that idea of antagonism to inclination which has found its most famous expression {136} in the Kantian ethics, and which made Bentham look upon the word itself as having in it "something disagreeable and repulsive."[13] It is the intrinsic connection between "ought" and "wrong" that has given to duty the most prominent place in ethical speculation whenever moral pessimism has been predominant. Whilst the ancient Greeks, with whom happiness was the state of nature, never spoke of duty, but held virtue to be the Supreme Good, Christianity, on the other hand, which looked upon man as a being born and bred in sin, regarded morals pre-eminently as the science of duty. Then, again, in modern times, Kant's categorical imperative came as a reaction against that moral optimism which once more had given the preference to virtue, considering everything in the world or in humanity as beautiful and good from the very beginning.[14] It is also worth noting that the feeling of self-complacency connected with the consciousness of having acted in accordance with the law of duty, has no distinctively expressive name in ordinary language, while the opposite feeling is known by so familiar and distinctive a term as "remorse." This is not, as has been said,[15] "a significant indication of the moral condition of mankind," but a significant indication of the true import of the notion of duty itself.

[Footnote 10: _Romans_, iv. 15.]

[Footnote 11: Diogenes Laërtius, _Solon_, 10. Cicero, _Pro S. Roscio Amerino_, 25.]

[Footnote 12: Griffis, _Religions of Japan_, p. 72.]

[Footnote 13: Bentham, _Deontoiogy_, i. 10.]

[Footnote 14: Ziegler, _Social Ethics_, pp. 22, 75 _sq._]

[Footnote 15: Murray, _Introduction to Ethics_, p. 108.]

It is not, then, in the emotion of approval that we must seek for the origin of this concept. We may undoubtedly applaud him who is faithful to his duty, but the idea of duty involves no applause. There is no contradiction in the omission of an act being disapproved of and the performance of it being praised. "Ought" and "duty" express only the tendency of an omission to call forth disapproval, and say nothing about the consequences of the act's performance. The conscientious man refuses the homage paid to him, by saying, "I have only done my duty." Duty is a "stern {137} lawgiver," who threatens with punishment, but promises no reward.[16]

[Footnote 16: The intrinsic connection between duty and disapproval has previously been noticed by Stuart Mill (in a note to James Mill's _Analysis of the Human Mind_, ii. 325), according to whom "no case can be pointed out in which we consider anything as a duty, and any act or omission as immoral or wrong, without regarding the person who commits the wrong and violates the duty as a fit object of punishment." _Cf._ also Bain, _Emotions and the Will_, ch. 15, and Gizycki, _Introduction to the Study of Ethics_, English adaptation by Stanton Coit, p. 102 _sq._]

The ideas of "ought" and "duty" thus spring from the same source as the ideas of "bad" and "wrong." To say that a man ought to do a thing is, so far as the morality of his action is concerned, the very same thing as to say that it is bad, or wrong, of him not to do it--in other words, that the not-doing of it has a tendency to call forth moral disapproval.

"Wrong" is popularly regarded as the opposite of _right_, and they are really contradictories, but only within the sphere of positive moral valuation. We do not call the actions of irresponsible beings, like animals or infants, "right," although they are not wrong; nor do we pronounce morally indifferent actions of responsible beings to be "right," unless we wish thereby especially to mark their moral value as not being wrong. An act which is permissible is of course not wrong, and so far it may be said to be right; but it would be more accurate to say that people have _a_ right to do it. The adjective "right," in its strict sense, refers to cases from which the indifferent is excluded. A right action is, on a given occasion, _the_ right action, and other alternatives are wrong. "Right" is thus closely related to "ought," but at the same time "right" and "obligatory" are not identical. I cannot quite subscribe to the view of Professor Sidgwick, that "in the recognition of conduct as 'right' is involved an authoritative prescription to do it."[17] What is right is in accordance with the moral law; the adjective "right" means that duty is fulfilled. It is true that the super-obligatory also is right. But "right" takes no notice of the super-obligatory as distinct from the obligatory, and what goes {138} beyond duty always involves the fulfilment of some duty. It may be admitted to be "not only right," but not to be more right. Right has no comparative. A duty is either fulfilled or not, and unless it be perfectly fulfilled the conduct is wrong. There are degrees of wrongness and of goodness, as the moral indignation and the moral approval may be stronger or weaker, but there are no degrees of rightness.

[Footnote 17: Sidgwick, _op. cit._ p. 106.]

The fact that the right action is a duty fulfilled accounts for the erroneous opinion so generally held by ethical writers that "right" is intrinsically connected with moral approval.[18] The choice of the right alternative may give us satisfaction and call forth in us an emotion of approval. This emotion may be the motive for our pointing out the rightness of the act, and the judgment in which we do so may even intrinsically contain applause. The manner in which the judgment "That is right," is pronounced, often shows that it is meant to be an expression of praise. But this does not imply that the concept "right" by itself has reference to moral approval and involves praise. It only means that in one word is expressed a certain concept--the concept that a duty is fulfilled--_plus_ an emotion of approval. That "right" _per se_ involves no praise is obvious from the fact that we regard it as perfectly right to pay a debt and to keep a promise, or to abstain from killing, robbing, or lying, although such acts or omissions generally have no tendency whatever to evoke in us an emotion of moral approval.

[Footnote 18: Hutcheson, _Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections, with Illustrations on the Moral Sense_, p. 279. Clifford, _Lectures and Essays_, pp. 294, 304 _sq._ Fowler and Wilson, _Principles of Morals_, ii. 199. Alexander, _Moral Order and Progress_, p. 399.]

The concept of "right," then, as implying that the opposite mode of conduct would have been wrong, ultimately derives its moral significance from moral disapproval. This may seem strange considering that "right" is commonly looked upon as positive and "wrong" as its negation. But we must remember that language and popular conceptions in these matters start {139} from the notion of a moral rule or command. It is a matter of paramount importance that such modes of conduct as are apt to arouse moral indignation should be avoided. People try to prevent them by prohibitions and injunctions, often emphasised by threats of penalties for the transgressors. The whole moral and social discipline is based upon commands; customs are rules of conduct, and so are laws. It is natural, then, that the notion of a command should figure uppermost in popular conceptions of morality. Obedience to the command is right, a breach of it is wrong. But the fact which gives birth to the command itself is the indignation called forth by the act which the command forbids, or by the omission of that which it enjoins.

I have spoken here of "right" as an adjective. Used as a substantive, to denote _a right_, it also, in whatever sense it be used, expresses a concept which is rooted in the emotion of moral disapproval. To have a right to do a thing is to be allowed to do it, either by positive law, in the case of a legal right, or by the moral law, in the case of a moral right; in other words, to have a moral right to do a thing means that it is not wrong to do it. But generally the concept of "a right" means something more than this. From the fact that an act is allowable, that it is not wrong, it follows, as a rule, that it ought not to be prevented, that no hindrance ought to be put in the way of its performance; and this character of inviolability is largely included in the very concepts of rights. That a man has a right to live does not merely mean that he commits no wrong by supporting his life, but it chiefly means that it would be wrong of other people to prevent him from living, that it is their duty not to kill him, or even, as the case may be, that it is their duty to help him to live. And in order to constitute a right in him, the duty in question must be a duty _to him_. That a right belonging to A is not merely a duty incumbent on B, but a duty _to_ A incumbent on B, will become evident from an example. To kill another {140} person's slave may be condemned as an injury done to the slave himself, in which case it is a duty to the slave not to kill him; or to kill another person's slave may be condemned on account of the loss it causes to the master, in which case it is deemed a duty to the master not to kill the slave. In the latter case we can hardly say that the duty of not killing the slave constitutes a right to live in the slave--it only constitutes a right in the master to retain his slave alive, not to be deprived of him by an act causing his death.

So commonly does the conception of a right belonging to a person contain the idea of a duty which other persons owe him, that it seems necessary to point out the existence of rights in which no such idea is involved. A man's right to defend his country, for instance, does not intrinsically imply that it is wrong of the enemy to disable him from doing so. But, on the other hand, there are rights which are nothing else than duties towards those who have the rights. A right is not always a person's right to a certain activity, or to abstaining from a certain activity; it may have exclusive reference to other people's acts or omissions. That a man has the right to be rewarded by his country only means that his country is under an obligation to reward him. That a father has a right to be obeyed by his children only means that it is a duty incumbent on his children to obey him. That a person has the right of bodily integrity only means that it is wrong to inflict on him a bodily injury. These rights may, no doubt, if violated, give rise to certain rights of activity: a man may have a right to claim the reward which is due to him, a father to exact from his children the obedience which they owe him, a person who is wronged to defend himself. But the rights of claiming a reward, of exacting obedience, of resisting wrong, are certainly not identical with the rights of being rewarded, of being obeyed, of not being wronged.

It is commonly said that rights have their corresponding duties. But if this expression is to be used, it must be {141} remembered that the duty which "corresponds" to a right, as a matter of fact, is either included in that right or simply identical with it. The identity between the right and the duty, then, consists in this, that the notion of a right belonging to a person is identical with the notion of a duty towards him. Rights and duties are not identical in the sense that it is always a duty to insist on a right, though this has been urged.[19] If anybody prevents me from making use of my right it may no doubt be deemed a duty on my part not to tolerate the wrong committed against me, but nothing of the kind is involved in the concept of a right. And the same may be said with reference to the assertion that a right to do a thing is always, at the same time, a duty to do it--an assertion which is a consequence of the doctrine that there is nothing morally indifferent and nothing that goes beyond duty; in other words, that all conduct of responsible beings is either wrong or obligatory. Even if this doctrine were psychologically correct--which it is not--even if there were a constant coincidence between the acts which a person has a right to perform and acts which it is his duty to perform, that would not constitute identity between the concepts of rights and duties. According to the meaning of a right, A's right may be B's duty towards A, but A's right cannot be A's duty towards B or anybody else.

[Footnote 19: Alexander, _op. cit._ p. 146 _sq._]

Closely connected with the notions of wrongness and rightness are the notions of _injustice_ and _justice_. Injustice, indeed, is a kind of wrongness. To be unjust is always to be unjust to somebody, and this implies a doing of wrong to somebody, a violation of somebody's right. "Justice," again, is a kind of rightness. It involves the notion that a duty to somebody, a duty corresponding to a right, is fulfilled;[20] we say that justice "demands" that it should be fulfilled. As an act is "right" if its omission {142} is wrong, so an act is "just," in the strict sense of the word, if its omission is unjust. But, like the adjective "right," the adjective "just" is also sometimes used in a wider sense, to denote that something is "not unjust." As non-obligatory acts that are "not wrong" can hardly be denied to be "right," so non-obligatory acts that are "not unjust" can hardly be denied to be "just," although they are not demanded by justice.

[Footnote 20: According to the _Institutiones_ of Justinian (i. 1. 1) "justice is the constant and perpetual will to render to each one his right,"--"justitia est constans et perpetua voluntas jus suum cuique tribuens."]

At the same time, "injustice" and "justice" are not simply other names for violating or respecting rights. Whenever we style an act "unjust," we emphasise that it involves partiality. We do not denominate murder and robbery unjust, but wrong or criminal, because the partiality involved in their commission is quite obscured by their general wrongness or criminality; but we at once admit their gross injustice when we consider that the murderer and robber indulged their own inclinations with utter disregard of their neighbours' rights. And we look upon "unjust" as an exceedingly appropriate term for a judge who condemns an innocent man with the intention to save the culprit, and for an employer who keeps for himself a profit which he ought to share with his employees. Again, when we style an act "just," in the strict sense of the term, we point out that an undue preference would have been shown to somebody by its omission. It is true that, as Adam Smith observes, "we may often fulfil all the rules of justice by sitting still and doing nothing,"[21] and that the man who barely abstains from violating either the person or the estate or the reputation of his neighbours so far does justice to them; but in such a case we hardly apply the epithet "just," simply because there is no reason for emphasising the partiality involved in the opposite mode of conduct. On the other hand, we say it is just, or, more emphatically, that justice demands, that the innocent should not suffer in the place of the guilty, or that the employer should give his employees all their dues.

[Footnote 21: Adam Smith, _Theory of Moral Sentiments_, p. 117.]

It is necessary to note that the impartiality which justice {143} demands is impartiality within the recognised order of rights, whether these rights themselves have a partial origin or not. A father is unjust if he gives away property to one of his children in preference to others, in case all of them are recognised to have a right to an equal share in his property, even though it be only a conditional right; and a man is unjust if he keeps for himself a profit to which another man has an equal right. But in a society which regards slavery as a morally permissible institution, a man is not necessarily deemed unjust if he beats a slave in a case where it would have been wrong to beat a freeman. However, in the case of unequal rights, justice admits of no greater difference of treatment than what the difference in rights implies. It may be just to punish a man who by a crime has forfeited that right to be protected from wilfully inflicted pain which every law-abiding citizen possesses, but it is unjust to extend the inequality between his condition and the condition of others beyond the inequality of their rights by inflicting upon him a punishment which is unduly severe.

It is the emphasis laid on the duty of impartiality that gives justice a special prominence in connection with punishments and rewards. A man's rights depend to a great extent upon his actions. Other things being equal, the criminal has not the same rights to inviolability as regards reputation, or freedom, or property, or life, as the innocent man; the miser and egoist have not the same rights as the benefactor and the philanthropist. On these differences in rights due to differences in conduct, the terms "just" and "unjust" lay stress; for in such cases an injustice would have been committed if the rights had been equal. When we say of a criminal that he has been "justly" imprisoned we point out that he was no victim of undue partiality, as he had forfeited the general right to freedom on account of his crime. When we say of a benefactor that he has been "justly" rewarded, we point out that no favour was partially bestowed upon him in preference to others, as he had acquired the special right of being rewarded. But the {144} "justice" of a punishment or a reward, strictly speaking, involves something more than this; as we have seen, what is strictly "just" is always the discharge of a duty corresponding to a right which would have been in a partial manner disregarded by a transgression of the duty. If it is just that a person should be rewarded, he ought to be rewarded, and to fulfil this duty is to do him justice. Again, if it is just that a person should be punished, he ought to be punished, and his not being punished is an injustice to other persons. It is an injustice towards all those whose condemnation of the wrong act finds its recognised expression in the punishment, inasmuch as their rightful claim that the criminal should be punished, their right of resisting wrong, is thereby violated in favour of the wrong-doer. Moreover, his not being punished is an injustice towards other criminals, who have been punished for similar acts, in so far as they have a right to demand that no undue preference should be shown to anybody whose guilt is equal to theirs. Retributive justice may admit of a certain latitude as to the retribution. It may be a matter of small concern from the community's point of view whether men are fined or imprisoned for the commission of a certain crime. But it may be a demand of justice that, under equal circumstances, all of them should be punished with the same severity, since the crime has equally affected their rights.

The emphasis which "injustice" lays on the partiality of a certain mode of conduct always involves a condemnation of that partiality. Like every other kind of wrongness, "injustice" is thus a concept which is obviously based on the emotion of moral disapproval. And so is the concept of "justice," whether it involves the notion that an injustice would be committed if a certain duty were not fulfilled, or it is simply used to denote that a certain mode of conduct is "not unjust." But there is yet another sense in which the word "just" is applied. It may emphasise the impartiality of an act in a tone of praise. Considering how difficult it is to be perfectly impartial and to give every man his due, especially when one's own interests are {145} concerned, it is only natural that men should be applauded for being just, and consequently that to call a person just should often be to praise him. So, also, "justice" is used as the name for a virtue, "the mistress and queen of all virtues."[22] But all this does not imply that an emotion of moral approval enters into the concept of justice. It only means that one word is used to express a certain concept--a concept which, as we have seen, ultimately derives its import from moral disapproval--_plus_ an emotion of approval. That the concept of justice by itself involves no reference to the emotion of moral approval appears from the fact that it is no praise to say of an act that it is "only just."

[Footnote 22: Cicero, _De officiis_, iii. 6.]

* * * * *

From the concepts springing from moral disapproval we pass to those springing from moral approval. Foremost among these ranks the concept _good_.[23]

[Footnote 23: Professor Bain, who takes a very legal view of the moral consciousness, maintains (_Emotions and the Will_, p. 292) that "positive good deeds and self-sacrifice . . . transcend the region of morality proper, and occupy a sphere of their own." A similar opinion has been expressed by Prof. Durkheim (_Division du travail social_), and, more recently, by Dr. Lagerborg, in his interesting essay, 'La nature de la morale' (_Revue internationale de Sociologie_, xi. 466). Prof. Durkheim argues (p. 30) that it would be "contraire à toute méthode" to include under the same heading acts which are obligatory and acts which are objects of admiration, and at the same time exempt from all regulation. "Si donc, pour rester fidèle à l'usage, on réserve aux premiers la qualification de moraux, on ne saurait la donner également aux seconds." But I fail to see that ordinary usage recognises regulation as the test of morality. On the contrary, terms like "goodness" and "virtue," though having no reference whatever to any moral rule, have always hitherto been applied to qualities avowedly moral.]

Though "good," being affixed to a great variety of objects, takes different shades of meaning in different cases, there is one characteristic common to everything called "good." This is hardly, as Mr. Spencer maintains,[24] its quality of being well adapted to a given end. It is true that the good knife is one which will cut, the good gun one which carries far and true. But I fail to see that "good" in a moral sense involves any idea of an adaptation to a given purpose, and, by calling conduct {146} "good," we certainly do not mean that it "conduces to life in each and all." "Good" simply expresses approval or praise of something on account of some quality which it possesses. A house is praised as "good" because it fulfils the end desired, a wine because it has an agreeable taste, a man on account of his moral worth. "Good," as a moral epithet, involves a praise which is the outward expression of the emotion of moral approval, and is affixed to a subject of moral valuation on account of its tendency to call forth such an emotion.

[Footnote 24: Spencer, _Principles of Ethics_, i. 21 _sqq._]

"Good" has commonly been identified with "right," but such an identification is incorrect. A father does right in supporting his young children, inasmuch as he, by supporting them, discharges a duty incumbent upon him, but we do not say that he does a good deed by supporting them, or that it is good of him to do so. Nor do we call it good of a man not to kill or rob his neighbours, although his conduct is so far right. The antithesis between right and wrong is, in a certain sense at least, contradictory, the antithesis between good and bad is only contrary. Every act--provided that it falls within the sphere of positive moral valuation--that is not wrong is right, but every act that is not bad is not necessarily good. Just as we may say of a thing that it is "not bad," and yet refuse to call it "good," so we may object to calling the simple discharge of a duty "good," although the opposite mode of conduct would be bad. On the other hand, no confusion of ethical concepts is involved in attributing goodness to the performance of a duty, or, in other words, praising a man for an act the omission of which would have incurred blame. To say of one and the same act that it is right and that it is good, really means that we look upon it from different points of view. Since moral praise expresses a benevolent attitude of mind, it is commendable for a man not to be niggard in his acknowledgment of other people's right conduct; whereas, self-praise being objectionable, only the other point of view is deemed proper when he passes a {147} judgment upon himself. He may say, without incurring censure, "I have done my duty, I have done what is right," but hardly, "I have done a good deed"; and it would be particularly obnoxious to say, "I am a good man." The best man even refuses to be called good by others:--"Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God."[25]

[Footnote 25: _St. Matthew_, xix. 17.]

Whilst "goodness" is the general expression for moral praise, _virtue_ denotes a disposition of mind which is characterised by some special kind of goodness. He who is habitually temperate possesses the virtue of temperance, he who is habitually just the virtue of justice. And even when a man is simply said to be "virtuous," this epithet is given to him, more or less distinctly, with reference to some branch of goodness which constitutes his virtue. A Supreme Being, to whom is attributed perfect goodness, is not called virtuous, but good.

It was the opinion of Aristotle that virtue is imperfect so long as the agent cannot do the virtuous action without a conflict of impulses. Others maintain, on the contrary, that virtue essentially expresses effort, resistance, and conquest. It has been represented as "mediation through pain";[26] according to Kant, it is "the moral disposition in struggle."[27] But I do not see that virtue presupposes struggle, nor that it is lessened by being exercised with little or no effort. A virtue consists in the disposition to will or not to will acts of a certain kind, and is by no means reduced by the fact that no rival impulses make themselves felt. It is true that by struggle and conquest a man may display more virtue, namely, the virtue of self-restraint in addition to the virtue gained by it. The vigorous and successful contest against temptation constitutes a virtue by itself. For instance, the quality of mind which is exhibited in a habitual and victorious effort to conquer strong sexual passions is a virtue distinguishable from that of chastity. But even this virtue of {148} resisting seductive impulses is not greater, _ceteris paribus_, in proportion as the victory is more difficult. Take two men with equally strong passions and equally exposed to temptations, who earnestly endeavour to lead a chaste life. He who succeeds with less struggle, thanks to his greater power of will, is surely inferior neither in chastity nor in self-restraint. Suppose, again, that the two men were exposed to different degrees of temptation. He who overcomes the greater temptation _displays_ more self-restraint; yet the other man may possess this virtue in an equal degree, and his chastity is certainly not made greater thereby. He may have more merit, but merit is not necessarily proportionate to virtue.

[Footnote 26: Laurie, _Ethica_, p. 253 _sqq._]

[Footnote 27: Kant, _Kritik der praktischen Vernunft_, i. 1. 3 (_Sämmtliche Werke_, v. 89).]

The virtues are broad generalisations of mental dispositions which, on the whole, are regarded as laudable. Owing to their stereotyped character, it easily happens, in individual cases, that the possession of a virtue confers no merit upon the possessor; and, at least from the point of view of the enlightened moral consciousness, a man's virtues are no exact gauge of his moral worth. In order to form a just opinion of the value of a person's character, we must take into account the strength of his instinctive desires and the motives of his conduct. There are virtues that pay no regard to this. A sober man, who has no taste for intoxicants, possesses the virtue of sobriety in no less degree than a man whose sobriety is the result of a difficult conquest over a strong desire. He who is brave with a view to be applauded is not, as regards the virtue of courage, inferior to him who faces dangers merely from a feeling of duty. The only thing that the possession of a virtue presupposes is that it should have been tried and tested. We cannot say that people unacquainted with intoxicants possess the virtue of sobriety, and that a man who never had anything to spend distinguishes himself for frugality. For to attribute a virtue to somebody is always to bestow upon him some degree of praise, and it is no praise, only irony, to say of a man that he "makes a virtue of necessity."

{149} Attempts have been made to reconcile the Aristotelian and the Kantian views of the relation between virtue and effort, by saying that virtue is the harmony won and merit is the winning of it.[28] This presupposes that a man to whom virtue is natural has had his fights. But, surely, it is not always so. Who could affirm that every temperate, or charitable, or just man has acquired the virtue only as a result of inward struggle? There are people to whom some virtues at least are natural from the beginning, and others who acquire them with a minimum of effort.

[Footnote 28: Dewey, _Study of Ethics_, p. 133 _sq._ Simmel, _Einleitung in die Moralwissenschaft_, i. 228. _Cf._ also Shaftesbury 'Inquiry concerning Virtue and Merit,' i. 2. 4, in _Characteristicks_, ii. 36 _sqq._]