THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY /70 H77£a 1864 The person charging this material is re- sponsible for its return on or before the Latest Date stamped below. Theft, mutilation, and underlining of books are reasons for disciplinary action and may result in dismissal from the University. University of Illinois Library ■> I3SS L161— O-1096 THE LAW OF LOVE AND LOYE AS A LAW; OB, CHRISTIAN ETHICS. Uttim €tiition* THEORY OF MORALS RESTATED. FOB USE WITH " THE OUTLINE STUDY OF MAN." BT MAKK HOPKINS, D.D., LL.D. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. 1884 Copyright, 1881, By chakles scribner'S sons. The Riverside Press, Cambridge : Stereotyped and Printed by II. 0. Houghton & Co* 170 To THE HON. WILLIAM E. DODGE. My Dear Sir: — As the following work, in its present form, is due to leisure that came through your beneficence, it is fit that it should be dedicated to you. I wish, too, as my name has so long been associated with yours in connection with a great movement for the spread of Christianity, that it may also be thus associated in connection with a system of Moral Science which is no less in accord with Christianity than with the constitution of man, and which will, as I trust, aid in its promotion. With high respect and regard, yours. MARK HOPKINS. PREFACE. ♦ ■ In the preface to the first edition of " The Law of Love and Love as a Law," reasons were given for the publication of that work in addition to the Lectures on Moral Science." To the third edi- tion a second preface was added, and of that the larger part is here given. In publishing a third edition of the following work some notice of the discussions to which it has given rise seems called for. In these it has apparently been forgotten by many how entirely the work is an exposition of that cardinal pre- cept of Christian philosophy, ' Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neigh- bor as thyself.' As imperative there is in that precept Law; and the one thing required by that law is Love. This gives us ' The Law of Love,' and the law practically carried out gives us ' Love as a Law.' With this the doctrine of ends as stated in the ' Lectures on Moral Science ' is co- incident, since the end of Love, so far as there is choice in it, and so morality, must be the good of the person loved. vi PREFACE. " But while the cardinal principle of Christian philosophy is as stated above, that of the prevalent philosophy is, ' Do right for the sake of the right.' Are these identical ? If so, those that hold to the doctrine of an ultimate right may spare their attacks, for I am substantially agreed with them. If not, it is for them to reconcile their ac- ceptance of the precept with their acceptance of Christianity as a philosophy. What we need is a Christian philosophy. Not that philosophy is to be received on the basis of revelation. To be philosophy it must be received on the basis of rea- son. But if a revelation really from God teach or imply a philosophy, it must coincide with that taught by reason, and ought to be seen thus to coincide. If Christendom is ever to be a fair ex- ponent of Christianity, its Moral Philosophy must be that of Christianity. " We need also a philosophy in which the prac- tical shall be drawn from the theoretical part, so that they shall not stand, as in most treatises, like the two sides of the Yosemite Valley, with a deep gulf between them. If, as Dr. Wayland says in the opening of his ' Practical Ethics,' the whole Moral Law is contained in the single word ' Love,' it would seem self-evident that the theo- retical part, the philosophy, must consist of an exposition of Law and Love as they are in them- selves, and as related to each other. Such an expo- sition Dr. Wayland did not attempt, nor can it be PREFACE. vii successfully attempted by any one of his school, or of the school of Right, except as it can be shown that the two precepts above given are iden- tical. " That those precepts can be made identical I do not believe. To me they seem to differ both in their sphere and object. The sphere of the one is choice, and its object good. To choose the good of beings capable of good, disinterestedly and as valuable in itself, is the love required. Here the sphere is choice without volition or outward action, and the obligation to choose thus is afBrmed in view of good as valuable in itself, and with no in- tervention of the idea of right as distinguished from that of obligation. The sphere of the other is volition and outward action, and its object is right, or the right. As commonly defined, and in its only intelligible sense, right is the quality of an action. This makes the right to be an abstrac- tion, a mere intellection, as it is acknowledged to be, which can become a motive to action only as an element is ' surreptitiously ' borrowed from the Bensibility to combine with it and make it obliga- tion. " But if the two precepts can be made identical in their material, the whole form and pressure of a system of duty will be different as the one or the other shall be made prominent. The Ptole- maic and Copernican systems differ, not in mate- rial, but in what they made central ; and yet the riii PREFACE. transition from the one to the other was one of the great steps of progress. And so it is here. Let Love be made central, so that in testing actions men shall be compelled to inquire whether they proceed from Love, and the moral heavens would come into order as a system, and order in society would be the result. The idea of right I accept ; I believe in it as obligatory from its relation to good. As thus related, and so only, it loses that affinity for fanaticism so conspicuous in its his- tory, and which has made religious wars and per- secutions more virulent and cruel than any oth- ers. The persecuting Sauls and assassinating Balthazars of all ages have ' verily thought that they ought to do ' what they have done, and the step now needed is to preclude, as far as possible, such mistakes by making good and Love central, and the ' Law of Love ' the test of right. " We also need, in practical morals, to see the guidance which Love may find from the distinc- tion between the susceptibilities and the powers ; and from the whole constitution of nature and of man through the unifying relation of conditioning and conditioned forces and faculties, and the Law of Limitation based on that. Whoever will be at the pains to trace this out will, I hope, find a sys- tem consistent with itself and in harmony with nature on the one hand, and with the Scriptures on the other. " For the readier apprehension of the system, PREFACE. ix which involves the step above mentioned, I ask attention to the following propositions which con- tain its principal points : — (1.) Moral philosophy regards man only as choosing and acting from choice. (2.) " Moral action is rational, as distinguished from instinctive action. (3.) " Rational action implies a recognized end. (4.) " There can be no conception of an end as a ground of rational action except through a sen- sibility. (5.) The end which man ought to choose is indicated by his moral nature, which affirms obli- gation to choose it ; but it is in his power to re- ject it. (6.) " This end is the good of all beings capa- ble of good, his own included. (7.) " This good has value in itself, absolute value, which makes it an object of rational choice for its own sake. (8.) " The choice of this good as the supremo end is.thej^ve required by the Law ; and hence, a in Love, known as Law, wisdom and virtue are identified. As obedience to moral law, it is vir- tue ; as the choice of good, it is wisdom. (9.) " When an act of choice alone is required without volition or the use of means, as in Love or good-willing, obligation is affirmed at once without the intervention of the idea of right, and PREFACE. with no place for it unless it be regarded as syn« onomous with obligation. (10.) " The choice of good being thus virtue, action from this choice is virtuous action. The good tree makes the fruit good. (11.) " Action that would naturally tend to promote this good is right action, and is obliga- tory from that tendency. (12.) " The rejection of the end, indicated by the moral nature, and any form of choice incom- patible with that end, is lawlessness and wicked- ness. "Identifying as above, wisdom and virtue in Love known as Law, we find a ground of har- mony between teleological and intuitive systems. It has not been sufficiently observed, that the moral imperative, in which I believe fully, the affirmation of obligation to love, can be' legiti- mately given forth only in the apprehension of that very good, which wisdom would choose for its own sake. This imperative is not the product of will. It is not, therefore, as the advocates of the theory of right persistently assert, a part of vir- tue. It is no more a part of virtue than it is of vice, since there could be neither without it. It is the voice of our moral nature made possible and rational by the rational apprehension of good, and can become Law only as that good is the good of all beings capable of good, or at least is compati- ble with that. In this view of it, that ' Good PREFACE. xi Dess of will,' of wMcli Kant speaks as ' the one absolute good,' is not a good at all. It is good- ness — goodness because it is tlie choice of good, and without the idea of that, the very idea of goodness had not been possible. " It is to be added that if the good be disin- terestedly chosen, the fact that it is a good can never make the system utilitarian. That the system is one of Love, the very Love commanded and made Law by God, would, it might have been supposed, be a bar to the charge of utilitari- anism. Love cannot be utilitarian." The above is thus far retained, partly to show that in rewriting, as I have now done, the theo- retical part of the work, the system is not changed. My objects in rewriting were two. Of these, one was to bring the present work into closer relation to the " Outline Study of Man." It is really a continuation of that from the point where up- building was completed, and would naturally fol- low that in a course of study ; but as this was written before that, the points of connection were less numerous and less obvious than I could wish. I wished also to carry over into moral science the method of teaching by diagrams. For this there is less scope here than in mental science, but it is hoped that what has been done may not be without benefit. Another object I had in view was, by giving the system more unity, to state it so that it might PREFACE, be more readily apprehended. In attempting this, I have started from a new definition, have carried the subject of the science back from con- duct, where it is placed by Mr. Herbert Spencer, in his Data of Ethics, to man himself as choos- ing and acting from choice, and have sought to keep closely to an exposition of the definition. It should be said, howevei\ that a subject so complex as this, and involving so much of mental science, cannot be understood without careful study. The system advocated in the following work differs radically from that commonly received. Some of the differences have been already men- tioned, but as the interest of truth requires that they should be clearly seen, the following propo- sitions are stated. In common with most other systems, it makes choice the moral act. It then differs from them — (1.) In making the ultimate object of choice always a good as furnished by the sensibility, and not right, or the right as furnished by the moral nature. (2.) In making the sensibility a condition for moral ideas, while it holds to their origin as nec- essary, and from the moral reason. That they are conditioned on a sensibility no more affects their character as rational, than the fact that the ideas of personal identity and resemblance are conditioned on the idea of being affects their character as rational. PREFACE. xiii (3.) In making the idea of rights and of obli- gation, as belonging to the person, the primary product of the moral reason, instead of the idea of right as the quality of an action, or of the right as an abstraction. (4.) In making the idea of obligation in view of a higher good to be chosen, independent of that of right. (5.) In the place and office now necessarily given to the conscience as behind the will, and as privy councilor in guiding its choices. (6.) In the identity of choice, and also of vris- dom and virtue, with Love. (7.) In the ability we thus gain to reconcile, as in no other way, teleological and intuitive, script- ural and rational systems. (8.) In bringing into moral science the law of the conditioning and the conditioned, and the law of limitation based upon that. Other points might be mentioned, and are, in the preface to the first edition, but these are suffi- cient. Among the above I ask special. attention to the second, in which the relation of a good in the sen- sibility to moral ideas is affirmed. I hold to ob- ligation as strongly as any one. I hold to a moral nature, through which rights and obligation are immediately and necessarily affirmed ; but I hold that obligation is obligation to choose, and because I hold further, that it is obligation to choose a xiv PREFACE. good rather than the quality of an action, or an abstract quality, I am regarded by some as a util- itarian. Utility is a good thing in its place, but that place is not at the basis of a moral system. I would choose a good, not for its utility, for it has none. It is the only thing I know of that neither has, nor can have, utility. I would choose*) it for its own sake, and also as under obligation to\ choose it, and that behest of moral law would, or< should, lead me to adhere to the choice of tJiei' good, and of the good of others, which is love,^. under every extremity. A system which thus recognizes a moral nature, and the sacredness of obligation, is not what I understand a system of utility or of expediency to be. Nor is it a blend- ing of any two systems, but a statement of the re- lation of the sensibility and the moral nature to the will, of virtue to a good, and thus the solution, or at least an attempted solution, of the most diffi- cult problem in theoretical morals. In the rewriting, I have given more prominence than heretofore to Rights, making the idea of them, in its necessary connection with that of ob- ligation, the primary moral idea, and also making them, in connection with the desires, active prin- ciples. I have also placed the moral affections among the active principles. « As the doctrines of the work have not been changed, the correspondence with Dr. McCosli is retained, tliouf^li witli some want, not important, of accuracy in the references.^ * See Appendix. CONTENTS. PART L THEORETICAL. THE LAW OF LOVE. MAN CHOOSING UNDER MORAL LAW. Definition, Division, and Preliminary Statements . • .31 DIVISION 1. Ihe Intellect 84 DIVISION 11. THE SENSIBILITY. CHAPTER I. The Sensibility in General • • 86 CHAPTER II. A-Good . 41 CHAPTER III. Different Kinds of Activity determining The Quality of the Good 45 CHAPTER IV. Impulsive Principles of Action « • 52 CHAPTER V. Rational Principles of Action 59 CHAPTER VI. The Moral Affections . . • • • • • • » ^ Xvi CONTENTS. DIVISION nL The Will 69 DIVISION IV. CHAPTER I. The Moral Nature 73 CHAPTER II. Moral Law 79 DIVISION V. The Person 85 DIVISION VI. Eight and Wrong • • 87 DIVISION VII. MAN CHOOSING. CHAPTER I. Alternatives and Law 95 CHAPTER n. Wickedness • • • « 108 DIVISION vin. Conscience Ill PART II. PRACTICAL. LOVE AS A LAW. MAN ACTING FEOM CHOICE UNDER MORAL LAW. CHAPTER 1. PRELIMINARY STATEMENT. Love as a Law distinguished from the Law of Love . . . 119 CONTENTS. XVii CHAPTER n. Classification of Duties. •••••••• 123 CLASS L DUTIES TO OURSELVES. Classification • • • • 127 DIVISION L The Securing of our Rights • . 127 DIVISION n. The Supply of our Wants 129 DIVISION III. THE PERFECTING OF OUR POWERS. CHAPTER I. Perfection as related to Direct Action for others: of the Body of the Mind 130 CHAPTER II. Perfection as related to Unconscious Influence • • • • 143 CHAPTER IH. Perfection as related to Complacency 145 CHAPTER IV. Perfection as related to the glory of God • • * • • 147 CHAPTER V. Perfection as related to Self-love . •«•••• 148 CHAPTER VI. Habits 149 b xviii CONTENTS. CLASS n. DUTIES TO OUR FELLOW-MEN. PRELIMINARY. PAQ] Self-love and the Love of others . . . • • • .155 FIRST GREAT DIVISION. DUTIES TO MEN AS MEN. DIVISION I. DUTIES REGARDING THE RIGHTS OF OTHERS. CHAPTER I. Of Rights 157 CHAPTER II. Personal Rights : Life and Liberty 166 CHAPTER in. Right to Property 169 CHAPTER IV. Right to Reputation 182 CHAPTER V. Eight to Truth 186 DIVISION II. DUTIES REGARDING THE WANTS OP OTHERS. CHAPTER I. Justice and Benevolence . . . . • . . . . 189 CHAPTER II. Supply of the Wants of others 194 CONTENTS, DIVISION in. PBBFECTING AND DIRECTING THE POWERS OF OTHERS. CHAPTER I. PAGB Duty of Influence from the Relation of Character to "Well-being. — Obstacles to Change of Intellectual State and of Charac* ter 198 CHAPTER II. Spheres of Effort: Who may labor in them 208 SECOND GREAT DIVISION. DUTIES FROM SPECIAL RELATIONS. CHAPTER I. Rights of Persons : Right and Rights : Special Duties : The Family 210 CHAPTER II. Government: Responsibility: Punishment 219 CHAPTER III. Relation of the Sexes : Chastity 233 CHAPTER IV. Rights and Duties in Relation to Marriage 236 CHAPTER V. The Law of Divorce 244 CHAPTER VI. Rights and Duties of Parents and Children 247 CHAPTER VII. Society and Government: The Sphere of Government: Origin of Government: Mode of Formation • . • . 255 £1 CONTENTS. CHAPTER VIII. PAGI Goverament Representative and Instrumental: ThB 'Bight ot Suffrage 269 CHAPTER IX. Forms of Goyemment : Duties of Magistrates and Citizens • S84 CLASS ni. DUTIES TO GOD. CHAPTER I Duties to God defined • 291 CHAPTER n. Cultivation of a Devotional Spirit •••••• 295 CHAPTER III. Prayer 801 CHAPTER IV. The Sabbath «09 Appendix • • 127 INTRODUCTION. » DIFFERENT THEORIES. Morality regards man as active. Hence moral science must imply a systematic knowledge of those powers in man which tend to, or regulate action, as those powers are related to each other, and to the objects that excite their action. These powers are related to each other as a system capable of harmonious action, and of securing through such action the highest good of the individual and of the whole. Into the conception of a system of active powers the idea of order, subordination, and of a supreme controlling powder must enter ; and that action of such a system which would secure the highest good of the individual and of the whole is right action Such action must be rational. It presupposes an end good in itself, and known to be good ; but it tan be moral only as we have a moral nature affirming obligation to such action. Of the nature and foundation of moral obliga- tion which I suppose to be thus affirmed, different i 2 INTRODUCTION, accounts have been given. This has arisen in part from the ambiguity of language, but more from a partial apprehension and wrong adjustment of the facts and principles of our complex nature. A striking fact, as of association, or a powerful princi- ple, as of self-love or sympathy, is seized upon and made to account for everything. It becomes the centre of a system having in it, perhaps, much tha is plausible, and much truth in its details, but as a system wholly false. Such systems are not useless. They insure a careftil examination of the facts made central ; the incidental truth involved, as in the treatise of Adam Smith, is often of much value ; and something is done in limiting and exhausting the possibilities of error. And not only are different systems produced from Different abovc causcs, but the moral problem the^t^oraf ^^^^^^ differently stated. By some it is problem. made an inquiry concerning the moral nature ; by some, concerning the nature of virtue ; by some, concerning the source and nature of right ; by some, after an ultimate rule ; and by some, afler the nature and foundation, or ground, of obliga- tion. This last I think preferable. In the fact of obligation all are agreed. All are agreed that all mankind are under obligation to do some acts and to abstain from others. Without obligation there *,an be no morality and no law, and a statement of the ground and conditions and limitations of obliga- tion, would be a statement of the theory of morals INTRODUCTION. 8 As I propose to use the term, a ground of obli- gation for us must presuppose a moral nature in as ; and the question what that nature is, is entirely different from any that may respect the ultimate ground or reason for its activity. The nature and constitution of the eye are one thing, the nature and constitution of light, without which the function of the eye could not be performed are another. The eye and light are related to each other, and each is so indispensable to vision that either might be said to be at its andation. But the questions in optics respecting the eye, and those respecting light, are entirely distinct ; and if the powers of the eye were regarded by one man as the foundation of the faculty of sight, and if the properties of hght were so regarded by another, and if, because they were using the same word, they were to go on under the delusion that they were treating of the same thing, it is easy to see the confusion that must ensue. In the same way the intellect, with its capacities and laws, is one thing, and truth, the object of the intellect, is another. These so imply each other that without truth the intellect could not act, and either might be said to be the founda- tion of mental activity. Here, also, there would be the same confusion if men were to mistake one for the other, or, without being aware of the transi- tion, were to apply the same terms to both. But this is precisely what has happened in specu lations on morals. Men have sometimes spoken of mT^ODUCTION. the various faculties and powers mvolved in the moral nature, such as conscience and free will, as lying at the foundation of obligation; sometimes they have spoken of that ultimate ground or reason in view of which alone the moral nature can legitimately act, and sometimes they have included both. The fact of this confusion is said hy Sir James Mcintosh to have been a great, and indeed the main reason of the confusion there has been in the perplexed speculation'^' on the subject of morals. Speaking of the difference c^^tween the *' Theory of Moral Sentiment," and the " Criterion of Mo- rality," he says : " The discrimination has seldom been made by moral philosophers ; the difference between the two problems has never been uniform- ly observed by any of them ; and it will appear in the sequel, that they have been not rarely alto- gether confounded by very eminent men, to the destruction of all just conception and of all correct reasoning in this most important, and perhaps most difficult, of sciences." But this confusion will not surprise us if we ob- serve how the speculations on these different sub- jects imply and almost necessarily run into each other. If we would understand optics, we must understand both the eye and light, and that not merely as they are in themselves, but as they are related to each other. If we would understand moral science, we must understand both the facul- ties which 8ct and thai in view of which they act INTRODUCTION. 5 but we must be careful to keep our speculations on the one subject distinct from those on the other. If I say that self-interest is the ground of obh'ga- tion I mean that it is that in view of which obliga- tion is affirmed by a moral agent fully constituted. If, on the other hand, I say that free will is the ground of obligation, I do not mean that it is that in view of which obligation is affirmed, but that it is a power essential to a moral agent, a necessary condition of the affirmation of obhgation by such an agent. If, again, it be said that self-interest is the ground of obhgation, and we would controvert that, we need to know what other possible grounds there may be ; if there may be what are called a prion grounds we must know that, and be able to state them, and this will involve the question of a 'priori knowledge and principles of action, and a decision of some of the highest and most disputed problems ")f mental science. Shall we then regard as the foundation of obliga- tion those faculties which are necessary The ground to constitute us moral beings ; or that in ?Lun^vilw view of which, we being thus constituted, obSat^nis obligation is affirmed ? With given facul- ties I see a crow flying over my head. In view of that fact I feel no obligation. With the same faculties I see a man in danger of drowning. In "^iew of that fact I do feel under obligation to aid aim if I can. Here is a ground of difference, and 6 INTRODUCTION. of obligation. What is that ground ? Is there any ground common to all cases? Without questioning what others have done, and simply desiring distinct- ness, I prefer to call that the ground of obligation in ^dew of which obligation is afBrmed. In seeking for this, however, we shall necessarily be drawn into an examination of those faculties and mental products on which moral agency is conditioned, for it must be remembered that that in view of which obligation is affirmed may itself, like the idea of right, be the product of mental agency. Moral philosophers have indeed been divided in- Dependence classcs, as they have belonged to on mental othcr of the two great schools science. ^£ mcutal scicuce that have divided thinkers from the time of Plato and Aristotle — in reality, as they have settled in one way or another the great problem of the origin of knowledge. A sensationalist, believing that all our knowledge is from experience, that there are no necessary prin- ciples, or forms of knowledge given by the mind itself, can believe in no a priori principles of moral- ity, and will, almost of course, adopt a low, fluctu- ating, and selfish system of morals. But one who finds in the mind itself as well as in the senses a source of primitive knowledge, given indeed, not without the senses, but on the occasion of them, oiay consistently, and will naturally, look ^to the same source for the principles, or elements, or prim- \tive facts, or ultimate ideas, or ground, or founda- INTRODUCTION. 7 cion, or whatever he may please to call it, of morals. Hence, the great battle of scientific morality is to be foup-ht on the field of mental science. On this field some, as those who so make the mind the product of organization as to bring it under the laws of matter and of necessity, and all, indeed, who deny the fact of liberty, so decide mental problems as to make morality impossible. Others necessitate a basis of self-interest, or of mere sentiment, while others still so solve these problems as to admit, in some form, of what may be called a rational system. Nor, I may remark in passing, need it discourage those who have not studied mental science formally, that moral problems strike their roots so deeply into that, for on this class of subjects sound judgment is native to the common mind. It is even true that wjiere accurate statement is most difficult, intuition is most certain, and when such statements are maoc they commend themselves with great readiness to the common consciousness. With this view of the ground of obligation and of the connection of mental with moral yarious science, we pass to consider some of the ^y^*^^™^- bystems respecting obligation and its ground which have been adopted by different philosophers. Of these the first commonly mentioned, as it wag the first in point of time among modern First theory systems, is that of Hpbbes. By him the tjround of obligation was found in the authority of 8 INTRODUCTION. the Civil Law. According to Hobbes, a regard to personal advantage is the only possible motive to human action. " Acknowledgment of power is called honor." Pity is the imagination of future calamity to ourselves." " Laughter is occasioned by sudden glory in our eminence, or in comparison with the infirmity of others." " Love is a concep* tion of his need of the one person desired." " Re- pentance is regret at having missed the way." There are no social affections, no sense of duty, no moral sentiments. As a desire for his own pleasure is supreme in every man, it will follow that the state of society is naturally one of war. But as nothing can so interfere with this supreme desire or end of man as war, it becomes obligatory on men to com- bine, by an expression of their common will in the form of law, for the preservation of peace : and as there is no other possible standard, it follows that men must be bound by the behests of law, whatever they may be, A system resting on a view of our nature so low and partial, and thus favorable to arbitrary power, was not fitted for permanence among a free people, and had nearly passed from remembrance, except .n the schools, when an attempt was made to revive it in connection with the enforcement of the fugitive slave law. This attempt gave rise to the expression 10 prevalent for a time, of " the higher law ; " and it really seemed at one time that we had a party among us who denied the existence of any sucb law. INTRODUCTION. S Of this system it has been well said, that it must either be right to obey the law and wrong to dis- obey it, or indifferent whether we obey it or not. [f it be morally indifferent whether we obey it or not, the law which may or may not be obeyed with equal virtue cannot be a source of virtue ; and if it be right to obey it, the very supposition that it is right implies a notion of right and wrong that is antecedent to the law, and gives it its moral effi- cacy. A second theory of obligation is that it is based on self-interest. Second the- ory ; self* Much might be said to show that this interest, was the system of Paley, whose work was formerly taught almost universally, both in England and in this country. Many things in his book are consis- tent with this theory only, while others would seem to imply that of general utility. Probably he did aot discriminate sharply between them. This system supposes the same low and imperfect view of the facts of oar nature as is implied in the preceding one. It fails to show the distinction between interest and duty, or why all actions that are for our interest, as a good bargain, are not vir- tuous. It ignores or denies the fact of disinterested affection, contradicting thus the general conscious- ness which attributes merit to actions in proportion as self is forgotten. As that which is the founda- tion of obligation should be supreme in our regard, this system would require us to regard self-interest 10 INTRODUCTION. supremely, and everything else as subordinate to that. It would thus be wrong to love God su- premely and our neighbor as ourselves ; and in- deed any high, or noble, or generous act would, according to this system, be either impossible or wrong. The plausibility of this system arises from the fact that self-interest has its place in one that is correct ; and also from the fact that men exalt self- interest so unduly, and do so generally make it practically the centre of their thoughts and actions. A third system founds obligation on utility. The Third sys- asscrtiou is, not only that we are under utility. obligation to do those things that are use- ful, but that their usefulness is the ground of the oblio-ation. To set aside this view it is only necessary to understand the meaning of terms. By a ground of obligation we mean the ultimate reason in view of which it is affirmed. But by its very definition utility cannot be ultimate. Some things," says Sir William Hamilton, "are valuable, finally, or for themselves — these are ends; other things are valuable, not on their own account, but as condu- cive towards certain ulterior ends — these are means. The value of ends is absolute ; the value of means is relative. Absolute value is properly called a good ; relative value is properly called a utility." Whatever is useful, then, can have value ^nly as it is related to the end which it may be INTRODUCTION. li ased to promote. A plough is useful, but only as it is related to the value of a crop. Unless there be ends that have value in themselves, means can have no value, and so nothing can be useful. But no one will contend that we can be under obligation to choose that as an ultimate and supreme end which can have no value except as it is related to an end beyond itself. The plausibility of this system is from the fact that we are so often under obligation to choose that which is useful, and from a failure, in doing this, to distinguish the ground from a condition of obliga- tion. The absolute value of an end may be the ground of obligation to choose it, but we can be under obligation to choose means only on condition that they shall be useful in attaining the end. Of course a system which should place obligation to choose an end on the ground of an intrinsic value that should have no end beyond itself, and so no utility, could not properly be charged with being a system of utility. The word utility expresses a relation — a relation between that which is valuable in itself and the means of obtaining; it. A fourth system, Fourth ® . */ system ; that of Dr. Wayland, bases obligation on wayiaud. the relations of one being to another. It is," says he, "manifest to every one that w^e all stand in various and dissimilar relations to all the sentient beings, created and uncreated, with which we are acquainted. Among our relations to created beings 12 INTRODUCTION. are those of man to man, or that of substantial equal- ity, of parent and child, of benefactor and recipient^ of husband and wife, of brother and brother, citizen and citizen, citizen and magistrate, and a thousand others. Now it seems to me that as soon as a human being comprehends the relation in which two human beings stand to each other, there arises in his mind a consciousness of moral obligation, connected by our Creator with the very conception of the relation." Here it will be observed that no enumeration of the relations on which obligation depends is at- tempted. Some are specified, and there are said to be a thousand others." Nor is any attempt made to show wliat is common to all these relations in virtue of which they are the ground of obligation. Relations as such cannot be the ground of obliga- tion. Why must these relations be between sensi- tive beings? Why are not all relations between sensitive beings, as those of time and space, the ground of obligation ? The relative height of two men, as tall and short, constitutes a relation, but not a ground of obligation. In themselves relations Have no value, and aside from the beings related they cannot exist. They cannot be made objects of choice or grounds of action. There is in them nothing ultimate. They are simply the occasion or condition of our ajiprehending a ground of obliga- tion that lies wholly beyond themselves. It is true that Avhatever we do we must do in some relation, INTRODUCTION. 18 and this gives the system its plausibihty ; but this incidental connection of relations with grounds of action that lie beyond them can never make them an adequate basis for a moral system. Analogous to this system of relations are two others — those of Dr. Samuel Clarke and Fifth and )f Wollaston. Of these the first founds teins ; Dr. oblio;ation on the fitness of thino;s : and the woiiaston. second on conformity to truth, or to the true nature of thino-s. A man owes a debt. It is accordino; to the fitness of things that he should pay it, and that fitness is the ground of the obligation. It is true that there is a difference between a man and a tree, and on the ground of this difference there is an obligation to treat them differently. Not to do so would be acting a lie, and so, according to Wol- laston, all immorality is an acted lie. Of these systems it is to be said that both fitness / ^ ^ and truth, as that is here used, express, not any- , thing ultimate, but only a relation. Between tlie ^ fact of the debt and its payment there is a fitness, tXX^v^ but it is not on the ground of its fitness that the I^iXm^*-'^^^ payment is to be made. The fitness has no value *^ in itself, and could exist only as the debt has value in some relation to an ulterior good. If there were no good of any kind to be gained by the payment of the debt — no satisfaction of any sentiment — \^ there would be no fitness in paying it. So of auth. It is true that there is a difference between \ man and a tree, and that they are to be treated 14 INTRODUCTION. difFerently, not however on the ground of the truth, which has value only for what it indicates beyond itself, but because a man is capable of a rational good and a tree is not. It is to be said, also, that both fitness and truth are terms quite too broad to be used accurately as the basis of a system, since there is a large class of fitnesses and of truths that have no relation to morals. To use a pen for writing is according to the fitness of things, and is a practical affirmation of the truth that the pen was made for that, but there may be in it nothing moral. Besides, there is as much fitness in an immoral act to produce evil as there is in a moral act to produce good, and it is as much according to the true nature of things that it should produce evil. It cannot, therefore, be either the fitness or the truth on which the ob- ligation depends. The plausibility of these systems is from the fact that all obligatory acts are in accordance both with the fitness and with the true nature of things, though these are not the foundation of the obliga- tion to do them. Another system of the same class is that of ^lu^'m; J^Jiiffroy, which makes order the basis of Joufifroy. obligation. This was mentioned by me \n my former volume, and I have nothing to add to what was then said. Order may be affirmed of mere physical being, in which tliere can be nothing moral. It expresses^rekti^^ INTRODUCTION. 16 ft can never be chosen for its own sake. Beings may place themselves in order for the sake of an end beyond, but not for the order itself. At least, such order cap'^ot be obligatory. It would be ab- surd for an army to preserve the order of its march if that would insure its destruction. The order of an army is for its safety and efficiency, and can be obligatory on no other ground. The same princi- ple apphes in all cases of order. It can never be so valuable as to become obligatory, except as sub- servient to an end beyond itself. From several passages in Jouflfroy it would appear that he identified the order of the universe with its end. Doing this, we can readily see how he might have adopted the system, but to do it is simply an abuse of terms. Order cannot be the end of the universe. That must be some good of the beings that compose the universe, which may or may not be attained by means of order. According to an eighth system, the will of God IS the ground of obligation. We are, it Eighth sys- is said, under obligation to do whatever of God. He commands, simply because He commands it. Philosophically this is the same doctrine as that of Hobbes, who referred everything to the will of the lawgiver, or of the law-making power, regarded Bimply as will, and accompanied by power. The question is, whether the will of any being, regarded simply as will and without reference to the ends ?hosen, can be the ground of obligation. It is true 16 INTRODUCTION. that the will of God is an infallible rule, and that we are to do unliesitatingly whatever He com- mands. It is true, also, that this can be said of no other will, whether of an individual or of any num- ber of individuals however organized. It is this fact, that the will of God is to be always and im- plicitly obeyed, that gives the system now in ques- tion its plausibility. But are we to obey his will simply because it is his will ? or from faith, that is, because we have adequate ground for implicit con- fidence in Him that his will will always be deter- mined^'by wisdom and goodness ? It is precisely j^here that faith comes in. God commands that for which we can see no good reason except that He commands it. He may even command that which, aside fi^om his will, shall seem opposed to all our apprehensions of what is right and best. This ren- ders faith possible, and famishes it with a distinct field for its conflicts and triumphs. But if his will, simply as will, be the ground of obligation, then faith is impossible, and that great bond and actu- ating principle of the social universe is annihilated. On this supposition all the acts of God would be equally right by a natural necessity, and the appeal of Abraham to God, Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right ? " was absurd. Again, there is nothing ultimate in will whether regarded as choice or as volition. In either case we distinguish between the act and the object. The act is for the sake of the object, and can nevej ge an end or object of choice for itself. INTRODUCTION. 17 Once more, on this supposition moral science is im- possible. Science supposes uniformity and grounds of certainty. These may be found in those grounds of action which ought to influence a free being, but never in the acts of such a being. The ground of our confidence that a free being will pursue a given course must be faith, and not science. This system has been strangely adopted under the impression that it honors God. It renders it impossible that He should be honored. The next system we shall consider is that of those who say that right is the foundation of Ninth sys- obligation. According to this, we are to do ^^"^ ' right for the sake of the right. This is, perhaps, the prevalent theory at the present time. On the face of it, nothing could seem simpler than this theory ; but the ambiguities of the word right have produced confusion. If we take right as an adjective expressing the quality of an action, and opposed to wrong, it is obvious that it cannot be the ground of obligation, because it expresses nothing ultimate, but onlj a relation. Used thus, the only conceivable meaning of the word right is either con- formity to a standard or rule, or fitness to attain an end. So it is commonly used by morahsts. Eight," says Paley, mean^ no more than conformity to the rule we go by, whatever that may be." " The adjective right," says Whew^ell, " means conform- able to a rule." He who solves a sum according tc 18 INTRODUCTION. ft rule does it right. In this sense simple rightness does not even involve a moral quality, and so cannot be the foundation of obligation. Whence then comes the moral quality ? Here is a right act that has no moral quality. Here is another morally right. Whence the difference ? This can be only from something in the rule, or standard, or end that lies beyond the act ; and if the moral quality come from one or the other of these, the obligation must' also. But whatever may be the origin of the moral quality in an action morally right, it is plain that the quality of an action can never be the ground oi an obligation to do that action. Look at this. A man does a wrong action ; he steals. He does not do this for the sake of the quality of the action — its wrongness ; but for the end that lies beyond the action. A man does a right action ; he gives money hi charity. He does not do this for the sake of the rightness of the action, but to relieve a case of dis- tress. If he were to do it for the sake of the rio-ht- ness of the act, the act would not be right. Think of a man's doing good to another, not from good will, but for the sake of the rightness of his own act. Think of his loving God for the same reason ! Cer- tainly, if we regard right as the quality of an action, uo man can be under obhgation to do an act morally right for which there is not a reason besides its being right, and on the ground of which it is right. That reason, then, whatever it may be, and not the rightness, must be the ground of the obhgation. INTRODUCTION. 19 But are we not under obligation to do what is morally right? Certainly, always. So are we always under obligation to do what is according to the fitness of things, and the truth of things, and the mil of God ; but these are not the ground of the obligation, and the quality of right in an action neither is, nor can be, the ground of the obligation to do it. Is there, then, in morals a right which is not the quality of an action ? Yes ; a man has rights. He has a right to life and liberty. Here the word right is used as a substantive, and means a just claim. This we understand, and the ground of it will be investigated hereafter, but it has no relation to our present subject. Is there still another sense of the word right? This is claimed, and in this too it is used as a sub- stantive, and with the article prefixed — ''the right." Can we here, as before, gain definite notions? I fear not. The term right,'' says Dr. Haven, in his excellent and popular work, — and he represents a large class of writers, — " expresses a simple and ultimate idea ; it is therefore incapable of analysis and definition." It expresses an eternal and immutable distinction, inherent in the nature of things." And not only right, but wrong is also 3ucli an idea, for he says, Might and wrong are iistinctions immutable and inherent in the nature of things. They are not the creations of expediency !ior of law ; nor yet do they originate in the divine 20 INTRODUCTION. character. They have no origin. They are eter- nal as the throne of Deity ; they are immutable as God himself. Nay, were God himself to change, these distinctions would change not. Omnipotence has no power over them, whether to create or to destroy. Law does not make them, but they make law. They are the source and spring of all law and all obligation." ^ I am of those who believe that there are simple and ultimate ideas. That of existence, or being, is one. All men have, and must have an idea of something, of themselves, as existing. Here we have the idea, and something actual which corre- sponds to it ; and I understand what is meant when it is said that existence, being, — not the idea, but the thing, — had no origin, and that it may be the source of law. Is then the idea of right such an idea ? Is there anything corresponding to the idea, but diflFerent from it, that has existed from eternity ? Is it like space, of which we might plausibly say that it existed independently of God and of all creatures, so that if they were withdrawn the eternal right would still exist? Is this true also of wrong ? If so, we might well, as some do, put right above God, and wrong too. This seems to be claimed, but cannot be, for we are told that " right and wrong are distinctions not things, but dis- tinctions immutable and inherent in the nature of things." But what things ? We are told again, I Moral Philosophy^ p. 47. INTRODUCTION. 21 " When we speak of things and the nature of things, as appHcable to this discussion, we do not of course refer to material objects, nor yet to spiritual intelli- gences, hut to the actions and moral conduct of intel- Hgent beings, created or uncreated, finite or in- finite." Here, then, we have moral action which is eternal and has no origin ; for if the distinctions be eternal, inhering in the nature of things, the things themselves in which they inhere must also be eternal. But further, if these eternal distinctions inhere in these eternal actions, what is this but to make them qualities of the actions, which, as we have already shown, would preclude the possibility of their being the ground of obligation to do the actions. We have also distinctions in moral actions — actions, observe, already moral, — which are the spring of all law and all obligation." But is this what the author really means ? Probably not, for he immediately adds, We mean to say, that such and such acts of an intelligent voluntary agent, whoever he may be, are, in their very nature^ right or wrong." This is quite diflferent from the proposi- tions with which we have been dealing. It simply amounts to saying that certain acts, not eternal, but such as you and I may do, are right or wrong, and that no reason can be given for it, except that they are so. Now I believe, and that, I suppose, is the real difference between us, the point on which this whole question turns, that when an action is right or wrong a reason can always be gi ren why it is so, 22 INTRODUCTION. and that in that reason the ground of the obligation is to be found. We are never to do, or to intend to do right for the sake of the right, but we are to intend to do that, the doing of which is right, for the sake of that which makes it right. The analogy is often insisted on, it is by Dr. Haven, between mathematical and moral ideas. Mathematical ideas and truths, it is said, are neces- sary and eternal. But how ? Is it meant that either ideas or truths can exist except in some mind? Is it meant that mathematical ideas are any more eternal in the divine mind than any other ideas that are there ? Is anything more meant than that, by the very nature of intelligence it is necessitated, if it act at all as intelligence, to form certain ideas, and also to assent to certain proposi- tions as soon as it understands them ? If this be all, and it could be so understood, it would sweep away much vague, not to say unintelligible phrase- ology. Certainly it enters into our conception of an intelligent being that he must have certain ideas, and into our conception of a moral being that he must have a knowledge of moral distinctions ; and if we suppose an intelligent and moral being to have existed eternally, we must also suppose, according to our inadequate mode of thinking on subjects invcJ- vmg the infinite, that certain intellectual and moraJ ideas have also been eternal, though in the order of nature the being must have been before the ideas. But this does not make these ideas in any sense in* INTRODUCTION. 23 dependent of God, or above him, or a fountain of law, or of anything else. It simply enables us to think of God as havmg always existed, and as hav- ing always had within himself the conditions of in- telligent, moral, and independent activity, so that he might himself, in his own intelligence and wis- dom, become the fountain of all law. When, as in the present case, the existence of a simple and ultimate idea is claimed, the appeal must be directly to consciousness. On this ground one may assert, and another deny ; and there is nothing more to be said. Neither argument nor testimony can avail anything. We can only so appeal to the general consciousness by applying tests as to show what that consciousness really is. This system will be referred to again. It is plausible, because every action that is obligatory is also right, as it is also fit, and according to the divine will. The only other system of which I shall speak is that of Dr. Hickok. According to him a reason can be given why a thing is right. " The highest good," he says — and in this I agree with him — " must be the ground in which the ultimate rule shall reveal itself." This is a great point gained. It concedes that right is dependent upon good of some kind, that is, that a reason can always be given why a thing is right ; and it only remains to inquire what that good is. But here, if I understand him rightly, I am still compelled to differ from my able and highly 24 INTRODUCTION. esteemed cotemporary. That good we are told is the highest good," ^' the summum bonum,^^ What then is that ? Says Dr. Hickok, The highest good, the summum bonum^ is worthiness of spiritual approbation." By this, it would seem, must be meant worthiness of approbation on the ground of the acts, or states, of our own spirits. The doctrine then will be, that the ultimate ground or reason why a man should do a charitable act is not at all the good of the person relieved for the sake of that good, but that he may preserve or place his spirit id such a state as shall be worthy of his own approba- tion. This is stated most explicitly. " Solely," says Dr. Hickok, " that I may stand in my own sight as worthy of my own spiritual approbation, is the one motive which can influence to pure moral- ity, and in the complete control of which is the essence of all virtue." ^ To those aware of the endless disputes of the ancients respecting the summum bonum^'^ further progress may seem hopeless if we must first decide what that is ; but it will be sufficient for our present purpose if we decide the province within which it is. By " the summum bonum " is generally meant the greatest good of the individual. That, it would Beem, must be meant here, because worthiness of approbation can belong only to the individual, and can be directly sought by tlie individual only for himself. But if this be meant, then the " summum hmum^'' and the end for which man was made, are 1 Moral Science, p. 60 INTRODUCTION. 25 not the same. Man was not made to find the ulti- mate ground of his action in any subjective state of his own, of whatever kind. He was made to pro- mote the good of others as well as his own, and the apprehension of that good furnishes an immediate ground of obhgation to promote it. The good of the individual is too narrow a basis to be the ground of obligation ; and besides, it is not in accordance with our consciousness to say, when we are laboring for the good of others, that the ultimate and real thing we are seeking is our own worthiness of approbation. But again, the man is worthy of approbation only as he is virtuous. It is virtue in him that we approve. But virtue is a voluntary state of mind, and that can never be chosen as an ultimate end. By necessity all choice and volition respect an end beyond themselves. But the ground of obligation, as we now seek it, is that ultimate end in view of which the will should act. As ultimate, the reason of the choice must be in the thing chosen, and not in the choosing. It is therefore impossible that any form, or quality, or characteristic of choice, any virtue, or goodness, or liohness should be the ground of obligation to choose. The same thing is to be said of law in every form, and for the same reason. Law can never be ultimate. In this case, as in most of the others, a rule may be drawn from that which is assumed as the ground pf obligation, because no man can be under obliga- 26 INTRODUCTION. tion to do anything that is not in accordance with his highest worthiness. This may be a criterion or test, just as the will of God or fitness is, of what he ought to do, but never a ground of the obligation to do it. Is it asked, then, what is your own system ? 1* is implied in the opening remarks of the chapter, is very simple, and can be stated in few words. In seeking the foundation of obligation, I suppose moral beings to exist. As having intelligence and sensibility I suppose them capable of apprehending ends good in themselves, and an end thus good that is both ultimate and supreme. In the apprehension of such an end I suppose the moral reason must affirm obligation to choose it, and that all acts that will, of their own nature, lead to the attainment of this end, are right. This puts man, as having reason, into relation to his end in the same way that the brutes, as having instinct, are put into relation to their end, and gives us a philosophy in accord with other philosophies of practical life. What is the philosophy of the eye ? It consists in a knowledge of its structure and use, or end ; and from these, and these only, can rational .•ules be drawn for the right use of the eye when well, or for its treatment when diseased. Knowing these, we know how we ought to use the eye. We know the ground of our obhgation in reference to it. It is so to use it that the end of the eye may be most perfectly attained. So we ought to use the INTRODUCTION. 27 eye, and the ground of our obligation is the fact ^^^^^^ that the eye lias relation to an end that has value in ^ itself. If it had not, we could be under no such ^//.^ ^ obhgation. The same is true of every part of the body, and of every faculty of the mind. And if ' ' true of these, why not of the man himself? Has he an end valuable for its own sake ? If not, what ' '-^w ^ is he good for ? But if he have such an end, why not, as in case of the eye, find in this end the . ..j reason of all use of himself, that is, of all rules of ^ ' conduct, and also the ground of obligation ? Can l"^^"^ there be anything higher or better than that a man , / should propose to himself and choose the attainment '^"^^""^(^v^ or advancement of the very end for which God made him ? What more can God ask of him — or man ? What more can he wish for himself? PART I. THEORETICAL. THE LAW OF LOVE. MAN CHOOSING UNDER MORAL LAW. L DEFINITION, AND PRELIMINARY STATEMENTS. Moral Philosophy, Ethics, Moral Science, is the science of man, choosing, and acting from choice, under Moral Law. This definition covers the whole field of moral action — duties to be done, rights to be Ground cov- ... ered by the respected and mamtamed, actions mor- definition ally bad, as well as those morally good. It goes back of conduct to those choices from which con- duct proceeds, and limits the field of moral action to such choices and actions from choice as are un- der Moral Law. The definition also recognizes the acknowledged dependence of Moral upon Men- tal Science. Of other definitions the following may be added : — " That science which teaches men their duty and the reasons of it." — Paley. " The science of Moral Law." — Wayland. The systematic application of the ultimate rule of right to all conceptions of moral con- duct." — Hickoh. ^' The science of obligation or duty." — Presi' dent Fairchild. 32 MORAL SCIENCE. In former editions, the science was defined as that which teaches men their supreme end, and how to attain it. In this, the moral element was assumed. In accordance with the above definition we need j-ivisionof fi^'^t, to know Mau in all that is requi- /"^Jueuton^" ^^^^ ^ condition to his choosing under .definition Moral Law. ~ ' h^" ^ 1^ t.L^v ^v. i (2.) We need to know him as choosing under Moral Law. ' ' ' C'^ ^^^v^^ These two give us Theoretical Morals. (3.) We need to know man as acting from jhoice under Moral Law. ^- a^-^^-^^^ This gives us Practical Morals, ^e thus have the division of our subject. What, then, does man need as prerequisite to his choosing under Moral Law? Since moral science is rational as well as moral, choosing within it must presuppose the intellect for insight and comprehension ; since it regards man as active, and only as active, it must pre- suppose the sensibility for motive, and the will for choice and volition ; and since he is to act un- der moral law, it must presuppose a moral nature to give moral ideas, and through which moral Jaw may be revealed. We can no more have moral science without a moral nature and moral ideas originally given, than we can have intellect- ual science witliout an intellectual nature, and intellectual ideas originally given. As moral sci- PRELIMINARY STATEMENTS. 33 ence is thus the outcome of the whole being, it can be conceived of only through the joint action of the intellect, the sensibility, the will, and the moral nature, and must therefore suppose man fully constituted as a Person. It has persons oniy nothing to do with things, or with the *f thf nature of things, but only with persons, nor has it anything to do with them except as they choose and act from choice. Of the above, the intellect, the sensibility, the will, and the moral nature, each is Personality essential to personality. They do not piex. constitute it as if the person were compounded of these, and so complex. They are, rather, different forms in which the one indivisible person is mani- fested. Nor is the moral nature anything differ- ent from intellect sensibility and will. It is the necessary manifestation of a personality that in- cludes the three. From man as thus constituted we have three sciences. From the intellect simply. Three sd- we have intellectual science including logic. From the intellect and sensibility combined, ^ we have aesthetic science, involving intellect and feeling, but not action ; and from the intellect, the sensibility, the will, and the moral nature com- bined, we have moral science. This is more com- plex, and so more ditficult. It involves, and is intended to control, the whole nature except that which is purely organic and spontaneous. DIVISION I. THE INTELLECT. In examining, then, the constituents of our be- ing as they are related to choice, the first to be noticed is The Intellect. Of this, the bearing upon choice is indirect. Indirectly Purc intellect cannot be a motive. For choice. that, some element from the sensibility must come in. ( The office of the intellect is to know what is, to judge of agreements or disagree- ments, to comprehend relations, and to furnish Underlies tliosc idcas by which we become rationaly^ choice. Without the intellect the ideas of a good, and of moral obligation, which underlie moral sci- ence, could not be formed ; but no knowledge of what is, or judgment of any kind, or idea from the pure intellect, can furnish a motive, or have authority. Knowing, comparing, comprehending, having ideas, as of obligation, formed by the joint action of the three great constituents of our being, and being free, our active principles hold a differ- ent relation to us from that which the instincts of the brutes hold to them. They are impelled di- rectly by instinct, that is, by an impulse to action INTELLECT. 35 without comprehending its end, and have no alternative in kind. We are free to choose be- tween principles of action comprehending their end, and have an alternative in kind. Thus it is that, through the intellect, choice, and action from choice, which is conduct, become the choice and conduct of a rational, and so of a moral, being. Thus it is that in moral science the intellect is not only essential for the knowing of the science, but as aiding to furnish a portion of its elements. THE SENSIBILITY. > CHAPTER L THE SENSIBILITY IN GENERAL. By the sensibility we feel. All feeling is the Is all feeling product of the Sensibility and, as we Bensibiiity? hold^ feeling is the concomitant of every form of conscious activity. That all knowing is by the intellect, and all choice and volition by the will, is conceded. Is it also conceded that all feeling is from the sensibility? This may be doubted. The sensibility is of great diversity, and it is conceded that the desires, the affections, the emo- tions, the passions, are forms of it. But in addi- tion to these there is feeling connected with the activity of the intellect and of the will that is simply tlie outgrowth or reflex of that activity. Through the intellect we have the enjoyment conoomitant that comcs from the pursuit and the ac- aai activity, quisitiou of truth. Tliis enjoyment is the reflex of the activity of the intellect, and is in- THE SENSIBILITY IN GENERAL. 37 separably connected with it. It belongs to man as rational, is of a quality peculiar to itself, and can be had in no other way. Is it from the sen- sibility or from the intellect? If the threefold division of the faculties is to be made thorough- going, it must be from the sensibility. That we have a satisfaction in the very act of knowing no one can doubt ; but if this satisfaction be not from the sensibility, it will follow that the sensibility is not distinctively the organ of feeling. We have also, involved in the activity of the will when it acts in accordance with the ^m_ac. moral nature, and inseparable from it, a satisfaction that is still higher and more intense. (Virtue is from the will as knowledge is from the intellect. Shall we say then that that satisfaction from virtue which is the reflex of the activity of the will, is from the will, or from the sensibility ? The latter is our only consistent course. If we are to have a sensibility at all, and define it to be the faculty of feeling, it would seem unreasonable not to refer to it one of the highest forms of feel- ing we have. Accepting then in full the threefold division of the powers, we say, that all knowledge is from the intellect, all feeling from the sensibility, and all choice and conduct from the will. And say ing this, we see what is meant when we Pursuit of say that we do an act for its own sake. ^rTts o*wn This is often said, and men are exhorted ^^^®* MORAL SCIENCE. to pursue knowledge, not for any utility con- nected with it, but for its own sake. Certainly knowledge may be pursued for the sake of an end beyond itself, as money, or fame. It may also be pursued with no thought of anything beyond the knowledge itself, and the satisfaction involved in its pursuit and attainment. It is then said to be pursued for its own sake, and the activity of mind in thus pursuing it is thought to be of a higher order. But would the knowledge be pursued if ^ • ' there were not_ thi^. satisfaction ? Clearly not. S ^uut^vA-cv^Q^ course there can be no activity in the first in- stance, because of the reflex of that activity. As in all our active principles, a spontaneous tend- ency is presupposed ; but if there were no satis- faction as the result of the activity, it would not be continued. And what is thus true of knowledge must be true also of virtue. \ Whatever the ob- Of virtue. . pi. , . . ject of choice may be, it is conceded that virtue consists in an act of the will, and that there is involved in this act an inseparable ^ / reflex action by which a saJbi^factiop^o^ high- est kind comes to the virtuous person. ) It is a consciousness of this satisfaction that I suppose to be identified with the act itself so as to form a part of it by those who say that they do the act for its own sake. As the act is voluntary, whatever the original impulse or motive may have been, if it were known that it neither did THE SENSIBILITY IN GENERAL. 39 nor could result in the good of the agent him- self or of any one else, it could not be ration- ally continued. From what has been said it will follow that there is no act of the will that is not aii motives / . ^ from the ^ preceded, prompted, and accompanied sensibility. by some state of the sensibility., All motives are from that. ' This is generally admitted. What we call rational motives are not from reason di- rectly, but are those which are shown by reason to be superior to others with which they are com- pared. With no desires or affections, no enjoy- ment or suffering, all of which are forms of the sensibility, there could be no choice, no volition, no voluntary action. But since moral action must be voluntary, it follows that there can be no moral action without a sensibility. And not only is moral action thus impossible without a sensibility, but so also are Moral ideas moral ideas. Except on the condition Z^'aslnT^ of beings who can enjoy and suffer, there can be no benevolence, no justice or injustice, no rights and no obligation, no right or wrong, and no moral law. Hence, again, as the existence of beings having a sensibility, and motives from that, is Moral ideas , . 1.1 1 relate solely a prerequisite to moral ideas, so those to persons, ideas can have no such relation to the nature of things as have those of space, and time, and math- ematics, but only to the nature of persons, and of 40 MORAL SCIENCE. these as capable of enjoyment and suffering, we/ shall then have to deal, not solely with the prod- \ nets of pure intellect, but with those of the in-*^ tellect, the sensibility, and will, combined. These "7 lie in a different field and aye of a different order. a CHAPTER IT. A GOOD. Understanding thus the relation of the Sen- Bibility to moral ideas and moral action, we pass < to the fundamental product given by it when act- ing normally. This is a good. Of the word good, the ambiguities have led to so much confusion, that we cannot be too careful respecting it. By a good^ I mean some result in a sensibility that has value in itself. This may be my own or that of another, but it must be known as having value in itself, or it cannot be a good. What then has value in itself ? Nothing exter- nal can have — nothing that is not subjective, and so the product of some activity within the being whose the good is. Not the activity is a good, but its result. Food, clothing, hou?^s, lands, have no value except as they are related to some want, — want lying wholly within the sensibility. To a disembodied spirit they could have no value. So of the products of art and of natural scenery. If there were no feeling of admiration, none of beauty or sublimity, they would have no value. 12 MORAL SCIENCE. So again of approbation, however expressed. If there were no result in a sensibility we should be affected neither by approbation nor disapproba- tion. There could be no reward or punishment, and so no government. We conclude then that a good is that which has A good uiti- value in itself, for its own sake, and that mate for the , ^ p i i • Bensibiiity. such good IS to be louud ouly m some result in a sensibility. This will be ultimate for the sensibility as truth is for the intellect. Con- cerning this, the question cannot be asked. What is it good for ? It is good for nothing beyond it- self. It has no utility. It is simply a good. As known by us, this good is the joint product of the sensibility and of the intellect. In its es- sence it is from the sensibility, but there must be intellect, that it may be comprehended in its idea as universally valuable, and to be chosen for its own sake. As thus known, we can not only choose it for ourselves and put forth efforts for its attain- ment, but can choose it for others and put forth efforts for its attainment by them. That which prompts the choice is the intrinsic value of the good ; that which prompts the effort is the desire to attain it for ourselves, or that it may be at- tained by others. As, then, a good is always subjective, it must Quality and be the result of some activity by, or good. within, the individual, and such good will differ both in quality and in quantity, accord- A GOOD. 43 ing to the source and degree of the activity. The quality will be high or low, as the powers or sus^ ceptibilities in action are high or low; and, within limits, the quantity will be as the degree of the activity. In quality, such good may pass from the lowest animal gratification to the highest forms of happiness, joy, blessedness ; in quantity, it will be limited only by the capability of the being to sustain the activity without injury. When a good is thus spoken of, the word good is used as a noun, and it would be well if the sense here given could be uniformly ^ adhered to, but it is not. When " the true, the beautiful, and the good," are spoken of, the good" evidently means goodness. So also moral good " is constantly used by eminent writers to signify goodness, whereas I mean by moral good the satisfaction that is inseparably connected with that form of activity which we call goodness, and think that any other use of the phrase must lead to confusion. If what has now been said of the word good, used as a noun, be accepted, we shall Theadjec- readily see what its meaning as an ad- ^^^^^soo^^- jective must be. Nothing will be good except as it is directly or indirectly, voluntarily or invol- untarily promotive of a good. This is obviously true of mere things whether beautiful or useful. If there be any thing which never has ministered or can minister to a good as above defined, that 44 MORAL SCIENCE. thing IS good for nothing. The value of such things is Avholly relative, and is in proportion to their adaption thus to minister. In the same way, substantially, the adjective good is applied to persons. A person is good who ministers voluntarily to the good of others. Such a person has goodness in its only proper, or at least, in its highest sense. In its proper sense goodness is a fixed purpose and disposition to min- ister to the good of others, and moral good is the satisfaction inseparably connected with such min- istration. To this satisfaction, the term " blessed," involving blessedness, was applied by our Saviour when he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive." If the above be correct, it will follow that ( neither knowledge as from the intellect solely, nor virtue as from the will, is a good. As has been said, from the activity involved in each there is a satisfaction high and peculiar, and that can be had in no other way, but this is properly from a pervading sensibility, as pervading as con- sciousness, and not from intellect and will regarded simply as powers of knowing and of willing. The good from virtue with the hope it embosoms is such that it may rationally sustain a man against all the might of nature. It is such as to make a true martyrdom possible, but the good is one thing and the virtue another. They are as distinct asr the fragrance and the flower. CHAPTER III. DrFFERENT KINDS OF ACTIVITY DETERMINING THE QUALITY OF THE GOOD. Since, as we have seen, the kind of activity de- termines the quality of the good, we next need to know what the different kinds of activity are. Of these there is a general division as the activity originates from without or from within, Susceptibii- . ities and irom the susceptibihties or the powers, powers. These words, susceptibilities and powers, point to a distinction that runs through our whole frame, physical and mental. In our physical constitution there is a double set of nerves, the afferent and the efferent, like the double track of a railway terminating in a metropolis. Provision is thus made for action upon us from without inward, which terminates in sensation, and for action by us from within out- wards, which originates in choice and volition. We are thus acted upon and we act ; we receive and we give. We receive first, and as a condition of giving, and there is a good in that; living and we also give, and in that there is a ^^^^^^'^^s- higher good, for it is more blessed to give than MORAL SCIENCE. to receive." Universally it may be said that ac- tivity from within, and its consequent good, is of a higher order than that from without, and the good from that. The application of terms here is not uniform, but in general it may be said that through the susceptibilities, the passivities, the movement from without inward, we have pleas- pieasure ^1^0 1 and that, through the activities, and joy ^j^^ choiccs, the volitions, the movement from within outward, we have joy, happiness, blessedness. And as these forms of good are dif- ferent in their origin, so are they in their quahty. By the one we are allied to the animals, by the other to the angels, being made through the power of rational activity and affection but little lower than they. For the one we are dependent on cir- cumstances, for the other on choice. And here it may be remarked that it is in this Twodirec- divisiou of our nature, and of the kinds activity. of good, that we find the two great direc- tions of human activity. The prevalent tendency of men is to remain in indolent passivity, enjoying the good there is in impressions from without, or, if they act, doing so for the sake of those impres- sions. Business men seek to surround themselves with the means of such impressions and of such good, and then retire. But the good that comes thus, wanes, in part by habit, and in part by de- cay of the organization. The deepest want is still anmet, and the unrest remains. It was of such QUALITY OF GOOD. 47 good that Solomon said " it is vanity ; " it was of such good that Mohammed constituted his Para- dise. But it is possible for man to subordinate passive impressions and the pleasures from them to some form of the activities. He may thus be- come a curse or a blessing. He may ravage a con- tinent through ambition, or may build up the spirit in greater efficiency for benevolent and holy activity. In doing this he will enter upon an up- ward and ever brightening path. In such activ- ity with its appropriate surroundings is the essen- tial idea of the Christian heaven. Of the good originated by movement from with- out there are varieties and gradations. Pleasures are higher and lower. And then there is an in- termediate region of art, sensuous, but interme- not sensual, and in which high forms ^^'^^^ ^^s^^^- of activity are blended with impressions from without. These, however, we need not here no- tice, but proceed to consider what are distinctively the active principles of our nature and the good from them. Active principles are indirectly known through their solicitations and promptings. The ^^^ive prin- principles themselves are that in our aM^ow^^^ constitution by which the solicitations, or cravings, or promptings occur when the occa- sion is given. They are not mere capacities, as the combustibility of wood, but are those in- stinctive tendencies towards the objects needed for our well-being which are the condition of ex- 18 MORAL SCIENCE. perience, or of any action at all. They suppose something outside of themselves in view of which they are originally called into spontaneous action with no knowledge by the person of the result. Perhaps the wisdom and beneficence of God are nowhere more distinctly shown in our constitu- tion than at this point. The body needs nourish- ment, and there is a principle placed in it by which there is a direct correspondence between the body of an infant and the milk drawn from its mother's breast. This principle abides and gives occasion to the appetite when the milk is needed. In consequence of this the appetite goes out spon- taneously, or, as some would say, instinctively, towards its object, and the result is found to be in this and in all analogous cases, a good either to the individual alone, or to both the individual and to others. But for such an immediate correspondence be- tween the constitution and something without there could be no original movement, and such movement is said to be for the sake of the object. It is in view of that, but not for that. These principles, whether physical or mental, reveal themselves both in attractions and repulsions, in affinities and aversions, and it might as truly be said of the aversions as of the attractions that they are for the sake of the object. No, they are not for that, but for the good of the being himself and of oth(TS. They were intended by God for tl'.at, and wlien the individual comes to QUALITY OF GOOD. 49 take himself under his own guidance he is bound to control all such principles, however they may re- veal themselves, for the same end. In themselves, so far as they are purely spontaneous, these prin- ciples have no moral character. As de- jno^ai signed by God, they may have for their ^^^^^^^er. object our own good or the good of others, but they are neither selfish nor benevolent. Moral character is shown in their control. - As differently manifested the principles that lead to action, called by Stewart active ciassm- principles, may be classified. They may too, like the forces of nature, the functions of the body, and the mental powers, be arranged as lower and higher on the principle of the conditioning and the conditioned. By Stewart, in his treatise on the active powers, they are classified as the Appetites, the Desires, the Affections, Self-love, and the Moral faculty. He thus makes the com- mon mistake of placing the moral faculty in the same relation to action as the rest and giving it an object of its own. The following arrangement of these principles that have corresponding objects I think prefer- able : — Moral Affections, Impulsive after choice. Sdf-bve7^' j National and Impulsive. Rights, Impulsive and Moral. Desir^"""""'' ! Impulsive before choice. 50 MORAL SCIEKCE. The place usually given to Conscience is above Moral Love, with Right for its object ; while the Moral Affections are not distinctively recognized. That the above are in their order as condi- tioning and conditioned will be readily seen. But for those below, the higher could not be, Lawofcon- 1^^ lowcr havc no agency in ^ntcondi- producing the higher. This is what I tioned mean by the law of the conditioning aiid the conditioned — a law that pervades the structure of the universe, and renders necessary an agent distinct from itself. This law is ex- plained in the " Outline Study of Man." It is suflBcient to say here, that by a condition I mean that in one being or thing which is indispensable to the being of another, but has no efficiency in A condition producing it. A condition is thus distin- notacause. g^;si^e(j fj^^^^ ^ causc. God is the cause of matter and of the universe, but not its condi- tion. Space is its condition, but not its cause. The foundation of a house is its condition, but not its cause, and any attempt to make it either the cause or a part of it is in violation of the common judgment as indicated by the settled usages of speech. Besides the foundation, there is needed a builder. In the same way the appe- tites, which are common to animals and men, are the condition, but not the cause of the higher powers that belong to man ; and in the series given, this principle applies all the way up. QUALITY OF GOOD. 61 Practically, the rank of these powers, and so that of the quality of the good from their Bank intui- activity, is known intuitively. Every known, man knows, and cannot but know, that the pur- suit of knowledge and the good from that, is higher, nobler, more human than that of sensual pleasure. It is only by the possession and exer- cise of noble faculties that man comes to a sense of dignity, and in such exercise he comes to it in- tuitively. No one who has not come to it thus can tell another, or be told, what it is. And as the sense of dignity is thus known, so is the rela- tive dignity of the different powers and their prod- ucts. This intuitive perception of an order of the powers as higher and lower, and of the correspond- ing quality of the good from them, is peculiar to man, and is a marked distinction between him and the brutes. Such recognition is sufficient for practice, but for the purposes of science we need a law. We need it not only to fix the quality of the different kinds of good, but, as will be seen hereafter, to fix the limit of action through the law of limitation drawn from this. Having then this law, and this arrangement from it, we notice briefly the several powers. CHAPTER IV. IMPULSIVE PRINCIPLES OF ACTION. THE APPETITES. These are desires, but tliey are made |b class by themselves, as originating from the body, as periodical, and as having a physical limit. The object of the appetites is the well-being of the body and the continuance of the race. The more prominent are three, hunger, thirst, and sex, but any periodical craving indicating a phj^sical want, as that for air or for sleep, is of the nature of an appetite. INSTINCT. That instinct has exclusive relation to the ap- petites, is not supposed, but it is placed with them as equally essential, and as most prominent in that connection. All spontaneous tendencies are of the nature of instinct, but in connection with appetite it is indispensable. If the young bird did not instinctively open its mouth it would per ish. So also would the lamb if it did not know in the same way where to seek for its food. As instinct is so far beyond the control of will, and as its function in man, after responsible action begins, IMPULSIVE PRINCIPLES OP ACTION. 63 is SO obscure, it is not usually treated of in moral science. THE DESIRES. As a good of some kind is the only ultimate ob- iect of choice, so desire is the chief, if The desires: , _ . _ . . . . their nat- not the only impulse to action m seeking ure. it, and indeed to any voluntary action. He who desires nothing will hope for nothing, will fear nothing, and will do nothing. If there be aver- sion, it will abide as a mere feeling till a desire to be removed from the hated object leads to action. Originally, the immediate objects of desire re- lated to our constitution as a means of good were individual, but these were readily classified, so that the objects of the desires are now expressed by general terms. What we now call the desire of property originally revealed itself in the desire of some particular thing ; and so of the others. Desire passes up as an element into the affections. There can be no love where there is no desire for the good of the object loved. It also passes up and blends with each of the principles of action above it. The desires being all of the same order, it was hardly to be expected that the law of order of the conditioning and conditioned should ap- ply to them at all, and certainly not in so pro- nounced a way as to different orders of powers. Besides, as they are more intimately related, the diJficulty from interdependence, as recognized in 54 MORAL SCIENCE. the Outline Study when arranging the functions of the body, would be greater. Still, the attempt to arrange them in part according to that law was made, and the desires of continued existence, of property, of knowledge, of power, and of esteem, were placed vertically in the order now mentioned, as lower and higher ; while those of good, of lib- erty, and of society, were placed by their side as blending with the others. Probably all would agree that there is room here for something of the kind, but would not agree upon the order. Ac- curacy here is not of the first importance; but perhaps we may be aided in our estimate of their relations if we place them all in a vertical line and divide them into two equal parts, thus : — Esteem, Power, Knowledge, Property, Society, Liberty, Good, Continued Existence. Of these the four lower are of things into which we naturally come without labor, and are the con- dition of the successful pursuit of those above. Of these several desires I have treated slightly in the Outline Study, and more fully in my Lec- tures on Moral Science, and nothing further need be said of them here, excepting a word respecting liberty and good. BIPULSIVB PKINCIPLES OP ACTION. 65 By liberty here is not meant the liberty of man as a moral being, that is, liberty of Desire for choice. That liberty he does not desire. He has it by necessity, and as a part of his being. The liberty desired is freedom from unjust re- straint by the will of another. The desire for good is altogether peculiar as not only blending with the others and al- Desire for ways present with them, as the idea of existence is with all our thoughts, but as that which gives to the objects of the desires, and to the desires themselves as a part of the constitution, their whole value. It is also peculiar because a good is the only thing that has value in itself, and is that ultimate end in all forms of activity that has no utility, and can never be directly sought for. All we know of our being is its activities and their results. The activities are in part directly subject to our will; the results only indirectly, or not at all. There are other ends, as the growth of plants and our own growth, that can be sought only indirectly; but they are of no value except with reference to a good either of our- selves or of others. If there were no conscious be- ing capable of a good, the material universe, how- ever beautiful or vast, would have no value. It is with relation to this that our being is constituted, and neither reason, nor Scripture, nor an enlight- ened conscience, ever requires of us anything that would not be for our own highest good, and, what 66 MORAL SCIENCE. is always coincident with that, the highest good of others. If Christ commands a man to "lose his life," it is that he may " find it; if to "hate his life in this world," it is that he may "keep it unto life eternal." These peculiarities of a good as the only object of desire really ultimate, and as incapable of be- ing directly sought, are worthy of careful atten- tion. They show us at once of how little value external things may become, and, do what we may ourselves, how constantly and entirely we are de- pendent on an agency not our own for any good we may enjoy. THE NATURAL AFFECTIONS. These differ from desires in their object. The Natural af- obicct of the desircs is thinejs. The ob- fections. • /. i , . . Their Ob- icct of the natural affections is sentient jects, nat- , i • n r^^^ (V ure, and bcinsfs, chieflv pcrsous. The affections classifica- ^ *^ ^ * tion. are more complex. Desire enters into them, and so is a condition for them ; but in their distinctive character the affections are the oppo- site of the desires. The desires receive ; the af- fections give. Though not selfish, the desires have reference to self, the affections to others. True, as the desires are ou7' desires there is a re- flex of good to us; but that is not thought of. If it could be, and become the motive, the distinct- ive element of affection would be lost. Affection is disinterested. It must be, or cease to be at BIPULSIVE PRINCIPLES OF ACTION. 67 all. Hence, and as spontaneous, its beauty. As purely natural it has no moral character ; but moral character is shown by dwarfing it through selfishness and vice, or by giving it all the play the higher powers will allow. Natural affections are of great diversity, and the character of them changes with their object. The affection of the parent for the child is different from that of the child for the parent. The affection of the brother for the brother is not the same as that for the sister. These affections are usually classified as benev- olent and malevolent. A better nomenclature would be, beneficent, defensive, and punitive. Nothing either benevolent or malevolent can be- long to natural affection, but let any one come be- tween the affection and its object, and the energies of the being will be arrayed in opposition in pro- portion to the strength of the affection. The de- sires are for the well-being of the individual, the affections for the preservation of the race in early life, and for the well being of society. EIGHTS. It is with hesitation that I place rights among o'lr active powers, and next in order. I Rights why hesitate first, because no one, so far as I among act- know, has placed them there; and second, p^ies^"^" because they involve an element from the moral nature, which has not yet been reached. They are 58 MORAL SCIENCE. among our active powers only as the idea of a right is associated with a desire or an affection ; but thus associated they are among the most pow- erful. Men fight for their rights, and feel justi- fied and ennobled in doing so. The idea of the right of a man to himself, that is, to the unob- structed exercise of his powers for their legitimate ends, is immediately given by the moral reason in connection with the exercise of those powers. This idea is fundamental in moral action, and per- vasive like the atmosphere. It stands ready to rush in at any point that is opened for it by the operation of a specific desire. Like its twin idea of obligation, it may stand by itself, or it may be- come, when associated with a desire or an affec- tion, the leading feature in a principle of action and give it its name. It is just thus that we get a new principle by the combination of the element of affection with desire. Having then an original desire for property, the idea of a right immedi- ately combines with it when that is brought into action, and becomes the leading feature of the whole. I therefore venture to place as springs of action next above the affections, those rights that spring from the desires, as the right to life, to property, to freedom, to reputation, and the still more sacred rights that spring up in connec- tion with the affections. CHAPTEE V. RATIONAL PRINCIPLES OF ACTION. SELF-LOYE. This has for its object our own good. In com- mon with the principles of action already object and , . . T ... T nature of mentioned it involves an instinctive tend- seii-iove. ency, and, in addition, a rational apprehension of good as valuable in itself, together with a compar- ison of the means of attaining it. In the lower principles of action there is a direct correspond- ence between the principle and its object, and so no comparison. Each separate principle tends di- rectly to its own object, and so, without some governing principle, they would become a mob. But here there is comparison, and if self-love be true to its own function, there will be a choice of that which is highest and best for us. This gives us from the principle itself of self-love, in addition to the good from the active principle adopted, a rational satisfaction and sense of dignity in secur- ing our own highest good. This we have because there -is in self-love, and in securing our highest good, both rational activity and dignity. When a being comes to know himself as rational and 60 MORAL SCIENCE. moral, with impulses that are to be controlled, there is involved in that the activity of reason and conscience, and a conception of the highest good that is possible for a rational and moral being of a seif-ioTe given capacity. It is this good that is ^^^^^ the proper object of self-love. It is a high and ineffable good, and the pursuit of it is as much a duty as the pursuit of the good of our neighbor. Why not? God estimates it as highly. He is as desirous it should be attained, and he has intrusted the attainment of it especially to us, and in the choice and pursuit of such a good there is a consciousness of dignity and worthiness wholly apart from any good that may come from the activity of any particular desire or affection. There is just now a tendency to confound self-love with seltishness, or, if that be not done, to dispar- age efforts for our own good as compared with those for the good of othei'S. Such efforts are not to be degraded from the high plane of duty. In- deed the choice by each man of his own highest good is a duty to others and to God as well as to himself, for the moment an inferior good Eelfishnefls. . , i r» i i IS chosen as supreme, seli-love becomes belfishness in its principle, and will be sure to manifest itself as such. No man can do this and give God and his fellow-creatures their proper place. Next above self-love, and as having an object of its own in the same way, is, BATIONAL PRINCIPLES OF ACTION. 61 BATIONAL LOVE. For this, self-love is a condition. Without a knowledge in our own experience of what a good is, and of its value, we can have no conception of the good of another, and no wish for it. But self-love being criven, we shall have in Elements of • r» 1 • 1 r» • 1 rational the formation of this love, first m the love order of time, an idea of the worth or value of the being as distinguished from his worthiness. This involves an appreciation of both the capa- bilities and liabilities of the being. This, how- ever, is rather a condition of the love than one of its elements. Second in the order of time, though first in that of nature, we have what Ed- wards calls a " propension " of mind, or, as Dr. McCosh calls it, an " appetency " towards the be- ing, and a desire that he should attain his end. This is an indispensable element of the love, but not the love itself. It is spontaneous, and may- be overcame by other forms of spontaneous action. That it may become rational love there must be (third) a choice for the being of his end and good, and such a devotement of ourselves to him, that is to the attainment by him of his end and good, that we shall be willing to make sacrifices for it as we would for our own. Of this love the central element is choice, — the choice choice the • -I TP! i» 1 1 (• central ele- 01 the good of others for the sake of ment. that good. If it be not for the sake of that it is 62 MORAL SCIENCE. not disinterested, it is not love. This choice is to be made in view of the capabilities and liabilities of others, without reference to their moral char- acter or to their relation to us as friends or ene- mies. In no other way can we understand the command of Christ to love our enemies; in no other way can we follow his example. Here the governing motive is not a sentiment, or impulse from behind, but an apprehension of reasons placed before us. It involves the will; and if it do not so involve it that impartial efforts would be made for the good of others as for our own, it is not the love which our moral nature de- mands, and which the Scriptures demand as the fulfilling of the law. The capacity for this love distinguishes man Rational from all creatures below him. It is ra- tinctive pre- tional, because none but a rational being rogativeof i i ii t i man. can Comprehend the good and measure its value ; and it is moral, because it is demanded by the moral nature, and so demanded as to be involved in and to limit all the virtues. As the idea of being underlies and is involved in all our thinking, and as the idea of a good underlies and is involved in all our choosing, so the idea of love underlies and is involved in all the virtues, and is so involved in them as to give them their limit. It is what the moral law demands as affirm- ing obligation; it is what it limits as guarding rights, if that can be called limitation which ia RATIONAL PRINCIPLES OF ACTION. 63 but another aspect of love. The guardianship of rights is that office of loye that gives it an aspect of severity. It is in this guardianship Rational that we find justice and its cognates. If justice, there were no rights to be guarded there, could be no justice. But justice has no absolute claim like that of love. If it had, mercy would be im- possible, since there can be no mercy where law is concerned unless punishment might be justly inflicted. As law has its origin in love, having always for its end the best good of those under it, there can be no real contrariety between them, and no apparent contrariety till the subject of law incurs its penalty. Then law, supposed to be just, can know no mercy; and love, as the originator of law, can know no expedient that will set it aside. To the law of love there can be no exception; but the claims of justice may be set aside in favor of that higher and more com- prehensive law if that can be done, not only with- out the violation of any right, but with the full or even fuller security of all rights. This, we be- lieve, can be done, and has been done ; and when this is done, ''mercy rejoiceth against judgment." To express this love, benevolence would be the best word if it were not ambiguous; but Benevoienc© it has been mischievously so. By some ^^^^s^ous it has been made identical with the love cora- \aanded by the Scriptures, and so inclusive of all the virtues. By others it has been regarded, as 64 MORAL SCIENCE. in part at least, an impulsion wliicli we share in common with the brutes; and others still have viewed it sometimes in one aspect and sometunes Dr. Alex- ^^^^^ Other. Sajs Dr. Archibald Alex- ^ ander : No doubt much that deserves the name of virtue consists in good-will to others and in contributing to their welfare ; but it is not correct to confine all virtuous action to benevo- lence. We can conceive of benevolence in a being who has no moral constitution. Something of this kind is observable in brute animals." ^ Again, j5jj,i^^p Bishop Butler says, as quoted by Dr. Butler. Alexander : ^ Without inquiring how far and in what sense virtue is resolvable into be- nevolence, and vice into the want of it, it may be proper to observe that benevolence, and the want of it, singly considered, are in no sort the whole of virtue and vice." But in his sermon on the love of our neighbor he says: "And therefore a disposition and endeavor to do good to all with whom we have to do, in the degree and manner in which the relations we stand in to them re- quire, is a discharge of all the obligations we are under to them." He says further : " It might be added that, in a higher and more general w^ay of consideration, leaving out the particular nature of creatures and the particular circumstances in which they are placed, benevolence seems in the strictest sense to include all that is good and 1 Moral Science, p. 164. ^ Ibid, p. 166. KATIONAL PRINCIPLES OF ACTION. 65 worthy, — all that is good which we have any- distinct, particular notion of, We have no clear conception of any positive, moral attribute in the Supreme Being but what maj^ be resolved up into goodness." The bishop even speaks of benevolence as entering into our love of God, which some are slow to allow. He says : " That which we call piety, or the love of God, and which is an essen- tial part of a right temper, some may perhaps im- agine no way connected with benevolence. Yet surely they must be connected if there be indeed in being an object infinitely good." With this ambiguity in the word, it is not surprising that those really in accord should have seemed to differ. CHAPTER VI. ^ THE MOEAL AFFECTION'S. We have now completed thelist of direct active principles before acting, that is, before a generic choice is made. When such a choice is made, especially if it be a choice of some good regarded as ultimate and supreme, we may be said to create for ourselves active principles that are spontane- ous, but that have, as determined by choice, a moral character. Spontaneous action is never either free or responsible except as it is deter- mined by voluntary action. Active principles thus generated are the MORAL affections, and the difference between these and the natural affec- tions is, that the moral affections, though seem- ingly spontaneous in the same way as the natural affections, are conditioned upon a previous choice, and derive their character from the character of that. That the moral should have been confounded Natural and with the natural affections is not sur- tions. prising. The difficulty has been in a failure to perceive the relation just stated of our generic and radical choices to subsequent spon- THE MORAL AFFECTIONS. 67 taneous action, the character of which is yet de- termined by the choice. This relation is so inti- mate that even where the choice is not of the most radical kind, it will yet so control the char- acter of a large class of desires, of affections, hopes, fears, and subordinate choices as to cause them to be the reverse of what they would have been. Two men, who, with a full apprehension of the principles involved, took opposite sides in our civil war must have had opposite desires and affections, and the events that caused hope and joy to the one must have caused fear and sorrow to the other. But all this is to be traced back to the original choice. That determined the leaders under whom they served, the army in which they marched, the friendships they formed, and very largely the direction and spontaneous movement of their whole sympathetic and emotive nature. And this, with the exception that the choice is more radical and all-pervading, is what takes place under the moral government of God. By a thorough choice of Him and his cause, the whole current of the soul, all its motives and subordi- nate choices, its dispositions and tempers, its de- sires and affections, its hopes and fears, its joys and sorrows, and its ultimate destiny will be the reverse of what they would have been if an opposite choice had been made. All these are spontaneous, are independent of volition ; we are responsible for them, but only through their rela- MORAL SCIENCE. tion to that generic and permanent choice which determines character, and in which character con- sists. It is but recently that the distinctive character of these affections has been seen, and hence they have not been placed as a separate class among our active principles. By some the emotions are classed as active Emotions principles, and active principles are not Rctiv© principles classed with emotions; but no pure emotion, that is, no emotion destitute of the ele- ment of desire, belongs here. Neither joy nor sorrow is an active principle. These are emotions that result from our active principles in success or defeat, but the emotions themselves are not active principles, nor, according to any proper usage, are the active principles emotions. DIVISION m. THE WILL. Haying thus considered the sensibility as it is related to choice, we pass to the third great divi- sion of our nature, the will. Of will there are two functions — choice and volition. These two, with rational in- Twofunc- tellect and sensibility as their condicion, wui. fit man to have dominion — dominion first over himself, and then over nature and all inferior creatures. Of these two functions choice is the chief. In that alone is freedom, in that moral quality. In its nature choice is free. If it be not, it is not choice. Man is under a necessity of choosing, but what he shall choose he himself freely determines. Freedom in choosing, being an essential mode in which our being is mani- fested, is as certainly known as the being itself. Not more certainly does man know the act of choosing than he knows its quality as free. The act itself is immediately known, and so cannot be proved. It is too certain for that, and the same may be said of its quality as free. Men may deny freedom in words, but they universally affirm it in 70 MORAL SCIENCE. their actions, and treat eacli other as if they sup- posed themselves and others to be free. Choice is completed, and responsibility under When re- moral govcmment incurred, when the is incurred, choicc is fully made. No outward act is needed. A choice that will revolutionize a nation may be made in the quiet and darkness of midnight, and may abide for an indefinite time simply as a choice. As thus completed by an immediate act, choice requires no means. Hence outward force cannot so reach it as either to compel or prevent it. Hence too, as the ques- tion, How? always has reference to means, no one can tell another how to choose. No one can tell a child how to love its father, or a man how to love God. It will follow also, since no outward force can compel choice or prevent it, that there can be no excuse for making a wrong choice, or for not making a right one. The cause must be wholly within the man, and within him regarded as free. Choice is either specific, or generic. A specific specific and choice is the choice of a single object. A choice^ generic choice is the choice of an end that can be attained only by a succession of subor- dinate choices and volitions ; or, which is mucli the same thing, the choice of some one principle of action to which others are to be subordinated. Of generic choices there is a great variety as they are more or less generic. The choice of a pro. THE WILL, 71 fession is a generic choice ; but the most generic choice possible is that by which a man accepts or rejects the law of his being, that is the moral law. In doing this he disposes of himself. This he alone, of all creatures on the earth, can do, and that he can do this is his great distinction. He can accept the law of his being and be wise, or reject it and be a fool. No being below man is capable of being wise, or of being a fool. Choice may be either between good of the same kind, as greater or less, or between good choice be- of different kinds, as higher or lower, things. When it is between good of the same kind, it is between things; when of different kinds, between different principles of action. Thus if between the sense of taste only be addressed the P^i^^^^pi^s- choice may be between an apple and a pear, but it may also be between the indulgence of appetite and the desire of knowledge, or any of the higher forms of activity. In either case the choice pre- supposes a knowledge by the intellect of that which is to be chosen, and an apprehension through the sensibility of some good on the ground of which it is to be chosen. Volition, the second and secondary constituent of will, is always preceded by choice, choice pre- not only by a choice that may be held tion. in abeyance, but by an immediate choice to put it forth. The choice between an apple and a pear 72 MORAL SCIENCE. may be made long before either is taken, but the moment comes when the choice is made to put forth the volition, and the office of that is to originate the movement by which the apple or the pear is taken. DIVISION IV, CHAPTER 1. r THE MOBAL NATURE. Fkom this the moral law proceeds when a man is a law to himself; and through it that same law is recognized when it is revealed directly and in its fullness by God. By a nature we mean a constitution such that on given conditions certain results will a nature, uniformly follow. Of the origin of ^^^w^^^^^- what is thus called a nature no account can be given. That it is can be known only by phe- nomena uniformly manifested ; nor can we know anything of the origin of the phenomena except their conditions. The conditions being given, fire will uniformly barn, and hence we say it is the nature of fire to burn. Because the ox uni- formly eats grass and the lion flesh, we say it is their nature to do so. Because sensation uni- formly occurs in us on certain conditions, we are said to have a sensitive nature. In the same way we say that mankind have uniformly, on cer- tain conditions, moral ideas and feelings, and hence that they have a moral nature. We say T4 MOBAL SCIENCE. that it is as natural and necessary for a man to be conscious of rights, and to feel under obliga- tion to do some things and to abstain from others, as it is to think or to feel. Endowed as he is, he cannot help thinking. If he could he would not have an intellectual nature. In the same way, if he could avoid having moral ideas and feelings he would not have a moral nature. This nature reveals itself, first, through the Revealed in ^OY^X ov practical rcasou, in the recogni- tk)n^or°^^' ^^^^ rights. No one can exercise his rights. powers legitimately without a recogni- tion of his right to himself, that is of his right to use his natural powers for their natural ends with no interference from any one else. This idea of the right of a man to himself is involved in the very exercise of his powers, and is revealed in connection with every active principle of our nat- ure. Has man an original desire for property, constituting it an end and a good ? Then the idea of a right to property will reveal itself in connection with that desire, and no mere expedi- ency, nor any law except that of necessity, may interfere with that right. The idea may not come into prominence till the right either is, or is at- tempted to be, infringed, but then our nature is stirred to its lowest depths. Rights are not prin- ciples of action except as they need to be de- fended. As thus corresponding to a right on the part of THE MORAL NATURE. 75 others obligation can be defined, and enforced. Such obligation was formerly called perfect, while one that could not be thus defined and enforced was called imperfect. According to this the ob- ligation to pay a debt would be perfect ; to give something in charity, imperfect. Whewell would limit the word to the first sense, but as commonly used, and as I use it, it transcends the region of rights, and is coextensive with the words ought, and duty. But with the idea of a right comes also the idea of obligation, for these are reciprocal, ideaofobu- If I have a right to myself, others must ^fifgJi^ts re- be under obligation to respect that right, ^^^p^o^^i- and I must be under obligation to abstain from interfering with the right of another to himself. It is affirmed, not solely on the ground of the rights of others as made known through our own, but also on the ground of their worth, and of our capacity to do them good. And here it may be noticed that these two forms, in which the moral nature reveals scriptural itself, are recognized by our Saviour in ofThTtwo" the two fundamental precepts of the moral law given by Him. One of these corre- sponds to the first and lower form, in which the moral nature is manifested through the constitu- tion, and the other to the second and higher form. The precept, " AH things whatsoever ye would T6 MORAL SCIENCE. that men should do to you, do ye even so to them," is given solely with reference to our con- duct towards men. It founds itself on our moral nature as intuitively made known on the side of rights, and could be interpreted only by one knowing, not his own wishes, but his own rights and the claims of humanity, and tbrougii these knowing what others would have a right to expect from him. It is the whole law as the moral nat- ure reveals itself on the side of rights and with reference to man, but not the whole as that nat- ure reveals itself on the side of capacities and with reference both to man and to God. We need then the higher and broader precept, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and thy neighbor as thyself." The first precept is " the law and the prophets." It is what they taught, but on the second " hang all the law and tlie prophets." It is said that Con- fucius and other philosophers have so far under- stood our nature as to give the first precept, but Christ alone has risen to the comprehension and grandeur of the second. As a product of the moral reason, this idea of Obligation obligation is peculiar, because it is re- Jli'oducL^ hited to each division of our complex nature. As related to the intellect, it is an idea ; as related to the sensibility, it is a feeling ; and is related to the will, it is a command. We call THE MORAL NATUEE. 77 it sometimes one and sometimes tlie other. It ia not a mere idea, or a mere feeling, or, like beauty, a sjaithesis of the two. It is also an imperative, the " categorical imperative." It is commonly- called an impulse, and an authoritative impulse. Dr. Wayland calls it so. But no impulse has au- thority. It is not an impulse in the ordinary sense of that word, since its action is directly upon the will, and its function is, not to impel a man directly towards any particular course, but, when two principles of action are in question, a higher and a lower, to require the will to choose the higher. Like the other constituents of our personality, the moral nature is active from the first, Automatic that is, from the beginning of our moral moral uai?^ life. This is true, as in the appetites, while there is yet no knowledge of results. Chil* dren and persons the most ignorant have at once, in connection with their active principles, an idea of rights, and so of justice. They have an im- mediate recognition that something is due from others to themselves, that is, of rights, and recip- rocally, that something is due from themselves to others, that is, of obligation. Under these ideas the moral life is developed, but they do not suf- fice for a philosophy. If we would have conditions that, we must take possession of our act- losophy. ive principles, must know them in their relation to each other, and be able to accept and justify 78 MOKAL SCIEKOE. them in the eye of reason, by the results they would produce. If we see that obligation is pri- marily obligation to choose, and that it always demands the choice of the higher principle of ac- tion and of the higher good, we may rationally accept it as aflBLrming the law of our life. CHAPTER n. MORAL IjAW. Haying thus a moral nature and moral ideas, man becomes subject to moral law. To know what moral law is, we need to distin- guish it from other kinds of law. Law is spoken of as natural, civil, and moral, and these need to be defined separately, for I know of no definition that will cover all the senses in which the general term, law, is used. We have then, first, natural law. A natural law is a uniform fact, implying a force Natural that acts uniformly and is independent ^'^^^^ of human will. If, as in gravitation, the rule in accordance with which the force acts is known, that enters into our conception of the law. Of law as thus understood, there are several varieties, as physical, vital, mental, in varieties each of which there is a force uniformly naturii law directed to an end. Up to a certain point, the mind is subject to this kind of law no less than matter. These laws, or more properly uniformi- ties, are the basis of experience, are the condition of education, and of that intelligent activity by which means are adapted to ends. 80 MORAL SCIENCE. Under natural law all things come alike to all. Peculiarities Accidcnt, imprudencB, willful exposure, of natural t, t , law. are treated alike. It may even be a duty to incur injury by what is called the viola- tion of a natural law. One who should be scorched in an heroic effort to save life would not be said to be punished. Indeed, whatever harm may come under natural law does not, as in other cases, come from breaking the law, for a natural law cannot be broken by one under it. The harm comes, as in falling from a precipice, not because a natural law is broken, but because it is perfectly obeyed. Civil law is the expressed will of the supreme authority of the State in the form of a Civillaw 1 T . 1 1 T command, and with a penalty annexed. It may be righteous or unrighteous. It takes no cognizance of motives, but has for its object the control of the outward actions of men so far as they relate to the rights of others. As affecting the will it reaches only to volitions. Moral law is law which moral beings are at Moraiiawai- all times uuder obligation to obey. It ways bind- , , . t . , ing. IS binding upon every moral creature under all circumstances. To a moral law there • can be no exception. If there can be an excep- tion to what purports to be a moral law, it is not a moral law, but a general rule that is to be in- terpreted as the case demands. If man is to be ^ law to himself, moral law must proceed from MOEAL LAW. 81 the moral nature, and as thus proceeding it will have, according to what has been said, fj^^^^ two branches, — the law of righteous- ness, and the law of obligation. The law of right- eousness respects rights, and its precept is. No right may be violated. The law of obligation re- spects principles of action as higher and lower, and good as varying in its quality, and as greater or less. Its precept is. Choose for yourselves and for others the higher principle of action, and the nobler and greater good. These taken together are the moral law as derived from the moral nat- ure. To this law there can be no exception, in this world or any other. Of this law the under- ^ lying idea is that of a good. Without that idea^ there can be no idea of rights, or of an obligation to do anything for ourselves or for others. As we shall see hereafter, this law in its coincident two branches is coincident with the law love. of love. No one who loves another can violate his rights, or fail to do for him what obligation demands. When moral law, in either form of it as pre- sented above, is placed before an unper- obligation verted moral being capable of under- affirmed, standing it, obligation to obey it is intuitively and necessarily affirmed. If it were not, man would not have a moral nature. The obligation is at first recognized in a particular case, but immedi- ately and necessarily, not by generalization or iu- 6 82 MORAL SCIENCE. duction, assumes a general form. It is thus, by the resolution of the two branches of the law into the law of love, that moral law is the law of obli- gation. Where there is obligation there is moral law, and where there is no obligation there is no moral law. This affirmation of obligation implies both a A law and commaud and a penalty, and thus be- a rule. couies law. In this it differs from a rule. A rule tells us how to do a thing. A law tells us what to do and commands us to do it, but becomes law only as it is enforced by a penalty, or by punishment. This affirmation of obligation car- ries with it the force of the word ought ; but un- less it be supposed to express the will of God with his authority lying back of it, it will be, as men now are, of small force in controlling the appetites and passions. Men fear but slightly the reaction upon themselves of violated law, which may be regarded as penalty in distinction from punishment. The sphere of moral law is the control of the Sphere of ^^^^ himsclf iu his preferences and moral law. choiccs. Disregarding outward manifes- tations it takes cognizance of that which can be known only to the individual himself and to God, of that which in the Scriptures is called " the heart." This is its grand peculiarity. It asserts its prerogative just where moral forces have play and moral battles are waged. MORAL LAW. 83 This law, or affirmation of obligation, comes from within a man, as any law must by comesfrom which a man is " a law unto himself." ^i^hm. It is given by the moral reason when the occasion comes, and is possible only on the condition that there be a being possessed of intellect, sensibility, and will. With this condition the idea and affir- mation of obligation is given by the moral reason, just as the idea of beauty is given by the aes- thetic reason on condition of intellect and sensi- bility, or as the idea of space is given by the pure reason. The occasion comes when there is opportunity for choice between a higher and a lower good. Obligation is primarily obligation to choose, and choice must always be between two objects re- garded as good, or between two principles of ac- tion regarded as productive of a good. But though the law is thus from within the man, it is vet not of him as having* choice Socrates, , .Ti T , , ., , Adam Smith, and will, but comes by necessity, and Kant, as from a somewhat apart from himself. Hence Socrates spoke of it as his demon ; hence Adam Smith called it " the man within the breast ; " and hence the comparison by Kant of the moral law to the starry heavens as equally wonderful, and ?ts equally apart from himself. Only too, in the fact of a moral law thus given, could Kant have found what he regarded as the strongest proof of the being of a God who is a moral governor. It is 84 MORAL SCIENCE. an adequate, and the only adequate proof. From the law of cause and effect, as well as from the revealed fact that we are in the image of God, we may infer that a moral nature, and so moral law, are involved in the personality of God as they are in our own. DIVISION V. THE PERSON. We have now examined the conditions for choice, and for action from choice by man as a being under moral law. In doing this we have considered the intellect, the sensibility, the will, and the moral nature, separately. This it was necessary to do, but we are to be careful not to regard them as separate entities or agents. It is not the intellect that thinks, or the sensibility that feels, or the will that chooses. It is the man^ the one indivisible, intelligent, self-conscious, free agent that thinks, and feels, and chooses, and acts from choice. We thus find, THE PERSON, OR EGO. We find a being Avho knows himself as the sub- ject of phenomena, and so can say 1. This, no being below man can do. No animal can do it, nor the sun, nor the stars ; and the power to do it places man above them all. This knowledge of himself as the subject of phenomena and yet distinct from them is consciousness ; and the knowledge of himself as the subject of moral 86 MORAL SCIENCE. phenomena that pertain to his own actions is at the basis of conscience. Finding such a being, we find, not an act, but its source. We do not find the quality of acts as right or wrong, but rights ^ and obligations, righteousness and wickedness, as pertaining to a person who chooses, and who knows with himself whether he chooses or does not choose in accordance with moral law. Here we find, not faculties which we may name, but a being who possesses these, and is more than they. Here we find the tree which must be made good if its fruit is to be good. DIVISION VI. EIGHT AND WEONG, Thus far we have been investigating the con- stitution of man as furnishing the con- j^^g.^^ ditions of choice and action from choice ^^^^^sity. under moral law. Both the conditions and the law have their origin as independently of the will of man as his physical system. His active principles he did not originate, their relations he did not es- tablish, he did not give their law. We now come to man, not only as so and so constituted, but as choosing from 'the influence of these principles and under this law. This brings us to a region wholly different from that in which we have been. We have been in a region of necessity, we now come into one of choice and of freedom. rr\ T jt • 'J 1 • T Of freedom. iowards this pomt everything that pre- cedes converges ; from it everything that manifests character radiates. Through this, man comes to his highest distinction and prerogative, that by which he is able to dispose of himself in choosing his own end. All creatures below man are sub- ject by necessity to the law of their being. Man chooses whether he will or will not be subject to this law. 88 MORAL SCIENCE. That man has thus a moral nature implies noth- ing praiseworthy in him. It may be, and is, an infallible indication of a moral nature in God, and of his will that we should be under moral law; but till we reach choice and freedom under the law given through that nature there is no virtue or vice, nothing riglit or wrong, and no ground for reward or punishment. Bat in reaching choice under moral law we find all these. Especially do Riffhtand ^^^^ ^^^^ ^'^^ ^^'^^ time the words wroug. right and 'ivroiig. The object of choice is a good ; the act of choice is right or wrong. The theorj^ of right was referred to in the Introduc- tion, bat from its prominence in moral discussions it requires further attention. Right has commonly been supposed to be the ultimate, or rather the moral idea. So it is made by Whewell. The adjective W^7i^," he says, signifies conformable to rule; and it is used with reference to the object of the rule. To be temperate is the right way to be healthy. To labor is the right way to gain money. In these cases the adjective right is used relatively, that is, relativelj^ to the object of the rale." "It has been said also that we may have a series of actions, each of which is a means to the next as an end. A man labors that he may gain money, that he may educate his children ; he would educate his children in order that tliey may prosper in the world. In these cases the inferior RIGHT AND WRONG. 89 ends lead to higher ones, and derive their value from these. Each subordinate action aims at the end next above it as a good. And the rules wliich prescribe such actious derive their imperative force and validity each from the rule above it. The superior rule supplies a reason for the inferior. The rule to labor derives its force from the rule to seek gain ; this rule derives its force (in the case we are considering) from the rule to educate our cliildren ; this again has for its reason to forivard the i^rosperity of our children,''^ "But besides such subordinate rules there must be a supreme rule of human action. For the suc- cession of means and ends with the corresponding series of subordinate and superior rules must some- where terminate. And the inferior ends would have no value as leading to the highest, except the highest had a value of its own. The superior rules could give no validity to the subordinate ones, except there were a supreme rule from which the validity of all these were ultimately derived. Therefore there is a supreme rule of human ac- tion. That which is conformable to the supreme rule is absolutely right ; and is called right simpl;y without relation to a special end. The opposition to riglit is wrong." The supreme rule of human action may also be described by its object." ''The object of the supreme rule of human ac- tion is spoken of as the true end of human action, 90 MORAL SCIENCE. the ultimate or supreme good, tlie summum honum. .... The question why ? respecting human ac- tions demands a reason which may be given by a reference from a lower rule to a higher. Why ought I to be frugal or industrious? In order that I may not want a maintenance. Why must I avoid want ? Because I must seek to act inde- pendently. Why should I act independently ? That I may act rightly." " Hence, with regard to the supreme rule the question why? admits of no further answer. Why must I do what is right? Because it is right. Why should I do what I ought ? Because I ought. The supreme rule supplies a rule for that which it commands by being the supreme rule." " Rightness and wrongness are, as we have al- ready said, the moral qualities of actions." According to this, when a subordinate end is to All rules gained right action becomes so by its aud^'Je'ijon^ rclatiou to that end ; but when the high- est end is to be gained, right action has no relation to that, but only to the rule for attain- ing it. We have thus, as a ground of right ac- tion, sometimes an end, and sometimes a rule that is simply a means for attaining the end. But hav- ing admitted that the object of the supreme rule of human action is the true end of human action, no reason can be given why the supreme rule should not hold the same relation to the supreme RIGHT AND WRONG. 91 end 01 good that any other rule does to its end. That would make all rules, as they obviously are, secondary, and would carry moral action back to the choice of a supreme end. In saying that we are to do right because it is right, right is made ultimate. But for Doing right , •1,1 • , • • 1 , because it ii a man to do right because it is right, nght meaning by that as Whewell does, conformity to a rule with no knowledge of the object of the rule or of its validity from that, is puerile. The only other meaning of this phrase, which many regard as expressing the sum of disinterestedness and vir- tue, is that a man is to do what he conceives to be his duty, because he so conceives it. This a man may rationally do, but it is not making right ultimate. It presupposes, if the agent be intelli- gent, an investigation, or a knowledge in some way, of the grounds of duty and of right. It is a singular view of disinterestedness and of virtue to suppose that they consist in a regard for an ab- straction for its own sake, whereas the teaching of the Bible is that we are to love God with all our hearts and our neighbor as ourselves, and that to do this is to be disinterested and virtuous. Whewell speaks of rightness and wrongness as the moral quality of actions. So we are accus- tomed to speak, and it is remarkable to j^jgi^t re- what an extent many have been misled end?nhe?°s by this, as if there were something moral inherent in the act itself. If we use rightness and 92 MORAL SCIENCE. wrongness, or the adjectives right and wrong, as we constantly do, to mean the fitness or unfitness of an act to accomplish its end whatever that may be, then the quality inheres in the act; but it is not a moral quality. The burglar says, I entered by the window; his companion replies, that was right. The policeman, seeking to catch the burg- lar, says, I entered by the window, and his com- panion says, that was right. In this sense of it right depends on the judgment. When an assist- ant surgeon tells his superior that he has cut off a limb, the term right or wrong in the response will have no reference to motives or to any moral quality, but solely to his judgment. In this view of it a man may intend to do right and do wrong. He may intend to do wrong and do right. He may even be virtuous in doing wrong and wicked in doing right. But while the quality of rightness and wrong- Right as '^^^^ above sense may belong to ity notin the '^^^ ^^^9 moral quality can belong to it except in a figurative way. It is con- venient to call an asylum for the cure of lunatics a lunatic asylum, and so it is convenient to call an act done by a moral agent acting morally a moral act; but there is no more a moral quality in the act than there is lunacy in the asylum. Moral quality can belong only to a person. The system which thus makes right the ulti- Riphtirame- mate moral idea has two phases. The .tiY© first regards the sense or intuition ol RIGHT AND WRONG. 93 right as immediate and infallible. An action is right because it is right, and there is an immedi- ate intuition of it. This not only admits of no rule as a standard, but of no regard to conse- quences. The second phase of this system not only allows, but requires, the use of the intellect in seeking for relations, consequences, utilities, but says that the intuition of right is given only in connection with these. It does not, Theintui- however, tell us what the particular re- mateiy de- , , . T T T p J 1 pends on the iations and consequences needed lor the apprehen- in tuition are. Fairly analyzed it will be good, found that these can be resolved into a good in some form, and so, that this system is coincident with the one we advocate. If the question be whether it is right to sell intoxicating drinks, or to give money to street beggars, there can be no rational intuition of right till it is known what will be for the good of the individuals in question and of the public. But are there not some actions right or wrong in themselves? No. No action can Acts not have moral quality in itself. The only ^fojig°-n meaning that can be attached to that themselves, phraseology is that the person doing the act is praiseworthy or blameworthy. Except figura- tively no action can be rewarded or punished. Not in the action but in the doer of it do we find moral quality, and him it is that we reward and punish. In him we find righteousness or unright- 94 MORAL SCIENCE. eousness, goodness or wickedness. These involve moral qualities whicli can belong only to a per- son. The action may indicate, but cannot possess, them. Is there then nothing right or good in itself ? Righteous- Yes. Righteousness, regarded as a form goodness. of coustaut activity in the will, is right in itself, and goodness, goodwilHng, is good in it- self. Of these the products in action are right and good, but only relatively, and not in them- selves. Nothing IS wrong in itself always and everywhere but the disregard of moral law, usu- ally shown in selfishness, and its sure offspring malignity ; and nothing is right in itself always and everywhere but love, and those forms of an- tagonism to selfishness and malignity which love must necessarily assume. DIVISION VII. MAN CHOOSING. —4 CHAPTER I. ALTERNATIVES AND LAW. f Haying now considered what is preliminary to choice as a moral act, and also right and wrong as related to such an act, we wish to know pre- cisely what takes place when we thus choose. In order to this we will suppose a man given to the use of strong drink, and with the inustra- pay for a day's work in his pocket, to be deliberating whether he shall take it home to his suffering wife and children, or go to the saloon. The question is between choosing in accordance with the cravings of appetite on the one hand, or with the promptings of affection and the behest of the moral law on the other. It may not be needed, but as the want of distinctness at this point has been so great, I will venture to illustrate the rela- tions of the several factors in a simple way, after the manner of the " Outline Study of Man," 96 MORAL SCIENCE, The person deliberating we will represent by the line A. We will then place Affection, B, and Appetite, C, in front of him as the motives by wb.ich he is directly addressed, the one drawing him upward along the line D, the other down- ward along the line E. We will then place Obli- gation, or the Moral Law, F, back of him, and represent its behests as proceeding along the lines This, as I suppose, presents the relation of the factors in all cases of moral action. The direct motives in this case are affection and appetite. In each there is a good; but one is higher, more human and ennobling than the other; and it is between these two kinds of good that the choice is to be made. In a being rightly disposed, affec- tion would win without the aid of the moral nat- ure. The man within the breast would simply stand by and smile assent; or, if the tendency towards appetite were too strong, would say. No. But when appetite is strong, and affection is strong, and the moral nature, now taking the form of conscience, is awake, we see what a strug- MAH CHOOSIKG. 97 gle of the elemental forces there may be. But, be the struggle greater or less, the choice itself, the final decision by which the man disposes of himself, is his own free act. There is no efficient cause of it, no proper cause of any kind, oat of himself. The act is simple, and so cannot be defined. It is direct, requiring no use of means, and so no one can tv-U another how to do it, and no one can interpose to prevent it. No force from without or within can so interfere as to render the act otherwise than free without subverting the nature. Force has no relation to it, and motives have no causal relation. Tliey have no efficiency. The man himself, not his will, but he, the agent, is the cause of the act, and therefore he is responsible. We here see that while there is but one force drawing the man to choose wrongly, there contending are three acting to lead him to choose rightly. On one side we have simpl}^ the crav- ing of appetite. On the other side we have (1.) affection for his family, having sole reference to their good. We have (2.) a sense of the base- ness of sensuality and of the greater consonance with his manhood of the higher act, with its inev- itable reflex good to himself. We have (3.) the affirmation of obligation, the moral law. Of these tliree the force of each may vary in- definitely. (1.) Pure affection, with no con- sciousness of any other motive, may lead the man 7 38 MORAL SCIENCE. to go to Lis family. As thus prompted the action would be beautiful. (2.) A regard to his own dignity and good may be the preponderating motive. The reflex of the act in good upon the man himself could not be the motive in the very first act ; but such good reveals itself at once, and is a rational and worthy motive. If there were to be no other there would be no selfishness. A man is not to blame for finding enjoyment in do- ing good if he cannot help it. This reflex good to the agent thus inevitably connected with affec- tion, and indeed with benevolence in its widest form, has led some to say that an act purely from affection or benevolence is impossible. It would be if the act could not be done without conscious reference to this good; but it can be, and is, just as a boy plays ball with no reference to the health and sound sleep promoted by it. But (3.) we have the affirmation of obligation. Place and tlic moral law. The relation of this to office of con- Boience. the act of choicc is wholly different from that of either of the others. It is not an induce- ment standing in front to be itself chosen, but is a voice from behind saying of the path that leads to the higher good, This is the way, walk ye in it." It presupposes two or more good things, causes or means of a good, in front, be- tween which choice is to be made, and its func- tion is to demand the choice of the higlier good MAN CHOOSING. 99 In this view of it there is a double motive for the choice of the higher good: one, its intrinsic value; the other, the imperative of moral law. Of these the imperative may so occupy attention that the man will seem to himself to act wholly from that. He may say that he does it because he ought, from a sense of duty, from principle, from a regard to the right, and because it is right; and this may be the determining element in his choice as between the two forms of good; but if there were not in some intrinsic value, aside from the affirmation of obligation, a reason why the choice should be made at all, obligation must base itself upon nothing. It could not be rationally affirm- ed. No one can be under obligation to anything for which there is not, aside from the obligation, more reason than there is against it. In such ac- tion the moral element may be more or less prev- alent, but will always be present while reason holds its seat. Having thus seen what takes place when only two active principles are in question, we need to know what all those principles are, and their rela- tions to each other ; and to find a supreme law. We have already considered them separately ; but perhaps we may be aided in apprehending their relations if we present them thus : — 100 MORAL SCIENCE. THE PERSON. c o a: Into, and above this nature man was put to dress uiid to keep it. When a choice is to be made be- tween any two principles of ac- tion an influence i s supposed t o pass from each along the lines A and B to the Per- son, and also from the conscience along the lines C and D. Righteous I n- dignation, C o m p 1 a c e Love, nt V Rational Love, Self-Love, Rights, Brother and Sis- ter, Parental, Conjugal, etc., Esteem, o Power, Knowledge, = o ^ Property, u yi Liberty, Society, o O Instincts. Sex, Thirst, Hunger, Activity, Sleep, Air, IMoral Affectiona Rational and Moral. Natural Affections > Desires. > Appetites MAN CHOOSING. 101 After what lias preceded, lifile need be said of the eiiuiiieration and arraiigenieiii: in the r^heappe- above coUimii. The felt needs of air, sleep, and activity are not usually placed among the appetites ; but as originating in the body, as periodical, and as having a physical limit, they come under the definition, and the regidation of them is so within our power and so essential to well-being, that attention needs to be drawn to them as subject to moral law. The desires may be variously arranged. In the preceding column, that of existence and that of good are placed on the side as pervading the rest. This they necessarily do. They The desires. are also distinguished from the others by the fact that their objects can never be directly sought. But whatever may be said of the arrangement of the active powers, what is contended for is, — First, that they differ from each other, and that that difference is intuitively perceived, just as the difference between memory and judgment is per- ceived. Second, that some are higher than others, Hj those who have no theory, and no principle of arrangement, the terms higher and lower are con- stantly applied to these principles. Third, that as the principles are higher or lower, the quality of the good from their activity is higher or lower, and that this difference of 102 MORAL SCIENCE. qualitj^ is perceived intuitively. Speaking of the "springs of action," Mr. Martineau says, Imme- diately on their juxtaposition, we intuitively dis- cern the higher quality of one than another, giv- ing it a divine and authoritative right of prefer- ence." / In connection with this higher quality of the Highest srood, it is to be noticed that as we pass Wholly in up it comcs to be more and more m our our own i i i • i power. own powcr till we reach the highest, when it becomes wholly so. For the gratification of the appetites, the desires, and the natural affec- tions we are dependent on what is without us, and often beyond our reach, but no one can pre- vent us from lovingc God and our neii^hbor, or de- prive us of the good there is from that and the accompanying approval of our conscience. Here we have an independent source of contentment and blessedness. A good man shall be satisfied from himself." The highest duty and the highest joy being thus naturally connected, we can see how it is that in the Scriptures joy is made a duty. We say, Fourth, that the moral nature, as af- firming obligation, is not itself an active principle having its own object, but that it acts directly upon the will, or rather upon the man himself, to determine him in his choice between two or more active principles or ends. Of principles of action in conflict it will always require him to choose the MAN CHOOSING. 108 higher. If there were not principles of action be- sides itself between which the man might choose, the conscience would have no scope. We say, Fifth, that the law of the conditioning and the conditioned gives us a scientific Law of con- test of the relation of the active princi- andTouoi- pies to each other as lower and higher? this law having been as strictly observed in the upbuilding of nature as the law of gravitation is in its permanence. This law, like that of gravi tation, was known and practically acted upon long before the conception of it entered into sci- ence. We say. Sixth, that from the law of the condi- tioning and the conditioned the la w of ' ^^^.^ lij^. limitation is directly derived, and that it is by this law that the normal action of the lower powers in their relation to the higher is to be tested. This law, as stated in previous editions, and in the " Outline Study of Man," is, that we are at liberty to bring into exercise every lower power, and to derive from it what enjoyment we may, provided such exercise be carried only to the point where it will best minister to all that is above it. This gives us the natural law of self-denial. It is the denial for our own sakes of a lower princi- ple of action when it would be inconsistent with the best action of any one above it. That such denial should be called s^Zf-denial does not speak 104 MORAL SCIENCE. well for that self. The Christian law would re- quire us to take into account the good of others, and to deny ourselves for that. If now we begin at the bottom of the column Conj^cience activc principles, and go upwards, we pu?si?e^^^" shall find that the conscience, which has principles, jurisdiction along the whole line, will enforce the law of limitation at every point. Ap- petite will be at work as an independent principle, and may be indulged up to the point where it will best minister to the health of the body, and to the highest efficiency of the powers above it ; but the moment it tends to transcend that limit the conscience puts in a veto. And not only so, but, since appetite has for its object only an in- ferior interest, the law of limitation may arrest it before reaching the point determined by its own law. Not seldom do higher interests require this. The mother who might properly satisfy her own appetite fully is bound to arrest it, if need be, for the sake of her famishing children. As subordi- nate, the law of appetite, its own law, is thus constantly liable to exceptions through the de- mands of the higher nature, and in accordance with the law of limitation. And so it is all the way up. In connection with every lower princi- ple of action there are exceptions, and the law of limitation comes in, until we reach the higliest Theprinci- principle of all. We then find a princi of love pie thnt has no limitation, and a law MAN CHOOSING. 105 ihat has no exception. We find The Principle OF Love, and The Law of Love. There is no^ possibility of loving God too much, and no danger of loving our neighbor, better than ourselves, and so there is no limitation. There can be no cir- cumstances in which we shall not be under obli- gation to love God with all our heart, and our neighbor as ourselves, and so there is no excep- tion. The natural and supreme law of our constitu- tion, thus found by a fair analysis of the scope of the powers, and an exposition of their rela- uw^^^^ tion to each other, will, of course, take cognizance of the whole column of active principles, whether to prevent the encroachment of the lower upon the higher, or of the higher upon the lower. As man now is, the chief danger is that the lower principles will encroach upon the higher. Hence the law of limitation is to be carefully guarded ; but having once reached through that and the law of the conditioning and the conditioned the su- preme law of love, that law can no more permit excess in a higher principle as it is related to a lower, than in a lower principle as it is related to a higher. It can no more permit the injury of health for the sake of knowledge, than it can per- mit an indulgence in appetite that would prevent the gaining of knowledge. v We thus see that the highest activity of rational ove with reference to its own ends as Having 106 MORAL SCIENCE. value in themselves, is the very thing, and the only Union of thing, that the law demands. Seeing this love. we find a perfect coincidence between the law of our being and its highest active prin- ciple, and thus do we marry them — Law and LoYE, the two mightiest forces in the universe. It is this that we have sought. This, and this alone, so brings harmony into the constitution that law, and reason, and impulse can work to- gether. We thus find a perfect law without bond- age, and perfect freedom without license. We find a perfect law without bondage, because there can be no bondage where love reigns ; and we find perfect freedom without license, because there can be no license where law reigns. The highest har- mony of the universe is in the love of a rational being that is coincident with the law of that being rationally affirmed ; and the deepest jar and dis- cord is from the love, persistent and utter, of such a being in opposition to his law. It is because there is in the Divine Being this harmony of law with love that He is perfect. It is because this harmony is required in the divine government that that is perfect ; and no philosophy for the regulation of human conduct can be both vital and safe in which that same union is not consum- mated. Such a union is demonstrably the only MAN CHOOSING. 107 Thus it is that while love is a rational princi- ple of action, and the highest possible TheUwof ^ , Ti love the law principle, it is at the same time and al- of our being, ways obligatory, and so the law of love becomes the law of our being. In substance, and as ex- pressing his inmost nature, love is the one word uttered by God in the Bible. God is uttered by Love." It is the one word that em- bodies his commands as expressed in the Bible. " Thou shalt LOYE the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself." Bythecou- It is also the one imperative word ut- man. tered by Him through the constitution of man regarded as a whole; and in the coincidence of these two utterances we find a perfect proof that botli are from Him. In the highest generalization, defining love to be the choice of the good of conscious Love and being impartially and for its own sake, ^^^^-^^^e. the law of love will include self-love as well as love to others. Still, since each one is specially intrusted to himself, and has appetites, passions, interests, temptations, that cannot be shared by others, it is better for practical purposes to regard self-love as a separate principle. CHAPTER ir. WICKEDNESS. We have now seen what the harmony of the constitution would be, and how it may be at- tained. We turn for a moment to the reverse of this. In the possibility that man can reject the law of his being we find the possibility of both sin and immorality. Sin is the transgression of the law." It is ^ what the Scriptures call it, " anomia^^^ lawlessness. It is the choice of some end or principle of action lower than the highest and making it supreme. It is the practical rejec- tion by a rational and moral being of the law of his being, the moral law, the one law for the con- Uuityof the ^^'^^ moral beings Avlioever and wher- law. Q^rQi^ they may be. Tiiis law must be re- ceived or rejected as a whole. For whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet olfend in one i point is guilty of all." Any other principle would J permit each man to transgress iu the direction ] of his strongest propensity and then to excuse I himself, as so many do, on the ground of their obedience in other r<'sp(*cls. WICKEDNESS. 109 This unity of the law and the necessity of re- ceiving or rejecting it as a whole divides two classes men into two classes — those who ac- cept the law, and those who do not. None obey it perfectly, but some recognize it, justify it, ac- cept it, and make it their purpose to conform their lives to it. With others there is no practi- cal recognition of the law as a whole. It is not their supreme purpose to make it the law of their life. For those who do accept it, it becomes both a principle and a law of love, an active principle like any other, and the supreme law as proclaimed by the moral nature. For such there are as many forms of beneficence as there are of besetments and liabilities, of wants and woes among Measure of men ; and the merit of the agent in re- lieving them will be measured, not by the amount done, but on the principle of the widow's two mites, by the amount of self-sacrificing love. Other motives may lead to beneficence, but the only pure source and true measure of it is self Bacrificing love. For those, on the other hand, who do not accept the law there are as many forms of sin as there are active principles lower than the highest, and that can gain occasional or permanent control. It will matter much to the individual and to society which of the lower principles predominates ; but be it which it may, the character will be rad- 110 MORAL SCIENCE. ically wrong unless the principle and the law of love be made supreme. This unity of the law and necessity of receiving Nosepara- ^ wliolc, if at all, shows too the im- ionVnVmo^" possiblHty of drawing a definite line be- "^aiity. tween religion and morality. It is usual and convenient to distinguish duties of which God is the object, and offenses directly against him, from those of which man is the object, and offenses directly against him, and thus to make separate departments of morality and religion. We say of men that they are moral, but not religious ; and it has been one of the great delusions and perver- sions of the world to suppose that they could be religious without being moral. Most religions ^ have been constructed on this supposition, and not a few have incorporated the grossest immo- ralities into their religious rites. But as the law is the moral law, any infraction of it is strictly, if not technically, an immorality; and as it is a - divine law, any infraction of it is disobedience to God, and so irreligious. A true religion must in- . elude and require all the duties of morality, but * no religion not from God ever did, or ever will, thus include and require those duties. DIVISION VIII. OF CONSCIENCE. In treating of the moral nature I said notlnng of conscience. The reason was that I The moral include in conscience onlv those phenom- nature and T . 1 1 conscience ena from the moral nature which relate not identi- cal. to our own conduct. Through the moral nature we are furnished with moral ideas, by which we are enabled to judge on moral subjects as on others where our own conduct is not in ques- tion. We thus judge of abstract questions of morality, and of the conduct of others. But ac- cording to its etymology (con^scio, a conscience knowing with), conscience is strictly the knowing of ourselves together with a knowledge of moral law as it is related to us. As As com- commonly understood, however, con- ?erstood.^ science includes not only knowledge, but also the feelings which precede, accompany^ and follow the moral act. It presupposes a moral nature that furnishes the two fundamental ideas of rights and of obligation, and includes all the phenomena that arise when either of these ideas is regulative 112 MORAL SCIENCE. in our owii conduct. Thus, tlie immediate rec- ognition of riglits by children and ignorant per- sons is said to be from conscience. They know themselves together with the moral law tliat is involved in the knowledge of rights, and, when their own rights are concerned, have a peculiar class of feelings which are attributed to the con- science. But the chief business of conscience is to regu- Conscionce Lite our choiccs. This it does, or seeks choicesl' to do, by tlic aflBmiation of obligation. In such cases we have presented to us always an alternative. We may act from a higher or a lower principle of action. We may choose a nobler or a baser end, and the moral nature, now acting as conscience, affirms obligation to Elements of clioosc the higher principle and the conscience, ^^oblcr end. Then will come delibera- tion for a longer or shorter period, often a pro- tracted and severe struggle ; then the choice ; then the selection of means to carry out the choice ; and then, on reflection, self-approbation or remorse. These are the phenomena, and so far as the moral nature is concerned in them, they are all commonly attributed to conscience. We may then define conscience to be, first, the knowledge of ourselves together with the Definitions. , i i c i i t knowledge oi moral law, and as we are related to that. This excludes feelinor. OF CONSCIENCE. 113 Or, second, we may define it to be the whole moral consciousness of man in view of his own actions and as related to moral law. Tliis will include the testifying state Avhich accompanies the struggle while deliberation is going on, and also the self-approbation or remorse that may follow. From what has now been said we may see how far the conscience is infallible. The moral nature necessarily affirming moral law in both its branches, when a moral Conscience . _ , when iufal- beuig sees that a proposed action will ubie. come under that law, the conscience will judge of it infallibly as right or wrong. Accepting the law respecting rights, the conscience will infal- libly judge it wrong to steal because stealing is, by its definition, the violation of a right. There may be question whether a given act comes under the law, and the judgment may err, but when the act is known to come under the law the judgment is infallible. We next inquire whether the conscience can be educated. Those who make it wholly intuitive necessarily say no. And as they say on the one can he con- hand that it cannot be educated, so they educated? say on the other that it cannot be blunted or seared. But if we regard conscience as including feeling, as practically we must, we have an indirect con- trol over it, call it education or what you please, 8 114 MOJRAL SCIENCE. by which the whole tone of our moral life may be changed. We may habitually neglect to bring our actions before the tribunal of conscience at all ; we may deal unfairly with ourselves and bring them disingenuously, — and one of these we shall certainly do if we choose a wrong supreme end ; or we may form the habit of bringing our actions uniformly and fairly before that tribunal. Be- sides, the general law of feeling applies here, by which, if it be rationally cherished, it becomes purer and stronger, or, if it be repressed, its foun- tains are dried up. Hence the conscience re- garded as a whole, may become more and more sensitive and pervasive, or it may become blunted and seared. The man may become hardened, " past feeling," " twice dead," " plucked up by the roots ; " or his path may be that of the just, "shining more and more unto the perfect day." Looking back now over the system we have considered, it is claimed for it, — 1st. That it is drawn from the constitution of man and accords with it. 2d. That it accords with Christianity. 8d. That through the principle of the condi- tioning and the conditioned it brings man into harmony with nature. 4th. That in the law of limitation it furnishes a principle to be applied by the individual in ad- OF CONSCIENCE. 115 justing the claims of each tendency and spring of action except the highest. 6th. That it reconciles discrepant systems. 6th. That, if fully accepted, it would result in the perfection of the individual and of society. PART II. PRACTICAL. LOVE AS A LAW. BIAN ACTING FROM CHOICE UNDER MORAL LAW. L PKELIMINARY STATEMENT. LOVE AS A LAW DISTINGUISHED FROM THE LAW OF LOVE. Haying considered the Law of Love, we now proceed to Love as a Law. If we would conduct life by philosophy it is not enough to know its law and its end. We must also know how to apply that law and to reach that end. We need both parts of that perfect wisdom which it is the part of moral science to teach. Perfect wisdom consists in the choice of the best ends and of the best means to attain them. In this, wisdom dif- fers from skill, — perfect skill consisting in the best use of means whatever the end may be. What belongs to the choice of ends we have con- sidered. Love is our general principle and primal wisdom. We now come to another part of our definition, and inquire what love, working under the law of limitation, would require us to do. According to the Scriptures, Love is the ful- filling of the law." Hence the Law of Love and of obligation or duty are coincident. The reason is that love is that which the law requires, and with which, if love be perfect, it is satisfied. 120 MORAL SCIENCE. This Is conceded, or at least not denied, by wri- ters on morals ; and yet when specific duties are to be deduced, they either do it wholly from the stand-point of conscience and not of love, or incon- sistently, from love out of regard to the Scriptural law. But accepting the Scriptural doctrine, be* lie vino; that the Law of Love covers the domain of morals, we proceed to inquire what that law re- v-juires. This inquiry It will be observed Is wholly deduc- tive. Li all inquiries respecting duties except the Uighest, there are two orders of questions : The first asks, What ought to be done ? The second, How ought it to be done ? To the broadest pos- sible What ? " on this subject, but one answer can be given. " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself." This is the law of love. As a spiritual act, it is the primal wisdom, and, corresponding to it there is no " How ? " No one can explain to another how to love, because the love is a primitive act, and no means can intervene. Thus regarded love is an act and a choice, 'and as rational must itself have a motive. Love as an act and as a There must be a reason on the ground motive, of which love may be demanded by the con- science. That reason, as we have seen, is the worth of being, or its capacity of good and evil. But the act having been done, the generic choice having been made, love becomes a motive in all sub- LOVE AS A LAW. 121 sequent acts. The first and great question is, What does the laiv demand ? To this the reply is. Love. The second question is, What does Love demand ? And to every " What ? " here, there is a How ? " Or, if we please, all questions of this order may bo comprised in one, — How shall the demands of love be carried out ? It is hi morals as in astronomy. In that we first find the law, and then apply it. The law being given, we inquire at what time the sun and moon ought to be in such relation as to produce an eclipse. This inquiry is of a different order from those which have it for their object to find the law, or the rea- sons of it. If we suppose, with Kepler, each planet to be accompanied by an angel, whose busi- ness it is to see that its radius vector shall describe equal areas in equal times, all the inquiries and eftbrts of the angel might have relation solely to that result ; but without understanding both the law and the reasons of it, he could know nothing of the philosophy of the heavens. Failing to distinguish, at this point, as most have Love as douc, betwecu love as an act demanded bv choice and , i • i r» as emotion, the couscieuce and itselt requn^mg a mo- tive, and love as the motive of subsequent sub- ordinate acts and demandino; them, we fall into confusion. In the one case we have the law of love ; in the other love as a law. In the first case the main element of the love is choice ^ * See Bac Sermon^ 1861. 122 MORAL SCIENCE. rather than emotion. In the second the choice is implied, but emotion seems more prominent. I:i the first the choice is like the body of the sun, iii itself dark ; in the second it is like the same body with the elements of light and heat and beauty gathered and floating around it. Over the subordinate inquiries arising under love Office of a law, the conscience must w^atch. de- ftnrintei-^ maudiug not only perfect uprightness and candor, but such painstaking in informhig the judgment as to secure that secondary wisdom which more often bears the name, and by which means are adapted to ends. But ^^hile the con- Bcience must keep watch of the processes, the pro- cesses themselves are carried on by the intellect. The great work of the conscience is done in an- swering the first question, and in holding the will in the form of choice up to a perfect correspond- ence wdth the law\ Subsequently its w^ork will be to bring subordinate choices and specific volitions into conformity with the generic choice, and in doing so, questions that will be relatively principal and subordinate, the " What? " and the How ? " will constantly arise. Accepting then the law of love, we shall need to inquire, what in the several departments of duty does that law require, and how are those requirements to be carried out? ri. CLASSIFICATION OF DUTIES. In answering the above questions, a classification of duties is needed. In this we shall be guided by that principle of sub- Principieof ordinatiou, on which the law of limitation tion. is based, as stated in the third of the Lectures on Moral Science. It is as true of duties as it is of forces, faculties, and enjoyments, that those are lower which are conditional for others. But are some duties conditional for others ? First de- The couditiou of good work is a good in- Kve."^ strument, of good fruit a good tree ; and of doing good to others, and glorifying God, a good man. Our first and lowest duty will then respect our own state, including both disposition and capacity. The first and imperative demand of love is, that we secure those conditions in ourselves, by which our power to do good will be the greatest. We thus reach our first class of duties under S^'duties^ the law of love. They are those wdiich iSves* respect ourselves. They respect eithei 124 MORAL SCIENCE. our own inward state or outward condition ; and till we reach absolute perfection, will have for their object a change for the better in one or the other of these. They are not distinctively duties to ourselves, though involving all that has com- monly been regarded as sucli; but will include everything possible to enable us to benefit others and glorify God. Hence they will be held as du* ties, not so much from regard to ourselves, as on other and higher grounds. The SECOND CLASS OF DUTIES are those to our fellow men. These will have for their ob- ge^oDd cia^sj ject, until they reach perfection, a change ou^^feuow for the better, either in their state or condi- tion. That these are lower than our duties to God will probably be conceded, but are they condi- These con- tional for them? In a sense they are. ou^dutier Whatever may be said of an innate or connate idea of God, and of duty to him as all-per- vasive, it is true that practically, and in a normal state, the parent would be known before God, and that God would be known throu^rh him. The si^r- nificance of " Our Father which art in heaven," is reached only through a knowledge of what a father on earth is ; and our duties to tlie earthly, iypify those to the heavenly Father, and prepare us for them. But besides this priority of time, and so a condi- tioning from the order in which the faculties are developed, duties may be so related that one cannot CLASSIFICATION OF DUTIES. 125 be consistently or acceptably performed except on the condition that another has been. One who de- frauds another may not bestow charity upon liim. He must be just before he is generous. In the same way immediate duties to God so imply those to men, that a man is in no condition to do the former who has not done the latter. This requires attention. It is the essence of No religion supcTstition, and has been the curse of the morality. racc, to frame something called religion that could be gone through wdth formally, and be rested on for salvation, to the neglect of the love of man, and the duties from that. Hence we need to emphasize the impossibility of religion without moral- ity. This the Scriptures do both in the Old Testa- ment and the New. I," says God, hate robbery for a burnt-offering." When ye spread forth your hands, I Avill hide mine eyes from you, yea when ye make many prayers I will not hear ; your hands are full of blood ; wash ye, make you clean, put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes ; cease to do evil, learn to do well ; seek udgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the father- less, plead for the widow." " If," says the Saviour, " thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there re- memberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar and go thy way ; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift." If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar. For 126 MORAL SCIENCS. be who lovetli not his brother whom he hath soeil, how can he love God whom he hath not seen ? " This view cannot be too strongly enforced, and ought to enter into the substance of every treatise on duty. As prior then in time, and as prerequisite for ac- ceptable worship, our duties to our fellowmen are conditional for our duties to God. Our THIRD CLASS OF DUTIES will be tliose to- wards God. These are higher than any other because of their object, of the higher faculties involved, Third class; and because they imply all the others. God. If the love of man be first, as it would be in a child growing up normally, it will be conditional for that of God, which will follow as certainly as the full day follows the morning twilight ; but when once there is the love of God, it will be seen to include or imply the love of his creatures. As man now is, the true relation seems to be, when specific duties are required, the performance first of tliose toward man as a condition of the acceptable per- formance of those toward God. It will be remembered that in classifying physical foi'ces as higher and lower, we begin ciassifica- with that which is broadest, and at each ties as ... higher and step in our ascent comprehend fewer mdi- broader, iduals, till we reacli man ; but in classifying duties we reverse the process ; we begin with that which is narrowest, and as we ascend reacli the broadest DUTIES TO OURSELVES 127 and grandest generality, including not only our duties to all the creatures of God with whom we are in relation, but to God himself. CLASS I. DUTIES TO OUKSELVES. I. CLASSIFICATION. We now proceed to consider the first class of Conditions diities in detail. These will require tliat thls^duties ^ve secure those conditions in ourselves by ai to our dSl whicli we cau work most efficiently under tiestoothers. the kw of loVC. These conditions are : — 1. That we secure our rights ; 2. That we supply our wants ; and 8. That we perfect our powers. Of these each in its order is conditional for the next, and they will include all that we need to do for our own good, and to enable us to do good to vtliers. DIVISION I. ' THE SECURING OF OUR RIGHTS. We are to secure our rights so far as they may be a condition to our best working under the law of love. The only right that must be secured for the above 128 MORAL SCIENCE. snd is that to life. As long as there is life men may act under this law, in whatever condition they may be. Hence the right to life is more sacred than any other, and hence the right to defend it even by taking the life of another. God has en- dowed men with life, has placed them in their positions here, often with many others dependent upon them, has implanted within them an instinct of self-preservation, has made the life of each as sacred as that of any other, that security of life which the instinct guards is essential both to the well-being of society and of the individual, and if, with these interests in question, life is wrongfully assailed, it not only comes within the law of love to defend it by taking, if necessary, the life of another, but it is an imperative duty. God does not regard life as too sacred to be taken for the violation of natural law, and it is not only by a righteous moral law that life is taken in such cases, but by a natural law implanted in the constitution. The right to life must be defended to the utmost. Of the other great rights, as of liberty, property, and reputation, we may be deprived and still work under the law of love. These ricrhts we are to secure as far as possible in compatibility with that law, but as no absolute rule can be laid down, and as the subject of rights will be treated further on, it is not necessary to speak o^ them more fully here. It is only to be said that at each point we are to yield or defend these rights as the law of love wisely interpreted may require. DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 129 DIVISION 11. THE SUPPLY OF OUR WANTS. The second condition of our action under the law of love is the supply of our wants. By wants is here meant those things which are necessary for the well-being of the body and the mind. These and nothing beyond are essential to full work under the law of love. To provide these requires toil, and this toil every one not incapacitated by feebleness or infirmity is bound either to undergo himself, or to pay others an equivalent for it. No duty is more strongly insisted on in the Scriptures than this. Not to perform it not only violates the first law of equity, but deprives us of all position and stand-point from which to labor for others. DIVISION III. THE PERFECTINQ OF OUR POWERS. Having life and having our wants supplied, we ti :e next to perfect our powers. This is the third duty to ourselves under the law of love. It is of much wider scope than those before treated of, but that the law of love requires it will be seen if we look at the ways in which we can minister to the good of others. These are three : — 9 130 MORAL SCIENCE. 1st. By putting forth our energies, physical and mental, directly to that end. Relation of 2d. By exerting over them an uncon- the^good^o? . ^ others. scious miluence. 3d. By awakening in them the joy of compla- cency. For each of these the one comprehensive con- dition and duty is our own perfection. " Be ye therefore perfect." How is this duty to be per- formed ? CHAPTER 1. perfection as related to direct action for others: of the body: of the mind. According to the views in the prehminary state- ment, the process in attaining this per- Perfection rection must be one ot ujobuildiyig. In ing. the language of the Scriptures, it must be an edification." This gives us a point of departure and a method^ which the term " self-culture " does not. In this view the instrumental powers, the appetites, the desires and natural affections, and the intellect are given us that through them we may build up a perfect body and a perfect mind. These powers we can control in three ways. We can incite^ restrain^ and guide them, and these we are to do partly from the good there is from their own regulated activity, but chiefly as they are con- ditional for the moral and s])i ritual nature. Of thai nature our perfection would require the fullest pos- sible expansion and activity. DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 131 In building ourselves up then so as to become Physical eiFective workino; powers, we be<£in with perfection , . . ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ , ^ , first. the body. Love would reqiure us to seek physical perfection, because this would include strength^ leauty^ and grace^ and each of these would aid in the highest ministries of love. The more strength love has to wield, the more efficient it will be ; the more it is clothed in beauty and in grace, the more satisfaction it will give. For the perfection of the body we are dependent To this end ou tlic appctites, the lowest of the instru- law of limit- ation for mental powers over wdiich we have con- the appe- ^ tites. trol. As lower, they are a condition for all that is above them, but their immediate object is the upbuilding and well-being of the body, and the continuance of the race. Through them we appro- priate such things as the body needs, and we have only to say that in dohig this tliey are to be held strictly subject to the law of limitation. By their constitution they are in a measure self-regulating, but must always require rational control with ref- erence to their ends. They may be of any degree of strength, and be indulged to any extent up to the point where they cease to be in the best man- ner a condition for tlie activity of that wliich if? above them. The stronger they are the better, if their action be for the strength, beauty, and grace of the body, and for tlie upbuilding of the inteHec- tual and moral powers ; and all pleasure through them that is incidental to such upbuilding, or ^ven compatible with it, is legitimate. 132 MORAL SCIENCE. From the varying relations of the appetites, moro precise rules for their regulation cannot be laid down. As, however, the evils from the appetites are so ereat, we may not pass them without Danger from , the appe- notice. The first great danger from the tites. natural appetites is, that men will find in the good from them their supreme end. This multitudes do. Such are sensualists ; for the character is always determined by that in which the supreme end is found. Such persons may wallow in gross sen- suality, or seek their gratifications in a refined and fashionable way, but they will belong to the sty of Epicurus, will live unworthily, and will die and be forgotten, leaving the world no better for their having lived in it. The second great danger from these appetites, is ihat those who have higher aims will be constantly allured and seduced by them, so that the whole tone of their life will be lowered. Those are few to whom some soil from sensuality does not cling. " Fleshly lusts " not only injure the body, but " war against the soul." The third danger from the appetites is in the for- mation of those that are artificial. These have noth- ing to do with upbuilding, as the substances ors which they fix are all poison and incapable of beinj} assimilated. The pleasure from them terminates in itS(^Jf ; the tendency to increase the amount of the stimulus is strong ; the nervous system ia ivu DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 133 paired by tliem ; habits are formed which hold men in fearful bondage, and it may be questioned whether the best state of the moral powers and the highest sjoiritual exercises are compatible with habitual stimulation, either alcoholic or narcotic. If God had judged it best that man should have an appetite for these substances, doubtless He would have implanted it. Held in their proper place, the appetites are pro- ductive only of good ; but looking at the history or at the present state of man, we find the amount of misery and degradation from abuse of the natural appetites, and from artificial ones which are them selves an abuse, to be appalling beyond description. Of the great corruption of the heathen, one of the most prominent forms is sensuality, their very re- liorion beino; often but a deification of this. Of coun- tries nominally Christian, especially in their great cities, the corruption is unutterable, and seldom, if ever, has Christianity so pervaded a community as to lift them wholly out of this slough. Hence we raise a warning cry at this point. Hence a right training of the young must involve a control by them of their appetites, since a failure here is a failure in all that is above them. But wliile the proximate object of the appetites Appetites is the perfection of the body, they alone 2ient. are not surhcient tor that, ror its highest strength, beauty, and grace, there are needed ir. addition health and physical training. l34 MORAL SCIENCE. 1. Health. This is to the body what virtue ia to the soul, its normal state, its p;ood ; and „ 1 . . . 1 , 1 Health. lor this, attention is needed, not only to the appetites, bat to air, exercise, sleep, and cloth- ing. The care of health through these is a duty, not only from the consequences to ourselves of its failure, but because the power of love would thus be paralyzed, and instead of aiding others we should become a tax upon their energies, if not a burden. Needless ill-liealth in its myriad forms is an incubus upon society ; and, though it may seem harsh to call it so, it is, as a violation of the law of love, a crime. This whole subject is not as yet brought as it should be within the domain of the conscience. The consequences of neglecting the laws of health, of imprudence, and excess, are constantly attributed to a mysterious Providence. They have the same relation to Providence as typhoid fever in the filthy wards of a cit}'. They are visitations under Prov- idence rendered necessary by the neglect and folly of man. 2. Physical training. Health alone will not secure perfection of form or of power. Espe- physical cially will it not secure grace, which is higher than beauty, and is expressed chiefly through motion. Hence the need of physical training. The true subject of education is man in the unity soul and body. If either factor be neglected, DUTIES TO OURSELVES. loO the Ino-hest results cannot be reached. Hence a o well regulated system of physical culture is not only a legitimate part of education, especially of a liberal education, but it is demanded. In this we have de- clined from the wisdom of the anrients. Physical training may be carried too far ; it may Physical bccomo Qu ciid. Not Subordinated to a to^be'"^ higher culture, or out of proportion, it is guarded. ^ deformity and a nuisance. It also needs to be guarded against an ambition to perform diffi- cult and danp-erous feats. If it can be warded at these two points, it must become an essential ele- ment in our system of education. Strength, beauty, grace, — these are the fruits of physical trainino; and health. Of these Results -It/ ~ strength is put forth solely under the di- rection of will, and its exertion for others may im- pose obligation. Beauty and grace, on the other hand, produce their effects without our direct voli- tion. They are as an emanation, a fragrance, a soft green, which w^e admire and enjoy without feel- ing obligation. Are we then under obligation even with regard to the body, to seek not only strength to be used by will for the good of others, but also those perfec- tions and accomplishments even which may become a source of pleasure when contemplated by them ? Y"es, even though they are so often sought and dis- played from vanity. By all means let beauty be •ought ; beauty of person, and even of dress. This 136 MORAL SCIENCE. natui'e teaches. The flowers are not simply become mg, they are beautiful. Nor do the Scriptures forbid it. The Apostle Peter, with his quiet and solemn eye, does not condemn outward adorning except as in antagonism to the higher ornament of a meek and quiet spirit ; " " the plaiting of hair," and " wearing of gold," and " putting on of apparel," are not to be the adorning. Rightly sub- ordinated they may have their place, but are as nothing when compared with the hidden man of the heart, which is in the sight of God of great price." Let grace be cultivated. That costs nothing. But let nothing be done from self as central. Let it be in sympathy with the tendency of every or- ganizing and vital force in nature towards perfec- tion, and as putting us in harmony with the Kosmos." Above all let it be for others. If vanity could but be exorcised by love, accomplish- ments would at once fall into their place and be- come admirable. The taint which attaches to them, as in the service of vanity and egotism, would be removed, and the social questions which arise concerning them would be easily settled. But if we are to seek a perfect body, perfection much more a perfect mind. Here again there must be upbuilding. Love Deing presupposed, its first business will be to put and hold in its place each of the instrumental powers. DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 137 Of these the desires are to the mind what the itaMon^f^r' ^PP^*^^^^ ^^'^ body. They are nat- the desires, ural aiid iiccessary principles of action, having no moral character in themselves, but re- quiring control. Like the appetites they are to be governed, not on the principle of repression, but by being made to minister to something higher. Let the desire of hfe, and of property, and of knowl- edge, and of power, and of esteem, have their full scope, provided they violate no right of others, and that what they appropriate is used in the service of the affections, and under the guidance of conscience. But here, as in the appetites, we must draw atten- Dangers tiou to tlic x^rcat dano'er there is from from the . ^ ^ desires. pcrvcrsiou and abuse. And here, also, the first danger is that the object of some one of the desires will be adopted as the supreme end. In this case the character formed, and the re- sults, are very different from those when the ap- petites are thus adopted. The appetites have a natural limit. They are satisfied, and cease their craving ; excess in them ultimately and speedily debilitates both body and mind ; the sphere of the sensualist is narrow ; he dies and is forgotten. But the desires have no natural limit. They grow by what they feed on," and are all absorbing. Hence we have the poltroon when we should have the martyr ; we have the miser, emaciated and cowering over his gold ; we have the pale student outwatch- 138 MOEAL SCIENCE. ing the stars ; we have the conqueror desolating continents, and the shifting devotee of pubhc opin ion These fill the \Yorld with their deeds. They trample on appetite, and may seem nobler than its slaves, but are equally in bondage, and some of them beyond comparison more mischievous. And here it may be well to state what that is in which the selfishness, and idolatry too, of selfishness the race consist. It is in adopting as their ^^'^ idolatry, supreme end the good there is from the activity of some lower part of their nature. This is selfish- ness. Its primary form is not that of enmity to God, or to any one else. There is no conscious malignity. It disclaims this when imputed to it, and says, Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?" Not interfered with, it is good-na- tured, perhaps cuhivated and elegant. But let any one, ej^^en God, come between it and the end made supreme, and it becomes aversion, enmity, bitter and uncompromising reb.ellion. In such cases, the form varying with the appetite or desire, and scope being given, there is no form of deception, and no extent or refinement of cruelty to which a people civilized, and cultivated through art, will not go. This, too, is idolatry. It is the true idolatry of the race, which has always found symbols to rep- resent that which they have made their supreme end, and who have really worshipped their own sel- fish passions as reflected in those symbols. It need only be added that those who have choseD DUTIES TO /OURSELVES. 139 higher ends are in constant clanger through inor- dinate desire, even more than through inordinate appetite. After the desires, the affections will require at- The affec- teution hj ouo wlio would perfect himself uraTknd*' as an agent for doing good. The affec- tions are Natural and Moral. The differ- ence between these is, that the moral affections are consequent upon acts of will or choice, and derive their character from the character of these acts. The natural affections are found in us acting spon- taneously, like the desires. For the most part the natural affections do not require repression. They rather need culture, and under that are capable of expanding into great beauty. Nor is there from them such danger of abuse that attention need be drawn to it here. It is sufficient to say that they are to be developed under the law of limitation. The Intel- Of ^hc instrumental powers it only re- mains to speak of the Intellect. The necessity of training, and if possible, per- fecting the Intellect if a man would do much for his own good or that of others, is admitted. To this every seminary of learning testifies. Its rela- tive importance is doubtless overestimated, since education has come to mean chiefly the training of the intellect. The general statement here is that the law of love requires that every talent and means of in« 140 MORAL SCIENCE. fluence, wlietlier general or professional, should be cultivated to the utmost. Does an artisan fail, as in making a steam boiler, to provide in the best way for the safety and com- fort of the community; is a physician ignorant of thu right remedy, or a lawyer of the precedent on which his case turns ; does the clergyman lack quickening and persuasive power ; each is con- demned by the law of love, and responsible for the consequences if tlie failure could have been avoided. There may be faithfulness at the moment, — at the bedside, in the court-room, in immediate jDrepara- tion for the pulpit — but the failure and guilt may lie far back in the indolent self-indulgence and dis- sipation of the years of preparatory study. We now pass to the Governing Powers. It is one thing for a person to improve his instru- Governing mental powers, as he might his knife or his reaper, and another to improve those which are more distinctively himself. It is in these that we find the worth and dignity of man, in these the image of God. In these is the germ of immortality ; in these the seat of spiritual conflict. For the education of these powers there are no institutions except those of Christianity, imp^o^g. Tlie Church with its Bible, and ministry, ^ll^'J^H^, and the Spirit of God pervading all, is God's institution for the education of these powers, and training them up into the likeness of Christ, and so of God. Nor would human institutions be DUTIES TO OUESELVES. 141 of any avail. Improvement here must begin in the Will itself, by its submitting itself to the laws of reason and of conscience, and opening the whole man to every high, and holy influence which God may bring to bear upon him. Ail powei^ are to be improved, and these no less than others, by their being exercised in the sphere and under the conditions appointed for them by God. So only. But the sphere of these powers is to rule. Hence they can be improved only as they are permitted to be active in ruling. But that they should do this nothing can secure but that ultimate act of choice which determines character, .and which lies beyond the reach of all institutions and external appliances. If these powers be held in abeyance, their place being usurped by appetite or desire in the form of passion, they will be dwarfed and perverted, and will manifest themselves in every form of superstition and fanaticism. Such is the sphere of the governing powers. He who would cultivate them must permit them to govern, and to govern uniformly. So shall they gain strength, and so shall he walk in increasing Hght until ''the perfect day." But the conditions under which these powers are Oonaitions ^ct, and the helps offered, require to be and helps. J^^owu uo Icss than their sphere. These cannot here be treated of at large, but I desire to advert to the subject of immediate divine aid, be- fause that is so generally regarded as alien to phi- 142 MORAL SCIENCE* losophy. It is not so, for the whole philosophy of upbuilding would lead us to anticipate that man in his highest powers would be connected with that which is still higher. And in this it is accordant with the voice of heathen antiquity, and of the Scriptures. Alwaj's men have spoken of the voice of God within them, and the Scriptures speak of the " light that lighteth every man that cometh Into the world." The expressions vary, but the import is that there is a direct access of the Spirit of God to the spirit of man, both for illumination and quickening. For the reception of these the Moral Reason is adapted as the flower is adapted to receive the light and warmth of the sun, and no symbol could be more beautiful than that of the flower that turns itself to the sun and follows it in its course. But are we not here in danger of mysticism ? Yes; but only as we are in danger of conflagration from the use of fire. Let us be cautious and encourage no mysticism. Let us also be cautious and neither ignore nor quench any light offered us by God. This is a vital question in our upbuilding. I hold that this communication and aid are in strict accordance with philosophy, and my conviction is that whoever attempts perfect- ing his directive powers without prayer, and open- ing his mind, by putting away wickedness, to the 'Uuminating and quickening influences of the Spirit '>f God, will fail of success. DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 143 It is only hy thus building up himself thro-ugh tho whole range of his faculties, that man can reach the highest efficiency when he would put forth direct acts of will in the service of love. CHAPTER n. PERFECTION AS RELATED TO UNCONSCIOUS INFLUENCE, The second mode of doing good to others is by unconscious influence or example. This, in its highest degree, requires perfection not so much of the powers, as in their control and mode of action. No lower power may act beyond the point at which it becomes a condition for the action of a higher. The appetite for food or drink may not be so indulged as to prevent the fullest activity of the desire of knowledge or of power. The desire of power may not become so engrossing as to dwarf the affections or stifle any claim of justice or of right. Napoleon cared nothing for appetite, but was gluttonous of power. When a man chooses the object of any lower power for his supreme end, that determines his character, his energies are directed to that, his development is around it, and he be- comes unsymmetrical, as a tree whose upward sap is arrested and expands it into a deformity. This most men do. They lack the controlling and directive power needed to keep the faculties in subordination, and even if they choose the highest 144 MORAL SCIENCE. end are long in bringing moral symmetry into their lives. Only when this is done are they in a con- dition to exert the highest unconscious influence over others, and when this is done, this influence is more efficient than any other. The direct power of man over nature is slight compared with that which he gains through her own forces. The same is true of society. As God in- tended man to be a social being, He implanted in him those principles by which he may have a com- mon life, and through which that life may be reached and m.odified throughout a nation, and for ages. Among these principles is that sympathy and un- conscious imitation by which families and nations are assimilated, and to reacli, as it may be done, the common life through this is the sublimest work of man. It is in early life that this unconscious imitation is most operative. Every child is a Chinese. Give him a cracked saucer for a model, and he will make a cracked set. The child needs formal teaching by words, but his principles are formed and practical habits moulded chiefly by that action of those around him which expresses their inner life. From this there is a subtle and pervasive influence that no direct teaching can counteract. It is thus that families, neighbornoods, sections of country an reached and assimilated, and to this all contribute. It is through this that great men, men great in character and action, reach their highest influence DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 145 They are simply set in the firmament of the past, and sliine. Doubtless the power of a book, of the word spoken, of mere teaching, is great, but this silent shining addresses different principles, and under different conditions. Power is from the inner Hfe in its in- tegrity, and this is most perfectly and certainly revealed by action. Hence " Example is better than precept." The word not weighted from the life sounds hollow. Hence the folly as well as guilt of attempting to substitute anything for that thor- ough sincerity of character from which alone good influences can legitimately flow. We here find a special danger to preachers, and to all who teach professionally or formally. They are tempted to " say and do^not." There is no surer way to destroy self-respect and bring such teachings into contempt. Against such teachers the Bible denounces its heaviest woes. " Woe unto you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye devour widows' houses, and for _a pretense make long prayers : therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation." CHAPTER III. PERFECTION AS RELATED TO COMPLACENCY. The third way of benefiting others through a care for our own state, is by awakening in them the 'oy of complacency. 10 146 MORAL SCIENCE. Under the former head we regarded man as active, with powers to be addressed ; under this we regard him as having susceptibiUties. Our object then was action, character ; it is now enjoyment. The highest susceptibiUties are moral, and it is from manifestations of moral character that we have our highest enjoyment through the susceptibiH^ ties. Through these we have the love of compla- cency, the sense of moral beauty and grandeur, esteem, veneration, and the emotions which, in their highest form, become worship. For the susceptibility to natural beauty and grandeur God has provided. Nature is full of ob- jects that correspond to this ; it is among our purest and best sources of enjoyment, and is the forerunner and type of the higher enjoyment from the beauty of hoUness. But the moral susceptibih- :ies can be awakened only by character. For these the great provision is in God himself, whose charac- ter is perfect ; but aside from this, these susceptibili- ties may be drawn out in high activity by human character. If all people were to reflect the image of Christ in their radical character, the ideals of literature and art, or rather something more beau- tiful and better, would live and act before us, and no one can estimate the enhanced joy from moral beauty. It is an office of Love to increase material beauty. She smiles upon the marriage of taste with industry. She would esteem it a crime to mar nature ; she DUTIES TO OUBSELVES. l4? ivould, if possible, restore the beauty of Eden. How much more then must Love feel under obliga- tion to increase moral beauty ; how much more a crime to diminish it. In a community whose moral nature is developed, high moral character is the purest, the best, the amplest contribution to mere enjoyment that can be made. It is better than pictures or statues or landscape gardens. Such a contribution every man can make by attending to his own state, and it is among the more imperative obligations of Love to do this. That this end of love would be most fally reached by our perfection, is too plain to need enforcement. Everywhere the highest complacency demands perfection. CHAPTEK IV. PERFECTION AS RELATED TO THE GLORY OP GOD. We have thus seen that our own perfection is a condition of our best ministrations to others in each of the three ways in which it is possible for us to minister to them, and that love would there- Pore oblige us to seek that perfection. We are also under obligation to seek it, because it is a condition of our most fully glorifying God. God is glorified by the manifestation of his per fections. In the products of his wisdom and power He is glorified, as they are seen to be perfect. He 148 MORAL SCIENCE. IS more glorified as He himself is seen to be perfect in his moral character and government, and as He is loved and obeyed by creatures made in his image. This love and obedience are the sum of human duty : they are perfection. They are also the glorifying of God, and, it may bo added, the enjoying of Him, That God should be glorified by us voluntarily, and enjoyed in any other way, we cannot conceive. In this view of it, therefore, perfection can hardly be said to be a condition of glorifying God. It is the glorifying of Him. CHAPTER V. PERFECTION AS RELATED TO SELF-LOVE. From the above it appears that love to others and to God would require us to seek our own perfection. But this is just what would be required by a reason- able self-love, and is there no place for that ? Yes ; and we here reach the point, not only of the recon- ciliation of self-love with benevolence, but of their convergence. Self-love is legitimate. Our own good IS of intrinsic value, and w^e are especially bound to care for it as it is that part of the universal good which is more especially intrusted to us. God cares for it, and why not we ? In doing this we bave reason to believe that we not only work with Him for our own good, but as He himself works. From hence, also, it is evident," says Edwards, ir DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 149 liis " Treatise on the Nature of Virtue,'' ^' that the divine virtue, or the virtue of the divine mind, must consist principally in love to himself." If this be correct, our virtue will consist in some degree in love to ourselves. While, therefore, we allow self- love a place in prompting efforts for our own per- fection, it is a subordinate one. It is Avorthy of notice that it is no part of the divine law, as directly expressed, that we love our- selves. It is simply implied in the command to love our neighbor as ourselves. The reason doubtless is the deep harmony there is between loving God and our neighbor and loving ourselves. So perfectly coincident are they as reciprocally re- sulting, both and equally, from perfect powers act- ing rightly, that if we love God and our neighbor we do the very thing that self-love would require, and there is no need of enforcing a further law. To love God and our neighbor is the best w^ay of loving ourselves. CHAPTER VI. HABITS. Iz speaking of individual upbuilding and perfec- tion, the subject of habits may not be omitted. Habits presuppose original faculties and suscep- Habits, ac- tibilitics by which acts are done and im- paaeive. prcssious are received independently ol habit. They are formed by repeated voluntary 150 MOBAL SCIENCE. action of the powers, and by repeated impressions on the sensibihty. No man, therefore, is born with habits, but every one has a tendency to form them ; and, according to the distinction just made, they will be either active or passive. Active ^ habits are formed by the repetition of voluntary acts. It is an ultimate fact in ^^^j^^ our constitution, that repetition, practice, use, produces, always facility in doing the acts re- peated, and sometimes, in addition, a tendency to do them. Facility and tendency, — these are the results of acts voluntarily repeated, which required at first careful attention and painful effort. Both facihty and tendency are spoken of as the result of habit, but they need to be distinguished ; and we also need to distinguish a tendency to do a thing in a particular manner, from a tendency to do it at all. By repetition one gains facility in writing his name, and a tendency, if he write it at allj to do so in a par- ticular way ; but he does not gain a tendency to write his name. For doirio; that a rational motive is required. The same may be said of all acquired skill. This is gained by the repetition of acts giving facility, and a tendency to do the thing in a particular manner. But in some cases a step further is taken, and a tendency is acquired to do the thing •tsolf. This may go so far that habitual action may seem automatic, and not only not to be from the will, but to be in opposition to it. It is this ten- dency which is more particularly spoken of as DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 151 " habit." This it is that may need to be guarded against, or to be overcome. Of such a constitution the object is evident. It Object of not to trammel us, or to reduce us to habits. routine, but to enable us so to incorporate into our being the results of voluntary action as to avail ourselves of those results with the least pos- sible attention, and so that the mind may be free to enter upon new fields of effort. This it is desir- able to notice, because many writers have enlarged the sphere of habit quite too much. Such being the nature of active habits, and the object of that constitution by which they are formed, it is obvious, — 1. That men must be responsible for their habits, Responsi- and for all acts done from them. Not bility for •pit* • • habits. only do specific habits origmate in the will as prompted by original and controlling faculties that act independently of habit, but they can never wholly escape from the control of will. 2. It is obvious that when men rest in any form Habits con- habitual action, they defeat the end for fcTut norto which the capacity for habits was given, trammel us. y^j^j^,}^ jg gjyg freedom to enter upon new fields of activity. Habit, as habit, is automatic and mechanical. It is simply conservative, while man never reaches a point where conservatism is not for the sake of progress. Hence, while we are to seek by repetition all possible facility and power, we are to guard sedulously against being brought 152 MORAL SCIENCE* mto bondage to any tendency. It is sad to see the power of rational will and free choice narrowed down by any blind force, natural or acquired. 3. It is obvious that bad habits may be formed as well as ^ood ones. In these there is ^ . . . Bad habits. a tendency to increase m strength m- definitely ; and when we have this accumulated power thus added to the force of original passion, we have a bondage the most fearful known. Hence the w^isdom of letting evil alone " before it be med- dled with " 4. It is a point of wisdom to set the habits," as Paley says, " so that every change may The "set" be a change for the better." In illustra- ting this he says that the advantage is with those habits which allow of an indulgence in the devia- tion from them. The luxurious receive no greater pleasure from their dainties than the peasant does from his bread and cheese ; but the peasant, when- ever he goes abroad, finds a feast ; whereas the epicure must be well entertained to escape disgust. Those who spend every day at cards, and those wlio go every day to plough, pass their time much alike ; but then whatever suspends the occupation of the card-player distresses him ; whereas to the laborer every interruption is a refreshment ; and this appears in the different effects that Sunday produces upon the two, which proves a day of rec- reation to the one, but a lamentable burden to tho other." 1 1 Moral Philosophy^ chap. vl. DUTIES TO OURSELVES. 153 Passive liabits, as has been said, are formed by re- Passive peated impressions. These, no less than habits. active habits, have it for their end to regu- late action. This they do by their effect both upon the enjoyment and the suffering caused by impres- sions. The end being action, the' means are disre- garded ; and emotions and impressions, both pleas- ant and unpleasant, are moderated by such habits when they woukl interfere with the best condi- tion for action. The doctrine of Bishop Butler is that, From our very faculty of habits, passive impressions, by being repeated, grow weaker. Thoughts, by often passing through the mind are felt less sensibly ; being accustomed to danger begets intrepidity, — that is, lessens fear ; to dis- tress, lessens the passion of pity ; to instances of others' mortality, lessens the sensible apprehension of our own. And from these two observations together, — that practical habits are formed and strengthened by repeated acts, and that passive impressions grow weaker by being repeated upon us, — it must follow that active habits may be gradually forming and strengthening by a course of acting upon such and such motives and excite- ments, whilst these motives and excitements them- selves are by proportionable degrees growing less sensible, — that is, are continually less and less sensibly felt, even as the active habits strengthen." ^ This shows how needful it is that motives, excite- 1 Analogy^ Part I., chap. v. 154 MORAL SCIENCE. ments, sympathies, legitimately connected with ac- tion, should be followed by sucli action, for no one is so hardened and hopeless as he who has become famihar with such motives without corresponding action. " Going," says Butler, " over the theory of virtue in one's thoughts, talking well, and draw- ing fine pictures of it ; this is so far from neces- sarily or certainly conducing to form a habit of it in him who thus employs himself, that it may harden the mind in a contrary course, — that is, form a habit of insensibility to all moral consid- erations." But wliile the aboVe gives us the relation of active and passive habits, and contains Qualification . 1 \ n ^ .of Butler's practical truth or the utmost moment, it doctriue. may be questioned whether the doctrine of passive impressions, as stated, does not require qualification. No proof is given by Butler that from our very faculty of habits, passive impressions must grow weaker." It is even conceivable that they might grow stronger. The law applies to all that depends on physical organization as now constituted, perhaps goes further, but is not a necessary law of intellect and sensitive being. Let that on which sensibility depends remain unworn, as surely it may, and there will be no reason why the thousandth impression should not be as vivid as the first. CLASS II. DUTIES TO OUR FELLOW MEN. Duties to our fellow men will fall into two great iivisions, wliicli we shall treat separately, with li visions under each. I. Duties to men as men. II. Duties growing out of special relations. PRELIMINARY. SELF-LOYE AND THE LOVE OF OTHERS. In passing to these we must not omit to say that Self-love as love to our fellow men requires atten- and love of . t • i others re- tiou to our owu conciition and state, so ciprocally . . . dependent, selt-love rcquircs attention to then' condi- tion and state. If we can best minister to our fel- low men only as Ave are perfect, they can best minister to us only as they are perfect. As social beings, our whole interest and enjoyment will de- pend upon the condition and state of others, and the promotion of their well-being is that of oui own. So intimate and reciprocally dependent are a rational self-love and a love of others. They are Qot only not opposites, as some have supposed, 156 MORAL SCIENCE. but are different phases of one common principle, equally necessary to the common end. In our duties to others the law is that we shall love our neighbor as ourselves. We must then do for him as we would for ourselves. But, as we have seen, we are to regard our own rights, to sup- ply our wants, and to perfect and direct our powers If, then, we would love our fellow men as we do ourselves, we must — 1. llegard, and, if necessary, aid in securing their rights ; — 2. Supply their wants ; and — 3. Do what we can to perfect and direct their powers. These will include, and in their order as lower and higher, all our duties to our fellow men. In these ways we are to "do good to all as we Lave opportunitv." But through rela- Ground of 1 T 1 1*' 1 r>{ 1 ' 1' • 1 special rights tions established by (jrod, mdicatmg the and duties, ends not only of the individual, but of the family ind of society, we are required, while we give to all their riglits, to supply the wants and to seek to per- fect and direct the powers of some rather than of others. To empower us to do these more effec- tually, we may have special rights over persons ; we may owe them special duties ; and they may have special claims and be under special obligations. This will give us what have been called the " right3 \)f persons " in distinction from the " rights of things," and w^ill recpiire a separate consideration of the rights and duties of the family and of society FIRST GREAT DIVISION. DUTIES TO MEN AS MEN. DIVISION I. DUTIES REGARDING THE RIGHTS OF OTHERS. CHAPTER L OE RIGHTS. We are now prepared to pass to the consideration of rights. Of rights the correlative is obhgation, and the obhgations corresponding to rights give the lowest form of duty to others. For the most part riglits are guarded by negative precepts, the command being Thou shalt not." They belong to others already, and can be taken or withheld from them only by positive injury. This love can never do. The least that love can do for others is to respect, find concede to them, all their rights ; and no one who violates or withholds the rights of another can consistently claim to be benevolent toward him. That we give to others their rights, is therefore the 'Oroper condition of all higher forms of duty. 158 MORAL SCIENCE. As actions are right from their relation to an end, 60 all rights are founded in the relation of those things to which men have a right, to some Foundation end indicated through our nature, and to be attained either by ourselves or others. For every active principle in man, for every natural desire, affection, or capacity, indicating an end to be attained, there is a corresponding natural ri<2:ht : and these rio;hts are hio;her or lower accord- ing to the dignity and sacredness of the end, or which is the same thing, of that part of our nature in which they originate. Thus theje are rights which would secure the attainment by instinct of its ends, and by the appetites of their end. And so of the desires, and of the intellect, and of the natural affections, and of the moral and spiritual nature. Whoever is permitted to pursue unob- structedly all the ends indicated by these several active principles, has all his rights ; and in doing so he has a right to have and to do everything that will not interfere with the riMits of others. If ob- structed on any other ground, he would not have all his rio;hts. Havino; endowed man with active principles, the purpose of God evidently was to place him in such conditions that he should be in duced, re(juired, and enabled to secure the eiids indicated by those principles ; and when in the pursuit of those ends he is arrested by any niter- ference with such divinely constituted conditions, the indignant protest which arises in the breast of %very man is the voice of God in the assertion of DUTIES TO OUR FELLOW-MEN. 159 rights. We are so constituted that, in appi-ehend- ing the relation between these active principles and their ends, the moral reason necessarily forms the idea of rights. Rights, as thus founded, are of several kinds. And 1st, There are what have been called Kinds of "rights of tilings" and ''rights of per- rights. sons." Tliis is a radical distinction, and needs to be clearly understood. Men have a right to things that they may be enabled to attain their own ends. They have rights over persons that they may enable those per- sons to attain their ends. Rights of things are to guard against the encroachment of others, and their sole correlative is obligation on the part of others. From the use of anything to which one man has a right, others are under obligation to ab- stain, and to abstain wholly. Of rights over others, having it for their object to enable them to attain their end, the correlative is still obligation on the part of others ; but they also involve obligation on the part of him in whom the right vests to those others. The parent has a right over the child, and the child is under obligation to respect that right ; but the parent is also himself under obligation to the child to use that right solely for the end for ivhicli it was given. As rights have their foundation in their relation Limit of ^^^9 ^^^^y their limit in the '^^^^ same relation > Relatively to others a mau 160 MORAL SCIENCE. may Iiave a right to do what he will with his own, but iu truth and before God, no man has a right to use anything except for the end for which it was given. No man has a right to destroy his property wantonly, or to use it foolishly, though no other man may have a right to prevent him. Here, too, we find not only the foundation, but the hmit of all rioihts of p:overnment whether human or divine. If any being be in a position to secure his own ends mdependently of all others, then no other being can have any rights over him. It is on this ground that any right over God is impossible, and his right over his creatures as moral Governor is not from his relation to them as Creator and Pre- server, as these relations are simply from his power, but it is from his capacity and disposition to do for them what is necessary for the attainment by them of their end. Moral government is by law, and no man will say that it would be right in God to give his creatures a law that would lead them astray in seeking their supreme end. So far as we can vm- derstand it the whole end of the moral government Df God is to lead his creatures to the attainment by them of that end. If any one should fail of this ultimately and finally, and it should appear that God had not provided conditions by which it was possible for lihn to attain it, the fault would not be in the creature. But there will be no such failure. No creature shall ever be able to charge such a failure apon God. Hence the righteousness of his govern- DUTIES TO OUR FELLOW-MEN. 161 ment, liis right under that government to control his creatures, and the guilt of their rebelhon. In the same way parents and civil rulers, holding rela- tions established by God, through which their aid is indispensable to others in the attainment of their ends, have rights over them, but only for the attain- ment by them of those ends. If any man make use of another for his own ends simply, he uses him as a tJdng. This, when done by an individual, is slavery ; when done by a government, it is tyranny. Rights, again, are natural, and adventitious. „. , , Natural rio-hts are both of thino-s and of adve^i-^^'^ persons. They are those which would tious. belong to man if there were no civil government. A man has a natural right to those means and conditions of good which God has pro- vided to enable him to secure his end, such as air, light, water, the unappropriated products of the ^arth and waters, and the fruit of his own labors. Parents have also a natural rio;ht to the obedience and respect of their children, and children to the love and care of their parents, because these grow out of natural relations. Adventitious rights are those which grow out of civil society. No man is naturally a ruler, or judge, or sheriff, or legislator. These have rights as such, but they are adven- titious. So also are many of the rights of property. Rights are also alienable and inalienable. Alien- Rigbts alien- able rio;hts are those which may be law- able and in- n ^^ ^ ^ ^ ^ tt- i iUenabie. lully transferred to another'. VV e do nol U 162 MOFvAL SCIENCE. here inquire what others may unlawfully do in de- priving us of rights, w^hich will still be ours and may again be exercised when we have the power, but what we may do in transferring to others rights which will cease to be ours. The ground of this di?tinction will be found in the ends which these rights respect. All rights from the lower powers, as the desires and natural affections, that do not respect the supreme end, are ahenable. A man^ may transfer to another his property, or -his right over his child. But a man has an inalienable right to himself in the use of all those means and condi- tions which are necessary to the attainment of his supreme end. These he cannot alienate, and no one can rightfully deprive him of them. No man may low^er his true manhood ; but if, without doing this, he can alienate or part with anything, he is at liberty to do it. If the foundation of rights has been correctly stated, it will follow that the rights of all ^q^^^i men are equal. As rights are founded "s^^®* pn ends indicated by active principles, if men have l ommon active principles and a common end, that is, if they are men, they must have common and equal rights. This is the doctrine of the Declaration of Independence,, and the foundation of republican 'nstitutions. The condition in which men are born, and tlieir natural endowments, may be of the greatest diversity, but the right of one Iniman being fee all the means and conditions given him by God DUTIES TO OUR FELLOW-MEN. 163 for attaining his ends must rest on the same ground^ and be as perfect and sacred as that of any other. Tiiat men have equal rights has been regarded as self-evident, but some confusion has arisen from not distinguishing clearly between the rights of things Rights of and of persons. As rerards riMits of per- persons to SOUS a practical evasion has been attempted. *e distm- I ... , . tinguished. Ji^\\ children, it is said, are indeed born with equal rights, but, as unable to secure their own ends, they need for a long time to be under guardianship, and if there are persons or races who are under the same need, they may be treated in an analogous way. This is true, but before the desired application of it may be made, it must be shown that such persons are really unable to take care of themselves. There are idiots and incompetent persons who must be thus cared for, but to suppose large classes or races to be left thus and without natural guardianship would be an imputation upon Providence ; there are no such races. It must also be shown that any such assumed guardianship is a rightful one, and will secure its legitimate ends. Such a guardian- ship for tlie ends of those over whom it is assumed, would not be coveted. The law of love would re- quire us first to give all persons their rights, and if, lifter a fair trial, they are unable to take care of themselves, then to have guardians appointed by lawful authority, and for their good. This would be wholly contrary to the spirit of slavery, which 2onsists in using persons as things, and for our own ends. 164 MORAL SCIENCE. Tlie rights which men, all men, thus have as em- powered of God to secure their own ends, are those of Justice and of Truth, which last is also a form of justice. As between man and man, justice consists in con- ceding and rendering to every one alj his rights. He who has all his rights has no injustice done him. Divine Justice consists not only in this, but also in rendering to every one his deserts. These two forms of justice are entirely distinct. Desert of punishment depends upon guilt ; but with guilt as such and in distinction from injury to the individual and to society, man cannot deal. That depends upon the heart, which he cannot know and can have no claim to regulate. Man looks on the act and infers the motive. He may not punish ex- cept on the presumption of a bad motive, but his punishment must be graduated, not by the pre- sumed badness of the motive, but by the tendency of the act to injure society. God, on the other hand, looks at the motive and disregards the act. He sees and punishes guilt in intention w^here there is no outward act. Hence " Veno-eance belono-s to Him." He only can administer punitive justice. Man may guard rights ; he may prevent any violation of them in the name of justice and within its limits. And the sentiment of justice w^ithin him may find satis- faction in such punishment, but the measure of pun- ishment by him must be found in its necessity to guard the rights of society, and not in any satis- DUTIES TO OUR FELLOW-MEN. 165 faction of absolute punitivQ justice. Any othei right can be had only from direct revelation. We now pass to consider more particularly the rights which belong to all men. But in doing tliis we must notice an element Security an whicli euters iuto our conception of all .element in rights — that of securitv. The rio;ht to the concep- & JO tion of right, g^curity in the possession and use of any- thin o; rests on the same fjround as the rio[;ht to the thino; itself, since the end on Avliich the riMit is based cannot be fully attained without this. With- out security there is no enjoyment or free use of anything, and perfect security alone gives its full value to a possession. This is the element and con- dition in connection with our rights which we value more than any other. Hence this element is recognized in law ; and if there be good reason to believe that any one will violate the rights of others, he may be bound over to keep the peace. CHAPTER II. PERSONAL rights: LIFE AND LIBERTY. Security being thus imphed in all rights, the first class which we shall notice is those of the Person. Every person has a riglit to life, and to such security and freedom as will enable him to attain the several ends indicated by his active powers. On the riglit to life all others depend. This is the first guarded in the Decalogue. It is j^jgi^^to also the first mentioned in the Declaration of Independence, where it is said to be inahenable. It is so. It may be forfeited for crime ; it m.ay be surrendered for the sake of principle or of humanity, but cannot be alienated for a consideration. How, then, may the right to life be so forfeited ■:hat others may have the right to take it hq^^^, away ? This may be done in four ways, and 1. By attempting the life of another. The right to take life in defending life is recognized by tlio laws of all countries and by all persons, except a Pew extreme non-resistants. 2. The right to life may be forfeited by attempt- PERSONAL RIGHTS: LIFE AND LIBERTY 167 mg house-breaking or robbery in the night. The law properly makes a distinction between such attempts by day and by night, and in the latter case justifies the taking of hfe. Still every such attempt will not make this morally right, and for such cases no general rule can be laid down, 3. The riglit to life may be forfeited by resisting the officers of the law. If officers of the law are resisted in its execution, they have a right, as a last resort, to take life. If a mob which they have been commanded to disperse, will not disperse, they have a right to fire upon it. 4. The right to life is forfeited by murder, that is, by taking life with malice aforethought. The death penalty was early authorized and de- manded by the Bible, not from cruelty, but on the very ground of the sacredness of human life. " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for in the image of God made He man.^^ The estimate placed by a lawgiver upon any right, can be measured only by the penalty by which he guards it ; and as death is the highest possible penalty, they who impose this show the highest possible estimate of the value of life. That is a sophism by which those who reject this penalty would persuade themselves or the community that in so doing they are more humane than others, or Bet a higher value on human life. It is the reverse. But the riglit to take life can depend upon no estimate of its value by us. It must come either lirectly or indirectly from God, — directly by rev- 168 MORAL SCIENCE. elation, and indirectly from its necessity to tlie ends of government. Government is from God, and has thus a right to do what is essential to its own being and ends ; and if the security which is its great end can be attained only by the death of those who would destroy it, then society may put them to death. Society has thus the right, and must judge how far, in the varying phases of civil- ization and Christianity, it may be necessary to use it. The rights of the Person are also infringed by any violence actual or attempted. An assault is violence attempted. Battery is any degree of vio- lence, even the slightest touch in anger, or for in- sult. Violence may also result in wounding or in maiming the person attacked. Under rights of the person is also included, — the Right to Liberty. By this is here Ri^htto meant, not freedom of choice, but the ^'^^^y- liberty of external action in carrying out our choices. It is the right to do whatever any one may choose, provided he does not interfere with the rights of another. Liberty to this extent is plainly essential to the end of man as a responsible being, and hence a natural right. It is also inalienable so far as it is necessary to the higliest end of any man ; but if by parting with some portion of it, — for even slavery does not wholly take it away, — a man can better subserve the great ends of love, he is at liberty to do it. CHAPTER III. RIGHT TO PROPERTY. The Riglit to Property reveals itself through an ItBfounda- original desire. The affirmation of it is early and universally made, and becomes a controlling element in civil society. The sense of this right, thus originally given, is deepened by observation and reflection. Without this society could not exist. With no right to the product of his labor no man would make a tool, or a garment, or build a shelter, or raise a crop. There could be no industry and no progress. It will be found too, historically, that the general well-being and progress of society has been in pro- portion to the freedom of every man to gain prop- erty in all legitimate ways, and to security in its possession. Let the form of the government be what it may, if there but be freedom of industry, and security in the possession and enjoyment of its results, there will be prosperity. The laws of every government relate largely to property. They regulate the modes of its acquisi- tion and transfer, and punish violations of the right. The acquisition of property is required by love, 170 MORAL SCIENCE. because it is a powerful means of benefiting others. There is no giving without a previous get- property to ting. A selfish getting of property, tliough ^^^^^^^^-i better than a selfish indolence or wastefulness, is not to be encouraged ; but the desire of property working in subordination to the affections should be. Most blessed would it be if all the desires could thus work, but especially this. Industry, frugahty, carefulness, as ministering to a cheerful giving, would then not only be purged from all taint of meanness, but would be ennobled. " There have," says Chancellor Kent, ^' been modern theorists, who have considered separate and ex- clusive property as the cause of injustice, and the unhappy result of government and artificial insti- tutions. But human society would be in a most unnatural and miserable condition if it were pos- sible to be histituted or reorganized upon the basis of such speculations. The sense of property is graciously bestowed upon mankind for the purpose of rousing them from sloth and stimulating them to action. It leads to the cultivation of the earth, the institution of government, the establishment of jus- tice, the acquisition of the comforts of life, the growth of the useful arts, the spirit of commerce, the productions of taste, the erections of charity, and the display of the benevolent affections." Property may be acquired, — 1. By a])propriating so much of those things which God has given to all as we need for oui RIGItT TO PROPERtY. 171 own use. Some things which God has given to all, Direct modes as air and sun1io;ht, cannot be appropriated, »f acquiring ^ ' , 4 .property. and SO cannot become property. iiut the spontaneous fruits of the earth, the products of the waters, and so much land as may be necessary for individual support, and as shall be permanently occupied, may, by appropriation, become property. 2. Property may be acquired by labor. Labor is the chief source of value, and the laborer has a right to the value he creates. This is a natural right resulting directly from a man's right to himself. It may not be easy, it is not, to adjust the questions that arise between the claims of accumulated labor in the form of capital and of labor directly applied, or wages ; but the principle is, that the value created should be shared in pro- portion to the labor represented or applied. In the above ways property may be acquired Indirect directly. It may also be acquired indi- modes. rectly, and — 1. By exchange. This may be either by barter, which is an exchange of commodities ; or by bargain and sale, in which the purchaser gives money. 2. By gift. The right to give away property is involved in the right of ownership. 3. By will. The right to bestow property by will is admitted in all civilized countries. This is natural and beneficial to society. The right how- ever is not absolute, but may be so limited by law as not to counterwork the general spirit of the in- ititutions of a country. 172 MORAL SCIENCE. 4. By inheritance. When persons die intestate, their property is inherited by their relatives in accordance with law. 5. By accession. " This is the right to all that one's own property produces, whether that property be movable or immovable, and the right to that which is united to it by accession either naturally or artificially. This includes the fruits of the earth produced naturally or by human industry, the in- crease of animals, and the new species of articles made by one person out of the materials of another." " Also title by alluvion, or the deposit of earth by natural causes." ^ 6. By possession. To prevent litigation the laws properly fix a limit beyond which a man shall not be disturbed in the possession of property, however it may have been acquired. This gives no moral right, but is what is called " right by possession." The right of property is exclusive. No man, no state, has the right to take it away without ^^^.g ^^^^ an equivalent, and the owner has a right to put it to any use he may please that is consistent with the rights of others. Property may be real or personal. Real estate consists of lands and of appurtenances, as Property real or per- houses, trees, shrubs, that cannot be easily sonai. moved. All other property is personal. With the exceptions to be mentioned hereafter, ihe right of property is violated if it be taken with- 1 Kent's Commentaries. KIGItT rp PROPERTY. 178 out tlie free consent of tlie owner; or if throiign rbis right concealment or deception tlie owner fail lated to have a full know^ledge of tlie equiva- lent offered. If property be taken with consent enforced by fear, or by violence without consent, it is robbery. If taken by forcibly entering a dwelling in the night, it is burglary. If simply taken without the knowledge or con- sent of the owner with no violence, it is theft. If property be taken, and through concealment or misrepresentation the owner be ignorant of the equivalent offered, it is cheating. If the equivalent offered be a forged paper, it is fraud. The line between fraud and cheating is not sharply drawn. In a large sense they cover the same ground, but while there is fraud in all cheat- ing, yet forgery is a fraud, and not cheating. If property be taken with consent obtained by lying or deception without an equivalent, it is ob- taining property under false pretences. Of these, robbery, as violating both the rights of person and of property, is tlie highest crime. As violating both the rights of security and property, burglary comes next. The others are criminal in the eye of the law, for that is the only criminality that can here be estimated, as they tend to unsettle the right of property and disturb the order of society, and this tendency may vary with time ana circumstances. MORAL SCIENCE. The right of property is exclusiv^e, but as it is an niferior good, it may not stand in the way Ground of of the great interests of the community, or fe?eice with of the hfe of the individual. Hence the community have the right, provided for and asserted ander all governments, of taking in a legal way, and for a fair equivalent, private property for the convenience and safety of the public. And indi- v-iduals have the right to take property as food to preserve life. It is commonly said that the right of property precludes the taking of the least thing without the consent of the owner, but consent may sometimes oe presumed. The rule is to take nothing we should not be willing the owner should see us take. To take an apple in passing through an orchard is not stealing. In the ways above mentioned ^^roperty is wrong- luUy taken. It may be taken rightfully with the Tree consent of the owner, whether as a gift or for an equivalent. If for an equivalent, it may be by exchange or by purchase. The law of excliange, as already indicated, is chat each party should have a full knowl- j^^w of ex- edge of that which is offered as an equiva- lent. In exchange intrinsic values are not ccnsid- er -XT • 1 not suffi- Iike the laws oi JNature, it must p^o by eienttose- ? 1 cure this general rules, and so cannot touch the supply, heart. It has in it the power of relief, but not of reform. It may reach want, but not character, and till that is reached nothing effectual or permanent is done. The present life is net retributive, tbut disciplinary, and when the laws of well-being have been so far transo-ressed as to brino; want and suffer- ing that call for charity, these should lead to refor- mation. But this they seldom do. More often we find either a hardened defiance or a languid and hopeless discouragement. What is then needed is such kindness and sympathy as will bring to the poor and suffering and degraded the hope of res- toration to his own self-respect, and to the respect and love of others. This can come only from a manifestation of individual and personal interest. Love begets love, and for all who can love tliere is hope. If love thus manifested, and seconded by the natural fruits of transgression, will not work a reformation, no human effort can avail. Nor will the highest interests of the benefactor aimself permit that the relief of want and suffering SUPPLY OF THE WANTS OF OTHERS. 197 from indolence and vice should be left to legislation alone. If we except the forgiveness of enemies, and kindness to those injurious to us personally, there is no way in which Christ can be imitated so closely as by doing good to the degraded through their own fault, and to those seemingly lost. There is no achievement like that of lifting a man sunk in vice and enchained by evil habits onto the high ground of Christian manhood, and fixing him permanently there ; and the more there is of sympathy, and of hysic;d want, ignorance, and I will not say vice, but that state in which the ra» DUTY OF INFLUENCE, ETC. 206 tional and spiritual powers are in bondage to those that are impulsive. Of these, physical want, as producing immediate First phys- Suffering, and as addressing us through leal want. ^j^^ scuscs, makcs an appeal that is uni- versally felt. Hence all mankind have a sympathy with the disposition that would relieve such want. From the time of Job, and doubtless from the be ginnmg, men have commended him who has been " eyes to the blind," and feet to the lame," and a " father to the poor," and who has " caused the widow's heart to sing for joy." Besides, physical suffering is often unavoidable. It may be from hereditary disease, or from misfortune, or accident, and no possible agency, or want of agency, on the part of the sufferer can come in to check our sym- pathy. It is to be said, too, though giving to sup- ply pliysical suffering often requires delicacy, yet that we approach in this less near to the centre of j. ersonality, and are less in danger of wounding either self-love or a just self-respect. But, with the evils from ignorance, all this is in 6 1 • right of ought society to confer the right or taking suffrage, part in the government ? And here it is plain that no one ought to be ex- cluded arbitrarily, that is, unless such exclusion is required by the ends of government. In this view all agree on two grounds of exclusion. One is in- competence, the other presumed hostility to the government. On these grounds minors, foreigners not naturalized, criminals, and those who have shown hostihty to the government, are excluded. This being conceded, and putting aside for the moment the question in regard to women, the one great principle which must be observed by society in conferring the right of suffrage, and which is practically found to be the foundation and safeguard of civil liberty, is that that right should be attainable oy all. It is to be something attainable by all, not possessed. Thus society may require that all voters shall have attained a uniform and discreet age, but aistinctions may not be drawn between the rich and the poor, the white and the black, the learned ana GOVERNMENT, ETC. 273 the unlearned. To the youth of each of thesa classes society may rightly say that when they reach such age, and not till then, they shall come equally into possession of this right. Nor may society impose any condition upon the right of suffrage which the mass of the people can- not comply w^ith. Thus society may not require that voters shall be free from sin, but may require that they shall be free from crime, for a moral life is a condition w^ith which all can comply. Thus society may not limit the right of suffrage to pro- found mathematicians, nor to men learned in the ancient languages, for these would necessitate talent and education not practically within the reach of every youth ; but it may require that every voter shall be able to read the Eno-Ush lano-uao-e, for that is attainable by every American youtli, and neces- sary, in the present age, to secure an ordinary intel- ligence. Such is the basis on which the v'mht of suffrage should be conferred. Forbiddino; that the rio;ht should be withheld from any race or class as such, and that any part of society should have or exercise the right of excluding any other part, it secures to every person the right to rise. But besides the rio-lit of suffrao:e, w^hich is the Bight of right to take a part in the affairs of the representa- lion. government, there is a totally distinct right. % right of representation. These two are often corfounded, but are distinct, for those who do not 18 MORAL SCIENCE. vote are Still entitled to be represented. In prac- tical effect, as in theory, the child is represented by the father, and the wife by the husband. All indi- viduals have an interest in government, and where the individual possesses an interest, that interest necessitates and confers a right, for wherever there is a rio;ht to o-overn there must also be a rio:ht to be governed rightly. The representative in the legis- lature represents far more than the minority of men who voted for him. He represents their opponents who voted against him, their wives and children who did not vote, and he represents, and is bound to provide for the well-beino; of even criminals who have forfeited the right to vote. This generality of representation is sought to be secured by what is termed " manhood suffrage," and it is this which must prevent one class from dominating over or ex- cluding another from the substantial right of repre- sentation, and w^hich must secure to all that equal protection and care without which civil liberty can but imperfectly exist. There is also a right of representation which in this country has received but little favor Representa- or attention as yet, but which may m time property, be found essential to the existence of popular gov- ernment, and that is the representation of property as distinct from the representation of persons. Mer owe certain common duties to society, and society owes a certain common protection to them, but there are also expenses of government which are noi GOVERNMENT, ETC. 275 drawn equally from all men, but which are contrib- uted in different proportions by individuals. This principle is very old, and has borne an important part in the history qf the Anglo-Saxon race, it hav- ing been enunciated as early as Magna Charta in the declaration that taxes should be laid only with the consent of the taxed given through the Com- mons "in Parliament; and again in the Bill of Rights ; and again in the revolution of the Amer- ican colonies, where the principle in question was the power to tax without the consent of the taxed, or without representation. There exists now the case of unmarried women holding property on which the government imposes taxes without affording a correlative right of representation ; and there is also the case of resident aliens whose property is taxed in the same way. This withholding of representa- tion from tax-paying women, and at the same time requiring them to contribute equally with men to rhe ordinary expenses of government, already strikes the common mind as injustice ; and it may be that the growing interests of civilization will one day re- quire that these two bases of representation shall be separated, and that one branch of the legislature shall represent property, and be chosen by those who contribute towards the expense of maintaining government, and that all such shall be allowed to cake part in the government to that extent, what- ever may be their nationality, race, or sex. Of the equity of such representation there can be no quea* 276 MORAL SCIENCE. Hon. Government is supported wholly by property ; the Larger portion of legislation respects property, and it may readily happen in communities like the city of New York, where irresponsible and destitute foreigners are constantly made voters, that great in- security and oppression should result from subject- ing property to the control of mere numbers. We have thus the family as the unit of society. We have wvernment as necessarily rep- Has woman ^ . . a right to resentative. We have a right in all the vote, members of society to representation; to protection in all their rights ; to be governed rightly. We have also the two grounds on which persons have been called on to take part in the government : responsi- bility for personal service, and the support of the government by their property. With these ele- ments we inquire whether the right of suffrage should be extended to woman. The question is not whether she has a natural right to vote, for none have that, but whether her own elevation and best influence, and the ends of society require that that right should be bestowed upon her. This question has been discussed as if the sexes constituted different classes, and as if there were, or could be, in their real interests, a conflict be- tween them. That is a great mistake. A man and his wife are not of a different class ; and their in- terests, together with those of their family, are identical. The very existence of society, indeed, iepends on men and women as entering into a special GOVERNMENT, ETC. 277 relation which not only unites their interests, as in a partnership, but identifies them, and makes each sex reciprocally the guardian of the other. The cases where this relation does not exist are strictly exceptional, and society is not organized, and does not exist for exceptional cases. This question, therefore, should not come in the form of a partisan discussion, but of a mutual in quiry what the rights of woman are, and how she may be elevated to the highest point in culture and legitimate influence. And upon such an inquiry man should enter with no less alacrity and candor than woman, for if there be anything which mus' react with swift retribution upon society, it is any needless ignorance or degradation of its wives and mothers. The family, as has been said, is the unit of society. This character of it should be, and unconsciously is, one of the most cherished objects of Christian civil- ization, and unhappy will be the nation whose legis- lative mind shall regard society simply as a mass of individuals, and not as a combination cf families. The family being regarded thus, as a divine institu- tion sufficing for itself, and society being regarded as a combination of families, society will have a double life, or rather, its one life will be within two spheres. There will be the domestic life of the family, and the public life of society. Of these the family is the more important and sacred, and over this in ita domestic life, it is the duty and dignity and happi- 278 MORAL SCIENCE. ness of woman to preside. This is her sphere, not inferior to that of man, but different from it. Here Bhe has not only a right to vote, but to rule. If, as is to be supposed, she is fitted for her place, nothing will be added to the dignity of the husband or to the happiness of the family by any interference with her where the responsibility properly falls upon her. The sphere of society on the other hand belongs to man, at least it has been hitherto regarded as belong- ing to him. For the support of its institutions and for those duties more immediately required for its welfare he is responsible. Here man has the right to vote, and nothing will be added to the dignity of the w^ife or to the happiness of society by any inter- ference of the wife wdiere the responsibility properly falls upon the husband. By a natural relation, and so by the appointment of God, the wife is the centre of the domestic circle, the chief source of its happi- ness, and guardian of her husband's interests and rights in all that pertains to it. By a natural rela- tion the husband is the house-land., the provider for its wants, its defender, and the guardian of the rights of the wife as of the children in their relations to society. He is the natural representative of both. The wife is not a child, but according to the Chris- lian conception is nearer than that, is one with her husband, and their interests are one. If we suppose society composed of families alone, and if the rights wives and children would not be secured by giv- ing to every husband and father a share in the gov GOVERNMENT, ETC. 279 ^rnment, the fault woulrl not be in the system, but in iirdividual corruption that would work itself out whatever system might be adopted. Women have had wrongs, and so have children. These must be ' dressed, but this will not be done by disregard- ing any relation established by God. If parents and children, and husbands and wives, will act in the spirit of those relations, society will be perfected. If they will not do that, no political relations will avail. The same spirit on the part of men that would concede the right of voting, would concede and secure in a representative capacity every right without that. For each of the spheres above spoken of, men and women are fitted respectively by their physical organization and by their mental instincts and ten- dencies, and their relations to the children require that the spheres should be kept separate, it is not that man is not competent to set the table and rock the cradle, or that woman is not competent to vote. It is because the one life of society will work itself mi in more perfect results, if these two great but kiiterdependent spheres be left to those who natu- rally have charge of them. But while the above is said, society is to hold it- self ready to make any changes which its changing modifications may require. In the primitive stages of society, when the chief business of governments was to carry on offensive or defensive war, women Viad no desire to take part in government, and theii 280 MORAL SCIENCE. m presence would have been an inconvenience and injury. But society has now greatly advanceS, so that tliere are many fields, especially that of educa- tion, in which woman may properly act, and in which her aid will be an advantage to society ; and it is possible that in a future and higher stage of progress these fields will be increased, and woman be assigned to perform her definite part in the gov- ernment. Yet so long as the sexes remain fused in one common mass, as has always been the case with society, so long the indiscriminate mingling of the sexes, either in the domestic sphere or in the gen- eral management of government, will be found an inconvenience, a source of embarrassment and weak- ness. If, however, it should be found advantageous to society and to woman herself that the number of her employments should be increased, and her re- sponsibility to society enlarged, there would probably be no opposition to a corresponding enlargement of the riorht of suffrao-e. If we adopt this view of the family as the unit of society, and of the natural right of representa- tion, the principle which it contains will harmonize and protect all interests. Let the family be regarded as the unit of society, and the principle adhered to of giving to each unit a single and equal represen- tation, and society may provide for exceptional cases Dy general laws. Such cases arise when the chil- dren of a family reach maturity and do not marry ind in the case of widows who are the heads of GOVERNMENT, ETC. 281 families. For the case of widows no remedy is pro- vided, but in equity there should be. When the sons of a family reach the age of manliood they go forth and become, in theory as in fact, the stocks of new families, which sooner or later they support, maintain, and represent, and hence they are made responsible for the duties and burdens of society. They may not, indeed, instantly marry and become the heads of new families, but they are preparing for that, and are essentially doing the work of main- taining the future family by the work of preparation. The daughters, on the contrary, remain at home, and are identified in its interests with the old family until they are taken forth to form parts of new fam- ilies. They do not go forth by themselves, nor un- dertake the work of preparation, but stay protected, maintained, and represented in and by the original stock. . Perhaps, exceptionally, they may acquire property, and in the contemplation of law, establish for themselves new homes. Society will never fos- ter such a system, for it would be prejudicial to its own ends ; but nevertheless it might protect the in- dividual by allowing her to exercise the suffrage of property representation. The right of personal suffrage she could hardly ask, and society would hardly allow, except as she should be willing and fitted to do the work of the juror, the policeman, the sheriff, the soldier, — except as she should be- come subject to all the duties and responsibilities or which the great interests of society depend. 282 MORAL SCIENCE. In Speaking on this subject nothing has been said Jiitherto of sentiment and a sense of propriety as distinguished from rights, and nothing need be, ex* cept as those indicate, as natural sentiment always does, what is right. But sentiment depends so much upon custom, and custom is so varied and capri- cious that it is difficult to know what natural sen- timent is. Throughout the East it shocks the sense Df propri'fety for a woman to appear in public un- veiled, or to \valk the streets arm-in-arm with her husband, probably even more than it w^ould here for aer to vote and take part in the stormy debates of a town meeting. Still, sentiment has a real basis. In reading the account lately given by a missionary of his findino; a man in the house knittino; and his wife at work in the field, we cannot help feeling that the sense of ludicrous impropriety as well as of indigna- tion is well founded. That there is in the minds of large portions of the people of this country — perhaps strono-er amono; the well educated and refined, and stronger among women than men — a feehng of pro- priety that would be offended by the promiscuous mingling of women with men in the conduct of pub- lic affairs, cannot be questioned. It is the sentiment which makes woman strong through her weakness. It lay at the foundation of all that w^as good in .hivahy. It has been a strong auxiliary to Chris- tian principle in elevating woman. It sets her apart m many hearts as something sacred, and adds to life otherwise hard and prosaic, much of its beauty GOVERNMENT, ETC. 283 f^'or this sentiment Americans are distinguished. It should be cherished rather tlian weakened, and if, as many think, it would be destroyed, or essentially impaired by extending the suffrage to woman, those who wish her elevation will hesitate long before tak- ing such a step. CHAPTER IX. POKMS OF GOVERNMENT. DUTIES OF MAOISTS AXES AND CITIZENS. After considering elementary points so fully, it will not be necessary to spend much time on the more beaten grounds of forms of government, and of the riMits and duties of citizens and of mamstrates. Governments have always been classed as Mon- archies, Aristocracies, and Democracies, Fo^mg^j^ but substantially they are now, and indeed fs^en^u^^y * always liave been, either monarchical or republican. There are indeed privileged classes, as in England, who have an hereditary share in the government, but there is no government that is in fact or in form aristocratic. Monarchies are either absolute or limited, as the power rests with one man alone or is divided w^ith others. The monarch may be elective, or heredi- tary, though of an elective monarchy there is now no example. That the monarchy should be hered- itary conduces to the stability of the government, %nd to peace. Democracies, that is governments by the people themselves, instead of by representation, are impos- FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, ETC. 285 Bible except for very sriiall communities. Repub- lican government is representative and elective. There may be a simple independent republic, such as the several States were before the formation of the Federal Union, or there may be a federal republic, with powers divided between the central government and the several states. The object of government, that is, security in the enjoyment of every right, may be attained under any form. A monarch may concede every right, and his character may give security, but practically it is found that rio;hts are best secured where a laro-e amount of power is retained in the hands of the people, and where the government itself is one of checks and balances. The essential condition of freedom and security „, is that the three p-reat functions of o-overn- Tne neces- o o separating Hicut, tlic Legislative, the Judicial, and the fSnctiorsof Executive, should be kept distinct, and government, gi^^^^jj different haucls. Let the laws be made by one set of men, with penalties fixed before transgression ; let the question of an infrac- tion of law and the declaration of the penalty be in the hands of another set of men, and the execution of the sentence in still other hands, and a good de- gree of security and freedom can hardly fail to be enjoyed. Still, much will depend on the method in which the legislative body and the judiciary are appointed and constituted. The object is the bes laws and their perfect administration. Society I 286 MORAL SCIENCE. therefore bound to elect men of wisdom and integ- rity, and laws passed by such men after due deliber- ation will be all that can be reached in the present imperfect state. To secure due deliberation and a view of each subject upon all its sides, the legislature Twoieg- should consist, and commonly does, of two bodies, bodies. In some cases these are elected in different methods and serve for different periods, and this would seem best adapted to secure the end. It gives opportunity also for the representation of every interest. It has been thought in this country that the office of legislation was a right and a privilege Rotation to be enjoyed in rotation, with little refer- ence to integrity and wisdom, especially with little reference to any special knowledge of the science of legislation. If the legislative body be numerous, such a theory will be comparatively harmless if a fair proportion of competent legislators be elected. In such bodies the business is really done by a few, and if the numbers that serve simply as ballast do no positive mischief, there is little objection to the prin- ciple of rotation for them. Crude legislation how- ever is too great an evil to be lightly incurred, and koo many men may not be set aside just as experience vould render their services valuable. Society owes it to itself to sec that its legislation moves on in the fall light of the experience of the past, and of the best talent and wisdom of the presemti FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, ETC, 287 Laws having been made, and penalties annexed, rhe judi- cases will arise under them, respecting both :iarj» property and crime, that will require a ju- diciary department. The sure and speedy and inexpensive administration of justice is an essential condition of the well-being of a people. The speed- iest and least expensive method of reaching this k by a single judge deciding cases on the spot, or, in cases of importance and difficulty, two others might be added. The objection to this is the danger of passion, prejudice, and corruption. Hence juries and courts of appeal have been introduced. These have guarded against corruption, but have in many cases so been the means of delay and expense that the rich could baffle and w^orry out the poor, and that it is often better pecuniarily to lose a just claim than to contest it in law. Such a state of things is disgraceful to civilization and to Christianity, and should be remedied by an enlightened people. What is needed is an impartial and competent judiciary, through which speedy and inexpensive justice may be reached. This end has been sought not merely through the constitution of the judiciary, but also through the mode of its appointment, and the ten- ure of office. Obviously these should be such as to Becure the appointment of the best men, and that the judge himself shall be unaffected in his prospects And private interests by his decisions. That these conditions should be secured by an elective judi- ciary, holding ofSce for a limited and comparative!; 288 MORAL SCIENCE. brief time, would not seem possible in the present estate of public morals. It is the business of the executive to see that* the laws are enforced, and that all sentences T^eex- of the judiciary are carried out. The executive also represents the majesty of the na- -tion before other nations, and in all international transactions is the medium of communication with them. The character of these duties demands that they be performed by a single person. If the ex- ecutive have, as he should have, to guard his own prerogatives, a veto power, he is so far a part of the legislature ; but beyond that his sole business is to execute the laws. This he must do, certainly, as he understands them. He must execute a law in what he supposes to be its true intent and meaning, seek- ing, if there be doubt, the best aid from legal ad- visers. But when a law has been passed, having fully the forms of law, he must accept it as such, and may not delay or refuse its execution on the ground of its alleged unconstitutionality, though, if there be doubt, he may take immediate measures to have the constitutionahty of the law tested. To secure always a suitable executive has been a great problem. In most nations the executive of- fice has been hereditary. This has many advan- tages. It tends to stability and a uniform policy, ^nd prevents the excitement and corruption incident to an election. Besides, in many countries an intel- ligent and patriotic election would be im2)ossible. In this country the executive is elective, virtually FOHMS OF GOVERNMENT, ETC. 289 by the whole people, and hitherto the strain has not been found too great. Whether this will continue to be the case when wealth shall be indefinitely in- creased, and interests shall be extended and compli- cated, is a problem. It can only be as there shall be a virtue and an mtelligence among the people hitherto unknown. Probably the danger would be diminished, if the tenure of office were for six years, with no possibility of a reelection. The duties of the citizen are, 1st. To obey the First duty ^^^^'^ ^^^^ ^^^^ conscicncc will allow him cftizen • possible for men to cherish obedience. willfulncss and fanaticism under the pre tense jof conscience, and the presumption is in favor of the law as right, and of the obligation of the citi- zen to obey. Still there have been, and are liable to be, under all forms of government, wicked laws, and if, with the best light a man can gain, he shall deem it wrong to obey a law, he is bound to disobey it, and take the consequences whatever they may be. He is bound to obey God rather than men. 2. The citizen is bound to bear cheerfully his Becondduty; sliarc of tlic burdcus of p;overnment, and lubmispion ^ . iT t r> to taxation, ot socicty. Wliether Called upou lor pcr- sonal service, or for property in the way of taxation, he is to stand in his place and do his part without Bubterfuge or evasion. 3. So far as his influence goes he is bound to see rhirdduty; that tlic bcst men' are selected as candi- •uffrage. dates for office, and so to cast his vot« ts will most benefit the country. 19 290 MORAL SCIENCE. 4. The citizen is bound to give his aid in all at- tempts to secure the rights of others, and Fo^^thduty to enforce law and order. He may not ^Hrgovem stand supinely by and see the right of property violated. If, through general supineness, the property of individuals be destroyed by a mob, society is bound to make it good. Against the ten- dency of liberty to license, and of license again to despotism, every citizen is to guard. If we look at history, or at the state of most countries now, we cannot value civil lib- vaiueof erty too highly. Hitherto it has existed ^'"^^ ^'^'"^^ but imperfectly, and has reached its present posi- tion only through great sacrifices and struggles. Tlie end of government, as for the individual, the ground of human rights, and the rights themselves, have not been well understood. These are now understood by some, and it has become possible to instruct a whole people in them. Let this be done, and if, in connection with such instruction and the advancing light of science the community may but be so pervaded by the spirit of Christianity that a permanent and constantly advancing civilization may be possible, there will be nothing to prevent the attainment by man of all the perfection and happi- ness of which the present state will admit. The highest earthly conception is that of a vast Christian ?ommonwealth, instinct with order, and with such triumplis and dominion over nature as moden) science is achieving, and promises to acliieve. CLASS m. DUTIES TO GOD. CHAPTER L DUTIES TO GOD DEFINED. Duties to God are distinguished from others by Beiationto having God for their object. It is one the^ont"*'^''' thJ^g subject to disregard the sov- great duty, ercign iudlrcctlj by breaking his laws in injuring a fellow subject, it is another for him to meet that sovereign personally and show towards him disregard or contempt. There are accordingly both duties and sins of which God is the immediate object, and which have reference to Him alone. Such are worship, and blasphemy. It is this capacity of coming directly to God that makes man a child, or rather it is the necessary result of his being a child. So far as we can separate religion from morality Mgion religion consists in those duties of which guished God is the object. That these cannot be rauty. performed acceptably except on condition of performing our duties to our fellow men has al» 292 MORAL SCIENCE. ready been shown. In this sense our duties to our fellow men are conditional for those to God, and so lower. Whether they are also conditional as prior in time is less clear. Many suppose that the moral nature is first called into action towards man, and observation favors this. But the relation of God to the soul as Creator and as all-pervading in his presence, and the necessary idea which, according to some, is formed of Him from the first, has led others to the belief that the moral nature is first stirred towards God, and that there can be no form of duty without some reference to Him. But be this as it may, while all must allow that there can be no p-enuine relio-ion without „ ,. , morality, it is generally supposed there can to^^jferSt be morality without religion. This may ^^^^i^^^- be differently viewed as we suppose morality to con- sist in outward conduct, or in a state of the heart. There are many reasons why outward conduct should be in accordance with the rules of morality, though it may not proceed from love. Doubtless, also, the moral nature, in common with the other parts of our nature, and taking its turn with them, is constantly brought into activity towards men with no conscious reference to God. But if we mean by morality the love of our neighbor as a paramomit and controlling principle, and by perfect morality the love of our neiglibor as ourselves, then there is no reason to 6uppose tliat it can exist witliout religion. The Drinciple in each is identical, and supposing God tc DUTIES TO GOD DEFINED. 293 be known, th^y reciprocally imply each other. Cer* tainly this is the only morality that has an adequate basis, or that can be relied on as consistent. With this view of the relation to each other of these two branches of duty, we inquire what those duties are of which God is the object. And here the first and great duty of every one is, Man's great 9^'^^ Mmself to God, This is the great- est and most solemn of all acts. It in- volves the highest possible prerogatives of a creature, and is the highest possible privilege as well as duty. The whole wisdom of man lies in his confiding him- self imphcitly to the guidance of the divine wisdom, and to the protection of the divine power. It was by withdrawing himself from this guidance and pro- tection that man sinned originally ; he can be restored only by accepting them anew. As Creator, God is the absolute owner of all things. As omnipotent. He can do with them as He pleases. But if He would be a Father and Moral Governor He must have children and subjects in his own image, and with the prerogative of choosing or rejecting Him as their supreme good. Control by force, order by an impulse from without, is the opposite of control by love, and of order from a rational choice, and the highest duty of man is to give himself in the spirit of a child, that is by faith, to God. The above will include everything. W^ioever holds himself fiiUy and constantly in the aK,i1ude tc 294 MORAL SCIENCfi. God of a child, does all that he can. This will in- clude love and obedience. Still we need to specify in three particulars — 1. The cultivation of a devotional spirit 5 2. Prayer ; and 3. The keeping of the Sabbath. CHAPTER n. CULTIVATION OF A DEVOTIONAL SPIRIT. A DEVOTIONAL spirit may be cultivated — 1. By the exercise of devotion. This is on the principle that all our active powers are strengthened by exercise. There is no active power that does not gain facility and scope by repeated acts under the direction of will. 2. A devotional spirit may be cultivated by a right use of Nature. The physical universe is but a visible expression of the power and the thought of God. This power and thought are seen in the very con- stitution of matter. It was not any matter, but such matter, and in such proportions, that was needed for the forms that we see, and for vital pro- cesses. The varieties and affinities and relative quantities of matter as much show that it was created, and for a purpose, as its forms and movements show that it is used for a purpose. It is therefore the voice of Science as well as of Revelation that He hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven " — that is the extent of 296 MORAL SCIENCE. the atmosphere — " with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance." But the more obvious manifestations of thought and power are in form and movement. It is in the forms that we see, so diversified — some changing, some permanent, each adapted to an end — together with those uniform and recurring movements w^hich reveal unlimited force and skill, that what we call Kature consists. Through this we gain our concep- tions of beauty, and of the most perfect adaptation of means to ends. Physical science is but the thought of God expressed through this. Upon this, suspended as it is in immensity, so vast in its magni- tudes, so mighty in its forces, so perfect in its organi- zations even the most minute, so extended yet pre- cise in its periods, no one can look without wonder, unless it be from ignorance or criminal stupidity. But all this may be regarded with two habits of mind utterly different. Through the element of uniformity in nature it is possible to regard it as having no relation to a per Bonal God. Through that element God so hides ■limself behind his works that very many are prac- tically, and some theoretically, pantheistic or athe- istic. They see nothing in Nature but impersonal forces and fixed relations. A devotional spirit is the opposite of this Through Nature it sees God. It sees, and culti- vates the habit of seeing Him in everything. Tc CULTIVATION OF A DEVOTIONAL SPIRIT, 297 3uch a spilit the earth and the heavens are a temple, the only temple worthy of God. To it the succes- sion of day and night and the march of the seasons are constant hymns. To it, not the heavens alone, l)ut the whole frame-work and structure of Nature with its ongoings " declare the glory of God.' ' This is the spirit which it is the duty and happi- ness of man to cultivate. The highest use of Nature is not the support of man, but to lead him up to God. 3. A devotional spirit may also be cultivated by observing the Providence of God as it respects Nations, individuals, and particularly ourselves. The warp of our earthly life is those uniformities, called laws, w^ithout w^hicli there could be no educa- tion of the race, and no rational conduct. But these laws mtersect and modify each other. They are so related to the results of human will, and the results of different wills apparently unrelated so combine and converge to unexpected ends, as to have produced an impression almost universal that the filling in of those seeming contingencies which go to make up the completed pattern of our lives is controlled by wise design. In this is Providence. This it is that in every age takes Joseph from the pit and makes him ruler of Egypt. Through this it is that the m'ow shot at a venture finds the joints of the har- ness. Here, as in Nature, it is possible for men to Bubstitute something else, as chance, or fate, for God; but those who believe in Him w^ill nc where 298 MORAL SCIENCE. find more striking evidence of a divine hand, and " he who will observe the Providence of God will have providences to observe." 4. But the main nutriment of a devotional spirit must be found in the Scriptures. In the Scriptures we have an unequivocal revela- tion of God as personal, and so of his attributes as moral. It is only in view of personality and moral attributes that devotion can spring up. Sentiment and sentimentalism there may be in view of force regarded as impersonal, but not devotion, not wor- ship. These require a Father in Heaven, an infinite God, universal in his government and perfect in his moral character. Whatever may be said of the truth of the Scriptures, it is demonstrable that the God whom they reveal must call forth the highest possible adoration, and hence that the knowdedge of God as revealed in them must, more than anything else can, quicken intelligent devotion. The attri- butes and character of God as made known in the Scriptures hold the same relation to devotion that the infinity of space, and the awful force that sus- tains and moves in it the array of suns and planets, holds to the emotion of sublimity ; and as nothing can supersede infinite space in that relation, so noth- ing can supersede the God of the Bible as the ground and stimulus of the highest possible devo- tion. Thus recognizing God in the three great modes ill which He is revealed, in Nature, in Pi'ovidence, CULTIVATION OF A DEVOTIONAL SPIRIT. 299 ind m Revelation, we shall cultivate a devotional spirit. In contrast with a devotional spirit is Profaneness. i • o one that is profane. This may manifest itself in action or in speech. The true conception of this world is that of a temple involving both the ownership and the indwelling of God. As there is nothing that God does not own, any reckless or vicious use of what is his is a form of profaneness. It is a profanation to convert what God gave for food into a means of gluttony or drunkenness. If travellers were to stop in a cara- vansera, and in the presence of him who built and furnished it were to destroy the food and injure the furniture he had provided for all, he would be grieved and justly incensed. It would be an -un- grateful disregard of his wishes, and an abuse of his goodness. But this is what men do who pervert the works of God from the end designed by Him, and such conduct toward Him is profaneness. But while this is really profaneness, and in an aggravated form, it is not generally so regarded The term is commonly applied to some form of speech implying disregard or contempt of God, or of the sanctions of his mo^al government ; and more particularly to an irreverent use of his name. This is an offense that would excite astonishment if it were not so common. . It differs from others in be- mg wholly gratuitous, and is thus, perhaps, the most striking evidence of the depravity of the race. The 300 MORAL SCIENCE. ttiiet, the sensualist, the ambitious man has a temp- tation that appeals to a natural desire; but that a creature and child of God, supported wholly by his goodness and responsible to Him, should wantonly profane his name, could not beforehand be credited. That there should be in Christian lands communities in which such profaneness is thought an accomphsh- ment, and so an evidence of manhood that boys are tempted to it on that ground, shows a standard of manhood that has depravity for its essence. Profaneness can be of no possible use to him who indulges in it, or to any one else. If it were not wicked it would be simply superfluous and ridicu- lous. As it is, it is, as Robert Hall said, in allusion to feudal times, merely " a peppercorn rent to show that a man belongs to the devil." So far from giv- ing, as some suppose, assurance of the truth of what is spoken in connection with it, it is the reverse. All observation shows, mine certainly does, what might have been inferred without it, that he who will swear, will lie. Why not? The practice is 'icarcely less offensive to a just taste than to a sen- sitive conscience, and whoever may be guilty of it, deserves to be not only condemned and abhorred, but despised. CHAPTER m. PRAYER. The second great duty which we owe exclusively to God is Prayer. Literally, prayer is supplication, it is asking ; but Prayer commouly uscd it includes all that we worship. mean by worship. It includes in addition to supplication, adoration, confession, and thanksgiv- ing. To a being like man each of these would seem to be the dictate of nature. What more reasonable than adoration in view of an Infinite Majesty ? What more suitable than confession in view of guilt, or than thanksgiving in view, not simply of good- ness, but of mercy, and of a love unutterable? What more natural than that the creature and child, in view of his wants, should ask the Creator and Owner of all, and his Father, to supply those wants ? That each of these, excepting the last, is not only suitable but a duty is generally conceded^ Dut that man should ask and that God should give because of his asking, has seemed to many incom patible with the fixed order of nature, and with his mfinite attributes. By asking is here meant, not simply desire ex* 302 MORAL SCIENCE. pressed, but paramount desire. There must be a desire for the thing asked greater than Prayer is for anything else that would be incom- desfrT.^^^* patible with it. This is prayer, and nothing else is. If a man may have either an estate or so much money for the asking, but cannot have both, how- ever much he may desire the estate he cannot really ask for it, unless he desires it more than the money. And so, whatever desire a man may have of heaven, or of the presence with him of the Spirit of God, yet if he have a stronger desire for any form of worldly good, any form of expression that he might use in the guise of prayer would not be ask- ing. It would be hypocrisy to the omniscient eye. It is only a paramount desire presented to God with the submission becoming a creature, that is prayer, and the question is whether, in consequence of such prayer, man will receive what he would not with- out it. On this point the Bible expresses no doubt. There is in that no recognition of the dif- Testimony ficulties raised by philosophy. It teaches us how to pray ; it commands and exhorts us to pray ; it gives us examples in great number and variety of direct answers to prayer ; it makes prayer an essential element of a Christian life ; it says ex- pHcitly, " Ask and ye shall receive." It would be impossible that the duty and efficacy of prayer should be taught more clearly than they are in the Bible. PKAYEB. 803 These teachings of the Bible are confirmed by the analogy of our earthly life, and by the instinct of the race. From his infancy the child asks and receives. Askinp' is one of the two lemtimate ap- pointed ways in which ms wants are to be supphed. For some things, and at some times, it is the only way. It is just an expression of that de- sire and dependence which are appropriate to the relation of parent and child. Without recognized dependence in the way of expressed desire on the one hand, and an ability and willingness to supply wants thus indicated on the other, the chief beauty and significance of the parental relation would be gone. Can it be then that we have a Father in heaven, and yet that the very feature which gives warmth and beauty and value to the earthly relation should be wanting ? Without this the name would lose, in its transference to God, its chief significance, and Christ would not be the benefactor He is sup- posed to have been in teaching the race to say, " Our Father." On this point too the instinct of the race has been Foiceof manifested unequivocally. Universally, or instinct. nearly so, when, as the Psalmist says, men 'draw near unto the gates of death," when " they that go down to the sea in ships " " mount up to the heaven," and " go down again to the depths," " anc' are at their wits' end," " then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble." Not only speculative ques- m MORAL SCIENCE. doners of the efficacy of prayer, but professed athe- ists have often been brought to extremities in which this instinct has so asserted itself that they have cried unto God. It may also be doubted whether the highest bless- ings can be received except on the condition of asking. Health, rain, a prosperous journey, may come to men whether they ask or not. But the hio-liest blessinsis are from the direct communion of man witli God. This is the great distinction of man, that God himself may be his portion and good. To be enjoyed, this blessing must be desired and sought for, and it can be sought for only by asking. To obtain the larger number of blessings we need, we must not only ask, but put forth active exertion ; but here the only active exertion possible is the asking. Nor would it seem fit that God should bestow this blessing on any other condition. Other things may come alike to all, but it might have been anticipated, even if He could do it otherwise, that God would give his Holy Spirit, as a sanctifier and comforter, only to those who should ask Him. Not only from the Bible, then, but from the anal- ogy of our earthly life, from our whole nature as practical, and from its necessary relation to our highest wants, should we infer the efficacy of asking. The question then recurs whether, in objection the light of a philosophy that apprehends {^mutebu- immutable law and the infinite attributes ^^y^*^^^^- God, all this be not a mere seeming and delusion PRAYER. 305 To the efficacy of asking for the Holy Spirit, oi for any direct agency of God upon our minds, there can be no objection from the immutabihty of phys- ical law, since that can have no relation to what is done immediately by a personal being. From this highest region and sphere of prayer, therefore, no cavil about fixed law can debar us. Nor, on the view of the immutability of law (the only correct one), taken by the Duke of Argyle in his " Reign of Law," can any valid objection lie against the effi- cacy of asking, for example, for rain. There are," says he, "no phenomena visible to man of which it is true to say that they are governed by any inva- riable force. That which does govern them is always some variable combination of invariable forces. But this makes all the difference in reason- ing on the relation of will to law — this is the one essential distinction to be admitted and observed. . . . . In the only sense in which laws are immutable, this immutability is the very charac- teristic which makes them subject to guidance through endless cycles of design. It is the very certainty and invariableness of the laws of Nature," — that is, of each individual law taken separately — " which alone enables us to use them, and yoke them to our service." If, as some suppose, man can cause /ain by the firing of cannon, then it may be obtained by asking it even of him. In such a case there would be simply a different adjustment of invariable laws ; and if results may be thus produced to some 20 806 MORAL SCIENCE. extent by the intervention of human will without a miracle, it cannot be irrational to suppose they may be thus produced to any extent by the divine will. The arrow shot at a venture that finds the joints of the harness, is governed by ordinary laws. Nothing but their nice adjustment is needed to carry it pre- cisely there. The intervention of will is supposed, but in no other relation to fixed law than that of the human will when it causes ice by a freezing mix- ture. This removes a difficulty which has weighed heavily on many minds. There remains the objection from the oi^jection infinite attributes of God. fntSite As infinite in knowledge, God knows ^-^^^^^^s. what we need before we ask Him. We can tell Him nothing new. He also knows what events are to be, therefore they cannot be changed. As infinite in goodness. He will do for us what is best whether we ask Him or not. In obviating these difficulties, we may say — 1. That no one can read the speculations of such men as Spinoza, Kant, Cousin, and Hamilton, upon the Infinite, without feeling that they are dealing with a subject which they do not fully grasp ; and that it can never be wise to set the results of such speculations in opposition to the practical principles of our nature. The apparent contradictions result- ing from these speculations were such that Kant felt obliired to recognize or invent what he called a Practical Reason, as the only basis of rationa -onduct. PRAYER. 807 2. The objection so makes God infinite as really to limit Him, and virtually to deny his personality. It makes it impossible for Him to be a Father, or moral Governor. Prayer is an act of choice and free will. So is murder. And if, because God is infinite, and knows what is to be, and will do w^hat is best, it can make no difference with a man whether he prays or not, for the same reason it can make no difference whether he murders or not. It will follow that God will do what He will do, with- out reference to human conduct, which is subversive of moral government, and a practical absurdity. If we regard God as a person, and man also, the pos- sibility of such direct intercourse as prayer involves must be allowed ; nor can we conceive of a being, especially of an Infinite Being,' having fully the attributes of personality, that is, being really God, to whom it would be impossible to answer prayer. Why not say that the immutable God immutably, that is always, answers prayer ? The difficulty lies in connecting personality with infinite attributes, and those who deny that prayer may be efficacious, really deny the personality and fatherhood of God. It is to the fatherhood of God that we cling. To that we turn with infinite relief, from those limitless and dreary abstractions, which philosophy calls the Infinite and the Absolute. Without that, we are orphans : virtually, all is Fate. With that, nothing can rationally prevent the cliild from coming to the Father, or even the sinner, when he sees evidence 808 MOKAL SCIENCE. of placability, from coming " boldly unto the throne of grace, that he may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." With this view of the nature and reasonableness of prayer, it only remains to say that its ^^^^ form is of little consequence. Prayer is ®^ i^^J^^- more than desire — more than sincere desire. It is paramount desire offered to God with a filial spirit. Of necessity this will be both reverent and miportunate. Such prayer, whether repeated from memory, or read from a book, or, as would seeir most natural, uttered directly from the promptings of the heart, is always heard. CHAPTER IV. THE SABBATH. The last duty to be considered is the keeping of the Sabbath. To man, originally, the Sabbath must have come as a positive institution, since he could have seen no reason for it, aside from the divine command. It has since been commonly regarded as partly pos« itive and partly moral. Now, however, as a reason can be assigned for it, and even for the proportion of time designated, it may be regarded as wholly moral. In considering the Sabbath, we shall first treat of the Rehgious, and then of the Civil Sabbath. By the Religious Sabbath, we mean a day set apart by God himself for his own worship, and to secure, in connection with that, the religious cul- ture and final salvation of men. By the Civil Sabbath, we mean a day made " non-legal," in which public business shall be sus- pended, and in which all labor and recreation shall be so far restrained, that the ends of a religious Sab- bath may be secured by those who wish it. 810 - MORAL SCIENCE. In treating of the religious Sabbath, we naturally consider, first, its origin and history. Concerning these, the points which the friends of the Sabbath accept and regard as established are the following : — 1. That the Sabbath was given to our first par- ents in Eden, according to the account in Genesis ii. 2, 3 ; and that it was intended for the race. 2. That we find unmistakable indications of the Sabbath, both in the Scriptui'es and in heathen liter- ature, between the original command and the giving of the Law. 3. That when the Law was given, the command to hallow the Sabbath .was made conspicuous, as one of t'ne ten commandments. That it has the same rank as the other commandments, all of which are moral in their character, and universally binding. 4. That during the subsequent history of the Jews the Sabbath is referred to by the prophets in a way to show that they classed it w^ith the other commandments, and that they regarded its obser- vance as intimately connected wdth the prosperity of the nation. 5. That at the time of our Saviour the Sabbath was observed with great strictness ; that the people assembled regularly for public worship, and that Moses and the prophets were read in the syna- gogues every Sabbath-day. Also, that this worship was attended by our Saviour, and that while He re- proved the superstitious observances and over- THE SABBATH. 811 gcnipulousness that had crept in, He yet recognized the Sabbath as a divine institution, and as " made tor man." 6. That after the resurrection of Christ the day was changed, and that the Christian Sabbath, with substantially the same ends, has been perpetuated till the present time. These points have been amply discussed by many writers, and as they belong to history rather than to philosophy, they will not be further noticed here. We proceed to inquire what may be known of the origin of the Sabbath, from the character and condi- tion of man. And here we observe that the religious Sabbath authenticates itself as from God. This it does m various ways. 1. Regarding man as sinful, taking him as we now find him in every country where the Sabbath is unknown, the very conception of a holy Sabbath would have been impossible. There could have been nothing within him or without him to suggest it. 2. ReggTL'ding men as selfish, the rich and the j)Owerful would never have originated an institution, or consented to it, which would not only free laborers and dependents and slaves from labor one seventh of the time, but would require that time for the service of another. 3. As the Sabbath corresponds with no cycle or natural division of time, it must have been impos- lible for any man, or number of men, to single oul 312 MORAL SCIENCE. one day, and set it apart authoritatively. Man could Qeither have decided rightly the proportion of time to be set apart, nor have guarded the sanctity of the day by penalties. If the division of time into weeks were wholly unknown, it would be impossible that it should be introduced by man. * 4. Man could not have so associated the Sabbath with the grandest ideas made known by revelation, or possible to thought, as the creation of the world, the resurrection of Christ, the outpouring of the Spirit, and the rest of a holy heaven. He could not have made it span the arch from the beginning till the consummation of all things. 6. The Sabbath authenticates its divine origin not only as it thus' blends with the highest ideas and interests of man, as connected with the past and the futm*e, but by its analogy with the works of God as simple, and at the same time touching the interests of the present life at so many points. In this it is like the air and the water, which seem so simple, yet subserve so many uses. As thus impossible to have been originated by man, as connected with the creation of the world, with the resurrection of Christ, with the outpouring if the Spirit, and with the rest of heaven ; being analogous to nature, and promoting every interest of time, we say that the religious Sabbath comes tc man bearing its own credentials as from God. From the origin of the Sabbath we TheSabbaU necessary turn to its necessity for man. for man. t. Of its necessity for man as an individual. THE SABBATH. 818 Of this the first ground is the necessity man is la For religions religious instruction. The rehgion of through with mechanically, or a superstition that can be inherited, or imposed upon ignorance. It is a religion of light. This is its glory. But rational ideas of God and of his worship, and of the duty and destiny of man as a religious being, can no more be reached without instruction than similar ideas of civil society. Upon such instruction the Bible in- sists, both in the Old Testament and in the New, and for this, if it is to be made general, the Sabbath is indispensable. But it is not simply instruction that man needs. Forpersua- uccds pcrsuasiou. Indifference and aversion are to be overcome. Men are tempted to forget God, to neglect prayer, and make light of accountabihty. They are tempted to live, and most men do live, for this world alone. Here is the great need of a Sabbath. There is need of time and opportunity to persuade men ; to go, if need be, into the highways and the hedges, and compel them to come in." But again, if we suppose an individual intelh- For culture S^^^^Y ^^eligious, the Sabbath would be Mid growth, needed for his culture and growth. Were men open every day to the calls of society, and sub- ject to the pressure of competition in business, the tide of worldliness would become resistless. The Sabbath brings the world to a solemn pause, as 314 MORAL SCIEiTCi. under the eye of God. It enables man to subordi- »iate sense to faith, and hfts him up to the power of living for the unseen and the future. Again, man cannot reach his end as isolated. He is social, and needs public and social For social worship, as well as instruction, and for these the Sabbath is indispensable. The Sabbath, the pulpit, the Sabbath-school, and the social meet- mgs appointed on the Sabbath and revolving about *t, are inseparable. Withdraw these, and it is doubtful whether the Church itself would survive. The pulpit, in connection with the Sabbath, is the only institution ever established on earth for the general diffusion of religious instruction, and for securing a form of social worship that should bring all men together in equality and brotherhood before God. II. The Sabbath is needed not only for the indi- vidual, but for the family. The Sabbath and the family were instituted in Paradise — these only, and they natu- j,^^ ^j^^ rally support each other. Where there is ofTh2°^ no Sabbath, the domestic relations are not ^"^^^^^y- held sacred, and where the domestic relations are not held sacred, there is no Sabbath. Let but these two institutions, the family and the religious Sabbath, be sustained in their integrity, and every interest of the individual and of the family will ht iocured. III. The Sabbath is essential to the state, if free government is to be maintained. tHE SABBATH. No people ever have been, or ever can be, raised - .^o a point of knowledge and virtue that would en- able them to maintain permanently a free govern- ment, that is, self-government, without that circle of agencies of which the Sabbath is an essential part. Without the Sabbath and the Bible there has The Sabbath bccu uo such diffusiou of kuowlcdge government, amoug a wholc pcopIc as would qualify them for liberty. It was among those who most highly esteemed the religious Sabbath, and were persecuted for maintaining it, that the idea of edu- cating the whole people first arose and was made efficient. The idea had its germ in that estimate of man as man, which underlies the whole system of re- ligion of which the Bible and the Sabbath are a part. But knowledge is not sufficient for freedom. There must also be virtue, principle, and a right social state. Outward forms and amenities must spring fi'om good will, and love as a law must be applied in the relations of life as it never has been, or can be without the Sabbath and its teachings.^ IV. We next observe, that man needs the Sab- 1 As the capacity of man for free government is now on trial, and especially in this country, this point is of special interest to the patriot as well as to the Christian, and has attracted no little attention. Two years since, at the request of the New York Sabbath Committee, a paper was read by me before the National Sabbath Convention, held at Saratoga, in which it was maintained : — 1. That a religious observance of the Sabbath would secure the permanence of free institutions.'* 2. *' That without the Sabbath religiously observed the permanend if free institutions cannot be secured; " and — 316 MORAL SClElTCi:. bath as a physical being, and not he alone, but the animals that are subjected to labor by him. It is worthy of notice that cattle are especially mentioned in the fourth commandment. If this be so, it is a fact of high import, not only as sliowing the wide relations of the Sabbath, but the subordination of physical to moral ideas in the whole structure of the present system. The question is, Will man and animals do more work, do it better, have better health, and pi^ygicai live longer by laboring six days and rest- thi*^ ing the seventh, than by laboring seven s^^^^-*^- days in the week ? This question can be decided only by facts, and by a wide and careful induction. On this point extensive observations have been made by cautious men, and facts like the following are stated: "The experiment was tried on a hun- dred and twenty horses. They were employed for years seven days in a week. But they became un- healthy, and finally died so fast that the owner thought it too expensive, and put them on a six days' arrangement. After this he was not obliged to replenish them one fourth as often as before. Instead of sinking continually, his horses came up again, and lived years longer than they could have 3. " That the civil as based on the reh'gious Sabbath is an institutioc *o which society has a natural right, precisely as it has to property." These propositions, it is believed, can be established, and if so the Babbath must be from God. The paper referred to having been published by the Sabbath Com< jnitte LOVE ASA LAW." BY THE KEY. JAMES MoCOSH, LL. D., D. D. In the summer of 1866 I found myself wandering among the limbs of the Green Mountains, and it oc- curred to me that I ought to find my way to Williams- town and its college. One end I had in view was to see more of the grand scenery — tlie' lovely forests and towering mountains, by which the region is character- ized. I was certainly not disappointed in the situation of the town. It is placed on a knoll in the heart of a capacious hollow, surrounded with imposing mountains. It struck me as a spot at which the Last Judgment might be held, with the universe assembled on the slopes of the encircling hills. But I had another object on which I had set my heart still more earnestly, and this was to make the acquaintance of the President of the college, whose works I had read in my own country, and whose character I had been led to revere by the accounts given me by those who knew him intimately. And if I was not disappointed with the scenery, I was still less so with Dr. Hopkins, whom I found a man stalwart and elevated like the mountains among which he lives and muses, and yet adorned withal with graces as lovely as the foliage of the spruce hemlock which there clothes the scenery. Since that time I ever place him before me, in imagination, seated under a tree in the heart of the mountains, pondering some deep theme, seeking light for himself, and wishing to impart it to others. 328 APPENDIX. In the book before us he has given us the result of his thoughts on no lower a subject than Law and Love and the rehition between them. And surely these two must be intimately connected, and this whether we are able to express it in categorical form or not. There can be no moral excellence without love ; but just as little can there be without a rule, without obligation. The two seem to be inseparably joined in the nature of things, as they certainly are in the revelation which God has given of duty in the Word, — " For this is the sum of the Ten Commandments, to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thyself." Jonathan Edwards used to ponder this profound sub- lect. Francis Hutcheson, the founder of the Scottish •School of Philosophy, had labored to prove that virtue consists in benevolence. Edwards saw the defect of this theory, as omitting love to God and justice, which are virtues quite as much as benevolence. So amending the theory of Hutcheson, Edwards makes the bold attempt to resolve all virtue into love, in love to being as being, and distributed to beings as they have claims upon us. But, with all his acuteness, he failed to see that in this resolution he had unwittingly introduced another idea besides love — that of claim or obligation — the claim of being as being, the separate claims of different beings, say of God, of father and mother, of husband and wife, of brothers and sisters, of rulers and subjects, of friends and foes. That being has claims upon us — that dif- ferent beings, such as God and our neighbors, have separate claims upon us, — this tui ns out to be an ulti mate truth, which cannot be resolved into anything hiferior to itself. Why ought I to love my fellow-men ? Why ought I to love God, aud to love liim more than APPENDIX, 329 I love even my fellow-men? To its, whatever there may be to higher intelligences, there can be no answer but one, and that is, that I ought to do so. And if any one puts the other question. How do I come to know this ? there is but one answer, and this is, that it is self-evident. And this leads me to remark that there is a great defect in the pievailing doctrine of our day among metaphysicians — a doctrine introduced by Kant into Germany and by Sir W. Hamilton among English-speaking nations — as to what are the proper tests of first truths : these are represented as necessity and universaliiy. The primary mark of first truths was seized by Locke with his usual sagacity : it is self-evi- dence. We regard God as having a claim upon our love, not because we are necessitated to love him, or because all men love him, but because it is right, and men see it to be so at once ; and it is because they see it to be so that the necessity and universality arise. Edwards has succeeded in showing that love is an essen- tial element in virtue ; but he has not succeeded in proving that to us there is no other element. In par- ticular, there is a binding obligation to love God and man, and not only so, but to discountenance and punish sin and to countenance and encourage moral excellence. And now we find a thinker of this century, and liv- ing in much the same parts, trying to solve the same problem of the relation of law to love, and love to law, and thinking he has solved it. The following is his noble language : — " Law and love ! These are the two mightiest forces in the universe, and thus do we marry them. The place of the nuptials is in the innermost sanctuary of the soul. As in all right marriage, there is both con- trariety and deep harmony. Law is stern, majestic, and the fountain of all order. Love is mild, winning, the 330 APPENDIX. fountain of all rational spontaneity — that is, of the Bpontaneity that follows rational choice. Love witliout law is capricious, weak, mischievous : opposed to law it is wicked. Law without love is unlovely. The highest harmony of the universe is in the love of a rational being that is coincident with the law of that being- rationally affirmed ; and the deepest possible jar and discord is from the love, persistent and utter, of such a being in opposition to his law. It is because there is in the Divine Being this harmony of law with love that - He is perfect.'' It is a curious circumstance that Dr. Hopkins does not examine, or even refer to the attempt made by Ed- wards. Indeed it is one of the peculiarities of our author — under one aspect an excellence, under another a defect — that, like Edwards, he is largely a " self-con- tained" thinker. The reading of the one, as of the other, seems confined, and confined to rather common - place works. This circumstance imparts a freshness and an independence to their thinking, but at times it keeps them from seeing certain aspects of their theme which others have noticed and brought out to view. Dr. Hopkins, as every one who knows his spirit would expect, has a great aversion to ancient Epicure- anism and modern Utilitarianism. He speaks with great contempt of " the sty of Epicurus," " the dirt phi- losophy " and " the bread and butter philosophy." On the other hand, he is not prepared to give his adherence to the counter doctrine of intuitive morals. Avoiding, as he reckons, the errors of both extremes, he is striving to construct a theory of his own, and he defends it with able arguments and acute distinctions. I am not sure whether he has been successfid any more than Edwards was in a like attempt. While evidently and strongly aiming at something higher, I fear that, without meaning APPENDIX. 331 it, he has landed himself logically in Eudai monism, or in making enjoyment the supreme end of man and of virtue. He admits fully that there is in the mind of man original and fundamental ideas : " I am oiie of those who believe that there are simple and ultimate ideas.'' He gives existence as an example : " That of existence, or being, is one. All men have, and must have, an idea of something, of themselves as existing." But then he will not allow that an idea, w^hich seems to me to be as much entitled to be regarded as simple and original as any other we could name, is of that description. I refer to our idea of Right. He insists that there is, that there must be, an ultimate end to which everything else is subordinate. But he denies that doing right, as right, can be that end. What, then, is the ultimate end, according to Dr. Hopkins ? It comes, in the end, to be a " form of enjoyment or satis- faction.'* He says it is " the good." But what is the good ? The following is his answer ; " An objective good is anything so correlated to a conscious being as to produce subjective good. Subjective good is some form of enjoyment or satisfaction in the consciousness." He tells us that " strictly there is no good that is not sub- jective." This is explicit enough. Commonly he speaks of the ultimate end in virtuous conduct as being " the good " or " well being." But then the phrases " good " and " well being " are ambiguous ; they may mean pleasure, or they may mean moral good and moral well being. I am not sure whether Dr. Hopkins is not kept at times, by the amphiboly of these phrases, from seeing the full consequences of his theory. Let him, or let his readers, substitute " some form of enjoy- ment or satisfaction in the consciousness " for " good" and " well being," and what the precise doctrine is, and 332 APPENDIX. mu8t be, will at once become patent. He tells us again and again : '* It is an affirmation, through the moral reason, of obligation to choose the supreme end for which God made ns — that is, to choose the good of all beings capable of good, our own included, and put forth all those volitions which may be required to attain or secure that good." This sounds well, and is in eutire accordance with the impression which Dr. Hopkins means to leave. But substitute for " good " some form of enjoyment or satisfaction in the consciousness," and it comes to this, logically — that the supreme end of man is to choose the enjoyment of all, including, so far as I see, the enjoyment of the Supreme Being. He is careful to explain, in thus speaking of good as " some form of enjoyment or satisfaction," that he does not mean our own good, but that of all conscious beings." But whether he means it or no, whether he wishes it or no, whether he sees it or no, this is in the end the utilitarian or "greatest happiness principle." This is the logical consequence, and if not drawn by himself it will be drawn by others ; and the history of philosophy and theology shows that what follows log- ically will, in fact, follow chronologically, when the sys- tem has had time to work and show its effects. And, after all, Dr. Hopkins cannot get rid of an ulti- mate principle of right. For why am I or any other man required to look after the good ? — meaning the en- joyment of all conscious beings — is the question that ever comes up. Why am I bound to look after any one's enjoyment but my own ? The answer to this question by such a man as Dr. Hopkins must be, Because it is right, which right is discovered by the moral reason, and is an ultimate idea and an ultimate end. Right thus comes, like love, to be an end in itself, inferior to no other, subordinated to no other. APPENDIX, 833 He cannot avoid this conclusion by the distinctions tvhich he draws. He tells us that hoiiness is not a means of happiness but the cause," and " that a cause we always conceive of as higher than its effects," and gives, as an illustration, " God as a cause is higher than the universe." Ti'ue, God as a cause is higher than any creature effect, or, we may add, any creature cause. But as to creature causes and effects, 1 am not sure that the cause is always higher than its eflPects. These late discussions as to the nature of causation have shown that all physical causes are composed of more than one agent, and that all effects are capable of be- coming causes which may or may not be greater than the effects. I am not sure that the causes which led to the abolition of slavery in the United States were higher than the effect — the abolition of slavery. But grant- ing his doctrine to be true, that holiness is greater than happiness because it is the cause of happiness (it is sometimes, also, in our world the cause of suffering), then it surely follows that holiness, which is the higher, and not happiness, ought to be the ultimate end. The following is evidently the difficulty which Dr. Hopkins feels in making right the end of moral action . " It is plain that the quality of an action can never be the ground of an obligation to do that action." " Think of a man's doing good to another, not from good will, but for the sake of the rightness of his own act. Think of his loving God for the same reason. Certainly, if we regard right as the quality of an action, no man can be under an obligation to do an act morally right for which there is not a reason besides its being right, and on the ground of which it is right." This is pointedly put. But it is possible to meet it. The difficulty arises from a confusion of idea into which we •*re apt to fall when we think or speak of ultimate 834 APPENDIX, ideas or ends. We talk of them as having a reason, but then we are apt to forget that this reason is not out of themselves but in themselves. It lies in the objects contemplated, and is seen to be so by the bare contem- plation of the objects, that is by self-evidence, which is the primary mark of intuitive trutli. All that passes under the name of love is not virtuous. Certainly our love is not always virtuous when we contemplate some form of enjoyment or satisfaction to ourselves or others. But when we love God and our fellow-men in a truly virtuous manner, we feel that love, that tliis love, is due to them. In this, as in all cases of moral excellence, the ought^ the due, the ohligation, comes in along with love, and is an ultimate end inferior to no other. Dr. Hopkins sees that utilitarianism has a truth in it. The truth lies in this, that we are bound by ultimate moral principle to promote the happiness of mankind. Or, to give a deeper and juster account, we are bound not only to do good to all conscious beings, we are bound to love them. Viewed under this aspect, the principle of virtue is not beneficence, but love. Had Dr. Hopkins, with his clinching power and high moral aims, brought out these two truths more fully than intui- tive moralists have done, he would have done essential service to ethical science, which has sometimes given morality a repulsive aspect, by exhibiting law as sepa- rated from love. But this is not the way in which Dr. Hopkins "marries" the parties. He thinks he has done great service to ethics by showing how sensibility, pleas- ure, enjoyment, or satisfaction is a condition of moial (rood. "A sensibility is the condition precedent of all moral ideas." I am not sure that he is absolutely right here. We may put the case that God creates an angelic being with high intellectual endowments, but without sensibility. Is not that angel bound to be grateful tC APPENDIX. 835 God, from the very relation in which he stands to hia Creator, and apart altogether from sensibility on his part or the part of God ? In following out this princi- ple, I hold that man is bound to love God, apart alto- gether from this love producing any enjoyment on God's part or on man's part. Dr. Hopkins is obliged, in effecting his reconciliation, to give a very inadequate view of law. " The object of law is the control of force by direction and regulation with reference to an end." Surely, the deepest idea of a moral law is here lost sight of, which is obligation to cherish the affection or do the deed as being right. But while I take objection to the very peculiar theory advocated as to the ground of morality, I am bound to speak in highest terms of the ability and high moral purpose displayed throughout the volume. Except in regard to the special theory in the first part, I have nothing to say against the work, and much to say in its favor. Of the second, or practical part, I have to speak only in highest commendation. Take the following as a specimen, selected at random, of the clear discrimina- tion and admirable judgment everywhere displayed. " Property may be permanently and rightfully alien- ated by gift, by exchange, and by sale. It is also per- manently alienated by gambling ; this has different forms In some cases, as in dice and in lotteries, it is simply an appeal to chance. In others, as in cards, there is a mixture of chance and skill. In others, as in betting, of chance and judgment. In all cases, the object is gain without an equivalent, and while there is such gain on one side, there is, on the other, loss without compen- sation. In legitimate trade both parties are benefited ; in gambling, but one. Legitimate trade requires and promotes habits of industry and skill ; gambling gener- ates indolence and vice, and stimulates a most infatuatino and often uncontrollable passion. It is wholly fselfish. 836 APPENDIX. aud wholly injurious in its effects upon the commumty. That a practice thus inherently vicious, should be re- sorted to for charitable purposes, does not change its character, but only tends to confound moral instructions. But are all appeals to chance in the distribution of prop- erty gambling ? Not necessarily, if we define it by its motives and results. A picture is given to a fair. No individual will give for it its value ; that value is con- tributed by a number and the picture disposed of by lot ; this differs from an ordinary lottery : 1st, Because there are no expenses, and all that is given goes for an object which the parties are gathered to promote. 2d, The prize is given, so that nothing is taken for the prizes from the amount paid in, but the whole goes for the proposed object. 3d, This may be done from a sim- ple desire that the fair should realize the worth of its property, and so, benevolently. And all appeals to chance under these conditions are not likely to be so frequent or general as to endanger the habits of the community. All this may, and should, in fairness, be said. It should also be said, 1st, that no form of charity should be tolerated for a moment that in the actual state of a community will foster a spirit of gam- bling. It should be said, 2d, that any attempt to promote a benevolent object by an appeal to selfish mo- tives is wrong. Benevolent giving is a means of Chris- tian culture, but selfish giving in the form of benevo* lence is a deception and a snare. If the cause of benevolence cannot be supported benevolently, it had better not be supported at all." I commend all intelligent readers to buy this book and read it with care, and they will find themselves travelling in the company of a man of high and inde- pendent soul, who expresses his thoughts in brief and weighty sentences, and imparts much moral instructioD '>£ a lofty order. APPENDIX, ANSWER TO REV. DR. McCOSH. BY REV. MARK HOPKINS, D. D., LL. D. In reviewing " The Law of Love," in the *^ Observer " of April 15th, Dr. McCosh speaks of his visit to Wil- liamstown and to myself. That visit is among my most pleasing recollections. It was dm^ing the summer vacation ; the weather was fine, and we were quite at leisure to stroll about the grounds and ride over the hills. Riding thus, we reached, I remember, a point which he said reminded him of Scotland. There we alighted. At once he bounded into the field like r, young man, passed up the hillside, and, casting himself at full length under a shade, gave himself up for a time to the asso- ciations and inspiration of the scene. I seem to see him now, a man of world-wide reputation, lying thus solitary among these hills. They were draped in a dreamy haze suggestive of poetic inspirations, and from his quiet but evidently intense enjoyment, he might well, if he had not been a great metaphysician, have been taken for a great poet. And indeed, though he had revealed himself chiefly on the metaphysical side, it was evident that he shared largely in that happy temperament of which Shakespeare and Tennyson are the best examples, in which metaphysics and poetry seem to be fused into one and become identical. As befitted the season, our conversation was in the light and aroma of those great truths in which we were agreed, without any attempt to go down to their roots. As, however, I was meditating my book, I went so far as to ascertain from him more fully what I knew be- fore from his writings, that he .held to an ultimate right and would not agree with me. My ground on that 22 APPENDDt, point was therefore not hastily taken, and while I ac- knowledge fully the want of reading referred to by Dr, McCosh, and regret it, I may be permitted to say that on this subject he has presented no point that I had not seen, and has raised no objection that I had not considered. That the foundation of obligation should be gener- ally understood is most desirable, and as the subject so appeals to the common consciousness that every intel- ligent man can understand it, I cannot but think that Dr. McCosh has done a public service in bringing it thus prominently before the wide circle reached by the Observer." Thanking him, therefore, for this, as well as for his courtesy and kind words to myself, I will en- deavor to do something to aid the object he thus evi- dently had in view. In doing this, I propose, since the book reviewed has probably not been seen by one in fifty of the read- ers of the " Observer," 1st, to make a condensed statement of the system it contains ; 2d, to inquire whether that system is one of utilitarianism or eudaimonism, which is the thing objected against it ; and 3d, to inquire whether Dr. McCosh can hold his system in consistency with the Scriptures, or with himself. " Morality regards man as active." It asks, " What ought to be done ? " " Why ought it to be done ? " How ought it to be done ? " How shall we answer these questions ? The method adopted in my books is so simple and obvious that nobody but a philosopher could ever have missed it. It assumes that all moral action is rational action, and that all rational action must not only have an end, but must find its occasion and reason in that end. This being assumed, the next step is, and must be^ to inquire what the end of man is. This is the uu APPENDIX. S89 derlying question of all philosophy of action for man. This we may know, or snppose we do, because we are told it; or we may know it by investigating the struc- ture of man in connection with his position, just as we do that of a locomotive standing on a railway track. In the first case, we should know the end by faith; in the second, by philosophy. The faith may be ra- tional, wholly so. That will depend on the ground of our confidence in him who tells us. But it will not be philosophical. Both methods are legitimate, but must ultimately coincide. It would not do for any- thing claiming to be a revelation to say that the chief end of a locomotive was to -stand still and scream through the steam whistle, and no teaching could stand that should go clearly against the end as revealed in the structure. Of the above methods, the Westminster divines, whose earnest minds were instinctively led to the ques- tion of an end, adopted the first. But, adopting a right method, they regarded man solely as under a remedial system, of which philosophy can know noth- ing, except, indeed, as it may become a test of anything claiming to be such a system. Tlie end, however, as stated by them, I adopt fully, while Dr. McCosh, as I understand him, adopts it only in part. According to him, " man is bound to love God apart altogether from this love producing any enjoyment on God's part, or on man's part." This must mean that enjoyment ought to be no part of the end in any moral action. That is the principle of it. Would Dr. McCosh say so? Would he say that virtuous love to God, which must consist in good-will, or the willing of good, would be possible if God were as incapable of enjoyment as a rock? To me, the conception even of such love is impossible, and yet the statement of Dr. McCosh would 340 APPENDIX. seem to require it. But, however this may be, what we ueed is no mere statement based on faith, but a philosophy of action, and for me this is possible only from a knowledge of the end of man as revealed in his structure. Let us then take man as we would a locomotive, and see if we can, as we could in that, find his end from his structure. This is no question of words and subtle distinctions that two hair-splitting philosophers may fall to loggerheads about. It is a great problem which I have hoped by my books, and hope by this paper, to set many at working out. This we are to do independently of revelation. I would do it cautiously and reverently, but I would do it. We are, indeed, bound to do it for ourselves, and not to leave it to be done by infidels, and then weakly quarrel with the results. In doing this we shall find aid in observing all lower forces that work towards ends. These we find ar- ranged in a beautiful gradation as conditioning and con- ditioned, and so higher and lower ; thus giving, as I have shown, a law of limitation for the regulation of all forces and faculties except the highest. In observ- ing these forces the point to be noticed is, that in pass- ing upward nature reaches points where she does not proceed by gradations that pass into each other, but by leaps. This she does when she passes from inor- ganic to organic being ; when she passes from vegetable to animal life; and again, when she passes from animal to rational and spiritual life. In eacli case we get some- thing different, not in degree merely, but in kind ; and in stepping across these gulfs we are to notice that while we carry with us everything on the side we leave, it yet falls into subordination to the new force, which will work by its own laws, and cannot be safely rea- APPENDIX, 841 soned about from the old analogies. A tree is the product of a force that acts in opposition to gravitation and to all the cohesions and chemical affinities of inor- ganic matter, and he would be seeking the living among the dead who should carry the laws of inorganic being over to account for the phenomena of vegetable life. In each case, in passing over, we need a test of the presence of the new power. The test of the presence of vegetable life is organization ; jof animal life it is sensation, and of rational life it is the power to choose its own end with an alternative in kind. Reacliing this point we pass out of the domain of mechanical forces acting from without, and of instinctive and impulsive forces acting from within, into a region higher and en- tirely new, of comprehension and of freedom. " Up to man," as I have said elsewhere, " everything is driven to its end by a force working from without and from behind, but for him the pillar of cloud and of fire puts itself in front, and he follows or not as he chooses." As I view it, it is only after passing this gulf that we find moral phenomena. But at this point there is a difference about the very nature of those phenomena ; and if we could always tell which side of the gulf men are on, if they would not sometimes be on one side, and sometimes on the other, and sometimes astride it, often not seeming to know where they are, it would prevent immense confusion. " Holiness," says Dr. Thornwell, " is a nature." Then, it may be created, but cannot be commanded. Where he was when he said this we cannot doubt. The same I suppose would be said, — it ought to be, — by the writer of a recent article on morals in the Princeton Review." By this olass of thinkers God is conceived of as an essence in which love and wrath inhere as qualities, and mani- fest themselves independently and necessarily ; whereas 342 APPENDljt. others conceive of him as a person, rational and free, and as a consuming fire only because he is love. Of these, Dr. McCosh is among the latter. He has passed this gulf. For him " moral good " (goodness ?) " is a quality of certain actions proceeding from the will." Saying thus, he must, with us, develop moral phenom- ena from the point of freedom as manifested in choice. What, then, are moral phenomena? They are those revealed from a moral nature, and are immediately known as moral, as intellectual phenomena are revealed from an intellectual nature, and are immediately known as intellectual. A man and a brute are moved equally by appetite to eat ; but the man can, and the brute can- not be induced to eat that which is distasteful out of regard to a higher good. Here is an alternative in kind, possible for man, impossible for the brute; and when this is presented the moral reason comes at once into action, and affirms obligation to choose the higher good, just as natural reason affirms personal identity when the occasion arises for that. This will be re- peated, as alternatives of higher and lower good are presented, till we reach the supreme good, and then we shall have moral law, and a basis for conscience both as an impulse and as a law. Whoever will ask him- self what he means by an enlightened conscience will find the meaning and necessity of a supreme end and good. In a being willing to come to the light the affirma- tion of obligation will be made impartially, whether the good be our own or that of another. It will be made in view of good as such, and valuable in itself, whether it be our own, or that of our fellow creatures, or of God, 'What then have we here ? We have, 1st, good. This is wholly from the sensibility, and is the condition for any affirmation of obligation, and of any moral idea APPENDIX. 343 We have, 2d, the affirmation of obligation to choose the good. In this we find moral law. Here we find the " claim " spoken of by Dr. McCosh, what he calls the ought,'' the " due,'' the " obligation" which it might be inferred from bis review that I ignore. It is indeed strange that in reviewing a book, one third of which is occupied in showing the precise origin and nature of obligation, it should be quietly taken for granted that it is ignored. I do not ignore it, but affirm it as strongly as he does ; but I do not say, as he does, that this affirmation of obligation to choose an end " is itself an ultimate end inferior to no other.*' " The ought, the due, the obligation,'' he says, " comes in along with the love, and is an ultimate end inferior to no other." This I do not say, because obligation must be obligation to choose some ultimate end, and how a man can choose as an ultimate end his obligation to choose some other ultimate end, I do not well under- stand. But be this as it may, this affirmation of obliga- tion is no part of virtue. It is not only not an ulti- mate end, but it cannot be an end of any kind. It is necessitated. If it were not, we should not have a moral nature. Without it man would be incapable of either virtue or vice, but it is no part of either. Through it we simply have law, that by which a man " is a law unto himself," but the question of obedience and disobedience, in which virtue and vice consist, re- mains. Having now the idea of good from the sensibility ^nd of obligation from the moral reason, we come to the action of the will, the man, the voluntary agent, the CAUSE, higher than any effect he can produce. It is in his power as a cause, as well as in his nature as rational and moral, that man is in the image of God ; and only as he is a cause is he either responsible oi B44 APPENDIX. respectable. As a cause it is obvious that man may assume one of three positions in regard to good. He may choose it unselfishly and impartially for himself and all who are capable of it — that is, he may love God with all his heart, and his neighbor as himself ; or he may choose his own good selfishly, regardless of that of others ; or he may be malignant, and wish to destroy good, and to cause positive misery. Taking the first of the above positions, the man ac- cepts the Law of Love as the law of his being. It is law because obligation is affirmed. It is the Law of Love because love is the thing, and the only thing com manded. " And thus do we marry them," — " Law and Love, the two mightiest forces in the universe." The command comes with immediate and " self-evidence " of its authority, on the apprehension of good as valuable in itself to God, to our fellow-creatures, and to our- selves. Choosing thus, the man has done no outward act, and yet he has virtually done all good acts. Noth- ing remains but to carry out this choice in executive volitions, according to the circumstances and relations of life. In making this choice, and thus carrying it out, the man will fulfill obligation, will be virtuous ; and in so doing there will be developed a sensibility of the moral nature giving a satisfaction higher than any other. This form of voluntary action would be moral goodness, and the enjoyment from it would be moral good. This is holy happiness, or happiness from holiness, or blessedness. It can come only from holiness, and is as much higher than animal enjoyment as an an- gel is higher than an animal. Becoming conscious of this, the man is fully in possession of himself, with all his possible forms of activity and their results. He knows himself now through and through, as he might know 1 locomotive. And now, retaining his generic choice APPENDIX. 345 to cause good, his action must take one of two forms. He must either seek to cause good directly, or to lead othei-s to cause it. He mu-t seek to cause a change either in the condition or the character of men. In thus laboring to cause well being directly, and to cause it indirectly by laboring for holiness, man finds his true 3nd. Thus does he glorify God ; thus does he do the greatest possible good to his fellow-creatures ; thus does he find his own highest enjoyment ; thus does lie reveal the highest beauty, and so become an object of complacency. What more can we ask for man as ac- tive ? Let him become thoroughly subject to the Law of Love, and we ask nothing more. But what of right, and righteousness, and justice ? Nothing has been said of these. We have now reached the point at which moral philosophies generally begin. They generally begin by inquiring about right, and obligation as from that. It will be seen from the fore- going statements what I would say of them. Let a man adopt the Law of Love, and then seek to apply love as a law in practical life, and he will need to ask con- stantly what is right ; he will always be under obliga- tion to do it ; and the doing of it will be righteousness. Then also will the idea and sense of justice be revealed ; but there is no more an eternal right, or an eternal justice, independent of good and of love as possible through that, than there is an eternal tree independent of existence. Existence is the conditioning idea with out which that of a tree could not be, and good and love are conditioning ideas without which those of right und justice could not be. A justice that should have no reference to the good of any being would not be justice, but a blind instinct. But, having its basis and conditioning idea in love, it justifies itself to itself even in becoming " indignation and wrath." These must be 346 APPENDIX, developed from love, which thus becomes holiness, when gelfishness and malignity would defeat its ends. Some- thing analogous to this is seen even in instinctive love. Tlie fury of the eagle is never so great as when it re- veals itself as an expression of love for its young. And nothing can be so dreadful as the wrath of Infinite Goodness, not as a blind fury, but because it is Infinite Goodness. That there are what may be called ra- tional instincts and impulses connected with our moral nature, and which some have mistaken for conscience and so have become fanatics, I believe ; but I also be- lieve that there can be no law of the conscience except in the presence of the supreme good. Of this system it may be said, 1st, that it is in harmony with the Scriptures. It was a great satisfac- tion to find that the law of the Constitution was the law of the Bible. Let that be shown and we shall have an argument for the divine origin of the Bible that cannot be gainsaid. 2d, By making the idea of good the condition of obligation, or goodness, or virtue, the system shows just how that absolute assurance" comes, " that happiness must be the accompaniment or end of holiness," which the Princeton Review" says is graven on man's soul." How this comes the advo- cates of an ultimate right have never attempted to show. Let them attempt it, and they will find the need of changing their system. 3d, It connects man with all that is below him, and all that is subordinate in him with that which is higher, thus bringing him into unity with his surroundings and with himself, and making the same law of limitation that we find in na- ture a law to him. 4th, It gives a basis out of which Ihe practical part grows, so that it is not mere precept Such is the system. We now inquire, as was pro- posed, is not this utilitarianism ? Of this there seems APPENDIX. 347 to be a superstitious horror in some quarters, and the idea is hardly better defined than that of a ghost. Dr. McCosh says there is a truth in it, but what that truth is, as he states it, if it be not precisely my doc- trine, I am unable to make out. It is the only part of his review that puzzled me. I have supposed that utility involved a tendency to some good, and that the choosing of a thing because of its tendency to a good, or as a means of good, was a different thing from the choice of a good that is good in itself and that has nothing to do with tendency. I must think these are wholly different. But as some do not see this, I will simply say, leaving out definitions, that as objectionable, nothing can be utilitarianism that does not either op- pose self to love^ or happiness to duty. To this all will agree. But so far from opposing self to love, the system is one of disinterested and impartial love — the " love of God with all the heart and of our neighbor as our- itelves." It has nothing to do with means or utilities, but chooses an end for its own sake, that is, not good in the abstract, but the good of beings capable of good ; and this choice is love. It fixes on good as that, and that alone, which renders virtuous love possible. We have, then, no possible taint of utilitarianism here. J^or, again, does this system oppose happiness to duty. It affirms, with Dr. McCosh, the " self-evidence " of obligation, and that duty is to be done at all hazards. Speaking of conscience in its relation to moral law, I Bay "From that is its power to originate the word ought^ and whenever the mandate and imjDulse involved 41 that word are truly derived from the law (hey are to be obeyed at all hazards. It would be absurd tc say that anything could excuse a man from doing what he ought to do. Moral law must be supreme." Nothing 348 APPENDIX. \ surely, can be stronger than this. There is no taint of utilitarianism here. But though the book so proclaims love and law sep- arately as to preclude utilitarianism, is it not inconsis- tent with itself, and does it not, in marrying the two, give an opportunity for this subtle and terrible enemy to slip in ? Again, No. If utilitarianism cannot be compatible with either separately, much less can it be with the two united. As I understood the contract, it was that law was so to remain law and love love, as to exclude utilitarianism. The two must be united in some way. They belong to each other by a preor- dained affinity, and the deepest laws of thought, and the necessities of moral government; and if they can- not be united by making good from a sensibility the condition of obligation, then how ? This does, indeed, and that is one advantage of it, retain the truth which Dr. McCosh admits is in utilitarianism — just that, and nothing more. The question here is not at all about un- compromising obedience or duty, when that is made known, but whether the very idea of duty is possible except through that of a good from the sensihility, and so of a possible love. The truth is, that the advocates of an ultimate right are so afraid of soiling virtue by some contact with happiness as to exclude the possibil- ity of it altogether. This Dr. McCosh seems to me to do when he speaks of obligation to love a being with- out regard to his happiness. If there may be the love of complacency without regard to liai)piness, there can DO more be virtuous love than there can be pity with- out regard to distress. The system, then, is not one of utilitarianism. It has no tendency towards it, and nothing could be more uii- Founded than such a supposition. If, indeed, there be any two things more opposed to utilitarianism than law APPENDIX. 849 and love, of which, in their true nature and relations to each other, this system is simply an exposition, I do not know what they are. But if the system be not utilitarianism, is it not " eu- daimonism, or the making of enjoyment the supreme end of man and of virtue ? " If we would clear this subject up fully, we must understand each other here. We must understand what is meant when it is said that there is some other good besides happiness. Looking at man in his complex nature, — as physical, intellectual, moral, spiritual, — we see that he is capa- ble of various forms of activity from without and within, and that these are accompanied with certain forms of feeling. This capacity of feeling is called the sensibility ; and the feeling may be one of pleasure or pain, of joy or of sorrow. Now we need a word which shall express unequivocally the whole range of feeling as it gives satisfaction, pleasure, joy, happiness, blessed- ness. Unfortunately we have no such word. Happi- ness is often used, but in many minds its associations are with the lower forms of enjoyment. Blessedness, which is from the moral and spiritual powers, and can be only as they act normally, will not do, because it excludes the lower forms of enjoyment. Hence the difficulty of finding any one word that will express the whole end of man ; but that that end is in the sensibil- ity, and so in it that without that the very conception of an end would be impossible, I have no doubt. To avoid ambiguity and put it in the broadest way, my statement is, that a sensibility is the condition prece- dent of all moral ideas." Of course it must be the con- dition of all moral action. Is this denied ? To deny t would be to deny the universally received doctrine of which my position is but an instance, that there is ao action of the will except fiom the sensibility. Dr 850 APPENDIX, McCosh does, indeed, attempt to deny it, but in doing BO he makes a supposition that I marvel at; one indeed that looks so much Jike an absurdity, that if it had been made by any one else, I am not quite sure but I might have taken it for one. He puts " the case that God creates an ans^elic beino^ with hioh intellectual endow- ments, but without sensibility," and then affirms, and founds a principle on it, that such a being would be under obligation to be grateful to God, while yet grati- tude is a form of the sensibility, and obligation itself cannot be conceived of without it. " Si naturam furca expeUas^' etc. Let the advocates of an ultimate right be explicit on this point. If they say there is any good not from sensibility, let them tell us what it is. If not, let them say so, and accept the consequences. So far as I can see, no one can any more, except by a juggle of words, deny that all good is from a sensibility than he can deny his personal identity. The view presented above is said by Dr. McCosh to be a " very peculiar theory." By others it is said to be the view long held by a large class of writers. This is of little consequence. In the materials of the system there is nothing new. They are the same old ideas. So the needle and thread were the same old materi- als. But as a simple change in the manner of thread- ing the needle led to a wide range of new C(mibinations and revolutionized a whole branch of industry, so a simple adjustment or two here, with very little that is new, may disentangle thought at this knotty point, and change our whole mode of conceiving of this subject. It remains to say something of the system held by Dr. McCosh. Dr. McCosh agrees with me in acce[)ting the law of love as given in the Scriptures ; and also obligation as " self-affirmed." What I venture to doubt IS, whether, in holding the system he does, he is consis- tent with the Scriptures, or with himself. APPENDIX. 351 And here, as v^e are to speak of love, I must call attention to two different meanings, an amphiboly " of that word. It may be a love of benevolence, as a man may love his enemy, including good-will, or the willing of good ; or it may be a love of congruity, as a man may love art or poetry, in which there is no good- will. The first is virtuous love, the second is not. There is no virtuous love that is not either the willing of good to some being capable of good, or that does not, like the love of complacency, proceed directly or indirectly from that. With this in mind, and remembering that we are seeking for the ultimate thing on which the mind rests when obligation is affirmed, let us take the Law of Love as given in the Scriptures : " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thy- self." Here God is presented to be loved for his own ^ake, and there is nothing more ultimate, the idea of good coming in simply as rendering love possible. The love is to be a simple primitive act in view of the object as worthy of love. But Dr. McCosh is not satisfied with this. He says, "We regard God as having a claim upon our love because it is right, and men see it to be so at once." I venture to say that men do not see it to be so at all. It may be true that men see at once that they are under obligation to love God; it is right that they should love him ; but it is not true that they are under obligation to love him because it is right, and of course they do not see that they are. I have said that ''No man is under obligation to do an act morally right for which there is not a reason be- ijides it3 being right, and on the ground of which it is right." In accordance with this, the reason of our love to God, its ultimate ground, is the worth and worthi- ness of God, so that we do not love him because it is 352 APPENDIX, right, tbe Tightness being as Dr. McCosh allows, a mere quality of our love, but because he is worthy of our love. In the one case the last thing seen as the ground of obligation is God in his worth as capable of good, and in his worthiness as seeking to promote it ; in the other it is — right. This is an " ultimate idea," absolutely ultimate, observe, with nothing beyond it ; " an end in itself, inferior to no other, subordinate to no other." This puts right above God. We are to love God, not for his sake, but for the sake of the right ; or, as was said to me recently, we are to love God because we love virtue, as if the love of God were not virtue. In the same way we are to love our fel- low-men, not for their sakes, but for the sake of the right. We are to love the right supremely, and to lo\^e God because we love the right. Nor can it be said that the love of God and of right are the same, for good-will towards an "ultimate idea" is impossible. 1 have seen quite enough of this abstract, hard, godless, loveless love of right and virtue, instead of the love of God and of men. It is nearly as bad on the one side as utilitarianism is on the other; and "whether" Dr McCosh " means it or no, whether he sees it or no, this is, in the end, the " ultimate right " principle." " This is the logical consequence, and if not drawn by him it will be drawn by others ; and the history of philosophy and theology shows that what follows logically " (ex- cept when men receive a system, as most men do this, in words only) " will follow chronologically when the system has had time to work and show its effects." Accordingly, we find that wlierever this system has been fully received it has tended to fanaticism. No man can adopt right as an ultimate end with no regard to good — and if it be ultimate it must be so ado{)ted without thi*' tendency ; nor can any man adopt as APPENDIX* 853 ultimate and supreme the Scriptural Law of Love, the very nature of love making the good of being its end, and at the same time consistently adopt riglit as "an ultimate end," " an end in itself, superior to no other, subordinate to no other." It is to be observed, also, that the Scriptures nowhere command men to do right because it is right, but that their whole tenor is opposed to this form of teaching. But if the theory held by Dr. McCosh be not con- sistent with the Scriptures, can he hold it, and be con- sistent with himself? 1 am not sure, indeed, whether Dr. McCosh has not been led to adopt and retain the system by the " amphiboly " of the cardinal words which we are obliged to use on this subject, such as "end," and "right," and "love," and "good." He speaks of right, and love, and obligation, and holiness, as being ultimate ends. So far as appears, there may be any number of these in his system ; nor does he seem to recognize the necessity of a supreme end, or the distinction insisted on by me, between ends as ulti- mate and supreme. But what does Dr. McCosh mean when he speaks of these — of love, for example — as an end ? Love is an act ; and we do not commonly speak of an act as an end, but as done for some end. Anything purely spontaneous, as an emotion, that may be called love, would have no moral character ; but if love be a ra- tional and moral act, as most people suppose, then it must have some object or end beyond itself, for it is difficult to see how a rational action, involving the choice of an end, can be its own end. What, again, does he mean when he speaks of right as an end ? What is right ? Is it, as some say, some- thing out of the mind, having an independent exist- ence, like space ? That Dr. McCosh denies. Is it the 23 S54 APPENDIX, quality of an action ? Most men think so. But the moral quality of an action can exist only in view of the end to be chosen, and therefore cannot be that end. Is right, as I suppose it is, equivalent to the " recti- tude " of the " Princeton Keview " ? Then it is " a simple quality" — " undefinable," "absolute," "eternal," "unchangeable" — having itself for its own standard ; as high as God, for there can be "nothing higher," as pure as God, for there can be " nothing purer," as authoritative as God, for there can be " nothing'- more authoritative." " It is underived," ultimate," " supreme," " elementary," " uncompounded." Yes ; a " simple quality " is elementary and uncompounded ! and yet it is not simple, for " it carries in itself the idea of obligation." This same "simple quality" is, moreover, " moral goodness," and " is the original supreme excellence of God and all moral creatures." Whether this " simple quality " originally inhered in God's essence or in his acts, we are not told, though we should be glad to know. Probably in both, for we are told that it is both "in man's soul, and in its acts." Is it this " simple quality," thus simplified and made per- fectly intelligible, the doctrine of which " may be called the catholic Christian doctrine of the ultimate moral idea," that Dr. McCosh would make an end ? If so, I have nothing to say ; for a simple quality capable of all that is thus attributed to this, may doubtless become an and, or, at least, I should be unwilling to say what it may not become, whether an end or an elephant. Prob- ably this is the very quality spoken of by the Teutonic theosopher, quoted by Campbell, when he aimoupcea that " all the voices of the celestial joyfulness qualify, commix, and harmonize in the fire that was from eternity in the good quality." Take again obligation, to which I have already re APPENDIX. 355 ferred. There may be obligation to choose an end, but as I understand it, obligation itself cannot be an end. And yet Dr. McCosh says that it is an " ultimate end, inferior to no other." Obligation an ultimate end! And one, too, not inferior to the good of God and bis uni- verse ! There must lurk here somewhere — and the public must judge where — that " confusion of idea into which," as Dr. McCosh says, " we are apt to fall when we speak or think of ultimate ideas or ends." But again : take love in the two meanings explained above, and the confusions from it are endless. What do the advocates of the ultimate right theory mean by the love of right, and of the right ? A virtuous love ? I suppose so. If a man is to do right because it is right, which is what Dr. McCosh would call virtue, it must be be- cause he loves the right, else there is a virtue without love, which neither Dr. McCosh nor the Bible allow. But is the love of right, or of the right, or of virtue, virtuous love ? No ; because neither ris^ht nor virtue can be ob- jects of good-will. There is no willing of good to them, and so no more virtue in loving them than in loving poetry, except as such love may imply a previous love that did involve good-will. But perhaps the most misleading ambiguity of all, is that of good " as derived — sometimes from the sensi- bility and meaning enjoyment, and sometimes from the will and meaning goodness. Of this, however, I have spoken so fully in the work reviewed, that I will not dwell on it here. On other points I should be glad to touch, particularly those of cause and law. But enough has been said. For the first time in my life I have noticed what has been said of my writings. If I have spoken plainly, it is not in a spirit of controversy, for I have no little fort to de- fend, but with a desire to aid Dr. McCosh in his evident 856 APPENDIX, purpose of awakening a more general interest in this great subject, and to add my mite toward the displace- ment, sure to come, of a traditional philosophy based on the inadequate and radically false method of construct- ing a system of conduct on a purely abstract idea. Wh-iLIAms College, May 1, 1869. ANSWER TO REV. DR. HOPKINS. BY JAMES McCOSH, D. D., LL. D. Dr. Hopkins's letter is worthy of the man, in respect both of the ability and the kindly spirit displayed in it. No evil can arise from a controversy so conducted. On the contrary, I expect good to spring from it. It bears on a question second to no other in philosophy, and it admits of applications to the justice of God, the punish- ment of sinners, and the atonement for sin. But we, the controversialists, must, for our own sake and that of our hearers, take care that we keep the point at issue clearly before us. It is a very simple one : What is the chief end of man? Is it or is it not some form of pleasure, happiness or enjoyment ? With much that Dr. Hopkins has said I concur. I agree with what he says as to the importance of looking ends in determining what " good " is. This has been done more or less by moralists since the days of Aristotle, who begins his Nicomachean Ethics with an inquiry into ends, and has been followed by the Stoics, and by Cicero in his treatise De Finihus, The question is, W^hat is the end and the supreme end of man ? Again Dr. Hopkins and I are agreed as to the manner in which this question is to be settled ; that is, by an inquiry into oui moral nature — in the manner of Bishop Butler. The APPENDIX. 367 question here is, What saith our moral nature as to the final aim of man? Dr. Hopkins's answer to the ques- tion is stated clearly in a passage which I have quoted before, and which I must quote again. What then is the ultimate end according to our author? He says it is " the good." But what is the good ? He answers, — An objective good is anything so correlated to a conscious being as to produce subjective good. Subjec- tive good is some form of enjoyment or satisfaction in the consciousness He tells us that strictly there is no good that is not subjective." In his review in the " Observer " he says there is " a difficulty of finding any one word that will express the whole end of man ; but that end is in the sensibility." " The capacity of feeling is called the sensibility, and the feeling may be one of pleasure or pain, of joy or of sorrow." This is the point at which we come into collision. My remarks will be confined to it. We are agreed as to the way in which the point is to be settled. It is by an appeal to our moral nature. To that moral nature I appeal with confidence, as deciding in my behalf. An intelligent being receives favors from God; say lofty reason, fine fancy, rich emotions, and a capacity of distinguishing between right and wrong. What is the affection which he should cherish toward this his benefactor? Our moral nature replies on the instant, — gratitude and love. And we do not require to consider whether this gratitude adds to the enjoyment of God or the enjoyment of him who cherishes it. It is the same with moral evil as with moral good. Ten lepers are healed by our Lord. Nine of them give him no thanks. In condemning their conduct we do not stop to inquire whether it is fitted to give pain to the sensi- bility of the Saviour or their own. On the bare con- templation ot he act we declare it to be evil. The £ict 868 APPENDIX. IS not wicked because it grates on the sensibility of the Saviour, or is fitted to inflict sorrow on those guilty of it. On the contrary, it offends our Lord and is fitted to bring down judgments on the offending parties because it is evil. Dr. Hopkins is shut up to this conclusion by his own statements. Enjoyment is represented by him as the end of moral action. But what enjoyment? P^njoy- ment as enjoyment? Every kind of enjoyment? En- joyment of passion, of sensual pleasure ? No, says Dr. Hopkins ; only enjoyment of a certain kind. He says expressly that good does not consist in happiness but " a holy happiness," " happiness from holiness," " it can come only from holiness." Does not this show clearly that in the moral end holiness requires to be looked at with the happiness ? Does it not prove that there is a higher end than enjoyment, and to which enjoyment must give way because enjoyment is the inferior ? With- out contradiction, it is the less that yields to the greater, and happiness, as the lower, must give place when holi- ness requires it. Holiness, then, and not mere happiness, thus comes to be the higher, the supreme end. It cannot be proven by an appeal to our moral na- ture that sensibility is a necessary condition of virtue. I acknowledge that it is presupposed in the exercise of certain virtues. It is our duty^ so far as within us lies, to promote the general happiness — this is the truth in utilitarianism ; but it is a truth which embraces more than mere sensibility — it embraces " duty " as well as hap[)iness. Again, it is true that one ground of our re- garding God as good is, that he delights in the happiness of his creatures ; another reason always being that he delights in their holiness. All this shows that while man should look to pleasure and pain, he should also looK to something higher. The brutes have no oihei APPENDIX. 859 end than enjoyment. But as nature rises — as Dr. Hopkins shows in one of the fine passages of his paper — from lower to higher, froai inorganic to organic, from plant to animal, and from irresponsible animal to responsible, so the end of each being rises in the same way ; the end of the organic is higher than that of the inorganic ; the end of man is higher than that of the brute. Moral and accountable man is bound, while he does not overlook enjoyment, to look beyond to the law- fulness or unlawfuhiess of the enjoyment as determined by moral law. Moral good does not consist in any case in the promotion of mere enjoyment, such as may be accomplished by a fine piece of furniture, a fine flower, or a fine animal, but by something different and higher, by the love which knowingly contemplates and promotes the enjoyment. Nor does it consist in every sort of love, but in love that is due and right. As we mount up in this way, we rise to the contemplation of a love, and a holiness, and a justice above all gratification of the sen- Bibility. We clothe the Divine Being with these per- fections, and we believe that in the exercise of them he will regard the happiness of his creatures ; but that he will also, and for a higher end, promote their love and their holiness. Dr. Hopkins is still perplexed with the difficulty, — " The moral quality of an action can exist only in view of the end to be chosen, and, therefore, cannot be that end." I endeavored to remove that difficulty in my review, and 1 must try to do it again in a few words. The difficulty arises entirely from a misapprehension of the nature of the first truths of the intellect, and of the ultimate ends of our moral constitution. The reason of first truths 18 to be found, not in anything out of themselves, but in themselves and the objects contemplated. We are sure that two straight lines cannot inclose a space, not because 360 APPENDIX, we can give any reason for it out of the things and out of ourselves, but because in contemplating two straight lines, we see that they are such in their nature that they cannot inclose a space. So it is with final moral ends — ends in themselves. When we love God in such a way as to constitute this a moral act, we see that there is an ob- ligation in the very act ; and this not our own enjoyment, , or that of God, but because the act is right in itself. He says, " If love be a rational and moral act, as most people suppose, then it must have some object or end be- yond itself, for it is difficult to see how a rationkl action, involving the choice of an end, can be its own end." But does not Dr. Hopkins see that in affirming our own existence and identity, which is a rational act, we have reason not " beyond," but in the thing ? In like man- ner, when we love God, we are made to feel that this is due to God. Dr. Hopkins acknowledges everywhere — which the Utilitarians do not — the existence of moral reason, deciding what ought to be done. His confusion arises from his not giving that moral reason the right place. He makes it, as I understand him, come after the end, after the end has been chosen. The correct statement is that the moral reason is implied in the very choice of the virtuous end. He says, The affirmation of obligation is no part of virtue." The abstract affir- mation may not, but the intuitive concrete conviction is. We love God, not as being a mere sensitive en- joyment to ourselves, or as adding to the enjoyment of God, but as fit, proper, and due. Dr. Hopkins has hit tlie truth for once, when he says, "The love is to be a simple primitive act in view of the object as worthy of love." This seems to me to be the correct expression. " The love is a primitive act in view of the object ; " he adds, '*as worthy of love ;" and I say, the worthiness is proclaimed by the moral reason " in view APPEiJDIX. 061 of the object,'* and has a place in the motive leading as to perform the act. This is the element wliich dis- tinguishes a virtuous love from other love which may not be virtuous, which may be positively sinful. I am surprised to find Dr. Hopkins saying that " the Scriptures nowhere command men to do right because it is right, but that their whole tenor is opposed to this form of teaching." Does not Paul say (Eph. vi. 1), " Children obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right — just, due ? And is not the whole tenor of Scripture on this wise : " Love God, obey his command- ments, for this is right ? " The question at issue has many applications. John Foster, in a well-known letter, proceeding on the doc- trine that it is the highest end of God and man to pro- mote happiness, argues with immense power that there cannot be eternal punishment under the government of God. I am obliged to say that if I grant his premises, 1 cannot avoid his conclusion. I can stand up for etei'nal Beparatiou of the wicked from God only on the principle that ingratitude, that ungodliness, are sins in themselves, and ought to be punished. I have not before me the means of ascertaining Dr. Hopkins's view of the nature of the atonement. I hold that in the Divine nature there is an essential justice which leads Him not only to promote enjoyment, but punish sin. I hold that the atonement has a reference not merely to the general happiness of mankind, but the holy perfections of God, and that Christ's sufferings were a real substitution and a satisfaction to Divine justice. It is only thus I can understand the strong language employed everywhere in Scripture about Jesus snffering and dying in our room and stead. I mention these things merely to show that this discussion has extensive bear- ings, but I believe it would weary the readers of a popu- lar newspaper to dwell on it. 862 Appendix. And so I must conclude by saying that 1 do not lieve that Dr. Hopkins has been able to build a half way house, likely to stand, between the two contending armies. Our author has evidently a great aversion to utilitarianism. But if the end of virtue be enjoyment, everything must be subordinate to it, and we are landed logically, whether we see it or no, in the greatest hap- piness theory. We can avoid this only by falling back on that moral reason which Dr. Hopkins acknowledges, and by giving it, which Dr. Hopkins does not, a place in determining the supreme end, which we will then see, not to be mere happiness, but holiness. Pbincbton, June 14, 1869. DR. HOPKINS'S REJOINDER TO DR. McCOSH. The subject of discussion between Dr. McCosh and myself not being of transient interest, I have not been in haste to reply to his second paper. I do it now, not as thinking my positions endangered, but in the interest of a subject too much neglected. Literally and figura- tively, deep ploughing is good husbandry. Only as the community shall be pervaded by a deeper knowledge of nature, and especially of man, can the best fruits of liv- ing be expected. " The point at issue," says Dr. McCosh, " is a very simple one — What is the chief end of man ? " I had supposed it to be. What is the foundation of obliga- tion? but accept this, since he prefers it. I am indeed pleased that he is so far a convert to the doctrine of ends as to be willing to substitute an end to be chosen for the abstract idea of right. Regarding man only as active, the science of morals requires this ; but it wiL be fatal to his system. APPENDIX. ■363 But, simple or not in the point it makes, the above question underlies practical philosophy. Tliis is coming to be more and more recognized. The difficulty with the French was said by JoufFroy to be that they did not know what the end of man is ; and in the last number of the " North British Review " there is an article hav- mg this for its title and subject, in which it is said that The theoretical solution of this question would be the answer to a fundamental problem in ethics ; its practi- cal realization would be the ideal of a perfect life." What the end of man is, Dr. McCosh says, is to be settled " by an inquiry into our moral nature, in the manner of Bishop Butler. The question here is. What 3aith our moral nature as to the final aim of man ? " In this I regret not to agree with Dr. McCosh, especially as he says I do. As rational, we have the power to overlook and comprehend our whole being, as we would a locomotive, and 1 suppose the question must be de- cided by our doing this. It must, if it is to be decided by philosophy at all. This is not to be done by the moral nature alone. On the contrary, that nature is to be compared with the other parts of our complex being, the proper functions and relations of each are to be de- termined, and thus the end of the whole. This was the manner of Bishop Butler." Making this comparison, he says, as quoted in ^' The Law of Love," " It may be allowed, without any prejudice to the cause of virtue and religion, that our ideas of happiness and misery are, of all our ideas, the nearest and most important ^0 us ; that they will, nay, if you please, that they ought to prevail over those of order, and beauty, and harmony, and proportion, if there should ever be, as it is impossi- ble there ever should be, any inconsistence between them," Here we have the highest English authority in morals not only making the comparison I advocate, but 364 APPEHDIl* affirming that our ideas of happiness and misery are nearer and more important to us than any others^ and so than that of holiness itself, which Dr. McCosh makes supreme. Butler, however, and I agree with him, does not, like Dr. McCosh, — who says that ^' happiness must give place where holiness requires it," — allow that there can be an " inconsistence " between holiness and happi- ness. He believed in a deep harmony of the constitu- tion, insuring the harmony of the two ; and that harmony is in the fact that a sensibility," and so the possible en- joyment and suffering of some being, is the condition precedent of all moral ideas." Nor, I may remark here, is Butler alone among thoso of the intuitional school in his estimate of happiness in its relation to virtue. Whewell, who has stood shoulder to shoulder with Dr. McCosh in opposing Mill, says, " Happiness is the object of human action in its most general form as including all other objects, and approved by reason." Edwards says,^ Agreeable to this the good of men is spoken of as an ultimate end of the virtue of the moral world and quotes Scripture to prove it. And Robert Hall himself, in opposing Edwards, says, " Let it be remembered we have no dispute respecting what is the ultimate end of virtue, which is allowed on both sides to be the greatest sum of happiness in the universe." But, authority aside, if we compare the different con- stituents of our being, we find that the end of the intel- lect is to know ; of the sensibility, to feel ; and of the will, to choose and act. As rational, we can feel onlj as we know, and can choose and act only as ends are presented through the sensibility. If we suppose the sensibility excluded, the concei)tion even of an end h Impossible. Aside from the products of this, nothing oan be a good, or have value. Excej)t as we and others 1 See 5th page of God*t Chitf End, APPENDIX. 365 are possessed of this, neither love, nor hatred, nor obliga- tion, nor right, nor wrong, nor viriiie, nor vice, is possi- ble. Finding thus the end in tlie sensibility, so fai- at least that without that there can be no end, 1 ac('ej)t the statement of the Westminster divines that " The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever." If any inquire how this 's to be done, I reply that* it is to be done by knowing, ioving, and obeying God. This is the whole of religion, and the whole duty of man. It may all be comprised in loving God, since to be loved, he must be known ; and if loved, he will be obeyed. This brings into requisition the intellect, the sensibility, and the will; and from the right action of these, wiib God for their object, there must be an enjoyment of him forever. Anything involving this 1 accept, and nothinoj short of it. 1 cannot, I do not wish to exclude from my conception of the end of man that fullness of joy " which is in the presence of God, and those [)loas- ures which are at his right hand forevermore." ]>ut while I accept the above statement, pei-haps a plainer one may be, that the chief end of man is " to jiromote blessedness impartially and in the highest degi'ee." Blessedness, then, is the supreme end — the blessedness of God and of his rational universe ; and that form of activity by which this is chosen and voluntarily caused, is holiness. Having thus stated my views positively, and I hope clearly, in this aspect of the subject, I proceed to some positions of Dr. McCosh in his second letter to which I do not assent. The first in logical order is, that there may be vir- tue without sensibility. Strange as it may seem, Dr. McCosh reaflSrms this position. It cannot," he says, be proven by an appeal to our moral nature " — and of course he means that it cannot be proved at all — " that 866 APPENDIX, sensibility is a necessary condition of virtue.*' 1 ac- knowledge," he continue?, " that it is presupposed in the exercise of certain virtues." Indeed ! Then have we need of a new division of the virtues into those that can, and those that cannot exist without sensibility. And this is said by Dr. McCosh while he allows that all vir- tue may be included in love ! It would be interesting to hear him give the constituents of a love that has no sensibility. It would be interesting to hear him enu- merate those virtues that presuppose no feeling, or- power of feeling, either in those who exercise them, or those toward whom they are exercised. I would not be too positive here ; but through what medium, or from what angle, Dr. McCosh can be looking when he speaks of such virtues, I cannot conjecture. For myself, I am free to say that I have no conception of any such virtue, and must venture humbly to question whether any one else either has or can have. The second position of Dr. McCosh that I would call in question is, that " holiness is the supreme end." As stated above, holiness is that form of voluntary activity by which blessedness is chosen and intentionally caused. The objection to making this the supreme end is, that it makes the activity its own end. If holiness be the su- preme end, and holiness or virtue consists in choosing the supreme end, then holiness must consist in choosing holiness. This difficulty mnst always arise when any form of activity of the will, and so of virtue, is made the ultimate end. Rational activity can never be for the sake of the activity itself, but must always be for the sake of some result of the activity ; for some good, satis- faction, enjoyment, blessedness, — either of the being acting, or of some other being. The activity is virtue, the result is blessedness. The virtue is from the will the blessedness from the sensibility. APPENDIX. Another position from which I dissent, if indeed it be another, is, that the moral quality of an action can be its end ; or that the quality of an action may be the ground of obligation to do that action. It is said in the ^' Law of Love " to be plain that this cannot be. Dr. McCosh and others say it is plain it can be ; and it is in conceiv- ing how it can be, that the difficulty arises with which " Dr. Hopkins is still perplexed," and I fear always will be. But how is this in other cases ? Can the bravery or the generosity of an act be the reason for doing it ? Yes, if it be done ostentatiously ; but no true man ever did a brave act because it was brave, or a generous act because it was generous. But for an underlying sensi- bility, the idea of bravery would be impossible ; and if the exposure to danger, in which the bravery consists, were not for an end beyond the exposure itself, it would be mere ostentation and fool-hardiness. It is the same with generosity. Both are praiseworthy and pleasing, and men may be so exhorted to cultivate them for their own sakes as to think them ultimate ; but the qualities themselves are possible only on the ground of interests lying beyond themselves, and can never be the chief legitimate motive for those actions in which they inhere. But if right and holiness be allowed to be the qualities of actions, no reason is seen why the same is not true of them. A man loves his enemy. This he does, not from any worthiness in him, but because of his worth as having capacity for good. In view of this he subdues his resentment, and makes sacrifices for the good of his enemy as he would for his own. This is a right and holy act. Is it done because it is so, or does it become BO from the end for which it is done ? The questions answer themselves. Dr. McCosh says my difficulty " arises entirely from 368 APPENDIX. a misapprehension of the nature of the first truths of the intellect, and of the ultimate ends of the moral constitu- tion.'* The reason of first truths,'* he adds, " is to be found, not in anj^thing out of themselves, but in them- selves and the objects contemplated." " Does not Dr. Hopkins," he asks triumphantly, " see that in affirming our own existence and identity, which is a rational act, we have the reason, not beyond, but in the thing?" Yes ; and admitting the parallelism here assumed, does not Dr. McCosh see that it makes against him? The reason for affirming the truth is not in the act affirm- ing it, or in any quality of the act, but " in the objects contemplated ; " it should follow, therefore, that the rea- son for choosing an end is found, not in the act of choos- ing, or in any quality of the act, but in the end ; and that is just what I say. But I do not admit the paral- lelism. It seems to me that the processes of the mind, in dealing with first truths where there is no choice, and with ends where there is, are wholly different. With what he says of first truths I agree ; but the moment he pp.sses to ends, I seem to find confusion both in the thought and in the language. " So," he says, " it is with tinal moral ends — ends in themselves. When we love God in such a way as to constitute this a moral act, we see that there is an obligation in the very act ; and that not our own enjoyment, or that of God, but because it is right in itself." Concerning this extraordinary passage, which contains the gist of what he says, 1 in- quire, 1st. Whether any "final" end be not an end in itself, whether nv)ral or not? 2d. Whether a "moral" end means anyiliing more than an end that we are under obligation to ch()ose? 3d. Whether it be pos- tiible to love God so that it sliall not be a moral act r And 4th. Whether Dr. INIcCosh means to say that we do not see that there is an obligation to love God before APPENDIX. 869 we love him ? His language implies this. He says, " WTien we love him, we see that there is an obligation 171 the very act'* If it be " in the very act," it could not exist before that, and so a man who had never loved God could be under no obligation to love him. This consequence must follow every attempt to make, as Dr. McCosh does, obligation, or the sense of it, a part of virtue. The obligation is " not our own enjoyment, or that of God ; " but it may be affirmed in view of the capacity of God and of other beings for enjoyment, and not because " it is right in itself," aside from all relation to enjoyment ; and this I suppose to be the truth. I suppose the moral reason affirms obligation to choose, not goodness, but good as good in itself. This, I sup- pose, is ultimate, and that a reason for every right act may be found in its relation to this ultimate good. And here I must notice a i^j^isapprehension of Dr. McCosh respecting the place assigned b}^ me to the moral reason. He says my "confusion arises from making the moral reason come after the end, after the end has been chosen." I not only do not do this, but ii never occurred to me as possible that any one should As I understand it, the moral reason has a place Id determining the supreme end by affirming obligation to choose it, but it is no part of the end ; nor is the ob- ligation a part of the act or choice. The choice, the love, I make " to be a simple primitive act in view of the object as worthy of love." In this. Dr. McCosh is 80 obliging as to say that I have " hit the truth for Dnce ; " and yet he says that " the intuitive, concrete conviction of obligation " is a part of the love, thus mak- ing it complex. Certainly I recognize the love as " fit, proper, and due;" but I also say that the love itself is impossible, except through a capacity for enjoyment. '1 bis makes " a sensibility the condition precedent of all 24 370 APPENDIX. moral ideas," and is fatal to the theory of an eternal right, or that anything is right in itself apart from all relation to enjoyment. On the Scriptural question, I have only to repeat what I have already said. The passage quoted by Dr. McCosh is the only one in the Bible that seems to say that we are "to do right because it is right but that does not say it, and scarcely seems to. If it said that^ no further question could be asked. The theory of morals would be settled. What it does say is, that children should ohey their parents because it is right, and that leaves the question, Why is it right to obey parents? where it was before. I " am surprised" that Dr. McCosli should think this a text in point. It is, indeed, worthy of notice how little is said of " right " in the New Testament. The word is used but thirteen times ill all, and only ten time^ as an adjective. Of these, the word hUaiov^ translated right in the passage quoted, is used but five times ; the proper meaning of it is not right, as that term is used in this discussion, but jusl ; and in no other case can it be tortured into a support of the theory of Dr. McCosh. Of " the whole tenor of the Scripture " on this point, [ am content that any one should judge, as between Dr. McCosh and myself, who has not a theory to support. Our Saviour opened the Sermon on the Mount, and every beatitude, by speaking of blessedness. In the !5ame connection, he spoke of the " great reward in heaven." The general doctrine of the Scriptures is, that men shall be rewarded according to their works. The " good and faithful servant " is to enter into the joy of his Lord. The righteous are to inherit eternal life, and the wicked to go into "everlasting punishment" It was for the "joy that was set before Him that ibe Saviour himself endured the cross, despising the shame,' APPENDIX, 371 Dr. McCosh refers to the theological bearings of the point in question. Those I might discuss if there were apace and a call for it ; but there is neither. Let the question be decided on its merits. That is the only fair way ; and to aid our readers in doing that has been my endeavor in the preceding discussion. Mark Hopkins. WiULiAMS College, July 24, 1869. DR. McCOSH'S SUMMATION OP THE CONTROVERSY BETWEEN HIM AND DR. HOPKINS. The discussion between Dr. Hopkins and myself must sooner or later come to an end, and I do not see why it should not now close. I fear the readers of the " Observer " will complain if we protract it much longer. We have both had an opportunity of stating our views, and the public must judge for themselves. Intelligent readers have already before tliem the means of coming to a decision, and will not thank us for falling, as we might be tempted to do, into miserable wrangling. I am in this paper to take up no new topic. I am simply to sum up what I believe to be the substance of the dis- pute. (1.) Dr. Hopkins tells us, in language which cannot be too often quoted, that the final end of man is " some form of enjoyment or satisfaction in the consciousness." "That end," he says, is in the sensibility," and the capacity of feeling is called the sensibility, and the feel- ing may be one of pleasure or pain, of joy or of sorrow," He says in his last paper, " If we suppose the sensibility excluded, the conception even of an end is impossible." Now this is the point which 1 controvert. I maintain that 872 APPENDIX. we ought to look to something higher, and that all truly good action has a higher refei ence. I have to complaiu that in explaining and defending his peculiar theory Dr. Hopkins changes "form of enjoyment" and "sen- sibility" into "good " and "blessedness." In this way I believe he deceives himself, and would hide from others the sensational character of his system. If by " good " is meant " moral good," I agree with him ; but then it is a departure from his fundamental principle, — that man's end is some form of enjoyment. He is able to give his theory a plausible appearance and a lofty moral tone only by passing from the one to the other. If we substitute for " the good," wherever it occurs, " the feeling of plea-^ure and pain," we see how bare and earrhly the system is. In his last paper, he tells us that " blessedness is the supreme end." This sounds well, and if it be properly explained, the view is correct. But the "blessedness" which has thus come in surrepti- tiously in the defense of his theory is not the same as " the enjoyment " of his primary principle. There may be an " enjoyment in consciousness " which is not blessed- ness ; and there is a blessedness which is not enjoyment, as when a man suffers pain and reproach in a good cause. He speaks of the supreme end being " blessed- ness, the blessedness of God and of his rational uni- verse." Substitute for " bles-edness "" sensitive enjoy- ment," the sensitive enjoyment of God, and the doctrine jars upon us offensively. Surely the supreme end of man is not to promote the enjoyment of God. 1 insist, *hen, that he stick to the one or other, ei:her the enjoy- ment or the blessedness. If he adhere to the enjoy- ment, his theory becomes the utilitarianism whicii he pei>udiates. If he insist on bringing in blessedness, he has introduced, whether he sees it or no, a new and far- ther clement, and is diiven, logically, to a very different APPENDIX. 373 theory. Whichever horn he takes, he is in difficulties in this middle position which he has cho-en to occupy. When our Lord says, " Blessed are they who mourn," he includes vastlj'- more than mere sensitive enjoyment. If Dr. Hopkins means by " blessedness " a " holy enjoy- ment,^' 1 believe that this is a supreme end ; but it is so because holiness is a constituent. (2.) I am sorry to find that he and I do not agree, as I thought at one time that we did, as to the way of set- tling the question between us. As a question of mental philosophy, I presumed that it was to be determined by an inquiry into our mental and moral nature. It turns out that Dr. Hopkins does not admit this. I am not sure what is the way in which he would settle it. He Bays, " As rational, we have the power to overlook and comprehend our whole being as we would a locomotive, and I suppose the question must be decided by our do- ing this." I accept his illustration. We determine the end of a locomotive by looking at its structure and its relation to other things in the uses to which it is turned. It is thus we are to determine the end of man's existence, as a question in philosophy. We look at man's nature, especially his higher nature, his moral nature, his moral reason, or conscience ; and we find it to declare that there is something higher than mere enjoyment, and to which enjoyment should be subordinated, if the two come in collision. I am sorry to find him, in his last paper, falling into the omission of Professor Bain, and of the sensational and utilitarian school generally, and rep resenting the original constituents of man's end to be * intellect to know, sensibility to feel, and will to choose and act." In doing so, he has left out as an independ- ent element the Moral Power Moral Reason, or Con- science, which, looking to an action, declares it to be good or evil, to be chosen and done as being good, or to 874 APPENDIX. be avoided as being evil. This moral power in man declares, if we listen to it, that there is a higher eud than the mere securing or promoting of enjoyment, and that this is an end which man should set before him. I am amazed to find hini dechuing that, apart from sensi- bility, " the conception of an end is impossible." The ]\Ioral Faculty points to a higher end, and it is easy to form a conception of it. I hold, tlien, tliat our moral nature settles the question in my favor, and I do not al low a loose appeal to any supposed " rational " or " over- looking " or ''comprehending" power capable of deter- mining the question without looking at the decisions of conscience. (3.) He gives a place to the Moral Reason, but it is not, 1 thiidi, the pioper place — it is a confused place. He tells us that Moral Reason has a place in deter- mining the supreme end by affirming the obligation to choose it, but is no part in the end." In discussing this subject, he puts a number of questions to me which I could easily answer, but the questions and the answers would only conduct us into a miserable chop-logic no way fitted to lead to a solution. Whenever the Moral Reason looks at a moral act, — say justice, or love to God, or love to man, — it declares it to be binding. It declares it to be so beforehand and behindhand, as Dr. Hopkins seems to admit. But I go a step further, and affirm that the moi al power declares the act to be good at the very time we do it ; that is, cherish the afTection, or do the deed that is viituous. I hold that not only be- fore we love God and afier we love God, but when we love God, we see that there is obligation in the act. Tliis makes the sense of duty to enter into the virtuous act and to become part of the end. Tiiis does not make the act com[)lex, any more than water is com[)lex, as containing two elements — oxygen and hydrogen ; any APPENDIX, 375 more than any other actual state of the mind is com- plex — all operations of the mind being concrete. Upon my statement that when we love God, we see that there is an obligation in the very act, he comments in a way scarcely worthy of liim : " If it be in the very act, it could not exist before that, and so a man who had never loved God, could be under no obligation to love liim." Surely a thing may be in the act, and yet exist before the act. The truth is, that if the obligation did not already exist, man could not see it by the Moral Reason. As the obligation exists, the Moral Reason may per- ceive it beforehand and behindhand, but also in the very act. (4.) On another important point we differ. He de- nies, and I affirm, that the quality of an action may be tlie ground of an obligation to do that action. When I affirm this, I do not mean that an abstraction is the ground of obligation, but that the concrete action is good as possessing that quality — that is, is done because it is right. This, I think, can easily be decided. I am tempted, let me suppose, to tell a lie, to say that I did not commit an act which I did commit. But in looking at and considering the act thus suggested, I see that it is evil in itself, and I decline doing it. It is clear to me that in such a case we are led to refuse to do the deed because of the sinful quality of the act, and not because we look to some form of enjoyment. It is the same with injustice, with ingratitude, and other sins. I avoid them, or should avoid them, not simply because they may deprive me or others of enjoyment, but because they are inherently evil. It is in the same way that we are led, or should be led, to do a good act, say to cherish gratitude or godliness : we see the essential excellence of the affections. Even in love the same element enters when the feeling rises to the rank of a virtue ; for alJ 876 APPENDIX. love is not virtuous. We have to distinguish between a holy love and an unholy ; and a holy love, say love to God or love to man, is cherished as being right proper, due, and not from any enjoyment to be thus de- rived by God or by ourselves. (5.) I allow that in many virtues, pleasure and pain enter into our view. We are i30und as much as within us lies to promote the happiness of all beings capable of joy or of sorrow. But even here, let it be observed, a moral element enters : we are hound to do this. All • our higher moralists maintain that justice, which looks to what is right in itself, is a virtue quite as much as be- nevolence is. Dr. HojDkins argues that in loving God we do so " in the view of the capacity of God and other beings for enjoyment.'' I am not prepared to uphold uuch a statement; for my moral nature, as interpreted by my consciousness, does not seem to me to sanction it. We love God as being our Creator and Benefactor, and as possessed of all perfection. I am not to enter on new subjects, and so will not review the statement which he gives of the doctrines of certain philosophers. It could easily be shown that neither Butler nor Edwards lend any sanction to the very peculiar ethical theory of Dr. Hopkins. I need to touch only on one other point. (6.) The Bible happily is not a metaphysical work, and I am not very willing to use its simple statements to settle philosophic questions. But it seems to me that the Word of God, in its spirit and its letter, opposes that theory which makes man's highest end to be enjoyment. Everywhere God is represented as a Being of whoso character holiness is as essential an attri))ute as even benevolence. Sin is spoken of as an evil in itself, and requiring atonement to be made for it. We are taught to do this, and avoid that, not merely that we may APPENDED, 377 avoid sensitive pahi, and gain sensitive enjoyment, but because God has commanded it, and because we are bound to obey God. Our chief end is to glorify God, and in this, and under this, enjoy Him forever. I began this di??cussion with a profound veneration for the character and abilities of Dr. Hopkins, and I close it with the same sentiment. Pbihceton, N. J., Sept. 13, 1869. REY. DR. HOPKINS'S CONCLUSION. Dr. McCosh thinks it time the discussion between him and myself should close. I agree with him. He says, We have both bad an opportunity of stating our views," and that "intelligent readers have already be- fore them the means of coming to a decision." So I thought, and was content. Hence anything further, and especially a rediscussion of the whole matter in the form of a summing up, was unexpected by me. Under these circumstances it is with reluctance that I say a word more ; but from his fame and position the words of Dr. McCosh fall with weight, and I am unwilling that some statements and representations in his last paper should pass without notice. On the first point taken up by Dr. McCosh, I am happy to say that, in my opinion, we are more nearly agreed than he seems to suppose. I cannot but think that much of our seeming difference arises from the different meaning we give to the word " sensibility," and hence to " blessedness." By the sensibility, I mean, in common, as I suppose, with philosophers gen- erally, the capacity of feeling in its whole range, as re- vealed, not only through the activity of the senses, bnt 378 APPENDIX, of every mental and moral power ; and did not suspecfc the possibility of my -being supposed to mean anything else. According to this, blessedness would be a form of enjoyment, and, except in and through the sensibil- ity, would be impossible. But Dr. McCosh cannot mean this, for he says there is a blessedness which is not enjoyment,'' and calls oh me to " stick to the one or the other." He says that if I adhere to enjoyment, my theory becomes utilitarianism ; if 1 insist on bring- ing in blessedness, I introduce a new element, whether I see it or not : and so he makes two horns of a dilem- ma where I see no horn at all. He says that the end of man is not in the sensibility, and yet says that "blessedness," ^'properly explained," "is the supreme end." He says that "holy enjoyment is a supreme end," — that is, the supreme end, for there can be but one. But this is precisely what I have said from the beginning,^ and whoever says this, explain it as he may, must agree with me substantially in my whole theory, " whether he sees it or not." I congratulate Dr. McCosh, or rather myself, on his coming to this lesult ; but what meaning he can attach to the word " sensibility " in his process of doing so, is inscrutable to me. With the above meaning, I still say that " if we suppose the sensibility excluded, the conception even, of an end is impossible ; " and I cannot but think that my readers, and even Dr. McCosh will agree with me. As I have said from the first, a being with no capac- ity of feeling of any kind not only could form no con- ception of an end, but would lack the very condition that would enable him to form moral ideas or to Ibrm- uiate a moral law. Under liis second head, again, I think we should be Bubstantially agreed but for the same didiculty. Dr McCosh accepts my illustraiion of the mode in which 1 See Moral Science, lect. viii. APPENDIX. 379 ie question between m is to be settled. He says. We determine the end of a locomotive by looking at its structure and its relation to other things in the uses to which it is put. It is thus that we are to determine the end of man's existence as a question of philosophy." This is just what 1 say ; and also that it follows that as we do not determine the end of a locomotive by inquiring " what saith our moral nature," so neither do we determine thus the end of man ; whereas Dr. Mc- Cosh says, after saying what I have quoted above, that the end of man is to be determined by his conscience. As I think, we judge that the end of man is to be gained by obeying his conscience by comparing that faculty with others, but that judgment and comparison are not the work of the faculty itself. In this there is a slight difference on another ground ; but now comes that again from our not understanding alike sensi- bility" and its cognates. Dr. McCosh is ''sorry to find me falling into the omission of Professor Bain, and of the sensational and utilitarian school generally," — an omission, by the way, fallen into by Kant and Ilamil- von and every distinguished intuitional pliilosopher who has written since, — " and representing the original constituents of man's end [being ?] to be intellect to know, sensibility to feel, and will to choose and act." In so doing, he says I have left out, as an independent element, the Moral Power, Moral Reason, or Con- science." He is " amazed to find me declaring that without a sensibility the conception of an end is impos- sible." He holds that "the moral power in man de- clares that there is a higher end than the mere securing or procuring of enjoyment," and that "it is easy to form a conception of it." Here it is, in all this, that we feel the need of that insci'utable meaning of the word " sensibility " of which I have spoken. For wit]^» 380 APPENDIX. out it what have we ? We have a part of man's na- ture, and that the highest, which neither consists, not is employed, in knowing, or feeling, or willing ! What else is possible ? We have an end without a sensibility, easy to be conceived of, higher than any other, and yet the pursuit of which would neither secure nor promote, at least intentionally, the enjoyment of anybody. I am curious to know what such an end may be, espe- cially in the view of one who holds that " the supreme end is blessedness (properly explained) or holy enjoy- ment." Under his third head Dr. McCosb says that I "give to Moral Reason a place, but a confused place." What I say is, that moral reason recognizes moral quality, and affirms obligation to choose ends. He, as I sup- pose, says the same, and also makes this affirmation of obligation, or sense of duty, a part of the end. He says, " This makes the sense of duty to enter into the virtuous act and to become part of the end." I say it enters into the act to give it quality, but not as a part of the end. The end, I suppose, must be known before the sense of duty can be oiiginated. Whether this more complex view gives moral reason a less "con- fused place," I leave others to judge. That a moral act may be binding, both beforehand and at the time when it is done, I agree fully with Dr. McCosh ; but am not sure that I understand what is meant by its beinfj bindinfj " behindhand." On the question under liis fourth head, we seem to be in direct opposition. Dr. McCosli affirms, and I deny, that the quality of an act can be the ground of obligation to do that act ; and yet I am not sure that we are looking at precisely the same point when we thus affirm and deny. I agree that the quality of ac ^t may be assigned as the reason for doiug it. A mau APPENDIX* 381 aiay be exhorted to do a just act because it is just, or he may say he did it because it was so. This is con- venient, and often sufficient, and hmguage has accommo- dated itself to it as it has to the apparent motion of the heavens ; but it would be mere trifling to assign the fact of the justice of an act — that is the quality of justice in it — as the ground of the obligation to do justice. We here seek what is ultimate, the real na- ture of things ; and what I say, and have said, is that without an underlying sensibility and its products in the consciousness, the quality itself of justice could not exist — that nothing could be either just or right. He and his school say that an action is right because it is right, and that is the end of it. I say that a reason can always be given why an action is right, and that without a sensibility, the quality of right in an action, regarded as moral, could not exist. Under his fifth head Dr. McCosh allows that "in many virtues pleasure and pain enter into our view." " We are bound," he says, " as much as in us lies, to promote the happiness of all beings capable of joy or of sorrow. But even here, let it be observed, a moral element enters : we are bound to do this." Of course we are. Who ever thought otherwise ? I agree with Dr. McCosh perfectly, that when beings capable of joy or of sorrow are in question, we are as much, or at least nearly as much, bound to exert ourselves for them as if they were capable of no such thing. I agree with him that justice is quite as much a virtue as be- nevolence, only I do not think that "justice looks to what is right in itself" independently of benevolence, or that it could exist without it. I think benevolence ita condition, but no more think the idea of justice a part of that of benevolence than I do the idea of identity a part of that of being. I think also that if God were 882 APPENDIX. as incapable of sensibility as a rock, and so incapable of enjoyment, it would be impossible for us to love Him with the love of benevolence, the only love com- manded. Respecting the Bible, Dr. McCosh says, under his sixth head, that he is " not very willing to use its sim- ple statements to settle philosophic questions." I am. Let the Bible state anything simply and explicitly, and I have no philosophy to oppose to it. I said that the Bible nowhere commands us to do right because it is right. Dr. McCosh was surprised, and undertook to show that it did, by quoting the only passage he could find that seemed to say so, though it did not. He now simply says that it seems to him " that the Word of God in its spirit and letter opposes that theory which makes man's highest end to be enjoyment/* quoting no text, and implying, in the form of his statement, that •I hold that the end of man is his own enjoyment. I have nowhere said that. What I say is, that the high- est end of man is to cause blessedness " properly ex- plained." In immediate connection, Dr. McCosh speaks of sensitive pain and sensitive enjoyment as if they were the basis of my system. I trust I have said nothing to justify this. I am no sensationalist, but a believer in the highest form of intuitional and spiritual philoso- phy. I am no utilitarian. I believe in a good that is good in itself, and to be sought for its own sake ; and in disinterested love of beings who are capable of happiness, quite as much, too, as if they were not. In my two books, 1 have examined the constitution of man in its relation both to nature and to the Bible. I have found from that, that the law of the constitution 18 the law of the Bible. That law — tJie Law of Love — I accept and endeavor to enforce — sim[)ly that. I build no " lialf-way house." I bring in nothing " sur APPENDIX. 3^3 reptHiously." T steal no element. I do not subordi- Date virtue to happiness, but find a harmony between them. I do not say as Dr. Lord, in his letter to the graduates of Dartmouth, taking the representation of Dr. McCosh, represents me as saying, that I am bound to glorify God " because my ^ faculties are adapted to that duty, and in performing it my faculties will be in harmony, and I shall be happy." I simply find the moral law — the one law for myself and for all others — impersonal and impartial, and have as little to do with this terrible enjoyment as is possible under a law that requires me to promote it in its purest form and in the highest degree. But enough. All metaphysical points lie within a narrow compass, and it is both amusing and annoying to me to see what a fog of discussion, and often nimbus^ will gather around them. Those involved in this dis- cussion seem to me simple and luminous. Most of the difficulty in making them appear so to others arises from the imperfection of language. This has seemed to me so great, that for years I was deterred from attempting anything. I saw so much on these subjects of mere logomachy. This has been a difficulty between Dr. McCosh and myself. We evidently do not always attach the same shade of meaning to the same word. If we could do that, I am confident it would bring us nearer together than we have seemed, for not only are the intuitions of all men on these subjects alike, but he and I belong to the same general school of thought, and are substantially working together. I close by reciprocating the kind expressions of re- gard by Dr. McCosh. It was a great pleasure to me to welcome him in this country. I rejoiced in the eclat with which he was received at Princeton, and in the favor and endowment which his coming brought 884 APPENDIX. to that College. I trust the favor will contmue, and the endowment increase ; and can only say that if another such man could be found who would come to this College and bring equal favor and endowment, es- pecially, just now, the endowment, I would resign to-day. Williams College, Sept. 2Sthf 1869.