THE IMMANENCE OF THE CONCEPT OF MORALITY
It is natural for man's thoughts to be concentrated on himself until he
has learnt to rise from the deep and narrow well of his egoism to a
higher and wider view of life and, free from the taint of self-love, to
form an idea of his place in the world and his relationship to it. Not
till the development of his intellect is far advanced does any doubt
assail him as to the truth of his conviction that all his personal
affairs, the least as well as the most weighty, are of the greatest
importance to the universe, that every ache or pain he feels must wake
an echo in the heavens, that the Earth shudders in anticipation when he
is about to stumble and sprain his ankle, and that the stars in their
courses mysteriously, though intelligibly to the discerning, foretell
the hour of his birth and of his death. An Indian legend pours cruel
scorn upon this childlike megalomania: A fox had fallen into a stream
and was drowning. "The world is coming to an end!" gasped the animal in
its agony. A peasant standing on the brink replied coldly, "Oh, no, I
see only a little fox drowning."
Many moral philosophers, those of the Kantian school without exception,
labour under the delusion of this same, egocentric view. In their eyes
the phenomenon of Morality is a cosmic one. Morality is the law of
human conduct, therefore it is the law of world processes, of the
universe. Indeed, it is the law of the universe before it becomes that
of human conduct. It would exist even if there were no men, no humanity,
no human conduct at all. The solemn innocents who weightily give
utterance to this doctrine are unaware how ridiculous they are. They do
not hesitate to subject Sirius to the yoke of the Ten Commandments. They
are convinced that the Milky Way practises virtue and shuns, or ought to
shun, vice, just as we inconsiderable human beings do. The precept,
"Thou shalt not steal," applies with binding force to gravity, and the
warning, "Thou shalt not kill," to electricity, though the latter
ruthlessly disregards it, as the results of being struck by lightning
and accidents with high voltage installations frequently prove. If they
do not threaten Nature with police and prison it is only because in
their eyes Morality is independent of all sanctions, is superior to
rewards and punishments, depends upon itself alone, constitutes its own
aim, is by its very nature a compelling force, and therefore has no need
of adventitious compulsion.
Such profound nonsense cannot lay claim to serious treatment. It is a
counterpart to the belief that events in the history of mankind, like
war and pestilence, are foretold by heavenly signs such as fiery comets.
The stars revolve, the clockwork of the universe continues undisturbed,
as though the earth were still uninhabited, as it was when it was a
glowing fluid globe or, earlier still, a nebular mass; and this
although man's self-esteem be hurt by such a lack of consideration. If
we care to call the (so far as we know) unalterable laws, according to
which the forces of Nature act and the mechanism of the world works, the
Morality of the Universe, that may pass. Only we must in that case
clearly realize that we are speaking metaphorically, that we are making
use of a poetic simile, that we are anthropomorphically attributing
human traits to the universe. Morality is a phenomenon restricted to
mankind, or, to be strictly accurate, a phenomenon which occurs only
among living beings; for the beginnings of Morality may be traced in
creatures of a lower order than man, and it develops simultaneously with
the consciousness and the mentality of living beings. Morality is a
function of life, dependent upon it, begotten and developed by it, to
meet life's needs and serve its interests. The existence of Morality
apart from life is as unthinkable as that of hunger, ambition, or
gratitude.
Morality is a collection of laws and prohibitions which Reason opposes
to organic instincts, by means of which the former forces the latter
into actions from which they would like to refrain, or prevents them
from carrying out that which they yearn to do. The existence of
Morality, therefore, presupposes in the first place that of an
intelligence sufficiently developed to form a clear idea of something
that is still in the future, namely, an image of the consequences
resulting from an action.
Guided by this inner contemplation of the image of the consequences of
an action, Reason decides to carry out or prevent the action. This
gives us the lowest plane upon which Morality can occur as the cause of
action and of abstention from action. It implies, above all things,
foresight, and can therefore only exist in a consciousness which is
sufficiently developed to grasp the idea of the future and form a
picture of it. This consciousness must be capable of extracting the
elements of a conception from memory according to the laws of the
association of ideas, and be able to group them logically in a new
order. In other words, as long as the mind cannot visualize the past and
from it build up a picture of the future, Morality can find no place in
it.
This statement requires no limitation, but it demands a short
explanation. It is quite true that Morality is foresight, but it is only
among the elect that the latter is developed to such a pitch that it is
possible to form images of the consequences of action and abstention
sufficiently clear and definite to exercise a restraining or encouraging
influence.
The average man can act morally without first working out a clear
picture of the future. It is enough that he has been trained to the
habit of respecting current precepts, and of accepting the views
obtaining in his circle as to what is good or bad, what is admissible or
inadmissible. This morality, of course, is merely a matter of drill or
training; it is unthinking automatism; it is inferior, and not to be
compared with the living, creative morality of higher natures, which, as
a sovereign law-giver, comes to an independent decision in every case
and, like the guardian angel of childlike faith, guides man on his path
through life, indicates the right course at the cross-roads, and warns
him of pitfalls and stumbling-blocks. But for everyday use mechanical
morality may suffice. In the uneventful existence of the average man,
which passes in a stereotyped way, this mechanical morality is an
acceptable guide and counsellor, but it remains an outside influence
foreign to his inner consciousness; he is glad to deceive and outwit it,
as a slave does his master's bailiff if he can do so without running the
risk of a thrashing; but if his destiny unexpectedly rises above its
accustomed dead level, then this dogmatic morality, which he has never
really assimilated, leaves him in the lurch, and mournfully, in piteous
tones, he utters the well-known cry, "It is easy to do one's duty; it is
difficult to know where one's duty lies."
Reason, then, which is capable of foreseeing the results of actions,
teaches a man what he must do and from what he must abstain, where he
may follow his instinct and where he must resist it, according as it
considers the presumptive results of yielding to impulse good or bad.
But whence does Reason obtain the standard it applies to the actions of
men and their results? How does it acquire the fundamental concepts Good
and Bad, and what is their significance? Generally speaking, the answer
will be as follows: Moral values are appraised by a standard supplied by
a general consensus of opinion; Reason acknowledges as good that which
meets with the approval of the community, that which the latter desires
and therefore praises; the community, for its part, echoes the
pronouncements of influential personages, i.e. of the most respected,
most powerful, and most aristocratic; Reason condemns as bad that which
the community disapproves, and which it therefore censures and rejects.
This definition does not solve the problem of good and bad, it only
shifts it.
Later we shall have to show upon what grounds the community
discriminates between acceptable and reprehensible facts, calling the
former good and the latter bad. For the present it is enough to observe
that Reason derives the laws, which it constantly impresses on man, from
the opinion of the community.
It can happen that Reason rejects the opinion of the community and forms
a conclusion opposed to it. This revolt of individual morality against
conventional morality is the great tragedy of man. It can only occur in
the soul of a hero, for mediocre and insipid people always bow to the
opinion of the majority. There is clearly imminent danger of making a
mistake. Not seldom, however, the individual is right in his opposition
to the community, and then the latter is fired by his example to examine
its traditional dogmas and to correct or reject them. This is not the
only, but it is the most common means by which Morality is developed and
changed. Its progress demands martyrs. Strong personalities must be
sacrificed to force a revision of moral values. Socrates has to swallow
the draft of hemlock so that unfettered thought may acquire the right to
doubt the legend of the gods. Jesus has to incur the dangerous anger of
the Pharisees so that the adulteress may be treated with indulgence and
human sympathy instead of being punished according to rigorous law. But
the opposition of a self-willed, subjective Morality to the accepted
moral law is always exceptional; the general rule is submission to the
moral law. This is indeed a necessary preliminary to revolt against the
moral law of the community, for it is only by means of a vigorous social
education that man develops such a nicely balanced and keen sense of
Good and Bad, that he cannot prevail upon himself to carry out generally
approved actions which his own intelligence does not recognize as moral.
He whose moral sense has not been intensified by strict discipline will
never be assailed by doubt, as long as he follows in the footsteps of
the multitude.
Hence, as a rule, Reason exercises its control of the actions of man in
conformity with the laws prescribed by the community. Before Morality
develops into the practice of Good and the rejection of Bad it takes the
form of consideration for the world at large, since it is the latter
which has created the concepts of Good and Bad as well as the standard
by which they are judged, and in order to avoid conflict with the
community, and to maintain uninterrupted agreement with it, the
individual exerts himself to persist in doing good and to refrain from
doing evil.
The establishment of these facts gives deep offence to the mystics among
moral philosophers. "What a debasement and belittling of Morality! What!
It is supposed to be nothing more than a sort of obsequiousness towards
the multitude? Its laws are observed for the sake of pleasing others? It
is a comedy played to win applause and a call before the curtain? That
is a libel and a calumny. The truly moral man looks neither to the right
nor to the left. He does not condescend to ask, 'What will the world say
to this?' There is but one judge in whose eyes he wishes to be
justified: his conscience."
Quite right. But what is conscience found to be if we penetrate the fog
of mystic words with which it has come to be surrounded? Conscience is
the permanent representative of the community in the consciousness of
the individual, just as public opinion may be termed the conscience of
every member of society made manifest. Metaphorically, it wields the
powers pertaining to society; it praises and blames, it condemns and
exalts, it punishes and rewards, as society could do; and it actually
pronounces judgment in the name of society, even though it does not
preface such judgment with this formula which is tacitly implied and
must always be mentally added. Conscience is the invisible link which
unites the individual with a social group, just as speech, custom,
tradition, and political institutions are the visible links. But the
social origin and representative nature of conscience set limits to its
power. Conscience is a respected authority with wide powers only in the
consciousness of those individuals who have a highly developed social
sense. I purposely do not say those in whom the instinct to follow the
crowd preponderates, because this mode of expression might imply blame
and condemnation which I do not intend to convey.
For social instinct comes natural to an individual born, educated and
working in a community, who shares its feelings, views and interests,
nay, even its prejudices and mistakes; and if he lacks it, it is a sign
of a morbid deviation from the normal. Only the decadent man is
uncannily lonely in spirit, alien, indifferent or definitely hostile to
his human surroundings; he is, according to the violence and
polarization of his instincts, the passionate anarchist or the born
criminal; the public opinion of his circle is unintelligible to him and
makes no impression on him; it has no significance for him; he attaches
no importance to its approbation, and its anger leaves him cold; he
would take no notice of it, were it not that he knows its power to
destroy him, and fears its police, its prisons, and its scaffolds. Such
a man, organically predisposed to crime, most urgently needs a
conscience. It would arrest him on the downward path to which his evil
instincts lead. It would warn him to resist the wicked impulses of his
selfishness. But he, of all people, has no conscience. He can have none.
He is anti-social, he is at war with society, diplomatic relations
between him and it have been broken off, and it has no representative in
his consciousness. A lively and active feeling of joint responsibility
with the community is a necessary predisposition on the part of the
individual before conscience can have any power. Where the former is
lacking the latter is mute and paralysed.
The essence of Morality, as we have found, is the subjection of
instinct and direct organic impulses to the discipline of Reason. The
latter exercises a censorship in pursuance of a law which it derives not
from within, but from without, from the ordinances of the community
which instructs Reason as to what it should permit, what it should
forbid, and what it should demand. Conscience ensures respect for its
commands, and may be called the executive power or police of Reason,
acting as the authorized representative of Morality. It is the garrison
which the community maintains in the individual's consciousness, which
it arms and supplies with authority and instructions; the power of
conscience lies in the strength of the community at its back, and is
without influence only upon those who refuse admission to the troops of
the community and yield to none but actual physical force. All this
proves irrefutably that Morality is a phenomenon arising from the social
life of man, and its power is a function of society.
If under the conditions in which humanity lives nowadays one could
imagine a man totally detached from his species, leading a solitary
life, Morality would be absolutely meaningless to him. The idea is one
he could never conceive. It would have no significance. Good and bad
would always retain their original meaning as labels for sensual
qualities, for pleasant or unpleasant sensations of taste, smell, etc.;
they would never be spiritualized or apply to the quality of actions. He
would be unable to attach any meaning to the words duty and right. The
terms virtue, vice, conscience, repentance would convey nothing to him.
Morality can only originate when the individual lives united with
fellow beings in a social community. It is a consequence of this union.
It is the one condition on which alone this union can be permanent.
The solitary individual must, however, not be confused with the lonely
one. Robinson Crusoe, shipwrecked on a desert island and forced to stay
there without companionship, is not primitive man. He is a son of
civilization who has fallen upon evil days. In his enforced solitariness
he maintains the habits of thought of his original surroundings. He
preserves the concepts of Morality even though he has no occasion to
obey its dictates. He can, if not actually yet potentially, be a paragon
of virtue or a sink of iniquity; he can have a very delicate or a very
dull conscience. He continues to be a man of social instincts cut off
from society, and goes on thinking and feeling in a social manner. By
primitive man I mean man as he was before society originated. For,
contrary to the sociological school which denies the individual and
boldly refuses to allow him any existence, declaring society to be older
and earlier than the individual, I think I have conclusively shown
("_Der Sinn der Geschichte_" [The Meaning of History]) that man is not
by nature a gregarious animal, that he lived alone, being self-sufficing
as long as the climatic conditions, under which he first made his
appearance on earth, enabled him to exist by his own unaided efforts and
capabilities, and that he banded himself together with others in gangs,
troops and hordes--the earliest forms of subsequent society--when, after
the first ice age following his appearance, the struggle for existence
grew ever harder, ever more laborious, transcending the powers of the
individual so that he could only overcome Nature, now grown hostile to
him, by uniting with others of his kind.
This primitive man of the golden geological period before the Ice Age
knew no Morality, and as far as human intelligence can tell he would
never have known of it had there been a continuance of the paradisaic
conditions obtaining at the time of his birth, and had the climate not
deteriorated. The occurrence of murderous frosts, the necessity of
seeking protection from them in natural caves or artificially
constructed shelters, and of kindling and maintaining fires, the
diminution or disappearance of vegetable food, and the need to replace
it by the booty of the chase or fishing--all these forced him to unite
his efforts with those of other men who shared his wretched lot on
earth. But in order to maintain this community with others he had to
learn a new science, one he had hitherto not known because he had had no
need of it: consideration for his fellows. He might no longer think of
himself alone, consider his own inclinations in all eventualities, give
way to all his moods or yield to every whim; he had unceasingly to bear
his neighbour in mind and take care not to annoy him, not to make an
enemy of him, not to become hateful to him. Forbearance towards his
neighbour was the necessary condition of their life in common, just as
their life in common was the necessary condition of self-preservation.
The penalty for selfish indulgence was stern persecution, punishment,
perhaps death; in any case, expulsion from the community. Man,
therefore, stood before the choice of self-control or destruction, and
this dilemma taught him Morality.
Such, we must imagine, were the beginnings of Morality. It was not
prearranged or purposely sought; it grew naturally from the
companionship of men and developed simultaneously with society. If the
struggle for existence made life in communities a necessity, the first
coercive law of the community was to enjoin upon its members a mode of
conduct which alone rendered the existence of the community possible,
and the fundamental rule of this conduct was mutual consideration.
Without this two egoisms cannot exist side by side and develop. They
either destroy or shun one another. This phenomenon may also be observed
among the higher animals. Elephants, living in herds, expel quarrelsome
individuals and force them to wander alone far from the rest. The
natives of Ceylon and India fear these "bachelor elephants" as being
specially savage and malicious. They think that they grow like this
because of their loneliness. That is probably a false conclusion. It is
much more likely that these animals have been driven from their herd
because they were savage and malicious, because their characters were
opposed to discipline. Here we come upon the first faint foreshadowing
of the phenomenon of Morality in an animal community.
Now that we have introduced the idea of the growth and development of
Morality, it becomes obvious that it must have begun with mere
indications, and that from rude, dim, undeveloped beginnings it
gradually grows more perfect, more refined, more nicely differentiated.
At first man avoids only the most brutal injuries to his neighbour, such
as hurting him, doing him bodily harm, threatening to kill him, openly
robbing him. In proportion as he becomes more spiritually sensitive, as
he learns to feel the insult and humiliation of injuries other than
those inflicted with a fist or club, he is led to refrain from giving
his fellow-men similar offence, which though it deals no gaping wounds,
yet hurts his spiritual sensibilities. A series of values is developed,
growing ever longer, ever more complicated, with more and more
gradations, until, going far beyond the simple, artless commandments,
"Thou shalt not kill," "Thou shalt not steal," "Thou shalt not covet thy
neighbour's wife nor his goods," it reaches the pitch of agonized
self-reproach, because of the slightest and most secret impulses to
dislike, injustice, covetousness, dissimulation, etc.
Morality must be regarded as a support and a weapon in the struggle for
existence in so far as, given present climatic conditions on earth and
the civilization arising therefrom, man can only exist in societies, and
society cannot exist without Morality. The chain of thought runs as
follows: without morality no society, without society no individual
existence; consequently, Morality is the essential condition for the
existence of the individual as well as for that of the community.
However, we must always bear in mind the reservation, "given the
present climatic conditions on earth." Had the earth continued to be the
paradise it must have been at the birth of our species (since otherwise
the latter could simply not have originated), the necessity would never
have arisen for the individual to band himself together with others of
his kind, no society would ever have developed, and there would have
been no Morality. Serious as the subject is, one cannot but smile at the
thought of the comic figure the learned, professorial Neo-Kantians would
cut with their dogma of the absolute and cosmic nature of Morality, if
they propounded it among men whose wants Nature's bounty was able to
satisfy as easily as the frog is satisfied in his puddle or the crow on
his tree top. They would find no trace of absolute Morality among
mankind, and would be reduced to seeking it among the stars.
The very nature of Morality, in that it is an aid to man in the struggle
for existence, makes it easy to understand the origin and nature of the
concepts Good and Bad. There are propensities and actions which
facilitate life in a community which, indeed, alone make it possible:
love of one's neighbour, helpfulness, liberality, consideration for the
feelings of others, and amiability. There are others which make such a
life difficult or absolutely impossible: uncompromising selfishness,
violence, cruelty, rapacity, instinctive hostility to one's neighbour.
Men recognized that the former were beneficial to them, the latter
harmful. The former aroused their liking, the latter their disapproval,
dislike and animosity. The quality of feeling which accompanied the
perceptions of actions of the former kind was akin to that with which
they responded to beneficial, profitable, useful and welcome sense
impressions. The quality of feeling, which actions of the second
category gave rise to, was akin to that due to harmful and repellent
sense impressions. Following the law of analogy, they placed on an equal
footing actions which were felt to be pleasing and pleasant sensations
of taste and smell; similarly with disagreeable actions and unpleasant
sense impressions; and finally they called the former good and the
latter bad, using terms originally applicable only to the realm of the
senses.
Not everything that is pleasant to the senses is beneficial. There are
poisons which are pleasing to taste, but none the less noxious for that,
such as (to give only one example) alcoholic drinks and impressions of a
certain order, like voluptuousness, which man greedily pursues, even
though they ruin his health. But these are exceptions. As a rule, not
only man, but all living creatures, derive pleasant sensations from
beneficial things; and it is probable that that category of sensations,
which we are conscious of as being pleasant, is nothing but the state of
coenesthesis, when the organism functions particularly energetically
under the influence of the absorption of food or of a special stimulus
of the senses, when it feels its life processes carried on particularly
vigorously, freely and harmoniously; just as we feel that state of
coenesthesis to be unpleasant, which occurs when the organism
functions badly, slackly, and in a manner calculated to endanger the
continuance of life. With the reservation that has been indicated we
can say in general that Good is equivalent to beneficial and pleasant,
Bad to harmful and unpleasant. This is true of the transferred and
spiritualized as well as of the immediate and material meaning of these
expressions of value. The significance of the words Good and Bad, the
point of departure, development and change of conception they indicate,
suffice to justify the Utilitarians and the Hedonists or Eudæmonists
among the moral philosophers, and to confute the contentions of their
critics, who deny all connexion between Morality and a practical
purpose, profit or pleasure, and declare these to be unworthy
humiliations of its majesty.
They wriggle, with the agility of a contortionist on the music-hall
stage, to get over the obvious and palpable aim of moral conduct. They
display all the cunning of dishonest sophistry in their arguments to
prove that the element of subjective satisfaction which moral action
yields is non-existent, and that, therefore, the Hedonists and
Eudæmonists are wrong. They stir up an opaque cloud of words, phrases
and formulæ to hide the fact, which nevertheless emerges clearly, that
he who acts morally expects to derive pleasurable emotions from his
action, or at least tries thereby to avoid probable painful emotions,
and that moral conduct, just as it is designed to give the individual
subjective satisfaction which is a kind of pleasure, is also meant to be
a benefit, or at any rate a supposed benefit, to the community.
Morality must never try for a reward and never expect one. It must be
absolutely disinterested. It has no business to pursue any aim outside
itself. Thus say the mystics of moral philosophy, juggling with words;
and they think they are doing especial honour to Morality and raising it
to a particularly proud eminence. But Morality has no need of this
artificial and false grandeur to maintain its lofty place among the
phenomena of life, and it is derogatory neither to its authority nor to
its influence to be recognized as a beneficial force conducive to
happiness.
The opponents of Utilitarianism and Eudæmonism in Ethics, if they speak
in good faith, may be excused on the grounds that their analysis of the
phenomenon of Morality is shallow. For them Morality is something
absolute, which exists by itself as an eternal and unalterable law of
the Universe, but which is revealed in the individual and therefore must
be conceived individually as a quality which has become human, as a
human value. If anyone persists in looking upon Morality as an
absolutely individual matter, without any connexion with anything
outside the individual, if anyone obstinately shuts his eyes to the fact
that Morality has not been developed by the individual out of his own
immediate needs and in consideration of himself alone, but that it is,
on the contrary, a creation of society and has no sense or significance
except as a social phenomenon, then indeed he can with some show of
justification deny Utilitarianism and Hedonism. For truly, looked at
from the point of view of the individual, moral conduct appears neither
pleasant nor immediately beneficial. On the contrary, it is, as a rule,
directly opposed to his own apparent interest, and it is achieved with
difficulty by sacrifice and renunciation, which are never pleasant and
often very painful.
Once in a drawing-room, during a game of definitions, I heard a
light-hearted young lady define Duty in the following terms: "Duty is
that which we do unwillingly." A stern professor contradicted her at
once with the solemnity he thought due to his position, and assured her
reprovingly: "It is my duty to give lectures, and I do this duty gladly.
If you were right, madam, expressions such as 'zealous in one's duty'
and 'willing performance of duty' would have no meaning and could never
have been coined." That seems convincing, but yet it is wrong.
Expressions such as "zealous in one's duty" and "willing performance of
duty" were not coined until society had developed its system of Morality
and had educated its members to strive for its approval by conducting
themselves in accordance with this system, to look on its approval as a
flattering distinction and to fear its disapproval as a disgrace. Such
phrases are Pharisaical, calculated to exercise a suggestive influence
profitable to society. They are the sugar to sweeten the pill; but the
young lady was honest and the professor conventional; the pill is
bitter. Thinkers recognized and admitted this thousands of years ago.
Antiphon, the sophist, says: "The law, the outcome of an agreement,
coerces nature, the result of growth, and goes against the interest of
the individual." The same idea is expressed by the tragic poet in the
lines: "The gods have placed sweat before virtue." This was said in the
very same words by Lao Tse, the disciple of Meng Tse, the pupil of
Confucius and the reformer of his doctrine.
The law, not only the law of the state which Antiphon has principally in
view, but also the moral law, "goes against the interest of the
individual"; not in reality, but apparently, at the first superficial
glance. Moral conduct is the reverse of natural conduct; it takes place
in opposition to instinct by deflecting the original impulse; it is a
subjugation of inclination, a victory over the real nature of the man.
Virtue has to exert its utmost strength in bitter struggles, fought out
within the individual, before it can reveal itself actively in deeds.
That is a natural consequence of the manner in which Morality
originated.
The point is that it was not created directly for the individual, but
for the community, and for the former only in so far as he is a part of
the community, and from its stability and well-being derives a benefit
which he may, or may not, be conscious of; which he may, or may not, be
able to appreciate; which he accepts as something natural and
self-understood without further thought; for which he does not consider
any return service to be due; but which is nevertheless of real
magnitude, profiting the individual, facilitating his existence, or even
alone making it possible; and for which, as for every other gift, he
must make sacrifices. For within society there can be no gifts. It
possesses nothing but what it has acquired from its members, and the
latter must pay full value for everything it provides, unasked or
otherwise.
As the Moral law originated to meet the needs of the community, and was
gradually formulated in definite precepts, it is comprehensible that the
community never paused to inquire what subjective effect its law would
have on the feelings of the individual. If you impose a law upon someone
you hardly ever consider how great will be the emotions of pleasure or
displeasure which its enforcement will entail. The order is, "Obey,
whether you like it or not; that which deeper insight and more
far-seeing wisdom prescribe is for your good." Thus the individual is
forced to work laboriously for his own good, which in his purblindness
he does not even recognize. It would be comprehensible if the
individual, who does not see farther than his own nose and does not look
beyond the present moment, formed the opinion that Morality is not
perceptibly beneficial to him and gives him no pleasure, and that,
therefore, the Utilitarians and the Hedonists talk nonsense. But the
moral philosopher, who observes the individual in relationship to the
community and surveys human actions, the way they are connected, and the
way they interact upon one another, has no right to pursue the same line
of thought as the individual, and deny that Morality aims at utility and
pleasure, even though the individual, when he acts morally, does not
perceive any personal advantage, nor feel any pleasure except the
self-satisfaction which he has been trained to feel, since in the eyes
of others he is so good and honest. That Morality aims at utility, and
is at the same time a source of pleasure and happiness, may seem dark
and doubtful while we consider the individual, but it becomes clear as
day and indisputable when we regard the community.
Among creatures of a lower order than man, indeed among all animals that
live together in flocks or herds, we find the first beginnings of that
mode of conduct which in man we call moral, and which is not intended to
be of direct benefit to the individual, or to add to his momentary
pleasure, but which subordinates or sacrifices these personal
satisfactions to the good of the community.
Chamois, when they are grazing, set one of their number on guard upon a
rocky eminence with a distant view, and this individual is responsible
for the safety of the herd. While the others feed in peace and comfort,
this guardian chamois forgoes the food which is doubtless just as
attractive to it as to the others, and tirelessly keeps a sharp look out
over its whole field of vision, warning its companions at the first
approach of danger by uttering a shrill cry.
When the great herds of buffaloes still inhabited the North American
prairies, they had at the head and on the flanks of the herd the
strongest bulls, while the centre was occupied by the cows with their
calves and the young animals. Before civilization came to trouble them,
the grizzly bear was the only enemy that threatened them, and with him
they were able to deal; one of them would meet the attacking bear in
single combat, but did not always emerge from it unhurt. Often enough at
the end of the fight both the bull and the bear would be terribly
injured or even dead; yet by sacrificing his life the bull saved the
rest of the herd.
The thrilling adventure of the Abyssinian baboon is well known; first
told by Alfred Brehm in his "_Tierleben_" (animal life), it was
afterwards quoted by Darwin and many other writers. On a hunting
expedition Brehm surprised a party of monkeys in a clearing. They fled
at once and had found shelter in the wood before the dogs could reach
them. Only one young one had got separated from the rest and was left
behind alone. It had scrambled up on to a solitary rock standing in the
plain, round which the dogs were barking furiously, and in its terror
the creature uttered piercing cries for help. A little male monkey,
hearing it, detached himself from the group, turned back from the safety
of the forest, made quietly for the rock and fetched away the trembling
young baboon from among the pack, silent now and shrinking in amazement;
and then stroking and caressing the little creature he carried it safely
in his arms to its family in the wood, unmolested by the stupefied dogs
and spared by the hunter, lost in admiration of this self-sacrificing
courage.
In these three instances we see how the joint responsibility among
gregarious animals develops in them an ever increasing sense of duty,
which teaches the chamois to forgo its food during the hours it is on
guard, rouses in the buffalo a savage lust for battle, and makes the
baboon perform a premeditated deed of epic heroism. When men act as
these animals did, we ascribe this to Morality. This is nothing but
joint responsibility in action, the joint responsibility which the
species is forced by the conditions of life to adopt, if it is to
survive.
Among the moral philosophers the mystics are prevented, by the haze
which obscures all their thought, from seeing that Morality originates
from this joint responsibility. Or rather, if they do see it, they think
this origin too low. They demand a more exalted genealogy for the
phenomenon of Morality. According to them the Moral law comes straight
from God. The concepts Good and Evil are revealed. Commands and
prohibitions are imposed upon the soul by that omnipotence which
spiritualizes the universe and of which the soul is an immortal part.
If these phrases were anything but moonshine and tinkling cymbals they
certainly would make any other explanation of this astonishing fact
superfluous; the fact, namely, that man does what is repugnant to him,
and refrains from doing what would give him pleasure, that he is content
with himself when he has voluntarily curbed his impulses and made
sacrifices, and that he feels the pricks of conscience if he chances to
experience the pleasure of appeasement because he has satisfied his
desires. "Man obeys divine commands." That suffices and obviates the
necessity of seeking for explanations of this phenomenon, which shall
satisfy Reason.
It is a mere mirage, the reflection of an earthly state of affairs in
the heavens, to assume that the universe is governed by an authority
devoid of responsibility, which imposes on its subjects, that is to say
men, laws and instructions, discipline and order.
It is a form of anthropomorphism, the most widespread and stubborn of
errors in thought among those men who try to understand the
unintelligible, and are content with the most unfounded explanation
which their naïve imagination freely invents for them. This same
anthropomorphism, not even at a loss to solve the problem of the origin
and essence of the universe, replies unhesitatingly that God by an act
of volition created it out of nothing to prove to Himself His own
omnipotence and omniscience; in like manner it has no scruple in
ascribing the phenomenon of Morality to a creative act of God's, and
makes Ethics, which properly speaking form the chief part of psychology,
anthropology and sociology, a subdivision of theology, that is, of
anthropomorphic mythology.
Critical Reason, which realizes that deceptive fictions are not true
thought, but dreams--not the result of ripe intellectual effort, but of
the childish play of the imagination, seeks the roots of Morality not in
the air or in the ether, but in the solid earth; not in some
indemonstrable, transcendental sphere, but in an obvious need of human
nature. The biological necessities of the species, which can only
survive by dint of living in communities, sufficiently explain the
origin of the feeling of joint responsibility, of consideration for
one's neighbour, of the concepts Good and Evil and of conscience; and we
have no use for the dogmas of revealed Morality derived from some
fabulous, supernatural source, or for the Kantian categorical
imperative.
Morality, understood as a form of joint responsibility, determines the
inner and outer relations of the individual to the community; that is to
say, to as much of it as he comes in immediate contact with, to wit, his
neighbour. Morality provides him with the notions of Duty and Right, of
the consideration he owes his neighbour and of that which he may demand
from his neighbour. It is customary to look upon Rights and Duties as
opposites. This is mere indolence of thought. Right and Duty are
supplementary, forming together one concept. They are in reality one and
the same thing regarded from different points of view. My Duty is the
subjective form of my neighbour's Right; my Right the subjective form of
other people's Duty. That which is Duty, when I have to do it out of
consideration for others, becomes my Right, when others have to do it
out of consideration for me.
Respect for the personality of others, which is the feeling from which
the concept of Right and Duty emanates, seems to be a late and noble
product of Morality and a particularly praiseworthy victory of prescient
intelligence over selfishness. This factor of our consciousness which
determines our will and which gradually becomes an instinct, is really
only a special application of the law of least resistance which governs
all organic life. We have no selfless, ideal respect for the personality
of another; but, made wise by experience and observation, we assume that
that other has the power to resist and to retaliate if a wrong is done
to him or he is injured; hence we avoid, to the best of our ability,
actions to which he is likely to object, so as not to come into conflict
with him, because to overcome his opposition would require effort and
expose us to danger. Respect for the personality of another and for his
rights may be expressed by a mechanical formula which runs as follows:
this respect varies directly as the real or supposed might of the other
person, and inversely as our own real or supposed might.
The society of which he is a member, and which makes his existence
possible, prescribes to the individual the laws governing his moral
conduct. That which a community at any given time approves and demands,
rejects or forbids, constitutes the precept whereby its members regulate
their conduct, and offers ample security for their conscience.
The concepts Good and Bad originate simultaneously with society; they
are the form in which its actual conditions of existence are conveyed to
the consciousness of its members. The only immutable thing about them is
the fact of their continued existence. Without the coercive discipline
of a rule conducive to the common weal and governing the mutual
relations between its members, no society could be imagined to exist,
unless its members were all similar in nature, reacted in an identical
fashion to all impressions and possessed the same feelings and
sensations, the same inclinations and the same impulses of volition. In
that case no difference could ever arise between one individual and
another, or between an individual and the community, which would have to
be smoothed over by the moral law emanating from the community and
controlling the individual, or be suppressed by the community's order.
Every individual could be left to the guidance of his own instincts, for
he would know himself always to be in agreement with the community; no
consideration for others need hamper or modify his actions; he could
behave just as if he were alone in the world. But as individuals differ
from one another, feel, think and want different things, collisions in
which they hurt, cripple or even kill one another are the inevitable
consequence of their opposing movements; and the interference of the
moral law is absolutely necessary to polarize these movements and guide
them into parallel courses, so that they do not run counter to one
another.
But Good and Bad derive not only their existence but their measure and
their significance from the views of the community. They are therefore
not absolute but variable; they are not an immutable standard amid the
ever-changing conditions of humanity, a rule by which the value of the
actions and aims of mortals are indisputably determined, but are subject
to the laws of evolution in society and therefore in a constant state of
flux. At different times and in different places they present the most
varied aspects. What is virtue here and now may have been vice formerly
and at another spot, and _vice versa_. In the royal family of ancient
Egypt marriage between brothers and sisters was the prescribed custom.
We call this incest and it fills us with horror. To the sons of Egypt it
seemed meritorious and constituted a claim to special veneration. The
Babylonians and Canaanites burnt their first-born in Moloch's fiery
furnace, and this sacrifice was accounted a highly praiseworthy act of
piety and of the fear of God. The Spartans taught their sons, their
future warriors, the art of stealing without being caught; and he who
did this most cleverly achieved the most flattering recognition. The
Cherusci butchered the Roman prisoners taken from the legions of Varus
as a sacrifice to their tribal gods, and a noble-minded and brave man
like Arminius considered this absolutely honourable and knightly. The
Aztecs, who had undeniably attained an advanced degree of civilization,
at high festivals used with obsidian knives to cut open the breasts of
human sacrifices on the altars of their gods, and tear the heart out of
their living bodies. That was an action finding favour in the sight of
the gods, and the people watched it with awe and those mystic emotions
which religious rites are intended to arouse.
Moral law in Europe, during the Middle Ages and almost up to modern
times, permitted, and even ordained, the punishment by horrible torture
and death of those whose religious convictions differed from the
teaching of the established church; and with its consent supposed
witches were sent to the stake. In feudal times the most terrible and
revolting of crimes was felony--that is, a breach of faith on the part
of the vassal against his overlord--and no torture was too cruel as a
punishment. Nobles, who had so delicate a sense of honour that for a wry
look or the accidental touch of an elbow they would draw their swords,
enunciated the principle: "the king's blood does not defile," and vied
with each other in forcing their daughters upon the king as concubines.
Until Wilberforce roused the English conscience at the end of the
eighteenth century, and Schölcher did the same in France in the middle
of the nineteenth, slavery was considered a state of affairs which a
moral community could tolerate. The North American descendants of those
Puritans whom no persecution and no martyrdom could prevent from leading
a life consonant with the dictates of their conscience, did not scruple
to exercise proprietary rights over human beings who, in the case of
octoroons and even of quadroons, did not even differ from them in
colour, supposing that difference of colour could be considered an
excuse. The code, which began with the "Declaration of Rights,"
contained heavy penalties for those who helped a slave to escape. Men,
whose uprightness no one could doubt, did not hesitate to set
bloodhounds on the track of an escaped nigger, and four years of a
bloody civil war were needed before refractory slave-owners were forced
to acknowledge the immorality of forced labour.
These examples have been taken from the customs of civilized nations.
Amongst races that have not attained the high degree of development to
which the white man has risen, we meet with much more revolting
deviations from the moral law obtaining among white men. Tribes are
known in which the commandment, "Honour thy father and thy mother," is
interpreted so, that the children kill and eat their parents as soon as
the latter have attained a considerable age. The North American Indians,
who had a well developed sense of honour, were capable of chivalrous
feelings and kept their word with absolute loyalty, used to torture
helpless prisoners and scalp their defeated enemies, even the women.
Among the Dyaks, who are under Dutch rule and are familiar with the laws
and customs of Christian Europe, a marriageable youth must first cut off
a human being's head before he is allowed to wed. He need not overcome
his victim in honourable combat; he may creep upon him surreptitiously,
and even fall upon him in his sleep and murder him in cowardly fashion
without danger to himself.
All these are instances which we unhesitatingly condemn. To our idea
they are crimes and misdeeds which among us would make their
perpetrators liable either to contempt and expulsion from decent society
or to the extremest penalties of the law; yet at their time and in their
place they were considered meritorious and virtuous, and were approved
by public opinion and the conscience of their authors. But we can go
farther and subject our own moral law to a similar independent
consideration. We shall find that to us also deeds appear permissible,
virtuous and even splendid, which do not differ essentially from the
thefts of the Spartans or the head-hunting of the Dyaks. A company
promoter who sells on the Stock Exchange shares that he must know to be
worthless, can with Spartan cunning rob thousands of trustful victims of
the fruits of their labour and economy, and reduce them to beggary; and
not only does he go unpunished, but if by his knavery he becomes a
millionaire and uses his wealth cleverly, he can attain the highest
political and social honours and distinctions. We may admit that
financial roguery of this sort can now no longer be classed among
strictly moral actions, that public opinion is on the verge of placing
it in the category of vice and crime, and that legislators are beginning
to make attempts to inflict severe and humiliating penalties on its
perpetrators.
But another series of deeds is still generally considered so undoubtedly
virtuous and laudable, that it evokes the highest homage from the best
intellects of the age, poets, musicians, scientists, teachers, sculptors
and painters, and the leaders of the people--the deeds of war. The most
horrible butchery of men, the theft of property and liberty,
ill-treatment, destruction are not only permissible but obligatory and
laudable, if they occur in war, and if their authors can point to the
fact that they are acting in the service of their country at the order
of a legitimate authority. Neither the soldiers nor their leaders are
bound to inquire whether the authority, whether their mother country is
waging war for a purpose that moral law can approve. "Right or wrong, my
country." In the eyes of her sons the country is always in the right,
even if it be objectively in the wrong, and by its orders every soldier
murders, robs, burns and ravages, plays the executioner to harmless,
unarmed, innocent strangers, compels prisoners to forced labour, steals
letters that fall into his hands and prevents families who are cruelly
separated from communicating with one another; and his conscience does
not reproach him in the least, nor is he conscious of being a criminal
deserving of all the penalties of the law. Every single one of these
actions, if perpetrated by an individual on his own account and for his
own purposes, would result in the death penalty, and it would be richly
deserved, too. But in war, carried out collectively at the bidding of a
government, they become deeds of heroism, filling the doer with pride,
moving the community to tears of enthusiasm, and they are held up to
youth as shining examples to be imitated. It is more than likely that
future times will judge the esteem in which these deeds are held not
otherwise than we do the value placed by other forms of society on human
sacrifices, the slaughter of parents and head-hunting.
It is hard to determine the exact part which conscience plays in the
changes undergone by the concepts Good and Evil. As conscience is the
voice of the community in the consciousness of the individual, it
approves on principle what seems right and praiseworthy to the
community. Just as little as conscience prevented a Babylonian mother
from sacrificing her child to Moloch, does it in these days stop the
average citizen from doing a soldier's work of killing and destroying in
time of war. If an individual knows himself to be in complete agreement
with the general opinion, then he lives at peace with his conscience. No
impulse to change the customs, to set up a new Morality, to condemn
long-established usages, is to be expected from such an one.
The mechanism whereby changes are wrought in views on Good and Evil is
quite different. Everywhere and at all times there are exceptional
persons whose abilities render them specially fit to feel and think
independently. To their idea the community has no determining but only
an advisory voice. They reserve to themselves the right of decision in
every case. In their consciousness there persists a clear recognition of
the fact that the essence of Morality lies in consideration for others,
and when the current acceptation of the moral law among the majority
allows them, nay, commands them to disregard this consideration, they
experience a feeling of discomfort which dull, unthinking imitation of
the general example does not soothe. They meditate upon the deviation
from the fundamental rule of considering one's neighbour, they test its
justification, and they condemn it, if its difference with the general
moral law cannot be adjusted. If the essence of Morality is
consideration for one's neighbour, its purpose is the well-being of the
community; its essence must be adapted to this purpose, that is to say,
consideration for one's neighbour must be subordinated to the general
welfare. The thief, the robber and the murderer have no claim upon
consideration, and even a man with the most delicate sense of Morality
will agree that coercion of the criminal is desirable. Tolstoy's
warning: "Do not oppose the evildoer," is not Morality, but an
exaggerated parody of it, which renders it nugatory. Thus the most moral
person will not raise any objection to a war waged in defence of hearth
and home when their safety is threatened by a ruthless attack.
But, if a mode of action which, though it be generally practised and
approved, injures the individual and causes him to suffer, cannot be
justified on the grounds of an obvious benefit to the community, then a
small, sometimes an almost infinitesimal minority of independent
thinkers will rise against the custom; they are not afraid of coming
into violent conflict with generally accepted views; they defend the
fundamental principle of Morality, namely, consideration for the
individual, against the exception, namely, oppression of the individual
for the ostensible good of the community; they brand as immoral what is
generally accounted moral; they announce that the current acceptation of
the goodness or badness of a certain order of actions must cease.
The intervention of such reformers always gives offence, and arouses
anger which at times rises to murderous fury. But this wrathful
indignation is just what makes a break in the automatic fashion in which
the majority of average men act according to traditional custom; the
attention of more and more minds is arrested, critically they examine
the accepted moral law, they are penetrated first by the suspicion and
finally by the clear conviction that it is contrary to the essence of
Morality, and they swell the ranks of the innovators who inveigh against
the tradition. The struggle lasts long and is carried on pitilessly. The
preachers of the new Morality seem corrupt and criminal to the
supporters of the old. They are persecuted and slandered and not seldom
have to suffer martyrdom, but they always emerge victorious if their
doctrine is in agreement with the logic of the fundamental principles of
Moral law. That is the history of the abolition of human sacrifices, of
the vendetta, of slavery, of legal torture, of religious coercion.
Whoever looks about him with open eyes will note that civilized men are
at the moment adopting new ideas with regard to the operation of state
omnipotence, to war, to the right of the economically strong to exploit
others, to the rights of women, to sexual morality, to the penal system.
The advocates of a new Morality must still put up with the most
humiliating abuse. He who wishes to defend the individual from coercion
by the state is an anarchist and deserves to be hanged or broken on the
wheel. He who maintains that war is immoral belongs to the rabble of
vagabonds who own no nationality, for whom no contempt is too deep and
no punishment too severe. He who refuses a duel is a dishonoured coward,
and thereby cuts himself off from decent society. He who recognizes
woman's right to motherhood is a dastardly purveyor of opportunities for
prostitution. He who attacks the present relation between Capital and
Labour as a hypocritical continuation of slavery is an ignorant agitator
or an enemy of society. He who would like to see the idea of punishment
excluded from the law, as being retrograde and unscientific, and who
wishes only the point of view of the defence of society to be recognized
as valid, talks sentimental nonsense, disarms justice and places the
community at large at the mercy of criminals.
But the issue of the struggle is not in doubt. The present systems,
which present exceptions to the moral law of consideration for one's
neighbour, must go. Although they are considered moral to-day, are, in
fact, Morality itself, to-morrow they will be felt to be immoral and be
abhorred by all men of moral feelings. Thus the concepts Good and Bad
gradually change their meaning; views on what is moral and what immoral
are constantly in a state of flux; and the only permanent thing is
recognition of the fact that man's actions must be withdrawn from the
control of subjective choice and whim, and must be subject to a law set
up by the community; the justification of this law lies in its being
necessary to the existence of society. Every revision of Moral values
originates in some vexation, and ends by refining and deepening moral
sentiment. In this chapter only the scheme of development of moral views
and of their changes has been indicated. The question of moral progress
will be dealt with fully later on.
To sum up the arguments of this section, Morality is not transcendental
but immanent; it is a social phenomenon and restricted to the sphere of
living beings. Its beginnings may be traced in animal societies, it is
developed among mankind. The preliminary condition necessary for this
development is the ability to visualize future happenings, since moral
conduct is determined by estimating its effects and results, that is, by
conceiving something in the future. Morality has a positive, concrete
aim. It makes the existence of society possible, and this, given the
circumstances obtaining on our planet, is the necessary condition for
the preservation of each individual, and it originated from the instinct
of self-preservation in the species. Its essence lies in consideration
for one's neighbour, because without this the communal life of
individuals, that is, a society, would be impossible.
If individuals had been able to live alone, Morality could never have
come into existence. The concepts Good and Bad characterize those
actions which society feels to be beneficial or harmful to itself. As
moral conduct implies consideration for one's neighbour, it is often, if
not always, in conflict with selfishness, that is, with the immediate
and instinctive impulses, and is, in the first place, accompanied by
disagreeable sensations. The pleasurable emotion of satisfaction arises
later through habit and reflection; it accompanies the thought of the
merit and praiseworthiness of the victory over self. Conscience is the
voice of the community in the individual's consciousness. The idea of
Duty is the subjective conception of the Rights of our neighbour; the
idea of Rights is the subjective conception of our neighbour's Duty to
us. Morality is not absolute, but relative, and is subject to continual
changes. To maintain that Morality is cosmic, eternal, immutable, that
it aims neither at profit nor pleasure, but constitutes its own aim, is
pure anthropomorphic superstition.