pleasure with the character of rightness and pleasure which is not
so qualified, are in danger of falling into opposite errors. The one
class view the matter as though _all_ pleasure had the character of
rightness, the other class as though _no_ pleasure were so qualified.
By the one class the notion of the good as that which rightly
pleases, is entirely given up; “worthy of desire” (begehrenswert) in
distinction from “desirable” (begehrbar), is an unmeaning expression.
For the other class, “worthy of desire” (begehrenswert) remains as a
separate notion, so that there is no tautology in their saying nothing
is in itself desirable except in so far as it is in itself worthy of
desire, is good in itself. Manifestly they must, to be consistent,
assert this, and this they have really taught. The extreme hedonists
all belong to this class; but, along with them, many others; in the
Middle Ages, for example, the teaching is found in Thomas Aquinas,
whose greatness receives fresh appreciation from Ihering (cf. Summ.
theol. I.a. qu. 80, qu. 82, art. 2 ad. 1, etc.).
But even then such a view cannot be maintained in the light of the
facts without exposing the nature of good and bad to a falsification
which involves a form of subjectivism similar to that formerly
committed by Protagoras respecting the notions of truth and falsehood.
Just as, according to this subjectivist in the sphere of the judgment,
man is the measure of all things, and often what is true for one,
may at the same time be false for another--so the advocates of the
view that only the good can be loved, only the bad hated, are really
compelled to assume that, in this sphere, each is himself the measure
of all things; for the good, in that it is good; for the bad, that it
is bad; so that often something is, in itself and at the same time,
both good and bad: good in itself, in the case of all who love it for
its own sake; bad in itself, in the case of all who hate it for its
own sake. This is absurd, and the subjectivistic falsification of the
notion of the good is to be rejected equally with the subjectivistic
falsification of the notions of truth and existence by Protagoras,
but with this difference: that the subjectivistic error in the sphere
of what is rightly pleasing and displeasing takes root more easily
and infects most ethical systems even to-day. Some, as recently,
Sigwart (_Vorfragen der Ethik_, p. 6), confess it openly; others fall
into this error without themselves becoming clearly conscious of the
subjectivistic character of their view.[A]
[A] Those especially who teach that generally speaking the knowledge,
pleasure, and perfection of each individual is, for him, good, their
opposites bad, and that all else is in itself indifferent, will
perhaps protest against my classing them among the subjectivists.
It might even seem on a superficial survey, that they have set up a
doctrine of the good equally valid for all. But on a more careful
examination we find that this teaching does not even in a single
instance, hold one and the same object to be good universally.
For example, my own knowledge is, according to this view, for me
worthy of love; for every one else indifferent in itself, while the
knowledge of another individual is in itself for me indifferent. It
is curious to observe theistic thinkers, as often happens, setting
up a subjectivistic view respecting the good, valid of all mortal
loving and willing, while, at the same time assuming that God, without
respect of person, estimates every perfection by a kind of objective
standard. This exception with regard to the loving and willing of
God and the notion of Him as eternal Judge is then meant to render
harmless in respect of its practical consequences, the egoism which
such a principle implies.
elebrated controversy between Bossuet and Fenelon it may be said that
the great bishop of Meaux advocated a kind of subjectivism. Fenelon’s
theses, though he advocated a system of morality neither ignoble nor
unchristian, were finally condemned by the Church of Rome, though it
did not go so far as to reject his teaching as heretical. Otherwise
one would really be compelled to condemn also those fine glowing lines
attributed by many to St. Theresa, that in a very imperfect Latin
translation have found their way into many Catholic prayer-books which
is much more than their escaping the ecclesiastical censor. I give
them translated directly from the Spanish
Nicht Hoffnung auf des Himmels sel’ge Freuden
Hat Dir, mein Gott, zum Dienste mich verbunden.
Nicht Furcht, die ich vor ew’gem Graus empfunden,
Hat mich bewegt der Sünder Pfad zu meiden.
Du Herr bewegst mich, mich bewegt Dein Leiden.
Dein Anblick in den letzten, bangen Stunden.
Der Geisseln Wuth. Dein Haupt von Dorn umwunden.
Dein schweres Kreuz und--ach!--Dein bittres Scheiden.
_Herr, Du bewegest mich mit solchem Triebe,_
_Das ich Dich liebte, wär’ kein Himmel offen._
_Dich fürchtete, wenn auch kein Abgrund schreckte;_
_Nichts kannst Du geben, was mir Liebe weckte;_
_Denn würd’ ich auch nicht, wie ich hoffe, hoffen,_
_Ich würde dennoch lieben, wie ich liebe.”_
The teaching of Thomas Aquinas has often been so represented as though
it were pure subjectivism. It is true that much of his teaching
sounds quite subjectivistic (cf. e.g. Summ. theol. 1a. q. 80, art.
1, especially the objections and replies as well as the passages in
which he declares that the happiness of each is the highest and final
end, asserting even of the saints in heaven that each rightly desires
more his own blessedness than the blessedness of all others). Along
with these, however, are to be found statements in which he soars
above this subjectivistic view as, for example, when he declares (as
Plato and Aristotle before him and Descartes and Leibnitz after) that
everything which exists is good as such, not good merely as a means
but also--a point which pure subjectivists (as recently Sigwart,
_Vorfr. d. Ethik_, p. 6) expressly deny--good in itself, and again,
when he affirms that in case any one--an impossible case--had at any
time to choose between his own eternal ruin and an injury to the
Divine love, the right course would be to prefer his own eternal
unhappiness.
There the moral feeling of western Christendom touches the feeling of
the heathen Hindu, as is shown in a somewhat strange story of a maiden
who renounces her own everlasting blessedness for the salvation of the
rest of the world; as also that of a positivist thinker like Mill when
he declares sooner than bow in prayer before a being not truly good,
“to hell he will go.” I knew a Catholic priest who, on account of this
utterance of Mill’s, voted for him at the parliamentary election.]
Whoever, as I have said, has once accepted the view that nothing can
please except in so far as it is really good, nothing displease,
except in so far as it is really bad, is on a way which, if
consistently followed, must lead him to subjectivism. This is
evident as soon as it is admitted (and at first sight, it is true,
it may be denied) that opposite tastes, here desire, there dislike,
may be associated with the same sense phenomenon. One might, in
defence, argue that here, in spite of the similarity of the external
stimulus the corresponding subjective idea may have an essentially
different content. But such a view refutes itself in those cases
where we ourselves repeatedly experience the same phenomenon, and, in
consequence of a further development in age or by reason of a changed
habit (cf. text 25, p. 16) thereby experience a different feeling,
dislike for desire, or desire for dislike. There remains, then, no
doubt, that as a fact the feelings may take an opposed attitude
towards the same phenomenon: and again, in the case where ideas
instinctively repel us, while at the same time arousing within us a
pleasure of a higher kind (cf. note 32, p. 92), what has been said is
also clearly evident.
Finally, we should expect from one who thinks that every act of simple
pleasure is right, and that one act never contradicts another, a
similar doctrine in respect of the act of choosing. But the reverse
is here so obvious that the advocates of this view have in striking
contrast always asserted in the most definite manner that different
individuals have preferences opposite in character, and that one is
right, the other wrong.
Glancing back from the disciples of Aristotle in the Middle Ages to
the master himself, we find his teaching appears to be a different
one. Aristotle recognizes a right and a wrong kind of desire (Ὄρεξις
ὀρθᾐ καἰ οὐκ οὐκ ὀρθή) and that what is desired (ὀρεκτόν) is not
always the good. (_De Anima_, iii. 10.) In the same way he affirms in
respect of pleasure (ἡδονή) in the _Nicomachian Ethics_ that not every
pleasure is good; there is a pleasure in the bad, which is itself bad
(_Nic. Eth._ x. 2). In his _Metaphysics_ he distinguishes between a
lower and a higher kind of desire (ἐπιθμία and βούλησις); whatever is
desired by the higher kind for its own sake is truly good (_Metaph._ Δ
7, p. 1072 a. 28). A certain approach to the right view seems already
to have been reached here. It is of special interest (a point I have
only discovered later) that Aristotle has suggested an analogy between
ethical subjectivism and the logical subjectivism of Protagoras, and
equally repudiates both (_Metaph._ Κ 6, p. 1062 b. 16, and 1063 a. 5).
On the other hand it would appear from the lines immediately following
as though Aristotle had fallen into the very obvious temptation of
believing that we can know the good as good, independent of the
excitation of the emotions. (_Metaph._ 29; cf. _De Anima_, iii. 9 and
10.)
In close connection with this appears to be the passage (_Nic. Eth._
i. 4) where he denies that there is any uniform notion of the good
(understanding, of course, the good in itself, cf. respecting this,
note 26, p. 77), thinking rather that only by way of analogy does
there exist a unity in the case of the good of rational thinking
and seeing, joy, etc., and when, in another passage (_Metaph._ Ε 4,
p. 1027 b. 25), he says that the true and the false are not in the
things, where the good and the bad are, i.e. the former predicates
(e.g. true God, false friend) are ascribed to the things only in
respect of certain mental acts, the true and false judgments, while
the latter, on the other hand, are not in a similar way ascribed to
them merely in respect of a certain class of mental activities:--all
of which, incorrect as it is, is still connected as a necessary result
with the aforesaid error. He is more in agreement with the true
doctrine of the origin of our notion and knowledge of the good, when
(_Nic. Ethics_, x. 2) he adduces as an argument against the assumption
that joy does not belong to the good, the fact that all desire it,
and adds: “For if only irrational beings desired it, the opposition
to this argument would still contain a certain justification; but if
every rational being also does so, how can anything be said against
it?” Yet even this utterance is reconcilable with his erroneous view.
Considered in this aspect, the moralist of sentiment
(Gefühls-moralist), Hume, has here the advantage of him, for Hume
rightly urges, how is any one to recognize that anything is to be
loved without experiencing the love?
I have said that the temptation into which Aristotle has fallen
appears quite conceivable. It arises from the fact that, along with
the experience of an emotion qualified as right there is given at the
same time the knowledge that the object itself is good. Thus it may
easily happen that the relation is then perverted and the love is
thought to follow as a consequence of the knowledge, and recognized as
right by reason of its agreement with this its rule.
It is not without interest to compare the error here made by Aristotle
in respect of emotion qualified as right with that which we have seen
was committed by Descartes in respect of the similarly qualified
judgment (cf. note 27, p. 78). The cases are essentially analogous; in
both cases the distinguishing mark is sought in the special character
of the idea which forms the basis of the act rather than in the act
itself qualified as right. In fact it seems to me evident from various
passages in his treatise _Des Passions_, that Descartes himself has
treated the matter in a way quite similar to that of Aristotle, and in
a manner essentially analogous to his doctrine of the self-evident
judgment.
At the present time many approach very near to Descartes’ error in
respect of the marks of self-evidence (if we are not rather to say
that the error is really implicitly contained in their statements)
when they regard the matter as though in the case of every
self-evident judgment a criterion were referred to. In this case it
must have been previously given somewhere, either as recognized--and
this would lead to infinity--or (and this is the only alternative),
it is given in the idea. It may be said that here also the temptation
to such a misconception lies ready to hand and this may well have
exercised a misleading influence upon Descartes. Aristotle’s error
is less general, though only because the phenomenon of the emotion
qualified as right has, generally speaking, come less frequently under
consideration than that of the similarly qualified judgment.
If the nature of the former has been misunderstood, the latter has
often been so overlooked as not even to admit of its essential nature
being misinterpreted.
[29] (_p. 19_). When I affirmed that the language of common life
offers no suitable terms for activities of feeling qualified as right,
I did not mean thereby to deny that certain expressions are, in
themselves, well suited, indeed they would seem to have been created
for this purpose, particularly, for example, the expressions “_to be
well pleasing_,” and “_to be ill pleasing_” (gut gefallen and schlecht
gefallen), as distinct from the simple “to be pleasing” and “to be
mis-pleasing.” Though, however, it might seem advisable to limit these
terms in this way and so to make them serve as scientific terms,
scarcely any trace of such a limitation is to be found in ordinary
language. One does not, of course, care to say: “the good pleases him
ill,” “the bad pleases him well,” though one still says that to one
this tastes good, to another that, and so on, i.e. the expression
“_to be well pleasing_” is applied unhesitatingly even in the case
where pleasure is given in the lowest instinctive form. Indeed the
term-“impression” (Wahrnehmung) has degenerated in an almost similar
way. Only really appropriate in respect of knowledge, it came to be
applied in the case of the so-called external impression (äussere
Wahrnehmung), i.e. in cases of a belief, blind, and in its essential
relations, erroneous, and consequently would require, in order, as a
terminus technicus to have scientific application, an important reform
of the usual terminology and one which would essentially narrow the
range of the term.
[30] (_p. 19_). _Metaph._, Α 1, p. 980 a. 22.
[31] (_p. 20_) i.e., “Als richtig characterisiert.” This phrase, which
occurs frequently, I have translated sometimes as above, sometimes by
“qualified as right.” By this phrase and its equivalents is meant that
the act (sc. of loving, hating, or preferring,) is at once perceived
by us to be a right one, bears the mark or character of rightness.
[32] (_p. 20_). In order to exclude a misunderstanding and the
doubts necessarily connected therewith, I add the following remark
to what has been suggested shortly in the text. In order that an
act of feeling may be called purely good in itself it is requisite:
(1) that it be right; (2) that it be an act of pleasing and not an
act of displeasing. If either condition be absent, it is already,
in a certain respect, bad in itself; pleasure at the misfortunes of
others (Schadenfreude) is bad on the first ground; pain at the sight
of injustice, on the second ground. If both conditions are lacking,
the act is still worse, in accordance with the principle of summation
of which we shall speak later in the lecture. According to this same
principle, where a feeling is good, its increase increases also the
goodness of the act, while, similarly, where an act is purely bad, or
at least participates in any respect in the bad, with the intensity
of the feeling increases the badness of the act. When the act is a
mixed one, good and bad manifestly increase, or diminish, in simple
proportion to one another. The “plus” belonging to the one or the
other side, must therefore, with the increase in intensity of the
act become ever greater, with its decrease ever smaller. And so the
surplus of good in the act may, under certain circumstances in spite
of its impurity, be described as a very great good, while conversely,
the surplus of the bad may, despite the admixture of the good, be
described as something very bad (cf. note 36).
[33] (_p. 20_). It may happen that, at the same time, one and the
same thing is both pleasing and displeasing. First, something in
itself displeasing may yet be pleasing as a means to something else,
and vice versa; then a case may arise where something instinctively
repels us, while at the same time it is loved by us with a higher
love. We may thus have an instinctive repugnance to a sensation, which
is yet at the same time (and every idea, qua idea, is good), a welcome
enrichment of our world of ideas. Aristotle has said: “It happens
that desires enter into conflict with each other. This happens when
the reason (λὁγος) and the lower desires (ἐπιθυμα) are in opposition
(_De Anima_ iii. 10). And again: “Now the lower desires (ἐπιθυμία)
gain a victory over the higher, now the higher over the lower, and as”
(according to the ancient astronomy) “one celestial sphere the other,
so one desire draws off the other with it when the individual has lost
the firm rule over himself” (_De Anima_ ii.).
[34] (_p. 21_). Just as love and hate may be directed towards single
individuals, so also they may be directed to whole classes. This
Aristotle has already observed. We are, he thinks, “not only angry
with the individual thief who has robbed us, and with the individual
sycophant who deceives our confiding nature, but we hate thieves and
sycophants in general” (_Rhet._ ii. 4). Acts of loving and hating,
where in this way there is an underlying general conception, also
possess frequently the character of rightness. And so quite naturally
along with the experience of this given act of love or hate, the
goodness or badness of the entire class becomes manifest at one
stroke, and apart from every induction from special cases. In this
way, for example, we attain to the general knowledge that insight as
such is good. It is easy to understand how near the temptation lies,
in the case of such knowledge of a general truth without any induction
from single cases otherwise demanded in truths of experience,
entirely to overlook the preparatory experience of a feeling having
the character of rightness, and to regard the universal judgment
as an immediate synthetic _à priori_ form of knowledge. Herbart’s
very remarkable doctrine of a sudden elevation to general ethical
principles seems to me to point to the fact that he had observed
something of this peculiar process without at the same time becoming
quite clear about it.
[35] (_p. 21_). It is easy to see how important this proposition may
become for a theodicy. As regards ethics it might be feared that
its security becomes thereby seriously endangered, perhaps, indeed,
completely destroyed. To see how unfounded such a fear is, cf. note
43, p. 99.
[36] (_p. 22_). It seems to me evident even from analysis of the
notion of choice (1) that everything which is good is to be preferred,
i.e. that in an act of choice it shall fall as a reasonable moment
into the balance; (2) that everything bad forms a reasonable
anti-moment, and therefore also that (3) in such cases--partly by
direct means, partly by an addition in which the good and the bad
are to be taken into account as quantities with opposite signs--the
preponderance in which right choice is to be grounded may become
evident, i.e. the preferability or superiority of the one as opposed
to the other. According to this view, it does not, closely examined,
require the special experience of an act of preference having the
character of rightness, but only the experience of simple similarly
qualified acts of pleasing and displeasing, in order to attain in the
above-mentioned cases to the knowledge of the better. And therefore
I have said that we derived our knowledge of preferability, not from
the fact that our experience has the character of rightness, but
that the said preferences possess the character of rightness because
the knowledge of preferability has here been made the determining
standard. I do not, however, mean to say that the same distinguishing
character which was previously insisted upon in the case of certain
simple acts of pleasing is not also here really present.
[37] (_p. 24_). In order that the procedure here might have been
rendered quite exact and really exhaustive, two other very important
cases would still need to have been mentioned in the lecture. The one
case is that of pleasure in the bad, the other that of displeasure
in the bad. If we enquire: Is pleasure in the bad good? the answer
has already been given in a measure quite rightly by Aristotle: No.
“No one,” he says in the _Nicomachian Ethics_ (x. 2, p. 1174 a. 1),
“would wish to feel joy in what is shameful even if it were made
certain to him that no harm would result therefrom.” The hedonists,
to which class belonged such noble men as Fechner (cf. his work on
_The Highest Good_) contradicted this view. Their teaching is to be
rejected; in practice as Hume has observed, they fortunately proved
much better than in theory. There is still, however, a grain of truth
in their view. The pleasure in the bad is, qua pleasure, good, and
only at the same time bad as a wrong activity of feeling, and though,
by reason of this perversion, it may be described as a preponderance
of the bad, it cannot be regarded as something purely bad. While,
therefore, abhorring it as bad, we are really making an act of choice
in which freedom from what in the object is bad is preferred to the
possession of what is good. And when we recognize the aversion as
right, this is possible only because the preference has the character
of rightness.
The case is similar when we inquire if a similarly qualified
displeasure in the bad is good, as e.g. where a noble heart feels pain
on seeing the innocent oppressed, or where some one, looking back upon
his past life, feels remorse at the consciousness of a bad action.
Here the case is in every respect the reverse of the one preceding.
Such a feeling arouses a state in which pleasure preponderates, but
this pleasure is not pure; it cannot be called a pure good like the
joy which would have arisen were the opposite of that over which we
now mourn a fact, hence Descartes’ advice (cf. 24, p. 75)--to turn the
attention and feeling in an equal degree rather to the good--would
really not lose its significance. We recognize all this clearly, and
have therefore, once more a preference with the character of rightness
as the source of our knowledge of what is worthy of preference.
In order not to introduce too many complications, I omitted in my
lecture when discussing preferences to mention these cases. And this
seemed to me the more admissible, because it would practically lead
to the same result, if (like Aristotle in the case of disgraceful
pleasure) one were to treat hate qualified as right on the one hand
and love qualified as right on the other, as phenomena of simple
disinclination and inclination.
It may be easily seen that from these special cases of a possible
determination of a quantitative relation between good and bad pleasure
and displeasure, on the one hand, and of rightness and unrightness on
the other hand (cf. for these also Note 31, p. 91) there is no hope of
filling in the great gaps referred to in the lecture in a way valid
for all cases.
[38] (_p. 26_). Cf. my _Psych. from the Empirical Standpoint_, book
ii. chap. iv.
[39] (_p. 26_). E. Dumont. _Traités de législation civile et pénale,
extraits des manuscrits de J. Bentham_; espec. in the section bearing
the title: “Principes des législation,” chap. iii. section 1 towards
the end; chap. vi. section 2 towards the end; and chaps. viii. and ix.