There is such a thing as a science of social life, for which, if the
term had not been so helplessly degraded, Politics is the proper name.
Men are beings of a certain constitution, who, under certain conditions,
will as surely tend to act in certain ways as stones will tend to
fall if you leave them, unsupported. The laws of their nature are
as invariable as the laws of gravitation, only the applications to
particular cases offer worse problems than the case of the three bodies.
The Political Economists have gone the right way to work--the way that
the physical philosopher follows in all complex affairs--by tracing out
the effects of one great cause of human action, the desire of wealth,
supposing it to be unchecked.
If they, or other people, have forgotten that there are other potent
causes of action which may interfere with this, it is no fault of
scientific method but only their own stupidity.
Hydrostatics is not a "dismal science," because water does not always
seek the lowest level--e.g. from a bottle turned upside down, if there is
a cork in the neck!
There is much need that somebody should do for what is vaguely called
"Ethics" just what the Political Economists have done. Settle the
question of what will be done under the unchecked action of certain
motives, and leave the problem of "ought" for subsequent consideration.
For, whatever they ought to do, it is quite certain the majority of men
will act as if the attainment of certain positive and negative pleasures
were the end of action.
We want a science of "Eubiotics" to tell us exactly what will happen if
human beings are exclusively actuated by the desire of well-being in the
ordinary sense. Of course the utilitarians have laid the foundations of
such a science, with the result that the nicknamer of genius called this
branch of science "pig philosophy," making just the same blunder as when
ne called political economy "dismal science."
"Moderate well-being" may be no more the worthiest end of life than
wealth. But if it is the best to be had in this queer world--it may be
worth trying for.