THE ETHICAL IMPERATIVE.
We have thus seen that the origin and authority of Ethics are to be
found in Sociology; but to allow the enquiry to rest here is only half
to understand the nature and imperativeness of ethical obligations as to
conduct. We consider that Mr. Spencer's ethical theory suffers from his
mode of exposition. We should be disposed to approach the question in an
inverse order, and instead of seeking for an ethical authority on
individual or biological grounds, culminating in an ethical Sociology,
to acknowledge at once the sociological origin and authority of the
ethical obligation, and to endeavour to understand it in detail by a
subordinate study of biological requirements and psychological growths.
The main fact underlying all Ethics is the existence of a society
composed of subjective factors, factors possessing feelings and
reasoning powers. The fundamental notion in Ethics is the regulation of
the mutual conduct of these factors. It is the voice of the million
against the voice of the unit which decides the duty of the unit. It is
the voice of the individual against the voice of society claiming a
modification of opinion. It is the voice of individuals to other
individuals specifying general duty. Broadly speaking it is the claim of
duties towards other individuals upon the Ego. But it follows from the
universality of the claim, that there is mutuality of claim, and the
duties which are demanded have at the same time to be acknowledged. The
principle can be easily accepted as theoretically correct, and many
general rights and duties can be readily deduced as corollaries, but
beyond these general rules ethical problems have rather to be worked out
than thought out--in the more important matters by societies during
their upward growth, in smaller matters by individuals through
multitudinous adjustments and re-adjustments. I do this or that in
contravention of some accepted social law. I am condemned, and am made
so generally uncomfortable by the social penalties that I am coerced
into conformity, or, otherwise, society modifies its opinion in
acknowledgment of my right to do as I have done.
But then the question arises, upon what principle should ethical
judgments be formed? Since society demands the performance of certain
actions, while it prohibits the performance of others, and since its aim
is the biological completeness of each of the individuals, what are the
principles upon which it determines the restraints and imposes the
injunctions so as not to interfere too much with individual liberties?
This principle finds very good expression in Mr. Spencer's formula.
The whole problem comes before us when we have to consider the relative
claims of egoism and altruism, a problem splendidly worked out by Mr.
Spencer, in the chapters entitled "Egoism _versus_ Altruism," "Altruism
_versus_ Egoism," "Trial and Compromise," and "Conciliation." As this is
a purely critical work, to be read only in conjunction with the work
criticised, we do not feel called upon to give an account of these
chapters. We simply state our acceptance of them bodily, the
reservations we would make being merely in regard to certain details of
the exposition. We ought to reprint them here in order to make this work
complete in its argument, but it is simpler to ask the student to
interrupt his reading of this criticism by a reperusal of the chapters
referred to.
* * * * * *
Having read Mr. Spencer's treatment of the problem, the question
remains, is the ethical imperative merely an external one, dictated by a
prudential consideration of the requirements of the social environment?
The answer must be a negative one; there is an internal moral authority
which gives to actions their ethical glory, their poetic delicacy, their
qualitative appreciation, insomuch that there are names in past history
that stand ever in the forefront of the memories of men, hallowed and
ennobled in their imaginations for all time, on account of the ethical
glory of their lives and the manner in which their example appeals to
the wide sympathies within us. From the same internal fount springs the
detestation of foul and cruel actions, the hatred of unjust and
tyrannical deeds, and the abhorrence of the men and women who commit
them. The same internal sentiment covers the individual himself with
shame and remorse for unworthy actions committed, from which an
ever-present memory suffers no release.
The natural history of the growth of this internal authority is the
history of the action of the subjective environment upon the subjective
individual. The understanding of this growth is the province of
Psychology in the two forms of emotional evolution and intellectual
evolution as presented by Mr. Spencer in chapter vii of the "Data of
Ethics,"--the enlargement of the number of sympathies with the
subjective environment--past, present, and future--and the enlargement
of the number of correspondences with the objective environment in
space, and time, and generality. We are more particularly concerned with
that branch of it which deals with the growth of the emotions. The
purely biological view relates to the individual, and its own personal
existence. But the care of offspring, arising from some incomprehensible
necessity for the continuance of the species, and accompanied by a
recognition of their subjective character, produces actions, having
regard to their effects upon the subjectivity of the offspring, of a
regulative, coercive, or deterrent character. Moreover, by some not
understood law, the sympathies which undoubtedly exist between
organisms, have led to the recognition of the pains of others as
egoistic pains, and of the pleasures of others as egoistic pleasures.
Thus altruism from the very first became _to a certain extent_ a form of
egoism, and the action of the Ego in its subjective environment was of a
regulative character amongst its offspring. An extension and
modification of this action ensued upon a social environment composed of
more distant, or only tribal relationships. Nevertheless psychological
evolution made the sympathies gradually include tribal and national, and
eventually humanitarian recognitions. The growth of Ethics, and the
growth of ethical feeling, are thus seen to be a natural growth, and not
merely the solution of an intellectual problem. The justification for
the ethical feeling is that it exists. The justification for any code of
morality is that is exists. But the amendment of the code of morality
derives its justification from changing conditions. The changefulness of
the latter does not detract from but attests the essential nature of the
former. It is the court of appeal for the retention of existing codes,
and for the judgment of imminent changes. We cannot, therefore turn
round and say--as we may be tempted to do when we find the relativity of
morals and its origin in external obligation--"Ethics is only an
intellectual puzzle, only a social contract, into which I may enter or
not as I please." If a man assumes a hostile attitude to society, he
wrongs his nature as a man; and if a philosopher or selfish man of the
world cuts off human sympathy for the purpose of living a merely
prudential life he becomes something less than a man, he misses the full
function and joy of life. Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged that
there are men who have so maimed their emotional nature as to lead
tolerably satisfactory lives within the narrow limits of selfish
desires. To them ethical obligation is external only, and the internal
obligation is a minimum. Such may be the case. There are men who do
actions in contradiction of the voice of society, and who do not repent.
Society has to deal with these men as best it can. The ethical problem
is only of interest to those who feel the obligation, or to the
philosopher who studies the human nature of which it is a
characteristic.
Viewed as a practical question, no philosophical theory will carry the
force of conviction to a bestial, brutal, sordid, selfish man. These
require the material punishments of the administrators of the law,
personal force, and social coercion. And even then there remain large
criminal classes in every community. The study of the ethical problem
is for those who recognise ethical obligation and seek guidance or to
guide. The internal ethical obligation is not to be reasoned into a man.
It must be grown into the child. This is to be done by love-enkindling
actions and demeanour, a just and considerate course of conduct, well
judged according to ethical principles. And herein lies the utility of
the study. Example and injunctions in daily exigencies form the
groundwork of such influence as can be exerted by education. A
discriminating judgment of contemporary actions and of past histories
tends to develop a proper discrimination of the qualities of actions.
But below and accompanying all this must be recognised--as Mr. Spencer
so fully recognises--the registration, as he terms it, of emotions and
mental capacities in the inherited constitutions of organisms. That
which is the lesson of one age has become the inborn faculty of a
succeeding one. There are natural tendencies inherited by individuals
from their ancestors, and the perpetual social improvement tends to the
gradual production of individuals more and more suitable to the social
state by the possession of sympathies for others, and the internal
feeling of moral obligation. Furthermore, these individuals are born and
reared under the influence of a social state ever more and more
permeated by the recognition of the good of society as rightly
overruling the destinies of the individual.
The ethical imperative then must be regarded as an internal growth in a
subjective individual brought about in psychological evolution in the
continuous advance both of the increase of the sympathetic
correspondences and of the intellectual correspondences with the
subjective environment, and in the hereditary transmission of the same,
and their perpetuation and modification by means of education and
training induced by the current social pressure, special and general;
which social pressure is itself undergoing constant but gradual change
in its incidence and tendency. The ethical imperative therefore is
partly internal in so far as each individual is actuated by societarian
sympathies and emotional regards for humanitarian ideals, or in so far
as he possesses numerous special and personal kindly relations with his
environment. But in-so-far as a man is destitute of these sympathetic
possessions, so far is he free from the obligations of the internal
ethical imperative, and so much does he approach to the lower
evolutionary states of the inanimate object, or of the beast of the
forest, the insensate fish which stares into vacuity in the tanks of an
aquarium, or a self-feeding engine which is only a little less developed
form of a moving equilibrium. For such as these there only remains the
external prudential obligation of conformity to social pressure in its
several forms of law, custom, or public opinion, or the variously
expressed displeasure or commendations of neighbours whereto it would be
wise to conform. This to them is the only ethical imperative.
To neither class does any reasoned-out theory of absolute morality yield
any force of obligation or insight into the details of duty. And here it
will be convenient to enquire whether Mr. Spencer himself attaches to
absolute morality, any power as an ethical imperative. Absolute morality
in Mr. Spencer's treatment is merely a conception of ideal conduct in an
ideal state of society. We must conceive a state of society in the
highest degree complex, composed of individuals following all the
various occupations necessitated by the sub-division of labour from the
lowest to the highest, in which each individual may yet perform his or
her functions in such a manner as to insure the highest degree of
personal happiness, and at the same time promote the highest happiness
of the society as a whole.
Such an ideal state would comprise individuals of all ages, from infancy
to extreme old age, and could not possibly exclude invalids and the
maimed, for we cannot suppose that moving equilibria will be able to
develop internal forces so as to preserve them intact from the effects
of storms, explosions, and other natural occurrences, and as it is part
of the moving equilibrium theory to suppose that organisms are only
temporary equilibrations on the way towards a final equilibration in a
state of rest, it is necessary to suppose that they will always be
subject to disease and death. It is therefore probable that the society
would comprise many sufferers from organic diseases, and it is difficult
to imagine any state of society which would be entirely free from mental
disorders in various degrees of defect, or excess, or aberration.
Nevertheless we are asked to conceive a state of perfect balance amongst
a society composed of heterogeneous individuals in various stages of
equilibration, and we are told that a proper and complete conception of
this character would furnish us with a code of absolute morality. But it
is quite clear that Mr. Spencer's utopian hypothesis is the outcome of
hope springing from large human sympathies rather than a realisable
future, affording an ethical imperative.
Thus it is supposed that actual standards of morality are extremely
imperfect, and form but faint foreshadowings of a future ideal, or in
any case, that there is an absolute morality which rules throughout all
ages, and is the authority for the approximations of each age. But if
we sufficiently realise the fundamental notion of Biology as that of the
most complete adjustment of the organism to its environment, including
incidentally the adjustment of the environment to the organism we must
acknowledge that the most perfect morality is the best adjustment of the
individual to his environment in the society to which he belongs. Thus
the most perfect morality is the best relative adjustment, and not the
nearest conformity to an ideal standard suited to a perfect state of
society. The biological rule is more fundamental than any other, the
societarian view following; and its ideal of morality is perfection of
actual adjustment amongst the individuals of existing societies so as to
insure the greatest happiness of each and all. Thus as there are higher
lives and lower lives, there are higher moralities and lower moralities,
but they are justified by their quantitative relative perfection, and
not according to their approach to absolute morality, and they do not
derive their ethical obligation from the latter source.
It is due to the growth of psychological views that man is troubled with
the burthen of so many ideals. Far be it from us to detract from noble
aims, but it is necessary to note the origin and nature of moral ideals
and to assign them their proper place. They arise from the growing
sympathies of the race, and its ever-widening intelligence; more
especially do they arise in the minds of thinkers and students of
humanity in regard to the continuous aggregations of tribes and nations
of men in entering on the practical problem, how they shall live
together without unduly trespassing upon one another's rights of life
and enjoyment. These necessarily had to form for themselves practical
ideals, but ideals of some sort--ideals of greater or less degree of
imperativeness in proportion as they affected the essentials of a
pleasurable existence, or as they affected interactions of lesser
consequence. The growth of individual sympathies continually afforded
wider scope in the judgment of personal actions, and the spread of
intelligence insured the acceptance of more general laws of regulative
requirements on the part of the society. The authoritativeness of some
of the laws so recognised seemed eventually to be in the nature of
things, and to be independent and absolute in its imperativeness. Those
laws which were seen to be essential to the very existence of society
were regarded as eternal and true independently of society. But this is
at once seen to be a false notion, and only a peculiar manner of
representing the most essential laws of relative morality. No men, no
morals! Immorality is a sin, not against eternal principles of right,
but against the practical working principles co-eval with human society.
To set up a perfect morality, an ideal code, which may possibly exist in
an ideal state of society, but which is scarcely likely ever to be
realised as a rule of present conduct, is to set up not only an
impracticable, but a false standard, since the only true standard is the
relative sociological one founded upon the historical principle of
adjustment.
Perhaps, however, even from this principle we work round to the same
point, for in working out the problem how to secure to each his fair
share of happy life, we are obliged to set down certain fundamental laws
protecting the individual from injury in the full exercise of his
faculties, and we are obliged to impose upon society as a whole, and
upon each individual, certain positive duties of assistance towards
individuals, being members of the community. Nevertheless, the ideal set
before each generation is that of which it is actually capable, and not
a fanciful one which is beyond its powers. And we imagine that some harm
is done by the sweeping condemnation of religious and moral idealists in
inculcating the sense of sin, and imperfection, and incapability of
attainment, which the preaching of such high absolute standards
necessitates.
No doubt the inculcation of high ideals kindles youthful enthusiasm, and
sustains manly effort. But sometimes the non-attainment of impossible
ideals detracts from the effort towards attainable relative perfections,
and causes us to under-value and to neglect the good qualities actually
extant in ourselves, and in our fellow-creatures. The "unco guid" may
repress as much as they may develop, for the idealists have made more
sin, and therefore sinners, than is justified by the adaptations of
society.
Nevertheless, the psychological conception of an ideal man in an ideal
state is a most fascinating one, alike to the philanthropist whose heart
broadens out to all humanity, and to the philosopher who aims at
absolute perfection of moral or political theory. There are men and
women of noble and sweet sympathies who aim at making each his little
ideal world around him, and so leaven the general mass and aid the
movement towards the great ideal. Poets have sung, and will sing through
all ages, of that golden age, and philosophers, consciously or
unconsciously, have it for their ruling motive in all their writings.
Statesmen in lesser circles of practical scope only work towards it, and
the whole heart of humanity teems with hope for a time when troubles
shall cease, and a bearable, if not a happy lot, shall be the meed of
all.
The ethical imperative we therefore find to possess a two-fold origin.
It has external authority in the imposition of coercive rules of
conduct, carrying with them social penalties or rewards, varying in
degree according to the essential or trivial manner in which actions
affect the lives of other individuals, and again an external one in the
sympathetic action of surrounding subjective organisms upon subjective
organisms in eliciting and enkindling sympathetic response. It has also
an internal authority in the sympathies which, by a law of nature, grow
up in the ego towards surrounding egos in the manifestation of its
several subjective characteristics.
Thus the ethical imperative is a growth within a man. It is also an
education imposed upon him, and it is again an external social pressure
accompanied by rewards and punishments. The internal ethical imperative
does not exist to all men, and to them must be applied the social
pressure in more or less manifest forms of scorn, denunciation, and even
scant diet, and the cold frowning walls of jails, and unrewarding
labour. Towards this end the legislator works, also in the removal of
hindrances to life, and the promotion of education. The philanthropist
gently encourages the feeble efflorescences of humanitarian sympathies.
Sunday schools and pulpits more or less earnestly impress the moral
obligations. Parents call forth the love and sympathy of children, and
amongst brothers and sisters and companions the child first learns the
lesson of mutual duty and mutual help. Occasionally in the world's
history arises a prophet in whom has become concentrated in a ten-fold
degree the humanitarian sentiment, and he speaks in a voice which
reverberates down the outspreading avenues of time, calling forth an
answering note from the attuned heart chords of the nations.