Chapter II. is on Justice; defined as the disposition that leads a man, where his own interests or passions are concerned, to act according to the judgment he would form of another man's duty in his situation. He introduces a criticism on Adam Smith, and re-asserts the doctrine of an innate faculty, explained as the power of forming moral ideas, and not as the innate possession of ideas. For the most part, his exposition is didactic and desultory, with occasional discussions of a critical and scientific nature; as, for example, some remarks on Hume's theory that Justice is an artificial virtue, an account of the basis of Jurisprudence, and a few observations on the Right of Property.

In Chapter III., on Veracity, he contends that considerations of utility do not account for the whole force of our approbation of this virtue. [So might any one say that considerations of what money can purchase do not account for the whole strength of avarice].

In Chapter IV. he deals with Duties to ourselves, and occupies the chapter with a dissertation on Happiness. He first gives an account of the theories of the Stoics and the Epicureans, which connect themselves most closely with the problem of Happiness; and next advances some observations of his own on the subject.

His first remark is on the influence of the Temper, by which he means the Resentful or Irascible passion, on Happiness. As against a censorious disposition, he sets up the pleasure of the benevolent sentiments; he enjoins candour with respect to the motives of others, and a devoted attachment to truth and virtue for their intrinsic excellence; and warns us, that the causes that alienate our affections from our fellow-creatures, suggest gloomy and Hamlet-like conceptions of the order of the universe.

He next adverts to the influence of the Imagination on Happiness. On this, he has in view the addition made to our enjoyments or our sufferings by the respective predominance of hope or of fear in the mind. Allowing for constitutional bias, he recognizes, as the two great sources of a desponding imagination, Superstition and Scepticism, whose evils he descants upon at length. He also dwells on the influence of casual associations on happiness, and commends this subject to the care of educators; giving, as an example, the tendency of associations with Greece and Rome to add to the courage of the classically educated soldier.

His third position is the Influence of our Opinions on Happiness. He here quotes, from Ferguson, examples of opinions unfavourable to Happiness; such as these: 'that happiness consists in having nothing to do,' 'that anything is preferable to happiness,' 'that anything can amuse us better than our duties.' He also puts forward as a happy opinion the Stoical view, 'I am in the station that God has assigned me.' [It must be confessed, however, that these prescriptions savour of the Platonic device of inculcating opinions, not because of their truth, but because of their supposed good consequences otherwise: a proceeding scarcely compatible with an Ethical system that proclaims veracity as superior to utility. On such a system, we are prohibited from looking to anything in an opinion but its truth; we are to suffer for truth, and not to cultivate opinions because of their happy results.]

Stewart remarks finally on the influence of the Habits, on which he notices the power of the mind to accommodate itself to circumstances, and copies Paley's observations on the setting of the habits.

In continuation of the subject of Happiness, he presents a classification of our most important pleasures. We give the heads, there being little to detain us in the author's brief illustration of them. I.—The pleasures of Activity and Repose; II.—The pleasures of Sense; III.—The pleasures of the Imagination; IV.—The pleasures of the Understanding; and V.—The pleasures of the Heart, or of the various benevolent affections. He would have added Taste, or Fine Art, but this is confined to a select few.

In a concluding chapter (V.), he sums up the general result of the Ethical enquiry, under the title, 'the Nature and Essence of Virtue.' No observation of any novelty occurs in this chapter. Virtue is doing our duty; the intentions of the agent are to be looked to; the enlightened discharge of our duty often demands an exercise of the Reason to adjudge between conflicting claims; there is a close relationship, not defined, between Ethics and Politics.

The views of Stewart represent, in the chief points, although not in all, the Ethical theory that has found the greatest number of supporters.

I.—The Standard is internal, or intuitive—the judgments of a Faculty, called the Moral Faculty. He does not approve of the phrase 'Moral Sense,' thinking the analogy of the senses incorrect.

II.—As regards Ethical Psychology, the first question is determined by the remarks on the Standard.

On the second question, Free-will, Stewart maintains Liberty.

On the third question, he gives, like many others, an uncertain sound. In his account of Pity, he recognizes three things, (1) a painful feeling, (2) a selfish desire to remove the cause of the uneasiness, (3) a disposition grounded on benevolent concern about the sufferer. This is at best vague. Equally so is what he states respecting the pleasures of sympathy and benevolence (Book II., Chapter VII.). There is, he says, a pleasure attached to fellow-feeling, a disposition to accommodate our minds to others, wherever there is a benevolent affection; and, in all probability, the pleasure of sympathy is the pleasure of loving and of being beloved. No definite proposition can be gathered from such loose allegations.

III.—We have already abstracted his chapter on Happiness.

IV.—On the Moral Code, he has nothing peculiar.

V.—On the connexion with Religion, we have seen that he is strenuous in his antagonism to the doctrine of the dependence of morality on the will of God. But, like other moralists of the same class, he is careful to add:—'Although religion can with no propriety be considered as the sole foundation of morality, yet when we are convinced that God is infinitely good, and that he is the friend and protector of virtue, this belief affords the most powerful inducements to the practice of every branch of our duty.' He has (Book III.) elaborately discussed the principles of Natural Religion, but, like Adam Smith, makes no reference to the Bible, or to Christianity. He is disposed to assume the benevolence of the Deity, but considers that to affirm it positively is to go beyond our depth.

THOMAS BROWN. [1778-1820.]

Brown's Ethical discussion commences in the 73rd of his Lectures. He first criticises the multiplicity of expressions used in the statement of the fundamental question of morals—'What is it that constitutes the action virtuous?' 'What constitutes the moral obligation to perform certain actions?' 'What constitutes the merit of the agent?'—These have been considered questions essentially distinct, whereas they are the very same question. There is at bottom but one emotion in the case, the emotion of approbation, or of disapprobation, of an agent acting in a certain way.

In answer then to the question as thus simplified, 'What is the ground of moral approbation and disapprobation?' Brown answers—a simple emotion of the mind, of which no farther explanation can be given than that we are so constituted. Thus, without using the same term, he sides with the doctrine of the Innate Moral Sense. He illustrates it by another elementary fact of the mind, involved in the conception of cause and effect on his theory of that relation—the belief that the future will resemble the past. Excepting a teleogical reference to the Supreme Benevolence of the Deity, he admits no farther search into the nature of the moral sentiment.

He adduces, as another illustration, what he deems the kindred emotion of Beauty. Our feeling of beauty is not the mere perception of forms and colours, or the discovery of the uses of certain combinations of forms; it is an emotion arising from these, indeed, bat distinct from them. Our feeling of moral excellence, in like manner, is not the mere perception of different actions, or the discovery of the physical good that these may produce; it is an emotion sui generis, superadded to them.

He adverts, in a strain of eloquent indignation, to the objection grounded on differences of men's moral judgment. There are philosophers, he exclaims, 'that can turn away from the conspiring chorus of the millions of mankind, in favour of the great truths of morals, to seek in some savage island, a few indistinct murmurs that may seem to be discordant with the total harmony of mankind.' He goes on to remark, however, that in our zeal for the immutability of moral distinctions, we may weaken the case by contending for too much; and proposes to consider the species of accordance that may be safely argued for.

He begins by purging away the realistic notion of Virtue, considered as a self-existing entity. He defines it—a term expressing the relation of certain actions to certain emotions in the minds contemplating them; its universality is merely co-extensive with these minds. He then concedes that all mankind do not, at every moment, feel precisely the same emotions in contemplating the same actions, and sets forth the limitations as follows;—

First, In moments of violent passion, the mind is incapacitated for perceiving moral differences; we must, in such cases appeal, as it were, from Philip drunk to Philip sober.

Secondly, Still more important is the limitation arising from the complexity of many actions. Where good and evil results are so blended that we cannot easily assign the preponderance, different men may form different conclusions. Partiality of views may arise from this cause, not merely in individuals, but in whole nations. The legal permission of theft in Sparta is a case in point. Theft, as theft, and without relation to the political object of inuring a warlike people, would have been condemned in Sparta, as well as with us. [The retort of Locke is not out of place here; an innate moral sentiment that permits a fundamental virtue to be set aside on the ground of mere state convenience, is of very little value.] He then goes on to ask whether men, in approving these exceptions to morality, approve them because they are immoral? [The opponents of a moral sense do not contend for an immoral sense.] Suicide is not commended because it deprives society of useful members, and gives sorrow to relations and friends; the exposure of infants is not justified on the plea of adding to human suffering.

Again, the differences of cookery among nations are much wider than the differences of moral sentiment; and yet no one denies a fundamental susceptibility to sweet and bitter. It is not contended that we come into the world with a knowledge of actions, but that we have certain susceptibilities of emotion, in consequence of which, it is impossible for us, in after life, unless from counteracting circumstances, to be pleased with the contemplation of certain actions, and disgusted with certain other actions. When the doctrine is thus stated, Paley's objection, that we should also receive from nature the notions of the actions themselves, falls to the ground. As well might we require an instinctive notion of all possible numbers, to bear out our instinctive sense of proportion.

A third limitation must be added, the influence of the principle of Association. One way that this operates is to transfer, to a whole class of actions, the feelings peculiar to certain marked individuals. Thus, in a civilized country, where property is largely possessed, and under complicated tenures, we become very sensitive to its violation, and acquire a proportionably intense sentiment of Justice. Again, association operates in modifying our approval and disapproval of actions according to their attendant circumstances; as when we extenuate misconduct in a beloved person.

The author contends that, notwithstanding these limitations, we still leave unimpaired the approbation of unmixed good as good, and the disapprobation of unmixed evil as evil. His further remarks, however, are mainly eloquent declamation on the universality of moral distinctions.

He proceeds to criticise the moral systems from Hobbes downwards. His remarks (Lecture 76) on the province of Reason in Morality, with reference to the systems of Clarke and Wollaston, contain the gist of the matter well expressed.

He next considers the theory of Utility. That Utility bears a certain relation to Virtue is unquestionable. Benevolence means good to others, and virtue is of course made up, in great part, of this. But then, if Utility is held to be the measure of virtue, standing in exact proportion to it, the proposition is very far from true; it is only a small portion of virtuous actions wherein the measure holds.

He does not doubt that virtuous actions do all tend, in a greater or less degree, to the advantage of the world. But he considers the question to be, whether what we have alone in view, in approving certain actions, be the amount of utility that they bring; whether we have no other reason for commending a man than for praising a chest of drawers.

Consider this question first from the point of view of the agent. Does the mother, in watching her sick infant, think of the good of mankind at that moment? Is the pity called forth by misery a sentiment of the general good? Look at it again from the point of view of the spectator. Is his admiration of a steam-engine, and of an heroic human action, the same sentiment? Why do we not worship the earth, the source of all our utilities? The ancient worshippers of nature always gave it a soul in the first instance.

When the supporter of Utility arbitrarily confines his principles to the actions of living beings, he concedes the point in dispute; he admits an approvableness peculiar to living and voluntary agents, a capacity of exciting moral emotions not commensurate with any utility. Hume says, that the sentiments of utility connected with human beings are mixed with affection, esteem, and approbation, which do not attach to the utility of inanimate things. Brown replies, that these are the very sentiments to be accounted for, the moral part of the case.

But another contrast may be made; namely, between the utility of virtue and the utility of talent or genius, which we view with very different and unequal sentiments; the inventors of the printing press do not rouse the same emotions as the charities of the Man of Ross.

Still, he contends, like the other supporters of innate moral distinctions, for a pre-established harmony between the two attributes. Utility and virtue are so intimately related, that there is perhaps no action generally felt by us as virtuous, but what is generally beneficial. But this is only discovered by reflecting men; it never enters the mind of the unthinking multitude. Nay, more, it is only the Divine Being that can fully master this relationship, or so prescribe our duties that they shall ultimately coincide with the general happiness.

He allows that the immediate object of the legislator is the general good; but then his relationship is to the community as a whole, and not to any particular individual.

He admits, farther, that the good of the world at large, if not the only moral object, is a moral object, in common with the good of parents, friends, and others related to us in private life. Farther, it may be requisite for the moralist to correct our moral sentiments by requiring greater attention to public, and less to private, good; but this does not alter the nature of our moral feelings; it merely presents new objects to our moral discrimination. It gives an exercise to our reason in disentangling the complicated results of our actions.

He makes it also an objection to Utility, that it does not explain why we feel approbation of the useful, and disapprobation of the hurtful; forgetting that Benevolence is an admitted fact of our constitution, and may fairly be assigned by the moralist as the source of the moral sentiment.

His next remarks are on the Selfish Systems, his reply to which is the assertion of disinterested Affections. He distinguishes two modes of assigning self-interest as the sole motive of virtuous conduct. First, it may be said that in every so-called virtuous action, we see some good to self, near or remote. Secondly, it may be maintained that we become at last disinterested by the associations of our own interest.

He calls in question this alleged process of association. Because a man's own cane is interesting to him, it does not follow that every other man's cane is interesting. [He here commits a mistake of fact; other men's walking canes are interesting to the interested owner of a cane. It may not follow that this interest is enough to determine self-sacrifice.]

It will be inferred that Brown contends warmly for the existence of Disinterested Affection, not merely as a present, but as a primitive, fact of our constitution. He does not always keep this distinct from the Moral Sentiment; he, in fact, mixes the two sentiments together in his language, a thing almost inevitable, but yet inconsistent with the advocacy of a distinct moral sentiment.

He includes among the Selfish Systems the Ethical Theory of Paley, which he reprobates in both its leading points—everlasting happiness as the motive, and the will of God as the rule. On the one point, this theory is liable to all the objections against a purely selfish system; and, on the other point, he makes the usual replies to the founding of morality on the absolute will of the Deity.

Brown next criticises the system of Adam Smith. Admitting that we have the sympathetic feeling that Smith proceeds upon, he questions its adequacy to constitute the moral sentiment, on the ground that it is not a perpetual accompaniment of our actions. There must be a certain vividness of feeling or of the display of feeling, or at least a sufficient cause of vivid feeling, to call the sympathy into action. In the numerous petty actions of life, there is an absence of any marked sympathy.

But the essential error of Smith's system is, that it assumes the very moral feelings that it is meant to explain. If there were no antecedent moral feelings, sympathy could not afford them; it is only a mirror to reflect what is already in existence. The feelings that we sympathize with, are themselves moral feelings already; if it were not so, the reflexion of them from a thousand breasts would not give them a moral nature.

Brown thinks that Adam Smith was to some extent misled by an ambiguity in the word sympathy; a word applied not merely to the participation of other men's feelings, but to the further and distinct fact of the approbation of those feeling's.

Although siding in the main with Shaftesbury and Hutcheson, Brown objects to their designation Moral Sense, as expressing the innate power of moral approbation. If 'Sense' be interpreted merely as susceptibility, he has nothing to say, but if it mean a primary medium of perception, like the eye or the ear, he considers it a mistake. It is, in his view, an emotion, like hope, jealousy, or resentment, rising up on the presentation of a certain class of objects. He farther objects to the phrase 'moral ideas,' also used by Hutcheson. The moral emotions are more akin to love and hate, than to perception or judgment.

Brown gives an exposition of Practical Ethics under the usual heads: Duties to Others, to God, to Ourselves. Duties to others he classifies thus:—I.—Negative, or abstinence from injuring others in Person, Property, Affections, Character or Reputation, Knowledge (veracity), Virtue, and Tranquillity; II. Positive, or Benevolence; and III.—Duties growing out of our peculiar ties—Affinity, Friendship, Good offices received, Contract, and Citizenship.

To sum up

I.—As regards the Standard, Brown contends for an Innate Sentiment.

II.—The Faculty being thus determined, along with the Standard, we have only to resume his views as to Disinterested action. For a full account of these, we have to go beyond the strictly Ethical lectures, to his analysis of the Emotions. Speaking of love, he says that it includes a desire of doing good to the person loved; that it is necessarily pleasurable because there must be some quality in the object that gives pleasure; but it is not the mere pleasure of loving that makes us love. The qualities are delightful to love, and yet impossible not to love. He is more explicit when he comes to the consideration of Pity, recognizing the existence of sympathy, not only without liking for the object, but with positive dislike. In another place, he remarks that we desire the happiness of our fellows simply as human beings. He is opposed to the theory that would trace our disinterested affections to a selfish origin. He makes some attempt to refer to the laws of Association, the taking in of other men's emotions, but thinks that there is a reflex process besides.

Although recognizing in a vague way the existence of genuine disinterested impulses, he dilates eloquently, and often, on the deliciousness of benevolence, and of all virtuous feelings and conduct.

WILLIAM PALEY. [1743-1805].

The First Book of Paley's 'Moral and Political Philosophy' is entitled 'PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS' it is in fact an unmethodical account of various fundamental points of the subject. He begins by defining Moral Philosophy as 'that science which teaches men their duty, and the reasons of it. The ordinary rules are defective and may mislead, unless aided by a scientific investigation. These ordinary rules are the Law of Honour, the Law of the Land, and the Scriptures.

He commences with the Law of Honour, which he views in its narrow sense, as applied to people of rank and fashion. This is of course a very limited code.

The Law of the Land also must omit many duties, properly compulsory, as piety, benevolence, &c. It must also leave unpunished many vices, as luxury, prodigality, partiality. It must confine itself to offences strictly definable.

The Scriptures lay down general rules, which have to be applied by the exercise of reason and judgment. Moreover, they pre-suppose the principles of natural justice, and supply new sanctions and greater certainty. Accordingly, they do not dispense with a scientific view of morals.

[The correct arrangement of the common rules would have been (1) the Law of the Land, (2) the Laws of Society generally, and (3) the Scriptures. The Law of Honour is merely one application of the comprehensive agency of society in punishing men, by excommunication, for what it prohibits.]

Then follows his famous chapter on the MORAL SENSE.

It is by way of giving an effective statement of the point in dispute that he quotes the anecdote of Caius Toranius, as an extreme instance of filial ingratitude, and supposes it to be put to the wild boy caught in the woods of Hanover, with the view of ascertaining whether he would feel the sentiment of disapprobation as we do. Those that affirm an innate moral sense, must answer in the affirmative; those that deny it, in the negative.

He then recites the arguments on both sides.

For the moral sense, it is contended, that we approve examples of generosity, gratitude, fidelity, &c., on the instant, without deliberation and without being conscious of any assignable reason; and that this approbation is uniform and universal, the same sorts of conduct being approved or disapproved in all ages and countries; which circumstances point to the operation of an instinct, or a moral sense.

The answers to these allegations are—

First, The Uniformity spoken of is not admitted as a fact. According to the authentic accounts of historians and travellers, there is scarcely a single vice that, in some age or country of the world, has not been countenanced by public opinion. The murder of aged parents, theft, suicide, promiscuous intercourse of the sexes, and unmentionable crimes have been tolerated and approved. Among ourselves, Duelling is viewed with the most opposite sentiments; forgiveness of injuries is accounted by some people magnanimity, and by others meanness. In these, and in many other instances, moral approbation follows the fashions and institutions of the country, which institutions have themselves grown out of local circumstances, the arbitrary authority of some chieftain, or the caprice of the multitude.

Secondly, That, although, after allowing for these exceptions, it is admitted that some sorts of actions are more approved than others, the approbation being general, although not universal, yet this may be accounted for, without supposing a moral sense, thus:—

Having experienced a particular line of conduct as beneficial to ourselves, for example, telling the truth, a sentiment of approbation grows up in consequence, and this sentiment thereupon arises whenever the action is mentioned, and without our thinking of the consequences in each instance. The process is illustrated by the love of money, which is strongest in the old, who least of all think of applying it to its uses. By such means, the approval of certain actions is commenced; and being once commenced, the continuance of the feeling is accounted for by authority, by imitation, and by all the usages of good society. As soon as an entire society is possessed of an ethical view, the initiation of the new members is sure and irresistible. The efficacy of Imitation is shown in cases where there is no authority or express training employed, as in the likings and dislikings, or tastes and antipathies, in mere matters of indifference.

So much in reply to the alleged uniformity. Next come the positive objections to a Moral Instinct.

In the first place, moral rules are not absolutely and universally true; they bend to circumstances. Veracity, which is a natural duty, if there be any such, is dispensed with in case of an enemy, a thief, or a madman. The obligation of promises is released under certain circumstances.

In the next place, the Instinct must bear with it the idea of the actions to be approved or disapproved; but we are not born with any such ideas.

On the whole, either there exist no moral instincts, or they are undistinguishable from prejudices and habits, and are not to be trusted in moral reasonings. Aristotle held it as self-evident that barbarians are meant to be slaves; so do our modern slave-traders. This instance is one of many to show that the convenience of the parties has much to do with the rise of a moral sentiment. And every system built upon instincts is more likely to find excuses for existing opinions and practices than to reform either.

Again: supposing these Instincts to exist, what is their authority or power to punish? Is it the infliction of remorse? That may be borne with for the pleasures and profits of wickedness. If they are to be held as indications of the will of God, and therefore as presages of his intentions, that result may be arrived at by a surer road.

The next preliminary topic is HUMAN HAPPINESS.

Happiness is defined as the excess of pleasure over pain. Pleasures are to be held as differing only in continuance, and in intensity. A computation made in respect of these two properties, confirmed by the degrees of cheerfulness, tranquillity, and contentment observable among men, is to decide all questions as to human happiness.

I.—What Human Happiness does not consist in.

Not in the pleasures of Sense, in whatever profusion or variety enjoyed; in which are included sensual pleasures, active sports, and Fine Art.

1st, Because they last for a short time. [Surely they are good for the time they do last.] 2ndly, By repetition, they lose their relish. [Intermission and variety, however, are to be supposed.] 3rdly, The eagerness for high and intense delights takes away the relish from all others.

Paley professes to have observed in the votaries of pleasure a restless craving for variety, languor under enjoyment, and misery in the want of it. After all, however, these pleasures have their value, and may be too much despised as well as too much followed.

Next, happiness does not consist in the exemption from pain (?), from labour, care, business, and outward evils; such exemption leaving one a prey to morbid depression, anxiety, and hypochondria. Even a pain in moderation may be a refreshment, from giving a stimulus to pursuit.

Nor does it consist in greatness, rank, or station. The reason here is derived, as usual, from the doctrine of Relativity or Comparison, pushed beyond all just limits. The illustration of the dependence of the pleasure of superiority on comparison is in Paley's happiest style.

II.—What happiness does consist in. Allowing for the great difficulties of this vital determination, he proposes to be governed by a reference to the conditions of life where men appear most cheerful and contented.

It consists, 1st, In the exercise of the social affections. 2ndly, The exercise of our faculties, either of body or of mind, in the pursuit of some engaging end. [This includes the two items of occupation and plot-interest.] 3rdly, Upon the prudent constitution of the habits; the prudent constitution being chiefly in moderation and simplicity of life, or in demanding few stimulants; and 4thly, In Health, whose importance he values highly, but not too highly.

The consideration of these negative and positive conditions, he thinks, justifies the two conclusions: (1) That happiness is pretty equally distributed amongst the different orders of society; and (2) That in respect of this world's happiness, vice has no advantage over virtue.

The last subject of the First Book is VIRTUE. The definition of virtue is 'the doing good to mankind, in obedience to the will of God, and for the sake of everlasting happiness.'

If this were strictly interpreted according to its form, it would mean that three things go to constitute virtue, any one of which being absent, we should not have virtue. Doing good to mankind alone is not virtue, unless coupled with a divine requirement; and this addition would not suffice, without the farther circumstance of everlasting happiness as the reward. But such is not his meaning, nor is it easy to fix the meaning. He unites the two conditions—Human Happiness and the Will of the Deity—and holds them to coincide and to explain one another. Either of the two would be a sufficient definition of virtue; and he would add, as an explanatory proposition and a guide to practice, that the one may be taken as a clue to the other. In a double criterion like this, everything depends upon the manner of working it. By running from one of the tests to another at discretion, we may evade whatever is disagreeable to us in both.

Book II., entitled MORAL OBLIGATION, is the full development of his views. Reciting various theories of moral right and wrong, he remarks, first, that they all ultimately coincide; in other words, all the theorists agree upon the same rules of duty—a remark to be received with allowances; and next, that they all leave the matter short; none provide an adequate motive or inducement. [He omits to mention the theory of the Divine Will, which is partly his own theory].

In proceeding to supply this want, he asks first 'what is meant by being obliged to do a thing;' and answers, 'a violent motive resulting from the command of another.' The motive must be violent, or have some degree of force to overcome reluctance or opposing tendencies. It must also result from the command of another; not the mere offer of a gratuity by way of inducement. Such is the nature of Law; we should not obey the magistrate, unless rewards or punishments depended on our obedience; so neither should we, without the same reason, do what is right, or obey God.

He then resumes the general question, under a concrete case, 'Why am I obliged to keep my word?' The answer accords with the above explanation;—Because I am urged to do so by a violent motive (namely, the rewards and punishments of a future life), resulting from the command of God. Private happiness is the motive, the will of God the rule. [Although not brought out in the present connexion, it is implied that the will of God intends the happiness of mankind, and is to be interpreted accordingly.]

Previously, when reasoning on the means of human happiness, he declared it to be an established conclusion, that virtue leads to happiness, even in this life; now he bases his own theory on the uncertainty of that conclusion. His words are, 'They who would establish a system of morality, independent of a future state, must look out for some other idea of moral obligation, unless they can show that virtue conducts the possessor to certain happiness in this life, or to a much greater share of it than he could attain by a different behaviour.' He does not make the obvious remark that human authority, as far as it goes, is also a source of obligation; it works by the very same class of means as the divine authority.

He next proceeds to enquire into the means of determining the WILL OF GOD. There are two sources—the express declarations of Scripture, when they are to be had; and the design impressed on the world, in other words, the light of nature. This last source requires him, on his system, to establish the Divine Benevolence; and he arrives at the conclusion that God wills and wishes the happiness of his creatures, and accordingly, that the method of coming at his will concerning any action is to enquire into the tendency of that action to promote or to diminish the general happiness.

He then discusses UTILITY, with a view of answering the objection that actions may be useful, and yet such as no man will allow to be right. This leads him to distinguish between the particular and the general consequences of actions, and to enforce the necessity of GENERAL RULES. An assassin, by knocking a rich villain on the head, may do immediate and particular good; but the liberty granted to individuals to kill whoever they should deem injurious to society, would render human life unsafe, and induce universal terror. 'Whatever is expedient is right,' but then it must be expedient on the whole, in the long run, in all its effects collateral and remote, as well as immediate and direct. When the honestum is opposed to the utile, the honestum means the general and remote consequences, the utile the particular and the near.

The concluding sections of Book II. are occupied with the consideration of RIGHT and RIGHTS. A Right is of course correlative with an Obligation. Rights are Natural or Adventitious; Alienable or Inalienable; Perfect or Imperfect. The only one of these distinctions having any Ethical application is Perfect and Imperfect. The Perfect Rights are, the Imperfect are not, enforced by Law.

Under the 'general Rights of mankind,' he has a discussion as to our right to the flesh of animals, and contends that it would be difficult to defend this right by any arguments drawn from the light of nature, and that it reposes on the text of Genesis ix. 1, 2, 3.

As regards the chief bulk of Paley's-work, it is necessary only to indicate his scheme of the Duties, and his manner of treating them.

Book III. considers RELATIVE DUTIES. There are three classes of these. First, Relative Duties that are Determinate, meaning all those that are strictly defined and enforced; those growing out of Promises, Contracts, Oaths, and Subscriptions to Articles of Religion. Secondly, Relative Duties that are Indeterminate, as Charity, in its various aspects of treatment of dependents, assistance to the needy, &c.; the checks on Anger and Revenge; Gratitude, &c. Thirdly, the Relative Duties growing out of the Sexes.

Book IV. is DUTIES TO OURSELVES, and treats of Self-defence, Drunkenness, and Suicide.

Book V. comprises DUTIES TOWARDS GOD.

Book VI. is occupied with Politics and Political Economy. It discusses the Origin of Civil Government, the Duty of Submission to Government, Liberty, the Forms of Government, the British Constitution, the Administration of Justice, &c.

The Ethical Theory of Paley may be briefly resumed thus:—

I.—The Ethical Standard with him is the conjoined reference to the Will of the Deity, and to Utility, or Human Happiness. He is unable to construct a scheme applicable to mankind generally, until they are first converted to a belief in Revelation.

II.—The Psychology implied in his system involves his most characteristic features.

1. He is unmistakeable in repudiating Innate Moral Distinctions, and on this point, and on this only, is he thoroughly at one with the Utilitarians of the present day.

2. On the Theory of Will he has no remarks. He has an utter distaste for anything metaphysical.

3. He does not discuss Disinterested Sentiment; by implication, he denies it. 'Without the expectation of a future existence,' he says, 'all reasoning upon moral questions is vain.' He cannot, of course, leave out all reference to generosity. Under 'Pecuniary Bounty' he makes this remark—'They who rank pity amongst the original impulses of our nature, rightly contend, that when this principle prompts us to the relief of human misery, it indicates the Divine intention and our duty. Whether it be an instinct or a habit (?), it is, in fact, a property of our nature, which God appointed, &c.' This is his first argument for charity; the second is derived from the original title of mankind, granted by the Deity, to hold the earth in common; and the third is the strong injunctions of Scripture on this head. He cannot, it seems, trust human nature with a single charitable act apart from the intervention of the Deity.

III.—He has an explicit scheme of Happiness.

IV.—The Substance of his Moral Code is distinguished from, the current opinions chiefly by his well-known views on Subscription to Articles. He cannot conceive how, looking to the incurable diversity of human opinion on all matters short of demonstration, the legislature could expect the perpetual consent of a body of ten thousand men, not to one controverted proposition, but to many hundreds.

His inducements to the performance of duty are, as we should expect, a mixed reference to Public Utility and to Scripture.

In the Indeterminate Duties, where men are urged by moral considerations, to the exclusion of legal compulsion, he sometimes appeals directly to our generous sympathies, as well as to self-interest, but usually ends with the Scripture authority.

V.—The relation of Ethics to Politics is not a prominent feature in Paley. He makes moral rules repose finally, not upon human, but upon Divine Law. Hence (VI.) the connexion of his system with Theology is fundamental.

JEREMY BENTHAM. [1748-1832.]

The Ethical System of Jeremy Bentham is given in his work, entitled 'An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation,' first published in 1789. In a posthumous work, entitled Deontology, his principles were farther illustrated, chiefly with reference to the minor morals and amiable virtues.

It is the first-named work that we shall here chiefly notice. In it, the author has principally in view Legislation; but the same common basis, Utility, serves, in his judgment, for Ethics, or Morals.

The first chapter, entitled 'THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY,' begins thus:—'Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do. On the one hand, the standard of right and wrong; on the other, the chain of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne. They govern us in all we do, in all we say, in all we think; every effort we can make to throw off our subjection will serve but to demonstrate and confirm it. In words a man may pretend to abjure their empire, but in reality he will remain subject to it all the while. The principle of utility recognizes this subjection, and assumes it for the foundation of that system, the object of which is to rear the fabric of felicity by the hand of reason and of law. Systems which attempt to question it, deal in sounds instead of sense, in caprice instead of reason, in darkness instead of light.'

He defines Utility in various phrases, all coming to the same thing:—the tendency of actions to promote the happiness, and to prevent the misery, of the party under consideration, which party is usually the community where one's lot is cast. Of this principle no proof can be offered; it is the final axiom, on which alone we can found all arguments of a moral kind. He that attempts to combat it, usually assumes it, unawares. An opponent is challenged, to say—(1) if he discards it wholly; (2) if he will act without any principle, or if there is any other that he would judge by; (3) if that other be really and distinctly separate from utility; (4) if he is inclined to set up his own approbation or disapprobation as the rule; and if so, whether he will force that upon others, or allow each person to do the same; (5) in the first case, if his principle is not despotical; (6) in the second case, whether it is not anarchical; (7) supposing him to add the plea of reflection, let him say if the basis of his reflections excludes utility; (8) if he means to compound the matter, and take utility for part; and if so, for what part; (9) why he goes so far, with Utility, and no farther; (10) on what other principle a meaning can be attached to the words 'motive and right.

In Chapter II., Bentham discusses the PRINCIPLES ADVERSE TO UTILITY. He conceives two opposing grounds. The first mode of opposition is direct and constant, as exemplified in Asceticism. A second mode may be only occasional, as in what he terms the principle of Sympathy and Antipathy (Liking and Disliking).

The principle of Asceticism means the approval of an action according to its tendency to diminish happiness, or obversely. Any one reprobating in any shape, pleasure as such, is a partisan of this principle. Asceticism has been adopted, on the one hand, by certain moralists, from the spur of philosophic pride; and on the other hand, by certain religionists, under the impulse of fear. It has been much less admitted into Legislation than into Morals. It may have originated, in the first instance, with hasty speculators, looking at the pains attending certain pleasures in the long run, and pushing the abstinence from such pleasures (justified to a certain length on prudential grounds) so far as to fall in love with pain.

The other principle, Sympathy and Antipathy, means the unreasoning approbation or disapprobation of the individual mind, where fancy, caprice, accidental liking or disliking, may mix with a regard to human happiness. This is properly the negation of a principle. What we expect to find in a principle is some external consideration, warranting and guiding our sentiments of approbation and disapprobation; a basis that all are agreed upon.

It is under this head that Bentham rapidly surveys and dismisses all the current theories of Right and Wrong. They consist all of them, he says, in so many contrivances for avoiding an appeal to any external standard, and for requiring us to accept the author's sentiment or opinion as a reason for itself. The dictates of this principle, however, will often unintentionally coincide with utility; for what more natural ground of hatred to a practice can there be than its mischievous tendency? The things that men suffer by, they will be disposed to hate. Still, it is not constant in its operation; for people may ascribe the suffering to the wrong cause. The principle is most liable to err on the side of severity; differences of taste and of opinion are sufficient grounds for quarrel and resentment. It will err on the side of lenity, when a mischief is remote and imperceptible.

The author reserves a distinct handling for the Theological principle; alleging that it falls under one or other of the three foregoing. The Will of God must mean his will as revealed in the sacred writings, which, as the labours of divines testify, themselves stand in need of interpretation. What is meant, in fact, is the presumptive will of God; that is, what is presumed to be his will on account of its conformity with another principle. We are pretty sure that what is right is conformable to his will, but then this requires us first to know what is right. The usual mode of knowing God's pleasure (he remarks) is to observe what is our own pleasure, and pronounce that to be his.

Chapter III.—ON FOUR SANCTIONS OR SOURCES OF PAIN AND PLEASURE whereby men are stimulated to act right; they are termed, physical, political, moral, and religious. These are the Sanctions of Right.

The physical sanction includes the pleasures and pains arising in the ordinary course of nature, unmodified by the will of any human being, or of any supernatural being.

The political sanction is what emanates from the sovereign or supreme ruling power of the state. The punishments of the Law come under this head.

The moral or popular sanction results from the action of the community, or of the individuals that each person comes in contact with, acting without any settled or concerted rule. It corresponds to public opinion, and extends in its operation beyond the sphere of the law.

The religious sanction proceeds from the immediate hand of a superior invisible being, either in the present, or in a future life.

The name Punishment is applicable only to the three last. The suffering that befalls a man in the course of nature is termed a calamity; if it happen through imprudence on his part, it may be styled a punishment issuing from the physical sanction.

Chapter IV. is the VALUE OF A LOT OF PLEASURE OR PAIN, HOW TO BE MEASURED. A pleasure or a pain is determined to be greater or less according to (1) its intensity, (2) its duration, (3) its certainty or uncertainty, (4) its propinquity or remoteness; all which are obvious distinctions. To these are to be added (5) its fecundity, or the chance it has of being followed by other sensations of its own kind; that is pleasures if it be pleasure, pains if it be pain. Finally (6) its purity, or the chance of its being unmixed with the opposite kind; a pure pleasure has no mixture of pain. All the six properties apply to the case of an individual person; where a plurality are concerned, a new item is present, (7) the extent, or the number of persons affected. These properties exhaust the meaning of the terms expressing good and evil; on the one side, happiness, convenience, advantage, benefit, emolument, profit, &c.; and, on the other, unhappiness, inconvenience, disadvantage, loss, mischief, and the like.

Next follows, in Chapter V., a classified enumeration of PLEASURES AND PAINS. In a system undertaking to base all Moral and Political action on the production of happiness, such a classification is obviously required. The author professes to have grounded it on an analysis of human nature, which analysis itself, however, as being too metaphysical, he withholds.

The simple pleasures are:—1. The pleasures of sense. 2. The pleasures of wealth. 3. The pleasures of skill. 4. The pleasures of amity. 5. The pleasures of a good name. 6. The pleasures of power. 7. The pleasures of piety. 8. The pleasures of benevolence. 9. The pleasures of malevolence. 10. The pleasures of memory. 11. The pleasures of imagination. 12. The pleasures of expectation. 13. The pleasures dependent on association. 14. The pleasures of relief.

The simple pains are:—1. The pains of privation. 2. The pains of the senses. 3. The pains of awkwardness. 4. The pains of enmity. 5. The pains of an ill name. 6. The pains of piety. 7. The pains of benevolence. 8. The pains of malevolence. 9. The pains of the memory. 10. The pains of the imagination. 11. The pains of expectation. 12. The pains dependent on association.

We need not quote his detailed subdivision and illustration of these. At the close, he marks the important difference between self-regarding and extra-regarding; the last being those of benevolence and of malevolence.

In a long chapter (VI.), he dwells on CIRCUMSTANCES INFLUENCING SENSIBILITY. They are such as the following:—1. Health. 2. Strength. 3. Hardiness. 4. Bodily imperfection. 5. Quantity and Quality of knowledge. 6. Strength of intellectual powers. 7. Firmness of mind. 8. Steadiness of mind. 9. Bent of inclination. 10. Moral sensibility. 11. Moral biases. 12. Religious Sensibility. 13. Religious biases. 14. Sympathetic Sensibility. 15. Sympathetic biases. 16. Antipathetic sensibility. 17. Antipathetic biases. 18. Insanity. 19. Habitual occupations. 20. Pecuniary circumstances. 21. Connexions in the way of sympathy. 22. Connexions in the way of antipathy. 23. Radical frame of body. 24. Radical frame of mind. 25. Sex. 26. Age. 27. Rank. 28. Education. 29. Climate. 30. Lineage. 31. Government. 32. Religious profession.

Chapter VII. proceeds to consider HUMAN ACTIONS IN GENERAL. Right and wrong, good and evil, merit and demerit belong to actions. These have to be divided and classified with a view to the ends of the moralist and the legislator. Throughout this, and two other long chapters, he discusses, as necessary in apportioning punishment, the act itself, the circumstances, the intention, and the consciousness—or the knowledge of the tendencies of the act. He introduces many subdivisions under each head, and makes a number of remarks of importance as regards penal legislation.

In Chapter X., he regards pleasures and pains in the aspect of MOTIVES. Since every pleasure and every pain, as a part of their nature, induce actions, they are often designated with reference to that circumstance. Hunger, thirst, lust, avarice, curiosity, ambition, &c., are names of this class. There is not a complete set of such designations; hence the use of the circumlocutions, appetite for, love of, desire of—sweet odours, sounds, sights, ease, reputation, &c.

Of great importance is the Order of pre-eminence among motives. Of all the varieties of motives, Good-will, or Benevolence, taken in a general view, is that whose dictates are surest to coincide with Utility. In this, however, it is taken for granted that the benevolence is not so confined in its sphere, as to be contradicted by a more extensive, or enlarged, benevolence.

After good-will, the motive that has the best chance of coinciding with Utility is Love of Reputation. The coincidence would be perfect, if men's likings and dislikings were governed exclusively by the principle of Utility, and not, as they often are, by the hostile principles of Asceticism, and of Sympathy and Antipathy. Love of reputation is inferior as a motive to Good-will, in not governing the secret actions. These last are affected, only as they have a chance of becoming public, or as men contract a habit of looking to public approbation in all they do.

The desire of Amity, or of close personal affections, is placed next in order, as a motive. According as we extend the number of persons whose amity we desire, this prompting approximates to the love of reputation.

After these three motives, Bentham places the Dictates of Religion, which, however, are so various in their suggestions, that he can hardly speak of them in common. Were the Being, who is the object of religion, universally supposed to be as benevolent as he is supposed to be wise and powerful, and were the notions of his benevolence as correct as the notions of his wisdom and power, the dictates of religion would correspond, in all cases, with Utility. But while men call him benevolent in words, they seldom mean that he is so in reality. They do not mean that he is benevolent as man is conceived to be benevolent; they do not mean that he is benevolent in the only sense that benevolence has a meaning. The dictates of religion are in all countries intermixed, more or less, with dictates unconformable to utility, deduced from texts, well or ill interpreted, of the writings held for sacred by each sect. These dictates, however, gradually approach nearer to utility, because the dictates of the moral sanction do so.

Such are the four Social or Tutelary Motives, the antagonists of the Dissocial and Self-regarding motives, which include the remainder of the catalogue.

Chapter XI. is on DISPOSITIONS. A man is said to be of a mischievous disposition, when he is presumed to be apt to engage rather in actions of an apparently pernicious tendency, than in such as are apparently beneficial. The author lays down certain Rules for indicating Disposition. Thus, 'The strength of the temptation being given, the mischievousness of the disposition manifested by the enterprise, is as the apparent mischievousness of the act,' and others to a like effect.

Chapter XII.—OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF A MISCHIEVOUS ACT, is meant as the concluding link of the whole previous chain of causes and effects. He defines the shapes that bad consequences may assume. The mischief may be primary, as when sustained by a definite number of individuals; or secondary, by extending over a multitude of unassignable individuals. The evil in this last case may be either actual pain, or danger, which is the chance of pain. Thus, a successful robbery affects, primarily, a number of assignable persons, and secondarily, all persons in a like situation of risk.

He then proceeds to the theory of PUNISHMENT (XIII., XIV., XV.), to the classification of OFFENCES (XVI.), and to the Limits of the Penal Branch of Jurisprudence (XVII.). The two first subjects—Punishments and Offences—are interesting chiefly in regard to Legislation. They have also a bearing on Morals; inasmuch as society, in its private administration of punishments, ought, no less than the Legislator, to be guided by sound scientific principles.

As respects Punishment, he marks off (1) cases where it is groundless; (2) where it is inefficacious, as in Infancy, Insanity, Intoxication, &c.; (3) cases where it is unprofitable; and (4) cases where it is needless. It is under this last herd that he excludes from punishment the dissemination of what may be deemed pernicious principles. Punishment is needless here, because the end can be served by reply and exposure.

The first part of Chapter XVII. is entitled the 'Limits between Private Ethics and the Art of Legislation;' and a short account of it will complete the view of the author's Ethical Theory.

Ethics at large, is defined the art of directing men's actions to the production of the greatest possible quantity of happiness, on the part of those whose interest is in view, Now, these actions may be a man's own actions, in which case they are styled the art of self-government, or private ethics. Or they may be the actions of other agents, namely, (1) Other human beings, and (2) Other Animals, whose interests Bentham considers to have been disgracefully overlooked by jurists as well as by mankind generally.

In so far as a man's happiness depends on his own conduct, he may be said to owe a duty to himself; the quality manifested in discharge of this branch of duty (if duty it is to be called) is PRUDENCE. In so far as he affects by his conduct the interests of those about him, he is under a duty to others. The happiness of others may be consulted in two ways. First, negatively, by forbearing to diminish it; this is called PROBITY. Secondly, in a positive way, by studying to increase it; which is expressed by BENEFICENCE.

But now the question occurs, how is it that under Private Ethics (or apart from legislation and religion) a man can be tinder a motive to consult other people's happiness? By what obligations can he be bound to probity and beneficence? A man can have no adequate motives for consulting any interests but his own. Still there are motives for making us consult the happiness of others, namely, the purely social motive of Sympathy or Benevolence, and the semi-social motives of Love of Amity and Love of Reputation. [He does not say here whether Sympathy is a motive grounded on the pleasure it brings, or a motive irrespective of the pleasure; although from other places we may infer that he inclines to the first view.]

Private Ethics and Legislation can have but the same end, happiness. Their means, the actions prompted, must be nearly the same. Still they are different. There is no case where a man ought not to be guided by his own, or his fellow-creatures', happiness; but there are many cases where the legislature should not compel a man to perform such actions. The reason is that the Legislature works solely by Punishment (reward is seldom applied, and is not properly an act of legislation). Now, there are cases where the punishment of the political sanction ought not to be used; and if, in any of these cases, there is a propriety of using the punishments of private ethics (the moral or social sanction), this circumstance would indicate the line of division.

First, then, as to the cases where punishment would be groundless. In such cases, neither legislation nor private ethics should interfere.

Secondly. As to cases where it would be inefficacious, where punishment has no deterring motive power,—as in Infancy, Insanity, overwhelming danger, &c.,—the public and the private sanctions are also alike excluded.

Thirdly. It is in the cases where Legislative punishment would be unprofitable, that we have the great field of Private Ethics. Punishment is unprofitable in two ways. First, when the danger of detection is so small, that nothing but enormous severity, on detection, would be of avail, as in the illicit commerce of the sexes, which has generally gone unpunished by law. Secondly, when there is danger of involving the innocent with the guilty, from inability to define the crime in precise language. Hence it is that rude behaviour, treachery, and ingratitude are not punished by law; and that in countries where the voice of the people controls the hand of the legislature, there is a great dread of making defamation, especially of the government, an offence at law.

Private Ethics is not liable to the same difficulties as Legislation in dealing with such offences.

Of the three departments of Moral Duty—Prudence, Probity, and Beneficence—the one that least requires and admits of being enforced by legislative punishment is the first—Prudence. It can only be through some defect of the understanding, if people are wanting in duty to themselves. Now, although a man may know little of himself, is it certain the legislator knows more? Would it be possible to extirpate drunkenness or fornication by legal punishment? All that can be done in this field is to subject the offences, in cases of notoriety, to a slight censure, so as to cover them with a slight shade of artificial disrepute, and thus give strength and influence to the moral sanction.

Legislators have, in general, carried their interference too far in this class of duties; and the mischief has been most conspicuous in religion. Men, it is supposed, are liable to errors of judgment; and for these it is the determination of a Being of infinite benevolence to punish them with an infinity of torments. The legislator, having by his side men perfectly enlightened, unfettered, and unbiassed, presumes that he has attained by their means the exact truth; and so, when he sees his people ready to plunge headlong into an abyss of fire, shall he not stretch forth his hand to save them?

The second class of duties—the rules of Probity, stand most in need of the assistance of the legislator. There are few cases where it would be expedient to punish a man for hurting himself, and few where it would not be expedient to punish a man for hurting his neighbour. As regards offences against property, private ethics presupposes legislation, which alone can determine what things are to be regarded as each man's property. If private ethics takes a different view from the legislature, it must of course act on its own views.

The third class of duties—Beneficence—must be abandoned to the jurisdiction of private ethics. In many cases the beneficial quality of an act depends upon the disposition of the agent, or the possession by him of the extra-regarding motives—sympathy, amity, and reputation; whereas political action can work only through the self-regarding motives. In a word these duties must be free or voluntary. Still, the limits of law on this head might be somewhat extended; in particular, where a man's person is in danger, it might be made the duty of every one to save him from mischief, no less than to abstain from bringing it on him.

To resume the Ethics of Bentham. I.—The Standard or End of Morality is the production of Happiness, or Utility.

Bentham is thus at one in his first principle with Hume and with Paley; his peculiarity is to make it fruitful in numerous applications both to legislation and to morals. He carries out the principle with an unflinching rigour, and a logical force peculiarly his own.

II.—His Psychological Analysis is also studied and thorough-going.

He is the first person to provide a classification of pleasures and pains, as an indispensable preliminary alike to morals and to legislation. The ethical applications of these are of less importance than the legislative; they have a direct and practical bearing upon the theory of Punishment.

He lays down, as the constituents of the Moral Faculty, Good-will or Benevolence, the love of Amity, the love of Reputation, and the dictates of Religion—with a view to the Happiness of others; and Prudence—with a view to our own happiness. He gives no special account of the acquired sentiment of Obligation or Authority—the characteristic of Conscience, as distinguished from other impulses having a tendency to the good of others or of self. And yet it is the peculiarity of his system to identify morality with law; so that there is only one step to connecting conscience with our education under the different sanctions—legal and ethical.

He would of course give a large place to the Intellect or Reason in making up the Moral Faculty, seeing that the consequences of actions have to be estimated or judged; but he would regard this as merely co-operating with our sensibilities to pleasure and pain.

The Disinterested Sentiment is not regarded by Bentham. as arising from any disposition to pure self-sacrifice. He recognizes Pleasures of Benevolence and Pains of Benevolence; thus constituting a purely interested motive for doing good to others. He describes certain pleasures of Imagination or Sympathy arising through Association—the idea of plenty, the idea of the happiness of animals, the idea of health, the idea of gratitude. Under the head of Circumstances influencing Sensibility, he adverts to Sympathetic Sensibility, as being the propensity to derive pleasure from the happiness, and pain from the unhappiness, of other sensitive beings. It cannot but be admitted, he says, that the only interest that a man at all times, and on all occasions, is sure to find adequate motives for consulting, is his own. He has no metaphysics of the Will. He uses the terms free and voluntary only with reference to spontaneous beneficence, as opposed to the compulsion of the law.

III.—As regards Happiness, or the Summum Bonum, he presents his scientific classification of Pleasures and Pains, without, however, indicating any plan of life, for attaining the one and avoiding the other in the best manner. He makes no distinction among pleasures and pains excepting what strictly concerns their value as such—intensity, duration, certainty, and nearness. He makes happiness to mean only the presence of pleasure and the absence of pain. The renunciation of pleasure for any other motive than to procure a greater pleasure, or avoid a greater pain, he, disapprovingly, terms asceticism.

IV.—It being the essence of his system to consider Ethics as a Code of Laws directed by Utility, and he being himself a law reformer on the greatest scale, we might expect from him suggestions for the improvement of Ethics, as well as for Legislation and Jurisprudence. His inclusion of the interests of the lower animals has been mentioned. He also contends for the partly legislative and partly ethical innovation of Freedom of Divorce.

The inducements to morality are the motives assigned as working in its favour.

V.—The connexions of Ethics with Politics, the points of agreement and the points of difference of the two departments, are signified with unprecedented care and precision (Chap. XVII.)

VI.—As regards the connexions with Theology, he gives no uncertain sound. It is on this point that he stands in marked contrast to Paley, who also professes Utility as his ethical foundation.

He recognizes religion as furnishing one of the Sanctions of morality, although often perverted into the enemy of utility. He considers that the state may regard as offences any acts that tend to diminish or misapply the influence of religion as a motive to civil obedience.

While Paley makes a conjoined reference to Scripture and to Utility in ascertaining moral rules, Bentham insists on Utility alone as the final appeal. He does not doubt that if we had a clear unambiguous statement of the divine will, we should have a revelation of what is for human happiness; but he distrusts all interpretations of scripture, unless they coincide with a perfectly independent scientific investigation of the consequences of actions.

SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH. [1765-1832.]

In the 'Dissertation on the progress of Ethical Philosophy chiefly during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,' Mackintosh advocates a distinct Ethical theory. His views and arguments occur partly in the course of his criticism of the other moralists, and partly in his concluding General Remarks (Section VII.).

In Section I., entitled PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS, he remarks on the universality of the distinction between Right and Wrong. On no subject do men, in all ages, coincide on so many points as on the general rules of conduct, and the estimable qualities of character. Even the grossest deviations may be explained by ignorance of facts, by errors with respect to the consequences of actions, or by inconsistency with admitted principles. In tribes where new-born infants are exposed, the abandonment of parents is condemned; the betrayal and murder of strangers is condemned by the very rules of faith and humanity, acknowledged in the case of countrymen.

He complains that, in the enquiry as to the foundation of morals, the two distinct questions—as to the Standard and the Faculty—have seldom been fully discriminated. Thus, Paley opposes Utility to a Moral Sense, not perceiving that the two terms relate to different subjects; and Bentham repeats the mistake. It is possible to represent Utility as the criterion of Right, and a Moral Sense as the faculty. In another place, he remarks that the schoolmen failed to draw the distinction.

In Section V., entitled 'Controversies concerning the Moral Faculty and the Social Affections,' and including the Ethical theories coming between Hobbes and Butler, namely, Cumberland, Cudworth, Clarke, &c., he gives his objections to the scheme that founds moral distinctions solely on the Reason. Reason, as such, can never be a motive to action; an argument to dissuade a man from drunkenness must appeal to the pains of ill-health, poverty, and infamy, that is, to Feelings. The influence of Reason is indirect; it is merely a channel whereby the objects of desire are brought into view, so as to operate on the Will.

The abused extension of the term Reason to the moral faculties, he ascribes to the obvious importance of Reason in choosing the means of action, as well as in balancing the ends, during which operation the feelings are suspended, delayed, and poised in a way favourable to our lasting interests. Hence the antithesis of Reason and Passion.

In remarking upon Leibnitz's view of Disinterested Sentiment, and the coincidence of Virtue with Happiness, he sketches his own opinion, which is that although every virtuous act may not lead to the greater happiness of the agent, yet the disposition to virtuous acts, in its intrinsic pleasures, far outweighs all the pains of self-sacrifice that it can ever occasion. 'The whole sagacity and ingenuity of the world may be fairly challenged to point out a case in which virtuous dispositions, habits, and feelings are not conducive in the highest degree to the happiness of the individual; or to maintain that he is not the happiest, whose moral sentiments and affections are such as to prevent the possibility of any unlawful advantage being presented to his mind.'

Section VI. is entitled 'Foundations of a more Just Theory of Ethics,' and embraces a review of all the Ethical writers, from Butler downwards. The most palpable defect in Butler's scheme, is that it affords no answer to the question, 'What is the distinguishing quality of right actions?' in other words, What is the Standard? There is a vicious circle in answering that they are commanded by Conscience, for Conscience itself can be no otherwise defined than as the faculty that approves and commands right actions. Still, he gives warm commendation to Butler generally; in connexion with him he takes occasion to give some farther hints as to his own opinions. Two positions are here advanced: 1st, The moral sentiments, in their mature state, are a class of feelings with no other objects than the dispositions to voluntary actions, and the actions flowing from these dispositions. We approve some dispositions and actions, and disapprove others; we desire to cultivate them, and we aim at them for something in themselves. This position receives light from the doctrine above quoted as to the supreme happiness of virtuous dispositions. His second position is that Conscience is an acquired principle; which he repeats and unfolds in subsequent places.

He finds fault with Hume for ascribing Virtue to qualities of the Understanding, and considers that this is to confound admiration with moral approbation. Hume's general Ethical doctrine, that Utility is a uniform ground of moral distinction, he says can never be impugned until some example be produced of a virtue generally pernicious, or a vice generally beneficial. But as to the theory of moral approbation, or the nature of the Faculty, he considers that Hume's doctrine of Benevolence (or, still better, Sympathy) does not account for our approbation of temperance and fortitude, nor for the supremacy of the Moral Faculty over all other motives.

He objects to the theory of Adam Smith, that no allowance is made in it for the transfer of our feelings, and the disappearing of the original reference from the view. Granting that our approbation began in sympathy, as Smith says, certain it is, that the adult man approves actions and dispositions as right, while he is distinctly aware that no process of sympathy intervenes between the approval and its object. He repeats, against Smith, the criticism on Hume, that the sympathies have no imperative character of supremacy. He further remarks that the reference, in our actions, to the point of view of the spectator, is rather an expedient for preserving our impartiality than a fundamental principle of Ethics. It nearly coincides with the Christian precept of doing unto others as we would they should do unto us,—an admirable practical maxim, but, as Leibnitz has said truly, intended only as a correction of self-partiality. Lastly, he objects to Smith, that his system renders all morality relative to the pleasure of our coinciding in feeling with others, which is merely to decide on the Faculty, without considering the Standard. Smith shrinks from Utility as a standard, or ascribes its power over our feelings to our sense of the adaptation of means to ends.

He commends Smith for grounding Benevolence on Sympathy, whereas Butler, Hutcheson, and Hume had grounded Sympathy on Benevolence.

It is in reviewing Hartley, whose distinction it was to open up the wide capabilities of the principle of Association, that Mackintosh develops at greatest length his theory of the derived nature of Conscience.

Adverting to the usual example of the love of money, he remarks that the benevolent man might begin with an interested affection, but might end with a disinterested delight in doing good. Self-love, or the principle of permanent well-being, is gradually formed from the separate appetites, and is at last pursued without having them specially in view. So Sympathy may perhaps be the transfer, first, of our own personal feelings to other beings, and next, of their feelings to ourselves, thereby engendering the social affections. It is an ancient and obstinate error of philosophers to regard these two principles—Self-love and Sympathy—as the source of the impelling passions and affections, instead of being the last results of them.

The chief elementary feelings that go to constitute the moral sentiments appear to be Gratitude, Pity, Resentment, and Shame. To take the example of Gratitude. Acts of beneficence to ourselves give us pleasure; we associate this pleasure with the benefactor, so as to regard him with a feeling of complacency; and when we view other beneficent beings and acts there is awakened within us our own agreeable experience. The process is seen in the child, who contracts towards the nurse or mother all the feelings of complacency arising from repeated pleasures, and extends these by similarity to other resembling persons. As soon as complacency takes the form of action, it becomes (according to the author's theory, connecting conscience with will), a part of the Conscience. So much for the development of Gratitude. Next as to Pity. The likeness of the outward signs of emotion makes us transfer to others our own feelings, and thereby becomes, even more than gratitude, a source of benevolence; being one of the first motives to impart the benefits connected with affection. In our sympathy with the sufferer, we cannot but approve the actions that relieve suffering, and the dispositions that prompt them. We also enter into his Resentment, or anger towards the causes of pain, and the actions and dispositions corresponding; and this sympathetic anger is at length detached from special cases and extended to all wrong-doers; and is the root of the most indispensable compound of our moral faculties, the 'Sense of Justice.'

To these internal growths, from Gratitude, Pity, and Resentment, must be added the education by means of well-framed penal laws, which are the lasting declaration of the moral indignation of mankind. These laws may be obeyed as mere compulsory duties; but with the generous sentiments concurring, men may rise above duty to virtue, and may contract that excellence of nature whence acts of beneficence flow of their own accord.

He next explains the growth of Remorse, as another element of the Moral Sense. The abhorrence that we feel for bad actions is extended to the agent; and, in spite of certain obstacles to its full manifestation, that abhorrence is prompted when the agent is self.

The theory of derivation is bound to account for the fact, recognized in the language of mankind, that the Moral Faculty is ONE. The principle of association would account for the fusion of many different sentiments into one product, wherein the component parts would cease to be discerned; but this is not enough. Why do these particular sentiments and no others coalesce in the total—Conscience. The answer is what was formerly given with reference to Butler; namely, while all other feelings relate to outward objects, the feelings brought together in conscience, contemplate exclusively the dispositions and actions of voluntary agents. Conscience is thus an acquired faculty, but one that is universally and necessarily acquired.

The derivation is farther exemplified by a comparison with the feelings of Taste. These may have an original reference to fitness—as in the beauty of a horse—but they do not attain their proper character until the consideration of fitness disappears. So far they resemble the moral faculty. They differ from it, however, in this, that taste ends in passive contemplation or quiescent delight; conscience looks solely to the acts and dispositions of voluntary agents. This is the author's favourite way of expressing what is otherwise called the authority and supremacy of conscience.

To sum up:—the principal constituents of the moral sense are Gratitude, Sympathy (or Pity), Resentment, and Shame; the secondary and auxiliary causes are Education, Imitation, General Opinion, Laws and Government.

In criticising Paley, he illustrates forcibly the position, that Religion must pre-suppose morality.

His criticism of Bentham gives him an opportunity of remarking on the modes of carrying into effect the principle of Utility as the Standard. He repeats his favourite doctrine of the inherent pleasures of a virtuous disposition, as the grand circumstance rendering virtue profitable and vice unprofitable. He even uses the Platonic figure, and compares vice to mental distemper. It is his complaint against Bentham and the later supporters of Utility, that they have misplaced the application of the principle, and have encouraged the too frequent appeal to calculation in the details of conduct. Hence arise sophistical evasions of moral rules; men will slide from general to particular consequences; apply the test of utility to actions and not to dispositions; and, in short, take too much upon themselves in settling questions of moral right and wrong. [He might have remarked that the power of perverting the standard to individual interests is not confined to the followers of Utility.] He introduces the saying attributed to Andrew Fletcher, 'that he would lose his life to serve his country, but would not do a base thing to save it.'

He farther remarks on the tendency of Bentham and his followers to treat Ethics too juridically. He would probably admit that Ethics is strictly speaking a code of laws, but draws the line between it and the juridical code, by the distinction of dispositions and actions. We may have to approve the author of an injurious action, because it is well-meant; the law must nevertheless punish it. Herein Ethics has its alliance with Religion, which looks at the disposition or the heart.

He is disappointed at finding that Dugald Stewart, who made applications of the law of association and appreciated its powers, held back from, and discountenanced, the attempt of Hartley to resolve the Moral Sense, styling it 'an ingenious refinement on the Selfish system,' and representing those opposed to himself in Ethics as deriving the affections from 'self-love.' He repeats that the derivation theory affirms the disinterestedness of human actions as strongly as Butler himself; while it gets over the objection from the multiplication of original principles; and ascribes the result to the operation of a real agent.

In replying to Brown's refusal to accept the derivation of Conscience, on the ground that the process belongs to a time beyond remembrance, he affirms it to be a sufficient theory, if the supposed action resembles what we know to be the operation of the principle where we have direct experience of it.

His concluding Section, VII., entitled General Remarks, gives some farther explanations of his characteristic views. He takes up the principle of Utility, at the point where Brown bogled at it; quoting Brown's concession, that Utility and virtue are so related, that there is perhaps no action generally felt to be virtuous that is not beneficial, and that every case of benefit willingly done excites approbation. He strikes out Brown's word 'perhaps,' as making the affirmation either conjectural or useless; and contends that the two facts,—morality and the general benefit,—being co-extensive, should be reciprocally tests of each other. He qualifies, as usual, by not allowing utility to be, on all occasions, the immediate incentive of actions. He holds, however, that the main doctrine is an essential corollary from the Divine Benevolence.

He then replies specifically to the question, 'Why is utility not to be the sole end present to the mind of the virtuous agent?' The answer is found in the limits of man's faculties. Every man is not always able, on the spur of the moment, to calculate all the consequences of our actions. But it is not to be concluded from this, that the calculation of consequences is impracticable in moral subjects. To calculate the general tendency of every sort of human action is, he contends, a possible, easy, and common operation. The general good effects of temperance, prudence, fortitude, justice, benevolence, gratitude, veracity, fidelity, domestic and patriotic affections, may be pronounced with as little error, as the best founded maxims of the ordinary business of life.

He vindicates the rules of sexual morality on the grounds of benevolence.

He then discusses the question, (on which he had charged Hume with mistake), 'Why is approbation confined to voluntary acts?' He thinks it but a partial solution to say that approbation and disapprobation are wasted on what is not in the power of the will. The full solution he considers to be found in the mode of derivation of the moral sentiment; which, accordingly, he re-discusses at some length. He produces the analogies of chemistry to show that compounds may be totally different from their elements. He insists on the fact that a derived pleasure is not the less a pleasure; it may even survive the primary pleasure. Self-love (improperly so called) is intelligible if its origin be referred to Association, but not if it be considered as prior to the appetites and passions that furnish its materials. And as the pleasure derived from low objects may be transferred to the most pure, so Disinterestedness may originate with self, and yet become as entirely detached from that origin as if the two had never been connected.

He then repeats his doctrine, that these social or disinterested sentiments prompt the will as the means of their gratification. Hence, by a farther transfer of association, the voluntary acts share in the delight felt in the affections that determine them. We then desire to experience beneficent volitions, and to cultivate the dispositions to these. Such dispositions are at last desired for their own sake; and, when so desired, constitute the Moral Sense, Conscience, or the Moral Sentiment, in its consummated form. Thus, by a fourth or fifth stage of derivation from the original pleasures and pains of our constitution, we arrive at this highly complex product, called our moral nature.

Nor is this all. We must not look at the side of indignation to the wrong-doer. We are angry at those who disappoint our wish for the happiness of others; we make their resentment our own. We hence approve of the actions and dispositions for punishing such offenders; while we so far sympathize with the culprit as to disapprove of excess of punishment. Such moderated anger is the sense of Justice, and is a new element of Conscience. Of all the virtues, this is the one most directly aided by a conviction of general interest or utility. All laws profess it as their end. Hence the importance of good criminal laws to the moral education of mankind.

Among contributary streams to the moral faculty, he enumerates courage, energy, and decision, properly directed.

He recognizes 'duties to ourselves,' although condemning the expression as absurd. Intemperance, improvidence, timidity are morally wrong. Still, as in other cases, a man is not truly virtuous on such points, till he loves them for their own sake, and even performs them without an effort. These prudential qualities having an influence on the will, resemble in that the other constituents of Conscience. As a final result, all those sentiments whose object is a state of the will become intimately and inseparably blended in the unity of Conscience, the arbiter and judge of human actions, the lawful authority over every motive to conduct.

In this grand coalition of the public and the private feelings, he sees a decisive illustration of the reference of moral sentiments to the Will. He farther recognizes in it a solution of the great problem of the relation of virtue to private interest. Qualities useful to ourselves are raised to the rank of virtues; and qualities useful to others are converted into pleasures. In moral reasonings, we are enabled to bring home virtuous inducements by the medium of self-interest; we can assure a man that by cultivating the disposition towards other men's happiness he gains a source of happiness to himself.

The question, Why we do not morally approve involuntary actions, is now answered. Conscience is associated exclusively with the dispositions and actions of voluntary agents. Conscience and Will are co-extensive.

A difficulty remains. 'If moral approbation involve no perception of beneficial tendency, how do we make out the coincidence of the two?' It might seem that the foundation of morals is thus made to rest on a coincidence that is mysterious and fantastic. According to the author, the conclusive answer is this. Although Conscience rarely contemplates anything so distant as the welfare of all sentient beings, yet in detail it obviously points to the production of happiness. The social affections all promote happiness. Every one must observe the tendency of justice to the welfare of society. The angry passions, as ministers of morality, remove hindrances to human welfare. The private desires have respect to our own happiness. Every element of conscience has thus some portion of happiness for its object. All the affections contribute to the general well-being, although it is not necessary, nor would it be fit, that the agent should be distracted by the contemplation of that vast and remote object.

To sum up Mackintosh:—

I.—On the Standard, he pronounces for Utility, with certain modifications and explanations. The Utility is the remote and final justification of all actions accounted right, but not the immediate motive in the mind of the agent. [It may justly be feared, that, by placing so much stress on the delights attendant on virtuous action, he gives an opening for the admission of sentiment into the consideration of Utility.]

II.—In the Psychology of Ethics, he regards the Conscience as a derived or generated faculty, the result of a series of associations. He assigns the primary feelings that enter into it, and traces the different stages of the growth. The distinctive feature of Conscience is its close relation to the Will.

He does not consider the problem of Liberty and Necessity.

He makes Disinterested Sentiment a secondary or derived feeling—a stage on the road to Conscience. While maintaining strongly the disinterested character of the sentiment, he considers that it may be fully accounted for by derivation from our primitive self-regarding feelings, and denies, as against Stewart and Brown, that this gives it a selfish character.

He carries the process of associative growth a step farther, and maintains that we re-convert disinterestedness into a lofty delight—the delight in goodness for its own sake; to attain this characteristic is the highest mark of a virtuous character.

III.—-His Summum Bonum, or Theory of Happiness, is contained in his much iterated doctrine of the deliciousness of virtuous conduct, by which he proposes to effect the reconciliation of our own good with the good of others—prudence with virtue. Virtue is 'an inward fountain of pure delight;' the pleasure of benevolence, 'if it could become lasting and intense, would convert the heart into a heaven;' they alone are happy, or truly virtuous, that do not need the motive of a regard to outward consequences.

His chief Ethical precursor in this vein is Shaftesbury; but he is easily able to produce from Theologians abundant iterations of it.

IV.—He has no special views as to the Moral Code. With reference to the inducements to virtue, he thinks he has a powerful lever in the delights that the virtuous disposition confers on its owner.

V.—His theory of the connexion of Ethics and Politics is stated in his account of Bentham, whom he charges with making morality too judicial.

VI.—The relations of Morality to Religion are a matter of frequent and special consideration in Mackintosh.

JAMES MILL. [1783-1836.]

The work of James Mill, entitled the 'Analysis of the Human Mind,' is distinguished, in the first glace, by the studied precision of its definitions of all leading terms, giving it a permanent value as a logical discipline; and in the second place, by the successful carrying out of the principle of Association in explaining the powers of the mind. The author endeavours to show that the moral feelings are a complex product or growth, of which the ultimate constituents are our pleasurable and painful sensations. We shall present a brief abstract of the course of his exposition, as given in Chapters XVII.—XXIII. of the Analysis.

The pleasurable and painful sensations being assumed, it is important to take notice of their Causes, both immediate and remote, by whose means they can be secured or avoided. We contract a habit of passing rapidly from every sensation to its procuring cause; and, as in the typical case of money, these causes are apt to rank higher in importance, to take a greater hold on the mind, than the sensations themselves. The mind is not much interested in attending to the sensation; that can provide for itself. The mind is deeply interested in attending to the cause.

The author next (XIX.) considers the Ideas of the pleasurable sensations, and of the causes of them. The Idea of a pain is not the same as the pain; it is a complex state, containing, no doubt, an element of pain; and the name for it is Aversion. So the name for an idea of pleasure is Desire. Now, these states extend to the causes of pains and pleasures, though in other respects indifferent; we have an aversion for a certain drug, but there is in this a transition highly illustrative of the force of the associating principle; our real aversion being to a bitter sensation, and not to the visible appearance of the drug.

Alluding (XX.) to the important difference between past and future time in our ideas of pleasure and pain, he defines Hope and Fear as the contemplation of a pleasurable or of a painful sensation, as future, but not certain.

When the immediate causes of pleasurable and painful sensations are viewed as past or future, we have a new series of states. In the past, they are called Love and Hatred, or Aversion; in the future, the idea of a pleasure, as certain in its arrival, is Joy—as probable, Hope; the idea of future pain (certain) is not marked otherwise than by the names Hatred, Aversion, Horror; the idea of the pain as probable is some form of dread.

The remote causes of our pleasures and pains are more interesting than the immediate causes. The reason is their wide command. Thus, Wealth, Power, and Dignity are causes cf a great range of pleasures: Poverty, Impotence, and Contemptibility, of a wide range of pains. For one thing, the first are the means of procuring the services of our fellow-creatures; this fact is of the highest consequence in morals, as showing how deeply our happiness is entwined with the actions of other beings. The author illustrates at length the influence of these remote and comprehensive agencies; and as it is an influence entirely the result of association, it attests the magnitude of that power of the mind.

But our fellow-creatures are the subjects of affections, not merely as the instrumentality set in motion by Wealth, Power, and Dignity, but in their proper personality. This leads the author to the consideration of the pleasurable affections of Friendship, Kindness, Family, Country, Party, Mankind. He resolves them all into associations with our primitive pleasures. Thus, to take the example of Kindness, which will show how he deals with the disinterested affection;—The idea of a man enjoying a train of pleasures, or happiness, is felt by everybody to be a pleasurable idea; this can arise from nothing but the association of our own pleasures with the idea of his pleasures. The pleasurable association composed of the ideas of a man and of his pleasures, and the painful association composed of the idea of a man and of his pains, are both Affections included under one name Kindness; although in the second case it has the more specific name Compassion.

Under the other heads, the author's elucidation is fuller, but his principle is the same.

He next goes on (XXII.) to MOTIVES. When the idea of a Pleasure is associated with an action of our own as the cause, that peculiar state of mind is generated, called a motive. The idea of the pleasure, without the idea of an action for gaining it, does not amount to a motive. Every pleasure may become a motive, but every motive does not end in action, because there may be counter-motives; and the strength attained by motives depends greatly on education. The facility of being acted on by motives of a particular kind is a DISPOSITION. We have, in connexion with all our leading pleasures and pains, names indicating their motive efficacy. Gluttony is both motive and disposition; so Lust and Drunkenness; with the added sense of reprobation in all the three. Friendship is a name for Affection, Motive, and Disposition.

In Chapter XXIII., the author makes the application of his principles to Ethics. The actions emanating from ourselves, combined with those emanating from our fellow-creatures, exceed all other Causes of our Pleasures and Pains. Consequently such actions are objects of intense affections or regards.

The actions whence advantages accrue are classed under the four titles, Prudence, Fortitude, Justice, Benevolence. The two first—Prudence and Fortitude [in fact, Prudence]—express acts useful to ourselves in the first instance, to others in the second instance. Justice and Benevolence express acts useful to others in the first instance, to ourselves in the second instance. We have two sets of association with all these acts, one set with them as our own, another set with them as other people's. With Prudence (and Fortitude) as our own acts, we associate good to ourselves, either in the shape of positive pleasure, or as warding off pain. Thus Labour is raised to importance by numerous associations of both classes. Farther, Prudence, involving the foresight of a train of consequences, requires a large measure of knowledge of things animate and inanimate. Courage is defined by the author, incurring the chance of Evil, that is danger, for the sake of a preponderant good; which, too, stands in need of knowledge. Now, when the ideas of acts of Prudence and acts of Courage have been associated sufficiently often with beneficial consequences, they become pleasurable ideas, or Affections, and they have also, from the nature of the case, the character of Motives. In short, there is nothing in prudential conduct that may not be explained by a series of associations, grounded on our pleasurable and painful sensations, on the ideas of them, and on the ideas of their causes.

The real difficulty attaches to Justice and to Beneficence.

As to Justice. Men, in society, have found it essential for mutual benefit, that the powers of Individuals over the general causes of good should be fixed by certain rules, that is, Laws. Acts done in accordance with these rules are Just Acts; although, when duly considered, they are seen to include the main fact of beneficence, the good of others. To the performance of a certain class of just acts, our Fellow-creatures annex penalties; these, therefore, are determined partly by Prudence; others remain to be performed voluntarily, and for them the motive is Beneficence.