Wallace Ethics and Sociology 1898

Mind Association
Ethics and Sociology

Author(s): W. Wallace
Source: Mind, Vol. 8, No. 30 (Apr., 1883), pp. 222-250
Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the Mind Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2246736 .
Accessed: 22/06/2014 17:13
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Oxford University Press and Mind Association are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend
access to Mind.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
V.-ETHICS AND SOCIOLOGY.'
IT was in 1839,withthepublicationof the thirdvolume
of the PhilosophiePositive,that Comte promulgatedhis new
conception of social science. Four years earlier Quetelet
had made public in his book On Man and the Development
of his Ftctultiesthe result of his statisticalstudies. But
neitherof these workshad much immediateeffecton the
generalintelligence
ofEnglandor evenof Europe. In 1843
J. S. Mill's Systemof Logic firstsaw the light. There the
English public had its earliest introduction(if we 'except
some reviewarticles)to the views of the Positivist chief on
the laws of intellectual progressand on the propermode of
studyingmoral phenomena. To the principles and ideas of
method foundin the Philosophie PositiveMill gave a generous,
if somewhat sober, welcome: but he shrank, even at the
first,fromthe imperial and sacerdotal tendencies of syste-
matic sociology. For Quetelet a more enthusiastic apostle
was prepared in H. T. Buckle. The firstvolume of his
Historyof Civilisatibn,which came out in 1857, began by
introducingto English readers the surprisinguniformities
Whichthe Belgian statisticianhad shown to be exhibitedin
the actions of human beings.
From anotherquarter man's amenabilityto the methods
of science was enforcedwith more originality. Darwin's
Origin of Species in 1859 broke down the barrierswhich
naturalclassification
had opposedto the regressof scientific
inquiry:and in 1862 Mr. HerbertSpencer'sFirstPrinciples
gave some coherentaccount of the way (already adopted in
his PrinciplesofPsychology,ed. 1855) in which Science hence-
forwardmust show what a thingis by tracingthe processby
which it ha5 come to be. In 1871 Darwin's Descentof Man
expressly showed how the general principles of evolution
might serve to explain the characteristicsof civilised man.
These views, like those of Buckle, found in Germany even
more enthusiastic welcome than in England. There the
Darwinian examplewas followedup by applyingevolutionist
ideas to ethics and to language: and the German translation
of Buckle's workby Ruge soon reached a fifthedition.
Vast issues would emergeif we were to ask how far this
revolutionin the attitudeof science to man was due to con-
temporaryor antecedent changes, either in metaphysicsor
7thDecember,1882.
1 InauguralLectureat Oxford,

ETHICS AND SOCIOLOGY. 223
in the methodsof historical study. As usual, no doubt,no
one departmentof activitycan be singled out as the foun-
tain-head. Experience, by unobserved attractionsamongst
intellectual and moral steps of progress, prepared men's
minds in silence; and once a conspicuous instance had been
signalled,the law so detectedwas rapidlyextended over the
whole range of the scientificproblem. Successfullyapplied
in a considerablebranch of knowledge,the idea of evolution
was no longera hypotheticaldream: -anddevelopment,which
had hithertomainlyfiguredin books on logic and metaphy-
sics, seemed to gain corroborationwhen it founda graphic
illustrationin the phenomena of nature. Naturalists had
been partially aware that the seemingly abrupt intervals
between the characteristictypes of animal and vegetable
species were the sum of many gradual and unimportant
variations appearing in the several individuals of a group.
They had complained of the difficulty of separating species
from species, and of giving a classificationwhich did not
confusewhat nature had put asunder,and put asunder what
nature had conjoined. They had seen the analogies of struc-
ture between differentorders of animals, and had scarcely
failed to note the parallel between the gradations which
mark the growthof the adult form out of the embryo and
the differenceswhich divide the various adult formsin a
species fromeach other. But if they observed these facts,
the only lesson they drew was that the plan of organisation
was essentiallythe same through all orders of animal life,
and that distinctionof species was a subjective device only,
employedwith but indifferent success to simplifythe anoma-
lies characterisingthe real objectiveworld.
The motto of older science had been 'Isolate the pheno-
menon to be studied': Divide et impera. Each species was
treated as a complete and independentobject, and in the
firstinstance examined foritself. The new way of looking
at thingsreaffirmed an old philosophic dictumthat the par-
ticulars could not profitablybe studied except under refer-
ence to theirenvelopingsystem. It now became a scientific
postulate that the structureof animal, plant, or anything,
should if possible be regardedas a functionof several agen-
cies, and be explained by estimatingthe relations in which
the object stood to other natural agents. Each natural
object thus came to be held a point continuallyaffectedby
and reacting upon its surroundingsuntil an approximate
equilibrium between them and it was reached. At every
stage in the course of existencethe individual,endowedwith
its special capacities,is subjected to pressurefromthe action

224 ETHICS AND SOCIOLOGY.
of other active capacities around it,-engaged in a struggle

where in extreme cases it may conquer or die, but whence
in general it will issue with a structurevariouslymodified
and accommodated. The plant and the animal, in particu-
lar, owe the specific differenceswhich they possess to-day
partly to inheritedenergies,partly to adjacent influences.
The existing fauna and flora are the product of the inter-
changes of action which in infinitelyvarying degrees have
gone on amongstthe creaturesof the past; and theyin their
turn are now undergoinginfluenceswhich will in course of
tivae result in a novel phase of terrestrialhabitants. Fol-
l6wing up the vistas thus suggestedto the imagination,we
seem, as we recede into the depths of the past ages, to
approachformsof greatersimplicity,more widelymodifiable
by circumstances,and only afterslow processesof accommo-
dation acquiring stabilityand permanence. It seems even
possible by the aid of analogies to trace out the hypothetical
steps by which such a rudimentaryorganismhas in the lapse
of countlessages embodiedin itself a complexframeworkof
organs, a system so stable in ordinaryconditionsthat to us
whose records only count by thousands of years it seems a
necessaryportionof the Cosmos.
Such a suggestion,though far fromnew in the historyof
knowledge, came like a revelation to the caterers for the
readingpublic. It soon led to the inferencethat man too in
his moral and spiritual,religiousand artistic,powers ofto-day
is a productof circumstances,no less than the animal and
the vegetable organisms. He too is due to the action of his
conditions upon a vast vacuum of possibilityfor develop-
ment: and here too we can go back along the line,-and
here too it must have been a long line-by which out of a
being with hardlyany moralityor spiritualityat all he has
grown into a complex intellectual product possessed of art,
science,and religion. But-as we are emphaticallyreminded
by Comte anidothers-there is one featurewhich demarcates
man from the animal world. The animals and vegetables
stand, each as an individualin its species, alone, separately
exposed to the influencesof theirenvironment. But man is
essentiallya social being. Even where, as in case of the
social bees and ants, sfomeanalogy is presented to a human
community,the unions are reallyunlike. The hive and the
ant-hill are as it were a magnifiedindividual,marked by a
unityeven closer than a human family. The hive may in
fact be compared to a dioeciousplant: the queen, working-
bee and drone, are only three fractionsout of which the
'great-bee' is made up. Here, and here alone, we find

realised the ideal communityof Plato. To such an extent

is this the case that some modern savantsincline literallyto
accept Virgil's dictumabout the hive (mensomnibtts una est)
and maintain that thereis one collective consciousness for
the whole group. No doubt there is a tendency in the
specialised developmentseven of human societiesto lead to
a considerable amount of social stratification. It may not
go so far as those characteristicdifferences
ofphysiquewhich
voyagersin the Pacific note between the two halves of the
social scale; it may not always markoffthe victimsof seden-
tary and mechanical pursuitsin the way to which the Greek
aristocratsreferredwith so much pride. But it is charac-
teristicof all semi-barbaroussocietiesto exhibitsuch physical
divergencies: and it is rather the ideal of ethical progress
than the actual law of any societyto maintain amidst speci-
ality of function a general unity and common ground of
human development,both moral and physical.
This sociality,so characteristicof the human being, acts
as a sort of elastic bufferbetween the individual and the
outward world. In the case of man, therefore,the problem
of evolutionhas to be approached in two stages. First of all
thereis a studyof the elementsand forceswhich contribute
to organisesociety,and shape the formsof its religious,eco-
nomical and political structure. It is desirable to ascertain,
ifpossible,the laws which governthe sympatheticconnexions
between one part of the body social and another,and the
order in which its states succeed each other. This is the
problem, known in a limited and practical aspect to the
Greeks as Political Philosophy, and to the moderns,with a
wider scope as Sociology. The second stage of the problem
-the problem of explaining the genesis of the moral and
spiritualman-has been called Ethics. It regards man not
as an individual in nature, but as a member of a social
body, of a social organismwhich accumulates and transmits
to him th~einfluencesof external circumstances. In this
social organism so-called are storedup the means by which
man both intellectuallyand materiallylives. If we take the
solitarysavage hunteras the nearest approach to the purely
animal type,we finda being who meets the natural forces
directlyand alone. Without companions,tools, or means of-
union, he is the playthingof elementarynature, and has no
reserveforces,no accumulations,no capital, to meet unusual
demands upon his resources. His lifeis a mere aggregation
of several strugglesforthe means of life,in which no instant
has any bearing upon or derives much benefit from the
achievements of another. But even the hunter, and still

226 ]ETHICS AND SOCIOLOGY.
more, the more social types of humanity,cannot be treated

as a mere resultantfromthe action of directphysicalmodifi-
cations. The social factor interferesfrom the very first.
Social man earns his daily bread not by his direct action
upon nature,but throughthe instrumentality of an economic
systemof capital and labour: he thinksand learns by means
of a language which is under the guardianshipof his nation,
by means of a scientificpabulum which is storedup in books
and protected by corporations: he loves his kind and wor-
ships his God by means ofpermanentinstitutionsintowhich
the social body has constituteditself.
Man was, in short, declared to be a social and what is
perhaps even more, an historicalanimal. It was proclaimed
that the mechanism of societyhad made him what he is. It
,seemed as if here we again had a picturebeforeour minds of
the rude and spirituallynaked being who gradually as he
lives puts on from his social environment some mental,
vestheticand moral characters,some formsof thought and
principlesof conduct, and who, having lived, hands down to
his childrenif not these formsand principles themselves,at
least an organism predisposedto develop them under much
slighter stimuli than were needed for the parents. The
animals inherit only such capabilities,only such capital, as
.can be organised in their bodilyframework. But in man's
case the achievementsof one generationare laid up for the
use of another: and the individualentersupon a great inheri-
tance of potential wealth, the secret of employingwhich is
entrustedto him by tradition fromhis forefathers. This is
the true heredityin human culture: and not any imaginary
localisation of categoriesand ideas in the lobes of the brain,
such as the last and grotesquestphase of the hypothesisof
innate ideas would ask us to believe. From this objective
cornucopia of mental and moral wealth man fills his own
individual cup: but, in so doing,he is but drawing fromthe
bank monty which he and his kind deposited there, and
using it, if he uses it well, so as to increase the numberof
talents, if ill, so as to diminishthe capital of humanity.
A similar conclusion had been brought home, and in a

more strikinglyreal-way, by the lessons which had been
drawn from statistical researches, especially as prosecuted
since the third decenniumof the presentcentury. A quiver-
ing horror passed over society as it read in the pages of
Buckle that in a fairly large given population the yearly
number of births,deaths, and mnarriages, of crimes, of sui-
cides, and even of unaddressedletterswhich foundtheirway

to the Post-6ffice, remained without any noteworthyvaria-
tion from one year to another. Even those familiarwith
the adage in the poet-Sine Cerereet Liberofriget Venus-
were farless deeplyimpressedwith the law thus expounded
than when it was stated in the shape of a tolerablyconstant
ratio between the cost of a bushel of wheat and the yearly
number of weddings. There is a tribute,-so the founderof
moral statisticsis never weary of repeating-which iiiankind
pays with more regularitythan what it owes to the treasury
of the state: the tributewhich it pays to crime. Year after
year the same crimes,the same punishments,it is asserted,
reappear with alarming uniformity in each country,in each
group of human beings living under similar conditions. It
seemed as if there were a fixedtale of victimsset apart every
Christmas to be offeredin the course of next year on the
altars of Hymen or of Libitina. And whereas Siissmilch,
who, a centuryago, called attentionin Germany to these
uniformitiesin the birth, death and marriage rates, had
used them to illustratethe doctrinethat Providence did all
things with mathematical accuracy,the new school rather
left an impression that a horrid Moloch ruled the destinies
of mankind. What the theologians had called God, the
scientificmetaphysicians styled cosmic forces and natural
laws. A gruesome Setebos, who cared nothing for indivi-
duals but only for the kind, and who, as paleontology had
illustrated,had but slight sympathyeven with any kind,
seemed to be the only god left to sport with this lower
world.
The statistical theoristsproposed to clear the way for a
science of social man, by gettingrid of the objectionthat the
acts of individuals are not amenable to calculation. They
offeredproof that by observingthese acts over a sufficiently
large group-especially a group possessing political,national
or social uniformity-we should find that the acts due to
individuals are one year in quantity and quality merelya
repetition of what they had been the year before. The
greaterthe mass of individualsobserved,the more individual
peculiarities both physical and mental are obliteratedin a
general average or mean. Such an average man (homme
moyen)is the proper subject of all social propositions. The
acts which were specially selected for observationwere the
criminal statisticsof a country,the lists of suicides, and the
numbers of marriages. There are few available statistics
for good actions: but by a remarkableapplication of meta-
physical subtleties,Buckle argued that, the sum of human
action being constant,a plus on the bad side must be com-

pensated by a minus on the good side. As for marriages

there may be some doubts as to the place they should have
in the classification: but here the ingenious theoristsfound
a point which theydid not let slip. "If thereis one circum-
stance in life," said Quetelet,who is quoted with admiring
acceptance by his followers," where a man has most inte-
rest in acting circumspectlyand using all the power of his
free-will,it is unquestionablywhen he proposes to marry."
But with the marriage-listsbefore us, it is clear that this
free-willcounts fornothing.
This referenceto free-willdoes not seem particularlyhappy.
However necessarycircumspectionmay be in theoryforthose
bent on matrimony,it is probablynot verylargelyexercised:
and even if it were, though it might lead to some difference
in the persons chosen, it would barelyaffectthe numbersof
the unions. Landor at 36, though theoreticallyaware that
marriage unrolsthe awful lot of numberless generations,"
at once declares " I'll marryher " when he sets eye upon a
young lady at a ball, and carries out his whim. And many
people probablywould echo the gentlemanin Miss Austen's
novel: " I was in the middlebeforeI knew that I had begun".
It seems even more pitifulto speak of the free-willof the
criminaland the suicide. Without probingvery deeplythe
mysteriesof these dark chambers in human history,it may
be said that, unless free-willmerely means the absence of
externalcompulsion,the criminaland the suicide,apart from
the not infrequentcases where he is the victimof disease,
passion and intoxication,rather driftsin semi-fatalismto-
wards his miserable goal than actively purposes and pre-
determinesit. If such statisticsprove anything,it is rather
that in the ordinaryrun of life " volitionis extremelyrare:
nearlythe whole of the practical lifeof man is and has ever
been transacted by an unconscious force'" (The Alternattive,
p. 385). Though even this may be going beyond the evi-
dence.
It should be added that the amazing uniformity sometimes
alleged to appear in the yearlybudget of crimeswas conside-
rably overstated; that the limits of variationwere wide, and
that much depended upon the manipulationof the tables of
data. It should still more 'be added that such deviations
were to be expected, so long as the acts tabulated were
known at least to depend on certainconditions,whichvaried
in some cases apart fromhuman interference, but in others
were distinctlymodifiable by it, There is no doubt, for
example, that an abundant vintage means an increase of
crime of one kind: that a failure in the harvest means

increase of anotherkind of crime. And as to the modifying

power of legislation,there is as little doubt that the social
condonation which,e.g., attends suicide removes a powerful
stimulus against the act, and rendersany formal legislation
perfectlynugatory.
But even with such drawbacks,enough remains to make
it clear that individualismhas not the whole bundle of keys
to the secretof man. Man must not be studied in isolation
from his surroundings. Living in a community,he volun-
tarily renounces a part of his individuality,to become a,
fractionof a great bodywhich also has its life and its various
phases. " It is," adds Quetelet, " the portioinof his indivi-
dualitywhich has been thus put in pledge that ultimately
regulates the chief social phenomena. It determines the
customs,requirements,and national spiritof a people. And
the regularityremarkedin the series of events must be attri-
buted not to the wills of individuals,but to the habitudes of
that concrete being we call a people and regard as endued
with a will of its own and ways which it is reluctant to
change." In normal circumstancesthe average man may
be describedas the child of his people. The explanation of
his actions,his beliefs,his rules, is not to be sought in him,
but in the collective being from which he derives them.
Alike forgood or forevil, the average man-and it is of him
that science can most obviouslytreat-is only an exponent
of the tendencies and wishes prevalent in the medium to
which he belongs. The criminal,in this light,is seen to be
the productof a diseased society: a societywhich has the
same longings,the same estimatesof worth,as the thiefand
the murderer,but has not the same temptations and the
same constraints. The good man, too, owes half his good-
ness to the sympatheticopinionin which he lives, and which
bears him up into heights of sacrificeand charitywhich his
unassisted,energieswould never reach. Man is not an inde-
pendent monad in the world: he and the societyin which
he is set are bound by chains of habit, by a tendency to
persist in statu quto,a power of inertia which whenever the
will is dormant carries on the movementwhich it has with
mechanical repetition,and even strugglesagainst the will
which seeks to alter it. It is thus evidentthat ethics cannot
stand independentof politics. Hence everysoul which has
found what it deems higher truth seeks by an instinct of
self-preservation to form an association, to founda brother--
hood,-feeling that unless it can stand strongin the sympathy
of a band, it will soon fall back into accustomed paths.
Hence the powerlessnessof legislationwhich can onlyattack

230 ]ETHICS AND SOCIOLOGY.
an isolated offence: hence the omnipotenceof an education

which can create a tone of character and mode of feeling
withwhich the beneficialagencies of law will findthemselves
in harmony.
It is scarcely to be wondered at if these considerations

tended to shake the conventional methods of ethics out of
the steady grooves in which they had run for more than a
century. English moral philosophyhad cut itselfcompletely
offfromthe two great ethical thinkersof the 17th century.
ilobbes had the honour of having his main political and
moral theses condemned not long after his death by the
University of Oxford: and Cudworth had to sustain the
more emphatic condemnation which the practical under-
standing of his country casts upon the metaphysician.
lHobbes unfortunately wrote under the tension caused by an
age in which the all-consumingfireof partisanship turned
both writerand reader into polemics ratherthan studentsof
truth: and Cudworth made the mistake of supposing that
the most idealist of philosophies,and that an ancient system,
could come home to the needs of modernEngland. Yet it
is not too much to say that calm examinationof Hobbes and
Cudworth might have prevented much tedious iterationof
moral commonplacesin the literatureof the 18th century.
Ethical thought,however,took anotherdirection,at least
in England. It rejected the attempt made by Hobbes to
base ethical obligationson the authorityof a sovereignpower
in the commonwealth,as well as the attempt made by Cud-
worthto show them foundedin an intelligentorderof things
anteriorand superiorto human affairs. The moralistsfrom
Locke and Butler down to the second quarter of the present
centurymade it their main care to steer clear of metaphy-
sics, and to keep up no more than a minimum contact with
theologyand jurisprudence. This was a natural recoil from
the Scholastic amalgamation between the Christian graces
and the heathenvirtues: and no less a recoil fromthe hybrid
progenyof ethics and jurisprudence,which under the name
of Natural Law commendeditselfto the philosophersof the
Continent. The English moralists took up a definite,if
somewhat narrow, problem. They discussed the abstract
question of the principlesin the individualman which enable
him to distinguishbetween rightand wrong,and which lead
him to pursue the formerand avoid the latter. How is a
man by himselfto decide what is right? And why is he to
do what is right?
The answers to these questions divide last-centurymoral-

ists into two groups: the Utilitariansand the Intuitionalists,

as they are generally called. The Utilitarians sought to
establish that the true test of right or wrong conduct is,
whetherit conduces or not to the happiness of human beings.
The moral sentimentsseem no doubt to have another rule:
but it will be found that they soon learn to reserve their
approbationforwhat is useful,and theirdisapprovalforwhat
is injuriousto the community. In earlierstages of the theory
it was supported by theological presuppositions. Apparent
exceptionswere got over by the reflectionthat althoughcer-
tain kinds of good conduct had no obvious usefulnessin,the
presentworld,they were still advantageous in consideration
of the bounteous rewards awaiting theirauthorsin the world
to come. But graduallyas the theorywas secularised,it was
laid down as a general principlethat the meritof what were
commonlyregardedas good and virtuous actions was based
on the preponderance of advantage which the prescribed
conduct would in the long-run secure for the best interests
of the great majority of human beings. The problem of
moralityseemed at last simplifiedand broughtto a workable
test. Some doubts mightbe raised as to what were the best
interests of human beings: but they were settled by an
appeal to the general uniformityalleged to exist in the
common estimate on these matters. The suggestion made
by the theorywas at any rate all in favour of progress and
reform. Utilitarianism demands continuous adaptation of
ordinancesand beliefsto needs. No dignity,however sacred
or august, however ready to take its stand on unquestioned
and superhuman authority,can conceal its weakness when
required to produce as credentialsa proof that the world is
ascertainably the better for it. But utilitarianism often
brought hardships in the train of its exceeding haste to
remove abuses. And that not merelythrough the common
error which makes the advanced philanthropistthink he
knowswhat is good forothersbetterthan those othersknow
themselves. Benevolent despotism,were it otherwiseright,
is but a secondary evil. There is another and deadlier
source of mischief.
The experientialprocessthroughwhich beliefsand institu-
tions have been establishedis oftenthe slow ingatheringof
ages: and the transientindividualis seldom in a position to
estimate fairlythe weight of the testimonyin their favour.
So much in social growthhas been due to forces operating
beyond the ken of consciousnessor memory,-forcesofwhich
an analytic estimate would require, and probably in most
cases exceed, the utmostresourcesof logic and computation.

The utilitarian,anxious to have nothing held sacred except

what can bring objectivewitnesses on its behalf,is only too
likely, as human nature goes, to forgetthat he has not a
'dry light' of impartiality,but is firedwith a zeal which,
howeverhonest in abstractprofessions,is liable to the attrac-
tion of personal prejudices. He is guided by the maxim
which if good in law is questionable in logic: De non appa-
rentibuset de nonexistentibus eadem,estratio. What he could
not detect by his means of observation,that he denied to
exist. He elevated his single powers into a standard of non-
existence. His principle may have been abstractlyjust, but
it could only be applied under the guidance of historical
analysis, and with due regardto the complex constituentsof
human nature. Instead of looking at the mattersof morals
and religion as so many things in juxtaposition,he had to
learn that theywere held togetherby real though indiscern-
ible ties, and that one portion could not be harmlesslydis-
severed fromanother. The want of such a perception that
a delicate sympathybeats through every fibre of human
association made the older utilitariansharsh and sometimes
vulgar in theirmethods.
To some minds probablyit was even a graver charge that
the utilitariantheorydid away with the fixitywhich was at
least in theoryassociated with the recognisedmoral distinc-
tions. Right and wrongseemed to be made dependenton a
mere difference of weight when consequences were laid in
the scales of the balance: and even if the consequenceswere
professedlygeneral averages, it might be urged that they
were probablysubject to periodicvariations,or even in some
cases to revolutions. But such a complaint,thoughprobably
legitimate against occasional applications,is invalid against
the principleof the method. It is an external and casual
limitationof the utilitarianprinciplewhich stops it shortat
those partial or temporaryutilitieswhich we call expediency.
The horizon of utilitycan be pushed out beyond the limita-
tions of a particular time or place: it can transcend the
bounds fixedby individual fancyand desire,and make itself
conterminouswith the furthestconceivable limits of the dis-
tant and the future. Yet when it thus looks at human actions,
and approximatesto that 'idea
as it were stubspeciecdte7nitatis,
of goodness' which Plato made the ultimatecanon of con-
duct, it may be questioned whether it has not changed the
basis of its character, and surreptitiouslyappropriatedthe
note of idealism.
The othertheoryof last centurywhich attemptedto justify
the beliefin moral distinctionswas that of a Moral Sense or

-ETHICS AND, SOCIOLOGY. 233
Conscience. Man, accordingto this view,possessed a special

and original power of distinguishingright and wrong-a
spark of the divinelight,which,if he onlykept his eyes open,
would always show the right path. Against this infallible
arbiter.within the breast,no merelyoutward authority,no
argumentationwhich failed to alter conviction,could count
as worth anything. And yet the believer in such a sense
must sometimesconfesshimselfwithoutany test to markoff
the voice of God within him fromthe suggestionsof mere
impulse. The rightsof conscience easily became a cloak for
a motleymass of motives. Selfishinterestscan scarcelyever
be proved absent: and oftenthe so-called intuitionsof con-
science are merelythe reflexionof judgments-currentin the
social stratumto which the individualbelongs. And so far
as the theoryasserted that the individual soul had a sure
light discerningmoral good fromevil,it stated what practice
showed to be untrue. Individual man is no more infallible
in moral than in otherjudgments: his isolated verdicts can
no more be accepted as decrees in one case than in the
other.
The advocates of the theoryreallyhad their eye on two
points,not always in veryclose or necessaryconnexionwith
each other. The one was that moral good and evil are not
arbitraryor esoteric distinctions,but rest upon a common
and permanentelementof human nature,and that therefore
this fundamentalnature,commonto all men, must be able
to detect their existence. The doctrineof an innate con-
science was an asseverationthat right and wrongare due to
no metaphysical subtleties or scientificreasonings,and are
derived from no merely historical facts, but are the very
characteristicwork of humanity, the seal and symbol of
man's place in the universe. The second point was that in
judgments upon human conduct, no less than in the pro-
cesses which lead up to action,there is abundant room and
frequentneed fora tact or delicacy of discrimination,of an
intuitiveunderstanding, which does not admitof formulation
in rules, and cannot supportitselfon strictsyllogisms. The
theory,in short,was an awkwardrecognitionof one feature
common to aestheticwith moral judgments. Art and the
conduct of liferequire more than the powers of abstraction
and analysis which are commonlyheld sufficient forscience.
For the great bulk of mankindthe validityof theirmoral as
of their asthetic principles must depend, not on their scien-
tificacquaintance with the principlesof art and morals,but
on constant familiarityand contact with great and good
examples, on the generationin them of a moral and cesthetic
16

taste which instinctivelyrecoilsfromevil and aspires to live

with the fairand good. Both require a power of looking at
things as a whole and in the concrete; because ars longa,
vita brevisest-because the analysis of science lingers and
conductpresses fordecision.
While what precedesis more especiallytrue of the moral
sense, Conscience has a peculiar featureof great historical
moment. And that is its referenceto a moral law, and to
the idea of duty. Conscience is describedas the vice-gerent
of God-the witness in man to a law which governs the
moral world. The sense of dutyis the recognitionthat every
act, instead of standing alone, is confronted,as soon as it
emerges into being, with the laws of a great spiritual king-
dom, of which man, as a reasonable being,is a citizen, and
to whose general aims and regulationshe is bound to con-
form. It is this feelingof a higher and better world,of a
truer self,which conscience bears evidence to. Here man
findsa safeguardagainst petty claims, temporaryperturba-
tions, human weaknesses: here in the conceptionof a uni-
verse, to which everyact must be relative and subordinate,
the human soul seeks a law to limitits extravagancesand to
consolidateits effortsafterright. But such a view of con-
science foundlittle supportamongstEnglish moralists.
Yet the theoryof Conscience kept alive the truththat no
act can count as moral which does not spring from the
heart: that mere argumentsare powerless in morals what-
ever they may avail in science: that 'in morals the soul must
feel itself in immediate contact with and direct vision of
goodness. It failedto show, however,that this immediacy
of presence does not come without preparation. And of
most applicationsof the termconscienceit may be said, that
the appeal to its authorityis a protestof the partyin posses-
sion, the beati possidentesin a man, against the new candi-
dates forreceptioninto his mind. Very early in the growth
of consciousness in most men, the character settles into a
conditionof stable equilibrium,or of adaptation to the im-
mediate environment. The mind becomes moulded in a
stereotypedformwhich resists any attemptat modification.
The reaction of this fixedselfagainst new influencesis what
we call conscience. H Hence, fromthe instinctiverepugnance
to anythingstrange to its old tone, its manifestationsare
chieflyin the way of negation and objection. In this attitude
lies both its strengthand its weakness. It is too apt to take
a strangerforan enemy. Its true functionis ratherto warn
than to judge: it notes discordance and inconsistency,and
excites wakefulness: and the harmony to be secured may

occasionallycome not by rejectingthe new, but by showing

that the strangeris only a friendin disguise.
Both of these schools were essentiallyproductsof a Pro-

testantand criticalage. The theoryof Conscience neglected
the supplementarydoctrine that the Church in its catholic
unityis the depositoryof truth,and that the whole body of
the faithfulmust afforda correctiveto the idiosyncrasiesof
the single believer. The driticaltheoryof Utilityforgotthat
in a creative aiid organic age much takes place which has
not legitimateditselfby registeringits birthon the records
of memory. Hence a reaction came against the somewhat
theologicalhypothesisof a fixedconscience,with its depend-
ence upon an abstractand impersonallaw of duty,as well as
against the dryand mechanical conceptionof utility,which
neglected,or seemed to neglect,as unaccountableand absurd
much that the finestsensibilitiesof mankindheld dear. Men
were weary of the excessive individualismwhich left men
isolated in the universe subject only to the awful voice of
duty on one hana or to the calculations of utilityon the
other. Human lifewas afterall somethingin and foritself,
-not merelya series of actions subservientto various uses,
and not merely a table of examples intended to illustrate
eternallaws.
The change in the conceptionof human lifewas heralded
by a new tone in the poets. The moralising and didactic
tone gave place to a freerand more catholic spirit which
sought sympathyoutside the region of proprietyand had
other ideals than improvementand edification. The very
moral came to be the sign of limitation: the moralist stood
in contrastto the concrete human being: and moral philo-
sophy itselfwas replaced by Ethics as the more comprehen-
sive term. The signs of the coming emancipationfromthe
narrowingb divisionswhich the religiousand politicalschisms
of the 16th and 17th centurieshad branded into the verylife
ofmen were seen alreadyin the yearsimmediatelyantecedent
to the French Revolution. The dawn of a humanitywhich
was neither Church nor Dissent, neither monarchical nor
anti-monarchical,was apparentboth in the mild and hesitant
accents of Cowperand in the fierierand morefitfulutterances
of Burns. But the new spirit scarcelygained articulateex-
pression of its own aspirations and aims till the time of
Wordsworth and Shelley. And even in them the old anti-
thesis revived: and neitherheard the fullnotes of the music
of humanity. The echoes of ancient conscience reverberate
throughthat worldof nature whereWordsworthtaught man

to be at home: the sentencesof the moral law are written

on the ancient hills; the birds sing and the flowersbloom
to gladden,to purifyand to strengthenthe heart of man.
And Shelley,with all his bright and passionate absorption
in the lifeof clouds and skylarks,is hauntedby the perplexing
memoryof the old strugglebetween the tyrannyof ancient
custom and the nascent rightsof human tendernesses. For
the fullestutteranceof the change which was coming over
men's minds we must go to Goethe,who, as he watched and
waited throughthe phases of contest and victory,of vagary
and resoluteendeavour,between the old world and the new,
seemed forthe time to concentratein himself and to mould
in plastic outlines the sympathetictide which was swelling
and swayingthroughwesternEurope.
It was with a lightheart that the enthusiasticgeneration
which had grownup in the fosteringairs of the Revolution
went down into the open plain where the freedomof nature
replaced the law of duty,and where the demand for utility
was hushed in the presence of fullenjoyment. They seemed
to gain release fromthe toilsomerestrictionsof humanity,
an entrance into "an ampler ether, a diviner air". The
watchwordsof the new school were Nature and Romance:
at firstthe two seemed not inconsistent. The unity of
existencewas loudly affirmed against the old logical distinc-
tions which had come to mean real separations. Man was
to be studiednot as unique, as isolated fromthe restof crea-
tion, but as at best an elder brotherin the grand familyof
animate nature. The line which had hithertodivided his-
tory fromphysics, ethics fromphysiology,was doomed to
obliteration. The natural world was declared to have a
historyno less than the spiritual: laws, institutions,language
and religionto have theirgrowthas well as plants: to speak
of the formeras made by man to be as meaningless as to
assert it of the latter., Here was reaction against the fancy
that the forms encirclingman's life are due to conscious
ingenuity,and that by a bold stroke reversingthe line of
historicalgrowthit was possible to carrymen on vast lengths
-in the path of progress. It was felt that individual effort,
even when in the hands of a lawgiverand wieldingthe force
of an empire, was weak against nature and destiny. The
giganticforcesdirectedby a Napoleon had shiveredto pieces
when they came directlyinto collision with the Olympian
powers of Nationality.
Coming on the back of these impressions,the suggestion
that man in his presentcondition representsthe result of a
struggleforexistence,in which he has stood the bruntof the

battle better than his animal compeers, does not at first

sight promise much help to a theory of ethics. The law
which the process of lifeshows to be the prevailinglesson of
nature is that weakness is the chief sin, and strengththe
chiefvirtue. The evolutionof the formsofanimateexistence
has been a silentbut solemn discourseillustratingthevarious
texts of the gospel of force; and any moral which can be
inferredfrom the spectacle is the morality of egoism.
Moralitythus collapses in the single virtueof prudence,and
self-regarding prudence. To help the weak, to relieve the
suffering, to teach the ignorant,would be to run counterto
the law of nature which leaves them to die. Intelligence,
recognisingthe general tendency by which the less highly
endowed abandon the fieldto theirsuperiors,would conform
man's action to this truth, and not attempt to alter the
course ofnatural events.
Or, if the main emphasis were laid upon the apparently
accidental character of the process by which the several
interactionsbetween cosmical circumstancesand a germof
lifelodgedin some rudimentaryorganismslowlyaccumulated
their effectsto produce the man of to-day,a new intensity
mightbe given to the fatalisticcreed which treats man as
the irresponsibleproductof the physical aggregate. Nature
,is then presented-not as a Goshen of romanceand freedom,
but as a prison where it is fruitlessto knock against the
bars:-as a compact structurewhere the inflexiblechain of
causation binds event to event. Consciousness,and with it
the sense of freedom,is treated as a mere illusion, which
plays upon the surface,but has no effectupon the movement
of the machinery which drives on blindly until it has
exhausted itselfin finalcollapse. Man, like otherthings in
the field of phenomena, cannot move except because some-
thingelse has moved-or instead of saying that he acts, we
should say that he has been acted upon. Or, in the words
of a deterministof the pre-scientificperiod: "The man
differsfromthe kn-ife as the iron candlestickdiffersfromthe
brass one: he has one more way of being acted upon. This
additional way in man is motive: in the candlestick is
magnetism." Mind in short was treated as a name for
certain occasional phenomena-no doubt somewhat unac-
countable-which accompaniedthe natural processes; and it
was denied otherinfluencethan that of interpreterbetween
the social arrangementswhich had been the outcome of
evolution,and the individualwho foundhimself,by no act of
his, planted in theirmidst.
Metaphysically,again, the idea of Evolution gave a new

aspect to the old quarrel between mechanical causation and

teleology. It left no place for the theory of a conscious
designer,an intelligentmindplanningbeforehandthe course
of the universe: but it emphasised more than ever the
relativityof everydetail in the universeto everyother and
to the whole. It set aside forever the beliefthat man had
been the constant aim of the providence of a utilitarian
deity: but it taughtthat a boundless varietyof phenomena,
naturallycame upon examination to present themselvesas
and developmentof a governingprinciple.
the differentiation,
Everywhere therewas evidence of a power of rectification
and self-adjustment in the universe: a universalvismedictatrix
natturae. Even so-called inanimate matter seemed as if it
must be conceived investedwith some powers analogous to
life,to will, perhaps to thought. Thus a principleof life-
or a moreelementaryand comprehensiveprinciplethan life-
(" Wer darf ihn nennen? Und wer bekennen ? ")-keeps up
perpetual correlationand sympatheticconcurrencebetween
the successive and coexistent constituentsof the cosmic
process. Mere juxtaposition and sequence are replaced by
more intimateunity in the bosom of a potenttotality. The
consensus offunctionsand interdependenceofparts were so
patent in all provinces of nature that metaphysiciansseized
upon the hint to modernise their theories: and in Hart-
mann's philosophy the waning speculation of Germany
provided,under the title of the Unconsciobs,an ontological
basis forthe conceptionsofthe biologist. As consciousness
had been driven fromthe fieldof adaptation,it was natural
for those who looked upon mind as a late product of
evolution,to introducethis picturesquelygloomy Power to
give a sort of blind directionand unityto the process which
made the wishes of individualssubserve the great interests
of the kind.
Apart fromthese metaphysicalinferencesfromthe theory
of Evolution, there were others'more intimatelyrelated to
ethics. Instead of fixed and absolute moral distinctions,it
seemed to suggest a gradual process in the discovery of
morality,a slow and intermittentemergence of moral con-
ceptions,coming out into clearer outlines,and extendingto
applications at firstuindreamedof. Morality was evidently
niotthe equipmentofthe primitivebarbarian,but a growing
and increasingideal which was formedin humanityitself,
and moulded itselfupon the lines laid down by the require-
ments of society. Its fundamentalfact was the sociality
of man, and its developmentconsisted in successive disco-
veries of the relationshipswhich that fundamentalfactin-

volved,and in layingbare the conditionsof social well-being.
At firstthese conditions were but roughly and sometimes
even erroneouslyconceived. But as lifegrew more complex
and ofricher content,and as knowledge increased,the per-
ception of these conditions revealed a greaternumber,and
definedthemwith greateraccuracy.
In these considerationsit is tacitlyimplied that in ethics
we have somethingspeciallyhuman; a province as it were
set apart fromthe general economyof nature. Within the
charmed circle of a society,the strugglefor existence was
temporarilyat least reducedto peace: though it still raged
outside in the relations between differentsocieties. On the
day when man, fromthe needs of physical existence, was
drivento combine with his fellows into a society,he turned
his back upon nature, and laid the foundationsof a new
kingdom. The societyat firsthad narrow limits,and was
tainted by exclusiveness. But in its essential germ,it had
the promise of great things. It had broken the ban of
nature, which lays down self-seekingas its law. And this
radical change in the attitudetowardsthe problemof lifeis
dependent upon the entrance of a new faculty upon the
scene, the power of conscious intelligence. By its means
thereis formedthe idea of a totalityof which the individual
is a member. He learns that he is not for himself,but for
somethingwhich includes and dominates himself: an idea,
at firstsomewhatconfusedwith his own and otherpersonal
interests,but capable of being made more and more clear.
The recognitionof this dependenceof the individual upon a
permanent something in which he findsthe central prin-
ciple of his being is the characteristicnote of morality.
He has more ways than one of describingit. He may
speak of it as the reason that is within him, the voice of
conscience,the sense of duty,the subordinationof the lower
nature in man to the higher; his true self as opposed to the
temporaryinstincts and changingphases which pass across
his consciousness. Yet if it is himself,in another sense it
is not himself: but something divine, and universal, a
commonhumanity,an epiphanyof the divine. Or, he may
describe the bond of his allegiance as due to the social
community,to the state,to the body politic. It is in the
ordinances of the society that he finds the most tangible
expressionof conditionson which his life as a human being
depends,the standardforrepressingaccidentaland temporary
aberrations. But these ordinances barely sufficeto mark
out the frameworkof such regulative: they varyfromtime
to time and fromcommunityto community: they are not

whollyfree fromtemptationto selfishnessand trucklingto

one-sidedimpulses any more than the court of appeal in the
individual. And hence in orderto secure a safe and stable
rule, beyondthe disturbinginfluencesof individualand par-
ticular selfishness,the standard is placed in the ideal self
which is the far-offgoal to which the whole creationmoves,
that self-subsistingunitywhich is conceived as the source
of all our moral being and as the infinitelyperfect life
towards which the gradual enlightenmentof humanityis a
constanteffortof approximation. From one point of view
the moral progressof humanity is the gradual unveilingof
God; just as fromanotherit has been called a becominglike
unto God.
But of these three points of view, which place the moral
centre respectivelyin the reasonable self,in the social com-
munity,and in God, the last as it were keeps in the back-
ground as the ultimate arbiter, and does not enter as a
factor into the process. He is the last judge, not the
immediate referee: still less a party in the contest. He
works through the two subordinate principles, his two
visible representatives,the state and the individual reason:
neither impeccable, and yet both indispensable. Through
means of the communitythe selfishinvolutionof the intel-
lect is in part removed: theregrows up by slow degreesthe
distinctionbetween what is forindividual interestand what
is for the common weal. At firstnaturally with many
drawbacks: for the common weal is readily identifiedwith
the interestof the strongerand dominantpart of the com-
munity,and it is only gradually that these anomalies are
discovered,and still more graduallythat they are set right.
And even when the inequalities within the state have been
removed,they operate between differentstates, where par-
ticularism still has its place. Laws indeed to a certain
extenthold good with some uniformity even beyondnational
and state linmits:there are fundamentalpointsof agreement,
forexample,between the civil and criminalcodes of different
countries. But political divisions keep up to a considerable
degreethe old inequalityof special and privateinterests:and
with these political divisions the religious oftengo hand in
hand. All ofthese influencesinterferewith the fullrealisa-
tion of the true centre and universal source of human life;
they prevent the revelation of the universalityof human
nature in a complete brotherhoodof all men. If morality
begins with the love of the brotherwhom we have seen, it
culminatesin the love of God whom we have not seen: ifit
begins with the recognition however imperfect of the

solidaritybetween man and man, in some limited degree,

it must ascend to the recognitionof a great brotherhoodof
all times and generations,an ideal and abidingfoundationin
which we live and move and have our being.
It is underthe stimulusofsocialitythat the moralinstincts
are awakened. There is abundant evidence that the sense
of duty,and the voice of conscience,owe their contentsand
even peculiaritiesof formto the mediumin which theygrow
up. But the same may be said of intellectualand mesthetic
judgments no less than of moral. It is underthe influence
of distinctions already fixed in language that the child
perceives the individual objects of sense around him: he
entersupon the inheritanceof a classificationthat has been
graduallymade. And that classificationitselfwas originally
due to the co-operationof individual minds,correctingtheir
inequalities and peculiarities. The development in every
sphere of activityand cultureis under the sanction and the
control of the body politic. The individual movement is
subject to the conditionof recognisingthe common will or
judgment as an essential element. No scientificproposition,
for example, will dare to pretend independence of general
assent fromall who can understandit. But nobody would,
therefore,assert that its authorityis derivedfromthe social
acceptance which attendsit. And so in morals. Here too,
authority may lay down duties: and these derive their
sanctionfromthe forceofthe collectivebody:-just as certain
pseudo-scientificdogmas derive it from the same power.
But the moral obligations strictlyso-called do not derive
their authorityfromsociety,though the quasi-legal enforce-
ment of those obligationsis firstexercisedby society. Their
moral characterdepends on the recognitionby the reason of
their essentialityto what is foundto be the higher kind of
life. They are arrived at through experience-social ex-
perience; but they pre-suppose a form or category-the
legislativeattitudeand power of reason,whichis filledup and
realised in experience.
But while we recognisethe essentialityof the social factor
in everyaspect of human development,it is needfulto enter
a protestagainst a tendencyto hypostatiseit into a separate
power overagainstindividualman. That thereis antagonism
between societyand the individualis obvious. For, on one
hand, the so-called societymay reallybe an exclusive associa-
tion of which the individualis not strictlyspeaking a mem-
ber: its laws, to which he is subjected,are then the laws of
an alien body. And, on anotherhand, the societyrepresents
an average of opinionfromwhich the individual to a greater

or less extent diverges,and an accumulation of experience

to which he has not attained. In the latter case, its action
upon him is peedagogic: it exercisesan educational function.
Still even here the relationis that between the elder and the
youngergeneration,between the majorityand the minority.
And while, during the one stage of life,the individuals are
initiated into the existinglaws or mysteriesof the craftof
the commonlife,in the other they are supposed to be active
in carryingon these laws a step farther. The social laws,
though they present themselves at first as antagonist to
personal prejudice,are still the workof originativeindividual
wills which make themselvesthe spokesmena.nd leaders of
theircommunity. It is onlybecause theypresentthemselves
as contraryto selfishwishes, and as acceptedwithoutdistinct
consciousnessof their origin,that they seem to spring from
a more than individualand even more than human source.
The workofmoralisationdoes not stop shortat adaptation
to existingconditions: it is not merelyan'adjustment of the
individual to the formsand laws which he findsprevailing.
Fo8rthe structuralarrangementof society, and the conse-
quent mould in which the conceptions of human life must
presentthemselves,have beeR the workof accident; not the
creation of free wills co-operatingequally and fairly,but
partiallythe effectsof despotismand violence,of superstition
and ignorance. The social organismwhich would give the
basis of moralitymust be sought elsewhere than on earth:
it lies, as Plato said, as a patternin heaven. The conscious-
ness of true unityand continuitybetween the individualsof
a societywas found(even in a nation otherwiseheadless and
disunited) realised in the faith in the national gods, the
powers who held ultimnatesanction over the fabricof social
materials,and in whom there-was a shadow fromthe con-
suming fire of tyranny,and a shelter from the storm of
anarchy. In actual forms of social union this consoling
sense of the supremacy of right is scantly present; and,
therefore, instead of assigningto the moralistthe provinceof
deducing the merit of the virtuesfromtheir power of con-
tributingto the welfare of the social structure,it is well to
note that the social fabric is the creation of individual
agencies, that it is Itrgely an object for correction and
improvement,and above all that the social organism,when
taken forthe standard of ethics is an idea, and has yet to be
carriedout into fact. I
The conceptionof the social organismis derivedfromthe
recent researchesof biology. The microscopeabout half a
century ago revealed the fact that animal and vegetable

ETHICS AND SOCIOLOdY. 243
bodies consisted of cells, each of which surroundedby its

enclosingwall had an independent existence,whilst it was
also conjoinedwith othersinto complex fabrics,or tissues,
and thus helped to make up the several organs of the body.
Here then was a structure apparently single which yet
embracedwithinit a numberof separate beings. And what
was true of cells, was similarlytrue of the several organs.
"We must look upon the body," say Virchow, " as an organ-
ism of many members, animated throughout: each of its
parts works as part of a mrachine,and yet each ofthem at
the same time has the life,the reason of its action in itself.
Many lives are combined in one collective life: many
separate existenceswith independentcapacity of living and
acting are placed in mutual interdependence." A hint was
thus givenfor interpretingafreshthe old analogybetween
the individualman and the social structure. Human beings
were treatedas cells in a social organism,as at once depen-
dent and independent: the organismwas supposed to have
or be the collective intelligencewhich governedthe actions
of its elementaryparts. An attemptwas even made to find
an analogue to the tissues in the new conception of a social
organism: but the exponents of the doctrine are hardly
agreed as to what this analogue preciselyis. At any rate,
therewas a reversalinthe old view: forthereal lifeand central
forceof societywas supposedto inherein the collectivebody,
and the individualsretainedonly a fragmentary existence.
It was admitted,indeed, that analogy would find the best
parallel to the social organismin the lower formsof animal
life, where each segment turns into a separate existence
when divided fromthe parent. For it seems clear that in
the social organism separationof a part does not implythe
death of that part. And yet it is well not to be too dogmatic
even on this point. A highlyspecialised elementof the social
organism would barely survive if he were deprived of his
surroundingsand leftto pick up subsistenceforhimself. It
is only certainparts of the social fabricwhich can maintain
existencewhen severedfromthe parent. And in such a case
we may compare the process to reproduction. The parent
body can dischargefromitselfcertain germinalformswhich
in the shape of a colonymay preserve independentvitality.
In a highlyelaboratedsociety,where differentiation of func-
tions was carried far, not any part of the organism could
serveto make a new and independentstructure,but certainly
some portions could. We have heard the story of the
Gentleman and the Basket-maker.
But even with these admissionsthe view seems open to a

furthercriticism. Physiologytells us of the separate and in

one sense isolated structureswhich co-existin the body of a
human being. But the unityof that body lies in the con-
tinuity of life and the feeling of personal identity. This
unity is not in any way homogeneous or comparable with
the divisionand separationof materialparts. It is unaffected
by any hypothesiswhich representsthe united consciousness
as a sum of the constituentconsciousnessof the parts, or as
an illusoryunificationofthe single consciousnessof the seve-
ral moments of life. Consciousness is in its very essence
undivided: or rather it is itselfunityand the force which
keeps the divided in one. As we know it, consciousness is
connected with individually concrete human beings. A
natural tendencypromptsus to presupposea similarprinciple
of unitywhereverwe finda harmonious adjustmentof part
with part, similarto our own case. But in this transference
we are liable to error. We are apt to suppose a sort of
material unitylike that which is exhibitedin our own living
organism. We find a unity in the social structureas it
stands in quasi-materialisedformbeforeus. In reality,the
social organismof whichwe speak is a stage of consciousness
which we do not reach or recognisewithoutan effort.From
anotherpoint of view it may be called a generalisationfrom
the actual associations-family, church, state,-which we
find around us: a something which though in general
charactersresemblingthemyetat the same timecomprehends
them all. As such it exists nowhere: glimpsesof it are to
be found everywhere: but the full reality has no concrete
manifestation.
The body of the social organism is a spiritual body: it
exists in thought,and can only be realised as an idea. It is
in the firstinstance a creationof the mind, which no doubt
proceeds to give such realisationin concrete formas it can,
by the fullerorganisationof society. But afterall the per-
formancefaHissadly shortof the reality: we find onlyfrag-
ments and have to construct from them a whole. And
furtherit is fromthe individualconsciousnessthat the centre
of unitycomes: that is the true source of lifewhich goes on
extendingits range of influence,strengthenedno doubt by
the co-operationof other individual consciousnesses till it
spreads abroad in a boundless life, which may be called
divine. What happens is not that the individualsurrenders
himselfto an outside comprehensivewill, but that he gradu-
ally learns to lay aside the isolatingattachmentswhich kept
him apart, and discovers that he and others are really one.
Moral lifeis not the work of a bureaucracywhich transmits

to individuals the orders and dispositions of the central

authority of the social organism, but is the spontaneous
co-operation of individuals, enlightenedby experience and
education,towards the harmonisationof human action,the
removal of inconsistenciesand unnecessary collisions from
the path of progress.
The social organism,therefore,is an inappropriatename
for an ideal unity. Literally taken it is a fiction. Science
working with terms like these is barelyin a fitpositionto
throw stones at the Realists of the Middle Ages. A social
organism,with its organs and tissues,is a mere abstraction,
formedby the help ofanalogy,and thoughit may occasionally
be usefulas a correctiveto impatient reformerswho believe
that they can modifythe individual quite apart fromhis
environment,it is out of place as a governingprinciple of
ethics. The true value of the social organism is rather to
emphasise the need of studyingthe moral environmentof
man. This environmenthe partly finds around him, he
partlyhelps to make or modifyit. But man morallyas well
as physicallyhas great libertyof choice and change in that
environment: he can rise out of it, he can turn his back
upon it, and adopt a new social atmosphere,to some extent,
of his own. When the voice of the social environmentcomes
to him, with its "They say": his "What say they?" is
accompanied by " Let them say". The social environment
is not to be identifiedwith a social organism.
Those who use such terms must at the same time admit
the double-edgednature of theirtools. In the conceptionof
an organism,the independence and originalityof the parts
fromone point of view must be set against their dependent
and derivative place in the whole: and the supremacy of
the totality must not let us lose sight of the priorityof
its constituentelements. Otherwise we fall into the con-
fusions which attend the unwary employmentof relative
abstractions. A thorough metaphysical analysis of the
conception of whole and parts must be followed up by a
theoryof the implicationsof organic and of ideal unity. It
is in such analyses that Hegel rightlyplaced the funda-
mental problem of philosophy. But to those who have
learnedon approvedauthoritythatlHegelianismis a worthless
figment,of arbitraryconstructiveness,it is more convenient
to conjure with quasi-real and quasi-scientificphrases. The
collective will of a social organismis a phrase which slurs
over incompatibilitieswhich bafflereconciliation and pro-
cesses which cannot be easily traced. Yet the collective
action only lumps the resultants of a complex group of

actions and reactions of individual wills. It is because our

intellectual mechanics fails to calculate the result from the
partial effects,and cannot estimate the forces of sympathy
and antagonism,that we allow the collective body an influ-
ence distinctfromthe actions of the component units,plus
theirreactionsupon each other.
The phrase social organism,as used to denote the subordi-
nation of individuals to their social aggregate and the
'centralisationof their life and action in the systemof this
aggregate, is scarcely adequate to represent the ideal
character ofthe principlewhich underliesand controls the
actions of individuals. The action of a society is always
describableas a functionor peculiarly-constituted compound
of the actions of individuals. The only real agents in the
process are human individuals. It is in the individualhuman
consciousness that the process of ethics is transacted: the
action of soul upon soul takes place only indirectly,through
the medium ofphysical agencies. By the aggregateofthese
physical agencies, or externalgoods-such as human bodies,
land, machinery, -railways,churches,factories,policemen,-
the communicationbetweenhuman souls is in variousdegrees
facilitated: and as the fact that theyhave been so consti-
tuted by human needs gives the aggregate a certain unity
and interdependence,we may call the whole fabrica social
organism,and allow that in the studyof it men and women
are as much parts of it as the machineryin the mills, or the
gold in the banks. For the purposes of ethics,however,the
importantpoint is to rememberthat man, thoughhe builds
himself as a stone in this structure,is also and always the
builder and even the architect.
Only man builds in two senses. In one sense he builds as
the ants do in the ant-hill,or as the coral insects on their
rock. His works are ushered into being with the same
blindness to ends, with the same unintentionality,which
marks the processes of organic nature. Before he has time
to reflect,he is forcedinto action, and the consequences of
his action bind him for the future. In his case, as in the
rest of nature,the powers and aptitudeshe possesses tend to
formorderlysystems. But this adaptationcomes slowlyand
at much cost. Intelligence steps in to abbreviate the pro-
cess. It brings into close connexion what previously was
merely coexistent: it builds up the several elements into
unity, and thus prepares the way for exclusion of hetero-
geneous and inconsistentelements. When man can thus
constructa plan or scheme in which his works may forma
part, he works in anotherand a peculiarlyhuman way. He

is guided by ideas. To them institutionsand associations
ministerconstructivematerial. In consciousnessthe details
of a social organismare investedwith a totalitywhich they
did not have in theiractual and temporalexistence. In the
so-called real world of space and time, in the sense-world,
that organism nowhere exists full and developed: the
organismof the ethical idea has its realityfromthe reason.
The unifyingsystematisingpower of reason is that light
which neverwas on sea or land,-it is the consecrationwhich
thoughtgives to the world. In the sensuous realitywe see
one thing and we see another: but it is mind which places
causation, which with increasing energy traces connexions
betweenwhat time and place have separated,and refersthem
to a governingunity. Such governingunityof the existing
materials and forces-the unity which the vulgar eye,
engrossed and absorbed in its own special range, fails to
recognise-is what is called an idea. As the verytruth of
the particulars fromwhich it emerges,it serves by its very
contrastwith the fragmentsas they exist to suggestreforms
to fillup the gaps.
To discoverthis unityis the discoveryof the true self. It
involves an act which may be variouslydescribedas abstrac-
tion, as reflection,as self-knowledge. The mind has to
detach itselffromits temporaryand accidental individuality
and to liftitself into its universal element. Intelligence,in
orderto be free and conscious, so as to act with originative
force,must withdrawback from and carryitself beyond its
embodiment in concrete interests. The soul that is to
discern the true spiritof the times,the real possibilities of
action, must retire fora while fromthe stage of life. The
real freedomof will-the power of absolute initiative-must
be purchased by self-renunciation. The giftof inspiration-
which is but another name forthe liberationof intelligence
fromits sensual bonds-comes to those and only to those
who have the heart to isolate themselvesfromthe sweep of
the current,and who surveythe mysteryof life from some
vantage groundof speculation. The soul which is to become
an agent and not a mere vehicle in the career of human
affairsmust retireinto the desert. Such withdrawalis typi-
fiedin the " fourtimesseven days" duringwhich the Buddha
remainedfastingunder the treeof knowledge," enjoyingthe
blessedness of redemption,"beforehe went and preached his
new gospel at Benares. It is typifiedno less in the marvel-
lous detachmentof Socrates in the midst of the social and
political activityofAthens.
The dawn of moralitywas the moment in the life of an

individualwhen he saw that his own selfishinterestswere

not the whole substanceof his life. The perceptionprobably
came fromsome shock when one whose lifehad been closely
bound up with his own had passed away, and he felt that
the nobler part of himselfhad gone, and that he had failed
to recognise before the grave his full fellowshipwith the
departed. For death has been at many times the revealer
of a tie which the jars and distractionsof life kept out of
sight. At such seasons in domestic lifewhen reflectionis
aroused, the whole institutionof domesticityrises up in con-
sciousness with full and vivid outlines which startle the
careless habitue'sof the social structure. It is no longer a
mere bundle of precise duties, of details going to make up
the tale of a contract,no limited specificationof points in
-which certain things are expected and required. On the
contrarythe institutionbecomes " an image of the mighty
world": it claims to be feltin everyfieldof activity,to be
the focus towardswhich all'action converges. On a larger
scale other'associations carryout the same process. They
realise in various degreesthe unityof human kind: making
the individualsno longeroutside each other,in animal inde-
pendence (moreferae), but members of a cdmmon being,
dependent on a common life,united by practice which fol-
-lows their faithin an idea,-an idea which is not seen, and
yet supports the conduct of those who " live by admiration,
hope and love ". Thus in many ways, not less in the lesser
circles of social brotherhoodthan in those greater but yet
imperfectunitiesknownas states and churches,man becomes
moral, not by the mere aggregationwhich driftshim into
these associations,but by the translationof them into ideas,
principles of universal significance,watchwords for which
lifeis to be spent and death faced ungrudgingly.
Yet all ideas embodied in institutionsare limited by their
range: the simplest and purest associations for common
aims look cdldlyon the Gentiles outside: they generatenew
and subtler selfishnesswhich hides its unsightlinessunder
the guise of an angel of light. Even on the heights of
moral grandeur,where devotionto an idea becomes sublime
and pathetic,the old enemy of the soul can whisper,"Ye
shall be as gods," and-snatch away fromhigh achievement
the gracious beauty of unselfish surrender. Asceticism,
which checks the cravings of the sensuous nature, leaves
open the door for spiritual vanity and worship of the
individual soul: and benevolence,which bestows its goods
to feed the poor, may yet want the spirit of perfectlove.
Ever must the idea be revived,in wakefulnessand recollec-

ETHICS AN) SOCIOLOGY. 249
tion, of the one ideal and universal state which is also the
one universal church; ever, "faith become a passionate in-
tuition" that the Son of Man is also the Son of God, the
heir of infiniteaspirations, which cannot be realised fully
in anything short of universal brotherhood, and in the
ultimate conformity of actions to the true reasonable life of
collectivehumanity.
Thus, if man is the portion of a system, with his place
and duties dependent upon his position, he is also the
creator of the organisation: and it is in his individual
consciousness that the dry bones of legal and social rules
gain the power of an organic and organisingidea. He is
not a mere blank sheet on which societyimprintsthe texts
which expound its interests. Too often indeed man does
little but reflecthis environment: and orthodox authority
has many means forsecuring his conformity. And for the
average human being the sense of social sympathywhen he
acts in the general interestis a useful criterionof conduct.
But even then,the individualhelps to make the verdict to
which he conforms: he is in part creator of the social
standard. And in other cases the individual may lead the
societyafterhim-especially when they see that he is free
from selfish motive and has the clear vision of reality.
There are times when the individualmust set social decisions
aside. There is an honour in the eyes of society which
stands rooted in dishonour: a social sanction which ought
to be withstood. The individual appeals from the society
which is, to the societywhich he sees by the eye of faith,
ready to be revealed: the sturdyindependent,if his inde-
pendence is foundedupon insight,comes to lay the basis of
a new social code: and even the blood of the martyrs
certifiesthe growthof the church. Always the social code
requires-if progressis to be the law of life,and if ethics as
the science of ideals is to survive-to be extended and per-
fected by continued discoveries in the immense range of
those conditionsof true human life,wherein lies the infinite
problemforhuman faculties.
The provinceof ethics thus divides into two departments.
On the one hand, thereis the theoryof individualman, first,
on his naturalside,as a subject of psychologicalinvestigation,
as a creatureofsense and emotionand desire: and, secondly,
as a reason,withthe facultyof ideas and ideals. The theory
of knowledge,of its conditionsand the evidence theybear to
a unityofprincipleunderlyingeven the senses and feelings,-
the doctrine of reason, as the ultimate formerof emotion
and shaper of action, constitutes what we may call the
17

logical and metaphysicalside of ethics. On the otherhand,

ethics has to confrontthe phenomenaof society,economical,
juridical, and religious,-to examine the relations of the
individual to the various formsof social organisation,-to
emphasise the priorityof the human idea in its totalityto
the fractionalaspects under which it appears in the indus-
trial world, in politics, in churches, and in the pursuit of
science. No preciseline can be drawn separatingthe sphere
of ethics fromthat of law or of religion. The moral nature
of man is the ultimatestandard both forthe jurist and the
theologian.
When I thus define in two directions the province of
ethics, I am reminded of one whom friendshipwould not
otherwise allow me to forget. My predecessor needs no
eulogy. But we all need encouragement and light from
those who have gone beforeus on a way which we also must
walk. And there are constant temptationsto simplifythe
work oflifeby shuttingthe eyes to everythingthat lies out-
side one clear and single duty. It is a great thingto have
the example of him who did not find it inconsistentwith
strenuous and profoundinvestigationof those so-called ab-
stract principles, on which rests the very possibility of
moralityitself,to giveearnestand sympatheticattentionto all
the social movementsin which ethical forceshows itself,and
to do what in him lay to renderthe idea of human brother-
hood a reality. And even for those who could not occupy
his theoretical standpoint or find themselves in harmony
with the special directionsof his work,there is the lesson
suggested that this is no time to sit down mourning for
an imaginary past, but a period in which the academic
association must realise, actually and actively, its raison
d'Ytrein servingthe moral,intellectual,and religiousdevelop-
ment of the nation and the world. It is well occasionallyto
look back with gratefulaffectionto the great traditionsof
our past. It is even more needful to prepare ourselves to
take a worthypart in mouldingthe age to come: solicitous
that by the fullmeasure of our abilities,unbiassed by merely
scholastic interests,the Oxfordof the new generationmay
be not perhaps more learned or more dignified,but wiser in
discerningthe main line of public good, readierto co-operate
in the movementtowards making life beautiful,true and
honest, and more generouslyzealous to become to England
withoutdistinctionof rank or sect a high courtof intellectual
and moral justice.
W. WALLACE.


Wallace Ethics and Sociology 1898

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Wallace Ethics and Sociology 1898

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Mind Association

Ethics and Sociology

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

of other active capacities around it,-engaged in a struggle

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

realised the ideal communityof Plato. To such an extent

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

more, the more social types of humanity,cannot be treated

A similar conclusion had been brought home, and in a

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

pensated by a minus on the good side. As for marriages

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

increase of anotherkind of crime. And as to the modifying

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

an isolated offence: hence the omnipotenceof an education

It is scarcely to be wondered at if these considerations

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

ists into two groups: the Utilitariansand the Intuitionalists,

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

The utilitarian,anxious to have nothing held sacred except

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

Conscience. Man, accordingto this view,possessed a special

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

taste which instinctivelyrecoilsfromevil and aspires to live

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

occasionallycome not by rejectingthe new, but by showing

Both of these schools were essentiallyproductsof a Pro-

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

to be at home: the sentencesof the moral law are written

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

battle better than his animal compeers, does not at first

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

aspect to the old quarrel between mechanical causation and

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

whollyfree fromtemptationto selfishnessand trucklingto

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

solidaritybetween man and man, in some limited degree,

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

or less extent diverges,and an accumulation of experience

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

bodies consisted of cells, each of which surroundedby its

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

furthercriticism. Physiologytells us of the separate and in

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

to individuals the orders and dispositions of the central

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

actions and reactions of individual wills. It is because our

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

individualwhen he saw that his own selfishinterestswere

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

logical and metaphysicalside of ethics. On the otherhand,

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.31 on Sun, 22 Jun 2014 17:13:45 PM

You might also like