438 READINGS IN BIOLOGICAL SCIENCE 



solute principle of justice conflicts with the equally absolute principles of 

 mercy and love. And finally these absolute emotional principles come in 

 conflict with the frankly utilitarian principles like the greatest good of the 

 greatest number, whose application must be decided rationally and rela- 

 tively to circumstances. Clearly one course will prove to be more right 

 than another; but in deciding which to adopt, the so-called absolute ethical 

 and moral principles will only take us part way. 



The same is true of the individual. As he grows up, he finds that his ap- 

 parently absolute ethical values constantly need the assistance of relativism, 

 in the shape of rational judgment in the light of experience, if they are to 

 be applicable to particular situations. It is wrong to lie; but we all know 

 circumstances where it is more wrong to tell the truth. It is wrong to take 

 life; but it needs rational judgment to decide whether this applies to war, 

 to certain cases of suicide and abortion, to euthanasia, to birth control. 



In fact, one of the chief tasks before each individual is to make a rational 

 and relative adjustment of the apparent absolute of his primitive ethics, 

 derived from infantile repression, to the practical realities of life. To ac- 

 complish this, it may even be necessary that the original structure of re- 

 pressed and repressing forces be destroyed, whether by some violent emo- 

 tional or rehgious experience, or by the deliberate "mental operation" of 

 psychoanalysis or other form of psychotherapy. 



The task before us, as ethical beings, now begins to take shape. It is to 

 preserve the force of ethical conviction that springs up naturally out of 

 infantile dependence and the need for inhibition and repression in early 

 life, but to see that it is applied, under the correctives of reason and experi- 

 ence, to provide the most efficient and the most desirable moral framework 

 for living. This will undoubtedly mean radical changes in the early up- 

 bringing of children, as well as in the methods of education and in accepted 

 religions and codes of ethics. For instance, sociologists are beginning to 

 realize that existing ethico-religious systems often contain a large element 

 of psychological compensation: they compensate for the miseries of this 

 world with the bliss of a world to come, they compensate for ignorance 

 of fact with certitude of feeling, they compensate for actual imperfec- 

 tions of ethical practice by setting up impossible ethical ideals. This is not 

 merely hypocrisy; it is a primitive method of self-defense against a hard 

 and difficult reality. 



Again, it is becoming clear that harshness of punishment in early life 

 tends to the development of a morally vindictive superego: other methods 

 are required for the development of character where the aggressive and 

 sadistic impulses are kept subordinate. The most difficult lesson to learn is 

 that irrational and intolerant certitude is undesirable. We have seen how 

 this applies to truth: the lesson is difficult there also, but science has learned 

 it. It will be even more difficult to learn in ethics: but it must be learned 

 if we are to emerge from psychological barbarism. To cUng to certitude 



