Civilisation : Its Cause and Cure 



fusion by their own martyrdom. It is also pretty 

 clear that the actions which are beneficial or injuri- 

 ous to the race must by the nature of the case vary 

 almost indefinitely with the changing conditions 

 of the life of the race — what is beneficial in one 

 age or under one set of conditions being injurious 

 in another age or under other circumstances — so 

 that a permanent or ever-valid code of moral 

 action is not a thing to be expected, at any rate 

 by those who regard morality as a result of social 

 experience, and as a matter of fact is not a thing 

 that we find existing. And, indeed, of those who 

 regard morals as intuitive, there are few who have 

 thought about the matter who would be inclined 

 to say that any act in itself can be either right or 

 wrong. Though there is a superficial judgment 

 of this kind, yet when the matter comes to be 

 looked into, the more general consent seems to 

 be that the rightness or wrongness is in the motive. 

 To kill (it is said) is not wrong, but to do so with 

 murderous intent is ; to take money out of another 

 person's purse is in itself neither moral nor immoral 

 — all depends upon whether permission has been 

 given, or on what the relations between the two 

 persons are ; and so on. Obviously there is no 

 mere act which under given conditions may not 

 be justified, and equally obvious there is no 

 mere act which under given conditions may not 

 become unjustifiable. To talk, therefore, about 

 virtues and vices as permanent and distinct classes 

 of actions is illusory : there is no such distinction, 

 except so far as a superficial and transient public 



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