Civilisation : Its Cause and Cure 



And if it be again said that a morality of this 

 kind, which rests on a principle and a mental 

 attitude only, is a danger, let us pause for a mo- 

 ment to consider how much more dangerous is 

 one which rests on formulas. If morality with- 

 out a code is a serious matter, how much more 

 serious is one which is nailed up within a code ! 

 For looking back on history it would sometimes 

 seem that the black-and-white, the this-thing- 

 right-and-that-thing-wrong morality has been the 

 most wicked thing in the world. It has been 

 an excuse for all the most devilish deeds 

 and persecutions imaginable. A formula of the 

 Sabbath-day, a formula about Witchcraft, a 

 formula of Marriage (regardless of the real human 

 relation), a formula concerning Theft (regardless 

 of the dire need of the thief) — and burnings, 

 hangings, torturings without mercy! The terrible 

 thing about this Right-and- Wrong morality is 

 not only that it leads to these dreadful reprisals ; 

 but that it brands upon the victim as well as upon 

 the oppressor the fatuous notions that a certain 

 thin^j^ is right or wrong, and that what one has 

 to do is to save oneself — two notions both of which 

 are directly contrary to true Morality. A boy 

 tells a verbal lie — perhaps through fear, perhaps 

 through inadvertence. He has broken a formula 

 and is immediately caned. Moral : he will 

 keep to verbal truth afterwards — however mean 

 or insidious it may be — and be pharisaically self- 

 satisfied ; but he will never realise that the im- 

 portance of truth and lies rests not in the words, 



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