50 The Descent of Man 



should judge that she ovighi not to have left them. To make 

 clear our point, let us imagine a man formerly entangled in 

 ties of affection which in justice to another his conscience 

 has induced him to sever. The image of the distress his act 

 of severance has caused may occasion him keen emotional 

 suffering for years, accompanied by a clear perception that 

 his act has been right. Again, let us suppose another case : 

 The struggling father of a family becomes aware that the 

 property on which he lives really belongs to another, and he 

 relinquishes it. He may continue to judge that he has done 

 a proper action, whilst tortured by the trials in which his act 

 of justice has involved him. To assert that these acts are 

 merely instinctive would be absurdly false. In the cases 

 supposed, obedience is paid to a clear intellectual perception 

 against the very strongest instincts. 



That we have not misrepresented Mr. Darwin's exposition 

 of ' conscience ' is manifest. He says that if a man has grati- 

 fied a passing instinct, to the neglect of an enduring instinct, 

 he ' will then feel dissatisfied with himself, and will resolve with 

 more or less force to act differently for the future. This is 

 conscience ; for conscience looks backwards and judges past 

 actions, inducing that kind of dissatisfaction, which if weak 

 we call regret, and if severe remorse' (vol. i. p. 91). 'Con- 

 science,' certainly, 'looks back and judges,' but not all that 

 ' looks back and judges ' is ' conscience.' A judgment of con- 

 science is one of a particular kind, namely, a judgment 

 according to the standard of moral worth. But for this, a 

 gourmand, looking back and judging that a particular sauce 

 had occasioned him dyspepsia, would, in the dissatisfaction 

 arising from his having eaten the wrong dish at dinner, 

 exercise his conscience ! 



Indeed, elsewhere (vol. i. p. 103), Mr. Darwin speaks of 

 * the standard of moraUty rising higher and higher,' though 

 he nowhere explains what he means either by the ' standard ' 



