961 



MORALS. 



MORALS. 



762 



single separate duties, or (in other words) to state in detail all that a 

 man ought or ought not to do under all possible varieties of circum- 

 stances. This can hardly be expected, or at any rate is seldom pro- 

 fessed, and never accomplished, in treatises expressly devoted to the 

 subject. The most at all events that can be done here is to n ime, with 

 the addition of some brief general explanation, the chief general classes 

 of duties. The adaptation of these general duties to particular cases' is 

 often obvious. In some cases, which will be specially noticed, the 

 carrying out into minute detail of general rules of duty opens new and 

 large departments of inquiry, which may be considered either as con- 

 stituting separate sciences, or as belonging to other sciences rather 

 than to morals. 



In thus taking refuge in a general classification of duties, we shall 

 have to furnish the reader with a list of dispositions which it is the 

 duty of man respectively to cultivate and not to cultivate. A dispo- 

 sition is a tendency in a man to act (under which word is comprehended 

 thinking, feeling, speakirg, and doing) generally in a certain way. The 

 names for the different dispositions thus come to embrace general 

 classes of actions. For instance, the disposition called benerolmcc leads 

 to innumerable actions which, under innumerably different circum- 

 stances, it is man's duty to perform ; and the name therefore stands as 

 a general name for all these actions. To name singly and separately 

 all these actions would perhaps not be practicable, and is certainly not 

 desirable. Certain sub-classes of them may be named, in explaining 

 the beneficial tendency of the general disposition, or (in other words) 

 the reasons why it is man's duty to cultivate this disposition. This 

 last explanation will necessarily comprehend a general view of the 

 advant ges of the different actions which the disposition tends to 

 produce. 



There are many different principles of classification on which the 

 enumeration of duties may proceed. It is perhaps not too much to say 

 that all duties may be deduced, with a greater or less exercise of in- 

 genuity, as corollaries from any one which has been previously 

 esta lished. Thus Wollaston, in his ' Religion of Nature,' deduces all 

 man's duties from the duty of truth. Hobbes again, in his ' De Give,' 

 derives all morality irom the duty of preserving peace. It is clear 

 that the mode to be adopted of treating the subject, or, in other words, 

 the mode of classifying our enumeration of duties, is a matter entirely of 

 convenience ; and, merely as a matter of convenience, we shall adopt 

 the division of dut'ies which has been partly acted upon by Dr. Paley, 

 and which is perhaps the division most generally resorted to by writers 

 on morals. 



We shall treat of a man's duties, first, as they regard himself indi- 

 vidually, and, secondly, as they regard others. It is necessary to 

 remark, in order to prevent misapprehension, that one duty is a duty 

 towards oneself, and another duty is a duty towards others, not on 

 account of its tending respectively to produce happiness only to oneself 

 or only to others, but simply from the accidental circumstance of 

 oneself in the one case and others in the other being, as it were, the 

 outward object of the action or disposition which constitutes the duty. 

 "Those acts of ours," to quote from Mr. James Mill," which are primarily 

 useful to ourselves, are secondarily useful to others ; and those which 

 are primarily useful to others are secondarily useful to ourselves." 

 (' Analysis of the Human Mind,' vol. ii., p. 234.) Much of the good 

 resulting from the performance of what we call duties towards our- 

 selves consists in our being thereby better enabled to do good to 

 others ; and together with the happiness conferred on others by the 

 performance of our duties towards them, is the happiness caused to 

 ourselves by the gratification of our feelings of sympathy and of duty, 

 and the additional security that is gained for the good-will of others 

 towards ourselves. 



I. A man's duty to himself consists generally in the preservation of 

 the life with which his Creator has endowed him, and in the improve- 

 ment, to the greatest degree in his power, of the faculties which he 

 possesses. 



The first part of this duty is altogether negative. A man must 

 abstain from wantonly exposing himself to danger, or, in other words, 

 he must be prudent, and he must refrain from suicide. For when man 

 learns that God has adapted his created world to the production of 

 general happiness, he learns at the same time that life has been given 

 for that purpose ; and in foolishly risking or in laying violent hands 

 upon his own life he tends so far to mar God's object. He throws 

 away his own means of attaining happiness in the way in which God 

 tin willed that he should attain it, and he destroys also his means of 

 promoting the happiness of others. 



Aa regards the second part of a man's duty towards himself, con- 

 sisting in the improvement of his faculties, or, as we may otherwise 

 express it, of his intellectual n'd moral being, this is partly positive 

 and partly negative. It is a man's duty to improve himself, so far as 

 he can, by study and by cultivating good dispositions; the full explana- 

 tion of the best mode of doing which belongs properly to the subject 

 of education. It is his duty also not to deteriorate his character by 

 sensual excesses. The vices which he has thus to guard against are 

 principally two, Ivst, and intemperance ; the latter of which divides 

 itself into drunkeanea and ijluttuny. The names of the two virtues 

 opposite to the two vices of lust and intemperance are chastity and 

 temperance. The cultivation of these two virtues, or the abstinence 

 from the two corresponding vices, is recommended not only by the 



good accruing to the individual, but also by the extent to which he is 

 thereby saved from inflicting injury on others. 



II. In considering a man's duties towards others, we would adopt 

 the subdivision of duties towards men generally as men, and duties 

 towards men as members of the same society. These last duties will 

 be again subdivided into duties towards members of the same political 

 society or state, and duties towards members of the same family. 



1. The duties towards men generally as men, or towards mankind, 

 may be comprehended under the general names of benevolence or kind- 

 ness, courage, sincerity, and Immilittf. 



In benevolence or kindness are included sympathy, or a general dis- 

 position to assist our fellow-men ; pity, or kindness towards those in 

 distress, and towards inferiors ; generosity or liberality, which, being 

 the disposition to make our own means serviceable to others, turns 

 pity to good account ; gratitude ; and charity, in the sense in which it 

 is used by St. Paul, or the disposition to judge kindly of others' con- 

 duct. The vices opposed to sympathy, pity, generosity, gratitude, and 

 charity, are seljishit ess, hirdhsa' tedness or cruelty, avarice, in ratitude, 

 and malevolence or uncharitablencss. Slander is one principal form in 

 which the last-mentioned evil disposition displays itself. The cultiva- 

 tion of the virtues comprehended under the name benevolence, and the 

 avoidance of the opposite vices, have an obvious and immediate bearing 

 on the happiness of others. At the same time it is not to be forgotten 

 that happiness accrues to the benevolent man himself from the grati- 

 fication of his natural feelings of sympathy, and that by doing good to 

 others he disposes others to do good to him. 



Couraije is valuable, as tending to give effect to our benevolence. It 

 must not exist in such excess as to lead a man to adventure a great 

 risk for a disproportionately small object, and must therefore be go- 

 verned by prudence. Mr. Mill indeed has treated of courage as a 

 particular form of prudence, a mode of treating of it which we cannot 

 think proper. There is an obvious difference, which Mr. Mill seems 

 strangely to have lost sight of, between courage being governed by 

 prudence, as it unquestionably ought to be, and courage being only a 

 particular form of prudence. 



Sincerity comprehends truth in words and honesty or justice in con- 

 duct. The manner in which the practice of these virtues, or the absti- 

 nence from the opposite vices of lying and cheating, is recommended by 

 general utility, is obvious. Without the general observance of truth 

 and honesty, men would have no confidence in one another, and there 

 would be no safety. The proverb, that " honesty is the best policy," 

 pithily expresses the bearing of this virtue on one's own good. Kant, 

 in his ' Metaphysic of Ethics ' (Metaphysik dcr Sitten), classes the virtue 

 of sincerity among the duties owed by a man to himself. " A lie is 

 the abandonment and, as it were, the annihilation of the dignity of 

 a man." 



It remains to speak of humility. This is perhaps not so decidedly a 

 virtue as its opposite, pride, is a vice. The evil of this vice consists in 

 its tendency to hurt the feelings of others, and to diminish our dis- 

 position to do good. Tolerance of others' opinions, and reverence 

 towards superiors in intellectual and moral worth, are forms of humility ; 

 and these are dispositions which, when they exist, are fruitful of much 

 good both for oneself and for others. 



2. The duties towards men as members of the same political society 

 or state, resolve themselves into the general dispositions of patriotism 

 and obedience. The first is a virtue, the value of which has been often 

 greatly overrated, and which is very apt to degenerate into the failing 

 called nationality. But nevertheless it is a virtue. As the general 

 happiness is best pursued by each individual making his own happiness 

 his own chief object, and again by each body of individuals making the 

 pursuit of their own separate interests thoir chief object, patriotism 

 properly tempered, or the desire to benefit one's own country so long 

 as this is not done in such manner as to injure other countries, is one 

 valuable means of promoting the general happiness of mankind. Of 

 obedience to those who are invested with authority in a state, and to 

 the laws, it belongs to morals to speak only in the most general manner. 

 The filling up of the detail belongs to political science. This science 

 having determined what laws ought to be enacted, on the ground of 

 conduciveness to general happiness, morals enjoins obedience to them, 

 without reference to their individual goodness, but for the sake of 

 maintaining political society generally, and of preserving to men all the 

 advantages which political society yields. 



3. The duties towards others who are members of the same family 

 consist altogether in affection, which manifests itself differently accord- 

 ing to the different family relations. Thus we speak of conjugal 

 affection, paternal and maternal affection, filial affection, and fraternal 

 affection. Conjugal affection implies fidelity. The proper exercise of 

 the paternal and maternal affection opens a wide field of discussion ; 

 but it may be said generally to show itself best in the proper education 

 of the children. Into filial affection gratitude and reverence largely 

 enter. Fraternal affection differs from friendship only in the peculiar 

 relation under which the feeling exists. 



Thus have we given a brief general summary of man's duties. We 

 have said nothing of duties towards God, which are generally made to 

 form a separate division in treatises on morals, because we conceive 

 that these duties, so far as they depend on God's special commands, 

 and thus differ from the duties which we have enumerated, and which 

 we come to know by observing their tendency to promote general 



