CHAP, x " SCIENCE OF ETHICS" 97 



a scientific basis. Mainly he is concerned with defining 

 ethics with reaching greater accuracy than is possible 

 for the colloquial judgments of mankind. His voyage 

 is one of survey and measurement. Ultimately his 

 reasonings must bear on the question of the justification 

 of ethical judgments ; primarily, he is concerned with 

 their precise statement. And, indeed, precision is 

 one great mark of science, along with exhaustiveness 

 and coherence. 



What, then, has evolutionism done for him? First, it 

 has taught him that every organism strives to attain to 

 its maximum efficiency. Darwin, indeed, has pointed out 

 that the organism which fails to strive, or fails to attain, 

 fails also to survive. There is, however, little direct 

 Darwinism in the Science of Ethics; 1 and in its absence 

 Mr. Stephen's view of an organism sounds almost 

 Lamarckian dreadful word ! or even more dreadful 

 still Spinozistic. He has borrowed from science the 

 fact that each organism seeks maximum efficiency. 

 Darwin's view of the reason of that fact he accepts 

 rejoicingly ; but he does not utilise it. 



Secondly : he agrees with many predecessors in 

 holding that society is essentially organic; and he 

 gives the usual and correct interpretation of that state- 

 ment, viz. that in society, as in plants or animals, 

 the whole explains the parts or is prior to the parts ; 

 that you cannot explain the whole as a mechanical 

 combination of separate parts, but on the contrary, must 

 have a knowledge of the whole before you can correctly 

 define or explain any one part. 2 Since man is essen- 

 tially dependent on society since man is by nature 



1 



Some passages on pp. 72, 73, 91, 92, where Mr. Stephen does 

 Darwinise, are quoted in Williams's Evolutional Ethics, 419, 420. 

 2 p. 32; calso p. 110. 



H 



