

Darwin s Ethical Theory. 193 



of one whole class with some of the individuals 

 composing another that Darwin wins a primacy 

 for the social instincts. Compare compassion or 

 gratitude with lust or hunger, and you would not 

 say that the individual social impulse is more per 

 sistent or enduring than the individual selfish 

 impulse ; or compare the whole class of social in 

 stincts with the whole class of selfish instincts, 

 and, again, you find no difference in the times of 

 their presence or persistency. Take, on the other 

 hand, the entire species of social instincts and 

 only two or three individuals from the selfish 

 group, and, of course, you may predicate of the 

 former a more constant presence and greater per 

 sistency. It is, now, by this utterly fallacious 

 procedure that Darwin gains the fundamental 

 proposition in his deduction of the moral sense 

 (that is, as we have seen, remorse). Instead of 

 granting that the social instincts exclusively are 

 ever present and persistent, we must maintain 

 they have no title to those predicates which can 

 not be urged with equal or greater validity on 

 behalf of the selfish instincts. 



But even if Darwin s assumption that the social 

 instincts are ever present and persistent were con 

 ceded, it would not enable him to educe con 

 science or remorse. For, suppose these instincts 

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