2O2 Darwin as Moralist. 



ising, though yet uncultivated domain of histori 

 cal ethics. Indirectly, indeed, he suggested the 

 way which a positive &quot;science&quot; of ethics would 

 have to follow ; but for himself, he remained an 

 ethical speculator of the old-fashioned type, with 

 all the preconceptions and with the same compla 

 cent confidence of the derivative school whose 

 traditions he had inherited. But his procedure 

 enables us to illustrate, in a concrete instance, 

 the difference between science and speculation 

 in ethics. The observation and classification of 

 ethical facts, whether manifested in the individ 

 ual or in the race, constitute the business of the 

 &quot; science &quot; of ethics ; all else is hypothesis, specu 

 lation, fancy. The phenomena of the individual 

 moral consciousness, Darwin presumably turned 

 over to the writers of systematic text-books ; and 

 the phenomena of the historical development of 

 morality among mankind he drew upon only 

 to illustrate his speculations on the origin of 

 conscience speculations which he followed his 

 school in supposing the principal subject-matter 

 of ethics. From infection with this speculative 

 spirit evolutionary moralists have not yet recov 

 ered, and they still put upon us as &quot; science &quot; con 

 jectures and phantasies as far removed from fact 

 as the republic of Plato or the paradise of Mil- 



