i.i:sso.\s ix MORAL SCIKNCK. 



by reason and experience." And, in fairness, it must be alao 

 ..!!. I. that it i.i not simply to the aavagi) and uncivilised 

 iiiitii that the appeal ia made, when it is desired to an- 

 .rt.iiii if existence, unity, suooeasion, and other ideas than 

 moral ideas are natural or acquired, innate or the result of 

 uxperienoe. 



In addition to this it can fairly be said that there can bo 

 found amongst nations, both in former times and at the present 

 day, differences upon points which we, and other civilised 

 nations, now regard as fundamental points of difference in 

 regard to moral right and wrong. A strange position, perhaps, 

 in some respects is that of those who assert the true explana- 

 tion to be this that although men have differed and do differ 

 greatly in their ideas of what is to be considered right and 

 ATOM-.,', yet that there has been in all ages, and is universally, an 

 agreement universally that there is a difference between actions, 

 according to which they may be denominated right or wrong, 

 virtuous or vicious. All " people, nations, and languages," 

 have some notion of a difference between right and wrong, 

 though all may not agree exactly as to what that difference is. 

 "This is," to adopt Bain's statement, "to surrender the only 

 position of any real importance. The simple and underived 

 character of the moral faculty is maintained because of the 

 superior authority attached to what is natural, as opposed to 

 -.vhat is merely conventional. But if nothing be natural but 

 the mere fact of right and wrong, while all the details, which 

 alone have any value, are settled by convention and custom, we 

 ore as much at sea on one system as the other." So that it 

 may be fairly said that thus the only position of any real im- 

 portance is surrendered. 



Another argument brought forward by those who maintain 

 the moral sentiment to be innate in the human mind is this, 

 that it is in its nature different from any other "fact or 

 phenomenon" to be found in the mind. If this faculty be so 

 simple and uncompounded in its nature that it cannot be 

 resolved into any other and simpler elements, then it may be 

 urged with some force that it is natural and not acquired. The 

 faculty which discriminates right from wrong, and which 

 " determines itself to be the guide of action and of life, in con- 

 tradistinction from all other faculties, or natural principles of 

 action, in the very same manner as speculative reason directly 

 and naturally judges of speculative truth and falsehood ; and at 

 the same time is attended with a consciousness, upon reflection, 

 tliat the natural right to judge of them belongs to it ; " this 

 faculty is not unnaturally considered to differ not only in degree 

 but in kind from all other faculties of the human mind. We 

 often act from motives quite other than and different from 

 those furnished by this moral faculty. We are influenced by 

 hunger and thirst, love and hatred, and many other motives 

 besides these ; but the influence of the moral faculty, or con- 

 science, differs from them all. The former can and do induce 

 us to act, but the latter, in addition to this power, which it 

 possesses in common with the former, carries also with it a 

 feeling of right, or a feeling that it ou^ht to influence us, in 

 addition to our consciousness that it does, a feeling which forms 

 no part of what is present to our mind in the former case. 



To this it may be answered, that what is generally understood 

 by a system of morals is a set of general rules to guide us in 

 action, and which are so extensive and complicated as to require 

 a maturity of comprehension and intellect to understand them 

 completely. We are not able to sum up the whole of morals 

 in one or two simple rules which shall be level with the compre- 

 hension of a child ; or, if we were to make the attempt, the com- 

 plications which would result when we came to test these rules 

 in practice would demonstrate its futility. Our idea of space, 

 however extended and vast, may, indeed, be reduced to the 

 simple data of sight and touch, but there are no corresponding 

 simple elements, to which our ideas of duty or " oughtness " as 

 to actions can be reduced. 



No doubt, at a late period of the world's history men learnt 

 that almost the whole sum of morals was contained in the 

 fulfilment of their duty towards their neighbour in the golden 

 rule of doing to others what they would that they should do to 

 them ; but we must not forget that it took revelation to teach 

 them a lesson apparently BO simple ; and in addition that the 

 application of a rule so wide and comprehensive must unavoid- 

 ably be inapplicable immediately to many of the particular and 

 complicated circumstances which occur in daily life. Aiid even 



granting the application of the rule to he a rery nmpU niittar 

 when once we bare clearly ascertained the true drcamaUaoea 

 to which it is to be applied, the very ascertainment of UMM 

 circumstances, disentangled from all extraneotu ooaiitomtium, 

 ia often the moat difficult part of the operation. Aa an illurtra- 

 tion of this let us take truth. " If," says Bain, -'any put ot 

 morals had the simplicity of an inatinct, it would be regard to 

 truth. The difference between truth and falaehood might almoei 

 be regarded aa a primitive susceptibility, like the difference 

 between light and dark, between remittance and non.reeut*nee. 

 That each person should aay what ia, instead of what ia not, 

 may well aeem a primitive and natural impulse. In circum- 

 stances of perfect indifference, thia would be the obvious and 

 usual course of conduct ; being, like the straight line, the 

 shortest distance between two points. Let a motive arie, 

 however, in favour of the lie, and there ia nothing to ensure the 

 truth. Reference must bo made to other parts of the mind, 

 from which no counter-motives may be furnished ; and the in- 

 tuition in favour of truth, not being able to support itself, has 

 to repose on the general foundation of all virtue, the instituted 

 recognition of the claims of others." 



Besides this, intuition is unable to settle without the aid of 

 experience many questions of the greatest importance in morals, 

 and often not without considerable controversy. Such a ques- 

 tion, for instance, as how far the State has a right to enforce 

 the profession of certain religions opinions, and to punish 

 criminally or civilly those who refuse to conform to its com- 

 mands, is one that we are not conscious, it is said, of any 

 faculty which can determine in a moment. Many moral prin- 

 ciples are capable of being invoked on each side, by those who 

 advocate persecution, and those who condemn it as opposed to all 

 true notions of morality. Almost all the questions with which 

 the ancient casuists used to perplex themselves were of the 

 same nature, i.e., they could not be determined by any appa- 

 rently instinctive or innate principle or faculty of our nature. 



No doubt, in many of such cases the principal difficulty, aa 

 has been already observed, arises from the difficulty of ascer- 

 taining all the circumstances, or, in other words, of learning 

 exactly what it really is upon which we are called on to decide. 

 No sane man can doubt that it will be highly injurious, if not 

 fatal to him, to take a large dose of poison ; but he may often 

 have considerable difficulty, from an imperfect knowledge of 

 its properties, in determining whether a particular substance ia 

 or is not a poison. That this line of argument fails to answer 

 the objection is, of course, maintained by the opponents of the 

 intuition school. 



Nor, upon examination, will it be so evident that the moral 

 faculty or moral sense, or at any rate our perception of actions 

 as right and wrong, is so simple and uncompounded as might 

 at first sight appear. In determining upon the propriety of a 

 particular act or course of conduct we are, at all events, often 

 influenced by and inclined to act from various other causes 

 besides the mere abstract question of right and wrong. Self- 

 love and sympathy and our various passions often form no con- 

 siderable part of what makes us act. We do not now speak 

 of cases in which these motives induce us to act wrongly or 

 viciously ; but of instances in which they lead us to act 

 virtuously, and where it is therefore difficult to distinguish the 

 relative strength in which they operate, and how much of the 

 particular act is to be attributed to them, and how much to 

 the simple desire to follow the dictates of the moral faculty, or 

 do right. Self-love is, as Bishop Butler remarks, a proper and 

 natural motive of action when kept within proper limits ; and 

 when it works strongly along with the moral sense it is not 

 often easy to say that we would not have followed its prompt- 

 ings alone, even if the course it advocated were not clearly 

 right. The case is the same with sympathy, from which it 

 may almost be said that a great portion of human virtue, or 

 rather of human acts that are virtuous, directly spring. The 

 various passions and affections, such as fear and love, have a 

 like influence in many instances too numerous to be mentioned 

 here. 



Naturally, against all this it may be urged that the fact of 

 various other motives co-existing in a particular act with the 

 perception of the act as right, and a determination to do it on 

 that account, fails to prove either that the latter motive doea 

 not exist separately and is different in kind from the others, or 

 that it may be ultimately resolved into them. Indeed, accord- 



