THE EVOLUTION OF MORALITY 



And let us mark why the task may be called 

 supremely important. That, if it be possible, it 

 is of high importance, as a contribution both to 

 philosophy and to practice, to demonstrate the 

 worth, the sanctions, and the principles of morality 

 as dependent upon and correlated with all the 

 facts of the cosmos, no one will deny; but I have 

 said that the task was of supreme importance. 

 This it would not be if, in point of fact, moral 

 principles could otherwise be reached and the 

 sanctions of morality otherwise derived. The 

 task would still be of extreme philosophic interest ; 

 but it would be almost negligible in relation to 

 practice. But the new ethics, by what it would 

 be most unphilosophic to regard as a "fortunate 

 chance," arose exactly when it was most needed. 

 The discovery of the natural sanctions coincided 

 with the accumulation of the evidence derived 

 alike from geology and archaeology, biblical criti- 

 cism, and biology which discredited the old 

 sanctions. Spencer well recognized the danger 

 not by any means yet overpast of a moral 

 interregnum or vacuum which "must be filled," 

 and he hastened to act because he saw that those 

 who believed that it could be filled were "called 

 on to do something in pursuance of their belief." 



The Christian 1 ethics is essentially a modifica- 

 tion of the legalism of the Jewish ethics, just as 



1 The word is used to indicate the system of thought invented 

 by the church, not as in any way referring to that sublime 

 system of thought which constituted the creed of the church's 

 Founder. 



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