IX.] EVOLUTION AND ETHICS. 225 



in certain cases are the right ones, and from the effects 

 which prejudice, interest, passion, habit, or even, indirectly, 

 physical conditions, may have upon our moral perceptions. 

 Thus Sir John Lubbock speaks 1 of certain Feejeeans, who, 

 according to the testimony of Mr. Hunt, 2 have the custom 

 of piously choking their parents under certain circum- 

 stances, in order to insure their happiness in a future life. 

 Should any one take such facts as telling against the 

 belief in an absolute morality, he would show a complete 

 misapprehension of the point in dispute ; for such facts tell 

 in favour of it. 



Were it asserted that man possesses a distinct innate 

 power and faculty of infallibly applying the moral rule in 

 each particular case, the illustration would be to the point. 

 But all that need be contended for is that the intellect can 

 perceive not only truth, but also a quality of "higher" 

 which ought to be followed, and of " lower " which ought to 

 be avoided when two lines of conduct are presented to the 

 will for choice, the intellect so acting being the conscience. 



This has been well put by Mr. James Martineau in his 

 excellent essay on Whewell's Morality. He says : 3 "If 

 moral good were a quality resident in each action, as 

 whiteness in snow, or sweetness in fruits ; and if the moral 

 faculty was our appointed instrument for detecting its 

 presence ; many consequences would ensue which are at 

 variance with fact. The wide range of differences obser- 

 vable in the ethical judgments of men would not exist ; 

 and even if they did, could no more be reduced and 

 modified by discussion than constitutional differences of 



1 "Primitive Man," p. 248. 



2 "Fiji and the Fijians," vol. i. p. 183. 



3 "Essays," Second Series, vol ii. p. 13. 



Q 



