MORAL SENSE. 125 



the whole question of the moral sense turns. "Why should 

 a man feel that he ought to obey one instinctive desire 

 rather than another? Why is he bitterly regretful, if he 

 has yielded to a strong sense of self -preservation, and has 

 not risked his life to save that of a fellow-creature? or why 

 does he regret having stolen food from hunger? 



It is evident, in the first place, that with mankind the 

 instinctive impulses have different degrees of strength; a 

 savage will risk his own life to save that of a member of 

 the same community, but will be wholly indifferent about 

 a stranger ; a young and timid mother urged by the 

 maternal instinct will, without a moment's hesitation, 

 run the greatest danger for her own infant, but not for 

 a mere fellow-creature. Nevertheless many a civilized man, 

 or even boy, who never before risked his life for another, 

 but full of courage and sympathy, has disregarded the 

 instinct of self-preservation, and plunged at once into a 

 torrent to save a drowning man, though a stranger. In 

 this case man is impelled by the same instinctive motive 

 which made the heroic little American monkey, formerly 

 described, save his keeper, by attacking the great and 

 dreaded baboon. Such actions as the above appear to be 

 the simple result of the greater strength of the social or 

 maternal instincts than that of any other instinct or motive; 

 for they are performed too instantaneously for reflection, 

 or for pleasure or pain to be felt at the time; though, if 



Erevented by any cause, distress or even misery might be 

 3lt. In a timid man, on the other hand, the instinct of 

 self-preservation might be so strong, that he would be 

 unable to force himself to run any such risk, perhaps not 

 even for his own child. 



I am aware that some persons maintain that actions per- 

 formed impulsively, as in the above cases, do not come 

 under the dominion of the moral sense, and cannot be 

 called moral. They confine this term to actions done 

 deliberately, after a victory over opposing desires, or when 

 prompted by soms exalted motive. But it appears scarcely 

 possible to draw any clear line of distinction of this kind.* 



*I refer here to the distinction between what bas been called 

 material and formal morality. I am glad to find that Prof. Huxley 

 ("Critiques and Addresses,'" 1873, p. 287) takes the same view on 

 this subject as I do. Mr. Leslie Stephen remarks (" Essays on Free- 

 thinking and Plain Speaking," 1873, p. 83), "the metaphysical dis- 

 tinction, between material and formal morality is as irrevelant at 

 other suck distinctions. M 



