454 METAPHYSICAL EVOLUTION. 



Good is well defined as the greatest happiness of the greatest 

 number ; and by a natural transfer, the term is applied to what- 

 ever is conducive to that object. It therefore includes not only 

 present pleasures, but also the influences which conduce to future 

 pleasures, and which may be sown in the mind long before they 

 bring forth fruit. As present pleasures are not always consistent 

 with greater ones in the future, so present pleasure is not always 

 good. Evil being the reverse or negation of good, or happiness, is 

 avoided by all beings to whom it is consciously known ; but what 

 they regard as evil will of course depend on their intelligence in 

 determining or predicating the future effects of actions. But no 

 matter what the degree of intelligence, no responsibility, as usu- 

 ally understood, can be expected of beings which have no power 

 of choosing, or will. 



The utilitarian theory of the evolution of morals asserts that 

 the development of goodness is simply due to the discovery and 

 enforcement of the law of self-protection and preservation. The 

 selfish interests require the protection of person and. property, 

 without which a community is an impossibility. Law being thus 

 established and enforced, moral habits are imposed ujDon men, 

 which become incorporated into character and transmitted to suc- 

 ceeding generations. This is all doubtless true, but whether it is 

 a fundamental or secondary truth is the point requiring attention. 



The fundamental objection to this hypothesis is, that the al- 

 truistic affections are not inherited or transmitted. This is be- 

 cause the pains and penalties of wrong-doing as inflicted by law, 

 can not (and ought not to) overcome the inherent instinct of self- 

 preservation in man. It is true that moral character is inherited, 

 and that changes in this department for better or worse are trans- 

 mitt.ed to offspring. The mental organization of a race may be 

 improved by the weakening of the emotional or the strengthen- 

 ins; of the rational faculties. But since the affections are at the 

 foundation of all activity whatsoever, of right-doing as well as of 

 wrong-doing, it is obvious that no amount of legal restraint can 

 render them innocuous. Their existence is necessary for self- 

 preservation, and law only restrains their activities to certain di- 

 rections. That intelligence tends to restrain wrong-doing is true ; 

 but although intellect is inherited, the manner in which its teach- 

 ings are applied in practice is not. Each man must learn the 

 merits of different courses of action in regard to morals for him- 

 self ; his intelligence places before him the facts, and shows him 



