51 



objected that pleasure and pain are not always in evidence 

 in our moral actions. This absence is explained by Spencer 

 as follows: "Originally, ethics has no existence apart from 

 religion, which holds it in solution. Religion itself, in its 

 earliest form, is undistinguished from ancestor- worship. And 

 the propitiation of ancestral ghosts, made for the purpose of 

 avoiding the evils they may inflict and gaining the benefits 

 they may confer, are promoted by prudential considerations 

 like those which guide the ordinary actions of life." 1 Now 

 "the essential trait in the moral consciousness is the control 

 of some feeling or feelings by some other feeling or feelings 

 the simpler to the more complex. In this we have the genesis 

 of the moral consciousness." 2 "Each later and higher order 

 of means takes precedence in time and authoritativeness of 

 each earlier and lower order of means", a law "traceable 

 throughout the evolution of conduct in general." 3 "Hence 

 it follows that as guides, the feelings have authorities pro- 

 portionate to the degrees in which they are removed by their 

 complexity and their ideality from simple sensations and 

 appetites." 4 "Preferences and aversions are rendered organic 

 by the inheritance of the effects of pleasurable and painful 

 experiences in progenitors." 5 In brief, the tribal chief, who 

 during life was incapable of inspiring fear among his followers, 

 after his death continues to exercise an influence, owing to the 

 belief in ghosts. Through dread of the ghost there developed 

 the political, religious, and social restraints, each becoming 

 more authoritative the further it is removed by its complexity 

 and ideality from simple sensations and appetites. 6 



Another point in Spencer's theory is that which has refer- 

 ence to the province of ethics. We are told that as conduct 

 has to do with the whole field of human actions, morality must 

 consequently be included within its scope. Morality, however, 

 is concerned only with a definite portion of the area covered 

 by this term. "Conduct is excluded from the totality of 

 actions by excluding purposeless actions. But during evolu- 

 tion this distinction arises by degrees." 7 



In thus distinguishing that part of conduct to which we 

 apply the term moral, we must have some criterion for the use 

 of the terms ' good ' and ' bad '. ' Good ' means good for some- 



1 O.C. 112. 

 2 O.C. 44. 

 3 O.C. 60. 

 4 O.C. 42. 

 6 O.C. 45. 

 6 O.C. 44. 

 7 O.C. 4. 



