394 ETHICS 



answer and has no means of answering. He can show their adapta- 

 tion or want of adaptation to certain ends, but he can say nothing 

 about the validity of these ends themselves. It is implied in their 

 efficiency that these ends were conceived as having moral value or 

 moral authority. But to what ends does this moral value or authority 

 truly belong? and what is its significance? these are questions 

 which the positive sciences (such as psychology and sociology) can- 

 not touch and which must be answered by other methods than those 

 which they employ. 



The moral concept is expressed in various ways and by a variety 

 of terms, right, duty, merit, virtue, goodness, worth. And these 

 different terms indicate different aspects opened up by a single new 

 point of view. Thus " right " seems to imply correspondence with a 

 standard or rule, which standard or rule is some moral law or ideal 

 of goodness; and "merit" indicates performance of the right, 

 perhaps in victory over some conflicting desire; and "virtue" means 

 a trait of character in which performance of this sort has become 

 habitual. The term "worth" has conveniences which have led to 

 its having considerable vogue in ethical treatises since the time of 

 Herbart; it lends itself easily to psychological manipulation; but 

 it does not seem to refer to a concept fundamentally distinct from 

 goodness. But between "goodness" and "duty" there seems to be 

 this difference at any rate, that the latter term refers definitely to 

 something to be done by a voluntary agent, whereas, in calling some- 

 thing "good," we may have no thought of action at all, but only 

 see and name a quality. 



There lies here therefore a difference which is not a mere difference 

 of expression. 



On the one hand it may be held that good is a quality which be- 

 longs to certain things and has no special and immediate reference 

 to volition: that we say this or that is good as we say that some- 

 thing else is heavy or green or positively electrified. No relation to 

 human life at all may be implied in the one form of judgment any 

 more than in the other. That relation will only follow by way of 

 application to circumstances. Just as a piece of lead may serve as 

 a letter-weight because it is heavy, so certain actions may come to 

 be our duty because they lead to the realization of something which 

 is objectively good in quality. 



According to the other view goodness has reference in its primary 

 meaning to free self-conscious agency. The good is that which 

 ought to be brought into existence: goodness is a quality of things, 

 but only in a derivative regard because these things are produced 

 by a good will. It is objective, too, inasmuch as it unites the individual 

 will with a law or ideal which has a claim upon the will; but it does 

 not in its primary meaning indicate something out of relation to the 



