x THE WILL IN DEVELOPMENT 181 



We may take as the general conditions of an ethical judg- 

 ment that it is"(i) a judgment passed on the purposive acts 

 of responsible individuals or on their character as tending 

 to issue in such acts, and (2) an impartial judgment, which* 

 whether explicitly or not, concerns itself with types of 

 action in so far as they affect the general relations on which 

 society is based, in so far as they affect others, and in so far 

 as they affect the value of an individual as a member of 

 society a judgment imposing duties or asserting rights. 

 Such elements are, of course, made explicit only at a reflec- 

 tive stage, but if our analysis is just a judgment is ethical 

 which in the concrete conforms to them. 



Now if we look at the lower grades of ethics we find 

 that outside the circle of the immediate kinsfolk the 

 primary rights of life, property and respect for sexual rela- 

 tions are generally recognised, but recognised in a peculiar 

 form. A breach of these rights is not precisely wrong. 

 It is rather an occasion for the recognised exercise of 

 vengeance. To take the life, wife or property of one who 

 is not a member of the kin, though he be a member of the 

 same society, is not wrong at this stage if it can be done 

 with impunity. It is simply an act which will stir the 

 resentment of the offended man and of his kin, and so lead 

 to a blood feud. At the lowest stages even vengeance is 

 not regulated nor organised, and it is hardly possible to 

 say that there is any regular method of securing redress. 

 But even where redress by the strong arm and the help of 

 the kinsfolk is well established and recognised, it is clear 

 that such a check on transgression is not of strictly ethical 

 character. The act that injures another and threatens social 

 peace is not condemned by any general rule impartially 

 applied. The ethical judgment fails at its central point. 

 In the same way and at bottom for the same reasons it 

 fails in distinguishing intentional and unintentional action, 

 and the vengeance of the blood feud often falls on the kin 

 collectively or on any member of it in place of the indi- 

 vidual wrongdoer. If the whole of primitive ethics were 

 of this description we should have indeed to recognise in 

 known and recorded social systems a stage at which the 

 ethical judgment is not yet formed. In actual societies, 



