198 DEVELOPMENT AND PURPOSE CHAP. 



tions and creeds of successive societies, but freely modi- 

 fying them in its advance to match the deeper needs of a 

 fuller and more conscious life. The ethical order is the 

 product of a spiritual principle working in human life. 

 This principle seeks, as the ablest of the Idealistic writers 

 teach, to realise itself. It is not complete here and now, 

 but is something in process, in effort. Operating in every 

 individual it moves to the fulfilment of personality, but 

 operating alike in all individuals the development that it 

 seeks must be self-consistent or harmonious, and it is as the 

 condition of such development that liberty acquires its full, 

 positive and social meaning. Lastly, as fulfilment of effort 

 satisfies, the result if not the direct aim of this development 

 is the general happiness. 



Indeed, if happiness be rightly defined as consisting in 

 harmony of life, the divergence from the Utilitarian teach- 

 ing is less marked than appears at first sight. We shall 

 see in the next Part that the Practical Reason must be 

 defined as an impulse to establish Harmony in the world 

 of Feeling, and that this world comprehends all sentient 

 beings, reducing differences of person to a secondary place. 

 Harmony will be seen to imply a relation of mutual support 

 or furtherance, and to be realised in several relations. There 

 is what we know familiarly as pleasure, a harmony of feeling 

 with the environment. Certain conditions yield pleasure, 

 and the pleasure prompts us to maintain or reinstate such 

 conditions. There is again a harmony of feeling with feel- 

 ing, and such a harmony, where the environment does not 

 conflict with it, is happiness. Lastly, there is a harmony 

 between our feeling and those of others with whom our 

 lives are in contact. This harmony is a part of the rational 

 order and the basis of any Happiness which can be called 

 general. Accordingly, (a) it is true to describe the ethical 

 end as Universal Happiness. But (b) we do not experi- 

 ence either pleasure or happiness in the abstract. We have 

 pleasure in the exercise of our powers, physical, mental, 

 emotional, or generally in the fullness of life. We have 

 happiness in so far as this exercise is in harmony with itself, 

 so that if there is to be a harmony of feeling running 

 through the world of mind, there must be a corresponding 



