710 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 71. 



between economics and utilitarianism seems 

 logical, it was obliteiated by the subsequent 

 development of economics. In the newer 

 economic theories the measurement of welfare 

 in units of satisfaction has displaced the old 

 measurement of welfare in units of commodity. 

 Each material good is valued by the satisfac- 

 tion its consumption yields, and this satisfaction 

 depends upou the quantity of goods already 

 possessed. This is, in short, the theory of 

 marginal utility which has revolutionized 

 economic thought. It is of importance in the 

 present connection because it destroys the dif- 

 ference between utilitarianism and economics. 

 Utilitarian ethics is but a species of economics. 

 There can be but one science of conscious mo- 

 tives. Conscious calculation is confined to a 

 field where the influence of the environment is 

 direct and where the actions of men are deter- 

 mined by a few dominant motives prompted by 

 pleasure and pain. Perhaps the name econom- 

 ics is not a good one to designate this field, 

 but it has been so monopolized by economists 

 that it will be hard to displace. 



Nineteenth Century progress, however, has 

 not justified the hopes of the rationalists of the 

 last century by making economics the only 

 social science. Men have not become mere 

 calculating machines. On the contrary there 

 has been a revival of those modes of thought 

 which seemed moribund. Custom and habit 

 still hold their own; national spirit has shown 

 its vitality in a way that would have astonished 

 the cosmopolitan rationalist ; while in law the 

 old standards and customs have endured in 

 spite of the attacks of Bentham. In ethics and 

 religion the revival has been equally notable. 

 What rationalist would have thought that Nine- 

 teenth Century ethics would be transcendental, 

 or that its religion would be dominated by 

 Blethodism instead of by Unitarianism? 



This failure of the utilitarian philosophy is too 

 apparent to be overlooked. It shows that there 

 was some defect in the analysis of its advocates. 

 They assumed that the influences of the physical 

 environment were greater, and the motives of 

 men simpler, than later reflection shows to be 

 •the facts. The reasoning of the utilitarians 

 might be saved by admitting a difference be- 

 tween positive and absolute utilities. Positive 



utilities are made up of units of pleasure and 

 they can best be secured by conscious calcula- 

 tion. Absolute utilities are, however, necessi- 

 ties upon which life depends and they can best 

 be guarded by strong impulses which compel 

 each man to secure them. In biologic language 

 it might be said that each man and race has 

 certain requisites for survival and certain re- 

 quisites for welfare. The first group is secured 

 by mental modifications generating strong de- 

 sires and impulses acting too quickly to admit 

 of calculation. The realm of welfare alone re- 

 mains open to conscious motives and here the 

 rationalistic attitude is supreme. 



It makes little diiference what line of reason- 

 ing a person uses to convince himself of the in- 

 adequacy of the old rationalistic program. 

 The patent fact is that economic philosophy is 

 not the whole science of human nature. Eco- 

 nomics has succeeded by its emphasis of a par- 

 tial man, and to include a study of the whole 

 man in it, as some would have us do, would 

 vitiate its best results. A glance at the his- 

 tory of the other social sciences will show 

 that they have not filled the gap created by 

 the defects in the utilitarian philosophy. 

 Politics in the Aristotelian sense might have 

 been such a science. Its field, howevei', has 

 been narrowed until it is little more than a 

 history of parliamentary government. Pro- 

 fessor Freeman's doctrine, ' history is past poli- 

 tics and ijolitics is present history,' shows how 

 the fields of history and politics have blended. 

 History has developed from a record of kings, 

 battles and dates into a study of institutions. 

 Utilitarian ethics has been absorbed in econom- 

 ics, just as politics has been absorbed in history, 

 while transcendental ethics is more a history 

 than a theory of ethical ideals. Law, like 

 politics, has become a branch of history; its 

 method is comparative and in it pure theory 

 has no place. 



It is evident that history is the only branch 

 of the social sciences which has kept pace with 

 economics. These two subjects have been 

 vitalized by Nineteenth Century thought aui 

 have grown until, between them, they have 

 absorbed all the social sciences. Only the 

 historical and economic methods of study have 

 been fruitful of results. Students of social 



