n6 



SCIENCE. 



mere idea of pleasure as an unquestionable good of its 

 own kind, nor the mere idea of immediate profit or ad- 

 vantage — but the very different conception of the benefi- 

 cence of ultimate results on the welfare of all men and of 

 all creatures, then there may be, and probably there is, 

 an universal and absolute coincidence between the things 

 which it is wise and the things which it is right to do. 

 Men may imagine, and they have imagined, that under 

 this conception of utility they can devise a system of 

 morality which is of such transcendental excellence that 

 it is far too good for earth. Thus it has been laid down 

 that evolation, in its most perfect conception, would be 

 such that the development of every creature would be 

 compatible with the equal development of every other. 

 In such a system there would be no " struggle for 

 existence — no harmful competition, no mutual devouring 

 — no death." 5 The inspired imaginings of the Jewish 

 prophets of some future time when the lion shall lie down 

 with the lamb, and the ideas which have clustered round 

 the Christian Heaven, are more probably the real origin 

 of this conception than any theory of evolution founded 

 on the facts and laws of Nature. But, for all practical 

 purposes, such a system of ethics is as useless as the 

 dreams of Plato's Republic or of More's Utopia. If, 

 however, we have got from some independent source a 

 right idea of that which will be most beneficent in its 

 ultimate results, we may well be guided by this light in 

 so far as we can see it. But inasmuch as these far-off 

 results and tendenciesof conduct cannot always be within 

 sight, and are indeed very often wholly beyond the hori- 

 zon visible to us, this admission, or rather this high doc- 

 trine that the right and the useful are always coinci- 

 dent, is a widely different doctrine from that which iden- 

 tifies the sense of obligation with the perception of utility. 

 The mere perception that any act or course of conduct 

 will certainly be beneficent in its results, would be of no 

 avail without the separate feeling that it is right to strive 

 for results which are beneficent. 



And here it is well worthy of observation, that in direct 

 proportion to the height and sublimity of the meaning 

 artificially attached to the word " utility," it becomes less 

 and less available as a test or as a rule of conduct. So 

 long as the simple and natural meaning was put upon 

 utility, and the good was identified with the pleasurable, 

 the Utilitarian theory of morals did indicate at least some 

 rule of life, however low that rule might be. But now that 

 the apostles of that theory have been driven to put upon 

 utility a transcendental meaning, and the pleasurable is 

 interpreted to refer not merely to the immediate and visi- 

 ble effects of conduct on ourselves or others, but to its 

 remotest effects upon ail living beings, both now and for 

 all future time, the Utilitarian theory in this very process 

 of sublimation becomes lifted out of the sphere of human 

 judgment. If it be true "that there can be no correct idea 

 of a part without a correct idea of the correlative whole," 

 and if human conduct in its tendencies and effects is only 

 " a part of universal conduct," 6 — that is to say, of the 

 whole system of the universe in its past, its present, and 

 its future — then, as this whole is beyond all our means of 

 knowledge and comprehension, it follows that utility, in 

 this sense, can be no guide to us. If indeed this system 

 of the universe has over it or in it one Supreme Authority, 

 and if we knew on that authority the things which do make, 

 not only for our own everlasting peace, but for the perfect 

 accomplishment of the highest purposes of creation to 

 all living things, then indeed the rule of utility is resolved 

 into the simple rule of obedience to legitimate Authority. 

 And this is consistent with all we know of the Unity of 

 Nature, and with all that we can conceive of the central 

 and ultimate Authority on which its order rests. All in- 

 tuitive perceptions come to us from that Authority. All 

 the data of reason come to us from that Authority. All 



Herbert Spencer : ".Data of Ethics," chap. ii. pp. 18, 19. 

 Herbert Spencer : " Dara of Ethics," chap. i. pp. 1-$. 



these in their own several spheres of operation may well 

 guide us to what is right, and may give us also the con- 

 viction that what is right is also what is best, " at last, far 

 off, at last to all." 



Thus far a clear and consistent answer can be given to one 

 of the greatest questions of ethical inquiry, namely, the na- 

 ture of the relation between those elements in conduct 

 which make it useful, and those elements in conduct which 

 make it virtuous. The usefulness of conduct in promoting 

 ends and purposes which are good is, in proportion to the 

 nature and extent of that good, a test and an index of its 

 virtue. But the usefulness of conduct in promoting ends 

 and purposes which are not good is a mark and index, not of 

 virtue, but of vice. It follows from this that utility in itself 

 has no moral character whatever apart from the particular 

 aim which it tends to accomplish, and that the moral good- 

 ness of that aim is presupposed when we speak or think 

 of the utility of conduct as indicative of its virtue. But 

 this characterof goodness must be amatterof independent 

 and instinctive recognition, because il is the one distinc- 

 tion between the kind of usefulness which is virtuous and 

 the many kinds of usefulness which are vicious. Accord- 

 ingly we find in the last resort that our recognition of 

 goodness in the conduct of other men towards ourselves 

 is inseparable from our own consciousness of the needs 

 and wants of our own life, and of the tendency of that 

 conduct to supply them. This estimate of goodness 

 seated in the very nature of our bodies and of our minds, 

 becomes necessarily, also, a standard of obligation as re- 

 gards our conduct to others ; for the unity of our nature 

 with that of our kind and fellows is a fact seen and felt 

 intuitively in the sound of every voice and in the glance 

 of every eye around us. 



But this great elementary truth of morals, that we 

 ought to do to others as we know we should wish them 

 to do to us, is not the only truth which is intuitively per- 

 ceived by the Moral Sense. There is, at least, one other 

 among the rudiments of duty which is quite as self-evi- 

 dent, quite as important, quite as far-reaching in its conse- 

 quences, and quite as early recognized. Obedience to the 

 will of legitimate Authority is necessarily the first of all mo- 

 tives with which the sense of obligation is inseparably as- 

 sociated ; whilst its opposite, or rebellion against the 

 commands of legitimate Authority, is the spirit and the 

 motive upon which the Moral Sense pronounces its earliest 

 sentence of disapproval and of condemnation. At first 

 sight it may seem as if the legitimacy of any Authority 

 is a previous question requiring itself to be determined 

 by the Moral Sense, seeing that it is not until this 

 character of legitimacy or rightfulness has been recog- 

 nized as belonging to some particular Authority, that 

 obedience to its commands comes in consequence to be 

 recognized as wrong. A moment's' consideration, how- 

 ever, will remind us that there is at least one Authority 

 the rightfulness of which is not a question but a fact. 

 All men are born of parents. All men, moreover, are 

 born in a condition of utter helplessness and of absolute 

 dependence. As a mattor of fact, therefore, and not at 

 all as a matter of question or of doubt, our first conception 

 of duty, or of moral obligation, is necessarily and uni- 

 versally attached to such acts as are in conformity with 

 the injunctions of this last and most indisputable of all 

 Authorities. 



Standing, then, on this firm ground of universal and 

 necessary experience, we are able to affirm with absolute 

 conviction that our earliest conceptions of duty — our ear- 

 liest exercises of the Moral Sense — are not determined 

 by any considerations of utility, or by any conclusions of 

 the judgment on the results or on the tendencies of con- 

 duct. 



But the same reasoning, founded on the same princi- 

 ple of simply investigating and ascertaining facts, will 

 carry us a great way farther on. As we grow up from 

 infancy, we find that our parents are themselves also sub- 

 ject to Authority, owing and owning the duty of obedi- 



