'Chap. ni. 
MO UAL SENSE. 
71 
“ reverence, if not always obedience ; before whom all 
“ appetites are dumb, however secretly they rebel ; 
‘ whence thy original ?” 3 
This great question has been discussed by many 
Writers 4 of consummate ability; and my sole excuse 
for touching on it is the impossibility of here passing 
it over, and because, as far as I know, no one has ap- 
proached it exclusively from the side of natural history. 
The investigation possesses, also, some independent in- 
terest, as an attempt to see how far the study of the 
lower animals can throw light on one ol the highest 
Psychical faculties of man. 
The following proposition seems to me in a high 
degree probable— namely, that any animal whatever, 
endowed with well-marked social instincts , 5 * * * * * 11 would inevi- 
tably acquire a moral sense or conscience, as soon as 
3 1 Metaphysics of Ethics,* translated by J. \V. Semple. Edinburgh, 
l83 6, p. 136. 
_ 4 Mr. Bain gives a list (‘Mental and Moral Science,’ 18G8, p. o43- 
' -“•!) of twenty-six British authors who have written on this subject, 
and whoso names arc familiar to every reader ; to these, Mr. Bain’s own 
lla me, and those of Mr. Becky, Mr. Sbadworth Hodgson, and Sir J. 
Lubbock, as well as of others, may be added. t 
* Sir B. Brodie, after observing that man is a social animal (‘ x ’sy- 
ehological Enquiries,’ 1854, p. 102), asks tiro pregnant question, 
‘‘ ought not this to settle the disputed question as to the existence ot a 
11 moral sense ?” Similar ideas have probably occurred to many persons, 
a s they did long ago to Marcus Aurelius. Mr. J. 8. Mill speaks, in 
Lis celebrated work, ‘ Utilitarianism,’ (1864, p. 40), of the social feelings 
a “powerful natural sentiment,’’ and as tho natural basis of 
“sentiment for utilitarian morality;” but on the previous page he 
sa ys, “if, as is my own belief, the moral -feelings are not innate, but 
. acquired, they are not for that reason less natural. It is w ith hesita- 
tion that I venture to differ from so pro! mold a thinker, hut it can 
hardly ho disputed that the social feelings are instinctive or innate 
in the lower animals ; and why should they not bo so ill man ? 
Mr. Bain (see, for instance, * The Emotions and the Will,’ 18G5, p. 481) 
and others believe that the moral sense is acquired by each individual 
during his lifetime. On the general theory of evolution .this is at 
least extremely improbable. 
