iles@46743@46743-h@46743-h-8.htm.html#Page_228" class="pginternal">228 |
| 3. It may be said that Moral Excellence, like Beauty, eludes definition: but if Ethical Science is to be constituted, we must obtain definite Moral Axioms. | 228-230 |
| CHAPTER III |
| THE INTELLECTUAL VIRTUES |
| 1. The common conception of Wisdom assumes a harmony of the ends of different ethical methods: all of which—and not one rather than another—the wise man is commonly thought to aim at and attain as far as circumstances admit. | 231-233 |
| 2. The Will is to some extent involved in forming wise decisions: but more clearly in acting on them—whatever we may call the Virtue thus manifested. | 233-236 |
| 3. Of minor intellectual excellences, some are not strictly Virtues: others are, such as Caution and Decision, being in part voluntary. | 236-237 |
| Note | 237 |
| CHAPTER IV |
| BENEVOLENCE |
| 1. The Maxim of Benevolence bids us to some extent cultivate affections, and confer happiness | 238-241 |
| 2. on sentient, chiefly human, beings; especially in certain circumstances and relations, in which affections—which are hardly virtues—prompt to kind services. Rules for the distribution of Kindness are needed, | 241-246 |
| 3. as claims may conflict; but clearly binding rules cannot be obtained from Common Sense in a definite form; | 246-247 |
| 4. nor clear principles from which rules may be deduced; as is seen when we examine the duties to Kinsmen, as commonly conceived: | 247-250 |
| 5. and the wider duties of Neighbourhood, Citizenship, Universal Benevolence; and the duties of cultivating Reverence and Loyalty: | 250-254 |
| 6. and those springing from the Conjugal relation: | 254-256 |
| 7. and those of Friendship: | 256-259 |
| 8. and those of Gratitude: and those to which we are prompted by Pity. | 259-263 |
| Note | 263 |
| CHAPTER V |
| JUSTICE |
| 1. Justice is especially difficult to define. The Just cannot be identified with the Legal, as laws may be unjust. Again, the Justice of laws does not consist merely in the absence of arbitrary inequality in framing or administering them. | 264-268 |
| 2. One element of Justice seems to consist in the fulfilment of (1) contracts and definite understandings, and (2) expectations arising naturally out of the established order of Society; but the duty of fulfilling these latter is somewhat indefinite: | 268-271 |
| 3. and this social order may itself, from another point of view, be condemned as unjust; that is, as tried by the standard of Ideal Justice. What then is this Standard? We seem to find various degrees and forms of it. | 271-274 |
| 4. One view of Ideal Law states Freedom as its absolute End: but the attempt to construct a system of law on this principle involves us in insuperable difficulties. | 274-278 |
| 5. Nor does the realisation of Freedom satisfy our common conception of Ideal Justice. The principle of this is rather ‘that Desert should be requited.’ | 278-283 |
| 6. But the application of this principle is again very perplexing: whether we try to determine Good Desert (or the worth of services), | 283-290 |
| 7. or Ill Desert, in order to realise Criminal Justice. There remains too the difficulty of reconciling Conservative and Ideal Justice. | 290-294 |
| CHAPTER
align="right">426-430 |
| 3. we observe, first, how the rules that prescribe the distribution of kindness in accordance with normal promptings of Family Affections, Friendship, Gratitude, and Pity have a firm Utilitarian basis: and how Utilitarianism is naturally referred to for an explanation of the difficulties that arise in attempting to define these rules. | 430-439 |
| 4. A similar result is reached by an examination, singly and together, of the different elements into which we have analysed the common notion of Justice: | 439-448 |
| 5. and in the case of other virtues. | 448-450 |
| 6. Purity has been thought an exception: but a careful examination of common opinions as to the regulation of sexual relations exhibits a peculiarly complex and delicate correspondence between moral sentiments and social utilities. | 450-453 |
| 7. The hypothesis that the Moral Sense is ‘unconsciously Utilitarian’ also accounts for the actual differences in different codes of Duty and estimates of Virtue, either in the same age and country, or when we compare different ages and countries. It is not maintained that perception of rightness has always been consciously derived from perception of utility: a view which the evidence of history fails to support. | 453-457 |
| On the Utilitarian view, the relation between Ethics and Politics is different for different parts of the legal code. | 457-459 |
| CHAPTER IV |
| THE METHOD OF UTILITARIANISM |
| 1. Ought a Utilitarian, then, to accept the Morality of Common Sense provisionally as a body of Utilitarian doctrine? Not quite; for even accepting the theory that the Moral Sense is derived from Sympathy, we can discern several causes that must have operated to produce a divergence between Common Sense and a perfectly Utilitarian code of morality. | 460-467 |
| 2. At the same time it seems idle to try to construct such a code in any other way than by taking Positive Morality as our basis. | 467-471 |
| 3. If General Happiness be the ultimate end, it is not reasonable to adopt “social health” or “efficiency” as the practically ultimate criterion of morality. | 471-474 |
| CHAPTER V |
| THE METHOD OF UTILITARIANISM (continued) |
| 1. It is, then, a Utilitarian’s duty at once to support generally, and to rectify in detail, the morality of Common Sense: and the method of pure empirical Hedonism seems to be the only one that he can at present use in the reasonings that finally determine the nature and extent of this rectification. | 475-480 |
| 2. His innovations may be either negative and destructive, or positive and supplementary. There are certain important general reasons against an innovation of the former kind, which may, in any given case, easily outweigh the special arguments in its favour. | 480-484 |
| 3. Generally, a Utilitarian in recommending, by example or precept, a deviation from an established rule of conduct, desires his innovation to be generally imitated. But in some cases he may neither expect nor desire such imitation; though cases of this kind are rare and difficult to determine. | 485-492 |
| 4. There are no similar difficulties in the way of modifying the Ideal of Moral Excellence—as distinguished from the dictates of Moral Duty—in order to render it more perfectly felicific. | 492-495 |
| CONCLUDING CHAPTER |
| THE MUTUAL RELATIONS OF THE THREE METHODS |
| 1. It is not difficult to combine the Intuitional and Utilitarian methods into one; but can we reconcile Egoistic and Universalistic Hedonism? | 496-498 |
| 2. In so far as the latter coincides with Common Sense, we have seen in Book ii. chap. v. that no complete reconciliation is possible, on the basis of experience. | 498-499 |
| 3. Nor does a fuller consideration of Sympathy, as a specially Utilitarian sanction, lead us to modify this conclusion; in spite of the importance that is undoubtedly to be attached to sympathetic pleasures. | 499-503 |
| 4. The Religious Sanction, if we can show that it is actually attached to the Utilitarian Code, is of course adequate: |
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