MORAL PHILOSOPHY

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MORAL PHILOSOPHY is the science which treats of the motives and rules of human actions, and of the ends to which they ought to be directed. The moral law is the law which governs intelligent and free beings, and which, determines the character of vice and virtue. It is a natural law, independent of any human institution ; a religious law, which emanates from the supreme Legislator, obligatory in itself, through the conviction which it produces, universal and immutable. The moral law revealed itself in the infancy of society. Philosophers are its expounders, not its creators. Their voice is but the echo of conscience. The first moralists confined themselves to expressing the law of duty in maxims, or to illustrating it in apologues. It needed no proof beyond a mere enunciation. Their simple precepts have been honored in all ages. Three chief causes have concurred in developing and establishing the rules of practical morality,positive laws, religious institutions, and civilization. Positive laws are only the written expression of the law of duty engraved in the human soul, with such provisions as the violence of the human passions requires to enforce its precepts. Legislators, it is true, have had in view rather the general interests of society than the interest of morality in the abstract; their punishments are proportioned to effects rather than intentions. But the common good is usually found to accord with individual duty; and men require, in the provisions for the public weal, an acknowledgment of the moral law. They require to be addressed in the name of justice.While civil institutions have regulated the conduct of man in society, religious institutions have penetrated into the sanctuary of conscience. Moral and religious sentiments are developed almost spontaneously, and have a natural sympathy. From its alliance with morality, religion becomes refined and elevated. Christianity has blended them in the precepts of love to God and love to man. What we call civilization, is a complex result which supposes the existence of close, extended and varied relations among men, the developement of industry, the progress of intelligence and taste, the establishment of general order, the refinement of public and private manners. It is, in part, the fruit of civil and religious institutions. Practical morality exerts a powerful influence on it, stisngthening the ties which unite individuals, fortifying the respect for equity and benevolence, encouraging labor, and assuring its reward by protecting property, favoring the progress of intelligence by nourishing the love of truth, and improving taste by purifying and elevating the sentiment of the beautiful. Civilization, in its turn, promotes practical morality. The closer and more varied the relations among men become, the more sensible do they grow to their mutual duties. Labor gives man the sentiment of selfrespect; the progress of science and the arts aids virtue, by enlightening the mind, and accustoming it to noble and delicate pleasures. If such are the influences of laws, religion and civilization upon morality, we need not be surprised that they have, in turn, been considered its source, from a limited view of its nature. But if the moral law is, in reality, prior to all these, why, it may be asked, does it appear to vary so much in its effects in different places and ages ? To this we reply, that practical morality supposes two conditionsthe idea of duty faithfully comprehended, .and the authority of duty strongly felt. But the idea may be partially or erroneously understood, and the sentiment may be blunted or weakened. The law of duty, in the abstract, is simple, and not liable to be mistaken ; but its applications are often complex and delicate, requiring the exercise of a strong and cultivated reason, and therefore affording great occasion for mistake. The feeling of duty, too, requires a certain degree of reflection, and becomes extinct in a life of violence and sensual excess, it may, moreover, become perverted in consequence of positive ordinances, civil and religious. But the very abuse of the notion of duty supposes its existence; and we find not a few instances in which the native energy of the moral feeling has risen superior to positive institutions, and wrought fundamental changes in the laws, religious and other institutions, which had sought to enchain it. We might add, that the doctrines of philosophy have often been much more the effect of the manners of a particular country or age than the agents which modified them.Moral precepts may be distinguished into two orders, with reference to the degree of obligation which they imposethe imperative and the meritorious. The first commands us to render to every man his due, including, of course, our duties to ourselves ; the second, to do for every man, ourselves included, all which is in our power, and therefore to strive for our own highest improvement. But the limits of these two classes cannot be distinctly defined. In considering what the moral law enjoins, we' soon perceive that there are degrees in our duties. Just as actions may differ in criminality, so may they also differ in merit; and the degree in both cases will depend upon accompanying circumstances ; and circumstances are often such as to make it difficult to determine on which side the balance of duty predominates. But though man is often driven to choose between conflicting duties, he is never obliged to choose between two criminal acts ; although, in some cases, an act of guilt will present itself under the specious guise of a means for a good end ; which has led some speculators to the revolting doctrine, that the end justifies the meansa doctrine sufficient to excuse the wildest excesses of fanaticism, which, in its blind zeal to effect what it deems a laudable object, tramples under foot the most sacred rights. When we inquire what gives a moral character to actions, we learn that it is the intention. A man's acts may, however, be sinful, although his intention at the time may not have been bad, if they originated in prejudice or ignorance, occasioned by a sinful neglect of the means of information. Proper instruction in moral duties is therefore every man's highest interest and highest duty.Moral duties have been distinguished into three great classesduties to God, to our fellowmen, and to ourselvesbut, though they may be classified, they are not to be separated. Duties to God comprise, essentially, all our obligations o and when we serve other men, WP, in fact, labor for ourselves ; so, too, in improv ing ourselves, we are qualifying ourselves to render the highest service to others. The class of mutual duties which supports the social relations may be divided into three branchesthe duties of the individual to society, those of society to the individual, and those of societies to each oth er. Under the name of societies, we include all the forms and degrees of human associationthe family, city, country, and mankind. The duties of the individual towards society differ with the station which he occupies, and the nature of social institutions. The duties of the private man, the magistrate, and the statesman, are very various. Free institutions, as they greatly increase the sphere of efficiency, proportionably enlarge that of duty ; and the rapid growth of such institutions, in our day, must give rise to new classes of social duties. Perhaps a wide field still remains open to moralists, in the exposition of the duties which society owes to its members. Some philosophers have been so blind to these as to maintain that the public interest would justify the sacrifice of an innocent individual. And how long have mankind been in learning the respect which they owe to the individual liberty of thinking, speaking and writing? Is this respect properly understood, even at present ? Have politicians duly learned the regard which they owe to the moral law ? Is it a long period since the writers on general law have considered with proper attention the rules which society ought to impose on itself in the application of punishments? But it is the relations of societies towards each other which principally demand the meditations of moralists. There is a social selfishness which meets a ready excuse, since each member of a society is apt to consider his individual character merged in his social, and that his duties towards the association with which he is connected, justify acts and feelings which would be censurable in his commerce with others in his individual capacity. Hence that esprit de corps, so bitter in its animosities, and so unscrupulous in its ambition, arming nation against nation, from commercial rivalry or lust of territorial aggrandizement, from wounded pride or thirst of conquest. The code of international law is yet very imperfect, and needs to be completed by reference to the code of morality.See Paley's Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy; Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments ; Dugald Stewart's Philosophy of the active ami moral Poivei^s of Man ; Degerando's Perfectionnement Moral; Mackintosh's History of the Progress of Ethical and Political Science (London, 1830).We shall now say a few words on the different theories of moral sentiments. Philosophers have endeavored to establish some genejal principle from which the laws of practical morality may be derived, and to which, in doubtful points, we may refer, to determine our rule of conduct in particular cases. The Hindoo moralists find their moral principle in the precept to purify the soul from all sensual desires. Plato, who drew from Eastern fountains, expresses his law of morality under three different formsStrive to resemble the Deity. Let your passions be in harmony with each other. Live in accordance with the fundamental type of the soul, or inborn ideas (or, according to the Stoics, with nature). Aristotle considered virtue and prudence as the same, and recommended the golden mean, or a rational avoidance of extremes; virtue, according to him, consists in the habit of mediocrity according to right reason. Epicurus (who did not, however, understand his precept in the low sense usually ascribed to it) founded his moral system on the rule, Live to enjoy thyself; which has been considered to refer to the happiness which virtue gives; and it is certain that Epicurus himself was a model of virtue. The New Platonists followed their master on this point. The fathers of the church did not attempt to establish any universal moral principle; nor did the Scholastics (q. v.). The English moralists have founded their systems on different principles; Hutcheson's rests upon the principle of benevolence, and assumes a moral sense ; Ferguson followed the Epicurean theory; Samuel Clarke places virtue in acting according to the nature of things, by which man will facilitate his progress to his destined sphere. Adam Smith assumes sympathy as the moral principle ; Woliaston, the acting according to the truth of things ; lord Shaftesbury, the maintenance of a proper balance of the affections. Paley's system is founded on utility. Cudworth considers virtue as an innate principle. Of the continental moralists, Grotius and Puffendorf derive all duties from the fundamental obligation to improve the condition of others and of one's self, and therefore command us to endeavor to do all in our power to promote the general good. The precept of Crusius, who considers duty an obligation to God rather than to man, is, Obey all the precepts of God. Thomasius, Leibnitz and Wolf give, as their fundamental principle, Aim at perfection ; Kant, Be thy own lawgiver, and strive less for dominion over others than over thyself. In all theories of morals, two questions ariseWhat is virtue ? How is it recommended to us ? And all theories on each point may finally be reduced to three: on the first, that virtue is benevolence, or prudence, or propriety ; and on the second, that it is recommended to us by selflove, or reason, or a moral sense.