{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_63249/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_63249","id":"gutenberg_63249","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/63249","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Politics","Political science -- Philosophy","State, The -- Philosophy"],"text":"Transcriber\u2019s Note: The text is that of the first edition, with the\nerrata incorporated. Because there are no page breaks, footnotes are\nplaced under the paragraphs or quotations to which they relate, and\nrenumbered accordingly. Page numbers have been inserted into the text\nin braces.\n\nTHE PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY OF THE STATE\n\nBY\n\nBERNARD BOSANQUET\n\nC\u2019est le peuple qui compose le genre humain; ce qui n\u2019est pas\npeuple est si peu de chose que ce n\u2019est pas la peine de le\ncompter. (\u00c9mile, livre 4.)\n\nLONDON  MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED\n\nNEW YORK  THE MACMILLAN COMPANY\n\n1899\n\nAll rights reserved\n\nGLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS\nBY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO.\n\nTo:  CHARLES STEWART LOCH\n\n\n\n\n{vii}\n\nPREFACE.\n\nThe present work is an attempt to express what I take to be the\nfundamental ideas of a true social philosophy. I have criticised\nand interpreted the doctrines of certain well-known thinkers only\nwith the view of setting these ideas in the clearest light. This is\nthe whole purpose of the book; and I have intentionally abstained\nfrom practical applications, except by way of illustration. It is\nmy conviction, indeed, that a better understanding of fundamental\nprinciples would very greatly contribute to the more rational\nhandling of practical problems. But this better understanding is\nonly to be attained, as it seems to me, by a thorough examination\nof ideas, apart from the associations of practical issues about\nwhich a fierce party spirit has been aroused. And, moreover, it\nis my belief that the influence of the ideas here maintained upon\npractical discussion, would be, in a certain sense, to detach it from\nphilosophical theory. The principles which I advocate would destroy\nso many party prejudices, would put the mind in possession of so many\nclues to fact, that practical \u201csocial\u201d issues would in consequence\nbe considered as problems of life and mind, to be treated only with\nintimate experience, and by methods adequate to their subtlety. The\n{viii} result would be that such discussions would be regarded, if\none may use the expression, more respectfully, and would acquire an\nindependence and completeness worthy of their importance. The work of\nthe social reformer should no more be regarded as a mere appendix to\nsocial theory than that of the doctor is regarded as a mere appendix\nto physiology. Such a division of labour is, of course, no hindrance\nto the interchange of facts and ideas between theory and practice.\nOn the contrary, it tends to promote such an interchange, by\nincreasing the supply on either side, and improving the intellectual\ncommunication between them.\n\nIt will occur to philosophical readers that the essence of the\ntheory here presented is to be found not merely in Plato and in\nAristotle, but in very many modern writers, more especially in Hegel,\nT.H. Green, Bradley, [1] and Wallace. [2] And they may be inclined\nto doubt the justification for a further work on the same lines\nby one who can hardly expect to improve upon the writings of such\npredecessors.\n\n[1] See especially the chapter in _Ethical Studies_ entitled \u201cMy\nStation and its Duties.\u201d\n\n[2] See _Lectures and Essays_ by the late Professor Wallace,\nespecially p. 213, \u201cOur Natural Rights,\u201d and p. 427, \u201cThe Relation of\nFichte and Hegel to Socialism.\u201d\n\nOn this point I should like to make a brief explanation. To begin\nwith, it is a truism that every generation needs to be addressed\nin its own language; and I might even plead that the greatness of\na tradition justifies some urgency in calling attention to it. But\nfurther, as regards T.H. Green in particular, whom in many points\nI follow very closely, I had two special reasons for desiring {ix}\nto express myself independently. One of these is to be found in my\nattempt to apply the conceptions of recent psychology to the theory\nof State coercion and of the Real or General Will, and to explain the\nrelation of Social Philosophy to Sociological Psychology. For a short\ndiscussion of the Imitation Theory, which the purpose of the present\nwork would not permit me to include in it, I may refer to a paper\nwhich will shortly appear in _Mind_.\n\nMy other reason lay in the conviction that the time has gone by for\nthe scrupulous caution which Green displayed in estimating the value\nof the State to its members. I have referred to this subject in the\nbody of my work (ch. x.); but I desire to emphasise my belief that\nour growing experience of all social \u201cclasses\u201d proves the essentials\nof happiness and character to be the same throughout the social\nwhole. Scepticism on this point is the product, I am convinced, of\ndefective social experience. Indeed, it seems worth while to observe\nthat the attention which is now rightly paid to such disadvantages,\naffecting the poorer classes of citizens, as it may be possible\nto remedy, has given rise to a serious confusion. The zeal of the\nadvocate has led him to slander his client. In proving that under\nsuch and such conditions it would be no wonder if \u201cthe poor\u201d were\nbad, he forgets to observe that in fact they are generally just\nas good as other people. The all-important distinction between a\npoor home and a bad home is neglected. And yet it seems probable\nthat, omitting the definitely criminal quarters, there is no\nlarger proportion of bad homes among the poor than among the rich.\nSuch terms as \u201cden\u201d and \u201cslum\u201d {x} are too freely used, with an\naffectation of intimacy, for homes in which thousands of respectable\ncitizens reside. Our democratic age will be remarkable to posterity\nfor having dimmed the time-honoured belief in the virtues of the\npoor. There was cant, no doubt, in the older doctrine, but it was not\nso far from the fact as the opposite cant of today, and it is time\nthat the truth in it should be revived.\n\nI must repeat that these remarks are not intended to be\ncontroversial. There is nothing in them which serious men of all\nschools may not accept. They are meant to defend my attitude in\ntreating the Real Will, and Freedom in the greater Self, as matters\nof universal concern, and not merely as hopes and fancies cherished\nby \u201ceducated\u201d persons. Indeed, although it would be churlish for a\nstudent to disparage literary education, it must never be forgotten\nthat, as things are today, the citizens who live by handicraft\npossess a valuable element of brain-culture, which is on the whole\ndenied to the literary class. Whatever, therefore, may be wanting\nin the following pages, it is not, I think, the relation of their\nsubject-matter to the general life of peoples.\n\nThe social student should shun mere optimism; but he should not\nbe afraid to make the most of that which he studies. It is an\nunfortunate result of the semi-practical aims which naturally\ninfluence social philosophers, that they are apt throughout to take\nup an indifferent, if not a hostile, attitude to their given object.\nThey hardly believe in actual society as a botanist believes in\nplants, or a biologist believes in vital processes. And hence, social\ntheory comes off badly. No student can really appreciate an object\nfor which he is always apologising. There is a {xi} touch of this\nattitude in all the principal writers, except Hegel and Bradley,\nand therefore, as I venture to think, they partly fail to seize the\ngreatness and ideality of life in its commonest actual phases. It is\nin no spirit of obscurantism, and with no thought of resisting the\nmarch of a true social logic, that some take up a different position.\nThey are convinced that an actual living society is an infinitely\nhigher creature than a steam-engine, a plant or an animal; and that\nthe best of their ideas are not too good to be employed in analysing\nit. Those who cannot be enthusiastic in the study of society as it\nis, would not be so in the study of a better society if they had it.\n\u201cHere or nowhere is your America.\u201d\n\nBernard Bosanquet\nCaterham, March, 1899.\n\n\n\n\n{xiii}\n\nCONTENTS.\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nRISE AND CONDITIONS OF THE PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY OF THE STATE  1-16\n\n1. Meaning of \u201cPhilosophical Theory\u201d  1\n\n2. Philosophy and the \u201cState,\u201d  3\n    a. The Greek City-State  4\n    b. Type of mind implied in it  5\n    c. Type of political philosophy suggested by it  5\n\n3. Transition from City-State to Nation-State. Law of Nature  9\n\n4. Rise of Nation-States and of modern political philosophy.\n   Rousseau  11\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nSOCIOLOGICAL COMPARED WITH PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY  17-52\n\n1. Problems of Social Physics and of Idealism  17\n\n2. Social Theory as influenced by special sciences  19\n    (i) Mathematics  19\n   (ii) Biology  21\n  (iii) Economics  27\n   (iv) Jurisprudence and the theory of Right  34\n        _(a)_  Law as \u201cideal fact\u201d  34\n        _(b)_  Sociological analysis of Law  36\n    (v) Idea of the \u201cspirit of laws\u201d or mind of peoples;\n            Anthropology in widest sense  39\n   (vi) Psychology  42\n  (vii) Connection of points of view and kinds of fact  47\n\n3. Comparison of Psychological Sociology and Social Philosophy  48\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE PARADOX OF POLITICAL OBLIGATION; SELF-GOVERNMENT  53-78\n\n1. The conception of self-government  53\n\n2. Law and Liberty in Bentham  56\n\n3. Examination of Mill\u2019s \u201cLiberty\u201d  60\n    (i) Mill\u2019s idea of Individuality  60\n   (ii) His view of the authority of Society over the Individual  61\n  (iii) His applications of his principle  66\n\n4. Views of Herbert Spencer  69\n    (i) Spencer and Bentham on Natural Right  70\n   (ii) Liberty and restraint in Spencer and Huxley  71\n\n5. Mill\u2019s criticism of Self-Government  73\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE PROBLEM OF POLITICAL OBLIGATION MORE RADICALLY TREATED  79-102\n\n1. Nature of above theories not expressed by term Individualism.\n    \u201cTheories of the first look\u201d  79\n\n2. Rousseau\u2019s earlier Essays  84\n\n3. Problem of the _Contrat Social_  87\n\n4. Conflict of ideas in Rousseau\u2019s statement  89\n\n5. Nature of his solution  91\n\n6. Reality of the \u201cMoral Person\u201d and conception of Civil Liberty  94\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nTHE CONCEPTION OF A \u201cREAL\u201d WILL  103-123\n\n1. The Supreme Will in Hobbes and Locke  103\n\n2. Meaning of the General Will for Rousseau  107\n\n3- The General Will contrasted with the Will of All  111\n\n4- The General Will and the work of the Legislator  117\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE CONCEPTION OF LIBERTY AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE FOREGOING\n    SUGGESTIONS  118-154\n\n1. Liberty as the condition of our being ourselves  118\n\n2. Illustrated by the idea of Nature and Natural  128\n\n3. Phases of idea of Liberty  133\n    _(a)_  Juristic phase = \u201cabsence of restraint\u201d  134\n    _(b)_  Political phase = \u201crights of citizenship\u201d  135\n    _(c)_  Positive connection of _(a)_  and _(b)_   136\n    _(d)_  Philosophical phase = \u201cbeing oneself in\n           fullest sense\u201d  137\n    _(e)_  Danger and justification of using same term\n           for _(a)_ and _(d)_  142\n\n4. Liberty as attribute of the will that wills itself  146\n\n5. This \u201creal\u201d will identified with State  149\n    _(a)_  State in this sense is social life as a whole  150\n    _(b)_  How State is force as extension of \u201cindividual\u201d mind  152\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nPSYCHOLOGICAL ILLUSTRATION OF THE IDEA OF A\nREAL OR GENERAL WILL  155-179\n\n1. Object of the Chapter  155\n\n2. Connection between social and mental groupings  156\n    (1) Analogy between them  156\n        (i) Associations of persons and of ideas  156\n       (ii) Organisation of social groups and of ideas  159\n    (2) Identity of social and mental groupings  170\n        (i) Social groups as an aspect of mental systems  170\n       (ii) Individual minds as structures of\n            appercipient systems  173\n      (iii) Social whole as a system of mental systems  175\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nNATURE OF THE END OF THE STATE AND CONSEQUENT LIMIT OF STATE ACTION  180-234\n\n1. Distinction between Individual and Society\n   irrelevant to question of Social Means and End  180\n\n2. True contrast: Automatism and Consciousness  181\n\n3. End of State, and Means at its disposal _qua_ State  184\n\n4. State can only secure \u201cexternal\u201d actions  186\n\n5. Principle of the hindrance of hindrances  190\n\n6. State action as the maintenance of rights  201\n    _(a)_  System of rights from standpoint of community  203\n    _(b)_  From standpoint of individuals. \u201cPosition\u201d  204\n        (i) As Rights or recognised claims  206\n       (ii) As Obligations or recognised debts  206\n    _(c)_  Rights as implying Duties  208\n        (i) When Duty = Obligation  208\n       (ii) When Duty = Purpose, which is source of Right  209\n    _(d)_  Rights, why _recognised_ claims? 210\n        (i) A \u201cPosition\u201d involves recognition  210\n       (ii) No right based on individual caprice  212\n\n7. State action as punishment  216\n    (i) Punishment as reformatory 221\n   (ii) Punishment as retributory  223\n  (iii) Punishment as deterrent  228\n\n   Conclusion. State Action as exercise of a _General Will_  232\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nROUSSEAU\u2019S THEORY AS APPLIED TO THE MODERN STATE:\n    KANT, FICHTE, HEGEL 235-255\n\n1. Rousseau\u2019s literary influence in Germany  235\n\n2. Freedom and Social Contract in Kant  238\n\n3. Freedom and Social Contract in Fichte  244\n\n4. Freedom in Hegel\u2019s _Philosophy of Right_  247\n    _(a)_  Supposed reactionary tendency in Hegel  248\n    _(b)_  Relation of analysis and idealisation  290\n\n5. The Philosophy of Right as a chapter in the\n   Philosophy of Mind  252\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nTHE ANALYSIS OF A MODERN STATE. HEGEL\u2019S \u201cPHILOSOPHY OF RIGHT\u201d  256-295\n\n1. Logic of Society as an _ideal fact_  256\n\n2. Sphere of Right or Law and its sub-divisions  258\n\n3. The Letter of the Law  260\n\n4. The Morality of Conscience  262\n\n5. Social Ethics  266\n    (i) Social Ethics as an actual world  266\n   (ii) Social Ethics as the nature of self-consciousness  267\n\n6. Sub-divisions of Social Ethics. The Family  269\n    _(a)_  Depends on natural fact  269\n    _(b)_ Is factor in the State  270\n    _(c)_  Ethical and Monogamous Household  271\n    _(d)_  Relation to Property  272\n\n7. Bourgeois Society. Justice, State Regulation, and\n   Trade Societies  272\n\n8. The State proper, or Political Constitution  280\n\n9. Public discussion and public opinion  285\n\n10. Criticism of such an analysis of the Modern State 287\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nINSTITUTIONS CONSIDERED AS ETHICAL IDEAS  296-334\n\n1. The individual soul and the social mind  296\n\n2. Institutions as common substance of minds  297\n\n3. The Family and Property as elements of mind  299\n\n4. The District or Neighbourhood as an element of mind  304\n\n5. Class as an element of mind. \u201cThe Poor\u201d as an ethical idea  310\n\n6. The Nation-State as an element of mind 320\n\n7. Morality of public and private action  322\n\n8. Humanity as an element of mind  328\n    _(a)_  Humanity not predicable of mankind as a whole  328\n    _(b)_  Humanity does not = mankind as a true community  329\n    _(c)_  Dichotomous expressions for humanity and mankind  330\n    _(d)_  The self beyond any actual society; Art,\n           Philosophy, Religion  332\n\nINDEX  335\n\n\n\n\n{1}\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nRISE AND CONDITIONS OF THE PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY OF THE STATE\n\n1. First, it will be well to indicate, in a very few words, what is\nimplied in a \u201cphilosophical theory,\u201d as distinguished from theories\nwhich make no claim to be philosophical. The primary difference\nis, that a philosophical treatment is the study of some thing as a\nwhole and for its own sake. In a certain sense it may be compared\nto the gaze of a child or of an artist. It deals, that is, with the\ntotal and unbroken effect of its object. It desires to ascertain\nwhat a thing is, what is its full characteristic and being, its\nachievement in the general act of the world. History, explanation,\nanalysis into cause and conditions, have value for it only in so\nfar as they contribute to the intelligent estimation of the fullest\nnature and capabilities of the real individual whole which is under\ninvestigation. We all know that a flower is one thing for the\ngeometrician, another for the chemist, another for {2} the botanist,\nand another, again, for the artist. Now, philosophy can of course\nmake no pretension to cope with any one of the specialists on his\nown ground. But the general nature of the task imposed upon it is\nthis: aiding itself, so far as possible, by the trained vision of all\nspecialists, to make some attempt to see the full significance of\nthe flower as a word or letter in the great book of the world. And\nthis we call studying it, as it is, and for its own sake, without\nreservation or presupposition. It is assumed, then, for the purpose\nof a philosophical treatment, that everything, and more particularly\nin this case the political life of man, has a nature of its own,\nwhich is worthy of investigation on its own merits and for its own\nsake. How its phases come into being, or what causes or conditions\nhave played a part in its growth, are other questions well worthy of\ninvestigation. But the philosophical problem is rather to see our\nobject as it is and to learn what it is, to estimate, so to speak,\nits kind and degree of self-maintenance in the world, than to trace\nits history or to analyse its causation.\n\nYet such phrases as \u201cwhat it is\u201d and \u201cfor its own sake\u201d must not\nmislead us. They do not mean that the nature of any reality which we\nexperience can be appreciated in isolation from the general world of\nlife and knowledge. On the contrary, they imply that when fully and\nfairly considered from the most thoroughly adequate point of view,\nour subject matter will reveal its true position and relations with\nreference to all else that man can do and can know. This position and\nthese relations constitute its rank or significance in the totality\n{3} of experience, and this value or significance--in the present\ncase, what the form of life in question enables man to do and to\nbecome--is just what we mean by its nature \u201cin itself,\u201d or its full\nand complete nature, or its significance when thoroughly studied \u201cfor\nits own sake\u201d from an adequate point of view. Further illustrations\nof the distinction between an adequate point of view and partial or\nlimited modes of consideration, and of the relations between the\nformer and the latter, will be found in the following chapter.\n\n2. In a certain sense it would be true to say that wherever men have\nlived, there has always been a \u201cState.\u201d That is to say, there has\nbeen some association or corporation, larger than the family, and\nacknowledging no power superior to itself. But it is obvious that\nthe experience of a State in this general sense of the word is not\nco-extensive with true political experience, and that something much\nmore definite than this is necessary to awaken curiosity as to the\nnature and value of the community in which man finds himself to be a\nmember.\n\nSuch curiosity has been awakened and sustained principally if not\nexclusively by two kindred types of associated life--the City-state\nof ancient Greece, and the Nation-state of the modern world. It will\nthrow light on the nature of our subject if we glance rapidly at the\ncharacteristics to which it is due that political philosophy began in\nconnection with the former, and revived in connection with the latter.\n\nIn considering the Greek city-states in connection with the birth of\npolitical philosophy, there are three points which press upon our\nattention:{4}\n    _a_. the type of experience which they presented;\n    _b_. the type of mind which that experience implied; and\n    _c_. the type of interpretation which such a mind elicited from\n    such an experience.\n\n_a_. A Greek city-state presented a marked contrast to the modes\nof human association which prevailed in the non-Greek world. It\ndiffered from them above all things by its distinct individuality.\nNo doubt there was a recognisable character in the life and conduct\nof Egypt or of Assyria, of Phoenicia or of Israel. But the community\nwhich has a youth, a maturity, and a decadence, as distinct as those\nof a single human being, and very nearly as self-conscious; which\nhas a tone and spirit as recognisable in the words and bearing of\nits members as those of a character in a play; and which expresses\nits mind in the various regions of human action and endurance\nmuch as an artist expresses his individuality in the creations of\nhis genius--such a community had existed, before the beginnings\nof the modern world, in the Greek city-state, and in the Greek\ncity-state alone. A political consciousness in the strict sense\nwas a necessary factor in the experience of such a commonwealth.\nThe demand for \u201cautonomy\u201d--government by one\u2019s own law,--and for\n\u201cisonomy\u201d--government according to equal law--though far from\nbeing always satisfied, was inherent in the Greek nature; and its\nstrenuousness was evinced by the throes of revolution and the labours\nof legislation which were shaking the world of Greece at the dawn of\nhistory. The very instrument of all political action was invented,\nso far as we can see, by the Greeks. The simple device by which an\norderly vote is {5} taken, and the minority acquiesce in the will\nof the majority as if it had been their own--an invention no less\ndefinite than that of the lever or the wheel--is found for the first\ntime as an everyday method of decision in Greek political life.\n\n_b_. Such a type of experience implies a corresponding type of mind.\nIt is not surprising that science and philosophy should owe their\nbirth to the genius from which politics sprang. For politics is\nthe expression of reason in the relations that bind man to man, as\nscience and philosophy are the expression of it in the relations\nwhich link together man\u2019s whole experience. The mind which can\nrecognise itself practically in the order of the commonwealth,\ncan recognise itself theoretically in the order of nature. And\nultimately, though not at first (for curiosity is awakened by\nobjects perceived in space and time, before attention is turned to\nthe very hinge and centre of man\u2019s own being), science passes into\nphilosophy; and mind, and conduct, and the political consciousness,\nare themselves made objects of speculation. It has become a\ncommonplace that this transference of curiosity from the outer to the\ninner--really, that is, from the partial to the total world--took\nshape in the work of Socrates, who invested with the greatness of\nhis own intelligence and character a movement which the needs of\nthe age had rendered inevitable. And thus there arose the ethical\nand political philosophy of Plato and Aristotle, the successors of\nSocrates, just at the time when the distinctive political life of\nGreece was beginning to decay.\n\n_c_. This philosophy, like all genuine philosophy, {6} was an\ninterpretation of the experience presented to it; and in this case\nthe interpretation was due to minds which were themselves a part\nof the phenomena on which they reflected. Such minds, hostile as\nthey may feel themselves to the spirit of the age, and however\npassionately they may cry out for reform or for revolution, are none\nthe less its representatives; and their interpretation, though it\nmay modify and even mutilate the phenomena, will nevertheless be\nfound to throw the central forces and principles of the time into\nthe clearest light. So Plato\u2019s negative treatment of the family, and\nof other elements which seem essential to Greek civilisation, was\nno bar to his grasping, and representing with unequalled force, the\ncentral principle of the life around him. The fundamental idea of\nGreek political philosophy, as we find it in Plato and Aristotle,\nis that the human mind can only attain its full and proper life in\na community of minds, or more strictly in a community pervaded by a\nsingle mind, uttering itself consistently though differently in the\nlife and action of every member of the community. This conception\nis otherwise expressed by such phrases as \u201cthe State is natural,\u201d\n_i.e._ is a growth or evolution, apart from which the end implied\nin man\u2019s origin cannot be attained; \u201cthe State is prior to the\nindividual,\u201d _i.e._ there is a principle or condition underlying\nthe life of the human individual, which will not admit of that life\nbecoming what it has in it to be, unless the full sphere or arena\nwhich is constituted by the life of the State is realised in fact.\nThe whole is summed up in the famous expression of Aristotle, \u201cMan is\na creature formed for the life of the City-state.\u201d The {7} working\nout of this idea, as we find it in Plato\u2019s commonwealth, is bizarre\nto our minds; but its difficulty really lies in its simplicity and\ndirectness; and there is no sound political philosophy which is not\nan embodiment of Plato\u2019s conception. The central idea is this: that\nevery class of persons in the community--the statesman, the soldier,\nthe workman--has a certain distinctive type of mind which fits its\nmembers for their functions, and that the community essentially\nconsists in the working of these types of mind in their connection\nwith one another, which connection constitutes their subordination\nto the common good. This working or adjustment obviously depends in\nthe last resort on the qualities present in the innermost souls of\nthe members of the community; and thus the outward organisation of\nsociety is really as it were a body which at every point and in every\nmovement expresses the characteristics of a mind. We must not pause\nhere to follow up the consequences of such a conception; but it will\nbe seen at once, by those who reflect upon it, to imply that every\nindividual mind must have its qualities drawn out in various ways to\nanswer to--in fact, to constitute--the relations and functions which\nmake up the community; and that in this sense every mind is a mirror\nor impression of the whole community from its own peculiar point of\nview. The ethical assumption or principle of Plato\u2019s conception is,\nthat a healthy organisation of the commonwealth will involve, by a\nnecessary connection, a healthy balance and adjustment of qualities\nin the individual soul, and _vice versa_. An attempt will be made\nto illustrate this principle further in the latter portion {8} of\nthe present work. The general nature of Plato\u2019s conception--the\ncharacteristic conception of Greek political philosophy--is all that\nconcerns us here.\n\nIt is important to observe that during the very genesis of this\nphilosophical conception of society, an antagonistic view was\npowerfully represented. The individual could not freely find himself\nin the community unless he was capable of repudiating it; the\npossibility of negation, as a logician might express it, is necessary\nto a really significant affirmation. Thus we find in the very age of\nPlato and Aristotle the most startling anticipations of those modern\nideas which seem diametrically opposed to theirs. We find the idea\nof nature identified not with the mature fulness, but with the empty\nstarting point of life; we meet with the phenomena of vegetarianism,\nwater-drinking, the reduction of dress to its minimum, in short, the\nfamiliar symptoms of the longing for the \u201creturn to nature,\u201d with all\nthat it implies; we find law and political unity treated as a tissue\nof artifice and convention, and the individual disdaining to identify\nhimself with the citizenship of a single state, but claiming to be a\nstranger in the city and a citizen of the world. To prove that these\nideas were not without their justification, it is enough to point out\nthat in some instances they were accompanied by a polemic against\nslavery, which, as a form of solidarity, was upheld in a qualified\nsense at least by Aristotle. The existence of this negative criticism\nis enough to show how distinctly the Greek intellect set before\nitself the fundamental problem of the relation between the individual\nand society, and of how high a quality was the bond of union which\n{9} maintained this relation in such intimacy among minds of a temper\nso analytic.\n\n3. Many writers have told the story of the change which came over the\nmind of Greece when the independent sovereignty of its City-states\nbecame a thing of the past. For our purpose it is enough to draw\nattention to the fact that with this change the political or social\nphilosophy of the great Greek time not only lost its supremacy,\nbut almost ceased to be understood. From this period forward, till\nthe rise of the modern Nation-states, men\u2019s thoughts about life\nand conduct were cast in the mould of moral theory, of religious\nmysticism and theology, or of jurisprudence. The individual demanded\nin the sphere of ethics and religion to be shown a life sufficing\nto himself apart from any determinate human society--a problem\nwhich Plato and Aristotle had assumed to be insoluble. Stoicism\nand Epicureanism, the earliest non-national creeds of the western\nworld, triumphantly developed the ideas which at first, as we saw,\nwere little more than a rebellion against the central Socratic\nphilosophy. Cosmopolitanism, the conception of humanity, the ideal\nof a \u201cSociety of Friends\u201d--the Epicurean league--from which women\nwere not excluded, and the precept of \u201cnot expecting from life more\nthan it has to give,\u201d take the place of the highly individualised\ncommonwealth, with its strenuous masculine life of war and politics,\nand its passionate temper which felt that nothing had been\naccomplished so long as anything remained undone.\n\nWith this change of temper in the civilised world there is brought\ninto prominence a great deal of {10} human nature which had not found\nexpression through the immediate successors of Socrates. In the\nperiod between Aristotle and Cicero there is more than a whisper of\nthe sound which meets us like a trumpet blast in the New Testament,\n\u201cneither Jew nor Greek, barbarian nor Scythian, bond nor free.\u201d But\nthe unworldliness which took final shape in Christianity was destined\nto undergo a long transmigration through shapes of other-worldliness\nbefore it should return in modern thought to the unity from which it\nstarted; and the history of ethics and religion has little bearing\nupon true political theory between the death of Aristotle and the\nawakening of the modern consciousness in the Reformation.\n\nIn so far as the political ideas of antiquity were preserved\nto modern times otherwise than in the manuscripts of Plato and\nAristotle, the influence which preserved them was that of Roman\nJurisprudence. The Roman rule, though it stereotyped the state of\nthings in which genuine political function and the spur of freedom\nwere unknown, had one peculiar gift by which it handed to posterity\nthe germs of a great conception of human life. This is not the place\nto describe at length the origin of that vast practical induction\nfrom the working of the \u201cforeigners\u2019 court\u201d at Rome which obtained\nfor itself the name of the Law of Nations, and which, as tinged with\nideal theory, was known as the Law of Nature. Whatever fallacies may\nbe near at hand when \u201cnatural right\u201d is named, the conception that\nthere is in man, as such, something which must be respected, a law\nof life which is his \u201cnature,\u201d being indeed another name {11} for\nhis reason, and in some sense or other a \u201cfreedom\u201d and an \u201cequality\u201d\nwhich are his birthright--this conception was not merely a legacy\nfrom Stoic ideas, which had almost a religious inspiration, but was\nsolidly founded on the judicial experience of the most practical race\nthat the world has ever seen.\n\n4. In order that the forces which lay hidden in the conception\nof Natural Right and Freedom, like the powers of vegetation in a\nseed, might unfold themselves in the modern world, it was necessary\nthat conditions should recur analogous to those which had first\nelicited them. And these earlier conditions were those of the Greek\nCity-state; for it was here, as we have seen, that the conception of\nman\u2019s nature had flourished, as the idea of a purposive evolution\ninto a full and many-sided social life, while in Stoic philosophy and\nRoman juristic theory it had become more and more a shibboleth and\na formula which lost in depth of meaning what it gained in range of\napplication.\n\nTo restore their ancient significance, expanded in conformity with\na larger order of things, to the traditional formulae, demanded\njust the type of experience which was furnished by the modern\nNation-state. The growth of Nation-states in modern Europe was in\nprogress, we are told, from the ninth to the fifteenth century. And\nit is towards and after the close of this period, and especially\nin the seventeenth century when the national consciousness of the\nEnglish people, as of others, had become thoroughly awakened, that\npolitical speculation in the strict sense begins again, {12} after\nan interval extending back to the Politics of Aristotle. To let one\nexample serve for many; when we read John of Gaunt\u2019s praises of\nEngland in Shakespeare\u2019s Richard II., we feel ourselves at once in\ncontact with the mind of a social unity, such as necessarily to raise\nin any inquiring intelligence all those problems which were raised\nfor Plato and Aristotle by the individuality of Athens and Sparta.\nAnd so we see the earliest political speculation of the modern world\ngroping, as it were, for ideas by help of which to explain the\nexperience of an individual self-governing sovereign society. And\nfor the most part the ideas that offer themselves are those of Roman\nJurisprudence, but distorted by political applications and by the\nrhetoric of Protestant fanaticism. As Mr. Ritchie [1] points out, the\nconception of natural right and a law of nature makes a strange but\neffective coalition with the temper of the Wycliffite cry\n\n  \u201cWhen Adam dalf, and Eve span,\n   Who was then the gentleman?\u201d\n\nThe notions of contract, of force, of representation in a\nsingle legal \u201cperson,\u201d are now applied separately or together\nto the phenomenon of the self-governing individual community.\nBut the solution remains imperfect, and the fundamental fact of\nself-government refuses to be construed either as the association of\nindividuals, originally free and equal, for certain limited purposes,\nor as the absolute absorption of their wills in the \u201cperson\u201d of a\ndespotic sovereign.\n\n[1] _Natural Rights_, p. 8.\n\nThe revival of a true philosophical meaning {13} within the abstract\nterms of juristic tradition was the work of the eighteenth century\nas a whole. For the sake of clearness, and with as much historical\njustice as ever attaches to an attribution of the kind, we may\nconnect it with the name of a single man--Jean Jacques Rousseau. For\nit is Rousseau who stands midway between Hobbes and Locke on the\none hand, and Kant and Hegel on the other, and in whose writings\nthe actual revival of the full idea of human nature may be watched\nfrom paragraph to paragraph as it struggles to throw off the husk of\nan effete tradition. Between Locke and Rousseau the genius of Vico\nand of Montesquieu had given a new meaning to the dry formulae of\nlaw by showing the sap of society circulating within them. Moreover\nthe revived experience of the Greeks came in the nick of time. It\nwas influential with Rousseau himself, and little as he grasped the\npolitical possibilities of a modern society, in matters of sheer\nprinciple this influence led him on the whole in the right direction.\nHis insight was just, when it showed him that every political whole\npresented the same problem which had been presented by the Greek\nCity-state, and involved the same principles. And he bequeathed\nto his successors the task of substituting for the mere words and\nfictions of contract, nature, and original freedom, the idea of the\ncommon life of an essentially social being, expressing and sustaining\nthe human will at its best.\n\nAccording to the view here indicated, the resurrection of true\npolitical philosophy out of the dead body of juristic abstractions\nwas inaugurated by {14} Vico and Montesquieu, and decisively declared\nitself in Jean Jacques Rousseau. The idea which most of us have\nformed of \u201cthe new Evangel of a _Contrat Social_\u201d is not in harmony\nwith this representation of the matter. Was it, we may be asked,\na genuine political philosophy which inspired the leaders of the\nFrench Revolution? And the question cannot be evaded by denying all\nconnection between the theory and the practice of that age. The\nphraseology of the revolutionary declarations [1]--which will strike\nthe reader accustomed to nineteenth century socialism as exceedingly\nmoderate and even conservative in tone--is undoubtedly to a great\nextent borrowed from Rousseau\u2019s writings.\n\n[1] See the very interesting collection of documents in the Appendix\nto Professor Ritchie\u2019s _Natural Rights_.\n\nPerhaps the truth of the matter may be approached as follows. The\npopular rendering of a great man\u2019s views is singularly liable to run\nstraight into the pit-falls against which he more particularly warned\nthe world. This could be proved true in an extraordinary degree of\nsuch men as Plato and Spinoza, and still more astonishingly, perhaps,\nof the founder of the Christian religion. The reason is obvious. A\ngreat man works with the ideas of his age, and regenerates them. But\nin as far as he regenerates them, he gets beyond the ordinary mind;\nwhile in as far as he operates with them, he remains accessible to\nit. And his own mind has its ordinary side; the regeneration of\nideas which he is able to effect is not complete, and the notions of\nthe day not only limit his entire range of achievement--where the\nstrongest runner will get to must depend on where he starts--but\nfloat about unassimilated {15} within his living stream of thought.\nNow all this ordinary side of his mind will partake of the strength\nand splendour of his whole nature. And thus he will seem to have\npreached the very superstitions which he combated. For in part he\nhas done so, being himself infected; in part the overwhelming bias\nof his interpreters has reversed the meaning of his very warnings,\nby transferring the importance, due to his central thought, to some\ndetail or metaphor which belongs to the lower level of his mind. It\nis an old story how Spinoza, \u201cthe God-intoxicated man,\u201d was held to\nbe an \u201catheist,\u201d when in truth he was rather an \u201cacosmist\u201d; and in\nthe same way, on a lower plane, the writer who struggled through to\nthe idea that true sovereignty lay in the dominion of a common social\ngood as expressed through law and institutions, is held to have\nascribed absolute supremacy to that chance combination of individual\nvoices in a majority, which he expressly pointed out to have, in\nitself, no authority at all.\n\nBut there is something more to be said of cases, like that under\ndiscussion, where a great man\u2019s ideas touch the practical world. If\nthe complete and positive idea becomes narrow and negative as it\nimpinges upon every-day life, this may be not only a consequence\nof its transmission through every-day minds, but a qualification\nfor the work it has to do. The narrower truth may be, so to speak,\nthe cutting edge of the more complete, as the negation is of the\naffirmation. And the vulgar notion of popular sovereignty and of\nnatural right may have been necessary to do a work which a more\norganic social theory would have been too delicate to achieve. {16}\nLike the faith in a speedy second coming of Christ among the early\nChristians, the gospel according to Jean Jacques may have taken for\nthe minds of Revolutionary France a form which was serviceable as\nwell as inevitable at the moment. If, as we said above, the great man\nis always misunderstood, it seems to follow that when his germinal\nideas have been sown they must assert themselves first in lower\nphases if they are ever to bear fruit at all. And therefore, while\nnot denying the influence of Rousseau on the Revolution, we shall\nattempt to show that he had another and a later influence, more\nadequate to the true reach of his genius.\n\n\n\n\n{17}\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nSOCIOLOGICAL COMPARED WITH PHILOSOPHICAL THEORY.\n\n1. There is no doubt that Sociology and Social Philosophy have\nstarted, historically speaking, from different points of view. The\nobject of the present chapter is to ascertain the nature and estimate\nthe importance and probable permanence of the difference between\nthem. I propose first to explain the difference in general; then to\nreview the sources of social experience, which in other words are\nfacets or aspects of social life, by which social theory has been\ninfluenced, and with which it has to deal; and, finally, to form some\nidea of the distinctive services which may be rendered by sociology\nand social philosophy respectively in view of the range of experience\nwhich it is the function of social theory to organize.\n\nBeginning with Vico\u2019s [1] _New Science_, there has been more than one\nattempt in modern Europe to inaugurate the Science of Society as a\nnew departure. But the distinctive and modern spirit of what is known\nas Sociology, and under that {18} name has had a continuous growth\nof half a century at least, first found unmistakable expression in\nAuguste Comte. The conception which he impressed upon the science to\nwhich he first gave the name of sociology or social physics, was a\ncharacteristically modern conception. Its essence was the inclusion\nof human society among the objects of natural science; its watchwords\nwere law and cause in the sense in which alone Positivism allowed\ncauses to be thought of--and scientific prediction. [2] It is true\nthat the large conception of unity which Comte embodied in his\nphilosophy had very much in common with the principles insisted on\nby the Greek social philosophers. The close interdependence of all\nsocial phenomena among each other, the unity of man with nature, and\nthe consequent correlation of moral and political theory with the\norganised hierarchy of mathematical and physical sciences, are ideas\nwhich Comte might have borrowed directly from Plato and Aristotle.\nNevertheless the modern starting-point is wholly different from that\nof antiquity. The modern enquirer--the sociologist as such--was\nto ask himself, according to Comte, in the language of physical\nscience, what are the laws and causes operative among aggregations\nof human beings, and what are their predictable effects? The ancient\nphilosopher--the ethical and metaphysical theorist--had before\nhim primarily the problem, \u201cwhat is the completest and most real\nlife of the human soul?\u201d The work of the latter has been revived\nby modern idealist philosophy dating from Rousseau and Hegel, and\nfinding a second {19} home in Great Britain, as that of the former\nhas developed itself within the peculiar limits and traditions of\nsociological research, flourishing more especially upon French and\nAmerican soil. The continuance of these two streams of thought in\nindependent courses, though not without signs of convergence, is a\nremarkable phenomenon of nineteenth century culture; and it will be\none of the problems which the present chapter, and in a larger sense\nthe whole of the present work, must deal with, to consider how far it\nis necessary or desirable that they should blend.\n\n[1] J. D. Rogers in Palgrave\u2019s _Dict. of Pol. Econ._, art. \u201cSocial\nScience.\u201d\n\n[2] See Gidding\u2019s _Sociology_, p. 6.\n\n2. Every science, no doubt, is to some extent, the playground\nof analogies; but the complexity and the unmateriality of human\nrelations has forced this character upon social theory in an\nextraordinary degree. It is impossible to account for the tendencies\nof sociological as well as of philosophical thought without making\nsome attempt to pursue the line of investigation suggested by Mr.\nBagehot in his _Physics and Politics_. Predominant modes and types of\nexperience necessarily colour the whole activity of the mind, and, as\nindicated above, this influence more especially affects a province of\nresearch which is not _prima facie_ accessible to direct experiment\nor sensuous observation. I must, therefore, endeavour to review, in\na brief outline, the principal branches of experience which have\nfurnished ideas for application to social theory, and to indicate\nthe leanings in speculation upon society, which have been due to\npreoccupation with one or another special analogy.\n\ni. The Newtonian theory of gravitation is the entrance gate to the\nmodern world of science. {20} \u201cWhen the Newton of this subject\nshall be seated in his place\u201d [1] is the aspiration of the modern\ninvestigator in every matter capable of being known. It is not\nsurprising, therefore, that the inclusion of human society within\nthe range of matters capable of being definitely understood, should\nhave been symbolized by demanding for social science a completeness\nof explanation and a power of prediction analogous to those displayed\nby astronomy or by mathematical physics. Representative of this\nconception is the title, Social Physics--for Comte the alternative\nand equivalent to the name Sociology. It is easy to see both the\nmerits and the dangers of such an ideal, which, as the embodiment\nof perfection in a natural science, is presupposed by the attitude\nof sociology down to the present day. Is a science necessarily a\nnatural science, and is a natural science necessarily an exact\nscience?--these are the fundamental questions involved in the\nadoption of a mathematical ideal for the study of society. No fault\ncan be found with it on the ground of its implying the highest degree\nof harmony and precision; the only question is whether an adequate\ntype of comparison is afforded for, let us say, the growth of an\ninstitution, by the law of a curve. The general conception, indeed,\nof a continuity between human relations and the laws of the cosmic\norder is thoroughly in the spirit of Plato, and betokens a scientific\nenthusiasm worthy to be the parent of great things. And especially\nin the sphere of economic science, where certain relatively simple\nhypotheses have proved on the whole to be effective instruments {21}\nof explanation, an analysis of intricate phenomena has been effected,\nwhich in some degree justifies the aspiration after the ideal of an\nexact science.\n\n[1] De Morgan, _Budget of Paradoxes_, p. 355.\n\nii. But it has been recognised from the earliest days of political\nspeculation that, within the general ideal of a perfect natural\nscience, the more special analogy of the living organism had a\npeculiar bearing upon social phenomena. Beginning in the ancient\nworld with the comparison between individuals as \u201cmembers\u201d of a\nsocial whole, and the parts or organs of a living body, or even the\nconstituent elements of a mind, this analogy has been extended and\nreinforced in modern times by what amounts to the new creation of\nthe biological and anthropological sciences. The sense of continuity\nthus intensified and implying all that is understood by the modern\nterm evolution, has brought an immense material of suggestions to\nsociological research, but has imposed upon it at the same time a\ncharacteristic bias from which it is just, perhaps, beginning to\nshake itself free. This characteristic may be roughly stated as the\nexplanation of the higher, by which I mean the more distinctly human\nphenomena, by the lower, or those more readily observed, or inferred,\namong savage nations, or in the animal world. Any one familiar with\nlogic will be aware that there is a subtle and natural prejudice\nwhich tends to strengthen such a bias by claiming a higher degree of\nreality for that which, as coming earlier in temporal succession,\nI presents itself in the light of what is called a I \u201ccause.\u201d So\nstrong has been this bias among sociologists, that the student,\nprimarily interested in the features and achievements of civilised\nsociety, is {22} tempted to say in his haste that the sociologist [1]\nas such seldom deals seriously with true social phenomena at all;\nbut devotes his main attention to primitive man and to the lower\nanimals, occasionally illustrating his studies in these regions by\nallusions, showing no great insight or mastery, to the facts of\ncivilized society. Such a complaint becomes less and less justified\nas the years go by, and sociology recovers its balance as against the\noverwhelming influence of the sciences of lower life. How far the\napproach from this \u201clower\u201d or more purely natural side will remain in\nthe end characteristic of sociological science, is an integral part\nof the main problem concerning its nature and destiny with which we\nhave to deal in the present work. But it remains true to say and very\nimportant to observe, that no such serious successes have as yet been\nwon in the name and by the special methods of sociology as have been\nachieved by many investigators approaching their problems directly\nand with an immediate interest; whether in the sphere of political\neconomy proper, or in dealing with various questions of social\nand ethical importance, such as pauperism, charity, sanitation,\neducation, the condition of the people, the comparative study of\npolitics, or the analysis of material and geographical conditions in\ntheir reaction upon social and artistic development.\n\n[1] By a \u201csociologist as such\u201d I mean a writer who is professedly\ndealing with sociology as such. Any independent researches, such as\nMr. and Mrs. Webb\u2019s _Industrial Democracy_, may of course be ranked\nunder the heading \u201cSociology.\u201d But works of this kind do not, as\na rule, attach themselves to the peculiar method and language of\nsociological writers.\n\nOn the other hand, there is no doubt that the {23} epoch and\ninfluence of which we speak has bequeathed a legacy of imperishable\nvalue to the theory of society. In a word, it has made us sensitive\nto the continuity of things, and therefore also to their unity. It\nhas shown us the crowning achievements of the human race, their\nStates, their Religion, their Fine Art, and their Science, as the\nhigh-water mark of tendencies that have their beginnings far back\nin the primitive organic world, and in their original sources have\nalso a connection with each other--as in the practical aspects\nof religion,--which too easily escapes notice in their highest\nindividual development. The \u201creturn to nature\u201d and the \u201cnoble savage\u201d\nhave been invested with a significance which can never be forgotten,\nand which criticism can never set aside. This is the sum and\nsubstance of the general contribution which the latter half of the\neighteenth century and the greater part of the nineteenth have made\nto sociology through the science of life and of man.\n\nMore particularly, it is necessary to notice the double operation of\nbiological influence on sociology, according to the unit from which\nthe analogy is drawn.\n\na. The idea which still bulks most largely in the popular mind, as\ncontributed by biology to social theory, is unquestionably that of\nthe struggle for life or the survival of the fittest. It should be\nnoticed that the social application of this analogy rests entirely\non the comparison of a human society, not to the individual animal\norganism, and still less to the individual mind; but to a whole\nanimal species or even to the aggregate of all animal species, so\nfar as they or their members are in competition with one another.\nOne whole side of the sociological {24} doctrine, which Mr. Spencer\nhas advocated with unwearied persistence, is founded upon this\napplication of the biological analogy, and the paradox which he\nhas made his principle professes to be borrowed directly from the\ndealings of nature with the individuals of the animal species. This\nparadox, that benefits should be assigned inversely as services\nin infancy but directly as services among adults, is his ultimate\nsociological basis; the modification of which, to suit human society,\nby the introduction of benevolence or altruism, so to speak, on the\ntop of it, only serves to display its inadequacy. But we may take it\nthat the analogy of the struggle for life has made it clear that, in\nany given position, life can be maintained only in virtue of definite\nqualities adapted to that position. And formal as this principle is\nwhen taken by itself, its application in human society can never be\nunnecessary.\n\nb. A more recent school has insisted on the complementary analogy,\nwhich might be taken as resting upon the comparison of a society\nwith an individual organism. Here, it must be remembered, lay the\nresemblance which, in this region of ideas, first caught the eye\nof social philosophers in antiquity. But it is alleged that the\naspect of co-operation can be traced as between individual members\nof the animal world no less than between the parts of a single\norganism, and it is affirmed that the view which sees nothing but\ninternecine competition in the animal kingdom has been too rough and\ntoo superficial in its reading of the facts. And therefore it is\nsuggested that the phenomena of social fellowship, no less than those\nof individual competition, have their source {25} and root in the\nworld of lower nature; and perhaps sociology is now not far from the\nrecognition that competition and co-operation are simply the negative\nand positive aspect of the same general fact--the fact of the\ndivision of labour, of essentiality of function, and of uniqueness\nof true individual service. If it is suggested by the one organic\nanalogy that life depends upon qualities adequate to the position\nwhich is to be filled, it is made obvious by the other that the\nqualities which satisfy the claims of a certain position are those,\nin general and in principle, by which a function is discharged in the\nservice of the whole.\n\nIn Mr. Spencer\u2019s doctrine the two sides above indicated have been\nbrought into very marked relation by a suggestive criticism, [1]\nwhich he has taken special pains to answer. If human society\ncorresponds to an individual organism--as is, in many ways, Mr.\nSpencer\u2019s well-known doctrine--how is it that the absolute central\ncontrol in which the perfection of an organism consists is, for Mr.\nSpencer, a note of imperfection when it appears in a human society?\nAnd the answer is in effect that human society corresponds in many\nof its features rather to a local variety of a species than to an\nindividual organism. It is essentially discrete, not individual, and\nat this point, therefore, the analogy of the individual organism\ngives way to that of the group or species.\n\n[1] _Sociology_, i. 586.\n\nBut Mr. Spencer does not really mean that a human society has\nno more intrinsic bond between its members than the local group\nof an animal species. To indicate its true nature he {26} gives\nus a good word--but a word only--the word \u201csuper-organic.\u201d [1]\nIt is a significant term, and brings us perhaps to the limit of\nwhat biological sociology is able to suggest with regard to the\nunity of a human commonwealth, and points us to something beyond.\nIt is remarkable that when the facts of true human society are\nmore thoroughly realised than by Mr. Spencer, but the clue of the\nindividual organism and the co-operative side of animal life is not\nfollowed up, there is a tendency to sever the links which unite man\nto \u201clower\u201d nature, and to represent the ethical and cosmic processes\nas absolutely opposed. We see this point of view decidedly adopted\nby Mr. Huxley, [2] and its adoption perhaps indicates the inception\nof an epoch in which sociology will cut itself free from a good deal\nof pseudo-scientific lumber. Nevertheless, a patient and careful\nstudy will continue to recognise the elements both of competition\nand of co-operation as ineradicable and inseparable moments in\nhuman society as in the animal world; the essential meaning of\ncompetition in its higher forms being the rejection and suppression\nof members who are unable to meet the ever advancing demand for\nco-operative character and capacity; and the study of parasitism\n[3] and of regressive selection will continue to {27} be a warning\nagainst the attempt to emancipate mankind from the sterner general\nconditions of the cosmic order. It will be recognised that there\nis an adaptation to conditions which consists in degradation; but\nthe failure will be understood by comparison with the only true\n\u201csurvival of the fittest,\u201d [4] being that which reveals the full\nunity and significance of organism and environment. It is important\nto observe that, at least in the two eminent biologists just alluded\nto, the doctrine of the individual self--of the relation between\nself-assertion and self-restraint--is altogether of an uncivilised\nand anti-social type. Biological categories do not, in their case\nat least, appear to have afforded any suggestion for the treatment\nof the social self as more and greater, in a positive sense, than\nthe self which is less bound up with social obligations. As for the\ndenying spirits in Plato\u2019s _Republic_, so for both Mr. Spencer and\nMr. Huxley, \u201cnature\u201d is essentially self-assertion, and \u201csociety\u201d\nself-restraint. [5] Here again we touch the same limitation which\nmet us in Mr. Spencer\u2019s term \u201csuper-organic,\u201d and we feel that a\ndifferent point of view must be brought to bear.\n\n[1] _Sociology_, vol. I., ch. i.\n\n[2] _Evolution and Ethics_, p. 82.\n\n[3] Geddes, in _Encyclo. Brit_., vol. xviii. 253a: \u201cFurther details\nof the process of retrograde metamorphosis and of the enormously\nimportant phenomena of degeneration cannot here be attempted; it must\nsuffice if the general dependence of such changes upon simplification\nof environment--freedom from danger, abundant alimentation and\ncomplete repose, etc. (in short, the conditions commonly considered\nthose of complete material well-being)--has been rendered clearer.\u201d\n\n[4] Cf. _Sutherland, Origin and Growth of the Moral Instinct_, vol.\nI., pp. 28, 29.\n\n[5] Huxley, _Evolution and Ethics_, p. 31; Spencer, _Man v. State_,\np. 98.\n\niii. Political Economy existed before modern Sociology was born, and\nis still the only part of it which is obviously and indisputably\nsuccessful as a science of explanation. The triumphant development\nof this theory reacted even upon Hegel\u2019s political philosophy, by\nsuggesting to him the distinction between \u201cBourgeois Society\u201d and\n\u201cThe {28} State.\u201d _A fortiori_, it could not but have a serious\ninfluence on the growing science of sociology itself, the ideal of\nwhich might not unfairly be regarded as the extension to society as\na whole of that type of investigation which had proved so successful\nin economic matter. From this influence has arisen the tendency\nin sociological research which has been called by the name of the\neconomic or materialist view of history and consequently of society.\nPrimarily connected with the name of Marx, it may also be illustrated\nby many contentions of Buckle and Le Play, and has become, indeed,\nthe formula of a school. In sum, the point of view amounts to this:\nthat the fundamental structure of civilisation, the type of the\nfamily, for example, and the order relations and development of\nclasses in society, have been and must be determined by the primary\nnecessities of human existence, and the conditions of climate and\nnutrition under which these necessities are met. Economic facts\nalone, it is suggested, are real and causal; everything else is an\nappearance and an effect.\n\nBefore saying a word as to the true importance of this point of\nview, we may profitably correct the commonplace idea of its nature.\nMaterialism, in a strict philosophical sense, means the conviction\nthat nothing is real but that which is solid, or, perhaps, which\ngravitates. By a not very convincing analogy from this idea, all\nthose passions and necessities which we speak of in a quite loose and\npopular way as connected with the body, may be and often are regarded\nas \u201cmaterial\u201d in opposition to energies which it seems pleasanter\n{29} to ascribe to incorporeal mind. But it should be noted that\nthis secondary usage, especially in a time when no one denies the\nphysical correlation of all psychical activity, has no important\nethical implication. Like the \u201cflesh\u201d or the \u201cbody\u201d of St. Paul\u2019s\nreligious language, the \u201cbodily\u201d or \u201cmaterial\u201d needs and appetites\nof man are an element of mind, the rank and value of which must be\ndetermined on other grounds than the notion that they are connected\nin some peculiar degree with \u201cphysical\u201d conditions. The economic\nview of history has been called and has called itself materialist\npartly because of the commonplace usage, which I have just described,\nby which certain passions and necessities, which it takes to be\nfundamental, are apt to be called material as opposed to ethical or\nideal--a wholly unjustified opposition--and partly from the notion,\nwhich I referred to at the beginning of this chapter, that the\nsuccess of political economy was in some way analogous to that of the\nmathematical science of abstract matter.\n\nStripping off, then, the unjustified suggestion of philosophical\nmaterialism, [1] what we have in the economic view of history,\namounts pretty much to what is expressed in the saying that while\nstatesmen are arguing, love and hunger are governing mankind. Climate\nand natural resources make a {30} difference to history; occupations\ndetermine the type of the family; an agricultural and an industrial\nsociety will never exhibit the same relations between classes, and\nvery vast commercial operations cannot be carried on by the same\nmethods or by the same minds which sufficed for the retail trade of\na petty shop. But when it is clearly seen that economic needs and\ndevices are no detached, nor, so to speak, absolutely antecedent\ndepartment of human life [2]--a fact which the epithet \u201cmaterialist\u201d\nhas done something to obscure, for, in truth, in economics there is\nno question of genuine material causation--then it becomes obvious\nthat we have not here any prior determining framework of social\nexistence, but simply certain important aspects of the operations\nof the human mind, rather narrowly regarded in their isolation from\nall others. If we seriously consider the import of such an economic\nconception as the \u201cstandard of life,\u201d it becomes plain that the\ncontrast too commonly accepted [3] between the mechanical pressure\nof economic facts and the influence of ideas [4] stands in need of a\ncompletely fresh criticism and of entire restatement. Discounting,\nhowever, the exaggerations which have arisen from confused notions of\nmaterialism, and from the genuine achievements of economic science,\nwe have remaining, in the point of view under consideration, a\nthoroughly just assertion of man\u2019s continuity with {31} the world\naround him. Undoubtedly man lives the life of his planet, his\nclimate, and his locality, and is the utterance, so to speak, of the\nconditions under which his race and his nation have evolved. The only\ndifficulty arises if, by some arbitrary line between man and his\nenvironment, the conditions which are the very material of his life\ncome to be treated as alien influences upon it, with the result of\nrepresenting him as being the slave of his surroundings rather than\ntheir concentrated idea and articulate expression. Do we think that\nHomer, Dante, and Shakespeare would have been greater or more free in\ntheir genius if one had not been the voice of Greece, another that of\nItaly, and the third that of England? The world in which man lives\n_is_ himself, but is constituted, of course, by presentation to a\nmind and not by strictly physical causation; and even where strictly\nphysical causation plays a part, as in the bodily effects of a hot\nclimate or of a certain kind of nutrition, still it cannot determine\na type of human life except by passing into the world which a human\nbeing presents to himself.\n\n[1] Quite probably there may be in the Marxian view an echo of true\nmaterialism--the idea that will and consciousness are \u201cepiphenomena\u201d\n_i.e._ are effects which are not causes generated by molecular\nmovements. Such a view cannot be criticised here, only it may be\npointed out that, on such a basis, the \u201cbodily\u201d passions, etc.,\nare in no way more \u201cmaterial\u201d than, e.g., the moral \u201ccategorical\nimperative,\u201d and therefore no more causal.\n\n[2] See note 4.\n\n[2] Cf. _e.g._ Durkheim, _Annee Sociologique_, 1897, p. 159.\n\n[4] _I.e._ as if economic conditions were a sort of iron girders put\nup to begin with and civilisation was the embellishment of them. It\nis the old story of forgetting that the skeleton is later than the\nbody, and is deposited and moulded by it.\n\nThe exclusive importance which has been attached to considerations\nof this kind in recent social theory is partly due to an unfounded\nopinion of their novelty. It is somewhat striking, though following\nnaturally enough from the sort of schism in the world of letters\nwhich modern sociology and ancient social philosophy represent,\nthat the firm and well balanced handling of these problems which we\nowe to Plato and Aristotle is for the most part ignored by modern\nsociologists.\n\n{32} The entire social conception of those writers is a continued\napplication of the principle, fundamental in their whole philosophy,\nthat \u201cform\u201d is the inherent organising life of \u201cmatter,\u201d so that\nthe better life of a commonwealth can be nothing but the flower and\ncrown of the possibilities inherent in its material conditions and\nindustrial and economic organisation. The law which is ultimately\nto reveal itself as the spring of all righteousness in the State,\nhas its most obvious and external symbol--so Plato tells us--in\nthe economic exchange of services; and every circumstance of site,\nand industry, and trade, and the racial type of the citizen, helps\nto constitute, both for him and for Aristotle, the living organic\npossibility from which, in some appropriate individual form, the\nhigher life is to spring. If we ask ourselves what then is the\ndifference between the ancient view of economic causation, and that\nof the \u201cmaterialist\u201d historical school, we shall find the answer in\nthe absence, from the former, of that unreal isolation upon which we\nobserved above. The relation of \u201cmatter\u201d or \u201cconditions\u201d to \u201cform\u201d\nor \u201cpurpose\u201d is not, for the Greek thinker, the pressure of an\nalien necessity, of a hostile environment, but the upspringing of a\nlife, continuous in principle through all its phases. The thought\nof the legislator fixes in the shape of distinct consciousness and\nwill, what the assemblage of conditions embodies as a physical or\ninstinctive tendency, as the artist, to use an ancient simile, finds\nthe statue in the marble. Working with this idea, the connection is\nfar more thoroughly, because more sympathetically, traced than it\ncan be when we think that our science is but laying bare the fetters\nof humanity. And following {33} in the spirit of the Greek thinkers\nthemselves, modern students of antiquity have devoted themselves to\neliciting the positive connection of conditions with history, up to\na point of success of which the common run of modern sociologists\nappear to have no conception. When we reflect how typical and,\ncomparatively speaking, how readily isolated and exhausted is the\nhistory of Ancient Greece in the greatest age, it seems extraordinary\nthat the considerable and minute researches which have been bestowed\nupon its geographical, commercial, and economic conditions should\nnot be commonly drawn into account with a view to the illustration\nof the relations between natural resources, commercial and economic\ndevelopment, and historical greatness. [1]\n\n[1] I have never, for example, seen the great work of Ernst\nCurtius, on the geography of the Peloponnese in connection with its\nhistorical development, referred to in any sociological treatise;\nnor, again, Duncker, nor B\u00fcchsensch\u00fctz, nor Mr. Newman\u2019s edition of\nAristotle\u2019s _Politics_. Boeckh\u2019s _Treatise on the Public Economy of\nAthens_ receives only a word of contemptuous notice in M\u2019Culloch\u2019s\n_Literature of Political Economy_.\n\nHowever this may be, here at any rate, in the analysis of economic\nand quasi-economic conditions in their bearing upon the life of\npeoples, we get a real subject-matter which is perhaps, so far as\ncan yet be seen, the territory least disputably belonging to the\npure sociologist. It is not really a sphere of natural causation,\nbut it is a sphere of certain simple and general conditions in\npsychical life, corresponding to external facts which admit of\nmore or less precise statement, and, we may hope, of reduction to\nfairly trustworthy uniformities. Such for instance are M. Durkheim\u2019s\ninvestigations on the effect of {34} density of population upon the\ndivision of labour, [1] or Professor Gidding\u2019s observations upon the\ncauses and limiting conditions of the aggregation of populations. [2]\nWe now proceed to a branch of experience which seriously strains the\nworking conceptions of the sociologist.\n\n[1] _De la Division du Travail Social_, Alcan, 1893.\n\n[2] _Principles of Sociology_, bk. II., ch. i. Few things are more\ninteresting in this respect than Mr. Poore\u2019s observations in _Rural\nHygiene_ on the mechanical conditions of modern city life, as regards\ndrainage and water supply, with their results in encouraging an\novercrowded and insanitary mode of living.\n\niv. A completely new vista reveals itself to the student of social\ntheory when he turns from biological analogies and economic\nconditions to consider the wealth of experience and of ideas which\nis furnished to him by Jurisprudence and the Science of Right. He\nknows, indeed, by this time, that the obvious aspect of a province\nof fact will not be the only one, and that a unity will certainly be\ntraceable between all the facets of social existence. But none the\nless, he will be able to restrain the itch to explain things away,\nand he will fairly and candidly give weight to the significance and\nsuggestiveness of the mass of history and of reflection which is now\nbrought before him.\n\n_a_. For here, as the plainest and most unmistakable data of\nexperience, we are confronted with _ideal facts_. The vast mass\nof documents which form the basis of the Science of Right--a more\ncomplete and comprehensive set of records, perhaps, than any other\nbranch of social science can boast--bears witness in every case to\none social phenomenon at least, to a formal act of mind and will,\naimed at maintaining some relative right or {35} hindering some\nrelative wrong, and stamped with what in some sense and in some\ndegree amounts to a social recognition. Theorists have said too\nhastily, though with a sound meaning, that right is independent\nof fact. It would be as true to say that reason is independent of\ncivilisation, or the soul independent of culture. Right is not\nexhausted in the facts of past history; but it is at every moment\nembodied in facts; and to comprehend that the social phenomena\nwhich are among the most solid and unyielding of our experiences,\nare nevertheless ideal in their nature, and consist of conscious\nrecognitions, by intelligent beings, of the relations in which\nthey stand, is to make a great step towards grasping the essential\ntask of science in dealing with society. From the beginning of\nsocial theory the facts of law have been set in opposition to the\nidea of a natural growth. It has been observed that, as a definite\ninstitution maintained by formal acts of will, society is artificial,\nconventional, contractual. We all know to-day that there is much\nmore than this to be said about the nature and principles of social\ngrowth. Nevertheless, it remains true that the social whole has an\nartificial aspect, an aspect of will and of design, of the agreement\nand mutual recognition of free conscious beings. And in so far as the\nhistory of law has resulted in the conception of natural right, this\nin no way derogates from the artificial or ideal character of society\nas above understood. For \u201cnatural\u201d right belongs to a \u201cnature\u201d which\nincludes and does not exclude that action of intelligence in virtue\nof which society may be termed artificial; and is {36} merely the\nrevelation of the principle towards which the social will is working,\nand which in some degree it has always embodied.\n\nTherefore the facts of Jurisprudence and the Science of Right, or\nof \u201cNatural Right,\u201d as the issue and outcome of Jurisprudence,\nnecessarily counterbalance the extreme ideas of continuous growth and\nnatural causation which social science derives from other analogies.\nWe are reminded that, after all, we are dealing with a self-conscious\npurposive organism, which is aware of a better and a worse, and\nhas members bound together by conscious intelligence, though, it\nmay be, not by conscious intelligence alone. At one time the ideas\nof Jurisprudence, such as Sovereignty or Contract, were considered\nsufficient by themselves to equip a social theory. And if they are\nnow seen to need completion from both sides,--from the side of lower\nnature, and from the side of the national spirit and culture,--this\nshould not make us neglectful of the important truths which the facts\nof law and recognised obligation, more than any others, establish on\nsolid ground.\n\n_b_. It is of course the case that Law has been treated from the\nstandpoint of economic history in the same way as the other phenomena\nof civilised life. It may be taken simply as the form into which\nsubstantive relations crystallise, under the influence of economic\nconditions or of other elementary social forces. And obviously such\na view has its truth. The social will, like the will of any one of\nus from day to day, is formed not _in vacuo_, but as the focus of\nall the influences which penetrate our being. It is a fair object of\n{37} research to ascertain the economic or other social meaning of\nthe statutes which we find on the statute book; and it is because\nthey have so much meaning that they are excellent object-lessons in\nthe play of the social consciousness and sense of right. But this\nfocussing of social influences makes the laws not less acts of social\nwill, but more. To suppose the contrary would be like supposing\nthat nothing is a true act of will which embodies an individual\u2019s\ndistinctive purposes in life.\n\nI will explain by an illustration the relative value of sociological\nanalysis in dealing with the facts of positive law. I am indebted\nfor it to M. Durkheim, whose writings appear to me among the most\noriginal and suggestive works of modern sociology. I regret that my\nimmediate purpose does not justify me in stating and appreciating the\nwhole very interesting theory of repressive and contractual law from\nwhich the point in question is selected.\n\nAn act is a crime, [1] we are told, for the pure sociologist, when\nit offends the strong and definite collective sentiments of society.\nThis is the strictly causal view of the matter. The act is a crime\nbecause it offends; it does not offend because it is a crime. And the\ncorollaries are valuable. It is idle to distinguish, on such a basis,\nbetween the reformatory, the retributive, and the deterrent views of\nthe reaction which is punishment. [2] An offensive act is in itself\nat once an exhibition of character, an injury, and a menace. If a man\n{38} assaults me in the street, and I knock him down; how futile to\nask if my action is meant to cure him of his insolence, to punish him\nfor having hit me, or to prevent him from hitting me again! The real\nfact is that I am offended, and I react by way of injury and negation\nagainst that which offends me. Now, this view, I think, illuminates\nthe subject. By going back to the simple operative cause, as it may\nbe supposed to exist especially in the mind of a tribe in an early\nstage of development (M. Durkheim is chiefly referring to religious\noffences), we have got a plain type of mental reaction, easy to\nimagine and to understand. In this type we see at once the unity of\naspects which the forms of law, and legal or philosophical theory,\ntend later to dissociate in a fictitious degree. And moreover we are\nreminded that a law must have something behind it; some positive\nsentiment or conviction, without which it would be unaccountable and\nunmeaning.\n\n[1] Durkheim, _Op. cit_., livre I., ch. ii.\n\n[2] See ch. viii. below.\n\nBut when all this is said, it must not be supposed that penal law\nhas been reduced to the level of a strong and definite collective\nsentiment, or a crime to the level of an annoyance. The simplest\npenal law of a self-existent social group is different from the\nanger of a crowd or mob. There is in it some sense of permanence,\nand permanence means responsibility and generality--a distinction of\nright and wrong. The fact of formally constituting a crime, _i.e._\nof announcing a law, implies that mere distaste is no ground of\npunishment. The law means that there is something worth maintaining,\nand that this is recognised, and that to violate this recognition is\nnot merely to be unpopular, but to {39} sin against the common good,\nand to break an obligation. With less than this there is no true\ncrime.\n\nThus, if I am right, the relation of pure \u201csociological\u201d causation\nto juristic facts is the well-known relation of the more abstract\nto the more concrete sciences, usually illustrated in logic by\nthe relation of the physical and the musical account of musical\nsound. For the pure physicist, a harmony and a discord are only two\ndifferent combinations of shakings. For the musician they are not\nonly opposite effects, but are causes of divergent consequences. So\nwith the relation between a strong collective sentiment and a true\nlaw. A strong sentiment, as such, is a mere fact, a mere force; and\nas such the sociologist regards it. A law involves the pretension\nto will what is just, and is therefore a sentiment and something\nmore, viz., the point of view of social good. It aims at a right and\nimplies a wrong, and demands to be apprehended and judged on this\nground. A mere force cannot by its reaction constitute a crime; for\nthat a law is necessary. The ideal aspect of law as recognition of\nright is no less actual, no less solid and verifiable, than the facts\nof sentiment or necessity which may have suggested and sustained it.\nIn this way the relation of sociological causation to the facts of\nJurisprudence is typical of the whole relation of Sociology conceived\nas a natural science, to the larger facts with which social theory\nhas to deal.\n\nv. But the ideas involved in mere legality, though they bear\nemphatic testimony to the conscious and artificial aspect of the\nsocial whole, have always {40} been regarded with some justice as\nthe type of what is empty and formal. To treat a law as a command\nwith a penalty annexed, or to enunciate the tendency of social\nprogress as being from status to contract, may convey important\nmeanings, but is obviously very far short of the whole truth. And,\nindeed, generalisations of this kind, though characteristic of a\ncertain class of reflective Jurisprudence, do not at all represent\nthe highest level which has been reached within the science of\nright itself. But yet, as we pass beyond these everyday working\nconceptions, we are beginning to leave the central ground of\nJurisprudence, and to move towards a point of view which deals\nmore completely with life and culture. The need and occasion for\nsuch a point of view may be measured by that revival of national\nindividuality which was referred to in the last chapter as\nconstituting the true ground and occasion for the rebirth of genuine\npolitical philosophy in modern times. Montesquieu\u2019s investigation\ninto the \u201cspirit of laws,\u201d and his treatment of a law as something\ndeeper than a command, following upon the similar endeavours of\nVico, was in fact a recognition of the fundamental unity of a\nnational civilisation, which, on its political side, even Hobbes and\nLocke had already attempted to explain by help of the inadequate\ninstruments furnished to them by legal theory. Montesquieu\u2019s and\nVico\u2019s conceptions were only the forerunners of the many-sided\nstudy of civilisation which characterised the latter part of the\neighteenth century, following up the problem which was enunciated in\nRousseau\u2019s paradox, that \u201claw itself must be created by the social\nspirit which it aims at creating.\u201d To recognise the social spirit\n{41} of a people, as the central unity behind its law and culture\nand politics, was the principle of the various researches dealing\nwith formative art, poetry, language, religion, and the state, which\nmarked the close of the eighteenth century (compare Wolf\u2019s theory of\nHomer as the utterance of a racial mind), and laid the foundation of\nnineteenth century idealism.\n\nThe true Greek renaissance, initiated in the age of Winckelmann,\nforcing modern minds into contact with Hellenic ideas in their\noriginal form, and no longer through Latin intermediaries, furnished\na type and focus for these researches by bringing before the thoughts\nof students the brilliant individuality of the ancient city-state,\nthe crude traditions of which had already exercised the most powerful\ninfluence on Rousseau, and through him on the Revolution. At the\nsame time the organic sciences were full of activity. The life-work\nof Goethe marks the parallelism of the two movements. It is plain\nthat the doctrines of Comte were no more than a very one-sided\nattempt to formulate the significance of the fermentation around\nhim, and that deeply as he felt the unity of the social being, his\nexpression of it ignored half the lesson of the times. Thus the\ngeneralities of Jurisprudence are vitalised and completed by the\nwork of the sciences of culture; and the conception of a national\nmind and character takes its unquestioned place in modern social\ntheory. It may be well at this point also to call attention to the\nresearches which later historians have directed to what may be called\n\u201cComparative Politics\u201d; the relations, that is, of communities under\ngovernment with respect to the {42} mode in which they are governed.\n[1] For this branch of inquiry once more, though narrow and empty by\nitself, yet does aid in bringing to light the purposive and conscious\ncharacter of society, and in correcting the tendency to treat it\naltogether as a \u201cnatural\u201d phenomenon.\n\n[1] Freeman\u2019s _Comparative Politics_, and Seeley\u2019s _Introduction to\nPolitical Science_.\n\nvi. \u201cAnd so the whirligig of Time brings about his revenges.\u201d French\nSociology to-day is a psychological science, though its founder\nbanished psychology from his sociological method. Nothing is more\ninstructive than to watch the gradual pressure of the various points\nof view which are emphasised by the various departments of social\nexperience, as they reveal, under criticism, their tendency to\ncomplete themselves and one another by suggesting the only category\nwhich is adequate to them as a whole. As every serious student of\nsocial matters knows by his own experience, it is impossible to touch\na physical fact, or a statistical datum, or a legal enactment, in\nreference to its social bearing, without its at once, so to speak,\ncoming alive in his hands, and attaching itself to an underlying\nrelation of mind as the only unity which will make it intelligible,\nand correlate it with other experiences, by themselves no less\nfragmentary. In statistics, for example, you touch a moving creature,\nas if through the holes in a wall, at this point and the other, and\nwrite down where you have touched him. [1] But to see the creature\nas he is, and combine your information of all kinds in a just and\ncomplete idea, you {43} must get him into the open. And that,\nwhen the question is of a life, you can only do by reconstructing\nhis mind, for even to see a social unit with your eyes gives you\na fragment only, and not a whole. On Fridays, we are told, the\npassenger traffic returns of French railways, omnibuses, and steamers\nshow a decline. [2] What dumb fact is this? People do not like to\ntravel on Fridays, or prefer to travel upon other days. What is this\npreference? The only unity that can really afford an explanation,\nthat can correlate this irregular fragment of fact with the whole\nto which it belongs, is the living mind and will of the society in\nwhich the phenomenon occurs. Explanation aims at referring things to\na whole; and there is no true whole but mind. Necessarily, therefore,\nwith widening experience and deepening criticism, mind has become the\ncentre of the experiences focussed by sociology.\n\n[1] Cf. _Aspects of the Social Problem_ (Macmillan, 1895), C.S. Loch\non \u201cReturns in Social Science,\u201d p. 287.\n\n[2] Tarde, _Les Lois de l\u2019Imitation_, p. 115.\n\nWe may note some significant points in this development, although,\nindeed, the whole course of modern sociology is one single\nillustration of what has just been said. Discussions of the problem\nin what the differentia of society consists, no longer deal with\norganic or economic conceptions, but with such ideas as the\n\u201cConsciousness of kind,\u201d [1] the \u201cMind of a Crowd,\u201d [2] \u201cImitation\u201d\nand \u201cInvention,\u201d [3] similarities and differences in the social\nconsciousness, [4] \u201cSocial logic\u201d and society considered as a\nsyllogism, [5] and the imitative and {44} inventive person. [6] The\nwork of M. Tarde in particular is typical of the whole movement,\nand his phrases have largely been adopted whether in agreement or\nin controversy. For him the one fact coextensive with the social\ncharacter is \u201cImitation\u201d--the means by which ideas and practices\nspread throughout groups and masses of intelligent beings. For the\ncharacteristic of knowable phenomena, in his view, is Repetition,\nand Imitation is the means and vehicle of Repetition in social\nmatters. Here, however, we have accounted only for generalisation,\nand differentiation needs a separate origin. This will be supplied\nby the idea of \u201cInvention;\u201d Invention and Imitation, therefore, are\nthe general form of all social process, the matter on the other hand\nbeing analysable as Belief and Desire. Every institution is a belief,\n[7] every activity is a want or desire. In the _Logique Sociale_\nthese conceptions of the general medium and process of social life\nare pushed home into the actual formative operation of the social\nmind and will. Society, we are told, may be compared not indeed to\nan organism, but rather to a brain; it is a cooperative mind, a\nsyllogism, in which the principles held by one part are modified\nand applied by another. M. Tarde\u2019s extreme illustrative hypothesis\ncorresponds strangely with one thrown out by Mr. Sidgwick. Mr.\nSidgwick [8] has simplified an ethical question by supposing only a\nsingle sentient conscious being in the universe; for M. {45} Tarde\nthere is, we might say, no single being at all; the typical social\nman is a hypnotical creature, a somnambulist acting under suggestions\nfrom others, though he does not know it, and is under the illusion\nthat he is himself. [9] Nothing could be of higher interest than to\nsee the necessities of social science thus working themselves out,\non slippery and unfamiliar ground, by the sheer force of facts and\nexperience. That a science of man must be a science of mind seems no\nlonger disputable.\n\n[1] Giddings, p. 17.\n\n[2] Le Bon, _Psychologie des Foules_.\n\n[3] Tarde, _Les Lois de l\u2019Imitation_.\n\n[4] Durkheim, _La Division du Travail Social_.\n\n[5] Tarde, _La Logique Sociale_.\n\n[6] Baldwin, _Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental\nDevelopment_.\n\n[7] Perhaps this expression originates with Fustel de Coulanges in\n_La Cit\u00e9 Antique_.\n\n[8] _Methods of Ethics_, p. 374.\n\n[9] _Les Lois de l\u2019Imitation_, p. 83.\n\nOn the substance of this development there is one observation which\ninevitably suggests itself to any critic who approaches the problem\nfrom the philosophical side.\n\nNecessarily, as the relation of the individual to society is the\nroot of every social problem, psychological sociology consists to a\ngreat extent in exercises upon the theme of identity and difference.\nThese exercises have hitherto been for the most part unconscious\nand involuntary. And the high degree of substantial truth which is\nattained by inquirers who have not thought the logic of identity\nworthy of a single glance, is the strongest possible confirmation of\nthe common experience that it is safer to neglect theory than to be\ncareless of facts. Nevertheless, it has now become apparent, that\na point has been attained at which logical criticism is absolutely\nessential, or if not logical criticism, at least some reference to\nthe familiar and well-established results of ancient or modern social\nphilosophy.\n\nFor it is a universal characteristic of the {46} sociological\nmovement before us, that identity and difference are referred to\ndifferent spheres, and the \u201cone\u201d and the \u201cother\u201d are regarded as\nreciprocally exclusive atoms. [1] The difficulties and fallacies\nwhich thus arise are innumerable. Thus we have the contagious common\nfeeling of a crowd [2] taken as the true type of a collective mind,\nobviously because it is not understood how an identical structure can\ninclude the differences, the rational distinctions and relations,\nwhich really constitute the working mind of any society. So again\nwe have one type of law marked off as corresponding to social\nsimilitude, [3] while a different type corresponds to the social\ndivision of labour; simply because the category of resemblance has\nbeen substituted for that of identity, and is treated as exclusive of\ndifferentiation; with the result of a really terrible distortion of\nfacts in the attempt to separate the whole sphere of penal enactment\nfrom that which deals with industrial organisation. So with the\nentire set of notions of \u201cImitation,\u201d \u201cRepetition\u201d and \u201cInvention.\u201d\n[4] The separation of Imitation and Invention is simply the popular\nexclusion of Difference from Identity; while the treatment of\nRepetition as the characteristic of knowable phenomena and the mode\nof utterance of social Imitation means the restriction of rational\nIdentity to its barest form, and the exclusion from {47} social\ntheory of absolutely every case of true cooperative structure. For\ntrue cooperative structure is never characterised by repetition, but\nalways by identity in difference; it is the relation not of a screw\nto an exactly similar screw, but of the screw to the nut into which\nit fastens.\n\n[1] M. Tarde\u2019s view just mentioned might seem to conflict with this.\nBut note that he regards the man influenced by others as under an\nillusion in thinking that he is himself: _i.e._, with Spencer and\nHuxley, he regards the \u201cself\u201d and the \u201cother\u201d as irreconcilable\nfactors.\n\n[2] Le Bon, Op. cit.\n\n[3] Durkheim, Op. cit.\n\n[4] Tarde and Baldwin, Op. cit.\n\nIn the discussions of Egoism and Altruism the difficulty comes to a\nhead. Some writers think Egoism prior to Altruism; others--the more\nwary and enlightened--incline to treat Altruism as a phase earlier\nthan Egoism; M. Durkheim, whose eye for a fact is very keen, seeing\nthe absurdity of both these suppositions, is determined to include\nthe two characters in question from the very beginning in the human\nconsciousness, [1] but, of course, as contents belonging to different\nspheres and consisting of contrasted elements. The conception of a\nwhole held together by its differences, its identity consisting in\nand being measured by their very profoundness and individuality, is\nnot at the command of any of these writers, although the greater\npart of M. Durkheim\u2019s theory seems imperatively to demand such a\nconception.\n\n[1] _Division du Travail_, 216.\n\nvii. Before considering, in conclusion, the relation of Sociology\nas influenced by the above-mentioned sources and points of view, to\nsocial philosophy proper, it will be well to devote a few words to\nemphasising the way in which these \u201csources\u201d ought to be regarded.\n\nEvery \u201csource\u201d of sociological science is at once a category, or\npoint of view, and also a certain group of actual social conditions.\nThis relation is effectively illustrated by the study of any social\n{48} unity which is such as to invite a thorough conspectus of\nits life from top to bottom of the social growth and underlying\nconditions. I repeat that the history and life of ancient Greece, a\nsingularly complete working model of society on a very small scale,\nanalysed with remarkable thoroughness, and individual throughout, is\nthe prerogative example of such a treatment; but next to this, or in\naddition to it, a thoroughly careful study of local history, life,\nand conditions, in a limited region, [1] with which we are familiar\nfrom top to toe, is an essential propaedeutic to true social theory.\nTo focus a number of groups of fact, and coordinate the points of\nview which they substantiate, into the conception of a living being,\nwith its individual character and spiritual utterance, needs more\nthan a merely literary or statistical study. But by making this\neffort we shall learn, as no economic charts or general scientific\nworks can teach us, what a social life is, and in what sense it\nis true that all partial facts and experiences within it demand\nultimate coordination in the category of mind. It is not meant that\nconsciousness can make the weather hold up, but it is meant that no\nfact has a true social bearing except in as far as, sooner or later,\nit comes to form part of the world which a being capable of sociality\nand therefore intelligent, presents to himself as his theatre of\naction.\n\n[1] Cf. Professor Geddes\u2019 idea of a \u201cRegional Survey,\u201d with which\nvisitors to his delightful \u201cSummer School\u201d become acquainted.\n\n3. Thus it may seem that by mere force of facts a necessary solution\nhas been arrived at, and that psychological sociology must be one and\nthe same science with social philosophy.\n\n{49} But this is not quite the case. Up to the present time these two\nsciences continue to approach their object-matter, as it were, from\ndifferent ends, and whether the two views will ultimately amalgamate\nis perhaps mainly a problem of the personal division of labour.\nBut a question of principle, with reference to the true nature of\npsychology, is indirectly involved. Only there seems no reason why\ntwo kinds of psychology should not exist.\n\nPsychology, as at present conceived by its best working\nrepresentatives, is a positive, though not a physical science.\n\u201cFor (the psychologist) the crude superstitions of Australian\naborigines have as much interest and value as the developed and\naccurate knowledge of a Newton or a Faraday.\u201d [1] Its aim is \u201cthe\nestablishment of continuity among observed facts, by interpolating\namong them intermediate links which elude observation.\u201d [2] If\nnot a \u201cphysical\u201d science, then, it is, in a common sense of the\nterm, a \u201cnatural\u201d science. It has the impartiality, and uses the\nwatchwords--law, process, genesis--which belong to a natural science.\nAnd like every impartial science, to which process and genesis are\nwatchwords, it tends to explain the higher by the lower. This springs\nfrom no malice aforethought, but from the conditions of the case. The\nlower is simpler, and usually comes first in time. It is naturally\ndwelt upon, as that into which it is hoped to resolve the more\ncomplex, and the explanation which is more adequate for the simple,\nis less adequate for the complex. No difference of higher {50} and\nlower is recognised by the impartial science, and its ideal, as a\nscience, is inevitably the expression of the complex in terms of the\nsimple; while, as far as genesis in time is insisted on, the bias\ntowards temporal causation is pretty sure to operate by attaching a\nquasi-causal significance to the earlier phases.\n\n[1] Stout, _Analytic Psychology_, Introduction.\n\n[2] _Ib_. From a logical point of view this idea of explanation seems\nseriously defective. See Bradley\u2019s _Principles of Logic_, p. 491.\n\nIn all these characteristics psychology is at one with sociology.\nAnd, therefore, though it is a gain that other points of view should\nbe resolved into the point of view of mind, yet the positive bias of\nsociology is not transcended simply by this resolution.\n\nPhilosophy starts, we have said, as it were, from the other end. It\nis critical throughout; it desires to establish degrees of value,\ndegrees of reality, degrees of completeness and coherence. Its\npurpose might be termed \u201cEthical,\u201d but for the extreme narrowness\nof the meaning of that term. Society, for it, is an achievement or\nutterance of human nature--of course not divorced from nature in\ngeneral--having a certain degree of solidity, so to speak; that is\nto say, being able, up to a certain point, to endure the tests and\nanswer the questionings which are suggested by the scrutiny of human\nlife from the point of view of value and completeness. Is the social\nlife the best, or the only life for a human soul? In what way through\nsociety, and in what characteristics of society, does the soul lay\nhold upon its truest self, or become, in short, the most that it has\nin it to be? How does the social life at its best compare with the\nlife of art, of knowledge, or of religion, and can the same principle\nbe shown to be active in all of them? And what have {51} they in\ncommon, or peculiar to each, which has an imperative claim on the\nmind of man?\n\nNow it was hinted above that there might be two kinds of psychology,\nor two tendencies within it. And if psychology were to be impelled,\nas it has been more than once in the past, by the recognition that\nwhere there is more of its object--of mind--its interest is greater\nand the rank of its object-matter is higher, then there would not\nbe much to choose between the temper of psychology and that of\nphilosophy. And as sociology has found itself driven forward into\nthe territory of social \u201clogic,\u201d a name which at once suggests a\ncritical and philosophical science, it may well be that sociological\npsychology will not remain wholly \u201cpositive\u201d and impartial, but\nwill assume, as in the hands of Professor Giddings, for example, it\nseems inclined to, at least a teleological attitude, testing social\nphenomena by the quantity and quality of life which they display.\n\nBut, at any rate, the points of view of sociology, and of social\nphilosophy as above described, will continue to supplement each\nother. Philosophy gives a significance to sociology; sociology\nvitalises philosophy. The idea of mind is deepened and extended by\nthe unity and continuity which sociological analysis, throughout all\nits many-sided sources, vindicates for the principle of growth and\norder down to the roots and in all the fibres of the world. Every\nnatural resource and condition must be thought of as drawing forth\nor constituting some new element in the mind which is the universal\nfocus; just as every shape and colour of the trees in the landscape\nor every note of a melody finds its {52} definite and individual\nresponse in the contemplative consciousness. The error lies, not in\nidentifying the mind and the environment, but in first uncritically\nseparating them, and then substituting not merely the one for the\nother, but wretched fragments of the one for the whole in which alone\neither can be complete.\n\nPhilosophy, on the other hand, in treating of society, has to deal\nwith the problems which arise out of the nature of a whole and its\nparts, the relation of the individual to the universal, and the\ntransformation by which the particular self is lost, to be found\nagain in a more individual, and yet more universal form. In all\nthese respects its view is what might be called teleological; that\nis to say, it recognises a difference of level or of degree in the\ncompleteness and reality of life, and endeavours to point out when\nand how, and how far by social aid, the human soul attains the most\nand best that it has in it to become. As long as these two points\nof view are clearly recognised, it is a matter of the mere personal\ndivision of labour whether they are brought to bear by the same\nthinkers and within the same treatises.\n\n\n\n\n{53}\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nTHE PARADOX OF POLITICAL OBLIGATION: SELF-GOVERNMENT.\n\n1. To every-day common sense there is something paradoxical in the\nphenomena of political obligation; however it may acquiesce in\nwhat, although not satisfactorily explicable, is plainly seen to\nbe necessary. Where, indeed, we meet with any form of absolutely\ndespotic government, we have not so much a paradox as a defect;\nfor, although government may exist in such a shape, it is open to\nquestion how far true political obligation can be said to arise\nunder such a system. In as far as it does so, we shall find that the\nfact is due to unacknowledged conditions and relations, which we\nshall more easily analyse as they appear in free or constitutional\nstates. It would then be easy to show, if we were interested in\ndoing so, that the principles which will have been recognised as\noperative in the freest states known to history, are and have\nbeen, in various degrees, at the root of the common life of every\nstate or community which has held together effectively enough to\nbe treated as in any sense a political whole. But this would be a\nhistorical investigation, unnecessary for the purpose of pure {54}\nsocial theory. In this we may fairly start from the highest form of\npolitical experience, in which, as we shall see, the mere defects\nof political immaturity being outgrown, the paradox of political\nobligation emerges with intensified emphasis.\n\nLet us take as our starting point, then, the conception of\n\u201cself-government,\u201d to which, it will be admitted on all hands, the\nthought and feeling of mature communities has clung both in ancient\nand modern times, as in some way containing the true root and ground\nof political obligation. We shall find in it a striking illustration\nof the strength and weakness of wide-spread popular notions. A\nuniversal popular notion cannot but have a hold of some essential\ntruth, otherwise it could not survive and spread, and form a working\ntheory for an immense area of experience. On the other hand, a\npopular notion, as such, cannot be critical of itself and aware of\nits own foundations; and so in defending and applying itself it is\npretty sure to plunge deep into fallacy. \u201cSelf-government\u201d is an idea\nwhich will be found, as has been said, to contain the true ground and\nnature of political obligation. But the rough and ready application\nof it which, for example, represents the individual as simply one\nwith the community, and the community therefore as infallible in its\naction affecting him, is a pure example of fallacy, and may be justly\ncharacterised as a confusion pretending to be a synthesis. Of this\nidea as of so many we must say that those who have pronounced it to\nbe self-contradictory have understood it much better than most of\nthose who accept it as self-evident.\n\nIn the conception of self-government then we {55} have the paradox of\nobligation in its purest form. As applied to the individual himself,\nit gives the paradox of Ethical Obligation. As applied to the\nindividuals who compose a society, it gives the paradox of Political\nObligation. This must be the preliminary distinction by which we\napproach the subject; but we shall find that the two problems and the\ntwo cases cannot be ultimately separated, although they are to be\ndistinguished in a certain respect.\n\nThe paradox of Ethical Obligation starts from what is accepted as\na \u201cself,\u201d and asks how it can exercise authority or coercion over\nitself; how, in short, a metaphor drawn from the relations of some\npersons to others can find application within what we take to be the\nlimits of an individual mind. [1]\n\n[1] On this problem, see below, p. 139.\n\nThe paradox of Political Obligation starts from what is accepted as\nauthority or social coercion, and asks in what way the term \u201cself,\u201d\nderived from the \u201cindividual\u201d mind, can be applicable at once to the\nagent and patient in such coercion, exercised _prima facie_ by some\npersons over others. Both relations and their connection have been\npointed out by Plato. [1]\n\n[1] _Republic_, 430, 431.\n\nOur object in the present chapter is to enforce the reality of the\ndifficulties which attach to the idea of political self-government,\nso long as current assumptions as to the union of individuals in\nsociety are maintained. And for this purpose we are to examine the\nviews of some very distinguished philosophers to whom the paradox\nhas appeared irreconcilable, and law or government has seemed {56}\nessentially antagonistic to the self or true individuality of man;\nwhile the term self, if applied to the collective group by or within\nwhich government is undoubtedly exercised, appears to them an empty\nand misleading expression. The curious and significant point, to\nwhich we shall call attention, is, in brief, that while maintaining\nlaw and government to be in their nature antagonistic to the self of\nman--whether as pain to pleasure or as fetters to individuality--they\nnevertheless admit with one voice that a certain minimum of this\nantagonistic element is necessary to the development of the sentient\nor rational self. We have here a dualism which challenges examination.\n\n2. The attitude towards law and government which Bentham adopted\n(1748-1832) was in a great degree that of the philanthropic reformer.\nHis principle of the greatest happiness of the greatest number is\nsaid [1] to have been derived from Beccaria, whose work on \u201cCrimes\nand Penalties\u201d had great influence throughout Europe. And Howard,\n\u201cthe philanthropist,\u201d who was just twenty-two years Bentham\u2019s senior\n(1726-1790), represented a revolt against the abuses of the treatment\nof criminals at that time, by which Bentham, who eulogised him as\n\u201ca martyr and apostle,\u201d was strongly affected. The movement which\nBentham led was, in short, markedly hostile to the existing system\nof law, and to the reasonings of its advocates. And substantial as\nhis knowledge and constructive genius proved to be, it never lost\nthe character which the direction of his approach to the subject had\nmarked upon it, a character of suspicion and antagonism, which is\n{57} expressed in his description of law as a necessary evil, and\ngovernment as a choice of evils. [2]\n\n[1] Professor Holland in _Encycl. Brit_., art.; Bentham.\u201d\n\n[2] Bentham, _Principles of Legislation_, p. 48.\n\nPain being the ultimate evil, it is clear why, on Bentham\u2019s\nprinciples, every law is an evil. For every law, for him, is\ncontrary to liberty; and every infraction of liberty is followed by\na natural sentiment of pain. [1] Against those who would deny the\nproposition that every law is contrary to liberty he brings a charge\nof perversion of language, in that they restrict liberty to the right\nof doing what is not injurious to others. They give the term, that is\nto say, a partly positive implication. For him then liberty has the\nsimplest and apparently widest meaning, [2] which includes liberty to\ndo evil, and is defined, we must suppose, purely as the absence of\nrestraint. And he therefore has no doubt whatever that the citizen\ncan acquire rights only by sacrificing part of his liberty. And in\nthis there is an appearance of truth, if we forget that in saying\nthat a part of one\u2019s liberty is sacrificed it is implied that one\nhad, to begin with, a certain area of liberty, of which a portion\nis abandoned to save the rest. But the idea of any such antecedent\nliberty is just such a fiction as Bentham himself delighted to\nexpose. It is true, however, that some degree of restraint on what\nwe can _now_ easily imagine ourselves free to do, is involved in\npolitical society. The point on which we have to fix our attention,\nfor the purposes of social theory, is the remarkable representation\nof this state of things under the figure, as it were, of an amount of\ngeneral liberty, {58} which is increased by subtraction, or which can\nonly attain its maximum by the conversion of a certain edge or border\nof it, so to speak, into constraint. This border of constraint is\nimplied to be capable of a minimum, such as to condition a maximum of\nliberty, or possible individual initiative; a relation which, being\nat first sight contradictory, demands further analysis. For it would\nappear that if the sacrifice of some liberty is to be instrumental\nto the increase of the whole amount, that whole can hardly be a\nhomogeneous given quantity, like, for instance, a piece of land; for\nsuch a one must surely be diminished by the subtraction of any part\nof it. It must, one would infer, be something which has a complex\nnature like that of a living plant, such that certain restrictions or\nnegations which are essential to its prosperity are dictated by its\nindividual characteristics (which must be positive), and express the\nsame principle with them; and therefore are wholly relative to the\npositive type and phase of the plant to be cultivated. Only in some\nsuch sense can it be intelligible how constraint is instrumental to\neffective self-assertion.\n\n[1] Bentham, _Principles of Legislation_, p. 94.\n\n[2] It is not really the widest, as will appear in the sequel.\n\nBut if this is so, the restrictive influences of law and government,\nwhich are the measure of the constraint imposed, cannot be alien to\nthe human nature which they restrict, and ought not to be set down\nas in their own nature antagonistic to liberty or to the making\nthe most of the human self. The root of the difficulty obviously\nlies in assuming that the pressure of the claims of \u201cothers\u201d in\nsociety is a mere general curtailment of the liberty of the \u201cone,\u201d\nwhile acknowledging, not {59} contrary to fact, but contrary to\nthe hypothesis of that curtailment, that the one, so far from\nsurrendering some of his capacity for life through his fellowship\nwith others, acquires and extends that capacity wholly in and through\nsuch fellowship. On the above assumption the terms of the paradox\nof self-government become irreconcilable, and government is made an\nevil of which it is impossible to explain how it ministers to the\nself which stands for the good. So long as to every individual, taken\nas the true self, the restraint enforced by the impact of others is\nalien and a diminution of the self, this result is inevitable.\n\nIt is instructive, therefore, to note Bentham\u2019s uncompromising\nhostility to all the theories of philosophical jurists. The common\npoint of all their theories, from Hobbes and Grotius to Montesquieu\nand Rousseau, not to mention Kant and his successors, has lain in the\nfact that their authors divined under the forms of power and command,\nexercised by some over others, a substantive and general element of\npositive human nature, which they attempted to drag to light by one\nanalogy after another. But neither Montesquieu\u2019s \u201ceternal relations,\u201d\nnor the \u201cSocial Contract,\u201d nor \u201cGeneral Will,\u201d nor \u201cNatural Rights\u201d\nof other thinkers find favour in Bentham\u2019s eyes. One and all they\nare to him fiction and fallacy. He can understand nothing in law but\nthe character of a command; he can see no positive relation of it to\nhuman nature beyond the degree in which it dispenses with the pain of\nrestraint while increasing the pleasure of liberty.\n\nTo describe the magnificent success which {60} attended the use of\nthis rule of thumb in the practical work of reform does not fall\nwithin our immediate subject. Our purpose was merely to illustrate\nthe paradox implied in the conception of self-government, by pointing\nout how fundamentally hostile to one another Bentham took its\nconstituent elements to be.\n\n3. The same point may be further insisted on by examining the main\nideas of Mill\u2019s \u201cLiberty,\u201d without by any means professing to give\na full account of Mill\u2019s opinions on the relation of individuals\nto society. What indeed is instructive in his position, for our\nimmediate purpose, is that, having so deep a sense, as he has, of\nsocial solidarity, he nevertheless treats the central life of the\nindividual as something to be carefully fenced round against the\nimpact of social forces.\n\ni. Mill\u2019s idea of Individuality is plainly biassed by the Benthamite\ntradition that law is an evil. It is to be remembered that Anarchism\nof a speculative kind, the inevitable complement of a hide-bound\nConservatism, was current in the beginning of this century, as in\nGodwin and Shelley. Thus we find concentrated in a few pages of\nthe \u201cLiberty\u201d [1] all those ideas on the nature of Individuality,\nOriginality, and Eccentricity, which are most opposed to the\nteaching derived by later generations in England from the revival of\nphilosophy and criticism. It is worth while, after reading Mill\u2019s\nobservations upon the relation of individuality to the Calvinistic\ntheory of life, [2] to turn to the estimate expressed by Mark\nPattison [3] of the force of individual character generated by {61}\nthe rule of Calvin at Geneva. That the individuality, or genius,\nthe fulness of life and completeness of development which Mill so\njustly appreciates, is not nourished and evoked by the varied play\nof relations and obligations in society, but lies in a sort of inner\nself, to be cherished by enclosing it, as it were, in an impervious\nglobe, is a notion which neither modern logic [4] nor modern art\ncriticism will admit. In the same way, the connection of originality\nand eccentricity, on which Mill insists, appears to us to-day to be\na fallacious track of thought; and in general, in all these matters,\nwe tend to accept the principle that, in order to go beyond a point\nof progress, it is necessary to have reached it; and in order to\ndestroy a law, it is necessary to have fulfilled it. Here, however,\nis the heart of the point on which we are insisting. If individuality\nand originality mean or depend upon the absence of law and of\nobligation; if eccentricity is the type of the fully developed self,\nand if the community, penetrated by a sense of universal relations,\nis therefore a prey to monotony and uniformity, then it needs no\nfurther words to show that law is a curtailment of human nature, the\nnecessity of which remains inexplicable, so that self-government is a\ncontradiction in terms.\n\n[1] pp. 35-9.\n\n[2] _Ib._, p. 35.\n\n[3] _Essays_, vol. I., \u201cCalvin.\u201d\n\n[4] See below, p. 79.\n\nii. How then does Mill bring the two terms into relation? How does\nhe represent the phenomenon that, in the life of every society,\nthe factors of self and of government have to be reconciled, or at\nanyrate to coexist?\n\nTo find the answer to this question, the whole {62} of the chapter,\n\u201cOf the limits of the authority of society over the individual,\u201d [1]\nshould be carefully studied. A few characteristic sentences may be\nquoted here.\n\n[1] _On Liberty_, ch. iv.\n\n  \u201cWhat, then, is the rightful limit to the sovereignty of\n  the individual over himself? Where does the authority of\n  society begin? How much of human life should be assigned\n  to individuality, and how much to society?\n\n  \u201cEach will receives its proper share, if each has that\n  which more particularly concerns it. To individuality\n  should belong the part of life in which it is chiefly the\n  individual that is interested; to society, the part which\n  chiefly interests society.\u201d\n\nEvery one who lives in society, he continues in effect, is bound\nnot to interfere with certain interests of others (explicitly or\nimplicitly constituted as \u201crights\u201d), and is bound to take his fair\nshare of the sacrifices incurred for the defence of society and\nits members. These conditions society may enforce, at all costs to\nrecalcitrants. Further, it may punish by opinion, though not by law,\nacts hurtful to others, but not going so far as to violate their\nrights. But acts which affect only the agent, or need not affect\nothers unless they like, may be punished, we are given to understand,\nneither by law nor by opinion. Mill expects his conclusions to be\ndisputed, and the following is the conclusion of the passage in which\nhe explains and re-affirms it:\n\n   \u201c... when a person disables himself, by conduct purely\n  self-regarding, from the performance of some definite\n  duty incumbent on him to the public, he is guilty of\n  a social {63} offence. No person ought to be punished\n  simply for being drunk; but a soldier or policeman should\n  be punished for being drunk on duty. Wherever, in short,\n  there is a definite damage, or a definite risk of damage\n  either to an individual or to the _public, the case is\n  taken out of the province of liberty, and placed in that\n  of morality or law_.\u201d [1]\n\n[1] Italics are mine.\n\nIt will probably occur at once to the reader that, considered as a\npractical rule, the view here maintained would by no means curtail\nunduly the province of social interference. We should rather\nanticipate that it would leave an easy opening for a transition\nfrom administrative nihilism to administrative absolutism; and some\nsuch transition seems to have taken place in Mill\u2019s later views.\nThis tendency to a complete _bouleversement_ is the characteristic\nof all conceptions which proceed by assigning different areas to\nthe several factors of an inseparable whole, which then reasserts\nitself in its wholeness within the area of either factor to which\nwe may happen to attend. Indeed, even in the passage before us, the\ndefence of individuality has already well-nigh turned round into\nits annihilation. Every act that carries a definite damage to any\nother person belongs to the sphere of law, and every act that can\nbe supposed likely to cause such a damage, to that of morality; and\nindividuality has what is left. The extraordinary demarcation between\nthe sphere of morality and that of liberty is to be accounted for,\nno doubt, by the Benthamite tradition which identified the moral and\nsocial sanctions; so that in this usage the sphere of morality means\nmuch the same as what, {64} in the first passage referred to, was\nindicated as the sphere of opinion.\n\nNow, it is obvious that the distinction which Mill is attempting to\ndescribe and explain is one practically recognised by every society.\nThe question is whether it can be rightly described and explained\nby a demarcation which, if strictly pressed, excludes individuality\nfrom every act of life that has an important social bearing; while,\nowing to the two-sided nature of all action, it becomes perfectly\narbitrary in its practical working as a criterion. For every act\nof mine affects both myself and others; and it is a matter of mood\nand momentary urgency which aspect may be pronounced characteristic\nand essential. It may safely be said that no demarcation between\nself-regarding and other-regarding action can possibly hold good.\nWhat may hold good, and what Mill\u2019s examples show to be present to\nhis mind, is a distinction between the moral and the \u201cexternal\u201d\naspects of action, on the ground of their respective accessibility\nto the means of coercion which are at the disposal of society. The\npeculiar sense in which the term \u201cexternal\u201d is here employed will\nexplain itself below. [1]\n\n[1] See ch. viii. below.\n\nFor our present purpose, however, what we have to observe is merely\nthat the demarcation between individuality and society, contrived in\ndefence of the former, has pretty nearly annihilated it. And thus we\nsee once more how overwhelming is the _prima facie_ appearance that,\nin the idea of self-government, the factors of self and government\nare alien and opposed; and yet how hopeless it remains {65} to\nexplain the part played by these factors in actual society, so long\nas we aim at a demarcation between them as opposites, rather than at\na relative distinction between them as manifestations of the same\nprinciple in different media.\n\niii. A few words may here be said on the applications by which Mill\nillustrates his doctrine, in order to point out what confusion\nresults from relying on a demarcation which cannot strictly be made.\n\nIt will be noted in the first place that he objects altogether to\nthe attempt to prevent by punishment either immorality or irreligion\nas such. [1] This objection a sound social theory must uphold. But\nif we look at Mill\u2019s reason for it, we find it simply to be that\nsuch an attempt infringes liberty, by interfering with action which\nis purely self-regarding. Without entering further upon the endless\nargument whether this or any action is indeed purely self-regarding,\nwe may observe that by taking such ground, Mill causes the above\nobjection, which is substantially sound, to appear as on all fours\nwith others which are at any rate very much more doubtful. Such is\nthe objection on principle to all restrictions imposed upon trade\nwith a distinct view to protecting the consumer, not from fraud,\nbut from opportunities of consumption injurious to himself. The\nregulation or prohibition of the traffic in alcoholic liquors is of\ncourse the main question here at issue; and it may be admitted that\nMill\u2019s discussion, with the many distinctions which he lays down,\nis full of shrewdness and suggestiveness. But the ultimate ground\nwhich he takes, as above stated, is quite different from the genuine\nreasons which exist {66} against attempting to enforce morality by\nlaw and penalty, and introduces confusion into the whole question of\nState interference by ranking the two objections together. Closely\nanalogous are his objections to the statutes respecting unlawful\ngames, [2] which, whether wise or unwise, are quite a different thing\nfrom an attempt to punish personal immorality as such. And lastly,\nthe same principle is illustrated by his whole attitude to the strong\nfeeling and the various legal obligations which determine and support\nthe monogamous family. In maintaining the general indissolubility\nof marriage, and supporting the parental power, the State is\ninterfering, for him, with the freedom of parties to a contract, and\nconferring power over individuals, the children, who have a right to\nbe separately considered. Such interference is for him _ipso facto_\nof a suspected nature. It is an interference hostile to liberty; and\nwhether it is or is not an external condition of good life, which\nthe State is able effectively to maintain, is a question which he\ndoes not discuss. Throughout all these objections to authoritative\ninterference we trace the peculiar prejudice that the criterion of\nits justifiability lies in the boundary line between self and others,\nrather than in the nature of what coercive authority is and is not\nable to do towards the promotion of good life. On many points indeed,\nwhen the simple protection of \u201cothers\u201d is concerned, Mill\u2019s doctrine\nleads to sound conclusions. Such, for example, is the problem of\nlegislation after the pattern of the Factory Acts.\n\n[1] Pp. 48 and 50.\n\n[2] P. 59.\n\nBut yet a strange nemesis attaches to grounds {67} alleged with\ninsufficient discrimination. Just as, by ranking inner morality and\nouter action alike under the name of freedom, Mill is led to object\nto interference which may be perfectly justified and effectual; so\nby the same confusion he is led to advocate coercive treatment in\nimpossibly stringent forms, and in cases where it runs extreme risk\nof thwarting a true moral development. We are amazed when he strongly\nimplies, in respect to the education of children and the prospect of\nsupporting a family, that moral obligations [1] ought to be enforced\nby law. The proposal of universal State-enacted examinations by\nway of enforcing the parental duty of educating children, to the\nexclusion of the task of providing education by public authority,\nin which Mill sees danger to individuality, opens a prospect of a\nChinese type of society, from which, happily, the good sense of\nEnglishmen has recoiled. And just the reverse of his proposal has\ncome to pass under the influence of the logic of experience. The\nState has taken care that the external conditions of an elementary\neducation are provided, and, while doing this, has no doubt exercised\ncompulsion in order that these conditions may be a reality. But the\nindividual inquisition by examination is tending to drop out of the\nsystem; and the practical working of the public education is more and\nmore coming to be that the State sees to it that certain conditions\nare maintained, of which the parents\u2019 interest and public spirit\nleads them to take advantage. Sheer compulsion is not the way to\nenforce a moral obligation.\n\n[1] Pp. 62 and 64.\n\n{68} Still more startling is the suggestion that it might be just to\ninterdict marriage to those unable to show the means of supporting\na family, on the ground of possible evil both to the children\nthemselves through poverty, and to others through over-population.\nThis is a case in which authoritative interference (except on account\nof very definite physical or mental defects) must inevitably defeat\nits object. No foresight of others can gauge the latent powers to\nmeet and deal with a future indefinite responsibility; and the result\nof scrupulous timidity, in view of such responsibilities, is seen in\nthe tendency to depopulation which affects that very country from\nwhich Mill probably drew his argument. To leave the responsibility\nas fully as possible where it has been assumed is the best that law\ncan do, and appeals to a spring of energy deeper than compulsion can\nreach.\n\nThus we have seen that by discriminating the spheres of\nnon-interference and interference, according to a supposed\ndemarcation between the sphere of \u201cself\u201d and of \u201cothers,\u201d a\nhopelessly confused classification has been introduced. Sometimes\nthe maintenance of external conditions of good life, well within the\npower of the State, is forbidden on the same grounds as the direct\npromotion of morality, which is impossible to it. In other cases\nthe enforcement of moral obligations is taken to lie within the\nfunctions of the State, although not only is the enforcement of moral\nobligations _per se_ a contradiction in terms, but almost always,\nas in the cases in question, the attempt to effect it is sure to\nfrustrate itself, by destroying the springs on which moral action\ndepends.\n\n{69} It is worth noticing, in conclusion, that in two examples,\n[1] the one trivial, the other that of slavery, both theoretically\nand practically very important, Mill recognises a principle wholly\nat variance with his own. Here he is aware that it may be right,\naccording to the principle of liberty, to restrain a man, for\nreasons affecting himself alone, from doing what at the moment he\nproposes to do. For we are entitled to argue from the essential\nnature of freedom to what freedom really demands, as opposed to\nwhat the man momentarily seems to wish. \u201cIt is not freedom to be\nallowed to alienate his freedom,\u201d as it is not freedom to be allowed\nto walk over a bridge which is certain to break down and cause his\ndeath. Here we have in germ the doctrine of the \u201creal\u201d will, and a\nconception analogous to that of Rousseau when he speaks of a man\n\u201cbeing forced to be free.\u201d\n\n[1] Pp. 57 and 61.\n\n4. Before referring to Mill\u2019s explicit utterances on the problem of\nself-government, which are of the same general character as those\nof Mr. Herbert Spencer, it will be well to note some instructive\npoints in the views of the latter thinker. The study of Mr. Spencer\u2019s\nwritings, and more especially of those which appear most directly\nopposed to the popular conceptions of the day, cannot be too strongly\nurged upon the sociological student. And this for two reasons. In the\nfirst place, no other writer has exhibited with equal vividness the\nfatal possibilities of a collective governmental stupidity. That in\npractice these possibilities are continually tending to become facts,\njust as in theory they are {70} represented by recurrent fallacies,\n[1] is a proof of the extreme arduousness of the demands made by the\ntask of self-government upon the people which undertakes it. And no\ntheorist is fitted to discuss the problem of social unity who has\nnot realised the arduousness of these demands in all its intensity.\nAnd, in the second place, the student will observe an instructive\nmeeting of extremes between elements of Mr. Spencer\u2019s ideas and\npopular social theories of an opposite cast. The revival of doctrines\nof the natural rights of man on a biological foundation [2] is a\ncase in point. An uncriticised individualism is always in danger of\ntransformation into an uncritical collectivism. The basis of the two\nis in fact the same.\n\n[1] As, for example, in Rousseau\u2019s attempts to explain the action of\na collective mind, in which he constantly falls into the advocacy of\na soulless _r\u00e9gime_ of mass-meetings.\n\n[2] _Man v. State_, p. 95.\n\ni. A comparison of the conception of \u201cright\u201d as entertained by\nBentham and by Herbert Spencer forms a striking commentary on ideas\nin which \u201cgovernment\u201d is antagonistic to \u201cself.\u201d Bentham, seeing\nclearly that the claims of the actual individual, taken as he\nhappens to be, are casual and unregulated, fulminates against the\nidea of natural right as representing those claims. Right is for\nhim a creation of the State, and there can be no right which is not\nconstituted by law. And the truth of the contention seems obvious.\nHow, in fact, could individual claims or wishes constitute a right,\nexcept as in some way ratified by a more general recognition?\n\nBut to Mr. Herbert Spencer the contrary proposition is absolutely\nconvincing, and, indeed, on {71} their common premises, with equal\nreason. [1] It is ridiculous, he points out, to think of a people as\ncreating rights, which it had not before, by the process of creating\na government in order to create them. It is absurd to treat an\nindividual as having a share of rights _qua_ member of the people,\nwhile in his private capacity he has no rights at all.\n\n[1] _Ib_., p. 88.\n\nWe need not labour this point further. It is obvious that Mr. Herbert\nSpencer is simply preferring the opposite extreme, in the antithesis\nof \u201cself\u201d and \u201cgovernment,\u201d to that which commended itself to\nBentham. If it is a plain fact that \u201ca right\u201d can only be recognised\nby a society, it is no less plain that it can only be real in an\nindividual. If individual claims, apart from social adjustment, are\narbitrary, yet social recognitions, apart from individual qualities\nand relations, are meaningless. As long as the self and the law are\nalien and hostile, it is hopeless to do more than choose at random in\nwhich of the two we are to locate the essence of right.\n\nii. And how alien and hostile the self and the law may seem we see\neven more crudely enunciated in Herbert Spencer than in Bentham\nor Mill, as the fundamental principle of the tradition has worked\nitself more definitely to the front. \u201cThe liberty [1] which a citizen\nenjoys is to be {72} measured, not by the nature of the governmental\nmachinery he lives under, whether representative or other, but by\nthe relative paucity of the restraints it imposes on him.\u201d And so\nwe are astounded to find it maintained that the positive and active\nelement in the right to carry on self-sustaining activities is of a\nnon-social character, depending only on the laws of life, [2] and\nif the matter were pushed home, would have to be identified, one\nmust suppose, with the more strictly animal element of the mind;\nwhile only the negative element arises from social aggregation, and\nit is this negative element alone which gives ethical character to\nthe right to live. Though these distinctions apply primarily to\nthe ground of the _right to live_, yet it appears inevitable that\nthey represent the point of view from which the active self or\nindividuality must be regarded on the principle we are pursuing.\nThe ground of the right to live, as here stated, is simply the\nrecognition that life is a good; and if the positive element of this\ngood is non-social and only the negative is of social origin, and\nthis alone is ethical, it seems clearly to follow that the making\nthe most of life--its positive expansion and intensification--is\nexcluded from the ethical aspects of individuality, and, indeed, that\nindividuality has no ethical aspect at all. Here is the ultimate\nresult of accepting as irreducible the distinction between the self\nand government, or the negative relation of individuality and law.\nLiberty and self are divorced from the moral end, a tendency which we\nnoted even in Mill. Selves in society are regarded as if they {73}\nwere bees building their cells, and their ethical character becomes\ncomparable to the absence of encroachment by which the workers\nmaintain the hexagonal outline due to their equal impact on each\nother as they progress evenly from equidistant centres. The self,\nwhich has ranked through out these views as the end, to whose liberty\nall is to be sacrificed, turns out to be the non-ethical element of\nlife.\n\n[1] _Man v. State_, p. 15. Cf. Seeley, _Introd. to Political\nScience_, p. 119: \u201cPerfect liberty is equivalent to total absence\nof government.\u201d I have attempted to point out the fallacy of this\nin a way applying to its practical and everyday meaning in my essay\non \u201cLiberty and Legislation,\u201d in the volume of essays called _The\nCivilisation of Christendom_.\n\n[2] _Man v. State_, p. 98.\n\nThus, when Professor Huxley speaks of \u201cself-restraint as the essence\nof the ethical process,\u201d [1] while \u201cnatural liberty\u201d consists in\n\u201cthe free play of self-assertion,\u201d we see how the whole method of\napproaching social and ethical phenomena is turned upside down unless\nthe paradox of self-government is conquered once for all. The idea\nthat assertion and maximisation of the self and of the individuality\nfirst become possible and real in and through society, and that\naffirmation and not negation is its main characteristic; these\nfundamental conceptions of genuine social philosophy [2] can only\nbe reached through a destructive criticism of the assumptions which\nerect that paradox into an insoluble contradiction.\n\n[1] _Evolution and Ethics_; pp. 27 and 31.\n\n[2] For the Greek, it is society which is natural, positive, and\npromotive of man\u2019s individuality. See ch. ii. above.\n\n5. We may now restate the essence of the problem of self-government\nas it presents itself to the thinkers whom we have been reviewing.\nOn the assumptions which they accept, the annihilating criticism of\nself-government in the first chapter of Mill\u2019s Liberty is indeed\nirresistible. He begins by pointing out that in times of political\nimmaturity, {74} the conception of political liberty consisted\nin setting limits to the power which the ruler, considered as an\nindependent force opposed in interest [1] to his subjects, should\nbe suffered to exercise over the community. But as it was found\npossible, in a greater and greater degree, to make the ruling power\nemanate from the periodical choice of the ruled,\n\n  \u201csome persons began to think that too much importance\n  had been attached to the limitation of the power itself.\n  _That_, it might seem, was a resource against rulers\n  whose interests were habitually opposed to those of the\n  people. What was now wanted was, that the rulers should\n  be identified with the people; that their interest and\n  will should be the interest and will of the nation. The\n  nation did not need to be protected against its own will.\n  There was no fear of its tyrannising over itself.\u201d\n\nRousseau in some moods is the victim of this fallacy, and it is\nwidely triumphant to-day.\n\n[1] So early an analysis of government as that made by Plato in the\n_Republic_ shows indeed that this was never the sole theory, as it is\nnot the truest, of the cohesive forces of any community whatever. But\nit has a certain validity, proportioned to the degree of political\nimperfection.\n\nBut with the success of the democratic principle,\n\n  \u201celective and responsible government became subject to\n  the observations and criticisms which wait upon a great\n  existing fact. It was now observed that such phrases as\n  \u2018self-government\u2019, and \u2018the power of the people over\n  themselves\u2019, do not express the true state of the case.\n  The \u2018people\u2019 who exercise the power are not always the\n  same people with those over whom it is exercised; and the\n  \u2019self-government\u2019 spoken of is not the government of each\n  by himself, but of each by all the rest. The {75} will of\n  the people, moreover, practically means the will of the\n  most numerous or the most active _part_ of the people;\n  the majority, or those who succeed in making themselves\n  accepted as the majority ... and precautions are as\n  much needed against this as against any other abuse\n  of power. The limitation, therefore, of the power of\n  government loses none of its importance when the holders\n  of power are regularly accountable to the community, that\n  is, to the strongest party therein. ... In political\n  speculations, the \u2018tyranny of the majority\u2019 is now\n  generally included among the evils against which society\n  requires to be on its guard.\u201d\n\nThe paradox of self-government then, so far from being theoretically\nsolved by the development of political institutions to their highest\nknown maturity, is simply intensified by this development. When\nthe arbitrary and irrational powers of classes or of individuals\nhave been swept away, we are left face to face, it would seem, with\nthe coercion of some by others as a necessity in the nature of\nthings. And, indeed, however perfectly \u201cself-government\u201d has been\nsubstituted for despotism, it is flying in the face of experience\nto suggest that the average individual self, as he exists in you or\nme, is _ipso facto_ satisfied, and at home, in all the acts of the\npublic power which is supposed to represent him. If he were so, the\nparadox of self-government would be resolved by the annihilation of\none of its factors. The self would remain, but \u201cgovernment\u201d would\nbe superfluous; or else \u201cgovernment\u201d would be everything, and the\nself annihilated. If, on the other hand, we understand the \u201cself\u201d\nin \u201cself-government\u201d to stand for the whole sovereign group or {76}\ncommunity, which is usually called a \u201cself-governing,\u201d as opposed to\na subject, state, then we have before us the task of showing that\nthis self is a reality in any sense which justifies the acceptance of\nwhat is done by the public power as an act of the whole community.\nBut on the ground where we stand in the theories reviewed in the\npresent chapter, no such self can be shown. Government, in fact\nand in principle, reveals itself as coercion exercised by \u201cthe\nothers\u201d over \u201cthe one.\u201d And so long as this is the case, and as the\ngovernment is alien to the self, not only do the rights of majorities\nremain without explanation, but no less is it impossible to say on\nwhat rational ground an entire community can apply coercion to a\nsingle recalcitrant member. We have seen that Mill would solve the\nproblem by a demarcation, according to which the aim and ground of\ngovernment is to protect the self from the impact of others, and\nleave it in its isolated purity. Herbert Spencer, it may be noted,\n[1] has recourse to one of those hypotheses of tacit consent which\nwould reduce a community to the level of a joint-stock company, [2]\n_minus_ a written instrument of association; which in the case of\nthe State has to be replaced by Mr. Spencer\u2019s estimate of purposes,\nwhich would _probably_ be accepted with unanimity _if_ the question\nwere asked! Bentham alone, founding {77} himself on the actual nature\nof social life, genially overrides the whole question of individual\nright, and while maintaining law to be a necessary evil, and pouring\nscorn on all attempts to exhibit a positive unity throughout the\nselves which compose a society, makes the promotion of a free and\nhappy life the sole criterion of governmental interference.\n\n[1] _Man v. State_, p. 83 _sq_.\n\n[2] It is a remarkable testimony to the inherent vitality of\nassociations of human beings that even a joint-stock company often\nfinds its work and aims so developing on its hands that it has to\nobtain additional powers from Parliament. It transcends, therefore,\nthe limits of the shareholders original contract, and Herbert\nSpencer\u2019s loud complaints of this procedure show how little he\nrecognises the nature of social necessity.\n\nOn the basis of every-day reflection, then, we are brought to an\nabsolute deadlock in the theory of political obligation. If, as\npopular instinct maintains, and as common sense seems somehow to\ninsist, there is a theory and a justification of social coercion\nlatent in the term \u201cself-government,\u201d we cannot find a clue to it\nin the reasoning of our most recent and popular political thinkers.\nNor should we find a comprehensive theory, though we might find\nsuggestions towards one, if we recurred to our more philosophical\nteachers, such as Hobbes and Locke, who are further from popular\nmodes of thought. If there is anything satisfactory in the conception\nof self-government, every interpretation of it is at once condemned\nwhich does not give the fullest force to both terms of the paradox,\nat the same time that it exhibits their reconciliation. What this\nfullest force is, and the antagonism which it involves, we have seen\nin the present chapter. We must start from an actual self, which is\ncapable of rebelling against law and government; and from an actual\n\u201cgovernment,\u201d which is capable of tyrannising over the individual\nself. We must not treat the self as _ipso facto_ annihilated by\ngovernment; nor must we treat government as a pale reflection,\npliable to all the vagaries of the actual self. Nor, again, must\nwe divide the inseparable {78} content of life, and endeavour to\nassign part to the assertion of the individual as belonging to self,\nand part to his impact on others, as belonging to government. We\nmust take the two factors of the working idea of self-government in\ntheir full antagonism, and exhibit, through and because of this, the\nfundamental unity at their root, and the necessity and conditions\nof their coherence. We must show, in short, how man, the actual man\nof flesh and blood, demands to be governed; and how a government,\nwhich puts real force upon him, is essential, as he is aware, to his\nbecoming what he has it in him to be. And if we fail to destroy the\nassumptions which hinder us from doing this, we shall have to admit\nthat the maturity of democratic institutions has only liberated us\nfrom arbitrary despotism to subject us to necessary tyranny; and\nthough, in spite of such a failure, we might still acquiesce in\n\u201ccounting heads to save breaking them,\u201d we should have to agree that\nthis may indeed be the shrewdest device of political expediency, but\nthat the difference between the two processes corresponds to no real\ncapacity of the human individual for partaking, by the exercise of\nwill and intelligence, in a peacefully organised and yet effectually\ngoverned whole. We shall then, in short, be compelled to agree with\nBentham and Mill and Spencer that \u201cself-government\u201d and \u201cthe general\nwill\u201d are meaningless phantoms, combinations of hostile factors,\nincapable of being united in a real experience.\n\n\n\n\n{79}\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nTHE PROBLEM OF POLITICAL OBLIGATION MORE RADICALLY TREATED.\n\n1. The reader will no doubt have observed that the theory dealt\nwith in the last chapter belongs to the general type of what is\ncurrently known as Individualism. For several reasons I have\npreferred not to make use of this hackneyed word. In the first place,\nit is very hackneyed; and the employment of such terms takes all\nlife and expressiveness out of philosophy. And, in the next place,\nIndividualism may mean many things, and in its fullest, which is\nsurely, for the student of philosophy, its truest meaning, it is far\ntoo good for the theories under discussion. An \u201cIndividual\u201d may be\n\u201cindividual\u201d or indivisible because he has so little in him, that\nyou cannot imagine it possible to break him up into lesser parts;\nor because, however full and great his nature, it is so thoroughly\none, so vital and so true to itself, that, like a work of art, the\nwhole of his being cannot be separated into parts without ceasing to\nbe what it essentially is. In the former case the \u201cindividual\u201d is an\n\u201catom\u201d; in the latter he is \u201ca great individuality.\u201d [1] The sense\nin which we shall make {80} use of the notion of the individual, so\nfar as we use it at all, will be the latter and not the former. And,\ntherefore, we shall as far as possible discard the hackneyed term\n\u201cIndividualism,\u201d which embodies the former meaning only.\n\n[1] See Nettleship\u2019s _Remains_, i. 160.\n\nIf then we are to coin an expression which will indicate the\ncommon features of the theories outlined in the previous chapter,\nwe may venture upon some such phrase as \u201c_prima facie_ theories,\u201d\nor \u201ctheories of the first look.\u201d By this I do not mean that they\nstand in the same rank with the views of the Greek thinkers, who,\nundisturbed by previous speculation, saw the great facts of social\nexperience with a freshness and wholeness of vision with which\nthey can never be seen again. The \u201cfirst look\u201d of our own day is\nof a different kind. It is the first look of the man in the street\nor of the traveller, struggling at a railway station, to whom the\ncompact self-containedness and self-direction of the swarming human\nbeings before him seems an obvious fact, while the social logic\nand spiritual history which lie behind the scene fail to impress\nthemselves on his perceptive imagination.\n\nWe see then that these theories of the first appearance are mainly\nguided by this impression of the natural separateness of the human\nunit. For this reason, as we noted, the experience of self-government\nis to them an enigma, with which they have to compromise in various\nways. And because their explanations of it are not true explanations\nbut only compromises, they rest on no principle, and dictate no\nconsistent attitude. For Bentham all solid right is actually in the\nState, {81} though conceived by himself as a means to individual\nends; for Mill, it is divided between the State and the individual,\nby a boundary which cannot be traced and therefore cannot be\nrespected; for Herbert Spencer all right is in the individual,\nand the State has become little more than a record office of his\ncontracts and consents.\n\nThe assumption common to the theories in question is dictated by\ntheir very nature. It is not precisely, as is often supposed to\nbe the case, that the individual is the end to which Society is\na means. Such a definition fails to assign a character which is\ndistinctive for any social theories whatever. For Society, being,\nat the lowest rate, a plurality of individuals, whatever we say of\nthe individual may be construed as true of Society and _vice versa_,\nso long as all individuals are understood in the same sense as one.\nThus the \u201cmeans\u201d and the \u201cends\u201d are liable to change places, as, for\npractical purposes, we saw that they did in Bentham. The ethical term\n\u201caltruism\u201d illustrates this principle. It shows that by taking \u201cthe\nindividual\u201d as the \u201cend,\u201d nothing is determined as to the relation\nbetween each individual and all, and it remains a matter of chance\nhow far it is required of \u201ceach\u201d individual, in the name of the\nwelfare of \u201cthe individual,\u201d to sacrifice himself to \u201call.\u201d\n\nThe fact is that the decisive issue is not whether we call the\n\u201cindividual\u201d or \u201csociety\u201d the \u201cend\u201d; but what we take to be the\nnature at once of individuals and of society. This is the question\nof principle; and views which are at one in this have nothing which\ncan in principle keep them apart, {82} although they may diverge to\nthe seemingly opposite poles of the liberty of each and the welfare\nof all. We have observed this sliding from one narrowness to its\nopposite, as between Bentham, Mill, and Herbert Spencer.\n\nThe root idea then, of the views which we have been discussing, is\nsimply that the individual or society--it makes no difference which\nwe take--is what it _prima facie_ appears to be. This is why we have\ncalled them \u201c_prima facie_\u201d theories, or \u201ctheories of the first\nlook.\u201d It would be a long story to explain how a first look can be\npossible in the eighteenth or nineteenth century A.D. But in brief,\nthe history of thought shows certain leaps or breaks in culture; when\nthe human mind seems to open its eyes afresh, or to emerge on a new\nplatform, from which new point of view all its adjustments have to be\nre-made and its perceptions re-analysed. In these new stages a great\nadvance is involved; but the advance is potential, and the possible\ninsight has to be paid for by an initial blindness.\n\nSuch an occasion it was on which the legislator or economist or\nnatural philosopher of the modern world turned his gaze upon man\nin society. He saw him as \u201cone of millions enjoying the protection\nof the law,\u201d [1] and society as the millions of which he is one.\nSuch an onlooker inevitably proceeds to treat the social whole as\ncomposed of units A, B, C, etc., who, _as they stand, and just as\nthey seem to us when we rub against them in daily intercourse_,\nare taken to be the organs and centres of human life. From this\nassumption all {83} the rest follows. Each of us, A, B, C, and all\nthe others, seems to be, and to a great extent in the routine of life\nactually is, self-complete, self-satisfied, and self-willed. To each\nof us, A, B, or C, all the rest are \u201cothers.\u201d They are \u201clike\u201d him;\nthey are \u201crepetitions\u201d of him, but they are not himself. He knows\nthat they are something to himself; but this \u201csomething\u201d is still\n\u201csomething else,\u201d and even in ethical reflection he is apt to call\nhis recognition of it \u201caltruism\u201d--an indefinite claim and feeling,\ntouching his being at its margin of contact with neighbouring\ncircles, the centres of which are isolated.\n\n[1] B. Jowett, in conversation, to author.\n\nTo the individual and society thus conceived--A, B, C, and the\nrest--it is plain that government can be nothing but self-protection.\nIt is, in fact, a form of the impact of \u201cothers,\u201d scientifically\nminimised, and accepted because it is minimised. For this reason it\nis, as we saw throughout, alien to the self, and incapable of being\nrecognised as springing from a common root with the spontaneous\nlife which we pretend to be aware of only within our private magic\ncircle. Then the forcible impact of B and C upon the circle of A\nis a necessary evil, a diminution, _pro tanto_, of A. And the more\naltruistic A is, the more he will recognise this, as affecting not\nhimself only, but B and C also.\n\nIt is for this reason that, on the views in question, all law and\ngovernment necessarily remain formal and negative as compared with\nthe substantive and positive ends of the self. The maintenance of\n\u201cliberty,\u201d of the circular or hexagonal [1] fences round A, B, C,\nand the rest, is {84} conceived as involving no determinate type of\nlife, no relation to the ends which the units pursue within their\nhexagons. If in any way the self went beyond itself, and A recognised\na positive end and nature which peremptorily bound him to B and the\nothers, it would be impossible to keep this nature and end from\nreflecting themselves in the determinate content of the conditions\nof association between them. The assumption would be destroyed which\nkeeps \u201cgovernment\u201d alien to \u201cself,\u201d and it would be possible to\nconsider in what sense and for what reason the nature of a spiritual\nanimal turns against itself with the dualism which the paradox of\nself-government embodies, and that in pursuit of its true unity.\n\n[1] See P. 73\n\n2. We will now discuss Rousseau\u2019s treatment of the paradox of\n\u201cself-government.\u201d And we discuss it, not because it is complete or\nself-consistent, but rather because, while breaking through to the\nroot of the whole matter, it is as incomplete and as inconsistent\nas are the efforts of our own minds to lay hold of any profound\ntruth. It displays, in fact, on the great stage of the history\nof philosophy, precisely the struggle which each of us has to go\nthrough if he tries to pierce the surface of commonplace fiction\nand tradition which persistently weaves itself about social facts.\nOn almost every page there is relapse and vacillation. The fictions\nwhich are being cast aside continually reassert themselves; the\nembodiment of the principle which the author\u2019s genius has discerned\nis sought for in expedients essentially opposite to its nature, while\nthe instruments which it has developed for itself are contemptuously\nrejected.\n\n{85} We are going to examine the main thesis of Rousseau\u2019s _Contrat\nSocial_. The reader who is surprised to find in our account little\nor nothing of the \u201creturn to nature,\u201d \u201cnatural equality,\u201d and the\n\u201cnatural rights of the individual,\u201d may refer for these to Rousseau\u2019s\nearlier essays on theses propounded by the Academy of Dijon. The\nfirst of the theses (1750) ran, \u201cWhether the re-establishment of the\nsciences and the arts contributed to purify morals\u201d; and Rousseau\u2019s\ndiscourse, which won the prize, following the lead of the thesis,\nstarted from the later Renaissance, and dealt in general with the\nphenomena of decadence--a very real problem. The notable feature\nof this brief essay is its constant vacillation between the attack\non science, art, and education as such, and the criticism, by no\nmeans an undiscerning criticism, of their abuses. Rousseau\u2019s head\nis full, not of primitive man, but of Socrates and Cato, of Sparta\nand republican Rome. A writer who speaks of Newton and Verulam\nas preceptors of the human race can hardly be hostile to true\nintellectual achievement. [1] It is noteworthy that his zeal for\neducational reform is already apparent in this first published work.\n\n[1] The whole piece breathes a spirit of prize essay paradox, and\nthough, if sympathetically read, it is seen to be most characteristic\nof the author, no serious conclusion should be drawn from it as to\nhis hostility to civilisation. A comic instance of his vacillation is\nproduced by the necessity he felt himself under, of excepting, from\nhis general dispraise of modern letters, such Academies as that of\nDijon, which was to judge his essay. For an excellent appreciation\nof these earlier works, and of Rousseau in general, see the essay\non \u201cOur Natural Rights,\u201d in the _Lectures and Essays_ of the late\nProfessor W. Wallace, Clarendon Press, 1898.\n\nThe second essay (1754), a much longer and {86} more serious\npiece, is on the thesis, \u201cWhat is the origin of Inequality among\nmankind, and is it justified by natural law?\u201d It was dedicated, with\nexpressions of extravagant laudation, to Rousseau\u2019s native state,\nthe Republic of Geneva. His enthusiasm for this community, as for\nthe ancient city-states, is a far truer guide to his genuine social\nideas than any of his paradoxes about the state of nature and the\nbondage of social man. His genius, in fact, is very much under-rated\nby those who suppose him at any time to have believed the primitive\nstate of nature, or earliest imaginable condition of the human\nrace, to be capable of furnishing an ideal of life. He is perfectly\naware that a state of nature, which is to furnish an ideal, must be\nselected at least from among the higher phases of man\u2019s evolution,\nafter morality and the family have begun to form themselves, and\nlanguage and property have made some advance. Here, again, his\nvacillation is strikingly observable, and we can see that it arises\nfrom his profound insight. The vices of civilisation tend to force\nthe desirable state of man down the scale of evolution, but the\nvalue of morality and respect for human nature tend to force it up,\nand Rousseau\u2019s argument embodies the struggle. For Rousseau is far\ntoo critical and clear-sighted to ascribe true morality or strictly\nhuman nature to a state of animal innocence, and he knows that virtue\ninvolves potential vice; [1] and therefore it is with hesitation\nand regret that he selects a middle state as {87} representing his\nideal, fully aware that it has forfeited animal innocence without\nhaving attained human morality. Even the famous declamation against\nthe first founder of property in land seems to pass away in an\nadmission that this was an inevitable stage in the growth of human\ncapacities, which the author would not seriously desire to remain\nundeveloped. Two further points may be noted; first, the fundamental\ncontention that men are by nature not equal but unequal, the\nevil of civilisation lying just in the replacement of natural by\npolitical inequality. If this political inequality were considered as\nmodifiable, it is plain that the view would point to an advantage in\nthe way of equality [2] possessed by society over nature. Secondly,\nthe view here taken of natural liberty in relation to the social\npact should be compared with that of the _Contrat Social_. In the\nessay, \u201cnatural liberty\u201d is on the whole preferred; in the _Contrat_,\nanother kind of liberty is held a truer good, although much of the\ntone and language associated with the preference of natural liberty\ncontinues by the side of the later view. It is plain that we are\ndealing, not with an unconsidering fanatical enthusiasm for one or\nanother state of man, but with a struggling insight, which sees evil\nbut also good in all, and, with hesitation and reluctance, depresses\nthe scale first in favour of the one, and then in favour of the other\ncondition of human beings.\n\n[1] He seems to regard the beginnings of industrial co-operation as\nthe end of the \u201cstate of nature\u201d in the widest sense. The remark that\n\u201ciron and corn civilised man and ruined the human race,\u201d anticipates\nmuch in later speculations.\n\n[2] We find Rousseau actually drawing attention to this in the\n_Contrat Social_. See _Cont. Soc_., I. ix. fin., where observe (i)\nthat he half believes himself to have spoken of natural equality,\nand not of natural inequality, in the \u201cEssay\u201d; and (2) the \u201chedging\u201d\nfootnote on the illusoriness of social equality.\n\n3. The famous opening words of chap. i. of the {88} _Contrat Social_\n(published 1762) sound like the beginning of a tirade against\ncivilisation and the State. \u201cMan is born free, and everywhere he is\nin chains. One thinks himself the master of others, who does not\nfail to be more of a slave than they.\u201d Here we might well suppose\nourselves to be reading the preface to a demonstration that all\nsocial constraint is slavery, and that man, in a state of nature,\npossessed a liberty which he has now lost. We expect such an opening\nto be followed by a denunciation of the fetters of society, and a\npanegyric on the pre-social life. And there can hardly be a doubt\nthat these sentences, along with a few similar phrases which stick in\nthe memory, are the ground of the popular idea of Rousseau, shared\nby too many scholars. [1] But how does Rousseau go on? Here are the\nsucceeding sentences. \u201cHow did this change take place? I do not\nknow. What can render it legitimate? I think I can tell.\u201d Here, as\npreviously in the discourse on \u201cEquality,\u201d he (1) cuts himself loose\nin principle from the historical fiction of a social pact succeeding\na state of nature; and (2) he promises to furnish a justification\nfor the change (or, striking out the quasi-historical term \u201cchange,\u201d\nfor the condition of man), which is expressed by the words, \u201cis\neverywhere in chains.\u201d\n\n[1] Professor Henry Sidgwick and Professor Ritchie are notable\nexceptions. See also, and pre-eminently, the essay of the late\nProfessor Wallace referred to above.\n\nThis then is the task which he has set himself. The sentences last\ncited show that his answer will, in some degree, turn its back on his\nquestion, and that really man had little natural freedom to lose, and\nis not everywhere in chains. But the fact that {89} the problem first\nstruck Rousseau\u2019s mind through a feeling of rebellion against social\nslavery, and a loathing for the civilisation of his day, sets him at\nthe very beginning of the path which social theory has to traverse,\nand ensures that the difficulties which we all feel at times will be\nmet in their sharpest form. He knows, in short, that something, which\ncan look like utter bondage, is a fact; and he knows that this fact\nhas to be justified.\n\nAfter some chapters devoted to clearing away inadequate solutions of\nthe problem, he re-states it as follows, in terms of that form of the\nsupposed social contract in which it was regarded as a compact of all\nwith all for the constitution of a community:\n\n   \u201cTo find a form of association which shall defend and\n  protect, with the entire common force, the person and\n  the goods of each associate, and by which, each, uniting\n  himself to all, may nevertheless obey only himself, and\n  remain as free as before.\u201d [1]\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, bk. i., ch. vi.\n\n4. Before proceeding to examine the true meaning of this formula and\nits answer, we will briefly notice the conflict of ideas suggested\nby it. Man\u2019s freedom, it is implied, remains at the same level. Even\nhis power is not increased; it is only that individuals combine\ntheir forces, previously isolated. These implications suit neither\nthe view he starts from, nor the view he arrives at. If man had a\nnatural freedom, and then submitted to society, though merely to\nincrease his force of action, some of his freedom must be lost, and\nhe cannot remain as free as he was before. But if man in society {90}\nhas a nature, which he could not have out of society, such that his\nindividuality is maximised by the organisation of a social whole,\nthen it is plain that he is not merely as free \u201cas he was before,\u201d\nbut very much more free; free, indeed, strictly speaking, under\nsocial conditions alone. The notion which Rousseau started from,\nthat man has surrendered some part of a previous freedom in order to\nmake the most of the remainder, appears, as here, in the language\nof compromise, frequently through the _Contrat Social_. But it is\nnot effectively relied on, for Rousseau is too acute to attempt a\ndemarcation theory, and while he assumes, for example, according\nto the literal notion of a compact, that man only surrenders as\nmuch of his liberty as is necessary to the community, he sees that\nthe sovereign is sole judge of this proportion and consequently is\nabsolute. [1] In the same way he first deduces the sovereign\u2019s right\nof inflicting capital punishment from the individual\u2019s pre-existing\nright to risk his life in order to save it, in virtue of which he\nhas transferred to the sovereign a right to demand his life when\nnecessary to the public safety, which includes his own. And then,\nfeeling this to be a fiction, he ekes it out by the precisely\ncontrary suggestion that a criminal has broken the social treaty,\nhas ceased to be a member of the community, and is dealt with as an\nenemy on terms of war. [2] This supplementation shows that Rousseau\nis aware of the weakness of his other account of the matter, based\non non-social individual right. His constant failure, entire or\npartial, to free himself from the language of \u201cfirst appearance {91}\ntheories,\u201d as we have ventured to call them, is just what makes him\nso instructive, in view of the similar inclination which besets us\nall.\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, bk. II., ch. v.\n\n[2] Bk. II., ch. v.\n\n5. We will now examine the real nature of his solution. For the\nhistorical fiction of a social contract, he substitutes, in answer\nto the problem formulated above (see section 3, end), the conditions\nwhich constitute a \u201cpeople\u201d or commonwealth. He speaks, indeed, of\nthe \u201cact\u201d or \u201ccontract\u201d which constitutes it--a survival of the\nlanguage which belongs to the fiction. [1] But it is plain, even\nif he had not said so distinctly in the first chapter, that he is\ndealing not with an act in historical time, but with the essential\nnature of a social body. The \u201cclauses of the contract,\u201d he explains,\nare dependent on \u201cthe nature of the act\u201d; they are implicit and\nuniversal--that is to say, not capable of being affected by any\nactual or supposed agreement in contravention of what the essence\nof a body politic requires. He is, as he has clearly said in the\nprevious chapter, analysing the \u201cact\u201d \u201cby which a people is a\npeople,\u201d _i.e._ the conditions of political unity.\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, bk. II., ch. v.\n\nThe \u201cclauses of the contract\u201d then reduce themselves to a single one,\n\u201cthe total alienation of each associated member, with all his rights,\n(the language is moulded by the fiction of an actual contract and\npre-social rights,) to the community as a whole.\u201d The community as\na whole is therefore absolute. The subsequent passage, referred to\nabove, [1] in which he speaks as if individual rights were retained,\nis a case of the vacillation on which we have remarked.\n\n[1] P. 90.\n\n{92} The essence of this \u201csocial pact\u201d is further reducible to the\nfollowing formula:\n\n  \u201cEach of us puts into the common stock his person and\n  his entire powers under the supreme direction of the\n  general will: and we further receive each individual as\n  an indivisible member of the whole.\u201d\n\n  \u201cInstantaneously, in place of the particular person of\n  each contracting party, this act of association produces\n  a moral and collective body, composed of as many members\n  as the assembly has voices, which receives from this same\n  act its unity, its common self (_son moi commun_), its\n  life, and its will. This public person which thus forms\n  itself, by the union of all the others, used to take\n  the name of city, [1] and now takes that of republic or\n  body politic, which is called by its members State when\n  it is passive, Sovereign when it is active, Power when\n  comparing it with others.\u201d\n\n[1] Rousseau\u2019s footnote _in loc_. \u201cThe true sense of this word is\nalmost entirely effaced among the moderns; most of them take a town\nfor a city, and a townsman for a citizen. They are not aware that the\nhouses make the town, but the citizens make the city.\u201d\n\nIn this passage the formula of association, and much of the\ncommentary upon it, imply the \u201ccontract\u201d to have been an event in\nhistory. Such is the bearing of the words \u201cact of association,\u201d\n\u201cproduces,\u201d \u201creceives,\u201d \u201cforms itself.\u201d It is admitted that\nRousseau\u2019s thoughts are always more or less struggling with this\nconception, which, it must however be remembered, he explicitly\nrefuses to rely on; and henceforward, having sufficiently called\nattention to it, we shall not encumber ourselves with observing upon\nit in every instance.\n\nPutting aside then the defective terminology, and {93} bearing in\nmind that Rousseau considers himself to be analysing the essence\nof that act or character \u201cby which a people is a people,\u201d we find\nin this passage very far-reaching ideas. We find that the essence\nof human society consists in a common self, a life and a will,\nwhich belong to and are exercised by the society as such, or by\nthe individuals in society as such; it makes no difference which\nexpression we choose. The reality of this common self, in the action\nof the political whole, receives the name of the \u201cgeneral will,\u201d and\nwe shall examine its nature and attributes in the following chapter.\n\nThe primary point which it is necessary to make clear, however, is\nwhether the whole set of ideas is to be seriously pressed, or whether\nthe unity which they indicate is merely formal and superficial.\nFor phrases of the kind here employed may be found in many earlier\nwriters. The term \u201cperson,\u201d for example, comes through Hobbes from\nthe Roman law. \u201c_Persona_,\u201d in Roman law, we are told, [1] means\neither a complex of rights or the possessor of those rights, whether\nan individual or a corporate body. \u201c_Unus homo sustinet plures\npersonas_.\u201d Thus a man may devolve his \u201c_persona_\u201d on another man. A\ncorporation has a single \u201c_persona_.\u201d It is in this sense that for\nHobbes, the State is a \u201creal unity in one person,\u201d which person has\nbeen devolved by all the individuals of a multitude upon one man or\na definite assembly of men, whose acts therefore are, politically\nspeaking, the acts of the whole multitude so united in one \u201cperson.\u201d\n\n[1] See, _e.g._, Green\u2019s _Lectures on the Principles of Political\nObligation_, p. 61.\n\n{94} This use of the term \u201cperson\u201d is one of the cases alluded to\nin ch. I., where an abstraction of law has preserved the seed of a\nphilosophical idea of unity. How far the unity thus indicated is an\nempty fiction, or how far it is grasped as something vital, into\nwhich the individual mind goes out and in which it finds what its\nnature demands, is what we now have to consider further.\n\n6. Chapters vii. and viii. of book I. of the _Contrat Social_ show\nthe outcome of Rousseau\u2019s conflicting ideas in a very few remarkable\npropositions.\n\nThe question is whether the unity of a body politic is an arbitrary\nabstraction or a fundamental force and reality.\n\nRousseau is discussing in chapter vii. the guarantees which exist\nfor a fulfilment of obligations by the sovereign (or whole) to its\nmembers and by the members to the sovereign respectively. As regards\nthe obligation of the sovereign to its members, he runs straight\ninto the fallacy referred to in ch. I. He contends, that is to say,\nthat the whole is necessarily, by its constitution, that which it\nought to be, and being composed of all the individuals can have no\ninterest opposite to theirs as a whole, while, _qua_ sovereign, it\nis debarred from any such special [1] action as might be hurtful\nto any single individual. This presupposes that the whole always\nacts according to its idea as a whole, and neither is \u201ccaptured\u201d by\nindividual interests nor transgresses the limits set to its action\nby restriction to true public concerns. But if this were so, the\nState would be perfectly wise and {95} good; and we do not need to\nbe told that a State, _qua_ wise and good, could do no injustice to\nits members. The whole is of course liable to vices correlative to\nthose which Rousseau is about to guard against when they arise in the\nindividual.\n\n[1] See below, p. 112.\n\nAnd his view of individual disloyalty is decisive as to the vitality\nof his conception of political unity.\n\n  \u201cIndeed,\u201d he says, \u201ceach individual may, as a man, have\n  a particular will contrary to or unlike the general will\n  which he has as citizen; his particular interest may\n  speak to him quite differently from the common interest;\n  his absolute and naturally independent existence may\n  make him regard what he owes to the common cause as a\n  gratuitous contribution, the loss of which would be\n  less injurious to others than its payment is burdensome\n  to himself; and considering the moral person which\n  constitutes the State as an abstraction (_\u00eatre de\n  raison_) because it is not a man, he would enjoy the\n  rights of the citizen without consenting to fulfil the\n  duties of the subject--an injustice the progress of which\n  would cause the ruin of the body politic.\u201d\n\n  \u201cIn order, then, that the social pact may not be a\n  vain formula, it tacitly includes the covenant, which\n  alone can confer binding force on the others, that\n  whoever shall refuse to obey the general will shall be\n  constrained to do so by the whole body, which means\n  nothing else than that he will be forced to be free.\u201d\n\nIn this passage Rousseau lays bare the very heart of what some would\ncall political faith, and others political superstition. This lies\nin the {96} conviction that the \u201cmoral person [1] which constitutes\nthe state\u201d is a reality, as opposed to the natural idea that it is an\nabstraction or fiction of the reflective mind (an \u201c_ens rationis_,\u201d\n_\u00eatre de raison_), because it is not an actual individual human\nbeing. The theories of the first appearance, as we have called\nthem, are characterised by accepting as ultimate \u201cthe absolute and\nnaturally independent existence\u201d of the physical individual, and\ntherefore regarding government as an encroachment on the self, and\nforce as oppression. Whereas, if the social person is taken as the\nreality, it follows, as Rousseau points out, that force against the\nphysical individual may become a condition of freedom. We saw even in\nMill how extreme cases bring out the necessity for assuming a \u201creal\u201d\nwill at variance with the individual\u2019s immediate desire. [2] There is\nmore to be said, of course, as to the limits within which force can\nbe so applied. [3]\n\n[1] For the meaning of \u201cperson,\u201d see account above, p. 93. Note\non the meaning of \u201cmoral\u201d as here used that it is determined by a\ngeneral opposition to physical, as in \u201cmoral certainty.\u201d None the\nless, this use of \u201cmoral person\u201d forms an interesting stage in the\nadvance from the physical individual through the legal \u201cperson\u201d\ntowards the notion of a higher or greater self.\n\n[2] The trivial case which he takes, of its being no curtailment to\nfreedom to keep a man off an untrustworthy bridge, as he certainly\ndoes not want to be drowned, has received terrible illustration of\nlate (June, 1898) by the disaster at the launch of the \u201cAlbion.\u201d\nThe disaster occurred because not enough force was used against the\npassionate momentary eagerness of individuals, and in favour of what\nit is fair to presume their real will would be.\n\n[3] See below, ch. VIII.\n\nIt is worth while to cite here the whole of the short chapter viii.,\nwhich draws out the {97} consequences of the above conception of a\nsocial pact and of sovereignty.\n\n  \u201c_Of the Civil Condition_.--This passage from the state\n  of nature to the civil state produces in man a very\n  remarkable change by replacing, in his conduct, instinct\n  by justice, and giving to his actions the morality which\n  they lacked before. It is then alone that, the voice\n  of duty succeeding to physical impulse, and right to\n  appetite, man, who till then had only considered himself,\n  sees himself compelled to act on other principles, and to\n  consult his reason before listening to his inclinations.\n  Although he deprives himself in this state of several\n  advantages which he holds from nature, he gains such\n  great ones in their place, his faculties exercise and\n  develop themselves, his ideas expand, his sentiments are\n  ennobled, his whole soul is exalted to such a degree,\n  that, if the abuses of his new condition did not often\n  degrade him below that from which he has emerged, [1]\n  it would be his duty to bless without ceasing the happy\n  instant which tore him from it for ever, and, from a\n  stupid and narrow animal, made him an intelligent being\n  and human.\n\n  \u201cLet us reduce these _pros_ and _cons_ to terms easy\n  to compare. What man loses by the social contract is\n  his natural liberty and an unlimited right to all which\n  attracts him and which he can obtain; what he gains is\n  civil liberty and the {98} property of what he possesses.\n  To avoid error in these reckonings we must carefully\n  distinguish natural liberty, which has no bounds but the\n  powers of the individual, from the civil liberty which\n  is limited by the general will; and possession, which\n  is only the effect of force or the right of the first\n  occupant, from property, which can only be founded on a\n  positive title.\n\n  \u201cWe might, in view of the preceding, add to the gains\n  of the civil state the moral freedom which alone makes\n  man master of himself; for the impulsion of appetite\n  alone is slavery, and obedience to the law which we have\n  prescribed to ourselves is liberty. But I have already\n  said too much on this head, and the philosophical sense\n  of the word liberty is not my subject here.\u201d\n\n[1] Cf. the well-known lines of Faust:\n\n        \u201cEin wenig besser w\u00fcrd er leben,\n    H\u00e4tt\u2019st Dur ihm nicht den Schein des Himmelslichts gegeben;\n\n        Er nennt\u2019s Vernunft, und braucht\u2019s allein\n    Nur thierischer als jedes Thier zu seyn.\u201d\n\nBesides the terminology of the historical fiction this curious\npassage shows in the strongest light the struggle by which Rousseau\npassed from the position of the \u201cDiscourse on the Origin of\nInequality\u201d to that of the \u201c_Contrat Social_.\u201d The \u201chedging\u201d of\nthe sentence, \u201cAlthough he deprives himself,\u201d etc., represents a\nloathing of the decadent society of his day, which was deep-seated\nin Rousseau\u2019s mind, and which his life enables us thoroughly to\nunderstand. The son of a Genevese artisan, with a touch of vagabond\nimpulses, and more than a touch of Wordsworthian genius, he was the\nfirst, perhaps, of great modern writers to feel the true democratic\npassion, [1] and to see his artificial age as Plato or as Ruskin\nmight {99} have seen it. It was no small feat of insight to subdue\nhis just repugnance so far as to estimate, in the language of the\nchapter before us, the use, as distinct from the abuse, of law and\nsociety.\n\n[1] Note the sentence in \u00c9mile, \u201cC\u2019est le peuple qui compose le genre\nhumain; ce qui n\u2019est pas peuple est si peu de chose que ce n\u2019est pas\nla peine de le compter.\u201d (Bk. iv., 3rd maxim.)\n\nAs a feature of this conflict of ideas, we may observe more\nespecially the notion of original individual right, ascribed to a\ncondition of man in which, according to the previous paragraph,\nright could not exist. The phrase is merely taken up from previous\nwriters, as is also the so-called \u201cright of the first occupant.\u201d\nAnd the antithesis with true right and property, recognised by the\nsocial mind, in which this chapter presents them, has the effect of a\ndestructive analysis of these uncritical conceptions. [1]\n\n[1] Rousseau\u2019s brilliant criticism, bk. I., ch. iii., has finally\ndestroyed the conception of a right, whether natural or social,\nfounded merely on force.\n\nTrue right, then, begins with that social unity \u201cby which a people is\na people,\u201d figured by Rousseau under the image of the social compact.\nThis unity is one aspect of the rule of reason, the sense of duty,\nand the essence of humanity. The quality of man is liberty, [1]\nand we here see that this fundamental principle which Rousseau has\nabove laid down in an undetermined sense, must, in the course of his\nreasoning, take on the higher meaning demanded by the conceptions of\nthis chapter.\n\n[1] Bk. i., ch. iv.\n\nAnd the import of the term \u201cliberty\u201d in this chapter is a measure\nof the modification of ideas which has been brought about in the\nprocess of \u201cjustifying\u201d the \u201cbondage\u201d of man. [1] The famous {100}\nsentence, \u201cMan is born free, and everywhere he is in chains,\u201d now\nturns out to mean, \u201cMan is born in natural liberty (which, if it\nrefers to any actual condition at all, implies, in animal isolation),\nand by subservience to social law, he attains the civil liberty\nthrough which alone he becomes truly man.\u201d Of course, however, the\nphrase \u201cborn free\u201d has the under current of meaning, \u201cis born _for_\nthe truest freedom,\u201d but in order that this import may be elicited\nthe rhetorical antithesis, \u201cand everywhere is in chains,\u201d must be\nabandoned.\n\n[1] See bk. i., ch. i.\n\nThe final paragraph of chapter viii. makes it clear that Rousseau\nconsiders the civil state as an embodiment of moral liberty, while\nhe is rightly anxious not to seem to cut the knot of his problem by\nappealing to the merely ethical or philosophical sense of the term\nfreedom. For this latter conception, taken by itself, is apt to be\nunderstood as the establishment of unity in the self by the path of\nrenunciation. Now, the freedom of the true civil state is, on the\none hand, only a stage in the ascent towards perfect ethical freedom\nor unity, for it involves rather the recognition of such freedom as\nthe imperative end of social law, than the actual attainment of it;\nand, on the other hand, it is something broader and more substantial\nthan ethical freedom is apt to be conceived as implying, because of\nthat outgrowth of the self into an organised social content which the\ncivil condition involves. The distinction between the civil state and\nethical freedom is therefore a sound one, but yet does not prevent\ntheir juxta-position in this passage from throwing {101} important\nlight on Rousseau\u2019s conception of the former.\n\nThe expansion of old conceptions in Rousseau\u2019s hands, and the\ndirection in which his views are advancing, are well illustrated by\nthe paragraph before us in comparison with Locke\u2019s idea of consent.\nA recent editor of the _Contrat_ [1] cites in illustration of the\nwords, \u201cObedience to the law which we have prescribed to ourselves\nis liberty\u201d Locke\u2019s sentence, \u201cThe liberty of man in society is\nto be under no other legislative power but that established by\nconsent in the commonwealth.\u201d [2] But Locke is speaking, according\nto his theory, of the actual or tacit consent of individuals to\nthe establishment of a governing power; a consent which, for him,\nis conditional and revocable, and therefore fails to meet the full\ndifficulty of self-government. Rousseau, borrowing very likely his\nactual phrases from Locke, is speaking of something quite different,\nviz., the recognition of a law and a will, with which one\u2019s everyday\nself may be at odds, as nevertheless one\u2019s truer and fuller self, and\nimperative as against the commonplace trivial moods which constitute\none\u2019s inferior existence.\n\n[1] M. Dreyfus-Brisac.\n\n[2] _Civil Government_, ii. 22.\n\nThus far, then, we have seen how the problem of self-government is\ntransformed by a deeper insight. _(a)_ The negative relation of the\nself to other selves begins to dissolve away before the conception\nof the common self; and _(b)_ the negative relation of the self to\nlaw and government begins to disappear in the idea of a law which\nexpresses our real will, as opposed to our trivial and rebellious\nmoods. The whole notion of man as one among {102} others tends to\nbreak down; and we begin to see something in the one which actually\nidentifies him with the others, and at the same time tends to make\nhim what he admits that he ought to be. We have now to follow these\nideas to their application.\n\n\n\n\n{103}\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nTHE CONCEPTION OF A \u201cREAL\u201d WILL.\n\n1. We saw in the course of the last chapter that for Rousseau\u2019s\npolitical theory everything turns on the reality of the \u201cmoral\nperson\u201d which constitutes the State. When active, this \u201cmoral\u201d\nor \u201cpublic person,\u201d or common self, is called sovereign; [1] and\nsovereignty for Rousseau consists in the exercise of the General\nWill; [2] and it is in this characteristic of political society that\nhe finds that justification for the use of force upon individuals [3]\nwhich he set out to seek. At the close of the last chapter we noted\nthe transformation in the problem of \u201cself-government\u201d which such a\nconception tends to produce. In face of it, the opposition between\nself and others, and between self and law or government, will have to\nbe interpreted altogether afresh. The present chapter will be devoted\nto explaining the idea of a General Will with reference to Rousseau\u2019s\npresentation of it, and the rest of the work will develop and apply\nit more freely.\n\n[1] Bk. I., ch. vi.\n\n[2] Bk. II., ch. i.\n\n[3] Bk. i., ch. vii.; cf. I., ch. i.\n\nA few words may be said upon Rousseau\u2019s relation to Hobbes [1] and\nLocke, simply to {104} illustrate the process by which deepening\npolitical experience awakened the ancient meaning within abstractions\nwhich had preserved it in a latent form.\n\n[1] See also p. 93 above.\n\nBoth Hobbes and Locke use expressions, in treating of the government\nand unity of a commonwealth, which closely resemble Rousseau\u2019s\nphrases respecting the General Will, the moral person, and the real\nunity.\n\nHobbes, for example, insisted that sovereignty must lie in a will,\nand that this will must be real and must be taken as representing\nor standing for the will of the community. \u201cThis is _more than\nconsent or concord; it is a real unity of them all_ in one and the\nsame person.\u201d [1] Only, interpreting \u201creal\u201d as implying inherence in\ntangible determinate individuals, he in fact _substituted_ the will\n(taking the word in its ordinary sense) of a certain individual or\ncertain individuals _for_ the will of the community or moral person\nas such. His temperament was emphatically one of those described by\nRousseau as treating the \u201c_moral_ person\u201d as a fiction. But so far\nfrom abandoning for that reason all idea of actual effective unity,\nhe replaces the fictitious or abstract unity of the \u201cperson\u201d by the\n\u201creal unity\u201d of an actual human being or a determinate group of human\nbeings, to be _taken as_ the unity of the Commonwealth as such. Thus,\nfor instance, with a logic which is irresistible on the basis which\nhe adopts, he denies all possibility of other representation of the\npeople where there is already a sovereign power. For the one and\nonly representative of the people is for him the {105} sovereign,\non whom the \u201cperson\u201d of the community is, by the very fact of his\nsovereignty, assumed to be conferred. We may say then, in short, that\nHobbes places the unity of political society in a will, and that, in\nhis sense, a real or actual will, but emphatically not in a general\nwill. He inherits the language which enables him to predicate unity\nand personality of the state, but in his mouth the terms have not\nrecovered a true political meaning, and the social right, which they\nare intended to account for, remains a mere name.\n\n[1] _Leviathan_, pt. II., ch. xvii. Italics mine.\n\nLocke brings to bear a truer political experience, but a far less\ncoherent logic. He feels that actual government is a trust, and that\nthe ultimate supreme power remains in the community as a whole. The\ndifficulty in his case is to understand how the will or interest of\nthe community as such obtains determinate expression. Generally,\nand apart from particular causes of dissent, it is to be taken as\none with the will of the governing body to which, according to the\nconstitution, the work of government is given in trust. But the trust\nis conditional, and theoretically revocable; the ultimate supreme\npower is in the community at large, which may withdraw the trust if\nits conditions are violated. Of course, no determinate means of doing\nthis in a lawful manner is, or can be, suggested, [1] and therefore\nthe will of the people is not expressed by Locke as a real or actual\nwill. And so the right, which was to be displayed as social, remains\n{106} a latent right in individuals to assent or to dissent, and\nsociety is not represented as a genuine unity.\n\n[1] The referendum is not really such a means. It can only work\nwithin a well organised constitution, and could not be used to\nre-make the whole constitution--the forms and conditions of\nsovereignty--at a blow.\n\nFor Hobbes, then, we might venture to say, political unity lies in\na will which is actual, but not general; while for Locke it lies\nin a will which is general, but not actual. If the two are pressed\nto extremes, the former theory annihilates \u201cself,\u201d and the latter\nannihilates \u201cgovernment.\u201d For the former there is no true right,\nbecause the will of the state is related as mere force to the actual\nindividual will; for the latter there is no true right, because\nthe individual\u2019s will remains a mere natural claim, which is never\nthoroughly transformed by social recognition and adjustment.\n\nBut if it were possible to inspire a logic as coherent as that of\nHobbes, with a political content as large as that which animates\nLocke, a new ground would be won. And this is what Rousseau has\nattempted in his conception of a will at once actual and general; on\nthe one hand, an absolute and determinate adjustment and recognition\nof rights; on the other hand, embodying in its recognitions all\nindividual claims which represent a true individuality. Here, if\nsuch a theory were workable, we should have a genuine account of\nself-government, political obligation, and social right. It may be\nadmitted that the theory is not workable in the form which Rousseau\ngave it. As Bentham contemptuously said, his doctrine would make\nall laws invalid, excepting, perhaps, those of the Republic of San\nMarino. But we shall see that these difficulties arise just where\nRousseau failed to be true to his own best insight; and we shall find\nindications in his writings which suggest a different conclusion.\n\n{107} 2. What Rousseau means to indicate by his expression, \u201cthe\nGeneral Will,\u201d may seem to many persons, as he clearly saw, to have\nno actual existence. It is of the nature of a principle operating\namong and underneath a great variety of confusing and disguising\nfactors, and can only be defined by the help of an \u201cas such\u201d or \u201cin\nso far as.\u201d It is, we might say, the will of the whole society \u201cas\nsuch\u201d or the wills of all individuals \u201cin so far as\u201d they aim at the\ncommon good. It is expressed in law, \u201cin so far as\u201d law is what it\nought to be; and sovereignty, \u201cas such,\u201d _i.e._ when truly itself\nbecause rightly acting for the common interest, is the exercise\nof the General Will. In its idea, as the key to the whole problem\nof self-government and freedom under law, it is that identity\nbetween my particular will and the wills of all my associates in\nthe body politic which makes it possible to say that in all social\nco-operation, and in submitting even to forcible constraint, when\nimposed by society in the true common interest, I am obeying only\nmyself, and am actually attaining my freedom. It embodies indeed the\nsame factors as the conception of self-government, but in a shape\nwhich is a stage nearer to reconciliation. It postulates a will which\nin some sense transcends the individual whose will it is, and is\ndirected upon an object of wider concern. And in one way or other, we\nknow that this may be, and indeed always is the case, for our will is\nalways directed to something which we are not.\n\nWe may, perhaps, approach Rousseau\u2019s thought more successfully by\nstarting from the idea of what is implied in the nature of will, as\na characteristic {108} of an intelligent being. We may then find\nground for conceiving that my will or yours, as we exercise it in the\ntrivial routine of daily life, does not fulfil all that it implies\nor suggests. It is narrow, arbitrary, self-contradictory. It implies\na \u201ctrue\u201d or \u201creal\u201d or \u201crational\u201d will, which would be completely, or\nmore completely, what ours attempts to be, and fails. Thus, it has\nbeen said that what Rousseau really aimed at, with his conception of\nthe General Will, was the will \u201cin itself,\u201d or the will as it would\nbe if it carried out what its nature implies and demands.\n\nWe can see that some notion of this kind floats before Rousseau\u2019s\nmind from the predicates which he assigns to Sovereignty and the\nGeneral Will, which are for him nearly convertible terms.\n\nSovereignty, for example, is inalienable and indivisible; [1] that is\nto say, it is a simple consequence of the nature of a body politic,\n\u201cthat by which a people is a people.\u201d You can no more alienate or\nbreak it into parts than you can alienate or break into parts the\nuse of your own judgment. To be capable of sovereignty means to be\na people \u201cas such\u201d or \u201cas a whole,\u201d that is a living and choosing\npeople. The people may of course give general orders to subordinates\nto hold good till revoked, as I may give a power of attorney for more\nor less specified purposes to another man. But that is the delegation\n\u201cof power, not of will.\u201d\n\n[1] Bk. II., chs. i. and ii. Here Rousseau is following Hobbes very\nclosely.\n\nWe see the author\u2019s intention still more clearly when he\nmaintains that the General Will is always {109} right, [1] and is\nindestructible. [2] Though it is always right, as Will, yet the\npeople may be misled in their knowledge and judgment of details;\nthough it is indestructible in the human breast, yet a man may vote\nat the polling booth on another issue than that which he would\nhave before him if he consulted the General Will. He may answer by\nhis vote not the question, \u201cIs this for the public good?\u201d but the\nquestion, \u201cIs this for my private good?\u201d If so, he does not indeed\nextinguish the General Will in himself, but he evades it. Or, as we\nmight say, the man does not altogether cease, however ignorant or\ninterested, to possess a man\u2019s leaning towards making the real best\nof himself, though his private interest may at times so master his\nmind as to throw the higher or common good into the second place.\nThus, the relation of the general will to a community is plainly\napprehended by Rousseau much in the spirit of the doctrine that\nman always aims at something which he takes to be good. And so the\nGeneral Will is as much implied in the life of a society as some sort\nof will for good in the life of an individual. The two, in fact, are\nnot merely analogous but to a great extent identical. The General\nWill seems to be, in the last resort, the ineradicable impulse of an\nintelligent being to a good extending beyond itself, in as far as\nthat good takes the form of a common good. Though this impulse may be\nmastered or cheated in a degree, yet, if it were extinct, human life\nwould have ceased.\n\n[1] Bk. II., ch. iii.\n\n[2] Bk. iv., ch. i.\n\nWe need not enter at length upon the question whether the good\nwhich extends beyond oneself {110} is adequately described as the\ngood which is general or common to oneself and others. It is plain\nthat the unity of myself with others in a common good is the same\nin principle as the unity of myself with myself which I aim at in\naiming at my own good. Thought and language, we should bear in mind,\nunite me to myself just as they unite me to others, and they expand\nmy being by binding my own life into a whole no less than by making\nintercourse possible between my fellow men and myself. Just so, the\ngood at which I aim extends beyond my trivial or momentary self--that\nis to say, is universal as against myself as particular--in ways\nwhich are not _prima facie_ exhausted by saying that they include the\ngood of others. But again, just like thought and language, the good\nwhich enables me to enter deeper into communion with myself or with\nthe world must always have an aspect of extending that communion to\nothers; and therefore, for the purposes of social philosophy, we may\ntreat the universal good or self as also in its nature a general or\ncommon good or self. It is that at least, though it may be more, in\naccordance with the logical relation between the rational universal,\nand the numerical generality.\n\nThis indestructible impulse towards the Good, which is necessarily\na common good, the substantial unity and filling of life by the\ninterests through which man is human, is what Rousseau plainly has\nbefore him in his account of the General Will. But it has rightly\nbeen observed [1] that he did not really distinguish this conception,\nanalogous as it is to what Plato or Aristotle might have said {111}\nof the \u201cdivine reason which is the source of the laws and discipline\nof the ideal polity,\u201d from the legal idea of the sovereign \u201cin the\nsense of some power of which it could reasonably be asked how it was\nestablished in the part where it resides, when and by whom and in\nwhat way it is exercised.\u201d We will point out, however, the negative\nand positive indications which he furnishes as to where it is not and\nwhere it is to be looked for. That he fails to emancipate himself\nfrom the fallacies which he acutely indicates is a phenomenon for\nwhich the reader is, I trust, sufficiently prepared.\n\n[1] Green, _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. 82.\n\n3. Rousseau develops his idea of a General Will by the contrast\nwhich he draws between the General Will and the Will of All. [1] The\nGeneral Will aims at a common interest; and it is this community\nof interest, and not the number of votes in which it may find\nexpression, which in truth \u201cgeneralises the will.\u201d [2] The Will of\nAll aims at private interest as such (\u201c_l\u2019int\u00e9r\u00eat priv\u00e9_\u201d) and is\nonly a sum of particular wills. Only, Rousseau fancies, if you let\nthe particular wills fight it out freely, their differences are\nlikely to cancel each other, and the General Will to make itself\nfelt, like any pervading factor through a chaos of indefinite\nvariations.\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, II. iii.\n\n[2] _Ib._ II. iv.; cf. above.\n\nThe important point in the idea of the Will of All\u201d lies in its\nbeing \u201ca sum\u201d of \u201cparticulars,\u201d as opposed to something common or\ngeneral in its nature. Thus, in the limiting case, you may have a\nunanimous vote in favour of a certain course of action, and yet the\nvoters may severally have been determined by aims and considerations\nwhich {112} Rousseau would not admit to be capable of entering at\nall into a determination of the General Will. For a private affair\n_as such_ is incapable in Rousseau\u2019s view of being made the subject\nof law, that is of an act of the General Will. Such an act must be\ngeneral, not only in the number of votes (which, as we have seen, is\nthe less important factor), but in the nature of its subject-matter,\nwhich must be, as we should say, a question of genuine public\ninterest. [1] Now, when men\u2019s minds leave out of sight the public\nor truly general aspect of a question, and are determined, each\nof them severally, by the expected consequences to himself as a\nprivate individual; then, though all may practically agree in the\ndecision which is arrived at, yet such a decision is founded on no\nview of truly public interest, but is what Rousseau calls \u201ca sum of\nparticular wills.\u201d The distinction between such a sum of wills, and\na will that aims at a truly common interest or good, rests upon that\nfundamental contrast between a mere aggregate and an organic unity,\nwhich is embodied in the opposing views of society which we have\nbeen discussing. Pushed to extremes, it might raise a difficulty\nfor those who are not familiar with the logical distinction between\na Judgment of Allness and a true Universal Judgment. [2] What harm\ncan there be, it may be asked, in my voting according to the effect\na measure will have upon my affairs, if everyone else is allowed\nto vote according to the effect it will have upon his affairs,\nespecially as in the extreme case suggested, the result is that we\nare all agreed? What can be more for the general {113} interest than\na decision in which every particular interest is satisfied? On the\nmere basis of comparative generality, as estimated by number, there\nis plainly no answer to this objection. We meet here with another\ninstance of the difficulties which arise from working with the notion\nof society as \u201cself and others,\u201d and of the good as an altruistic\naim. For in the case supposed, the others are all satisfied as\nmuch as myself; and so I should give weight to no higher aim by\nconsidering their interest than by considering my own, unless I\nconsidered it on different grounds from those which I admitted in\njudging of my own advantage. But any different, higher, or deeper\ngrounds might just as well present themselves to me with reference to\nmy own advantage as with reference to theirs; and would differ from\nmotives of private interest, not by bringing about a more unanimous\nadhesion, but by belonging to a deeper appreciation of the common\ngood, and therefore producing a less superficial unity of resolve.\nThe real difference between Allness and true Universality is that\na \u201cuniversal\u201d characteristic goes more deeply into the nature of\nthat which it characterises than does a mark or attribute which,\nlike the owner\u2019s name in the books of a library, simply happens to\nbe attached _ab extra_ to all the objects in question. So here, the\nsupposed accordant decisions of all the voters, as guided each by his\nstrictly private interest, are not really or completely accordant.\nThey happen to come together in one point which has to be settled\nat the moment; but beyond that they express no oneness of life or\nprinciple; still less can they give voice to any demand of the\ngreater or rational {114} self in which the real common good resides.\nThis is what Rousseau means by saying that it is the community of\nthe interest or the nature of the object, and not the number of\nvoices, which distinguishes the General Will from the Will of All.\nIt follows, therefore, that the private interest as such, which in\nthe case supposed determines the individual voter, is not ultimately\nhis true interest; and it may be said, \u201cBut if each followed his\nown true interest the Will of All would be right.\u201d But a true\ninterest, as opposed to an apparent interest, necessarily has just\nthe characters which the true Universal has as against the collection\nof particulars, or the General Will against the Will of All. So that\nto say, \u201cIf everyone pursued his own _true_ private interest the\nWill of All would be right,\u201d is merely to say, \u201cIf everyone pursued\nhis _true_ private interest he would pursue the common interest\u201d;\nor, \u201cThe Will of All, if directed to the common good, would be one\nwith the General Will.\u201d The reason why it is necessary to insist\nupon the distinction between true and apparent interest, universal\nand aggregate of particulars, General Will and Will of All, is\njust that a true interest generally requires some degree of energy\nor effort, perhaps of self-sacrifice; while the purely private or\napparent interest, the interest of each of us in his routine frame\nof mind, is that by which many are always determined, and a whole\ncommunity is only too likely to be guided. That is why it is worth\nwhile to distinguish the Will of All from the General Will. Let us\nsuppose that Themistocles had been beaten in the Athenian assembly\nwhen he proposed that, instead of dividing the revenue {115} from the\nsilver mines among all the citizens, they should devote this revenue\nannually to building a fleet--the fleet which fought at Salamis. It\nis easy to see that in such a case a relatively ideal end, demanding\na certain self-denial, might appear less attractive to all the\nindividuals--each keeping before himself his own separate share of\nprofit--than the accustomed distribution of money. And if such a\nview had gained the day, history would never have told, and no free\nEurope would have existed to understand, by what decision the true\ngeneral will and common interest of Athens might have transcended\nthe aggregate private interests of all her citizens. No doubt, it\nmay be added, a true universal end is usually more powerful than a\nlimited interest even in the mere area of its operation; and we may\nultimately find, in the benefits conferred by Athens on the world,\na justification of her courage and self-denial, even by the rough\nand unreliable standard of the number of individuals beneficially\naffected.\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, II. iv.\n\n[2] Cf. p. 110 above.\n\nIf such a theory as that just stated were to be literally pressed, it\nwould lead to the conclusion that a law which was not _really_ for\nthe general interest was not binding on the subjects of a state. For,\nby the definition, such a law could not be a true act of sovereignty.\nNo political theorist, however visionary, could accept such a\nconclusion as this, and Rousseau, seeing that the decision of the\nrecognised sovereign must be final, attempts to show how and when it\ncomes nearest to a true General Will.\n\nThe decisive point of his doctrine on this subject is his hostility\nto representative government, [1] {116} and his consequent demand of\na primary assembly and a small community as the only guarantees for\nthe genuine expression of a will for the common good. \u201cThe English\npeople,\u201d according to his well-known saying, \u201cis only free during\na general election.\u201d Further, it is a sign that the Will of All\nis, on the whole, coinciding with the General Will, when unanimity\nprevails in the assembly. But long discussions and the organisation\nof minor \u201cinterests\u201d and associations within the state, in short,\nall the phenomena of mature political life, are signs and conditions\nof failure to express the General Will, which is most likely to make\nitself felt when particular wills neutralise one another in the way\nexplained above. [2]\n\n[1] Bk. III. xv.; cf. IV. ii.\n\n[2] P. 111\n\nNow all this makes it clear that in endeavouring to point out the\nsigns of the General Will, Rousseau is really enthroning the Will\nof All. He aims at eliciting a direct opinion, uncontaminated by\nexternal influence or interest, from each and every member of the\ncitizen body. In this aim, what is present to his mind is of course\nthe popular idea of the ancient City-State. But the actual working\neven of Athenian or of Roman institutions was far more subtle\nand complex than this. And more especially, the very core of the\ncommon good represented by the life of a modern Nation-State is\nits profound and complex organisation, which makes it greater than\nthe conscious momentary will of any individual. By reducing the\nmachinery for the expression of the common good to the isolated and\nunassisted judgment of the members of the whole body of citizens,\nRousseau is ensuring the {117} exact reverse of what he professes\nto aim at. He is appealing from the organised life, institutions,\nand selected capacity of a nation to that nation regarded as an\naggregate of isolated individuals. And, therefore, he is enthroning\nas sovereign, not the national mind, but that aggregate of private\ninterests and ideas which he has himself described as the Will of\nAll. He is so far aware of this that, as we have seen, he refuses to\ncontemplate a great modern nation as a political whole, because he\nfails to conceive how, for such a community, the General Will can\nsatisfactorily find expression. But in as far as he commits himself\nto the view that the sovereign, constituted as he would have it,\n\u201cnecessarily is what it ought to be,\u201d or \u201cis incapable of injustice\nto any of its members,\u201d so far he has forgotten the dangers of the\nWill of All, and has affirmed the absolute supremacy of the popular\nwill in the very sense against which his conception of the Will of\nAll is a protest. The notion of primary assemblies and of direct\nparticipation in citizen life has no doubt a real lesson for the\npolitical theorist; but it does not point to reducing the whole\npolitical system of a great state to a model which never, perhaps,\nthoroughly fulfilled its idea except under very special conditions.\n\n4. The other and more fruitful direction of Rousseau\u2019s speculations\nupon the General Will is to be found in his remarks on the function\nof the Legislator. We will approach them by help of a short\nrestatement of the problem as it now stands.\n\nIt was observed above that what Rousseau had before him in his notion\nof the General Will might {118} be described as the \u201cWill in itself,\u201d\nor the Real Will. Any such conception involves a contrast between the\nReal Will and the Actual Will, which may seem to be meaningless. How\ncan there be a Will which is no one\u2019s Will? and how can anything be\nmy Will which I am not fully aware of, or which I am even averse to?\n\nThis question will be treated more fully on psychological grounds in\na later chapter. For the present, it is enough to call attention to\nthe plain fact that often when people do not know what they mean,\nthey yet mean something of very great importance; or that, as has\ncommonly been said, \u201cwhat people demand is seldom what would satisfy\nthem if they got it.\u201d We may recall the instances [1] in which even\nMill admitted that it is legitimate to infer, from the inherent\nnature of will, that people do not really \u201cwill\u201d something which\nthey desire to do at a given moment. The example of slavery is a\nstriking one. A man may contract to become a slave, but no civilised\ngovernment will enforce his contract at law, and the ultimate reason\nfor the refusal is, as Mill in effect points out, that man\u2019s nature\nis to exercise will--to have liberty--and a resolution to divest\nhimself of this capacity must be taken as _ipso facto_ void, by\ncontradicting the very essence of humanity. [2]\n\n[1] P. 69 above.\n\n[2] \u201cLiberty is the quality of man.\u201d (Rousseau, _Contrat Social_).\n\nNow the contradiction, which here appears in an ultimate form,\npervades the \u201cactual\u201d will, which we exert from moment to moment as\nconscious individuals, through and through. A comparison of our acts\nof will through a month or a year is {119} enough to show that no one\nobject of action, as we conceive it when acting, exhausts all that\nour will demands. Even the life which we wish to live, and which on\nthe average we do live, is never before us as a whole in the motive\nof any particular volition. In order to obtain a full statement of\nwhat we will, what we want at any moment must at least be corrected\nand amended by what we want at all other moments; and this cannot\nbe done without also correcting and amending it so as to harmonise\nit with what others want, which involves an application of the same\nprocess to them. But when any considerable degree of such correction\nand amendment had been gone through, our own will would return to\nus in a shape in which we should not know it again, although every\ndetail would be a necessary inference from the whole of wishes\nand resolutions which we actually cherish. And if it were to be\nsupplemented and readjusted so as to stand not merely for the life\nwhich on the whole we manage to live, but for a life ideally without\ncontradiction, it would appear to us quite remote from anything which\nwe know. Such a process of harmonising and readjusting a mass of data\nto bring them into a rational shape is what is meant by criticism.\nAnd criticism, when applied to our actual will, shows that it is not\nour real will; or, in the plainest language, that what we really want\nis something more and other than at any given moment we are aware\nthat we will, although the wants which we are aware of lead up to it\nat every point.\n\nTo obtain something which approximates to a real will, then, involves\na process of criticism and {120} interpretation, which may be either\nnatural or intellectual; that is to say, it may proceed by \u201cnatural\nselection,\u201d through the method of trial and error, or it may be\nrapidly advanced at favourable moments by the insight of a great\nmind. But some forwardness in this criticism and interpretation,\nbringing with it some deposit, so to speak, of objects of volition\nin which the private will, so far as it is distinguished at all,\nfinds harmony and expansion, must be coeval with social life, and, in\nshort, with humanity.\n\nIt is such a process of interpretation that Rousseau ascribes to\nthe legislator. He fathers on him the whole labour of history and\nsocial logic in moulding the customs and institutions of mankind.\nAnd in agreement with our general attitude to Rousseau\u2019s historical\nimagination, we may take what he says of legislation and the\nlegislator as an expression of his views on the function of customs\nand ordinances in the constitution of will. It is very remarkable,\nconsidering the other aspect of his views, that he should have\nconceived so distinctly, as the following passage shows that he did,\nthe immense contrast between a real will and anything which could be\npresented as a whole in the momentary consciousness of human beings.\n\nHere is his statement of the problem.\n\n  \u201cLaws are, strictly speaking, only the conditions of\n  civil association. The people which submits to the laws\n  ought to be their author. Only the associates can have\n  the right to regulate the conditions of the society.\n  But how are they to regulate them? Can {121} it be done\n  by a common agreement, by a sudden inspiration? Has the\n  body politic an organ for pronouncing its acts of will?\n  Who will give it the necessary foresight to form such\n  acts and to publish them before they are needed? Or how\n  is it to pronounce them at the moment when they are\n  required? How is a blind multitude, which often does not\n  know what it wills, because it rarely knows what is good\n  for it, to execute for itself so great and difficult an\n  enterprise as a system of legislation? Of itself, the\n  people always wills the good, but it does not always see\n  it. The general will is always right, but the judgment\n  which guides it is not always enlightened. It must be\n  made to see objects such as they are, and, sometimes,\n  such as they ought to appear to it; it must be shown the\n  right road which it seeks, must be protected from the\n  allurements of private will; places and times must be\n  brought close to its eyes, and the attractions of present\n  and visible advantages counterbalanced by the danger of\n  remote and latent evils. Private persons see the good\n  which they reject; the public wills the good which it\n  does not see. All alike need guidance. The former must\n  be obliged to conform their will to their reason; the\n  latter must be taught to know what it wills. [2] Then,\n  from the public enlightenment there results the union of\n  understanding and of will in the social body; and hence\n  the precise co-operation of the parts and the greatest\n  power {122} of the whole. Hence springs the necessity of\n  a legislator.\u201d [1]\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, bk. II., ch. vi.\n\n[2] There is a _prima facie_ contradiction in this rhetorical\nantithesis; if all private individuals were enlightened, but\nselfishly interested, there could be no public good will. The\ncontrast must lie between different classes of persons, if it is to\nhave a meaning.\n\nIn the following chapter [1] Rousseau touches the essence of laws and\ninstitutions in a few words, which only embody a contradiction or a\nmiracle because he is thinking of the legislator\u2019s work as a creation\naccomplished at one blow.\n\n  \u201cIn order that a people at its birth should have the\n  capacity to appreciate the sound maxims of policy and\n  follow the fundamental rules of political reason, it\n  would be necessary for the effect to become the cause;\n  for the social spirit, which is meant to be the work of\n  the legislation, to preside over the legislation itself,\n  and for men to be, before laws are made, what they are\n  meant to become by their means.\u201d\n\nThe legislator then, in face of this contradiction, must have\nrecourse to supernatural sanctions.\n\n[1] _Contrat Social_, II. vii.\n\nBut the paradox precisely expresses the fact. Laws and institutions\nare only possible because man _is_ already, what they gradually\nmake more and more explicit; because he has a general will, that\nis, because the good which he presents to himself as his own is\nnecessarily in some degree a good which extends beyond himself, or\na common good. The criticism or interpretation which elicits the\ngeneral will or actual social spirit, by removal of contradictions,\nand embodiment in permanent form, is essentially one with the work\nwhich Rousseau ascribes to the legislator. And his paradox is removed\nwhen we understand that the legislator is merely one of the organs of\nthe social spirit itself, as it carries out its self-criticism and\nself-interpretation, in part by trial and error {123} and in part by\nconscious insight and adjustment. The habits and institutions of any\ncommunity are, so to speak, the standing interpretation of all the\nprivate wills which compose it, and it is thus possible to assign\nto the General Will an actual and concrete meaning as something\ndifferent at once from every private will, and from the vote of any\ngiven assembly, and yet as standing, on the whole, for what both the\none and the other necessarily aim at sustaining as the framework of\ntheir life. It is needless to observe that such a representation\nof the Real Will is imperfect, since every set of institutions is\nan incomplete embodiment of life; and any given system of life is\nitself also incomplete. It is more important to remember that, though\nalways incomplete, just as the system of sciences is an incomplete\nexpression of truth, the complex of social institutions is, as we\nhave seen, very much more complete than the explicit ideas which at\nany given instant move any individual mind in volition.\n\n\n\n\n{124}\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nTHE CONCEPTION OF LIBERTY, AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE FOREGOING\nSUGGESTIONS.\n\n1. We have now seen that the problem of Self-Government may be\nregarded from a point of view other than that which presented it\nas a contradiction in terms. The contradiction depended on the\nabsolute opposition between self and others which was embodied in\nthe _prima facie_ idea of society; the result of which was that all\nincrease of individuality and all assertion of self were at the\nfirst view hostile as regarded others, and liberty, the condition\nof individuality, became a negative idea, prescribing as it were a\nmaximum of empty space, to be preserved against all trespassers,\nround every unit of the social whole. We saw that notions of this\nkind were pushed so far as to endanger the fundamental principle,\naccording to which self-affirmation is the root of morality, and\nit was maintained that the ethical attitude essentially lay in the\nnegation and limitation imposed by social life upon the natural\ntendency to self-assertion. [1] According to these ideas, the self in\nsociety is something less than, if it could so exist, it would {125}\nbe out of society, and liberty is the arrangement by which, at a\nsacrifice of some of its activities, it is enabled to disport itself\n_in vacuo_ with the remainder.\n\n[1] Pp. 27 and 73.\n\nBut if we may give weight to the suggestions of the two previous\nchapters, the assumptions which we work with are transformed. The\ndifference of principle is that the average individual, such as each\nof us takes himself to be in his ordinary [1] trivial moods, when he\nsees, or thinks he sees, nothing in life but his own private interest\nand amusement,--this average individual is no longer accepted as the\nreal self or individuality. The centre of gravity of existence is\nthrown outside him. Even his personality, his unique and personal\nbeing, the innermost shrine of what he is and likes to be, is not\nadmitted to lie where a careless scrutiny, backed by theoretical\nprejudice, is apt to locate it. It is not in the nooks and recesses\nof the sensitive self, when the man is most withdrawn from things\nand persons and wrapped up in the intimacies of his feeling, that\nhe enjoys and asserts his individual self to the full. This idea is\na caricature of the genuine experience of individuality. It is true\nthat to feel your individuality is to feel something distinctive,\nwhich gives you a hold and substance in yourself and a definite\nposition among others, and, it may be, against them. But on a careful\nconsideration, it will be found that this substance and position are\nalways sustained by some kind {126} of determinate achievement or\nexpansion on the part of the self. It always comes from taking hold\nof the world in some definite way; which, just because it is definite\nand affirmative, is at once a distinct assertion of the self, and\na transition from the private self into the great communion of\nreality. The simplest machine will show us that it is the differences\nof the parts which enable them to make a whole. And so, we are now\nsuggesting, it is in the difference which contributes to the whole\nthat the self feels itself at home and possesses its individuality.\n\n[1] There is a difficulty in stating this point without confusion,\njust because the \u201cordinary\u201d individual, being at the bottom different\nfrom what he seems, is actually determined in all sorts of ways,\nconsciously and unconsciously, by demands and ideas which go far\nbeyond what he would admit to determine him.\n\nFollowing up such thoughts as these, we see that there is a meaning\nin the suggestion that our real self or individuality may be\nsomething which in one sense we are not, but which we recognise as\nimperative upon us. As Rousseau has said of the social self, we say\nmore generally of the self or life which extends beyond our average\nprivate existence, that it is more real than we are, and we only feel\nourselves real in proportion as we identify ourselves with it.\n\nWith such suggestions in our minds, we see the problem of liberty in\na new light. Liberty, no doubt, is as Rousseau has told us, so far\nagreeing with Mill, the essential quality of human life. It is so, we\nunderstood, because it is the condition of our being ourselves. But\nnow that it has occurred to us that in order to be ourselves we must\nbe always becoming something which we are not, or in other words, we\nmust always recognise that we are something more than we have become,\nliberty, as the condition of our being ourselves, cannot simply be\nsomething which {127} we have, still less something which we have\nalways had--a _status quo_ to be maintained. It must be a condition\nrelevant to our continued struggle to assert the control of something\nin us, which we recognise as imperative upon us or as our real self,\nbut which we only obey in a very imperfect degree. Thus it is that\nwe can speak, without a contradiction, of being forced to be free.\n[1] It is possible for us to acquiesce, as rational beings, in a law\nand order which on the whole makes for the possibility of asserting\nour true or universal selves, at the very moment when this law and\norder is constraining our particular private wills in a way which we\nresent, or even condemn. Such a law and order, maintained by force,\nwhich we recognise as on the whole the instrument of our greatest\nself-affirmation, is a system of rights; and our liberty, or to use\na good old expression, our liberties, may be identified with such a\nsystem considered as the condition and guarantee of our becoming the\nbest that we have it in us to be, that is, of becoming ourselves.\nAnd because such an order is the embodiment up to a certain point of\na self or system of will which we recognise as what ought to be, as\nagainst the indolence, ignorance, or rebellion of our casual private\nselves, we may rightly call it a system of self-government or free\ngovernment; a system, that is to say, in which ourselves, in one\nsense, govern ourselves in another sense; not as Mill has said, by\neach one of us being subject to all the \u201cothers\u201d (taking \u201cothers\u201d in\nthe same sense in which each of us is \u201cone\u201d), {128} but by all of us,\nas casual private units, being subject to an order which expresses,\nup to a certain point, the rational self or will which, as rational\nbeings, we may be assumed [2] to recognise as imperative.\n\n[1] For limitations see ch. viii. below.\n\n[2] In principle, actual individual assent is not needed. The\nquestion when the assumption breaks down belongs to the subject of\nthe duty of rebellion and the significance of punishment.\n\n2. Before proceeding to develop the idea of liberty, we may consider\nfor a moment the closely analogous idea of \u201cnature\u201d and what is\n\u201cnatural.\u201d\n\nLike the notion of \u201cliberty\u201d which is that of \u201cbeing able to be\nyourself,\u201d the notion of nature, which is that of \u201ccoming to be\n_of_ yourself, or _of_ itself,\u201d has always, however imperfectly\napprehended, exercised immense power over the mind. It is felt that\nyou have touch with reality when you have found something which can\ngrow of itself. But again, like the notion of liberty, the notion\nof nature is apt to be apprehended in a form so partial as to be\npractically negative, and in this form, to be given a hostile bearing\nagainst what are, in fact, completer phases of the same idea.\n\nThat which is natural, or by nature, in the most obvious sense--what\nmost plainly appears to have \u201ccome of itself\u201d--is what comes first in\ntime, and what comes with the least putting together the primitive\nand the simple as against the late and the complex. And so in the\ntheoretical inquiry after what is solid and can be relied upon, there\nconstantly recurs in all ages the tendency to story-telling; to the\nnarration of what is supposed to have come first, as the simple\n{129} spontaneous beginning out of which the world as we know it has\nemerged with greatly altered attributes. The note of story-telling is\nunmistakable in this na\u00efve theory, whether we find it in poets who\nportray the Golden Age, from Hesiod downwards, [1] or represented\nas a fallacy of social compact by Plato in the second book of the\n_Republic_ [2] or adopted as a juristic theory by Tacitus [3] and\nthe writers who relied on the idea of a \u201cstate of nature,\u201d down to\nRousseau.\n\n[1] The resemblance between Hesiod\u2019s dream of the Golden Age and\nmodern doctrines of intensive culture is startling, and there is\nprobably a true historical continuity between them. This does not\ninvolve the assertion that there can be no truth in the latter, but\nit does suggest that the disproportionate emphasis laid upon it\n(_e.g._ by Fourier and in _Merrie England_) indicates an element of\nthe old \u201cNature\u201d fallacy.\n\n[2] _Rep_., 358 E.\n\n[3] _Annals_, iii. 26; cf. _Germania_, ch. xix. 20, \u201cNeque corrumpere\net corrumpi \u2018seculum\u2019 vocatur. ...\u201d Note the identification of \u201cour\nage\u201d with corruption; cp. use of _fin de si\u00e8cle_.\n\nIt may be observed at this point that the conception of a \u201claw of\nnature\u201d made a very valuable middle term between the conception of a\npurely primitive condition of the world and the ideal of a complete\nsociety. The logical reason is plain. The instinct of getting at\nsomething solid and permanent, which first reveals itself by going\nback to the supposed original or simple, soon attaches itself also\nto what is _generally_ found to exist, understanding generality as\na mark of that tendency to come of itself which it feels to attach\nto what is real and able to stand in its own right. But generality\nis a clue which leads a long way; and the mind passes from saying\n\u201cFire burns [1] by nature, {130} for it burns everywhere; but law\nis variable\u201d [2] to observing that there are features of law which\nhave their own generality, and there thus appears to be a \u201cnatural\u201d\nelement in law, which may mean the right of the strongest, [3] but\nmay again amount to a tendency to come out of the \u201cstate of nature.\u201d\nJust in the same way, the conception of Liberty has always drawn\nfrom experience a certain positive tendency to progress, and has\nnever perhaps, even in the most fanatical theory, maintained the full\ndemand for isolation which its negative bearing might seem to imply.\n\n[1] Argument cited by Aristotle, _Eth_., v. 10.\n\n[2] Just so, in strict science, from the Atomists downward, the\nprimary qualities (spatial) are real, the secondary (colours)\nconventional (or, as we say, \u201csubjective\u201d); the former meaning holds\ngood more generally than the latter.\n\n[3] Plato, _Gorgias_, p. 484.\n\nBut again, the instinct which, in looking for what has power to grow\nor come of itself, lays hold of what is merely primitive or merely\ngeneral, has in all great epochs of thought been met by a deeper\ninsight.\n\nIt is not merely what we are born _as_, or what the world begins\nwith, that comes of itself. The most ordinary conception of growth\ninvolves maturity, and the term nature in Greek and Latin, as in\nEnglish, can indicate not only what we are born _as_, but what we are\nborn _for_, our true, or real, or complete nature. Thus the great\nthinkers of every age have been led to something like Aristotle\u2019s\nconception, \u201cwhat a thing is when its growth is completed, that is\nwhat we call its nature [1] (growth or evolution)\u201d; and so, if we\nare to think of \u201cnature\u201d as a whole, it will not be, {131} as when\nwe speak of \u201cnatural\u201d science, an outward world, whether of atoms\nor of organisms, contrasted both with God and with Man, \u201cfor nature\nin Aristotle is not the outward world of created things; it is the\ncreative force, the productive principle of the universe.\u201d [2] To\nus, inclined to contrast the natural at once with the human and\nthe divine, there is something startling in the vivid reality with\nwhich the Greek thinkers hold the three ideas together. The creative\nactivity of the divine principle seems for Plato to be actually one\nwith growth, or nature, or evolution. [3] It may be of interest to\ncite the great passage in which Plato lays his finger on the common\nfallacy. [4]\n\n  \u201cMany learned men say that the elements and inorganic\n  and organic world below man came by nature and chance,\n  but that law and justice and man\u2019s works and social\n  institutions and religion are merely conventional,\n  variable, and untrue. But we must maintain that law and\n  religion and man\u2019s works exist by nature, or are not\n  lower than nature, being the products of mind according\n  to right reason.\u201d ... \u201cFor they give the name of nature\n  to the origin of the earliest things; [5] but if really\n  mind is earliest of all things, then _it_ may rightly be\n  said to be superlatively natural.\u201d\n\n[1] Aristotle, _Pol_., i. i.\n\n[2] Butcher, _Aristotle\u2019s Theory of Poetry and Fine Art_, p. 116.\n\n[3] _Republic_, x. 597.\n\n[4] _Laws_, 889 ff. abridged.\n\n[5] We are not dealing here with Platonic interpretation, but it\nseems necessary to point out that, literally taken, this passage\naccepts the principle that nature = primary genesis, and sets out to\nprove mind to be natural in this sense. We might rather reject the\nappeal to succession in Time altogether, as at bottom Plato means\nto. But we see how emphatically mind is for Plato the superlatively\nnatural.\n\nAnd so, as the universe is for the great thinkers {132} at once\nnatural and divine, the same applies to human society. Not only in\nAristotle\u2019s trenchant expressions to the effect that the City State\nis a natural growth, but in the whole of Plato\u2019s careful analysis\nof moral and social life, we find society depicted as a living and\ngrowing creature, in which man\u2019s nature expands itself from more to\nmore, having its own essence progressively communicated to it. And so\nwe find that the peculiar naturalness of the primitive and the simple\nis only an illusion, caused by the greater difficulty of recognising\nthe larger individuality which comes both of and to itself in the\nlater and more complex phases of life. But whatever it was that was\nreal and that came of itself in the primitive and simple is there to\na greater degree--with more reality and as the same self, only more\ncomplete--in the later and complex. The idea of a diminution of being\nas we pass from the simpler to the more developed self is a fallacy\nof non-recognition.\n\nRousseau, as we saw, maintains in words the traditional opposition\nbetween the natural and the civil or moral condition of man. From the\ntendency of his views, however, we might have expected that in his\nphilosophy the wheel would come full circle, and the term \u201cnature\u201d\nwould revert to its Greek meaning. But this is not the case, though\nin \u00c9mile there is a compromise which points in some such direction.\nYet a remarkable passage [1] from Burlamaqui, a Genevese jurist, the\nearlier contemporary of Rousseau, shows the reversion to the Greek\nview of social nature completed in principle.\n\n  \u201cLa libert\u00e9 civile l\u2019emporte de {133} beaucoup sur la\n  libert\u00e9 naturelle, et, par cons\u00e9quent, l\u2019\u00e9tat civil qui\n  l\u2019a produit est de tous les \u00e9tats de l\u2019homme le plus\n  parfait, et, \u00e0 parler exactement, le veritable \u00e9tat\n  naturel de l\u2019homme. L\u2019\u00e9tablissement d\u2019un gouvernement\n  et d\u2019une puissance souveraine, ramenant les hommes \u00e0\n  l\u2019observation des lois naturelles, [2] et par cons\u00e9quent\n  dans la route de bonheur, les fait rentrer dans leur \u00e9tat\n  naturel, duquel ils \u00e9taient sortis par le mauvais usage\n  qu\u2019ils faisaient de leur libert\u00e9.\u201d\n\n[1] Cited in Dreyfus-Brisac\u2019s edition of the _Contrat Social_, p. 39.\n\n[2] Note the value of \u201cnatural law\u201d as a middle term equivalent to\nthe general and rational features of positive law, and forming a\nstep by which the \u201cnatural\u201d is carried beyond the supposed \u201cstate of\nnature.\u201d\n\nUpon this reversion to ancient usage there followed the movement\nof the age of romantic genius and of organic science, and with\nGoethe\u2019s Erdgeist and Wordsworth\u2019s religion of Nature the restriction\nof the natural to the primitive and simple was destroyed. Nature\nstill remains a point of view under which we regard what relatively\nspeaking \u201ccomes of itself,\u201d but it has ceased to exist as a\nquestion-begging predicate, attached to pre-social or extra-social\nconditions of man.\n\n3. Liberty, as understood by the writers who were discussed in ch.\niii. of the present work, is related to the State much as Nature, in\nthe mouth of story-telling theory, is related to civilised society.\nWe saw that Seeley in his _Introduction to Political Science_ [1]\nlays it down that \u201cperfect liberty is equivalent to total absence\nof government.\u201d And this no doubt fairly represents our first\nnotion of the matter, when cleared of the limitations imposed upon\nit by practical life, which {134} limitations--really a first hint\nof the truth--we are apt to mistake for mere sophistications and\nimperfections. We noted in Rousseau the surviving contrast between\nnatural liberty on the one hand and civil or moral liberty on the\nother, and we observed that the expanding idea of what was natural\ncould not be prevented from covering the ground of the civil or moral\nlife. The thread of connection, or rather the ferment of expansion,\nwe found to be, in the case of nature, the idea of self-origination.\nThat was natural which came of itself.\n\n[1] Seeley, quoted p. 91 above.\n\n_(a)_ In the simple ideal of liberty, as equivalent to the absence of\nall government--for we must not forget that it is an ideal, obtained\nby neglecting the facts of life which run counter to it--there is\nclearly embodied a claim which commands our respect. The claim is so\nself-evident and so convincing to average human feeling--Mr. Spencer\nwould indeed say, with some truth, to animal feeling in general--that\nits precise nature is seldom stated in distinct language. We have\nassumed above that the root of it lies in the claim to be ourselves.\nBut it is safer to take it in the shape which it actually has for the\naverage consciousness, and this is the negative shape, as a claim\nto be free from constraint. [1] If we ask, \u201cWhat is constraint?\u201d\nthe answer is founded on the current distinction between myself\nand others as different minds attached to different bodies. It is\nconstraint when my mind is interfered with in its control of my body\neither by actual or by threatening physical {135} violence under the\ndirection of another mind. A permanent and settled condition of such\nconstraint, by which I become in effect the instrument of another\nmind, is slavery. And it will not lead us far wrong if we assume that\nthe value put upon liberty and its erection into something like an\nideal comes from the contrast with slavery. The ideal of positive\npolitical freedom presupposes more complex experiences. But Homer\nalready knows that \u201cZeus deprives a man of half his manhood when he\nbecomes a slave.\u201d\n\n[1] We must assume, I suppose, that in Seeley\u2019s sentence \u201cGovernment\u201d\n= \u201cConstraint,\u201d or its _vraisemblance_ is lost.\n\nThis, then, we may take as the practical starting point in the notion\nof freedom. It is what, with reference to a formed society, we may\ncall a status; the position of a freeman as opposed to a slave; that\nis, of one who, whatever oppression he may meet with _de facto_ from\ntime to time, or whatever specified services he may be bound to\nrender, normally regards himself and is regarded by others as, on the\nwhole, at his own disposal, and not the mere instrument of another\nmind.\n\nThus the juristic meaning of the term liberty, based on the normal\ndistinction between one self-determining person and another, we may\nset down as its literal meaning, and so far the English writers,\nof whom Seeley is the latest type, are on solid ground when they\ndefine liberty as the absence of restraint, or perfect liberty as the\nabsence of all government (in the sense of habitual constraint by\nothers).\n\n_(b)_ It is obvious that the above definition would be wholly\ninadequate to the simplest facts respecting the demands which have\nthrough all history been asserted and achieved under the name\nof political {136} liberty. A man may be a long way more than a\nslave and yet a long way less than a citizen. If, as Seeley says,\nthe English writer of the verses, \u201cAh, Freedom is a noble thing,\u201d\nonly meant by Freedom, being out of prison, it is certain that he\nmeant much less than the Greek historian who two thousand years\nbefore used almost the same words. \u201cThe right of equal speech,\u201d he\nwrote, \u201cdemonstrates itself in every way as a noble thing.\u201d [1]\nBy this, as his words and their occasion make plain, he meant a\ncertain determinate security for the positive exercise of activities\naffecting the welfare of the social whole, and some such security\nis always understood to be involved in the notion of political\nliberty. But we will content ourselves at this point with noting the\ndistinction and connection between the negative or juristic, and\nthe varyingly positive or political conception of liberty. For the\nlatter is, in its degree, a case of that fuller freedom which we are\nabout to trace to its embodiment in the state; and the phenomena of\npolitical liberty are covered, of course, by the point of view which\nwe shall take in indicating the state as the main organ and condition\nof the fuller liberty.\n\n[1] Hdt., v. 78.\n\n(c) The connection, we said, between juristic and political liberty\nshould be observed at this point. It is merely an example of what\nwe shall find throughout, that the apparently negative has its\nroots and its meaning in the positive, and, in proportion as its\ntrue nature becomes evident, its positive aspects become explicit.\nThere is no true security for juristic liberty apart from political\n{137} liberty; and it has constantly been the infraction of juristic\nliberty that has been the origin of the demand for a share in highly\npositive political duties and functions. Mere protection for person\nand property may seem an easy thing to define and maintain with just\na little goodwill; but the questions when, how, and in what sense it\nis to be maintained involve the positive character of the political\nsystem, and there is no ultimate security unless that system is\nmoulded by the whole compass of individuality which society contains.\n\n_(d)_ Recurring then to the literal or elementary sense of liberty,\nas the absence of constraint exercised by one upon others, we may\nadmit that, in going beyond it, we are more or less making use of a\nmetaphor. [1] We are passing from the idea of non-constraint pure\nand simple to the idea of more or less moulding and selection within\nthe powers and activities of the self. It is true, indeed, and must\nbe maintained as a fundamental principle, that the \u201chigher\u201d liberty\nis also in fact the \u201clarger\u201d liberty, presenting the greater area\nto activity and the more extensive choice to self-determination.\n[2] But this larger development remains within a positive general\ncharacter, and if more alternatives are open, there are also, by\nthat very fact, more which are closed. We cannot wholly exhaust the\nnew meaning of liberty as applied to the law-abiding and moral life\nof a {138} conscientious citizen even by changing the negative into\nthe positive, and saying that, whereas mere juristic freedom was\nonly freedom _from_ constraint, political freedom means freedom _to_\nact. The higher sense of liberty, like the lower, involves freedom\n_from_ some things as well as freedom _to_ others. And that which we\nare freed from is, in this case, not the constraint of those whom we\ncommonly regard as others, but the constraint of what we commonly\nregard as a part of ourself. Here is the reason for saying that, when\nwe speak of liberty in the higher sense, we must be admitted to be\nspeaking metaphorically. [3]\n\n[1] In this and the following section I have made great use of\nGreen\u2019s discussion in the first chapter of the _Principles of\nPolitical Obligation_.\n\n[2] Perhaps I may refer on this head to \u201cLiberty and Legislation\u201d in\nmy _Civilisation of Christendom_ (Sonnenschein).\n\n[3] But see below, p. 145.\n\nIn the straightforward sense of the word, we saw, I am free when\nI am not made the instrument of another person\u2019s will through\nphysical violence or the threat of it. The subtle questions which\nmay arise with regard to due or undue degrees of influence, by which\nI may become the instrument of another\u2019s mind, with more or less\nwillingness on the part of my own, are here disregarded. I am assumed\nto be acting freely so long as I follow the inclination of my mind,\napart from any painful conflict forced upon it by the prospect of\nphysical interference with its belongings.\n\nBut from the earliest ages of ethical reflection, a further sense\nhas been ascribed to the term liberty. It has been pointed out\nby moralists and philosophers--first, perhaps by Socrates and\nPlato--that the condition of man as to being himself is fundamentally\naffected not only by the power to do what he likes without\nconstraint, but by the nature of that which he likes to do. The human\n{139} mind, it is explained, is never wholly at one with itself,\nand the common phrases \u201cself-mastery\u201d or \u201cself-control\u201d are adduced\nby way of presenting what we spoke of above as the ethical paradox\nof self-government. [1] The mind, then, is treated by a metaphor as\nif it were two or more persons; and the term liberty, which applies\n_prima facie_ to the non-constraint of one person by another, is\napplied to the non-constraint of something within an individual mind\nby something else within it. Now, apart from further scrutiny, it\ndoes not appear why the term liberty, when thus applied, should mean\nanything of ethical value. As Plato observed, in a passage [2] from\nwhich the current use of all these phrases is probably derived, it\nseems absurd at first sight to speak of self-control as a distinctive\npredicate of certain states of mind. For surely, within the mind,\nthat which is controlled must be of the nature of self no less than\nthat which controls it, so that, in saying that I have self-control,\nI am saying that I am self-indulgent; in saying that my mind is free,\nI am at the same time saying that it is a slave. Within certain\nlimits this paradox represents a truth, and the ethical rank of\nthe elements which coerce and are coerced may be quite oppositely\nestimated. We may think fit to call ourselves free either when love\nconquers reason or when reason triumphs over love. Still, as Plato\nproceeds to point out, the general adoption of the metaphor, the\nfact that we think and call ourselves \u201cfree\u201d or \u201cself-controlled\u201d\nor \u201cfully ourselves\u201d in some cases and not in others; and that we\ndo not in each of {140} these cases regard the opposite attribution\n\u201cslave,\u201d \u201cself-indulgent,\u201d \u201cnot ourselves\u201d as equally true with the\nformer, indicates that some substantial fact is forcing itself upon\nus through the metaphor in question. It is the same problem as that\nwhich Professor James has wittily stated when he points out that\n\u201cthe sluggard, the drunkard, the coward never talk of their conduct\nin that way (i.e. as conquering their impulses and temptations) or\nsay they resist their energy, overcome their sobriety, conquer their\ncourage, and so forth.\u201d [3]\n\n[1] P. 55.\n\n[2] _Republic_, 430 E.\n\n[3] _Principles of Psychology_, ii. 548.\n\nIt is most important, we may venture to observe in passing, not to\nunderstand the substantive fact, or Plato\u2019s presentation of it, as\nif it lay in an alternative between two psychological factors, say\nintelligence and desire, the one of which was to be preferred and\nthe other to be repudiated, through some quasi-ethical conception of\nrank, such as the supposed affinity of the one factor with divine or\nof the other with animal life. We are speaking of the sense in which\nit can be asserted that the human self is, comparatively speaking,\nfree in one kind of life and unfree in another, both being assumed\nto be chosen, in the absence of constraint by an external will. It\nis plain that the only ground on which such an assertion can really\nbe sustained is that the one life more than the other gives effect\nto the self as a whole, or removes its contradictions and so makes\nit most fully what it is able to be, or what, by the implied nature\nof each and all of its wants, it may be said really to want to be.\nThe claims of intelligence and desire in their various phases must be\n{141} criticised according to this principle, and not advocated upon\npresuppositions drawn from external comparisons.\n\nBut our question at the present moment is not as to the deeper\nnature of that which we call the self _par excellence_, but as to\nthe bearing of the metaphor by which the assertion of such a self is\nidentified with liberty or absence of constraint. And the point is\nplainly this; [1] that in the conflict between that which stands for\nthe self _par excellence_ and that which, at any time, stands opposed\nto it, we have the clear experience that we are capable of being\ndetermined by a will within our minds which nevertheless we repudiate\nand disown, [2] and therefore we feel ourselves to be like a slave as\ncompared with a freeman if we yield, but like a freeman compared with\na slave if we conquer. We may be determined by something which not\nonly is not ourself--for in the greatest moments of life, when our\nbeing touches its maximum, we, in a sense, feel an impulse which is\nnot ourself--but it is not ourself as something which has got hold of\nus by force, and operates upon us by conflict and violence, without\nhaving the kind of power needed to carry us away and sweep our whole\nself harmoniously into its current. That we can be determined by a\nwill in us which neither is ourself nor represents it at a higher\nlevel, and which we loathe and disown, is the experience on which the\nmetaphor of freedom and slavery is {142} based, when applied to the\nlife of man considered apart from external constraint. [3]\n\n[1] See Green\u2019s _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. i.\n\n[2] This remains substantially true, even if we agree with Socrates\nthat it is impossible to know the better and prefer the worse at a\ngiven moment. Our normal self will repudiate the view we took at some\nmoment.\n\n[3] There is something worthy of Dante in Rousseau\u2019s observation\n(_Contrat Social_, Bk. iv. ch. 2, note) that the convicts in the\ngalleys at Genoa had \u201cLiberty\u201d stamped on their chains. The fetters\nof the bad self are the symbol of freedom. Rousseau turns his remark\nto commonplace, after his fashion, by referring it to the mere\nliberation of society from malefactors.\n\n_(e)_ The metaphorical application of the term Liberty to a state of\nthe individual mind has both its danger and its justification. The\nstate of mind in question, we repeat, is that in which the impulse\ntowards self-satisfaction sets itself upon an object which represents\nthe nature of the self as a whole, as free from contradiction or as\nat its maximum of being, and triumphs over the alien and partial\nwill, the tendency to narrower tracks of indulgence, when entangled\nin which it feels itself oppressed and constrained by a foreign\ninfluence. When the mind does what, as a whole, it wills, as Plato\nimplies, [1] it feels free. When it cannot be said to will anything\nas a whole, but is distracted among aims which cannot satisfy it,\nthen there is no sense in which it can be said to do what _it_ wills,\nand it feels itself under constraint and a slave.\n\n[1] _Republic_, ix. 577 E.\n\nThe metaphor has this danger. The contrast between whole and part is\ntoo readily transformed, in popular theory, into the contrast between\nan empty generality and everything in particular. The claim to be\nfree then involves the separation between mind as a general faculty\nof volition, and every particular object. Mind is then said to be\nfree as an undetermined faculty, but as filled and {143} moulded by\nany object or idea, (the passive participles \u201cfilled\u201d and \u201cmoulded\u201d\nimply a relation which is not real, but, as assumed, is the ground of\nthe fallacy in question) it has lost its freedom and become a slave.\nBut if we retain the conception that mind has reality only as a whole\nof determinate character, self-determined through its power of being\na self, but not through any power of creating particulars out of\nnothing, we shall avoid this caricature of the higher freedom.\n\nBut it is far more important to note the justification of the\nmetaphor. We saw that, from Homer downwards, the conviction has been\nineradicable that liberty is the true nature of man. And we now\nobserve that the metaphor, through which the deepest sense of this\nquality has expressed itself, depends upon the same principle as\nthe literal usage from which it is drawn. In the case of Liberty,\nconceived as a condition of the mind, just as in the case of Liberty,\nconceived as the absence of physical menace or coercion on the\npart of other persons, the root of the matter is the claim to be\ndetermined only by ourself. But, in the literal case, what we mean by\nourself is the given self, the group of will and wishes, of feelings\nand ideas, associated from time to time with my particular body;\nin short, the actual uncriticised \u201cmind,\u201d as we experience it all\nday and every day. In the metaphorical case, we have made so much\nprogress in self-criticism as to know at least that our \u201cself\u201d is\nsomething of a problem. We know that the given self, the mind from\nday to day, [1] is not satisfactory; and {144} we throw the centre\nof gravity outside it, and place the true self in something which\nwe rather want to be than actually are; although, at the same time,\nit is clear that to some extent we are this something or we should\nnot want to be it. We realise, indeed, that to be ourselves is a\nprinciple at once of distinction or position among others, and of\nthorough transition into and unity with the life which is at the\nroot of theirs. And it is for this reason that we feel so confident,\nin proportion as we at all lay hold upon a life which can thus\ndistinguish and identify us, that we have here the grasp of what is\nin its nature our true self. Here then, as in the literal case of\nliberty from personal constraint, we are putting in act the principle\nof \u201cbeing determined only by ourself.\u201d\n\n[1] See, however, note on p. 125 above.\n\nAnd thus Liberty as understood by \u201ctheorists of the first look,\u201d or\nby those who in all ages have resisted arbitrary tyranny, belongs\nafter all to the same principle with the civil or moral liberty\nof the philosopher. The claim to obey only yourself is a claim\nessential to humanity; and the further significance of it rests\nupon what you mean by \u201cyourself.\u201d Now if it is true that resistance\nto arbitrary aggression is a condition of obeying only ourselves,\nit is more deeply true, when man is in any degree civilised, that,\nin order to obey yourself as you want to be, you must obey some\nthing very different from yourself as you are. And it has been\nwell pointed out [1] that the consciousness of civilised peoples\nis deeply alive to this significance of liberty, so that any work\nof self-improvement may be most effectively {145} presented to a\npopular audience as an effort to attain freedom by breaking the\nbondage of drink, for example, or of ignorance, or of pauperism.\nIn spite of the objection that Freedom as thus represented is a\nmere metaphor, \u201cthe feeling [2] of oppression, which always goes\nwith the consciousness of unfulfilled possibilities, will always\ngive meaning to the representation of the effort after any kind of\nself-improvement as a demand for freedom.\u201d We have followed the usual\ncourse of English thought, and the example of a writer whose caution\nequalled his enthusiasm, in admitting that the lower sense of the\nterm Liberty is the literal sense, and that the deeper meaning may\nbe treated as metaphorical. It is worth while to observe that the\njustice of this way of looking at the matter is very doubtful. It\nis because we know, however indefinitely, that our self has a reach\nbeyond its daily needs, that arbitrary oppression becomes a thing\nto be resisted at the price of life itself. Herbert Spencer draws\nattention to the struggles of an animal which we try to confine,\nas a proof of the innate feeling of liberty. But the domesticated\nanimal is the highest animal, or at anyrate not the lowest; while the\nman domesticated on similar terms is what we call a slave, because\nhe has sold his liberty for his life. It is therefore in truth the\nsense of the higher liberty--the greatness and unity of life--that\nhas communicated uncontrollable force to the claim for the lower;\nand if the fuller meaning is the reality and the lesser the symbol,\nit would be nearer the truth to say that the reality is the liberty\nof {146} a moral being whose will finds adequate expression in its\nlife, of which liberty the absence of external constraint is only an\nelementary type or symbol. The claim of the dictionary-maker that the\nearliest or the average meaning is also the truest or the \u201cproper\u201d\nmeaning of words has no foundation. [3]\n\n[1] Green\u2019s _Principles_ p. 18. [2] _Loc. cit._\n\n[3] Nettleship\u2019s _Remains_, i. 27 and 30.\n\n4. Liberty, then, throughout, is the being ourselves, and the\nfullest condition of liberty is that in which we are ourselves most\ncompletely. The ideal thus implied may be further explained by help\nof the philosophical expression, \u201cThe free will is the will that\nwills itself.\u201d We have already seen, by implication, the meaning of\nthis. If we are asked, \u201cBut does not our will always will itself?\u201d\nwe have the answer ready, that in one sense it does, but in another\nit does not. We always want what we will, but what we will is not\nalways what would satisfy our want. A will that willed itself would\nbe a will that in willing had before it an object that would satisfy\nits whole want, and nothing but its want. Its desires would not\nbe narrow and partial desires, in the fulfilment of which a man\nfeels choked and oppressed like one lost in a blind alley which\ngrows narrower and narrower. They would not be artificial desires\nstimulated and elaborated into a tyranny of the machinery of life by\nthe self which gropes for more and cannot find the \u201cmore\u201d which it\nneeds. That is to say, the volitions of the self would have undergone\na process just such as is undergone by a casual sensuous observation\nas it passes into a great scientific theory. As the observation\nstands it is inadequate to itself; for it poses as a truth, and is\nmanifestly a false {147} connection. So it is supplemented on the\none hand and purged away on the other; conditions and qualifications\nare inserted into it to harmonise it with other knowledge, until\nit makes some approach to being an expression of experience fit to\noccupy a permanent place in man\u2019s conception of the world. This,\nthe adjustment of a partial element to unity with the whole, is the\nessence of criticism. And it is just such another process by which\nthe experience of life fills up and purifies the objects presented\nto the casual volition. That is to say, the nature of the process\nmay be represented by considering it as having an effect of this\nkind on an unharmonised will; and relatively at any given moment\nsuch a process is in some degree going on. But we must bear in mind\nthat we are not to think of the sensuous individual as totally prior\nin time to the social consciousness, and as a pre-existing matter,\nupon which such an effect is to be thought of as super-induced. That\nwould be precisely the fallacy with which Rousseau struggles so hard,\nand the escape from which we are attempting to illustrate; none\nthe worse, perhaps, if our own language betrays how very difficult\nit is to throw it off altogether. We really know the sensuous\nindividual as such, the will in its impure and uncriticised form,\nonly in our experience, constant as that is, of failure, error,\nand forgetfulness, in adhering to the rational life, which, on the\nwhole, is inherent in the very nature of our rational being, and\nwhich we only desert in the same way and to the same extent as we\nmake mistakes in intellectual matters. We go wrong by narrowness and\nconfusion, by erroneous abstractions out of the whole, in a way only\npossible {148} for a social and intellectual being, and not prior to\nour entire social and intellectual character.\n\nUnderstanding then that we are dealing with narrowness and confusion\nand their opposites within a social intelligence already existing and\npredominant on the whole, we may note the sort of relation in which\nthe more adequate will is analogous to the more adequate piece of\nknowledge.\n\nTake, as we said above, the actual casual will of any individual at\nany given moment, especially if it is of a nature which, within the\ncontext of civilised life, we commonly pronounce to be wrong. Let it\nbe, for example, an impulse of sensual passion. It is a commonplace\nthat in such impulses the self can find no abiding satisfaction.\nThey pass and leave him empty. They bring with them no opening out\nof fresh possibilities, no greater stability to the mind. Yet they\nhave their meaning, and belong to human nature. They imply a need for\nunion, and an attraction outside the immediate self. If we compare\nthem with the objects and affections of a happy and devoted family,\nwe see the difference between a less adequate and a more adequate\nwill. The impulse, in passing into family affection, has become\nboth less and more. It is both disciplined and expanded. The object\npresented to the will is transformed in character. Lawlessness is\nexcluded; but, in place of a passing pleasure, a whole world of\naffections and interests, extending beyond the individual life, is\noffered as a purpose and a stimulus to the self. In short--for it\nis idle to expatiate upon what everybody recognises at once--you\ncan make a life out of the one, and you cannot out of the other.\nIn the family at its best the will has an {149} object which is\nreal and stable, and which corresponds to a great part of its\nown possibilities and capacities. In willing this object, it is,\nrelatively speaking, willing itself. We might compare in the same\nway the mere will to earn our daily bread, with the horizon of a\ngreat intellectual profession; or the routine of an industry or\nprofession vacantly and formally pursued with the very same routine\nconscientiously followed in a spirit of enlightenment. In every case\nwe are led up to the contrast of the actual indolent or selfish will,\nand the will, in as far as it comes to be what its nature implies,\nnamely, that which we have spoken of as the real or rational will,\nembodied in objects which have power to make a life worth living for\nthe self that wills them.\n\nNow, our nature as rational beings implies the imperative claim\nupon us of a will which is thus real or rational. Recognised or\nunrecognised, it is rooted in our own wills, as the claim to be\ntrue is rooted in our assertions. Any system of institutions which\nrepresents to us, on the whole, the conditions essential to affirming\nsuch a will, in objects of action such as to constitute a tolerably\ncomplete life, has an imperative claim upon our loyalty and obedience\nas the embodiment of our liberty. The only question that can arise\nis whether the system is that which it pretends to be. But even\nif rebellion is a duty, it can only be so because the imperative\nobligation, as we recognise it, is irreconcilable with the particular\nsystem which claims our obedience in its name. The imperative claim\nof the will that wills itself is our own inmost nature, and we cannot\nthrow it off. This is the ultimate root of political obligation.\n\n5. It is such a \u201creal\u201d or rational will that {150} thinkers after\nRousseau have identified with the State. In this theory they are\nfollowing the principles of Plato and Aristotle, no less than the\nindications which Rousseau furnished, by his theory of the general\nwill in connection with the work of the legislator. The State, when\nthus regarded, is to the general life of the individual much as we\nsaw the family to be with regard to certain of his impulses. The\nidea is that in it, or by its help, we find at once discipline and\nexpansion, the transfiguration of partial impulses, and something\nto do and to care for, such as the nature of a human self demands.\nIf, that is to say, you start with a human being as he is in fact,\nand try to devise what will furnish him with an outlet and a stable\npurpose capable of doing justice to his capacities--a satisfying\nobject of life--you will be driven on by the necessity of the facts\nat least as far as the State, and perhaps further. Two points may be\ninsisted on to make this conception less paradoxical to the English\nmind.\n\n_(a)_ The State, as thus conceived, is not merely the political\nfabric. The term State accents indeed the political aspect of the\nwhole, and is opposed to the notion of an anarchical society. But\nit includes the entire hierarchy of institutions by which life is\ndetermined, from the family to the trade, and from the trade to the\nChurch and the University. It includes all of them, not as the mere\ncollection of the growths of the country; but as the structure\nwhich gives life and meaning to the political whole, while receiving\nfrom it mutual adjustment, and therefore expansion and a more\nliberal air. The State, it might be said, is thus conceived as the\noperative criticism of all {151} institutions the modification and\nadjustment by which they are capable of playing a rational part in\nthe object of human will. And criticism, in this sense, is the life\nof institutions. As exclusive objects, they are a prey to stagnation\nand disease--think of the temper which lives solely for the family\nor solely for the Church; it is only as taken up into the movement\nand circulation of the State that they are living spiritual beings.\nIt follows that the State, in this sense, is, above all things,\nnot a number of persons, but a working conception of life. It is\nthe conception by the guidance of which every living member of\nthe commonwealth is enabled to perform his function, as Plato has\ntaught us. If we ask whether this means that a complete conception\nof the aims and possibilities of the common life exists even in the\nminds of statesmen, not to speak of ordinary citizens, the question\nanswers itself in the negative. And yet the State can only live\nand work in as far as such a conception, in however fragmentary,\none-sided shapes, pervades the general mind. It is not there mostly\nin reflective shape; and in so far as it is in reflective shape it\nis according to ultimate standards contradictory and incomplete. But\neveryone who has a fair judgment of what his own place demands from\nhim, has, at his own angle, so to speak, a working insight into the\nend of the State; and, of course, practical contradictions would be\nfewer if such conceptions were completer and more covered by each\nother. But a complete reflective conception of the end of the State,\ncomprehensive and free from contradiction, would mean a complete\nidea of the realisation of all human {152} capacity, without waste\nor failure. Such a conception is impossible owing to the gradual\ncharacter of the process by which the end of life, the nature of the\ngood, is determined for man. The Real Will, as represented by the\nState, is only a partial embodiment of it.\n\n_(b)_ The State, as the operative criticism of all institutions, is\nnecessarily force; and in the last resort, it is the only recognised\nand justified force. It seems important to observe that force is\ninherent in the State, and no true ideal points in the direction of\ndestroying it. For the force of the State proceeds essentially from\nits character of being our own mind extended, so to speak, beyond\nour immediate consciousness. Not only is the conduct of life as a\nwhole beyond the powers of the average individual at his average\nlevel, but it is beyond the powers of all the average individuals\nin a society taken together at their average level. We make a great\nmistake in thinking of the force exercised by the State as limited to\nthe restraint of disorderly persons by the police and the punishment\nof intentional law-breakers. The State is the fly-wheel of our life.\nIts system is constantly reminding us of duties, from sanitation to\nthe incidents of trusteeship, which we have not the least desire to\nneglect, but which we are either too ignorant or too indolent to\ncarry out apart from instruction and authoritative suggestion. We\nprofit at every turn by institutions, rules, traditions, researches,\nmade by minds at their best, which, through State action, are now in\na form to operate as extensions of our own minds. It is not merely\nthe contrast {153} between the limited activity of one individual\nand the greater achievement of millions put together. It is the\ncontrast between individuals working in the order and armed with the\nlaws, customs, writings, and institutions devised by ages, and the\nsame individuals considered as their daily average selves, with a\nvarying but always limited range of immediate consciousness. For at\nany given moment, no judge knows all the law; no author knows all\nhis own books, not to mention those of others; no official of an\ninstitution has the whole logic and meaning of the institution before\nhis mind. All individuals are continually reinforced and carried\non, beyond their average immediate consciousness, by the knowledge,\nresources, and energy which surround them in the social order, with\nits inheritance, of which the order itself is the greatest part.\nAnd the return of this greater self, forming a system adjusted to\nunity, upon their isolated minds, as an expansion and stimulus to\nthem, necessarily takes the shape of force, in as far as their minds\nare inert. And this must always be the case, not merely so long as\nwills are straightforwardly rebellious against the common good, but\nso long as the knowledge and energy of the average mind are unequal\nto dealing, on its own initiative and out of its own resources, with\nall possible conjunctions in which necessary conditions of the common\ngood are to be maintained. In other words, there must be inertia to\novercome, as long as the limitations of our animal nature [1] exist\nat all. The State is, as {154} Plato told us, the individual mind\nwrit large, or, as we have said, our mind reinforced by capacities\nwhich are of its own nature, but which supplement its defects. And\nthis being so, the less complete must clearly submit to find itself\nin the more complete, and be carried along with it so far as the\nlatter is able to advance. It is very important to note, however,\nthat our mind at its best is very different from our mind at its\naverage; and it has understood and approved, when at its best, a\ngreat deal which in its average moments comes upon it as force or\ncustom from the outside. Thus, there is no abrupt division between\nour conscious mind and the social system of suggestion, custom, and\nforce, which supports and extends and amends it. The two are related\nmuch as the focus of consciousness is related to the sub-conscious\nand automatic habits by which daily life is rendered possible. It is\nno more conceivable that social life should go on without force and\nauthoritative custom, because the end of social life is reflected in\nthe varying intelligence of individuals, than that individual life\nshould go on without sub-consciousness and automatism, because it is\nultimately relative to the ends which appear as ideas in the shifting\nfocus of the mind. The inherent limitations of State action will be\ndealt with in a later chapter. We have thus far been attempting to\nmake clear what is meant by the identification of the State with the\nReal Will of the Individual in which he wills his own nature as a\nrational being; in which identification we find the only true account\nof political obligation.\n\n[1] Not \u201cof our individuality.\u201d Individuality is not, in principle, a\nlimitation which makes us unequal to our part in the whole.\n\n\n\n\n{155}\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nPSYCHOLOGICAL ILLUSTRATION OF THE IDEA OF A REAL OR GENERAL WILL.\n\n1. The object of the present chapter is to assist the reader in\nbringing together the conception of the State or the Community on\nthe one hand, and that of an actual personal will, existing in an\nindividual mind, on the other. [1] We have seen that Self-Government\ncan only be explained if the centre of gravity of the self is\nthrown outside what we are continually tempted to reckon as our\nindividuality, and, if we recognise as our real being, and therefore\nas imperative upon us, a self and a good which are but slightly\nrepresented in our explicit consciousness, at its ordinary level. We\nhave seen that all sound theory and all good practice are founded\non the insight or on the faith [2] that the common self or moral\nperson of society is more real than the apparent individual; and\nwe have followed Rousseau\u2019s clue in criticising as defective and\ncontradictory the actual will of {156} given persons, and in looking\nfor its interpretation and completion in law and institutions as the\nembodiment of the social spirit.\n\n[1] Cf. ch. ii., p. 43.\n\n[2] The faith may of course exist in minds which would absolutely\nrepudiate the theoretical form here propounded for it. No one could\nhave had a more ardent actual faith in the reality of the greater\nself than Bentham and Mill.\n\nBut Society and the State present themselves at first sight as\nindefinite multitudes of persons. Institutions are many-sided facts;\nand an unreflective citizen could hardly say of what he takes them\nto be composed. And though law and custom approach more nearly to\nwhat we commonly understand by a \u201cwill,\u201d yet they again are apt to\nbe regarded as a sort of dead external weight with which the living\nvolition of the ordinary man has little or nothing to do.\n\nOur purpose, therefore, is to explain what is meant by saying that\n\u201ca will\u201d can be embodied in the State, in society, in law and\ninstitutions; and how it is possible for the individual, as we know\nhim, to be in an identity with this will, such as continually to\nvary, but never wholly to disappear. How can a man\u2019s real self lie\nin a great degree outside his normal self, and be something which he\nonly now and then gets hold of distinctly, and never completely?\n\n2. We will begin (1) by pointing out the analogy between the groups\nor systems of which our intelligence is composed, and the groups or\nsystems which make up the fabric of society, and we will then go on\n(2) to exhibit them as up to a certain point aspects of the same fact.\n\n(1) We may note two degrees of connection between the members of a\nwhole, which we may call \u201cAssociation\u201d and \u201cOrganisation.\u201d\n\n(i.) When two individuals are so connected that where you find\nthe one you expect to find the {157} other, they may be called\nassociates. And any kind of habitual grouping, from a gang of\nthieves to a scientific or philanthropic institution, may be called\nan Association. Owing probably to the verbal force which it borrows\nfrom the verb \u201cto associate,\u201d the term \u201cassociation\u201d implies the\nintentional coming together of units which have been separate, and\nwhich may become separate again. The word \u201cSociety,\u201d on the other\nhand, has not this verbal force, and although an \u201cassociation\u201d may\ncall itself \u201ca society,\u201d yet \u201cSociety\u201d as such is not spoken of as\nan \u201cAssociation.\u201d When we speak of \u201cSociety\u201d we do not emphasise the\naspect of being put together out of elements which exist apart, and\ntherefore we habitually apply the word to that natural grouping,\nwhich, at any rate, we do not normally think of as purposely put\ntogether and liable to be dissolved again. When the State is treated\nas an Association, a definite theory of its nature is implied, such\nas is involved in Herbert Spencer\u2019s comparison between it and a joint\nstock company.\n\nNow this same term \u201cAssociation\u201d is the most familiar expression for\na connection between elements of mind, analogous to that between\npersons who are called associates. If two elements of mind are so\nconnected that, where we find the one we expect to find the other,\nthey are said to be \u201cassociated.\u201d If the engine\u2019s whistle makes me\nthink the train is going to start, then it would be said that the\nidea \u201ctrain starting\u201d is associated in my mind with the idea \u201cengine\nwhistling.\u201d They have before entered into the same mental group or\nwhole, and so, where we find the one, {158} we expect to find the\nother, just as, where my friend X is, his comrade Y is probably not\nfar off.\n\nWe may here note the analogy between these two modes of\nassociation--that of persons and that of mental elements. In\nboth cases, according to the plain man\u2019s view of the matter, we\nare dealing with wholly casual conjunctions of units naturally\nindependent. The associates in either case need no better reason for\nnow being together than that they had been together before. Their\nconnection expresses nothing intimate or essential in their natures,\nand, if they fall apart again, they will not be seriously affected by\nthe separation.\n\nNow, of course, this idea of mere conjunction is not strictly true\neven of the connections between the most casual associates. Every\nassociation, whether of comrades or of ideas, is a connection between\nqualities, and therefore a general connection between the natures of\nthe related terms. People are not really companions for no reason at\nall; and ideas are not really units or atoms which stick together\nby mere juxtaposition, so that when one is pulled up out of the\nHades of oblivion it drags the other with it. Both the association\nof companions and the association of ideas are tendencies in which\nsome general connection of qualities is at work, and expresses itself\nthrough the detail of the actual surroundings, so far as an opening\nis left to it. When the association is made explicit by both members\nbeing present together, there is an outlet or utterance of the nature\nof the associates which there is not when they are separated.\n\n{159} But though all this is true, and can be detected in cases of\nassociation by careful analysis, it is, relatively speaking, the\nfact that commonplace association depends upon qualities which are\nso superficial that they may set up a tendency to connection between\nany units which are members of the same world. And, therefore, as\ncompared with any more thorough-going kind of connection, such\nassociation may be set down as casual, and as determined by the mere\nchance of juxtaposition.\n\n(ii.) Let us compare the kind of connection just described as\nassociation with that which we have agreed to call organisation.\n\nAssociates, [1] we saw, were together, as might roughly be said,\nsimply because they found themselves together. That is to say, they\nwere, after their association, what they were before it, and would\nnot be seriously affected if they were to be separated. Connections\nof this kind are essentially between unit and unit. They fall short\nof the nature of a plan which determines a great range of elements,\nvariously but with reference to an identical operation.\n\n[1] An \u201cAssociation,\u201d it may be urged, generally has a definite\npurpose, and so far, as indeed we said above, the associates come\ntogether, and do not merely find themselves together. But this is\nonly an apparent difficulty. In comparison with the whole compass\nof their nature, associates who come together for some limited\npurpose--Bimetallism, Philanthropy, a political cause--do merely\nfind themselves together. They form, as the cynic will say, an\nextraordinary menagerie, and their association may break up without\nany apparent effect upon their nature. Obviously, however, there are\nsome purposes which go deeper into men\u2019s characters, and others which\nare shallower; and this merely illustrates our point that the most\ncasual association is a universal connection of qualities in disguise.\n\nBeginning, as before, with the connection between {160} persons,\nwe may illustrate the difference by the comparison between a crowd\nand an army. The mind of a crowd has indeed been taken as the type\nof a true social mind. But it is really something quite different.\nIt is merely the superficial connection between unit and unit on an\nextended and intensified scale. As unit joins unit in the street,\neach determines his immediate neighbours, and is determined by them\nthrough the contagion of excitement, and with reference to the\nmost passing ideas and emotions. What acts upon them in common is\nnecessarily what there is in common between persons meeting, as it\nwere, for no reason, and not knowing what they share beyond what they\nimmediately see and feel. The crowd may indeed \u201cact as one man\u201d; but\nif it does so, its level of intelligence and responsibility will,\nas a rule, be extraordinarily low. It has nothing in common beyond\nwhat unit can infect unit with in a moment. Concerted action, much\nmore reasoning and criticism, are out of the question. The doing or\nthinking of a different thing by each unit with reference to a single\nend is impossible. The crowd moves as a mere mass, because its parts\nare connected merely as unit with unit. Any form of connection which\ncould effect an organisation in the whole would make a demand on\nthe nature of every unit, which, where their conjunction is merely\ncasual, could not possibly be met.\n\nAn army, [1] no less than a crowd, consists of a multitude of men,\nwho are associated, unit to unit. Influences must pass and repass\nbetween every one {161} of the men and those men with whom he is\nstanding in the ranks, or with whom he passes his leisure time. We\nmay note, by the way, that these influences are themselves of a more\npermanent nature than those which pass between members of a crowd,\nand that they must necessarily be modified by that other connection\nof which we are about to speak. For the links of \u201cassociation\u201d\nbetween man and man are not the determining force in the operations\nof the army as such. The army is a machine, or an organisation, which\nis bound together by operative ideas embodied on the one hand in\nthe officers, and on the other hand in the habit of obedience and\nthe trained capacity which make every unit willing and able to be\ndetermined not by the impulse of his neighbours, but by the orders\nof his officers. What the army does is determined by the general\u2019s\nplan, and not by influences communicating themselves from man to man,\nas in a crowd. In other words, every unit moves with reference to\nthe movements of a great whole, with most parts of which he is not\nin direct touch at all. He is not determined by simple reference to\nthe movements of his immediate neighbours. The army, that is, is a\nsystem or organised group, the nature of which, or the predominant\nidea embodied in its structure, determines the movements and\nrelations of its parts or members. The difference of the two modes\nof determination is plainly visible on a review day, if we first\nwatch the compact regiments marching off the ground, and then the\ncrowd streaming away irregularly in search of rest or refreshment. By\norganisation then, as opposed to association, we mean determination\nof {162} particulars by the scheme or general nature of a systematic\ngroup to which they belong, as opposed to their determination by\nimmediate links uniting them with what, relatively speaking, are\nother particulars in casual juxtaposition with them. [2]\n\n[1] The illustration was suggested to me by a passage in Mr. Stout\u2019s\n_Analytic Psychology_.\n\n[2] Ultimately, of course, the distinction is one of degree. What\noperates is always a general connection between members of a whole;\nthe only question is what kind of whole, and, therefore, what kind of\nconnection.\n\nIn the working and composition of mind the same difference is\nobservable between association and organisation. Mere association\nmeans that any perception or idea may suggest absolutely any mental\nelement whatever with which it has developed a connection by entering\ninto the same mental whole. A study of the purely associative mind is\nsometimes said to be found in the character of Miss Bates in \u201cEmma.\u201d\nPerhaps, as really uncontrolled association can hardly be found\nin a sane intellect, we may say that the character in question is\nsomething more subtle and more true to nature; and that is, a study\nof the tendency to pure association continually breaking out, and as\ncontinually repressed, or \u201cherded back\u201d to the main subject, to use\nthe expression which Walter Scott applies to the way in which just\nsuch an associative talker [1] is brought back to his point by his\nhearer.\n\n[1] Claude Halcro in the _Pirate_.\n\nIn mind, as in the external world, the higher stage of association\nis organisation. The characteristic of organisation is control by a\ngeneral scheme [1] as opposed to influence by juxtaposition {163}\nof units. The zigzag course of thought which is represented in such\na character as Miss Bates is due to the absence of control by any\ngeneral scheme. Every idea--every significant word--has practically\ninnumerable connections in the mind. If the course of thought has no\ngeneral direction impressed upon it, no selective control operative\nwithin it, it may change its line altogether at every principal word.\n[2] The possibilities of the ideas at our command make them like a\ncomplex of railways, wholly consisting of turn-tables, so that, on\nany one of these component parts, the train may swing round and go\noff in a wholly new direction. This is notably illustrated by the\nsense of context in interpretation. For anyone who has no such sense,\npossible errors are endless, beyond the hope of correction.\n\n[1] For the psychological theory of such control see Stout, _Analytic\nPsych_. ii. 3.\n\n[2] If it has not enough control to complete a significant sentence,\nof course there is insanity or idiocy.\n\nThe opposite of such a zigzag course is a train of thought such as\nan argument. In a train of thought, one general idea prescribes the\ndirection, or forms the \u201csubject,\u201d or limits what has been called\nthe universe of discourse. Attention is wholly guided by the general\nidea, and refuses to be distracted by any interest or suggestion\nwhich does not bear upon it. Let the general idea be, for example,\nthe relation of wealth to the best life. Experience shows that it\nis most difficult to resist the varied interests and distractions\nwhich present themselves in the attempt to keep this relation in\nview. Easy and attractive modes of acquisition, easy and attractive\nmodes of expenditure, force themselves upon the mind as isolated\n{164} suggestions, and divert it from the question: \u201cShall I, or\nwill any one else, be the better for it, as I understand better?\u201d\nThe effort of control, needed to keep in view the general nature of\nour conception of what is best in life, and to attend to suggestions\nwhich offer themselves as to acquisition and expenditure, only in\nso far as they seem likely to promote that conception, means the\npredominance of a scheme or general idea through all the varied\ncircumstances of economic possibility. It makes no difference whether\nwe are speaking of reasoning or of practice. The nature of the\ncontrol which insists on relevancy, and of the intellectual system\nin which it exhibits itself, is the same in both cases. Every mind,\nin fact, is more or less organised under the control of dominant\nideas, which belong to its habitual preoccupations and determine\nthe constant bias of its thoughts. There is a well-known story how\na traveller in a railway carriage undertook to detect the vocation\nof each of his fellow travellers from their respective answers to\na single question. The question was: \u201cWhat is that which destroys\nwhat it has itself produced?\u201d and a naturalist, so the story runs,\nrevealed himself by the answer, \u201cvital force,\u201d a soldier replied\n\u201cwar,\u201d a scholar \u201cKronos,\u201d a journalist \u201crevolution,\u201d and a farmer \u201ca\nboar.\u201d [1] Each answer was determined by the dominant bias or idea\nwhich selected out of the possible answers to the riddle that which\nwould harmonise with the general mental system under its control.\nSelection, it must be remembered, is at the same time creation. In\nevery situation, {165} theoretical or practical, the surroundings\nas a whole are new, and the rule or scheme has to assert itself in\nconditions which are not precisely repeated from any former case. In\nso asserting itself it does not simply _reproduce_ something old,\nany more than a batsman recalls a former movement when he plays a\nball, but it _produces_ that thought or deed which expresses its\nnature with reference to the new surroundings in which it has to act.\n[2] For it is a universal tendency, a scheme partly defined, and in\nprocess of further defining itself by moulding the material presented\nto it.\n\n[1] Steinthal, in James\u2019 _Psychology_, II., 108.\n\n[2] See Mr. Stout on \u201cProportional Systems,\u201d _Analytic Psychology_,\nii. 167.\n\nThere is one more essential point. A mind has its dominant nature,\nbut is no single system equally organised throughout. It is rather\na construction of such systems, which may be in all degrees of\nalliance, indifference, and opposition to one another. Each of such\nsystems, or groups of ideas and experiences, has its own dominant\nscheme, and its own tendency in controlling thought or action. And,\nas a general rule, in proportion as one system is active, all the\nothers are quiescent; in proportion as we are intent or engaged upon\none train of thought or one pursuit, we are not alive to suggestions\nbelonging to any other. Every system, or group of this kind, is\ncalled in psychology an \u201cAppercipient mass,\u201d because it is a set of\nideas, bound together by a common rule or scheme, which dictates\nthe point of view from which perception will take place, so far as\nthe system in question is active. And without some \u201capperception,\u201d\nsome point of view in the mind which enables the {166} newcomer to\nbe classed, there cannot be perception at all. The eye only sees\nwhat it brings with it the power of seeing. Hence some of the most\nstriking instances of apperception are drawn from elementary cases\nin which a really remote system is active in default of a better,\njust because the action of some system is necessary and the nearest\nresponds. A child calls an orange \u201ca ball\u201d; a Polynesian calls a\nhorse \u201ca pig.\u201d These are the nearest \u201cheads\u201d or rules of apperception\nunder which the new perception can be brought. Every scientific\nidea we apply, every set of relations in which we stand, and every\npursuit with which the mind is familiar, is a case of such an\nappercipient mass, or rule or scheme of attention. And we know by\ncommon experience how entirely quiescent is one such factor of the\nmind while we are absorbed in the activity of another; how utterly,\nfor example, we disregard the botanical character of wild flowers\nwhen we are clearing them out of the garden as weeds, and how wholly\nwe neglect the question whether they are \u201cflowers\u201d or \u201cweeds\u201d when\nwe are occupied in studying their botanical character. And in the\naction of every appercipient mass, in as far as it determines thought\nby the general nature of a systematic whole, rather than through\nthe isolated attraction exercised by unit upon unit, we have an\nexample of organisation as opposed to association; or, if we like,\nof systematic connection or association between whole and part, as\nopposed to the same principle operating casually and superficially\nbetween unit and unit.\n\nThe scheme or systematic connection, it must be added, may work\nunconsciously. Not all ideas {167} which control our thought and\naction are explicit ideas in abstract form; and perhaps the general\nnature and limits of a man\u2019s mind are something of which he can never\nbe reflectively conscious, though he is aware of what he takes to\nbe his leading ideas. It is well known that principles which are\nnot presented to reflection may be intellectually operative, and\nembodied in a train of results. Thus our appercipient masses may\nhave very different degrees of explicit system. But their action is\nalways systematic--the nature of the whole modifying what it comes in\ncontact with, and being modified by it.\n\nWith this conception of psychical systems before us, let us cast\none more glance at the organisation of society and the State. We\nrefused to take a crowd as a true type of society, and we looked to\nthe example of an army for the leading features of organisation as\nopposed to casual \u201cassociation.\u201d The characteristic of an army on\nwhich we insisted was the determination of every unit in it, not by\nthe movements and impulses of his immediate neighbours, but by the\nscheme or idea of the whole. Now, on looking closer, we see that\nsociety as such is a vast tissue of systems of this type, each of\nthem a relatively, though not absolutely, closed and self-complete\norganisation. There are wheels within wheels, systems within systems,\ngroups within groups. But, speaking generally, the business and\npleasure of society is carried on by persons arranged in groups,\nwhich exhibit the characteristic of organisation that the capacity\nof every person is determined by the general nature and principle\nof the group considered as a whole, and not by his relations to the\nunits who happen to be next him. {168} Such groups, for example, are\nthe trades and professions. Their structure may be very different.\nIn some the workshop is again a subordinate self-organised group. In\nothers the professional man works alone, and to all appearances goes\nhis own way. It is common to all of them, however, that they form\ngroupings of members, within each of which groupings all members are\ndetermined in a certain way by the common nature of the group. Within\nhis trade or profession, a man acts, as it is said, in a definite\n\u201ccapacity.\u201d He regards himself and is regarded from a definite point\nof view, and all other points of view tend to be neglected while\nand in so far as he is acting in the capacity corresponding to his\nmembership of a certain group. [1]\n\n[1] The group to which he belongs, as bound together by differences,\nis often rather that of his clients or customers than of his\ncolleagues in his vocation. But there is generally a differentiation\nwithin the vocation-group also.\n\n_Prima facie_, there may be, as with systems which compose the\nmind, all degrees of alliance, indifference, or opposition between\nthese groupings of persons; and the same person, belonging to many\ndifferent groups, may find his diverse \u201ccapacities\u201d apparently at\nvariance with one another. A conscientious Trade Unionist may find\nhis capacity as a member of the Union, interpreted as binding him\nto do his utmost for the amelioration of working class conditions\nin general, apparently at variance with his capacity as the head of\na family bound to provide immediately for those whom he has brought\ninto the world. Or a judge or magistrate, obliged to {169} enforce\nwhat he conceives to be a bad law, may find his official capacity\napparently at variance with his duty as a conscientious citizen. It\nis plain that unless, on the whole, a working harmony were maintained\nbetween the different groups which form society, life could not go\non. And it is for this reason that the State, as the widest grouping\nwhose members are effectively united by a common experience, is\nnecessarily the one community which has absolute power to ensure, by\nforce, if need be, at least sufficient adjustment of the claims of\nall other groupings to make life possible. Assuming, indeed, that\nall the groupings are organs of a single pervading life, we find it\nincredible that there should ultimately be irreconcilable opposition\nbetween them. That they should contradict one another is not more\nnor less possible than that human nature should be at variance with\nitself.\n\nThus, we have seen that the mind, and society or the State, are\nidentical in the characteristic of being organisations, each composed\nof a system of organisations, every superior and subordinate grouping\nhaving its own nature and principle which determines its members as\nsuch, and every one, consequently, tending to impose upon its members\na peculiar capacity or point of view, which, in so far as a given\nsystem is active, tends to put all other systems out of sight. The\nconnection between these systems is of very different kinds, and very\nunequal in degree; but in as far as the mind and the community are\nactual working wholes, it is to be presumed that in each there is an\nultimate or pervading adjustment which hinders {170} contradiction\nfrom proceeding to destructive extremes. And neither the mind nor\nthe community, as working organisations, can be accounted for on the\nprinciple of mere association.\n\n(2) After pointing out the analogy between the organised structure\nof minds and the organised structure of society, we now go on to\nshow that minds and society are really the same fabric regarded from\ndifferent points of view. The explanation may be divided into three\nparts.\n\n(i.) Every social group is the external aspect of a set of\ncorresponding mental systems in individual minds.\n\n(ii.) Every individual mind is a system of such systems corresponding\nto the totality of social groups as seen from a particular position.\n\n(iii.) The social whole, though implied in every mind, only has\nreality in the totality of minds in a given community considered as\nan identical working system.\n\n(i.) Society and the State and every institution present themselves\nto us at first sight as a number of persons, together, perhaps, with\ncertain buildings and other external apparatus, and certain kinds\nof work carried on and tangible results produced--so many children\n\u201ceducated,\u201d so many workmen \u201cemployed,\u201d so many ships built or fields\ntilled.\n\nBut if we could bring before ourselves the complete reality of any\nsocial group or institution, we should find ourselves considering\na very different order of facts. Let us think for a moment of\na rate-supported elementary school. We imagine it as a heap of\nbuildings and a mass of children with a percentage of teachers\nscattered among {171} them. But in what does its actual working\nreally consist, and on what does it depend?\n\nThe actual reality of the school lies in the fact that certain living\nminds are connected in a certain way. Teachers, pupils, managers,\nparents, and the public must all of them have certain operative\nideas, and must be guided according to these ideas in certain\nportions of their lives, if the school is to be a school. Now, the\nbeing guided by certain operative ideas is, in other words, the\nactivity of certain appercipient masses dictating a certain point of\nview, in so far as those particular masses are awake. And it must\nbe noted that the connection or identity in which the school exists\npresupposes a different activity, that is, a different appercipient\nsystem, in every mind, and more especially in every class of mind\nconcerned. It is the same as in our old example of the screw and the\nnut. No school could be made of teachers alone or of pupils alone;\nnor, again, could a school be made with teachers who were all the\nsame, or with pupils who were all the same.\n\nSo, if we could visualise the reality of the school--the\ninstitution--what we should see would be an identical connection\nrunning through a number of minds, various and variously conditioned.\nBut within each mind the connection would take a particular shape,\nsuch as to play into the connections with all other minds, as a\ncogwheel plays into the other cogwheels of a machine. The pupil must\nbe prepared to learn in his particular way and the teacher to teach\nin his particular way. The parents and the public also have their\n{172} own relations to the work of teaching, and whether for good\nor for evil they take up some attitude to it, and their attitude\nmodifies it. Thus the connection, as it is within any one mind,\nis useless and meaningless if you take it wholly apart from what\ncorresponds to it in the others. It is like a wheel without an axle\nor a pump handle without a pump. And it is because of this nature of\nthe elements which make up the institution that it is possible for\nthe institution itself to be an identity, or connection, or meeting\npoint, by which many minds are bound together in a single system.\n\nIt may seem as if this way of analysing an institution was reducing\na solid fact into mere thoughts. But it is not really so. Taking the\nideas of all concerned as they really are, we have the facts in space\nand time--buildings, appliances, hours of work and attendance, and so\non--included in them. It is impossible to state the idea fully and\ncorrectly without including the environment on which it rests, and\nthe activities in which it is realised. We are not to omit the facts\nin space and time from what we mean by an institution; the only thing\nis that we have not known them as they really are till we have known\nthem as bound into unity by the mental systems of which they are the\ncontext or the expression. The child and the teacher alike must think\nof their work with reference to particular times and places, or they\nwould not do it at those times and places; and it is only in actually\ndoing it at those times and places that the idea, or point of view,\nwhich stands for the school in each of their minds, is able to assert\nitself without frustration.\n\n{173} Thus we may fairly say that every social group, or institution,\nis the aspect in space and time of a set of corresponding mental\nsystems in individual minds. We may draw corollaries from this\nconception, both as to the nature of the individual will, or active\nmind, and as to the nature of the social and political whole.\n\n(ii.) Every individual mind, in so far as it thinks and acts in\ndefinite schemes or contexts, is a structure of appercipient systems\nor organised dispositions. Now, we do not suggest at present that\nall appercipient systems can be represented as social groups, though\nthere are few, if any, such systems which do not involve some\nrelations with persons connected in time and space. But it is clear,\nfrom the explanations of the last section, that every social group\nor institution involves a system of appercipient systems, by which\nthe minds that take part in it are kept in correspondence. Every\nindividual mind, then, so far as it takes part in social groupings\nor institutions, is a structure of appercipient systems, answering,\neach to each, to the different capacities in which it enters into\neach grouping respectively. We have already remarked on the way in\nwhich the distinction between different \u201ccapacities\u201d answers to the\npsychological tendency for the activity of one appercipient system to\nobstruct the activity of all others. It is hardly necessary to point\nout that, partly for this reason, though the mind must be an actual\nstructure of systems, it is very far from being a rational system of\nsystems. The fact that, when one system is active, all others, as a\nrule, are inert, conceals the contradictions which {174} underlie the\nentire fabric, and protects them from criticism and correction.\n\nBut though the mind is thus implicitly self-contradictory in various\ndegrees, this does not alter the fact that its general nature is to\nbe a unity of organised ideas answering to the actual set of parts\nwhich the individual plays in the world of space and time. Thus each\nindividual mind, if we consider it as a whole, is an expression\nor reflection of society as a whole from a point of view which is\ndistinctive and unique. Every social factor or relation, to which it\nin any way corresponds, or in which it in any way plays its part,\nis represented in some feature of its appercipient organism. And\nprobably, just as, in any man\u2019s idea of London, there is hardly any\nfactor of London life which does not at least colour the background,\nso, in every individual impression of the social whole, there is\nno social feature that does not, in one way or another, contribute\nto the total effect. In the dispositions of every mind the entire\nsocial structure is reflected in a unique form, and it is on this\nreflection in every mind, and on the uniqueness of the form in which\nit is reflected, that the working of the social whole, by means of\ndifferences which play into one another, depends. If, so to speak,\nwe lay a mind on the dissecting table, we find it to consist for the\nmost part of a fabric of organised dispositions, each disposition\ncorresponding to a unique point of view or special angle [1] from\nwhich it plays a part in some human function. About the precise\nrelation of a human function to the fact that, as a {175} rule, it\nconnects together a plurality of human beings, we shall have more\nto say in the following chapter. It is enough for the present that\nwhatever does connect a plurality of human beings depends on the\noperation of appercipient systems in their minds, and therefore every\nindividual mind is, as Plato has told us, so far as it goes, for good\nor evil, the true effective reality of the social whole. And it is\neasy to see when we consider the working of organised apperception,\nhow it is possible actually to will more or less of our own\nvolitional system. There is first the contrast between appercipient\nsystems which are at any time active and those which are not active,\nand then there is the contrast between our actual volitional nature\nat its actual fullest, and the demands implied by the nature of\nthe whole, from which it is inseparable. These demands are always\nappearing more or less in every act of willing our own will.\n\n[1] I owe this comparison to a lecture by Prof. S. Alexander.\n\n(iii.) The social whole, regarded from a corresponding point of\nview, would be a whole consisting of psychical dispositions and\ntheir activities, answering to one another in determinate ways. It\nwould therefore be of the nature of a continuous or self-identical\nbeing, pervading a system of differences and realised only in them.\nIt differs from a machine, or from what is called an \u201corganism\u201d pure\nand simple, by the presence of the whole in every part, not merely\nfor the inference of the observer, but, in some degree, for the\npart itself, through the action of consciousness. But it would be a\nmistake, we should observe at this point, to identify the presence\nof {176} the whole for the part by means of consciousness, with the\nconsciousness of the part that the whole is present to it. The latter\nis a speculative idea, the former is a fact which embodies this idea\nfor the observing theorist, but not necessarily or usually for the\nworking consciousness itself. In the shape of our minds and their\nadjustment to our work, of which we are unconscious, there is an\nirreducible analogy between human society and the lower organisms.\nThe consciousness which guides our lives is a consciousness of\nsomething, but not as a rule a consciousness of the place of that\nsomething in the whole of life. We live in our objects, but we do not\nknow how or how far our objects identify us with the whole to which\nwe ultimately belong.\n\nIt is plain that the social whole can, in practice, only be complete\nin a plurality of individuals. We know that in the development of\nhuman nature, which we take as the ultimate standard of life, no one\nindividual can cover the whole ground. As in the natural world in\nspace and time, so, in the world of human beings which on one side\nbelongs to it, differentiation implies dispersion into a plurality\nof centres. The same man, according to what seems to be the limit\nof physical and psychical possibility, could not be both Plato\nand Aristotle, nor both Greek and Jew, not even both Spartan and\nAthenian, not to say both man and woman. We are on less secure ground\nwhen we say that he could not, effectively and as a rule, be both\nstatesman and shoemaker, or soldier and clergyman. It is plain that\nin some cases capacities may be united which in other cases are found\napart. {177} The same man may be a good architect and a good workman,\nor again, the architect and the workman may be different persons,\nthough suited to work together. We may reply, of course, that\nwhatever abilities lie within one personality, effective work demands\nthe division of labour. This is true, but is obviously a matter of\ndegree. The man who does only one thing does not always do it best,\nand it is not easy to say what \u201cone thing\u201d means.\n\nThe point of these suggestions is to make it clear that, while\nplurality of human beings is necessary to enable society to cover\nthe ground, as it were, which human nature is capable of covering,\nyet actual individuals are not ultimate or equal embodiments of the\ntrue particulars of the social universal. We thus see once more\nthat the given individual is only in making, and that his reality\nmay lie largely outside him. His will is not a whole, but implies\nand rests upon a whole, which is therefore the true nature of his\nwill. We also gain some light on the unity of the social mind. For\nit seems plain that one actual human being may cover the ground,\nwhich, in other instances, it takes many men to occupy. And in\nsome such examples--not, or not obviously, in those where a high\nintensity of genius is the essential quality--there seems little\nreason to distinguish the correlation of dispositions within the one\nperson from the correlation of the same dispositions if dispersed\namong different persons. If I am my own gardener, or my own critic,\nor my own doctor, does the relation of the answering dispositions\nwithin my being differ absolutely and altogether from what {178}\ntakes place when gardener and master, critic and author, patient and\ndoctor, are different persons? My instructions to my gardener are\nconveyed in language, it will be said, while I know my own wishes\ndirectly. And this is not the place to press the problem home either\npsychologically or metaphysically. But, just to induce reflection,\nit may be asked whether my instructions to myself are not as a rule\nconveyed and remembered in language. If we consider my unity with\nmyself at different times as the limiting case, [1] we shall find it\nvery hard to establish a difference of principle between the unity of\nwhat we call one mind and that of all the \u201cminds\u201d which enter into a\nsingle social experience.\n\n[1] Cp. p. 110 above.\n\nIn any case, we have said enough to suggest that Society _prima\nfacie_ exists in the correlated dispositions by which a plurality\nof individual minds meets the need for covering the ground open to\nhuman nature, by division of labour in the fullest sense. But we have\nfurther pointed out that the true particularisation of the human\nuniversal does not necessarily coincide with the distinction between\ndifferent persons, and that the correlation of differences and the\nidentity which they constitute remain much the same whether they\nchance to fall within a single human being, or to be dispersed over\nseveral. The stress seems, therefore, to lie on the attainment of the\ntrue particularisation which does justice to the maximum of human\ncapacity, rather than on the mere relations which arise between the\nmembers of a _de facto_ plurality. Not that the presence of human\nnature in any {179} individual does not constitute a claim that it\nshall be perfected in him, but that its perfecting must be judged by\na criticism addressed to determining real capacities, and not by the\naccidental standard of a given plurality. We shall pursue these ideas\nfurther in the following chapter.\n\n\n\n\n{180}\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nNATURE OF THE END OF THE STATE AND CONSEQUENT LIMIT OF STATE ACTION.\n\n1. According to the course of thought which we have been pursuing,\nthe distinction between the individual on the one hand, and the\nsocial or political whole on the other, is not relevant to the\nquestion where the \u201cend\u201d of man in Society is to be sought. For the\nconceptions of Society and the Individual are correlative conceptions\nthrough and through; at whatever level, therefore, we take the one,\nwe are bound to construe the other as at the same level; so that,\nto distinguish the one element from the other as superior from\ninferior, or as means from end, becomes a contradiction in terms. If\nwe begin by drawing boundaries round the individual, the boundaries\nwhich we draw reproduce themselves in society conceived as a total\nof such individuals, and the question of means and end, as we saw\nin Bentham\u2019s case, [1] takes the form whether \u201ceach\u201d is the means\nto the welfare of \u201call,\u201d or \u201call\u201d to the welfare of \u201ceach\u201d; the\ndistinction thus becoming purely verbal. While, if we set no limit\nto individuality, except the limit of the nature {181} which makes\nit contributory to the social universal, then we find that the\nadvancements of the universal and of its differences vary together,\nand are indeed one and the same thing. It is idle to think of\ndissociating them as means and end.\n\n[1] Chapter III.\n\nThe only way in which the idea of means and end can be applied to\nthe social whole and its parts, is to take Society when at its lower\nlevel, being dealt with under the aspect of mere plurality, as a\nmeans to what it is at its higher level, when realised as a communion\nof individualities at their best. But from this point of view we get\nno distinction of means and end as between Individuals and Society.\nWhat we get is Individuals and Society alike, as understood and\npartly existing at one level (that of commonplace Individualism and\nCollectivism), taken as a means to both Individuals and Society\nat a higher level. As we have seen, the only true explanation of\nself-government is to throw the reality of the self outside what\npasses for its average nature, and in this sense the average nature\nmay be treated as a means to the truer or fuller self--as something,\nthat is to say, which is instrumental to the latter, and has no\nrights against it.\n\n2. For us, then, the ultimate end of Society and the State as of\nthe individual is the realisation of the best life. The difficulty\nof defining the best life does not trouble us, because we rely\nthroughout on the fundamental logic of human nature _qua_ rational.\nWe think ourselves no more called upon to specify in advance what\nwill be the details of the life which satisfies an intelligent being\nas such, than we are called upon to specify in advance {182} what\nwill be the details of the knowledge which satisfies an intelligent\nbeing as such. Wherever a human being touches practice, as wherever\nhe touches theory, we find him driven on by his intolerance of\ncontradictions towards shaping his life as a whole. What we mean by\n\u201cgood\u201d and \u201ctruth\u201d is practical and theoretical experience in so far\nas the logic which underlies man\u2019s whole nature permits him to repose\nin it. And the best life is the life which has most of this general\ncharacter--the character which, so far as realised, satisfies the\nfundamental logic of man\u2019s capacities.\n\nNow, it is plain that this best life can only be realised in\nconsciousness, that being the medium of all satisfaction and the\nonly true type of a whole in experience. And all consciousness, as\nexperienced by man, is on one side particular, attached to bodies,\nand exclusive of consciousnesses attached to other bodies. In a\nsense, it is true that no one consciousness can partake of or\nactually enter into another. Thus, it is apt to be held, as we have\namply seen, that the essential danger of State interference lies in\nthe intrusion of something originated by \u201cothers\u201d upon a distinct\nparticular consciousness, whose distinction and particularity--its\nfreedom--are thus impaired. It is all-important to our point of view\nthat this prejudice should be dispelled. Force or automatic custom\nor authoritative tradition or \u201csuggestion\u201d are not hostile to one\nindividuality because they come from \u201cothers,\u201d but because their\nnature is contradictory to the nature of the highest self-assertion\nof mind, because they are, so to speak, in a medium incompatible with\nits medium. They {183} are just as hostile to this self-assertion,\njust as alien, if they emanate, as they constantly do, from\nconflicting elements in our complex private experience, as if they\ncome to us, as we say, \u201cfrom without.\u201d The question is of their\n\u201cnature\u201d and tendency, not of their centre of origin. Individuals are\nlimited and isolated in many ways. But their true individuality does\nnot lie in their isolation, but in that distinctive act or service\nby which they pass into unique contributions to the universal. True\nindividuality, as we have said, is not in the minimisation which\nforbids further subdivision, but in the maximisation which includes\nthe greatest possible being in an inviolable unity. It is not,\ntherefore, the intrusion upon isolation, as such, that interferes\nwith individuality; it is the intrusion, upon a growing unity of\nconsciousness, of a medium hostile to its growth.\n\nBut we have seen that force, automatism, and suggestion, are in\nsome ways necessary to the support and maintenance of the human\nconsciousness, owing to its animal limitations. They are, indeed, as\nis well known, the condition of its progress. Therefore, in promoting\nthe best life, these aids must be employed by society as exercising\nabsolute power--viz., by the State. And the problem presented\nby their employment is _not_ a question of the \u201cinterference of\nthe State with the Individual\u201d--an antithesis which is strictly\nmeaningless; but it is a question how far and in what way the use of\nforce and the like by the State is a hindrance to the end for which\nthe State itself exists. In other words, it is to be ascertained\nhow far the fullest self-assertion of the social {184} universal\nin its differences--the best life--can be promoted or is likely to\nbe endangered by means which are of a different order, and so in\nsome circumstances opposed to it. The point is not that _I_ and\nsome thousands more break in by force upon _you_ in particular and\nviolate _your_ isolation; but that such breaking in by force, whoever\ndoes it and whoever suffers by it, and even if through passion or\nobsession _you_ do it to _your_self and _I_ to _my_self, is hostile\n_prima facie_ to the living logic of the will, which alone can create\na unity and realise a best. How then, and under what reservations,\nin the complicated conflict of the fuller and narrower self, can\nthis dangerous drug of violence be administered, so to speak, as a\ncounter-poison to tendencies which would otherwise give no chance\nto the logical will? With this difficulty in our minds, we will\nendeavour to determine the general principle on which force and\nmenace should be used by the State, and a routine be mechanically\nmaintained by it.\n\n3. We have hitherto spoken of the State and Society as almost\nconvertible terms. [1] And in fact it is part of our argument that\nthe influences of Society differ only in degree from the powers of\nthe State, and that the explanation of both is ultimately the same.\nBut on the other hand, it is also part of our argument that the\nState as such is a necessary factor in civilised life; and that no\ntrue ideal lies in the direction of minimising its individuality or\nrestricting its absolute power. By the State, then, we mean Society\nas a unit, recognised as rightly exercising control over its members\n{185} through absolute physical power. The limits of the unit are, of\ncourse, determined by what looks like historical accident; but there\nis logic underneath the apparent accident, and the most tremendous\npolitical questions turn upon the delimitation of political units.\nA principle, so to speak, of political parsimony--_entia non sunt\nmultiplicanda praeter necessitatem_, \u201ctwo organisations will not\nsurvive when one can do the work\u201d--is always tending to expand the\npolitical unit. The limits of the common experience necessary for\neffective self-government are always operating to control this\nexpansion. We might therefore suggest, as a principle determining\nthe area of states, \u201cthe widest territorial area compatible with the\nunity of experience which is demanded by effective self-government.\u201d\nBut the State _de facto_ (which is also _de jure_) is the Society\nwhich is recognised as exercising compulsory power over its members,\nand as presenting itself _qua_ a single independent corporation among\nother independent corporations. Without such power, or where, if\nanywhere, it does not exist, there can be no ultimate and effective\nadjustment of the claims of individuals, and of the various social\ngroups in which individuals are involved. It is the need for this\nultimate effective adjustment which constitutes the need that every\nindividual in civilised life should belong to one state, and to one\nonly. Otherwise his \u201creal\u201d will might have no working representative\nat all, but all be sheer conflict. That Society, then, is a State,\nwhich is habitually recognised as a unit lawfully exercising force.\nWe saw that the characteristics of Society pass gradually into those\nof the State. It would not be true that {196} Society is a State\nonly as actually exercising force; but it would perhaps be true to\nsay that State action as such, though far from being limited to\nthe downright exercise of force, yet consists of all that side of\nsocial action which depends on the character of ultimate arbiter\nand regulator, maintainer of mechanical routine, and source of\nauthoritative suggestion, a character which is one with the right to\nexercise force in the last resort.\n\n[1] See, however, p. 150 ff.\n\nThe end of the State, then, is the end of Society and of the\nIndividual--the best life, as determined by the fundamental logic\nof the will. The means at its disposal, _qua_ State, always partake\nof the nature of force, though this does not exclude their having\nother aspects as well. Taxation may have the most reasonable and\neven the most popular purpose, yet the generality and justice of\nits incidence, and the certainty of its productiveness, can only be\nsecured by compulsion. No State could undertake its work on the basis\nof voluntary contributions. A universal end, we might say, is indeed\nnot a mere general rule; but you cannot carry out a universal end in\na plurality of units--and a set of human individuals is always in one\naspect a plurality of units--without enforcing general rules.\n\n4. Here, then, we have our problem more closely determined than in\nthe previous chapters. There we saw, in general, that self-government\ncan have no meaning unless we can \u201creally\u201d will something which we\ndo not always \u201cactually\u201d will. And we were led to look for a clue to\nour real or implied will in the social spirit as incorporated in laws\nand institutions, that is to say in Society as a {187} working whole\nreflected in the full system of the consciousnesses which composed it.\n\nWe supposed ourselves prepared, then, it would seem, to do and\nsuffer anything which would promote the best life of the whole--that\nmaximisation of our being which, from the nature of our real will, we\nsaw to be imperative upon us--a demand implied in every volition and\nfrom which we could never escape.\n\nBut now we are face to face with the question what we _are_ called\nupon to do or to suffer, as members of a State, in promotion of\nthe best life. We have here to renew, from another standpoint, the\ndiscussions of chapter iii. The governing fact of the situation is\nthat the means of action at our disposal as members of a State are\nnot, on their distinctive side, _in pari materia_ with the end. It\nis true that the State, as an intelligent system, can appeal by\nreasoning and persuasion to the logical will as such. It constantly\ndoes so in various forms, and a State which did nothing of the kind\neither directly or indirectly would not possess the recognition\nwhich is necessary to its very existence. So far its work is _in\npari materia_ with the end, being a direct element in the expansion\nof mind and character in their own spiritual medium of thought and\nwill. But this side of its work is not distinctive of the State,\nand, therefore, is not that for which more particularly it exists.\nIts distinctive attribute is to be ultimate arbiter and regulator\nof claims, the guarantor of life as _at least_ a workable system\nin the bodily world. It is in its ultimateness _de facto_ that the\ndifferentia lies which separates it from the innumerable {188} other\ngroupings and associations which go to make up our complex life. This\nis shown in the fact that each of us, as we have said, must belong\nto a State, and can belong to one only. For an ultimate authority\nmust be single. Now, authority which is to be ultimate in a sphere\nincluding the world of bodily action, must be an authority which\ncan use force. And it is for this reason that, as we said, force is\ninvolved in the distinctive attributes of the State.\n\nBut force is not _in pari materia_ with the expansion of mind and\ncharacter in their spiritual medium. And, thus, there at once appears\nan inadequacy of means to end as between the distinctive _modus\noperandi_ of the State and the end in virtue of which it claims to\nrepresent the \u201creal\u201d will.\n\nWhat is the bearing of this inadequacy? What is the most that the\nState, in its distinctive capacity, can do towards promoting a form\nof life which it recognises as desirable? Its direct power is limited\nto securing the performance of external [1] actions. This does not\nmean merely the performance of outward bodily movements, such as\nmight be brought to pass by actual physical force. It is remarkable\nthat actual physical force plays a very small part in the work of any\ndecently ordered State. When we say that the State can do no more\nthan secure the performance of external actions, we do not exclude\nfrom the action the intention to act in a certain way. With out such\nan intention there is no action in the sense of human action at all,\nbut merely a muscular movement. It is necessary for the State to\nattach {189} importance to intention, which is involved in the idea\nof human action, and is the only medium through which the muscular\nmovements of human beings can be determined with any degree of\ncertainty. The State, then, through its authority, backed ultimately\nby physical force, can produce, with a fair degree of certainty,\nthe intention to act in a certain way, and therefore the actions\nthemselves. Why do we call intentional actions, so produced, external\nactions only?\n\n[1] Green, _Principles of Political Obligation_, pp. 34, 35.\n\nIt is because the State is unable to determine that the action\nshall be done from the ground or motive which alone would give it\nimmediate value or durable certainty as an element in the best life.\nOn the contrary, in so far as the doing of the action is due to the\ndistinctive mode of operation which belongs to the State, due, that\nis to say, to the hope of reward or the fear of punishment, its value\nas an element in the best life is _ipso facto_ destroyed, except in\nso far as its ulterior effects are concerned. An action performed in\nthis sense under compulsion is not a true part of the will. [1] It is\nan intention adopted from submissiveness or selfishness, and lacks\nnot only the moral value, but what is partly the same thing, the\nreliable constancy of principle, displayed in an action which arises\nout of the permanent purposes of a life.\n\n[1] The theory of punishment will modify this proposition in some\ndegree.\n\nThe State, then, as such, can only secure the performance of external\nactions. That is to say, it can only enforce as much intention [1]\nas is {190} necessary to ensure, on the whole, compliance with\nrequirements stated in terms of movements affecting the outer world.\nSo far from promoting the performance of actions which enter into the\nbest life, its operations, where effective, must directly narrow the\narea of such actions by stimulating lower motives as regards some\nportion of it.\n\n[1] On this question _vide_ Green\u2019s very thorough discussion. It is\ntrue, of course, that the law takes account of intention, and does\nnot, _e.g._, treat accidental homicide as murder, the difference\nbetween them being a difference of intention. But it is obvious that,\nin attempting to influence human action at all, so much account\nas this must be taken of intention; for intention is necessary to\nconstitute a human action. An unintentional movement of the muscles\ncannot be guarded against by laws and penalties; it is only through\nthe intention that deterrent or other motives can get at the action,\nand a constant law-abiding disposition is the best security for\nlaw-abiding action. On the importance of intention and disposition as\naffording a certainty of action, Bentham, who wholly rejects judgment\naccording to moral motive, is as emphatic as possible.\n\n5. The State, then, in its distinctive capacity, has no agency at its\ncommand for influencing conduct, but such as may be used to produce\nan external course of behaviour by the injunction or prohibition of\nexternal acts, in enforcing which acts the State will take note of\nintentions, so far as it can infer them, because it is only through\nthem that its influence can be exerted.\n\nThe relation of such a means to the imperative end, on which we have\nseen that political obligation depends, must be in a certain sense\nnegative. The means is one which cannot directly promote the end,\nand which even tends to narrow its sphere. What it can effect is to\nremove obstacles, to destroy conditions hostile to the realisation\nof the end. This brings us back to a principle laid down by Kant,\n[1] and in its bare statement strongly resembling Mill\u2019s contention.\nWhen force is opposed to {191} freedom, a force that repels that\nforce is right. Here, of course, all depends upon what we mean by\nfreedom, and in what sense we think that force can hinder hindrances\nto it. If freedom meant for us the empty hexagon [2] round each\nindividual, the principle would take us back to Mill\u2019s Liberty. If,\non the other hand, we failed to grasp the discrepancy between force\nof any kind and the positive nature of the common good which we take\nto be freedom, the principle would lead us straight to a machine-made\nUtopia. For its negative character cannot restrain it from some\ndegree of positive action. It is only through positive operation\nthat a negation or opposition can find reality in the world. And the\nlimits of its positive action must depend on the precise bearings of\nthe negation which it puts in force.\n\n[1] W., ix. 34. Fichte remarked on the pregnancy of this principle.\n\n[2] See p. 72, above.\n\nNow, for us, after the explanations which have been given, the\nnegative nature of our principle is to be seriously pressed, although\nits action has to take positive form. The State is in its right when\nit forcibly hinders hindrance to the best life or common good. In\nhindering such hindrances it will indeed do positive acts. It may\ntry to hinder illiteracy and intemperance by compelling education\nand by municipalising the liquor traffic. Why not, it will be asked,\nhinder also unemployment by universal employment, over-crowding by\nuniversal house-building, and immorality by punishing immoral and\nrewarding moral actions? Here comes the value of remembering that,\naccording to our principle, State action is negative in its immediate\nbearing, though positive both in its {192} actual doings and its\nultimate purpose. On every problem the question must recur, \u201cIs the\nproposed measure _bona fide_ confined to hindering a hindrance, or\nis it attempting direct promotion of the common good by force?\u201d For\nit is to be borne in mind throughout that whatever acts are enforced\nare, so far as the force operates, withdrawn from the higher life.\nThe promotion of morality by force, for instance, is an absolute\nself-contradiction. [1] No general principle will tell us how in\nparticular to solve this subtle question, apart from common sense\nand special experience. But there is perhaps more to be learned from\nthis principle, if approached with _bona fides_ [2] than from most\ngeneralities of philosophy on social or ethical topics. It is well,\nI think, constantly to apply the idea of removing hindrances, in\ncriticism of our efforts to promote the best life by means involving\ncompulsion. We ought, as a rule, when we propose action involving\ncompulsion, to be able to show a definite tendency to growth, or\na definite reserve of capacity, which is frustrated by a known\nimpediment, the removal of which is a small matter compared to the\ncapacities to be set free. [3] For it should be remarked that {193}\nevery act done by the public power has one aspect of encroachment,\nhowever slight, on the sphere of character and intelligence, if only\nby using funds raised by taxation, or by introducing an automatic\narrangement into life. It can, therefore, only be justified if it\nliberates resources of character and intelligence greater beyond all\nquestion than the encroachment which it involves. This relation is\naltogether perversely presented, as we saw above, if it is treated as\nan encroachment of society upon individuals. All this is beside the\nmark. The serious point is, that it is an interference, _so far as\ncompulsion operates in it_, of one type of action with another and\nhigher type of action; of automatism, so to speak, with intelligent\nvolition. The higher type of action, the embodiment of the common\ngood in logical growth, is so far from being merely individual as\nopposed to social, that it is the whole end and purpose in the name\nof which allegiance to society can be demanded from any individual.\nAs in the private so in the general life, every encroachment of\nautomatism must be justified by opening new possibilities to\nself-conscious development, if it is not to mean degeneration and\nsenility.\n\n[1] \u201cYou will admit,\u201d it was once said, \u201cthat compulsory religion is\nbetter than no religion.\u201d \u201cI fail to see the distinction\u201d was the\nreply.\n\n[2] Among true students _bona fides_ is presupposed. The range opened\nto sophistry by a principle of this kind, which commends positive\naction with a negative bearing for a positive end, is, of course,\nimmeasurable. Practically, I believe that _bona fides_ is about the\nfirst and last necessity for the application of political ideas.\n\n[3] Perhaps I may adduce an instance of real interest. It has been\nargued that ship-masters should be induced by a premium to ship\nboys as apprentices to the trade of seamanship, and that training\nfor this trade should be fostered by local authorities like any\nother form of technical education. The argument which really told\nin the discussion, consisted of statistics which seemed to prove a\nwide-spread eagerness on the part of boys and their parents that they\nshould enter a maritime life, and the existence of a hindrance simply\nin the absence of adequate training for a few years during boyhood.\n\nIt is the same principle in other words which Green lays down when\nhe says in effect [1] that only such acts (or omissions) should be\nenforced by the public power as it is better should take place {194}\nfrom any motive whatever than not take place at all. When, that is,\nwe enforce an act (or omission) by law, we should be prepared to\nsay, \u201cgranting that this act, which might conceivably have come to\nbe done from a sense of duty, now may come to be done for the most\npart from a fear of punishment, or from a mechanical tendency to\nsubmit to external rules (attended by the practical inconveniences of\ninsensibility, half-heartedness, and evasion which attach to acts so\nenforced), still so much depends, for the higher life of the people,\nupon the external conditions at stake, that we think it worth while\nto enforce the act (or omission) though our eyes are fully open to\nthe risk of extended automatism.\u201d\n\n[1] _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. 38.\n\nHere we may have to meet our own arguments against Mill. \u201cYou said\nit was a contradiction,\u201d we shall be told, \u201cto admit coercion as a\nmeans to liberty. But here you are advocating coercion as a means to\nsomething as incompatible with it, in so far as it is operative, as\nour \u2018liberty,\u2019 viz., a certain state of mind and will. If the area of\ncoercion is necessarily subtracted from the area of liberty, as you\nargued above, is not the area of coercion necessarily subtracted from\nthat to be occupied by the desired growth of will and character?\u201d\n\nThe answer depends, as we indicated in ch. iii., on the difference\nbetween bare liberty and a determinate growth. If your liberty is\nwholly indeterminate, then every restraint is a reduction of it. You\ncannot increase a quantity which is all of one kind by taking away\na part of it. And, in fact, the idea that there was or could have\n{195} been a previous general liberty, of which a part was given up\nin exchange for more, is a mere illusion. Liberty has grown up within\nthe positive determinations of life, as they have expanded and come\nto fit mankind better.\n\nBut if the quantity to be increased is a determinate growth, of a\ntype whose general character is known, the problem is transformed.\nIt is the commonest of experiences that hindrances can be removed\nand favourable conditions maintained, if this has to be done, not\nwith a view to every conceivable and inconceivable development,\nbut for a growth the general line of which is known. In this case,\nas the whole expands, the restraints and the liberty, the room for\naction, may even increase together. [1] This is not only true in\nuniversal theory, but much more important than is always remembered\nin special theory or practice. The possibility of promoting freedom\nor well-being by compulsion depends very greatly indeed on the unity\nof habit and experience which binds together a single community.\nThe more the life has in common, the more definite and automatic\narrangements you may safely make in promotion of it. The rules of my\nhousehold, which inconvenience its members no more than their clothes\ndo, would produce a rebellion if they were enforced by law even\nthroughout our village.\n\n[1] See the author\u2019s essay, \u201cLiberty and Legislation,\u201d in\n_Civilisation of Christendom_ (Sonnenschein).\n\nThus, then, we may maintain our principle of the limits of\ndistinctive State action. The peculiarity of it is that it allows\nof positive acts and interferences, motived by an ultimate positive\n{196} purpose, but with a bearing on that purpose which is primarily\nnegative or indirect. However positive, as actual facts, are the\nconditions which it may become advisable to maintain, they may\nalways, on the side which is distinctively due to State compulsion,\nbe regarded as the hindrance of hindrances. And the _bona-fide_\napplication of this principle will really be, when aided by special\nexperience, in some degree a valuable clue to what ought to be done.\nIt is only putting in other words the rule of action followed by all\npractical men in matters of which they have genuine experience. We\nmay think, for instance, of the problem involved in State maintenance\nof universities. It is easy to vote money, to build buildings, and\nto pass statutes. But none of these things will secure the objects\nof a university. Money and buildings and statutes may throw open an\narena, so to speak, for the work of willing minds in learning and\neducation. But the work itself is in a different medium from anything\nwhich can be produced by compulsion, and is so far less vital as it\nis conditioned by the operation of force upon minds which demand no\nwork of the kind.\n\nBut here we meet a difficulty of principle. Do we say that no\nexternal conditions are more than hindrances of hindrances to the\nbest life? Do we deny that the best life can be positively promoted\nby external conditions; or if we admit this, do we still deny that it\ncan be positively promoted by the work of the State? The answer has\nalready been implied, but may be explicitly restated. We refused [1]\nto separate mind from its embodiment in {197} material things, and\nso to be drawn into a purely inward theory of morality, It would be\nexaggeration to call such external conditions as, _e.g_., first-rate\neducational apparatus, [2] mere negative conditions of the best life.\nBut then, we are now asked, cannot the State supply such external\nconditions by expenditure compulsorily provided for, and if so, is\nnot our principle destroyed, viz., the limitation of State action to\nthe hindrance of hindrances?\n\n[1] Page 31.\n\n[2] See Thring on the importance of this, in Parkin\u2019s life of him.\nNote, however, also the modification of his view by the adventure of\nUppingham on the Sea.\n\nThe difficulty springs from the fact, that the State, as using\ncompulsion, is only one side of Society, and its action is only\none side of social action. If first-rate educational apparatus is\ncalled into existence by a State endowment, the first-rateness of the\napparatus is not due to the compulsion applied to taxpayers, which\nrather, so far, negatives the action of intelligent will as such. But\nit must be due, in one way or another, to the fact that first-rate\nability in the way of devising apparatus was somewhere pressing for\nan outlet, which, by a stroke of the pickaxe, so to speak, the public\npower was able to provide for it. We must not confuse the element of\ncompulsion, which is the side of social action distinctly belonging\nto State interference, with the whole of the material results which\nliberated intelligence produces. When we say, then, that the State as\nsuch can do nothing for the best life but hinder hindrances to it,\nthe principle applies in the strictest sense only to the compulsory\nor automatic side of State action, which {198} must, so to speak, be\nreckoned against it [1] in comparing its products with those which\nare spontaneous social growths throughout.\n\n[1] Subject to what will be said on the theory of rights and\npunishment.\n\nBut it is further true that material conditions which come close to\nlife, such as houses, wages, educational apparatus, do not wholly\nescape our principle. They occupy a very interesting middle region\nbetween mere hindrances of hindrances and the actual stimulation\nof mind and will. On the one side they are charged with mind and\ncharacter, and so far are actual elements in the best life. On the\nother side they depend on external actions, and therefore seem\naccessible to State compulsion, which extends to all external\ndoings and omissions. But what we have to observe is, and it is in\npractice most important, that, _as charged with mind and will_,\nthese material facts may not be accessible to State compulsion,\nwhile, _as accessible to State compulsion_ pure and simple, they\nmay forfeit their character of being charged with mind and will.\nThis shows itself in two ways. First, just because they are facts\nof a kind which come so close to life (in other words depend so\ngreatly upon being charged with mind and will), State compulsion\ncannot with certainty secure even their apparent existence. They\nfail bodily, like human beings, if there is no spirit to keep them\nalive. The relation of wages to the standard of life illustrates this\npoint. Secondly, supposing that for a time, by herculean efforts of\ncompulsion, which must call active intelligence to its aid, such\nfacts are made to present a satisfactory appearance of existence,\nnone the less, {199} so far as they are characterised by compulsion,\nthey may lose their character as elements in the best life. That\nis to say, they may fail to benefit those whom they are meant to\nbenefit. The fact may fail to be absorbed in the life.\n\nThe principle of the hindrance of hindrances is most valuable and\nluminous when rightly grasped, just in these middle cases. A pretty\nand healthy house, which its inhabitant is fond of, is an element in\nthe best life. Who could doubt it who knows what home-life is? But\nin order that putting a family out of a bad house into a good one\nshould give rise to such an element of the best life, it is strictly\nand precisely necessary that the case or policy should come under our\nprinciple. That is to say, unless there was a better life struggling\nto utter itself, and the deadlift of interference just removed an\nobstacle which bound it down, the good house will not be an element\nin a better life, and the encroachment on the ground of volition will\nhave been made with out compensation--a fact which may show itself in\nmany fatal ways. If, on the other hand, the struggling tendency to a\nbetter life has power [1] to effect the change without the deadlift\nfrom outside, then the result is certain and wholly to the good.\n\n[1] Many forms of _social_ co-operation, it must be remembered, need\nno deadlift from the _State_ as such. We are not setting self-help\nagainst co-operation, but will against automatism.\n\nThus we may say that every law and institution, every external fact\nmaintained by the public power, must be judged by the degree in which\nit sets at liberty a growth of mind and spirit. It is a {200} problem\npartly of removing obstacles to growth, and partly of the division of\nlabour between consciousness and automatism.\n\nIt ought to occur to the reader that the ground here assigned for\nthe limitation of State action--that is, of social action through\nthe public power--is not _prima facie_ in harmony with the account\nof political obligation, according to which laws and institutions\nrepresented a real self or general will, recognised by individuals\nas implied in the common good which was imperative upon them. We\nspoke, for example, of being forced to be free, and of the system of\nlaw and order as representing the higher self. And yet we are now\nsaying that, in as far as force is operative through compulsion and\nauthoritative suggestion, it is a means which can only reach its end\nthrough a negation.\n\nBut this _prima-facie_ contradiction is really a proof of the\nvitality of our principle. It follows from the fact that we\naccept self-government in the full strength of both its factors,\nand can deal with it on this basis. The social system under\nwhich we live, taking it as one which does not demand immediate\nrevolution, represents the general will and higher self as a whole\nto the community as a whole, and can only stand by virtue of that\nrepresentation being recognised. Our loyalty to it makes us men and\ncitizens, and is the main spiritualising force of our lives. But\nsomething in all of us, and much in some of us, is recalcitrant\nthrough rebellion, indolence, incompetence, or ignorance. And it\nis only on these elements that the public power operates as power,\nthrough compulsion {201} or authoritative suggestion. Thus, the\ngeneral will when it meets us as force, and authority resting on\nforce, and not as a social obligation which we spontaneously rise\nto accept, comes to us _ex hypothesi_ as something which claims\nto be ourself, but which, for the moment, we more or less fail\nto recognise. And, according to the adjustment between it and\nour complex and largely unintelligent self, it may abandon us to\nautomatism, or stir in us rebellion or recognition, and so may\nhinder the fuller life in us or remove hindrances to it. It seems\nworth while to distinguish two main cases of the relation between\nthe ordinary self and the general will. One of these cases covers\nthe whole of our every-day law-abiding life, in its grades of active\nloyalty, acceptance of suggestion, and automatic acquiescence; and\nconsists of the relation of our ordinary self to the general system\nof rights maintained by the State as ultimate regulator and arbiter.\nThe other is confined to more exceptional situations, and has to\ndo with collision between the particular and the general will, as\ntreated in the theory of punishment. The subject of reward may be\nmentioned at the same time, if only to show why it is almost an empty\nheading in political theory. We will end this chapter, therefore,\nwith a general account of the system of rights and of reward and\npunishment.\n\n6. The idea of individual rights comes down to us from the doctrine\nof natural right, and has generally been discussed with reference to\nit. We need not now go back upon the illusions connected with the\nnotion of natural right. It is enough if we bear in mind that we\ninherit from it the important {202} idea of a positive law which is\nwhat it ought to be. A right, [1] then, has both a legal and a moral\nreference. It is a claim which can be enforced at law, which no moral\nimperative can be; but it is also recognised to be a claim which\nought to be capable of enforcement at law, and thus it has a moral\naspect. The case in which positive enactment and the moral \u201cought\u201d\nappear to diverge will be considered below. But a typical \u201cright\u201d\nunites the two sides. It both is, and ought to be, capable of being\nenforced at law.\n\n[1] This is a right in the fullest sense. The nature of a merely\nlegal or merely moral right will be illustrated below.\n\nIts peculiar position follows from what we have seen to be the end\nof the State, and the means at its disposal. The end of the State\nis a moral purpose, imperative on its members. But its distinctive\naction is restricted to removing hindrances to the end, that is,\nto lending its force to overcome--both in mind and in externals\nessential to mind--obstacles which otherwise would obstruct the\nrealisation of the end. The whole of the conditions thus enforced\nis the whole of \u201crights\u201d attaching to the selves, who, standing in\ndefinite relations, constitute the community. For it is in these\nselves that the end of the State is real, and it is by maintaining\nand regulating their claims to the removal of obstructions that the\nState is able to promote the end for which it exists. Rights then are\nclaims recognised by the State, _i.e._ by Society acting as ultimate\nauthority, to the maintenance of conditions favourable to the best\nlife. And if we ask in general for a definition and limitation of\nState action as such, the answer is, in a simple {203} phrase, that\nState action is coincident with the maintenance of rights.\n\nThe system of rights which the State maintains may be regarded from\ndifferent points of view.\n\nFirst, _(a)_ from the point of view of the whole community, that is,\nas the general result in the promotion of good life obtained by the\nworking of a free Society, as a statesman or outside critic might\nregard it. Thus looked at, the system of rights may be described\nas \u201cthe organic whole of the outward conditions necessary to the\nrational life,\u201d or \u201cthat which is really necessary to the maintenance\nof material conditions essential to the existence and perfection of\nhuman personality.\u201d [1] This point of view is essential as a full\ncontradiction of that uncritical conception by which rights are\nregarded as something with which the individual is invested in his\naspect of isolation, and independently of his relation to the end.\nIt forces us away from this false particularisation, and compels us\nto consider the whole State-maintained order in its connectedness as\na single expression of a common good or will, in so far as such a\ngood can find utterance in a system of external acts and habits. And\nit enables us to weigh the value which belongs to the maintenance of\nany tolerable social order, simply because it is an order, and so\nfar enables life to be lived, and a determinate, if limited, common\ngood to be realised. From other points of view we are apt to neglect\nthis characteristic, and to forget {204} how great is the effect,\nfor the possibilities of life throughout, of the mere fact that a\nsocial order exists. Hegel observes that a man thinks it a matter of\ncourse that he goes back to his house after night-fall in security.\nHe does not reflect to what he owes it. Yet this very naturalness, so\nto speak, of living in a social order is perhaps the most important\nfoundation which the State can furnish to the better life. \u201c_Si\nmonumentum quaeris, circumspice_\u201d If we ask how it affects our will,\nthe answer is that it forms our world. Speaking broadly, the members\nof a civilised community have seen nothing but order in their lives,\nand could not accommodate their action to anything else.\n\n[1] Krause and Henrici, cit. by Green, _Principles of Political\nObligation_, p. 35. Cp. \u201cThe system of right is the realm of realised\nfreedom, the world of the mind produced by the mind as a second\nnature\u201d (Hegel, _Philosophie d. Rechts_, sect. 4).\n\nIt should be mentioned as a danger of this point of view that,\nfascinated by the spectacle of the social fabric as a whole, we may\nfail to distinguish what in it is the mere maintenance of rights,\nand what is the growth which such maintenance can promote but cannot\nconstitute. Thus we may lose all idea of the true limits of State\naction.\n\n_(b)_ We may regard this complex of rights from the standpoint of\nthe selves or persons who compose the community. It is in these\nselves, as we have seen, that the social good is actual, and it is\nto their differentiated functions, [1] which constitute their life\nand the end of the community, that the sub-groupings of rights, or\nconditions of good life, have to be adjusted each to each like suits\nof clothes. The rights are, from this point of view, primarily the\nexternal incidents, so far as maintained by law--the authoritative\nvesture as it were--of a {205} person\u2019s position in the world of his\ncommunity. And we shall do well to regard the nature of rights, as\nattaching to selves or persons, from this point of view of a place\nor position in the order determined by law. It has been argued, I\ndo not know with what justice, that, in considering the relations\nof particles in space, the proper course would be to regard their\npositions or distances from each other as the primary fact, and to\ntreat attributions of attractive and repulsive forces as modes of\nexpressing the maintenance of the necessary positions rather than\nas descriptive of real causes which bring it about. At least, it\nappears to me, such a conception may well be applied to the relative\nideas of right and obligation. What comes first, we may say, is the\nposition, the place or places, function or functions, determined by\nthe nature of the best life as displayed in a certain community, and\nthe capacity of the individual self for a unique contribution to\nthat best life. Such places and functions are imperative; they are\nthe fuller self in the particular person, and make up the particular\nperson as he passes into the fuller self. His hold on this is his\ntrue will, in other words, his apprehension of the general will. Such\na way of speaking may seem unreally simplified when we look at the\nmyriad relations of modern life and the sort of abstraction by which\nthe individual is apt to become a rolling stone with no assignable\nplace--indeed \u201cgathering no moss\u201d--and to pass through his positions\nand relations as if they were stations on a railway journey. But in\ntruth it is only simplified and not falsified. If we look with care\nwe shall see that it, or nothing, is true of all lives.\n\n[1] I do not say merely social functions, _i.e._ functions dealing\ndirectly with \u201cothers\u201d as such.\n\n{206} The Position, then, is the real fact--the vocation, place or\nfunction, which is simply one reading of the person\u2019s actual self and\nrelations in the world in which he lives. Having thoroughly grasped\nthis primary fact, we can readily deal with the points of view which\npresent the position or its incidents in the partial aspects of\nrights or obligations.\n\n(i.) A right, we said, is a _claim_ recognised by society and\nenforced by the State. My place or position, then, and its incidents,\nso far as sanctioned by the State, constitute my rights, when thought\nof as something which I claim, or regard as powers instrumental to\nmy purposes. A right thus regarded is not anything primary. It is\na way of looking at certain conditions, which, by reason of their\nrelation to the end of the whole as manifested in me, are imperative\nalike for me and for others. It is, further, the particular way of\nlooking at these conditions which is in question when I claim them or\nam presumed to claim them, as powers secured to me with a view to an\nend which I accept as mine. I _have_ the rights no less in virtue of\nmy presumed capacity for the end, if I am in fact indifferent to the\nend. But, in this case, though attributed _ab extra_ as rights, they\ntend to pass into obligations.\n\n(ii.) If rights are an imperative \u201cposition\u201d or function, when looked\nat as a group of State-secured powers claimed by a person for a\ncertain end, obligations are the opposite aspect of such a position\nor group of powers. That is to say, the conditions of a \u201cposition\u201d\nare regarded as obligations in as far as they are thought of as {207}\nrequiring enforcement, and therefore, primarily, from the point of\nview of persons not directly identified with the \u201cposition\u201d or end\nto which they are instrumental. Rights are claimed, obligations\nare owed. And _prima-facie_ rights are claimed _by_ a person, and\nobligations are owed _to_ a person, being his rights as regarded by\nthose against whom they are enforceable.\n\nThus, the distinction of self and others, which we refused to take\nas the basis of society, makes itself prominent in the region of\ncompulsion. The reason is that compulsion is confined to hindering\nor producing external acts, and is excluded from producing an act in\nits relation to a moral end, that is, the exercise of a right in its\ntrue sense; though it can enforce an act which in fact favours the\npossibility of acting towards a moral end that is, an obligation.\nThis is the same thing as saying that normally a right is what _I_\nclaim, and the obligation relative to it is what _you_ owe; as an\nobligation is that which can be enforced, and that is an act or\nomission apart from the willing of an end; and a right involves what\ncannot be enforced, viz., the relation of an act to an end in a\nperson\u2019s will. But even here the distinction of self and others is\nhardly ultimate. The obligation on me to maintain my parents becomes\nalmost a right [1] if I claim the task as {208} a privilege. And\nmany rights of my position may actually be erected into, or more\ncommonly may give rise to, obligations incumbent on me for the sake\nof my position or function. If the exercise of the franchise were\nmade compulsory that would be a right treated also as an obligation;\nbut it might be urged that _qua_ obligation it was held due to the\nposition of others, and only _qua_ right to my own \u201cposition.\u201d But if\nthe law interferes with my poisoning myself [2] either by drains or\nwith alcohol, that, I presume, is the enforcement of an obligation\narising out of my own position and function as a man and a citizen,\nwhich makes reasonable care for my life imperative upon me.\n\n[1] I do not know that I can compel my parents to be maintained by\nme, and therefore it is not my legal right to maintain them; but at\nleast the obligation, if I claim it, ceases to depend on force. An\nEast-End Londoner will say, \u201cHe had a right to maintain his father,\u201d\nmeaning that he was bound to do so; and Jeannie Deans says, \u201cI have\nno right to have stories told about my family without my consent,\u201d\nrepresenting her own claim as an obligation on herself as well as\non others. She represents the thought, \u201cI have a right that you\nshould not tell stories, etc.,\u201d in a form which puts it as a case of\nthe thought, \u201cYou have no right to tell stories,\u201d disregarding the\ndistinction between herself and others as accidental.\n\n[2] The law used to interfere with bad sanitation only as a\n\u201cnuisance,\u201d _i.e._ as an annoyance to \u201cothers.\u201d It now interferes\nwith any state of things dangerous to life as such, which probably\nmeans that a change of theory has unconsciously set in. Legislation\nfor dangerous trades almost proves the point, though here it is\npossible to urge that the employer is put under obligation for the\nsake of his workers, and not the workers for their own sake. But the\ndistinction is hardly real.\n\n_(c)_ It is commonly said that every right implies a duty. This has\ntwo meanings, which should be distinguished.\n\nIn the one case, (i.) for \u201cduty\u201d should be read \u201cobligation,\u201d _i.e._\na demand enforceable by law. This simply means that every \u201cposition\u201d\nmay be regarded as involving either powers secured or conditions\nenforced, which are one and the same thing differently looked at.\nRoughly speaking, they are the same thing as differently looked at\nby one person, and by other persons. My right {209} to walk along\nthe high road involves an obligation upon all other persons not to\nobstruct me, and in the last resort the State will send horse, foot\nand artillery rather than let me be causelessly obstructed in walking\nalong the high road.\n\nIt is also true that every position which can be the source of\nobligations enforceable in favour of my rights is likewise a link\nwith obligations enforceable on me in favour of the rights of others.\nBy claiming a right in virtue of my position I recognise and testify\nto the general system of law according to which I am reciprocally\nunder obligation to respect the rights, or rather the function\nand position, of others. My rights then imply obligations both in\nothers, and perhaps in myself, correlative to these rights, and\nin me correlative to the rights of others. But it cannot strictly\nbe said that the obligations are the source of the rights, or the\nrights of the obligations. Both are the varied external conditions of\n\u201cpositions\u201d as regarded from different points of view.\n\nBut (ii.) there is a different sense in which every right implies a\nduty. And this, the true meaning of the phrase, is involved in what\nwe have said of the nature of a \u201cposition.\u201d All rights, as claims\nwhich both are and ought to be enforceable by law, derive their\nimperative authority from their relation to an end which enters into\nthe better life. All rights, then, are powers instrumental to making\nthe best of human capacities, and can only be recognised or exercised\nupon this ground.\n\nIn this sense, the duty is the purpose with a view to which the\nright is secured, and not merely {210} a corresponding obligation\nequally derived from a common ground; and the right and duty are not\ndistinguished as something claimed by self and something owed to\nothers, but the duty as an imperative purpose, and the right as a\npower secured because instrumental to it.\n\n_(d)_ We have treated rights throughout as claims, the enforcement\nof which by the State is merely the climax of their recognition by\nsociety. Why do we thus demand recognition for rights? If we deny\nthat there can be unrecognised rights, do we not surrender human\nfreedom to despotism or to popular caprice?\n\n(i.) In dealing with the general question why recognition is\ndemanded as an essential of rights, we must remember what we took\nto be the nature of society and the source of obligation. We\nconceived a society to be a structure of intelligences so related\nas to co-operate with and to imply one another. We took the source\nof obligation to lie in the fact that the logic of the whole is\noperative in every part, and consequently that every part has a\nreality which goes beyond its average self, and identifies it with\nthe whole, making demands upon it in doing so.\n\nNow, we are said to \u201crecognise\u201d anything when it comes to us with a\nconsciousness of familiarity, as something in which we feel at home.\nAnd this is our general attitude to the demands which the logic of\nthe whole, implied in our every act, is continuously making upon\nus. It is involved in the interdependence of minds, which has been\nexplained to constitute _the mind_ of which the visible community\nis the body. A teacher\u2019s {211} behaviour towards his pupils, for\nexample, implies a certain special kind of interdependence between\ntheir minds. What he can do for them is conditioned by what they\nexpect of him and are ready to do for him, and _vice versa_. The\nrelation of each to the other is a special form of \u201crecognition.\u201d\nThat is to say, the mind of each has a definite and positive attitude\ntowards that of the other, which is based on, or rather, so far as it\ngoes, simply _is_, the relation of their \u201cpositions\u201d to each other.\nThus, social positions or vocations actually have their being in the\nmedium of recognition. They _are_ the attitudes of minds towards one\nanother, through which their several distinct characteristics are\ninstrumental to a common good.\n\nThus, then, a right, being a power secured in order to fill a\nposition, is simply a part of the fact that such a position is\nrecognised as instrumental to the common good. It is impossible to\nargue that the position may exist, and not be recognised. For we\nare speaking of a relation of minds, and, in so far as minds are\nunited into a single system by their attitudes towards each other,\ntheir \u201cpositions\u201d and the recognition of them are one and the same\nthing. Their attitude, receptive, co-operative, tolerant, and the\nlike, is so far a recognition, though not necessarily a reflective\nrecognition. Probably this is what is intended by those who speak of\nimitation or other analogous principles as the ultimate social fact.\nThey do not mean the repetition of another person\u2019s conduct, though\nthat may enter in part into the relation of interdependence. They\nmean the {212} conscious adoption [1] of an attitude towards others,\nembodying the relations between the \u201cpositions\u201d which social logic\nassigns to each.\n\n[1] To call this imitation is something like calling fine art\nimitation. Really, in both cases, we find a re-arrangement and\nmodification of material, incident to a new expression. The process,\nif we must name it, is \u201crelative suggestion\u201d rather than imitation.\n\n(ii.) But then the question of page 210 presses upon us \u201cIf we deny\nthat there can be unrecognised rights, do we not surrender human\nfreedom to despotism or to popular caprice?\u201d\n\nThe sting of this suggestion is taken out when we thoroughly grasp\nthe idea that recognition is a matter of logic, working on and\nthrough experience, and not of choice or fancy. If my mind has _no_\nattitude to yours, there is no interdependence and I cannot be a\nparty to securing you rights. You are not, for me, a sharer in a\ncapacity for a common good, which each of us inevitably respects.\nA dog or a tree may be an instrument to the good life, and it may\ntherefore be right to treat it in a certain way, but it cannot be\na subject of rights. If my mind _has_ an attitude to yours, then\nthere is certainly a recognition between us, and the nature of\nthat recognition and what it involves are matters for reasoning\nand for the appeal to experience. It is idle for me, for instance,\nto communicate with you by language or to buy and sell with you,\nperhaps even idle to go to war with you, [1] and still to say that\nI recognise no capacity in you for a common good. My behaviour is\nthen inconsistent with itself, and the question takes the form what\nrights are involved {213} in the recognition of you which experience\ndemonstrates. No person and no society is consistent with itself, and\nthe proof and amendment of their inconsistency is always possible.\nAnd, one inconsistency being amended, the path is opened to progress\nby the emergence of another. If slaves come to be recognised as free\nbut not as citizens, this of itself opens a road by which the new\nfreeman may make good his claim that it is an inconsistency not to\nrecognise him as a citizen.\n\n[1] As distinct from hunting. We do not go to war with lions and\ntigers.\n\nBut no right can be founded on my mere desire to do what I like. [1]\nThe wish for this is the sting of the claim to unrecognised rights,\nand this wish is to be met, as the fear that our view might lead\nto despotism was met. The matter is one of fact and logic, not of\nfancies and wishes. If I desire to assert an unrecognised right, I\nmust show what \u201cposition\u201d involves it, and how that position asserts\nitself in the system of recognitions which is the social mind, and my\npoint can only be established universally with regard to a certain\ntype of position, and not merely for myself as a particular A or B.\nIn other words, I must show that the alleged right is a requirement\nof the realisation of capacities for good, and, further, that it\ndoes not demand a sacrifice of capacities now being realised, out\nof proportion to the capacities which it would enable to assert\nthemselves. I must show, in short, that in so far as the claim in\nquestion is not secured by the State, Society is inconsistent with\nitself, and falls short of being what it professes to be, an organ\nof good life. And all my showing gives no _right_, till it has\n{214} modified the law. To maintain a right against the State by\nforce or disobedience is rebellion, and, in considering the duty of\nrebellion, we have to set the whole value of the existence of social\norder against the importance of the matter in which we think Society\ndefective. There can hardly be a duty to rebellion in a State in\nwhich law can be altered by constitutional process.\n\n[1] Green, _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. 149.\n\nThe State-maintained system of rights, then, in its relation to the\nnormal self and will of ordinary citizens with their varying moods of\nenthusiasm and indolence, may be compared to the automatic action of\na human body. Automatic actions are such as we perform in walking,\neating, dressing, playing the piano or riding the bicycle. They have\nbeen formed by consciousness, and are of a character subservient to\nits purposes, and obedient to its signals. As a rule, they demand\nno effort of attention, and in this way attention is economised\nand enabled to devote itself to problems which demand its intenser\nefforts. They are relegated to automatism because they are uniform,\nnecessary, and external--\u201cexternal\u201d in the sense explained above,\nthat the way in which they are required makes it enough if they are\ndone, whatever their motives, or with no motives at all.\n\nBy far the greater bulk of the system of rights is related in this\nway to normal consciousness. We may pay taxes, abstain from fraud and\nassault, use the roads and the post-office, and enjoy our general\nsecurity, without knowing that we are doing or enjoying anything that\ndemands special attention. Partly, of course, attention is being\ngiven by other consciousnesses to maintaining the securities and\n{215} facilities of our life. Even so, the arrangement is automatic\nin so far as there is no reason for arousing the general attention in\nrespect to it; but to a varying extent it is automatic throughout,\nand engrained in the system and habits of the whole people. We are\nall supposed to know the whole law. Not even a judge has it all in\nhis knowledge at any one time; but the meaning is that it roughly\nexpresses our habits, and we live according to it without great\ndifficulty, and expect each other to do so. This automatism is not\nharmful, but absolutely right and necessary, so long as we relegate\nto it only \u201cexternal\u201d matters; _i.e._ such as are necessary to be\ndone, motive or no motive, in some way which can be generally laid\ndown. Thus used, it is an indispensable condition of progress. It\nrepresents the ground won and settled by our civilisation, and leaves\nus free to think and will such matters as have their value in and\nthrough being thought and willed rightly. If we try to relegate these\nto automatism, then moral and intellectual death has set in.\n\nBut if the system of rights is automatic, how can it rest on\nrecognition? Automatic actions, we must remember, are still of a\ntexture, so to speak, continuous with consciousness. \u201cRecognition\u201d\nexpresses very fairly our habitual attitude towards them in ourselves\nand others. We might think, for example, of the system of habits and\nexpectations which forms our household routine. We go through it\nfor the most part automatically, while \u201crecognising\u201d the \u201cposition\u201d\nof those who share it with us, and respecting the life which is its\nend. At points here and there in which it {216} affects the deeper\npossibilities of our being, our attention becomes active, and we\nassert our position with enthusiasm and conscientiousness. Our\nattitude to the social system of rights is something like this. The\nwhole order has our habitual recognition; we are aware of and respect\nmore or less the imperative end on which it rests--the claim of a\ncommon good upon us all. Within the framework of this order there is\nroom for all degrees of laxity and conscientiousness; but, in any\ncase, it is only at certain points, which either concern our special\ncapacity or demand readjustment in the general interest, that intense\nactive attention is possible or desirable.\n\nThe view here taken of automatism and attention in the social whole\nimpairs neither the unity of intelligence throughout society nor\nthe individual\u2019s recognition of this unity as a self liable to be\nopposed to his usual self. As to the former point, every individual\nmind shows exactly the same phenomena, of a _continuum_ largely\nautomatic, and thoroughly alive only in certain regions, connected,\nbut not thoroughly coherent. As to the latter point, permeation of\nthe individual by the habits of social automatism does not prevent,\nbut rather gives material for, his tendency to abstract himself from\nthe whole, and to frame an attitude for himself inconsistent with his\ntrue \u201cposition,\u201d against which tendency the imperative recognition of\nhis true self has constantly to be exerted.\n\n7. We have finally to deal with the actual application by the State\nof its ultimate resource for the maintenance of rights, viz., force.\nSuperior force may be exercised upon human nature both {217} by\nrewards and by punishments. In both respects its exercise by the\nState would fall generally within the lines of automatism; that is\nto say, it would be a case of the promotion of an end by means other\nthan the influence of an idea of that end upon the will. But, owing\nto the subtle continuity of human nature throughout all its phases,\nwe shall find that there is something more than this to be said, and\nthat the idea of the end is operative in a peculiar way just where\nthe agencies that promote it appear to be most alien and mechanical.\nIn so far as this is the case, the general theory of the negative\ncharacter of State action has to be modified, as we foresaw, [1] by\nthe theory of punishment. _Prima facie_, however, it is true that\nreward and punishment belong to the automatic element of social life.\nThey arise in no direct relation of the will to the end. They are a\nreaction of the automatic system, instrumental to the end, against\na friction or obstacle which intrudes upon it, or (in the case of\nrewards) upon the opposite of a friction or obstacle. There is no\nobject in pressing a comparison into every detail; but perhaps, as\nsocial and individual automatism do really bear the same kind of\nrelation to consciousness, it may be pointed out that reward and\npunishment correspond in some degree to the pleasures and pains of a\nhigh-class secondary automatism, say of riding or of reading, _i.e._\nof something specially conducive to enhanced life. Such activities\nbring pleasure when unimpeded, and pain when sharply interrupted\nby a start or blunder which jars upon us. Putting this latter case\nin language which {218} carries out the analogy to punishment,\nwe might say that the formed habit of action, unconsciously or\nsemi-consciously relevant to the end or fuller life, is obstructed by\nsome partial start of mind, and their conflict is accompanied with\nrecognition, pain, and vexation. \u201cWhat a fool I was,\u201d we exclaim, \u201cto\nride carelessly at that corner,\u201d or \u201cto let that plan for a holiday\ninterrupt me in my morning\u2019s reading.\u201d\n\n[1] P. 189.\n\nIt may seem remarkable that reward plays a small and apparently\ndecreasing part in the self-management of society by the public\npower. To the na\u00efve Athenian, [1] it seemed a natural instrument for\nthe encouragement of public spirit, probably rather by a want of\ndiscrimination between motives than by a real belief in political\nselfishness. In European countries honours still appear to play a\nconsiderable part, but on analysis it would be found less than it\nseems. Partly they are recognitions of important functions, and\nthus conditions rather than rewards. To a great extent, again, they\nrecognise existing facts, and are rather consequences of the respect\nwhich society feels for certain types of life (with very curious\nresults in regions where the general mind is inexperienced, _e.g._ in\nfine art) than means employed to regulate the conduct of citizens.\nWe should think a soldier mean whose aim was a peerage, still more a\npoet or an artist. I hardly know that rewards adjudged by the State,\nas distinct from compensations, exist {219} in the United States\nof America. [2] Rewards then fill no place correlative to that of\npunishments, and the reason seems plain. Punishment corresponds much\nbetter to the negative method which alone is open to the State for\nthe maintenance of rights. For Punishment proclaims its negative\ncharacter, and no one can suppose it laudable simply to be deterred\nfrom wrong-doing by fear of punishment. But though precisely the same\nprinciple applies to meritorious actions done with a view to reward,\nan illusion is almost certain to arise which will hide the principle\nin this case. For, if reward is largely used as an inducement to\nactions conducive to the best life, it is almost certain that it\nwill be used as an inducement to actions, the value and certainty of\nwhich depend on the state of will to which they are due. And then the\ndistinction between getting them done, motive or no motive, which\nis the true region of State action, and their being done with a\ncertain motive, which is necessary to give them either practical or\nmoral value, is pretty sure to be obliterated, and the range of the\nmoral will trenched upon in its higher portion and with a constant\ntendency to self-deception. [3] {220} It is the same truth in other\nwords when we point out that taking reward and punishment, as\ninterferences, only to deal with exceptional cases, reward would deal\nwith the exceptionally good. Therefore, again, reward must either\nmake an impossible attempt to deal with all the normal as good, which\ninvolves the danger of _de_-moralising the whole of normal life,\nor must take the line of specially promoting what is exceptionally\nconducive to good life; in which case confusion is certain to arise\nfrom interference with the delicate middle class of external actions\nanalysed above. [4] And thus it is only what we should expect when\nwe find that States having no _damnosa hereditas_ of a craving for\npersonal honours are hardly acquainted with the bestowal of rewards\nby the public power.\n\n[1] \u201cSpeech of Pericles,\u201d Thucyd., ii. 46: \u201cWhere there are the\ngreatest rewards of merit, there will be the best men to do the work\nof the State.\u201d Contrast Plato\u2019s principle that there can be no sound\ngovernment while public service is done with a view to reward.\n\n[2] The precise theory of the grants in money made to soldiers or\nsailors, for distinguished service, is not easy to state. But it\nseems clear that they are not intended to act as motives. They are\nessentially a recognition after the act, not an inducement held out\nbefore it.\n\n[3] It is perhaps permissible to observe in general, what is very\nwell known to all who have much experience of what is called\nphilanthropy, that the tendency to distinguish it by public honours\nis exceedingly dangerous to its quality, which depends entirely on\nthat energy and purity of intelligence which can only accompany the\ndeepest and highest motives. Mere vulgar self-seeking is not the\ndanger (though it does occur) so much as obfuscation of intelligence\nthrough a mixture of aims and ideas.\n\n[4] P. 199.\n\nIt will be sufficient, then, to complete the account of State action\nin maintenance of rights by some account of the nature and principles\nof punishment.\n\nAnd we may profitably begin by recalling M. Durkheim\u2019s suggestion,\nwhich was mentioned in a former chapter. [1] Punishment, he observes,\nfrom the simplest and most actual point of view, includes in itself\nall those sides which theory has tended to regard as incompatible.\nIt is, in essence, simply the reaction of a strong and determinate\ncollective sentiment against an act which offends it. It is idle\nto include such a reaction entirely under the head either of\nreformation, or of retaliation, or of prevention. An aggression is\n_ipso facto_ a sign of character, an injury, and a menace; and the\nreaction against it is equally _ipso facto_ an attempt {221} to\naffect character, a retaliation against an injury, and a deterrent\nor preventive against a menace. When we fire up at aggression it is\npretty much a chance whether we say \u201cI am going to teach him better\nmanners,\u201d or \u201cI am going to serve him out,\u201d or \u201cI am going to see\nthat he doesn\u2019t do that again.\u201d A consideration of each of these\naspects is necessary to do justice both to the theories and to the\nfacts.\n\n[1] P. 37.\n\ni. An obvious point of view, and the first perhaps to appear in\nphilosophy, though strongly opposed to early law, is that the aim of\npunishment is to make the offender good. As test of the adequacy of\nthis doctrine by itself, the question may be put, \u201cIf pleasures would\ncure the offender, ought he to be given pleasures?\u201d The doctrine,\nhowever, does not, by any means, altogether incline to leniency. For\nit carries as a corollary the extirpation of the incurable, which\nPlato proposes in a passage of singularly modern quality, when he\nsuggests the co-operation of judges and physicians in maintaining the\nmoral and physical health of society. [1]\n\n[1] _Republic_, 409, 410.\n\nThe first comment that occurs to us is, that by a mere medical\ntreatment of the offender, including or consisting of pleasant\nconditions, if helpful to his cure, the interest of society seems\nto be disregarded. What is to become of the maintenance of rights,\nif aggressors have to anticipate a pleasant or lenient \u201ccure\u201d? It\nmay be true that brutal punishments stimulate a criminal temper in\nthe people rather than check it; but it is a long way from this to\nlaying down that there is no need {222} for terror to be associated\nwith crime. To suppose that pleasures may simply act throughout as\npains, is playing with words and throws no light on the question.\nIf we leave words their meaning, we must say that punishment must\nbe deterrent for others as well as reformatory for the offender,\nand therefore in some degree painful. It is true, however, that the\noffender, as a human being, and presumably capable of a common good,\nhas, as Green puts it, \u201creversionary rights\u201d of humanity, and these,\npunishment must so far as possible respect.\n\nBut there is a deeper difficulty. If the reformation theory is to be\nseriously distinguished from the other theories of punishment, it has\na meaning which is unjust to the offender himself. It implies that\nhis offence is a merely natural evil, like disease, and can be cured\nby therapeutic treatment directed to removing its causes. But this\nis to treat him not as a human being; to treat him as a \u201cpatient,\u201d\nnot as an agent; to exclude him from the general recognition that\nmakes us men. (If the therapeutic treatment includes a recognition\nand chastisement of the offender\u2019s bad will [1]--the form of which\nchastisement may, of course, be very variously modified--then\nthere is no longer anything to distinguish the reformatory theory\nfrom other theories of punishment.) It has been lately pointed out\n[2] what a confusion is involved in the claim that beings, who\nare irresponsible and so incapable of guilt, are therefore in the\nstrict sense innocent. Here are the true objects {223} for a pure\nreformatory theory. Here that may freely be done, as to creatures\nincapable of rights, which is kindest for them and safest for\nsociety, from quasi-medical treatment to extirpation. There is no\nguilt in them to demand punishment, but there is no human will in\nthem to have the rights of innocence.\n\n[1] Plato\u2019s reformatory theory seems to involve this.\n\n[2] Mr. Bradley, in the _International Journal of Ethics_, April,\n1894.\n\nBut, applied to responsible human beings, such a theory, if really\nkept to its distinctive contention, is an insult. It leads to the\nnotion that the State may take hold of any man, whose life or ideas\nare thought capable of improvement, and set to work to ameliorate\nthem by forcible treatment. There is no true punishment except where\none is an offender against a system of rights which he shares, and\ntherefore against himself. And such an offender has a right to the\nrecognition of his hostile will; it is inhuman to treat him as a wild\nanimal or a child, whom we simply mould to our aims. Without such\na recognition, to be punished is not, according to the old Scotch\nphrase, to be \u201cjustified.\u201d\n\nii. The idea of retaliation or retribution, though in history the\noldest conception of punishment, [1] may be taken in theory as a\nprotest against the conception that punishment is only a means for\nmaking a man better. Its strong point is its definite idea of the\noffender. The offender is a responsible person, belonging to a\ncertain order which he recognises as entering into him and as entered\ninto by him, and he has made actual an intention hostile to this\norder. He has, {224} as Plato\u2019s Socrates insists in the _Crito_,\ndestroyed the order so far as in him lies. In other words, he has\nviolated the system of rights which the State exists to maintain,\nand by which alone he and others are secured in the exercise of any\ncapacity for good, this security consisting in their reciprocal\nrespect for the system. His hostile will stands up and defies the\nright, in so far as his personality is asserted, through a tangible\ndeed which embodies the wrong. It is necessary, then, that the power\nwhich maintains the system of rights should not merely, if possible,\nundo the external harm which has been done, but should strike down\nthe hostile will which has defied the right by doing that harm.\nThe end or true self is in the medium of mind and will, and is\ncontradicted and nullified so far as a hostile will is permitted to\ntriumph.\n\n[1] We saw that, even in its earliest forms, it cannot really be\ntaken to exclude the other aspects.\n\nIt is obvious, however, that the means by which the hostile will can\nbe negatived fall _prima facie_ within the region of automatism.\nThe recalcitrant element of consciousness is not susceptible to the\nend as an idea, or it would not be recalcitrant. The end can here\nassert itself, agreeably to the general principle of State action,\nonly through external action the mental effects of which cannot\nbe precisely estimated. It might, therefore, seem that the pain\nproduced by the reaction of the automatic system on the aberrant\nconsciousness--the punishment--was simply a natural pain, which might\nact as a deterrent from aberration, but had no visible connection\nwith the true whole or end for the mind of the offender. We shall\nspeak below of the sense in which {225} punishment is deterrent or\npreventive. But it is to be noted at this point that a high-class\nsecondary automatism, with which all along we have compared the\nsystem of rights as engrained in the habits of a people, retains\na very close connection with consciousness. We do not indeed will\nevery step that we walk, but we only walk while we will to walk, and\nso with the whole system of routine automatism which is the method\nand organ of our daily life. At any interruption, any hindrance or\nfailure, consciousness starts up, and the end of the whole routine\ncomes sharply back upon us through our aberration.\n\nSo it is with punishment. Primarily, no doubt, chastisement by pain,\nand the appeal to fear and to submissiveness, is effective through\nour lower nature, and, in as far as operative, substitutes selfish\nmotives for the will that wills the good, and so narrows its sphere.\nBut there is more behind. The automatic system is pulsing with the\nvitality of the end to which it is instrumental; and when we kick\nagainst the pricks, and it reacts upon us in pain, this pain has\nsubtle connections throughout the whole of our being. It brings us\nto our senses, as we say; that is, it suggests, more or less, a\nconsciousness of what the habitual system means, and of what we have\ncommitted in offending against it. When one stumbles and hurts his\nfoot, he may look up and see that he is off the path. If a man is\ntold that the way he works his factory or keeps his tenement houses\nis rendering him liable to fine or imprisonment, then, if he is an\nordinary, careless, but respectable citizen, he will feel some thing\nof a shock, and recognise that he was getting {226} too neglectful\nof the rights of others, and that, in being pulled up, he is brought\nback to himself. His citizen honour will be touched. He will not like\nto be below the average which the common conscience had embodied in\nlaw.\n\nWhen we come to the actual criminal consciousness, the form which\nthe recognition may take in fact may vary greatly; and as an extreme\nthere may be a furious hostility against the whole recognised\nsystem of law, either involving self-outlawry through a despair of\nreconciliation, or arising through some sort of habitual conspiracy\nin which the man finds his chosen law and order as against that\nrecognised by the State. [1] But after all, we are dealing with a\nquestion of social logic and not of empirical psychology. And it must\nbe laid down that, in as far as any sane man fails altogether to\nrecognise in any form the assertion of something which he normally\nrespects in the law which punishes him (putting aside what he takes\nto be miscarriage of justice), he is outlawed by himself and the\nessentials of citizenship are not in him. Doubtless, if an uneducated\nman were told, in theoretical language, that in being punished for\nan assault he was realising his own will, he would think it cruel\nnonsense. But this is a mere question of language, and has really\nnothing to do with the essential state of his consciousness. He would\nunderstand perfectly well that he was being served as he would say\nanyone should be served, whom he saw acting as he had done, in a case\nwhere his own {227} passions were not engaged. And this recognition,\nin whatever form it is admitted, carries the consequence which we\naffirm.\n\n[1] See the account of the Mafia in Marion Crawford\u2019s _Corleone_.\nAccepting this as described, it simply is the social will in which\nthe population of a certain region find their substitute for the\nState.\n\nIn short, then, compulsion through punishment and the fear of it,\nthough primarily acting on the lower self, does tend, when the\nconditions of true punishment exist (_i.e._ the reaction of a system\nof rights violated by one who shares in it), to a recognition of the\nend by the person punished, and may so far be regarded as his own\nwill, implied in the maintenance of a system to which he is a party,\nreturning upon himself in the form of pain. And this is the theory\nof punishment as retributive. The test doctrine of the theory may be\nfound in Kant\u2019s saying that, even though a society were about to be\ndissolved by agreement, the last murderer in prison must be executed\nbefore it breaks up. The punishment is, so to speak, his right, of\nwhich he must not be defrauded.\n\nThere are two natural perversions of this theory.\n\nThe first is to confuse the necessary retribution or reaction of the\ngeneral self, through the State, with personal vengeance. [1] Even in\nthe vulgar form, when a brutal murder evokes a general desire to have\nthe offender served out, [2] the general or social indignation is\nnot the same as the selfish desire for revenge. It is the offspring\nof a rough notion of law and humanity, and of the feeling that a\nstriking aggression upon them demands to be strikingly put down. Such\na sentiment is a part {228} of the consciousness which maintains the\nsystem of rights, and can hardly be absent where that consciousness\nis strong.\n\n[1] It may be noted that Durkheim, relying chiefly on early religious\nsentiment, denies Maine\u2019s view that criminal law arises out of\nprivate feud.\n\n[2] Green, _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. 184.\n\nThe second perversion consists in the superstition that punishment\nshould be \u201cequivalent\u201d to offence. In a sense, we have seen, it\nis _identical_; _i.e._ it is a return of the offender\u2019s act upon\nhimself by a connection inevitable in a moral organism. But as for\n_equivalence_ of pain inflicted, either with the pain caused by the\noffence or with its guilt, the State knows nothing of it and has no\nmeans of securing it. It cannot estimate either pain or moral guilt.\nPunishment cannot be adapted to factors which cannot be known. And\nfurther, the attempt to punish for immorality has evils of its own.\n[1] The graduation of punishments must depend on wholly different\nprinciples, which we will consider in speaking of punishment as\npreventive or deterrent.\n\n[1] See above, p. 192.\n\niii. The graduation of punishments must be almost entirely determined\nby experience of their operation as deterrents. It is to be borne in\nmind, indeed, (i.) that the \u201creversionary rights\u201d of humanity in the\noffender are not to be needlessly sacrificed, and (ii.) that the true\nessence of punishment, as punishment, the negation of the offender\u2019s\nanti-social will, is in some way to be secured. But these conditions\nare included in the preventive or deterrent theory of punishment, if\ncompletely understood; if, that is to say, it is made clear precisely\nwhat it is that is to be prevented.\n\nIf we speak of punishment, then, as having for {229} its aim to be\ndeterrent or preventive, we must not understand this to mean that a\nmajority, or any persons in power, may rightly prevent, by the threat\nof penalties, any acts that seem to them to be inconvenient.\n\nThat which is to be prevented by punishment is a violation of the\nState-maintained system of rights by a person who is a party to\nthat system, and therefore the above-mentioned conditions, implied\nin a true understanding of the reformatory and retributive aspects\nof punishment, are also involved in it as deterrent. But, this\nbeing admitted, we may add to them the distinctive principle on\nwhich a deterrent theory insists. If a lighter punishment deter as\neffectively as a heavier, it is wrong to impose the heavier. For the\nprecise aim of State action is the maintenance of rights; and if\nrights are effectively maintained without the heavier punishment,\nthe aim of the State does not justify its imposition. It is well\nknown that success in the maintenance of rights depends not only on\nthe severity of punishments, but also on the true adjustment of the\nrights themselves to human ends, and on that certainty of detecting\ncrime which is a result of efficient government. And it must always\nbe considered, in dealing with a relative failure of the deterrent\npower of punishment in regard to certain offences, whether a better\nadjustment of rights or a greater certainty of detection will not\nmeet the end more effectively than increased seventy of punishment.\nWe have seen that the equivalence of punishment and offence is really\na meaningless superstition. And there is no principle on which {230}\npunishment can be rationally graduated, except its deterrent power as\nlearned by experience. This view corresponds to the true limits of\nState action as determined by the means at its disposal compared with\nthe end which is its justification, and is therefore, when grasped in\nits full meaning as not denying the nature of punishment, the true\ntheory of it.\n\nWe saw, in speaking of punishment as retributive, in what sense it\ncan and cannot rest upon a judgment imputing moral guilt. Of degrees\nof moral guilt as manifested in the particular acts of individuals,\nthe State, like all of us, is necessarily ignorant. But this is\nnot to say that punishment is wholly divorced from a just moral\nsentiment. Undoubtedly it implies and rests upon a disapproval of\nthat hostile attitude to the system of rights which is implied in the\nrealised intention constituting the violation of right. Though in\npractice the distinction between civil and criminal law in England\ncarries out no thoroughly logical demarcation, yet it is true on\nthe whole to say with Hegel that, in the matter of a civil action,\nthere is no violation of right as such, but only a question in whom\na certain right resides; while in a matter of criminal law there is\ninvolved an infraction of right as such, which by implication is a\ndenial of the whole sphere of law and order. This infraction the\ngeneral conscience disapproves, and its disapproval is embodied in\na forcible dealing with the offender, however that dealing may be\ngraduated by other considerations.\n\nI may touch here on an interesting point of detail, following Green.\nIf punishment is essentially {231} graduated according to its\ndeterrent power, and not according to moral guilt, how does it come\nto pass that \u201cextenuating circumstances\u201d are allowed to influence\nsentences? That they do so really, if not nominally, even in\nEngland, there can be no doubt. Is it not that they indicate a less\ndegree of wickedness in the offender than the offence in question\nwould normally presuppose? It would seem that judges themselves\nare sometimes under this impression. But it may well be that they\nact under a right instinct and assign a wrong reason. For it is\nimpossible to get over the fact that moral iniquity is something\nwhich cannot be really estimated. The true reason for allowing\ncircumstances which change the character of the act to influence\nthe sentence is that, in changing its character, they may take it\nout of the class of offences from which men need to be deterred by\na recognised amount of severity. If a man is starving and steals a\nturnip, his offence, being so exceptionally conditioned, does not\nthreaten the general right of property, and does not need to be\nassociated with any high degree of terror in order to protect that\nright. A man who steals under no extraordinary pressure of need does\nwhat might become a common practice if not associated with as much\nterror as is found by experience to deter men from theft.\n\nIt may be said, in some exceptional emergency, \u201cbut many men are\nnow starving; ought not the theft of food, on the principle of\nprevention, to be now punished with extreme severity, as other wise\nit is likely to become common?\u201d Or in general, ought not severity to\nincrease with {231} temptation or provocation, as a greater deterrent\nis needed to counterbalance this? The case in which the temptation or\nprovocation is exceptional has just been dealt with. But if abnormal\ntemptation or provocation becomes common, as in a famine, or in some\nexcited condition of public feeling, then it must be remembered that\nnot one right only, but the system of rights as such, is what the\nState has to maintain. If starvation is common, some readjustment of\nrights, or at least some temporary protection of the right to live,\nis the remedy indicated, and not, or not solely, increased severity\nin dealing with theft. [1] If provocation becomes common, then the\nrights of those provoked must be remembered, and the provocation\nitself perhaps made punishable, like the singing of faction songs in\nIreland. Punishment is to protect rights, not to encourage wrongs.\n\n[1] Though for the sake of all parties, and to avoid temptation, a\nstrong policing of threatened districts may be desirable in such\ncircumstances.\n\nThus, we have seen the true nature and aims of punishment as\nfollowing from the aim of the State in maintaining the system of\nrights instrumental to the fullest life. The three main aspects of\npunishment which we have considered are really inseparable, and each,\nif properly explained, expands so as to include the others.\n\nWe may, in conclusion, sum up the whole theory of State action in\nthe formula which we inherit from Rousseau--that Sovereignty is the\nexercise of the General Will.\n\nFirst. All State action is General in its bearing and justification,\neven if particular, or rather {232} concrete, in its details. It\nis embodied in a _system_ of rights, and there is no element of it\nwhich is not determined by a bearing upon a public interest. The\nverification of this truth, throughout, for example, our English\nsystem of public and private Acts of Parliament, would run parallel\nto the logical theory of the Universal Judgment as it passes into\nJudgments whose subjects are proper names. But the immediate point is\nthat no rights are absolute, or detached from the whole, but all have\ntheir warrant in the aim of the whole, which at the same time implies\ntheir adjustment and regulation according to general principles. This\ngenerality of law is practically an immense protection to individuals\nagainst arbitrary interference. It makes every regulation strike a\nclass and not a single person.\n\nAnd, secondly. All State action is at bottom the exercise of a Will;\nthe real Will, or the Will as logically implied in intelligences\nas such, and more or less recognised as imperative upon them. And,\ntherefore, though in the form of force it acts through automatism,\nthat is, not directly as conscious Will, but through a system which\ngives rise to acts by influences apparently alien, yet the root\nand source of the whole structure is of the nature of Will, and\nits end, like that of organic automatism, is to clear the road for\ntrue volition; it is \u201cforcing men to be free.\u201d And in so far as by\nmisdirection of the automatic [1] process it {234} encroaches on\nthe region of living Will the region where the good realises itself\ndirectly by its own force as a motive it is \u201csawing off the branch on\nwhich it sits,\u201d and superseding the aim by the instrument.\n\n[1] It must not be forgotten that the State is, by its nature,\nunder a constant temptation to throw its weight on the side of the\nautomatic process. A most striking example is its adoption of the\nautomatic water-carriage system in drainage, with far-reaching\neconomic consequences. See Poore\u2019s _Rural Hygiene_ and _The Dwelling\nHouse_.\n\n\n\n\n{235}\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nROUSSEAU\u2019S THEORY AS APPLIED TO THE MODERN STATE: KANT, FICHTE, HEGEL.\n\n1. Probably no other philosophical movement has ever focussed in\nitself so much human nature as the post-Kantian Idealism. It has\nfallen to the present writer to show elsewhere [1] how the \u201cfinding\nof Greek art,\u201d which it owed to Winckelmann, gave it unrivalled\ninsight into mind as embodied in objects of sense. Here we have to\ndeal with another source of its ideas. As we pointed out in the\nfirst chapter, the ethical and political theory of Kant, Fichte, and\nHegel springs from the same _Evangel of Jean Jacques_ from which\nthe French Revolution drew its formulae. It would not be true to\nsay that it springs from this alone. Great philosophers know how\nto fuse the materials they work in; and particularly the modern\nabstraction of \u201cfreedom\u201d was blended, for Hegel, with the idea of\nconcrete life through the tradition of the Greek city, with its\naffinity for autonomy on the one hand and for beauty on the other.\nNevertheless, few lines of affiliation are better established in the\nhistory of philosophy than that between Rousseau\u2019s {236} declaration\nthat liberty is the quality of man and the philosophy of Right as it\ndeveloped from Kant to Hegel.\n\n[1] _History of Aesthetic_ (Sonnenschein).\n\nIt has been suggested that the literary intercourse of France,\nEngland, and Germany was far closer in the eighteenth century than\nit is to-day, in spite of the immense mechanical development of\ncommunication in the interval. National self-consciousness and the\ndivergent growth of national minds have, it is urged, raised a\nbarrier between peoples, which existed in the last century to a far\nsmaller degree. [1] This question of literary history lies beyond my\nsubject; but at least it seems probable that Rousseau had a power\nin Germany which no French writer of to-day could possibly exercise\noutside his own country. His educational influence [2] alone forms\na considerable chapter in the history of _P\u00e4dagogik_, and touches\nclosely on philosophy. Our psychologists of childhood are his\nspiritual descendants, and indeed the question of the development of\nthe human being is closely akin to the question of liberty.\n\n[1] See M. L\u00e9vy-Bruhl, \u201cDe l\u2019Influence de Jean Jacques Rousseau en\nAllemagne,\u201d _Annales de l\u2019\u00c9cole libre des Sciences Politiques_,\nJuillet, 1897.\n\n[2] Cf. _Kant et Fichte et la Probl\u00eame de l\u2019Education_, Duproix,\nAlcan., 1897; and on Rousseau\u2019s varied initiative, see Amiel,\n_Journal Intime_ E. tr. I. 202, \u201cJ.J. Rousseau is an ancestor in all\nthings. It was he who founded travelling on foot before T\u00f6pffer,\nreverie before Ren\u00e9, literary botany before George Sand, the worship\nof nature before Bernardin de St. Pierre, the democratic theory\nbefore the Revolution of 1797, political discussion and theological\ndiscussion before Mirabeau and R\u00e9nan, the science of teaching before\nPestalozzi, and Alpine description before De Saussure.\u201d\n\nHis literary influence, as the prophet of nature and feeling, and the\nchampion of sentimental {237} religion against the _Philosophes_,\ncarried everything before it. He struck into the path which had\nbeen opened in Germany by the translation of Thomson\u2019s _Seasons_\nbefore 1750, and followed by the Swiss critics and the idyllic\npoets, who were opponents of the dominant pseudo-classicism. [1]\nJacobi, who passed some years of his youth at Geneva, owed his\ndoctrine of feeling as the faculty of religious truth in part at\nleast to Rousseau. Klinger, whose drama, _Sturm und Drang_, gave its\nname to the romantic and naturalist revolution, marked by Goethe\u2019s\n_G\u00f6tz von Berlichingen_ (1773) and Schiller\u2019s _R\u00e4uber_ (1781),\nwas responsible, we are told, in later years, for the surprising\njudgment that Rousseau (in _Emile_) is the young man\u2019s best guide\nthrough life. [2] Even Schiller and Herder passed through a period of\nenthusiastic admiration for Rousseau. It is exceedingly significant\nthat Schiller\u2019s _Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Humanity_\nare addressed expressly to the problem of reconciling the claims of\nNature [3] and of the State upon individual man. For, when Schiller\nsuggests that the clue to the required reconciliation between Nature\nand the State lies in the union of feeling and intelligence which is\nfound in Beauty, we have before us in a single focus three main types\nof experience, from the fusion of which a new idealism was to emerge.\n\n[1] See author\u2019s _History of Aesthetic_, p. 214.\n\n[2] L\u00e9vy-Bruhl, _Loc. cit_. p. 330. The citation appears to be from a\nromance, and I have not seen the context.\n\n[3] Letter 3 contains a profound criticism of the supposed actual\n\u201cstate of nature,\u201d and it might be said with truth that the whole\nsubject of the letters is the problem \u201chow man is to be free without\nceasing to be sensuous.\u201d\n\n{238} 2. Returning to our immediate subject, the Philosophy of\nRight, we will consider for a moment the specific relation of\nRousseau\u2019s idea of Freedom to Kantian or post-Kantian thought. It is\npermissible, perhaps, to embody the chief part of what has to be said\nin extracts from works of great original value and not very generally\naccessible. Not only the poets and sentimentalists of Germany, but\nalso the great philosophers, distinctly recognised the debt of the\nGerman genius to the ideas of Rousseau. The conception of the \u201cSocial\nContract\u201d has an importance which surprises the modern reader in the\npolitical philosophy of Kant and more especially of Fichte, and it\nis not till we come to Hegel that the literal interpretation of the\n\u201cSocial Contract\u201d is completely discriminated from the truth conveyed\nby the doctrine of the General Will. Apart from all questions about\nthe literal meaning of the \u201cSocial Contract,\u201d it is simple fact that\nthe whole political philosophy of Kant, Hegel, and Fichte is founded\non the idea of freedom as the essence of man, first announced--such\nwas Hegel\u2019s distinct judgment--by Rousseau. I begin by citing the\ncrucial passage from Hegel\u2019s _History of Philosophy_, which gives in\na few lines the basis of his own theory of Right, as well as his view\nof Rousseau\u2019s position. [1]\n\n[1] Hegel\u2019s _Geschichte der Philosophie_, iii. 477.\n\nAfter explaining that Rousseau treated the right of Government as\non one side, in its historical aspect, resting [1] on force and\ncompulsion, Hegel {239} continues,\n\n  \u201cBut the principle of this justification (the absolute\n  justification of the State) Rousseau makes the free\n  will, and, disregarding the positive right (or law)\n  of States, he answers to the above question [2] (as\n  to the justification or basis of the State) that man\n  has free will, seeing that \u2018Freedom is the distinctive\n  quality of man. [3] To renounce one\u2019s freedom, means to\n  renounce one\u2019s humanity. Not to be free is therefore a\n  renunciation of one\u2019s human rights, and even of one\u2019s\n  duties.\u2019 The slave has neither rights nor duties.\n  Rousseau says, therefore, [4] The _fundamental problem_\n  [5] is to find a form of association which shall protect\n  and defend at once the person and the property of every\n  member with the whole common force, and in which each\n  individual, inasmuch as he attaches himself to this\n  association, _obeys only himself, and remains as free\n  as before_ [5] The solution is given by the _Social\n  Contract_; [5] it (Rousseau says) is this combination, to\n  which each belongs through his will.\"\n\n  These principles, thus set up in the abstract, we cannot\n  but take as correct; yet ambiguity begins at once. Man is\n  free; this is no doubt the substantive nature of man; and\n  in the State it is not only not abandoned, but in fact\n  it is therein first established. The freedom of nature,\n  the capacity of freedom, is not the actual freedom; {240}\n  for nothing short of the State is the actualisation of\n  freedom.\n\n  But the misunderstanding about the \u201c_General Will_\u201d\n  begins at the following point. The notion of Freedom must\n  not be taken in the sense of the casual free-will of each\n  individual, but in the sense of the reasonable will, the\n  will in and for itself. [6] The general will is not to be\n  regarded as compounded of the expressed individual wills,\n  [7] so that these remain absolute; else the proposition\n  would be true, \u201cwhere the minority has to obey the\n  majority, there is no freedom.\u201d Rather the general will\n  must be the rational will, even though people are not\n  aware of it; the State, therefore, is no such association\n  as is determined upon by individuals.\n\n  The false apprehension of these principles does not\n  matter to us. What matters to us is that by their means\n  it comes as a content into consciousness, that man has\n  in his mind Freedom as the downright absolute, that the\n  free will is the notion of man. It is just freedom that\n  is the self of thought; one who repudiates thought and\n  talks of freedom knows not what he is saying. The oneness\n  of thought with itself [8] is freedom, the free will.\n  Thought, only taken in the form of will, is the impulse\n  to break through [9] one\u2019s mere subjectivity, is relation\n  to definite being, realisation of one\u2019s {241} self,\n  inasmuch as I will to make myself as an existent adequate\n  to myself as thinking. The will is free only as that\n  which thinks.\n\n  The principle of freedom dawned on the world in Rousseau,\n  and gave infinite strength to man, who thus apprehended\n  himself as infinite. This furnishes the transition to\n  the Kantian philosophy, which, from a theoretical point\n  of view, took this principle as its basis. Knowledge\n  [10] was thus directed upon its own freedom, and upon\n  a concrete content, [10] which it possesses in its\n  consciousness.\u201d\n\n[1] In the place referred to, _Contrat Social_, Bk. I. chs. iii.,\niv., Rousseau points out clearly that _force_ gives _no right_. So\nwhen Hegel describes him as saying that the right of rule rested on\nforce, etc., _in its historical aspect_, this is incorrect unless it\nmeans that, this \u201chistorical\u201d aspect giving no explanation of right,\nthe term \u201cright\u201d is a mere name so far as it is concerned.\n\n[2] _Cont. Social_, Bk. I., iv.\n\n[3] I retain Hegel\u2019s paraphrastic rendering of Rousseau\u2019s words.\n\n[4] _Cont. Social_, Bk. I., iv., cf. p. 89 above.\n\n[5] Hegel\u2019s italics.\n\n[6] Anything is \u201cin and for itself\u201d when it has become \u201c_for\nitself_,\u201d _i.e._ consciously and explicitly what it is \u201c_in itself_,\u201d\n_i.e._ in its latent or potential nature.\n\n[7] Rousseau\u2019s _Will of All_.\n\n[8] _i.e._ Anything is free, in as far as it is able to be itself.\nThought, as the embodiment of the return upon oneself or being with\noneself, is for Hegel the strongest case of this.\n\n[9] _i.e._ By going beyond it.\n\n[10] _I.e._ Philosophy, by basing itself on the idea of freedom, is\nled to scrutinise the life in which mind realises itself, before it\nbecomes, and on the way to becoming, reflectively philosophical;\nand which is therefore \u201c_its own_ freedom\u201d--as one texture with\nknowledge--and also a \u201cconcrete content,\u201d _i.e._ an actual system\nof living, as an object in which mind can find itself expressed--a\nrelation which = freedom.\n\nEveryone is familiar, in general terms, with the part played by the\nidea of freedom in Kant\u2019s philosophy. It may, however, be of interest\nto point out how definitely it comes to him in the form given it by\nRousseau. Omitting the whole subject of Kant\u2019s educational interest,\n[1] I will refer to two passages from Kant\u2019s early notes [2] in\nconnection with the tract on the _Feelings of the Sublime and the\nBeautiful_, and two from the _Philosophy of Right_, which first\nappeared in the autumn of 1796.\n\n[1] See Duproix, _Loc. cit_. [2] Between 1765 and 1775.\n\nFirst, then, to establish the definite impulse communicated to Kant\nin his earlier years by Rousseau in particular.\n\n  \u201cI am myself,\u201d he writes, [1] \u201ca student by inclination.\n  I feel the whole thirst for knowledge, and the covetous\n  restlessness that demands to advance in it, and again the\n  satisfaction of every {242} step of progress. There was a\n  time when I believed that all this might constitute the\n  honour of humanity, and I despised the crowd that knows\n  nothing. It was Rousseau who set me right. That dazzling\n  privilege disappeared; and I should think myself far less\n  useful than common artisans if I did not believe that my\n  line of study might impart value to all others in the way\n  of establishing the rights of humanity.\u201d\n\n[1] Kant\u2019s _Werke_ (Rosenkrantz), xi., p. 240. Cf. p. 218.\n\nKant seems, from the context, to be foreshadowing the idea of his\ncritical philosophy, as putting man in his place in the order of\ncreation.\n\n  \u201cIf there is any science,\u201d he says just below, \u201cwhich man\n  really needs, it is that which I teach, to fill properly\n  _that_ place which is assigned to man in creation; a\n  science from which he can learn what one must be in order\n  to be human.\u201d\n\nThis throws light on the curious passage in the same set of notes,\n[1] where, in a discussion of the idea of Providence, Kant first\nrefers to Newton\u2019s discovery of order in the multiplicity of the\nplanetary motions, and then proceeds,\n\n  \u201cRousseau first discovered, beneath the multiplicity\n  of the forms assumed by man, the deeply latent nature\n  of humanity, and the hidden law, according to which\n  Providence is justified by his observations. Before that\n  the objection of Alphonsus and of Manes [2] held the\n  field. After Newton and Rousseau, God is justified, and\n  henceforwards Pope\u2019s doctrine is true.\u201d\n\n[1] _Ib_, p. 248.\n\n[2] The Manichean doctrine.\n\n\u201cPope\u2019s doctrine\u201d is no doubt his Leibnitzian optimism, founded on a\nsupposed insight into man\u2019s true place in creation. [1] Rousseau\u2019s\n{243} \u201cdiscovery,\u201d which Kant here connects with this doctrine, must\nbe his assertion of man\u2019s natural goodness and freedom, which he\ntends to forfeit by departing in civilisation from the place assigned\nhim by nature. It is clear that Rousseau\u2019s impeachment of literature\nand civilisation had at this time made a considerable impression upon\nKant. It is all the more interesting to see Kant retracing, on a very\ndifferent scale, the development which Rousseau had initiated, from\nnatural to social and ethical freedom.\n\n[1] See passage cited from Kant, just above.\n\nI subjoin two passages from the _Philosophy of Right_ (1796),\nwhich exhibit this later development, still in its connection with\nRousseau\u2019s phraseology.\n\n  \u201c_The innate Right is one only_.--Freedom (independence\n  of the constraining will of another), in as far as it can\n  co-exist with the freedom of every other according to a\n  universal law, is this unique original right, belonging\n  to every human being by reason of his humanity.\u201d [1]\n\n[1] Kant\u2019s _Werke_ (Rosenkrantz), ix. 42.\n\nAn indication of the embodiment of this freedom in the State may be\ngiven as follows:\n\n  \u201cAll those three powers in the State (Sovereignty or\n  the Legislative, the Executive, and the Judicial), are\n  offices; and, as essential, and necessarily proceeding\n  from the idea of a State in general with reference to\n  the establishment (Constitution) of one, are offices\n  _of State_. They contain the relation of a universal\n  supreme Power (which, considered according to laws of\n  freedom, can be no other than the united people), to\n  the crowd of individuals which compose it _qua_ the\n  governed; that is, of the ruler (_imperans_) to the\n  {244} subject (_subditus_). The act whereby the people\n  constitutes itself into a State, _or strictly speaking\n  only the idea of that Act, according to which idea alone\n  the justice of the Act can be conceived_, [1] is _the\n  original contract_, [2] according to which all (_omnes et\n  singuli_) of the people surrender their external freedom,\n  in order at once to receive it back again as members of a\n  commonwealth, that is, of the people regarded as a State\n  (_universi_). And one cannot say, The State, or man in\n  the State, has sacrificed a part of its innate outward\n  freedom for a certain end; but rather, he has totally\n  abandoned his wild lawless freedom in order to find his\n  entire freedom again undiminished in a lawful dependence,\n  that is, in a condition of right or law; (undiminished),\n  because this dependence springs from his own legislative\n  will.\u201d [3]\n\n[1] The italics are mine.\n\n[2] Kant\u2019s italics.\n\n[3] _Ib_., 160\n\nIt is remarkable, in face of these general views, that both Kant\nand Fichte follow Rousseau, for reasons which Kant explains from\nthe political conditions of the time, in distrusting representative\ngovernment. [1]\n\n[1] _Ib_., 166 (the deputies are practically dependent on the\nMinistry). But cf. p. 193, which shows that in a true Republic\nthe representative system might, according to Kant, be a reality,\nand then would be the ideal form. The whole discussion is full of\nreference to Rousseau.\n\nThe passage just cited is of course a reproduction of Rousseau\u2019s\nview modified by interpretation very much in the sense in which we\ninterpreted it above.\n\n3. When we pass to Fichte (whose earlier work upon _Natural Right_\nwas published actually before that of Kant), we observe the idea\nof contract in the act of transmuting itself, though {245} by an\nimperfect transition, into the idea of an organic whole. For Fichte,\nthe State is a necessary implication of the human self; for a self\ninvolves a society of selves, and law or right is the relation\nbetween selves in a bodily world. And the \u201ccontract\u201d on which\ncitizenship rests, by the fact that it is general, [1] forges an\nindiscernible unity of the social whole. In this connection, Fichte\nmakes the remarkable claim to be first to apply the simile of an\norganism to the whole civic relation. I cite an important passage:\n\n  \u201cAs far as I know, the idea of the whole of the State\n  has so far only been established through the ideal\n  combination of individuals, and thereby the true insight\n  into the nature of this relation has been cut off.\u201d [2]\n\n[1] Fichte (_Werke_, iii. 203 ff.) says, \u201cIndeterminate\u201d; viz.\nI undertake to aid in protecting whoever is injured. Now, I can\nnever know (he argues) who in particular is to be benefited by\nthis undertaking; many are invisibly benefited by it through the\nsuppression of the injurious will before it comes to be manifest.\nTherefore the relation is really organic; every part strives to\nconserve every part, because injury to any part may concern any part.\nIt is the general as indeterminate, really less of a unity than\nRousseau\u2019s \u201cmoi commun\u201d.\n\n[2] Werke, iii. 207. The \u201cideal combination\u201d = the imaginary contract.\n\nYou must, he urges, not merely have an idea of combination; you must\nshow a bond of union beyond the idea, or making the idea necessary.\n\n  \u201cIn our account this has been achieved. In the notion\n  of that which is to be protected, in accordance with\n  the necessary uncertainty _which_ individual will need\n  the visible protection, and still further, _which_ it\n  will have advantaged invisibly in the case of a wrongful\n  will suppressed by the law before its outbreak, all\n  individuals are forced into unity.\n\n  {246} \u201cThe most fitting simile to elucidate this notion\n  is that of an organised natural product, which has\n  often been employed in modern times to describe the\n  different branches of the public power as a unity, but\n  not, so far as I know, to throw light on the whole civic\n  relation. Just as, in the natural product, every part\n  can be what it is only in _this_ combination, and out\n  of this combination simply would not be this (indeed\n  outside all organic combination there would simply be\n  nothing ...): just so it is only in the combination of\n  the State that man attains a definite position in the\n  series of things, a point of rest in nature; and each\n  attains _this determinate_ position towards others, and\n  towards Nature, only through the fact that he is in\n  _this determinate_ combination. ... In the organic body\n  every part continually maintains the whole, and while it\n  maintains it, is itself maintained thereby; just such is\n  the citizen\u2019s relation to the State.\u201d\n\nHere we seem to be back with Plato and Aristotle. We are in fact\ntoo near to Plato; for the distinction between maintenance of the\ncitizen\u2019s determinate activity, and maintenance of the general\nconditions of such activity, being destroyed by Fichte in his desire\nto make State action positive and not negative, the conclusion\nnecessarily arises that the citizen must be secured and maintained in\nhis definite activity or occupation, and from this springs the notion\nof the closed commercial State; \u201cclosed\u201d against foreign trade in\norder that the government may be able to determine prices and assign\noccupations. In other words, the basis of the State is still the Ego\nconceived as the individual self; it is not the social good operating\nby its own {247} power on intelligent will. And, arising from this\nindividualism, the precautions which seem necessary to protect and\nsustain the individual in his fixed relation to the whole, make\nFichte\u2019s \u201cClosed Commercial State\u201d perhaps the earliest document of\na rigorous State Socialism. Freedom, as he himself recognises to be\n_prima facie_ the case, is annihilated by the provisions for its\nprotection. [1] It is curious to see Rousseau\u2019s phrase \u201cforced to be\nfree,\u201d [2] which refers in him to the supremacy of law, reappearing\nas a defence of the enforcement of leisure time, [3] as though\nfreedom were not realised in labour and in loyalty. Here is Hegel\u2019s\njudgment of the transition we have just been considering.\n\n  \u201cKant began to found right on freedom, and Fichte too\n  in his _Natural Right_ made freedom his principle; but\n  it is, as in Rousseau, the freedom of the particular\n  individual. This is a great beginning; but in order to\n  get to particular results they were obliged to accept\n  presuppositions. The universal (for them) is not the\n  spirit, the substance of the whole, but the external\n  mechanical negative power against individuals. ... The\n  individuals remain always hard and negative against one\n  another; the prison-house, the bonds, become ever more\n  oppressive, instead of the State being apprehended as the\n  realisation of freedom.\u201d [4]\n\n[1] Fichte, _Nachgelassene Werke_, ii. 535.\n\n[2] _Ibid_., 537.\n\n[3] Of course such enforcement may have justification.\n\n[4] Hegel, _Geschichte der Philosophie_, iii. 576. The idea of\norganism was thus mechanically apprehended.\n\n4. To apprehend the State as the realisation of freedom was the aim\nof Hegel\u2019s _Philosophy of Right_, which has perhaps been more grossly\nmisrepresented {247} than any work of a great political philosopher,\nexcepting Plato\u2019s _Republic_.\n\nPopular criticism will tell us that Hegel found his ideal in the\nPrussian bureaucracy, and will further hint that his doing so was\nto his advantage. Such suggestions imply two misapprehensions,\nfor one of which Hegel\u2019s tactlessness was responsible, while the\nother depends on a genuine difficulty attending any philosophical\nanalysis of society. I will try to throw light on each of these\nmisapprehensions.\n\n_(a)_ If Hegel had wished to have a partisan tendency attributed to\nhis book, he could not have timed it better nor written a preface\nmore certain to mislead. In 1820, when the book was published, the\nminds both of governments and of peoples were full of irritation.\nThe anti-constitutional reaction had recently declared itself. [1]\nThe demonstration at the Wartburg, celebrating the anniversary\nof the Reformation, and of the Battle of Leipzig, took place in\nOctober, 1817. The unaccountable change in the ideas of the Czar from\nLiberalism to reaction took place, we are assured, [2] in June, 1818.\nThe murder of Kotzebue, a Russian agent, reactionary journalist, and\ndecayed dramatist, took place in March, 1819. Kotzebue seems to have\nbeen popularly credited with perverting the views of the Czar. His\nassassination had an effect in no way related to his real importance.\nHardenberg, the Prussian minister, exclaimed on hearing of it that\na Prussian constitution had now become impossible. Innocent persons\n{249} were arrested in Prussia at Metternich\u2019s instigation, and\nprivate papers were seized and published in a garbled form. The\npublication of Hegel\u2019s book with a preface attacking Fries for some\nexpressions used by him at the Wartburg festival, took place, as we\nsaid, in 1820, and Hegel had moved from Heidelberg to Berlin, having\nobtained the honour of a Berlin professorship, in 1818. Small wonder\nthat \u201cit was pointed out that the new professor was a favourite of\nthe leading minister, that his influence was dominant in scholastic\nappointments, and that occasional gratuities from the Crown proved\nhis acceptability,\u201d or that Fries remarked that Hegel\u2019s theory of the\nState had grown, \u201cnot in the garden of science, but on the dunghill\nof servility.\u201d [3] Hegel himself \u201cwas aware that he had planted a\nblow in the face of a shallow and pretentious sect, and that his book\nhad given great offence to the demagogic folk.\u201d [4]\n\n[1] See Fyffe\u2019s _History of Modern Europe_, vol. II., ch. ii.\n\n[2] Fyffe, _Loc. cit_.\n\n[3] Wallace, _Hegel\u2019s Philosophy of Mind_, p. clxxix.\n\n[4] Wallace, _Loc. cit_.\n\nAnd yet, so far as the essence of Hegel\u2019s political philosophy is\nconcerned, there is nothing in all this. The first sketch of the\n_Philosophy of Right_ was published in the _Encyclopaedia of the\nPhilosophical Sciences_ in 1817, before Hegel left Heidelberg. His\npolitical interest, in its gradual development, can be traced back\nin unpublished writings to 1802. [1] He started from the conception\nof the Greek State, on which his early sketch of the ethical system\n(1802, unpublished in his lifetime) was founded. And his subsequent\ndevelopment consisted in enlarging this conception by drawing out\nits framework to include the more {250} accented freedom of modern\nlife, as he divined it from the attentive study both of English and\nof German politics. His substantive political theory never changed,\nexcept by development, in accordance with his general attitude\ntowards the differences between Greek and modern life.\n\n[1] See Wallace, _Op. cit_., clxxx. and clxxxvii.\n\n_(b)_ \u201cBut,\u201d popular criticism will rejoin, \u201chere we have Hegel\u2019s\nideal State, depicted by his own hand, and it is pretty much the\nPrussian State of his time, tempered by a few references to English\npolitics. Is not this a narrow horizon and a low ideal?\u201d This\ncriticism is of value, because it leads up to an important feature of\ntrue political theory.\n\nTo depict what most people call \u201can ideal State\u201d is no more the\nobject of political philosophy than it is the object, say, of\nCarpenter\u2019s _Human Physiology_ to depict an \u201cideal\u201d man or an angel.\nThe object of political philosophy is to understand what a State is,\nand it is not necessary for this purpose that the State which is\nanalysed should be \u201cideal,\u201d but only that it should be a State; just\nas the nature of life is represented pretty nearly as well by one\nliving man as by another.\n\n  \u201cEvery State,\u201d [1] Hegel says, \u201ceven if your principles\n  lead you to pronounce it bad, even if you detect this\n  or that deficiency in it, always has (especially if\n  it belongs to the more developed States of our time)\n  the essential moments of its existence in it. But\n  because it is easier to discover defects than to grasp\n  the affirmative, people easily fall into the error of\n  allowing particular aspects to lead them to forget the\n  inner organism {251} of the State. The State is no work\n  of art, it stands in the world, that is, in the sphere\n  of caprice, accident, and error; evil behaviour is able\n  to mar it in many respects. But the ugliest human being,\n  a criminal, a sick man, or a cripple, is all the same a\n  living human being; the affirmative, his life, persists\n  in spite of the defect, and this affirmative is what we\n  are concerned with here.\u201d\n\n[1] _Phil. d. Rechts_, p. 313.\n\nOf course, no comparison is quite precise, and it may be urged that\nthe State is more artificial than a human body. However this may\nbe, [1] we shall at least understand Hegel\u2019s attitude better, and,\nas I venture to think, adopt by far the most fruitful standpoint\nfor ourselves, if we look at political philosophy like one who is\ntrying to ascertain what is the nature of human life as he observes\nit in any or every human body. If the life is there, its essentials\nare there, and his aim is to understand them. No doubt a door is\nhere opened to argument with regard to what logicians call a \u201cpure\ncase.\u201d In understanding life \u201cas such,\u201d you must, it would seem,\npurge out its mere defects, in regard to which it is not \u201clife,\u201d and\nthe remainder, what you pledge yourself to as essential, must be _ex\nhypothesi_ your \u201cideal\u201d of life. And perhaps there is no reason to\nreject this responsibility if confined to the emphasis of elements\nand interconnection of facts. It cannot apply to more.\n\n[1] The comment will probably betray the type of pessimism indicated\nby Rousseau. See p. 95 above.\n\nWe cannot construct an ideal body by reducing life, nor an ideal\npolity by reducing mind, to its pure case or essentials, since we\ncannot construct {252} organisms [1] or history at all. And it is\nbecause this is always being forgotten that the duty of understanding\nrather than constructing has to be insisted upon. It is true that in\nunderstanding, as in constructing, we imply essential relations, and\nso incur responsibility, and are liable to betray a bias; but still,\nlife can be understood by help of any creature that is alive, and\ntherefore it is not the example with which the student works, but the\ninsight which he shows, that is the decisive point.\n\n[1] \u201cNo human mind has ever conceived a new animal.\u201d Ruskin, _Modern\nPainters_, ii. 148.\n\n4. We have to begin by realising what is involved in the fact that\nwe are about to treat the analysis of a Modern State as a chapter\nin the _Philosophy of Mind_. For Hegel\u2019s _Philosophy of Right_\n(or of _Law_), though published by him as an independent work, is\nessentially an expansion of paragraphs which form one sub-division of\nhis _Philosophy of Mind_, itself the third and concluding portion of\nthe _Encyclopaedia of Philosophy_, of which the two earlier portions\nare the _Logic_ and the _Philosophy of Nature_.\n\nWe saw in the second chapter of the present work that the mere\nforce of facts has driven modern sociologists to handle their\nscience in a more or less intimate connection with Psychology. The\ndifferentia of society, we saw, has been stated in various formulae\nof a psychological character. But it seemed to us that, owing to a\nneglect of the logic of identity, the nature of mind was broken up\nby such unreal distinctions as that between invention and imitation,\nvaried by the unreal {253} reduction of the one to the other, [1]\nand also that an unexplained separation and parallelism survived as\nbetween the individual and the social mind, bearing witness to the\nvitality of the superstition which Rousseau\u2019s insight picked out for\ncondemnation. [2] We do not deny that mind may be more than social;\nbut in as far as it is social it is still real mind, and that means\nthat it is not something other than what we know as individual lives,\n[3] a pale and unreal reflection of them, but it is a characteristic\nwhich belongs to their most intimate constitution. This was Plato\u2019s\nanalysis of moral autonomy, and his work remains classically valid,\nneeding only expansion and interpretation in applying it to modern\nfree intelligence and social self-government.\n\n[1] Prof. Baldwin, _Social and Ethical Interpretation_, p. 105, at\nleast suggests this unreal reduction.\n\n[2] See p. 95 above.\n\n[3] \u201cLives,\u201d and not merely \u201cconsciousnesses,\u201d as objective mind is\nlargely in the form of habit.\n\nThe position of the analysis of a State in the _Philosophy of Mind_\nmay be briefly indicated as follows. When we embark on the study of\nordinary Psychology, we take the individual human being as we find\nhim to-day. We accept him as a formed individual, distinguishing\nhimself from external things, and possessing what we call a will--a\ncapacity of seeking his own satisfaction, which he represents to\nhimself in general ideas by the help of language. We analyse the\nself and will with their aspects of memory, attention, association,\nimpulse, and emotion. But all modern psychologists are aware that\nthis formed self and will has much history behind it, and presupposes\na long genesis connecting it with simpler forms of {254} soul-life.\nHegel, indeed, was among the first in modern times to see how far\nback the story of mind must be taken. The human intelligence, as the\npsychologist assumes it, is for him a middle phase in the romance of\nwhich mind is the hero. Before it come the chapters of Anthropology,\nwhich treat of the fixation of a soul in the disciplined powers and\nhabits of a human body, and then the account [1] of a consciousness\nwhich gradually rises from a struggling perception of objects around\nit to a moral and scientific certainty of being at home in the world.\n\n[1] For this account, to which he has devoted perhaps the greatest\nof his works, Hegel has coined the term \u201cPhenomenology of the Mind.\u201d\nIt is the history of the emergence of the free or modern spirit from\nthe undeveloped consciousness of the ancient world, to which, for\ninstance, slavery seemed a natural thing.\n\nThe story of mind, then, begins long before the free mind, the object\nof Psychology to-day, has appeared on the scene. And as to this there\nwould be no great difference of opinion. The peculiarity of Hegel\u2019s\ntreatment is that his romance of the intelligence not only begins\nlong before the phase of free mind is reached, but continues long\nafter. Investigation can no more stop at the individual of to-day\nthan it can begin with him. His \u201cmind\u201d is not a separable entity,\nand throughout the story no such entity has appeared. It has been\nconvenient for Hegel to treat the earlier division of the _Philosophy\nof Mind_, comprising the Anthropology, Phenomenology, [1] and\nPsychology, as dealing _par excellence_ with Mind Subjective. This is\nbecause its main purpose was to trace the growth of \u201csubjectivity,\u201d\nthe emergence of the man of full mental {255} stature, aware\nof himself, of his ideas and purposes, and confident in his\n\u201csubjectivity\u201d his self-hood against all comers.\n\n[1] See previous note.\n\nBut the following division of the work, under the title of Mind\nObjective, deals with a necessary implication which might have been\nnoted at any point of the entire history of consciousness, though at\nany earlier point it could have been treated as referring to mind\nonly by anticipation.\n\nHere, however, the problem can no longer be deferred. The \u201cfree\nmind\u201d does not explain itself and cannot stand alone. Its impulses\ncannot be ordered, or, in other words, its purposes cannot be\nmade determinate, except in an actual system of selves. Except by\nexpressing itself in relation to an ordered life, which implies\nothers, it cannot exist. And, therefore, not something additional and\nparallel to it, which might or might not exist, but a necessary form\nof its own action as real and determinate, is the actual fabric in\nwhich it utters itself as Society and the State. This is what Hegel\ntreats in the second division of the _Philosophy of Mind_ under the\nname of Mind Objective. It is not for him ultimate. A particular\nsociety stands in time, and is open to criticism and to destruction.\nBeyond it lies the reality, continuous with mind as known in the\nState, but eternal as the former is perishable, which as Absolute\nMind is open to human experience in Art, Religion, and Philosophy.\n\nWe will pursue in the following chapter Hegel\u2019s analysis of the\nmodern State as Mind Objective, a magnified edition, so to speak,\nof Plato\u2019s _Republic_, bringing before the eye in full detail\ndistinctions and articulations which were there invisible.\n\n\n\n\n{256}\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nTHE ANALYSIS OF A MODERN STATE. HEGEL\u2019S \u201cPHILOSOPHY OF RIGHT.\u201d\n\n1. We are about to analyse a modern State into groups of facts which\nare also ways of thinking. And a question may arise in what sense the\nconnection is to be understood which will be alleged to bind together\nthese groups of facts or points of view. When it is urged that group\n_b_ or view _b_ is suggested and made necessary by the shortcomings\nof group _a_ or view _a_, does this imply that group a or its idea\ncame into existence first, and group _b_ or the notion of it sprang\nup subsequently or as an effect of the former? And could such a\nrelation be reasonably maintained as between the component parts of a\nunity like the State?\n\nAn answer may be indicated as follows. We are dealing, in society\nand in the State, with an _ideal fact_. As a fact, a form of life,\nsociety has always been a many-sided creature, meeting the varied\nneeds of human nature by functions no less varied. As an ideal fact,\nhowever, its advance has partaken of the nature of theoretical\nprogress. In the continuous attempt to deal satisfactorily {257} with\nthe needs of intelligent beings, the mind, the intelligent will, has\nthrown itself with predominant interest now into one of its functions\nand now into another. And this has not been a chance order of march.\nObviously, what it has emphasised and modified in the second place\nhas depended both positively and negatively on what it had emphasised\nand modified in the first place. Positively, because when one step is\nthoroughly secured the next may be definitely attempted. Negatively,\nbecause the definite attainment of one step exposes the limitations\nof what has been achieved, and the need for another. At every stage\nthe will is dissatisfied with the expression of itself which it has\ncreated. Till some public order has been established, morality can\nhardly find expression; but when a legal system is thoroughly in\nforce it becomes apparent how far the letter may fall short of the\nspirit. We see the same action of intelligence in pure theory. Every\nconquest of science leads to a new departure. It suggests it by its\nsuccess, and demands it by its failure.\n\nNow, in science it may or may not be the case that the connection\nwhich has led to a discovery enters permanently as a discernible\nfactor into the structure of knowledge. The re-organisation of\nexperience may sweep away the steps which led to it. But in the\nliving fact of society this is not so. Its many sides are actual and\npersist, and the emphasis laid from time to time on the principle\nof each--_e.g._ on positive law, on family ties, on economic\nbonds--merely serves to accent an element which has its permanent\nplace in the whole. Thus, there must always be family ties and\neconomic bonds. But at one time everything tends to be construed\n{258} in terms of kinship, at another time in terms of exchange.\nAnd the tendency means a difference of actual balance between the\nfunctions as well as a different theory. The positive and negative\nconnection of elements like these, the true place and limit of each,\nis permanently rooted in human nature, but may be elucidated by the\nexplicit logic of their attempt and failure to give the tone to the\nwhole social fabric. It follows that the social whole grows, like\na great theory, in adequacy to the needs which are its facts; and\nthe dissatisfaction of the will with its own expression, in other\nwords, the contradictions which practical intelligence is continually\nattempting to remove, becomes more like suggestion than flat\ncontradiction--or change, as we say, becomes less revolutionary. It\nmay seem to be a difference between the social whole and a scientific\ntheory that the former, as it grows, creates new difficulties, by\ncreating new and freshly contradictory matter, as in the social\nproblems of civilisation; while the latter, as we imagine, deals with\nan unchanging experience. But this distinction is less true than it\nappears, and the comparison with the growth of a theory will always\nthrow light on the true nature of the will and its continuous effort\nto satisfy itself.\n\n2. Right or Law may be taken in the widest sense as including the\nwhole manifestation of Will in an actual world--\u201cthe actual body of\nall the conditions of freedom,\u201d [1] \u201cthe realm of realised freedom,\nthe world of mind produced out of itself, as a second nature.\u201d [2] It\nis a merit of the German {259} term \u201c_Recht_\u201d [3] that it maintains\nthe connection between the law and the spirit of law, [4] and almost\nof itself prohibits the separation between positive law, and will,\ncustom or sentiment, which underlies such a theory as Austin\u2019s.\n\n[1] Hegel, _Philos. of Mind_ (E. Tr.), p. 104. Cf. defs. quoted from\nGreen, p. 203 above.\n\n[2] _Rechtsphil_., sect. 4.\n\n[3] Cf. the Greek\u2019s idea of \u201c_nomos_.\u201d\n\n[4] See ch. ii. above on Montesquieu and Rousseau.\n\nThis whole sphere of Right or Law, the mind as actualised in Society\nand the State, naturally divides itself on the principle which has\njust been explained, into three connected groups of ideal facts\nor points of view. The first, or simplest and most inevitable, of\nthese, may be called the \u201cletter of the law\u201d as we come upon it most\nespecially in the law of property--Shylock\u2019s law--the sheer fact, as\nit seems, that the world is appropriated by legal \u201cpersons.\u201d\n\nThe second, obviously conditioned by the first both positively and\nnegatively, may be described as the morality of conscience; the\nrevolt of the will against the letter of the law, though this was\nits own direct expression of itself (_e.g._ in taking things as\nproperty); and its demand to recognise as right nothing but what\nsprings from itself as the good will.\n\nAnd thirdly, there is the reality or concrete experience in which\nthe two former sets of facts, or ideas, find their true place and\njustification--the completed theory, so to speak, which adjusts and\nexplains the narrower views founded on one-sided contact with life.\nThis is indicated to consist in \u201csocial observance,\u201d or \u201cethical use\nand wont\u201d; the system of working mind where the true will appears as\nincarnate in a way of living. This, {260} like the others, it must\nbe remembered, is a fact, though akin to a theory. Not only does it\nexplain and justify the other factors, but its existence has enabled\nthem to exist, as theirs has also been essential to it. And yet each\nof the three, as one aspect of society which under certain influences\nmay catch the eye, has at times claimed--is, indeed, constantly\nclaiming--predominance, and has thus brought into relief its own\ndefects and the need of the complementary ideas. We will speak of\nthese moods of mind or kinds of experience in their order, expecting\na further sub-division when we come to treat of the third.\n\n3. \u201cLaw,\u201d then, in the directest possible sense--the minimum sense,\nso to speak--is the hard literal fact that it is a rule of the\nworld we live in for things to be appropriated by persons. This is\nthe first or minimum change of the world from mere matter into the\ninstruments of mind, and it is a necessary change. Things have no\nwill of their own, and it is by having a will asserted upon them that\nthey become organs of life. In the same way, it is by assertion in\nexternal things that the will first becomes a fact in the material\nworld. Property is \u201cthe first reality of freedom.\u201d [1] It is not\nthe mere provision for wants, but the material counterpart of will.\nContract belongs to this sphere, the sphere of property. It is an\nagreement of persons about an external thing--a \u201ccommon will,\u201d but\nnot one \u201cgeneral\u201d or \u201cuniversal\u201d in its own nature like that involved\nin the State.\n\n[1] _Rechtsphil_., sect. 41. Not, in its developed form, the first\nin time. Hegel lays stress on the fact that true, free, property was\nhardly realised even in his own day.\n\n{261} Thus, it is a confusion of spheres to apply the idea of\ncontract to the State, for the State is an imperative necessity of\nman\u2019s nature as rational, while contract is a mere agreement of\ncertain free persons about certain external things. The idea of the\nsocial contract is a confusion of the same type as that by which\npublic rights and functions were treated as private property in the\nmiddle age. The attributes of private property are nothing more than\nthe conditions of \u201cpersonal\u201d existence, and absurdity results if they\nare transferred to functions of the State.\n\nThis phase or view of law as, in its letter, an ultimate and absolute\nrule, may be illustrated, Hegel says, by the Stoic notion that there\nis only one virtue and one vice; by the Draconic conception that\nevery offence demands the extreme penalty; and by \u201cthe barbarity\nof the formal code of honour, which found in every injury an\nunpardonable insult.\u201d It might also be illustrated by Austin\u2019s theory\nof law as a command enforced by a penalty; or by the theories which\naccount for property simply by the fact of occupancy or of labour\nmixed with the thing. The common point of all these views is that\nthey treat the law, not as a part of a living system, [1] ultimately\nresting on the will to maintain a certain type of life, but as\nsomething absolute in its separateness, and equally sacred in all its\naccidents and inequalities.\n\n[1] See _e.g._ above, p. 232, how the idea of a system of rights may\nmodify punishment.\n\nNow, this emphasis and idea of law, being the exaggeration of a\nsingle and direct necessity, the {262} necessity of order and\nproperty, may be called \u201cprimitive\u201d or barbarous, but it cannot of\ncourse be identified with the earliest state of social authority\nknown to history or to anthropology. There we should probably find\nlaw undifferentiated from custom and from religious sentiment,\nand consequently, though rigid enough, not in any such one-sided\nabsoluteness as we have been describing. All we can say is that\nthis is the way in which law must come to be regarded whenever its\nliving spirit is forgotten, and an unreal absoluteness is assigned\nto it; and this connection of principle verifies itself as a fact in\nrecurrent historical phenomena, and in fallacies which perpetually\nreappear.\n\n4. Within the whole fabric of right or realised will, the element\nwhich naturally asserts itself by antagonism to the letter of the\nlaw is the morality of conscience, conscientiousness, or the idea of\nthe Good Will. It is connected with the letter of the law, as Hegel\nputs it, by the various degrees of wrong. The will, that is to say,\nfinds itself at variance in or with [1] the order of law and property\nwhich it has created as its direct and necessary step to freedom. Its\nrealised theory, so to speak, is found to break down at a certain\npoint, by being in contradiction with the needs which it was created\nto meet. \u201c_Summum jus, summa injuria_\u201d. We may object that the\nanti-legal will is simply wrong. This may be so, and again it may\nnot be so. What the will has awakened to, whether right or wrong, is\n{263} that it can acquiesce in nothing which does not come home to it\nas fulfilling its own principle. What so comes home to it is what it\ncalls \u201cgood,\u201d and it cannot accept any order or necessity which it\ncannot will as good, _i.e._ as satisfying its own idea.\n\n[1] \u201cIn it,\u201d when my will does not conflict with right as such, but\nclaims the right in an object A to be mine and not yours--a civil\ndispute. \u201cWith it,\u201d when my will rebels, and by its act, so far as\nin it lies, denies and destroys the whole fabric of right, _e.g._\ntakes the object A, without alleging a right to it--theft, a criminal\noffence, cf. p. 230.\n\nWhen this phase of reaction is pushed to its logical extreme, we\nhave the modern doctrine of my conscience and my pure will. It is\nthe conflict of the inner self with the outer world, expressed in\nhistory through the Stoic and through some forms of the Christian\nconsciousness (especially the Protestant consciousness), and in\nphilosophy through the Kantian doctrine of the good will, uttered in\nthe famous sentence, \u201cNothing can possibly be conceived in the world\nor out of it which can be called good without qualification except\na good will.\u201d [1] Nothing is worth doing but _what_ one ought, and\n_because_ one ought.\n\n[1] Kant, _Grundlegung zur Metaphysik d. Sitten_, sect. I.\n\nThe criticism to which this principle has been subjected is familiar\nto students of ethics. Its point is, in brief, that there is no way\nof connecting any particular action with the mere idea of a pure\nwill. The forms assumed by evasions of this difficulty, which we fall\ninto when we desire wholly to separate the inner from the outer, or\nthe \u201cought\u201d from the \u201cis,\u201d are treated by Hegel with unsurpassable\nvigour and subtlety, as indeed the annihilating criticism of this\nconception is primarily due to him. The essence of the matter is\nthat the pure will directed towards good for the sake of good,\nhaving no real connection with any detailed conduct, may be alleged\nby self-deception in support of any behaviour whatever, and out of\nthis may spring the {264} whole sophistry and hypocrisy of \u201cpure\nintention.\u201d He makes the shrewd observation, [1] which is still of\ninterest, that the extreme Protestant doctrine of conscience may take\nthe form of ethical vacuity or instability, and that this had in his\ntime been the cause of many Protestants going over to Rome, to secure\nsome sort of moorings, if not precisely the stability of thought.\n\n[1] _Rechtsphil_., sect. 141.\n\nStill, out of all this one-sidedness, there survives the permanent\nnecessity that an intelligent being can acquiesce only in what\nenters into the object of his will. It is his will which affirms the\naim to which his nature draws him, and he is absolutely debarred\nfrom reposing in anything which does not appeal to his will. The\nsubjective will is the only soil on which freedom can be a reality.\n\nSo, within the general organism of Right or realised Free-will, we\nhave found two opposite groups of facts--for the aspirations of\nintelligent beings are facts--or tendencies or theories, which are\nconnected by opposition, and yet are necessary to the expression of\nthe same underlying need--the letter of the law, and the freedom of\nconscience.\n\n5. Hegel\u2019s name for the third term, which, as he puts it, expresses\nthe \u201ctruth\u201d of these extremes, may be rendered \u201cthe Ethical System,\u201d\nor \u201cthe Moral Life,\u201d or \u201cSocial Ethics.\u201d It expresses \u201cthe truth\u201d of\nthe extremes, as a good theory may express the truth of two one-sided\nviews. Only, as we have said, it is a fact as well as a theory, and\ntherefore is something which actually contains what these two views\ndemand, and does the work which they, and the facts they rely on,\n{265} exhibit as necessary to be done. This relation is not obscure\nor unprecedented. Every institution, every life, works as a theory,\nand either masters its facts or fails to master them; though not\nevery theory is a life or an institution.\n\nThe German word which the above-mentioned phrases attempt to render\nis \u201c_Sittlichkeit_\u201d The word takes its meaning from \u201c_Sitte_\u201d which\nin common usage is equivalent to \u201ccustom.\u201d Hegel\u2019s use of the\nterm, in his later writings, as opposed to \u201c_Moralit\u00e4t_\u201d and as\nindicating, in comparison with it, a fuller and truer phase of life,\nis an intentional declaration of war against the Kantian principle\nof the pure good will, and is the gist of Hegel\u2019s ethico-political\nview in a nutshell. The word would most naturally apply to the\nlife of a community in which law, custom, and sentiment were not\nyet very sharply distinguished. According to accepted views, the\ncommunities of ancient Greece, before they were stirred by the\nreflective movement which is associated with the names of Socrates\nand the Sophists, would be examples of a disposition and order of\nlife which the word \u201c_Sittlichkeit_\u201d might denote. And it was in\nthe Greek communities, as is shown by the work which he sketched\nas early as 1802, [1] that Hegel found this suggestion of a whole\nin which law and custom, duty and disposition, were absolutely at\none. He subsequently modified the conception in accordance with the\nmodern idea of freedom, by allowing a greater emphasis and relief to\nits {266} component parts, and insisting (against Plato\u2019s _Republic_\nfor instance,) on the principle of individual choice, initiative,\nand property, as necessary to the complete communion of intelligent\nbeings. As we have just seen, indeed, he introduces reflective\nmorality or conscientiousness into the sphere of Right, to represent\nthe full nature of mind, which is only exhibited in a consciousness\nwhich pursues its aims of its own choice and for their own sake.\n\n[1] The _System d. Sittlichkeit_. The _Rechtsphil_. was not published\ntill 1817, in its earliest form. See Wallace, _Hegel\u2019s Philosophy of\nMind_, p. 187.\n\nThe Ethical System, then, or Social Ethics, is put forward as the\nideal fact which includes, and does the work of both the literal law\nand the moral will, alike in practice and as a theory. It is the idea\nof freedom developed (i.) into a present world, and (ii.) into the\nnature of self-consciousness.\n\nFor (i.), in the first place, the ethical system, or the ways of\nacting which make up social ethics, constitute a present and actual\nworld. So far it partakes of the nature of the literal law and order,\nthe system of property-holding, which, as we have seen, is all but\na natural fact. Social Ethic, we might say, _is_ a physical fact.\nThe bodily habits and external actions of a people incorporate it.\nIt transforms the face of a country, \u201cdomesticating the untamed\nearth.\u201d [1] Each individual has his own bodily existence in a\ndeterminate mode as a part of the ethical life of society. The rules\nand traditions of ethical living are, as has been said, \u201cthe nature\nof things.\u201d They are as hard, as \u201cobjective\u201d an order as \u201csun,\nmoon, mountains, rivers, and all objects of nature.\u201d [2] Man lives\naccording to them before he knows that he {267} does so, and always,\nin a great degree, independently of knowing that he does so. As this\ngroup of facts, or considered from this point of view, the ethical\nsystem is the body of the moral world.\n\n[1] Aeschylus, _Eumenides_, I. 14. [2] _Rechtsphil_., sect. 146.\n\n(ii.) But it is also and no less the very nature of\nself-consciousness. It is as much a demand of man\u2019s intelligence\nor an inner and universal law as the \u201cpure will\u201d itself. [1] The\ndifference between them is that the Ethical System is a _system_,\na world, though from the point of view of will regarded as inner,\nthat is to say, as something which is the motive and fulfills the\ndemand of consciousness. Thus, it bears the character of a thoroughly\nsystematised theory, as contrasted with the idea of a good will,\nwhich is a mere general point of view. And it is because of this\nsystematic character that it is enabled to connect the individual\nor particular will with the universal spirit of the community. It\nis only in a system that a particular fact can be connected with\na universal law, as the planetary motions are with the law of\ngravitation. The particular will, as we have explained above, is\nuniversalised by its relation to a systematic purpose which it partly\nimplies and partly realises. A man wishes for this thing or that\nthing, but not at any price. The reservations to which his wish is\nsubject, by reason of other purposes and postulates of life, are\nknown to him only in part; but if they could be stated in full, they\nwould constitute the system of his life as realised in the universal\nlife of the community. It is precisely {268} analogous to the process\nwhich a common judgment of perception has to go through in becoming a\nscientific truth--the implications have to be stated in full, and the\nperception modified in accordance with them. And when this is done,\nwe have no longer a fact, but a science.\n\n[1] On all this portion of the subject, see Mr. Bradley\u2019s Essay, \u201cMy\nStation and its Duties,\u201d in _Ethical Studies_.\n\nRegarded from this point of view, as the substance of the individual\nWill, the Ethical System is the Soul of the moral world.\n\nIn analysing the Ethical System, we shall say nothing of \u201cduties\u201d\nor \u201cvirtues.\u201d Duty is in each case what the relation requires--the\nattachment of the universal system of will to the individual life.\nVirtue is a habit of such action, considered as embodied in the\nnature of an individual. The idea of virtue and virtuousness is not,\nin Hegel\u2019s view, altogether suitable to the members of an ethical\ncommonwealth. It belongs rather to a time of undeveloped social life,\nwhen ethical principles and the realisation of them are ascribed to\nthe nature of peculiarly gifted individuals. Virtue or excellence, to\nthe Greek moralist, for instance, suggested doing something better\nthan the average, or being in some way specially gifted, and it is\nstill apt to indicate the desire to be some thing exceptional, and\nnot simply to find yourself in genuine service. The meaning of the\nwords to-day tends to narrow itself to certain special relations, and\ndoes not indicate that life of the member in the whole, which is the\nessence of what we really value.\n\nThe Ethical System, or the Order of Social Ethics, then--the mind and\nconduct of the citizen in Christendom--may be regarded as affirming\nfreedom {269} in three principal aspects, necessarily connected, and\nsupplementing one another. Outwardly these aspects are different\ngroups of facts--different institutions; inwardly they are different\nmoods or dispositions of the one and indivisible human mind.\n\nThus, Hegel\u2019s analysis regards the social whole or system of social\nethics from three points of view. First, in respect of the Family;\nsecondly, in respect of what he has entitled Bourgeois Society; and\nthirdly, in respect of the Political Organism, or the State in the\nstrict sense.\n\nIt is to be borne in mind that, like the three principal divisions in\nthe sphere of Right, these headings represent explicit theories of\nsociety, as well as groups of facts.\n\n6. Beginning once more, within an ordered social sphere, at the\nethical factor which stands nearest to the natural world, and has\ntaken, so to speak, the minimum step into the realm of purpose and\nconsciousness, we start from the family. As the family exists in a\nmodern civilised community, it is something necessary to society and\nthe State, but absolutely distinct from both.\n\nIt first _(a)_ represents the _fact_ of the natural basis of social\nrelations, being the embodiment of natural feeling in the form of\nlove, both as between the parents, and as embodied for them in the\nchildren. It is in accordance with Hegel\u2019s general views of the\nmeaning of a system that he sees this element of mind primarily\nrepresented by the family, as an organ preserved and differentiated\n_ad hoc_, and not, or not merely, distributed indefinitely throughout\nthe community. Thus, the modern family represents for him a higher\nstage {270} of civilisation--an organ to a fuller embodiment of\nmind--than the clan or tribe, or, in short, than any form of\ncommunity in which the _whole_ bond of union rests on merely natural\nfeeling, kindness, generosity, or affection. In the nation, indeed,\na tinge of natural affection, a colouring of unity by kinship,\nsurvives, just as feeling runs through the experience of the\nindividual mind. But the distinctive character of the State is clear\nintelligence, explicit law and system, and so the natural basis of\nfeeling, though necessary to be preserved and spiritualised, achieves\nthese needs in the family as a special organ, and not in the State as\nsuch.\n\nAll those theories, therefore, which tend to assimilate the State to\na family by a sort of levelling down of the former or levelling up of\nthe latter (Plato\u2019s _Republic_, the phalanstery, paternal government,\nand the like) involve for Hegel a mere confusion of relations. They\nrecognise an element which is essential to society, and may truly\nbe said to be even its foundation. But they do not see its right\nplace in the whole, and do not understand that in order to attain a\nstronger and deeper unity (which is, in short, a stronger and deeper\nmind) the different elements must be allowed a greater emphasis and\nrelief, and their respective characteristics must not be slurred or\nscamped.\n\nBut _(b)_ in the second place, the family is a factor in the rational\nwhole, the State, though its function _par excellence_ is that of\nthe natural basis of society. Hence its nature and sanction is\nethical--it rests neither on mere feeling on {271} the one hand,\nnor on mere contract on the other. It has a public side, and the\nacceptance of a universal obligation by a declaration in explicit\nlanguage (language being the stamp of the universal), in face of the\ncommunity, is an essential part of marriage, and not a mere accident\nor accessory, as the votaries of feeling have urged. This view is\naimed against the confusion which finds the sole essence of marriage\nin feeling. This is a perpetually recurring contention, represented\nin Hegel\u2019s day by Friedrich von Schlegel\u2019s _Lucinde_, which argues\nthat the form of marriage destroys the value of passion. Hegel\u2019s\nanalyses are everywhere directed against this inability to grasp the\ndistinct sides of a many-sided fact.\n\n_(c)_ The ethical aspect of the family [1] shows itself in the nature\nand organisation of the household, as an institution embodying\npermanent interests and relations of the two persons who are its\nhead, and as an organ of public duties in the bodily and spiritual\nnurture of the children. The permanent and equal relation of the\nheads of the household, involved in its nature as the ethical aspect\nof the family, implies monogamy, and it is the monogamous family\nalone which can count as a true element of the ethical order.\n\n[1] Cf. Green\u2019s _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. 235.\n\n_(d)_ The household, being the true and operative ethical organ\nwhich makes parentage into family, is the unit which demands to be\nrespected and protected by the State against the less differentiated\nforms of consanguinity, such as the clan. The true family starts\nfrom marriage and the foundation of a household, and in the early\n{272} development of law we find the State, with a just instinct,\nprotecting the household against the clan, _e.g._ by conferring the\npower of bequest. This power, though now it may imply a discretion\nmainly hostile to the family, presented itself in early law rather\nas a means of perpetuating the separate household as against the\npretensions of the clan to interfere with its property.\n\nThus, the monogamous family is naturally and necessarily, to some\nextent, a unit in respect of property; the children, at least, being\ninevitably under tutelage and incapable of self-support, even if\neconomic equality asserts itself as between husband and wife. This\npeculiar relation in respect of property is rooted in the unique\nnature of the household, as an organ for the guardianship of immature\nlives, and as a unity of feeling rather than of explicit thought. It\nis noticeable that progress tends to introduce the distinctions of\nproperty within its unity [1] (though for children this can never go\nvery far), and very slightly to introduce the relations of the family\ninto the outside world. In as far as such distinctions come to be\nmade, the nature and functions of the household being undisturbed, a\nsomewhat higher intensity of ethical union is rendered necessary, and\nwill no doubt assert itself.\n\n[1] Married Women\u2019s Property, Protection of Earnings of Children,\nProperty assigned by understanding within household to young children.\n\n7. When the man (or woman [1]) arrives at maturity and leaves the\nsafe harbour of the family, he finds himself, _prima facie_, isolated\nin a world {273} of conflicting self-interests. He has his living\nto make, or his property to administer. He is tied to others, in\nappearance, only by the system of wants and work, with the elementary\nfunction which is necessary to it, viz. its police functions and the\nadministration of justice.\n\n[1] Hegel would say only or chiefly the man, who is for him the\nnatural earner and chief of the household.\n\nIt is this phase of social life, and the temper or disposition\ncorresponding to it, which Hegel indicates by the expression\nBourgeois Society. [1] It presents itself to him as the opposite\nextreme of life and mind to that embodied in the family. It is an\naggregate of families--for the units of the Bourgeois Society are\nheads of households--as seen from the outside, in the great system\nof industry and business, where a man has to find his work and do\nit. It is, in mind, the presence of definite though limited aims,\ncalculation and self-interest. [2]\n\n[1] _B\u00fcrgerliche Gesellschaft_. \u201cSociety,\u201d Wallace points out, is\nhere opposed to \u201ccommunity,\u201d and indicates a looser phase of union.\n\n[2] Cf. the merchant in Wilhelm Meister\u2019s _Lehrjahre_, viii. 2. \u201cI\ncan assure you that I never reflected on the State in my life. My\ntolls, charges, and dues I have paid for no other reason than that it\nwas established usage\u201d (cited from Wallace, _Hegel\u2019s Philosophy of\nMind_, p. cci.).\n\nBourgeois Society is the aspect of the social whole insisted on by\nthe classical political economy, by which, as an achievement in\nthe way of reducing complex appearances to principles, Hegel was\nmuch impressed. It is, again, the view of society embodied in the\nconception of the purely police State, and its principle is confused\nwith that of the State proper by one set of theorists, as that of the\nfamily is by another.\n\nIt is the peculiarity of Hegel\u2019s view--probably {274} the most\ndefinitely original, as it is the most famous, of all his political\nideas--to contend that this aspect of society, with the form of\nconsciousness belonging to it, is necessary to a modern State.\nAccording to his logic, indeed, it is inevitable that every true\nwhole shall have an aspect of \u201cdifference,\u201d of breaking up into\nparticulars.\n\nThe principle of the ancient State, as concentratedly expressed in\nPlato\u2019s _Republic_, was weak and undeveloped, and fell short of the\ntrue claims of intelligence, [1] just because it dared not really let\nthe individual go--let him assert himself as himself. \u201cSubjectivity\u201d\nwas a principle fatal to it. Not that there was an iron oppression\nin the States of antiquity. The individual was, for an onlooker,\nmagnificently developed. His limitations were in him, and did not\noppress him; but for all that, free choice and the career open to\ntalents were not for him.\n\n[1] \u201cWas not ideal enough\u201d (Hegel, _Geschichte der Philosophie_,\nii. 254). The \u201cnotion\u201d for him necessarily involves identity,\ndifferentiation, and re-integration; and in this respect the ancient\nState falls short of a true notion, while the modern realises it.\n\nThe modern demand--such is Hegel\u2019s conception--is harder and higher.\nThe individual\u2019s life is not predetermined by his birth, but he is\nthrown face to face with economic necessity, which is a form of the\nuniversal end. He has to strip off his crudeness and vanity, and, of\nhimself, mould himself into something which fulfils a want. This is\na step without which there can be no true freedom--the giving one\u2019s\nself by one\u2019s own act a definite place in the region of external\nnecessity, the \u201cbecoming _something_\u201d or attaching oneself to {275}\na definite class of service renderers. Thus, we are startled to\nfind culture or education treated in general, and in respect of\nits indispensableness, under the head of the Bourgeois Society.\nFor culture is the liberation from one\u2019s own caprices, and the\nacceptance of a universal task. It is a severe process, and therefore\nunpopular, but it is a necessary one if we are to have true freedom.\nThe criticism that such a world and temper is the world and temper\nof self-interest does not appeal strongly to Hegel. We shall have to\ntreat of it more fully below. [1]\n\n[1] See p. 291.\n\nIt may be noted in passing that the insecurity of life, which may\nseem to attach to dependence on the vast system of wants and work,\nis more and more seen, as modern economic relations develop, not to\nbe insecurity at all, except in as far as \u201cculture\u201d in the form of\nindustrial training is absent. There is, indeed, in modern life,\nnowhere any absolute and oyster-like stability. The highest stability\nto be anywhere attained is that due to fitness for service in the\ninterdependent system of needs. [1]\n\n[1] I may refer to _The Standard of Life_, by H. Bosanquet, essay on\n\u201c_Klassenkampf_\u201d.\n\nTherefore, as Hegel saw, but in more ways than he saw, the system\nof Bourgeois Society--the economic and industrial world--is not a\nseparate reality, but only an appearance within a larger system.\nThe member of it is not so detached as he may seem, or think. He is\nwithin, and sustained by, the general life of the State, as the aims\nwhich are his motives in \u201cbusiness\u201d or industry are within {276} and\ninseparable from the whole structure of his intelligence.\n\nThus, the world of Bourgeois Society--a world, on the whole, of cash\nnexus and mere protection by the State--has a structure or tendency\nof its own which brings it back by necessary steps to connection with\nthe State proper or explicit and determinate social unity. It is,\nwe must observe, posterior to the State in time. It is only within\nthe State proper, and resting on its solid power, that such a world\nas that of Bourgeois Society could arise or be conceivable. Its\npriority to the State is, like that of the family, the priority of\ncomparative narrowness or simplicity, of dealing with fewer factors,\nand of representing human nature in a more special, though necessary,\naspect. And for this very reason it could not exist by itself. It has\nnot the many-sided vitality indispensable to anything which is to\nhold its own in the actual world.\n\nThe working of the Bourgeois Society, then, exhibits an inevitable\nconnection with the State proper, and, so to speak, leads up to it.\n\nIn the first place, the economic world implies the administration\nof justice. In this, as involving a developed system of civilised\nlaw, there is an advance on the \u201cletter of the law\u201d in its crudest\nand most barbarous acceptation. The system of law of a modern\nState is, and still more ought to be, [1] a fairly reasonable and\nintelligible definition of the rights and relations of persons.\nBy this determination the economic system of particular wants and\nservices enters upon a first {277} approximation, as it were, to a\nunity of principle. The law only professes, indeed, to _protect_\nproperty and exchange, but in doing so it unavoidably recognises\nthat the particular want has a general bearing; for the developed\nsystem of law only comes into existence to enable wants to be\nsupplied, and takes its definite shape according to the system of\nwants. We may illustrate this first approximation to universality,\nwhich law confers upon the particulars of private interest, by a\nsuggestive view which M. Durkheim has propounded. [2] He has pointed\nout that the current formula for social change, \u201cfrom status to\ncontract,\u201d has a subtler significance than is apt to be recognised.\nFor contract is not really indeterminate, as if it arose _in vacuo_\nwithout a precedent. It runs in forms determined by social experience\nthrough law and custom; and thus the law, which professedly aims at\nprotecting property and exchange, necessarily regulates them by the\nmodes in which it chooses to protect them.\n\n[1] Hegel pleads strongly for codification.\n\n[2] _De la Division du Travail Social,_ 225 ff.\n\nA more intimate relation to the State proper--to a definite\nprinciple, as we might say, of common good--grows out of the\ninterests of Bourgeois Society which take the shape of what a German\ncalls \u201cPolice and Corporation,\u201d _i.e._ State regulation and Trade\nSocieties.\n\nThe basis of State regulation is the emergence of aspects of common\ninterest in the system of particular interests. The region of\nparticular interests (supply and demand) has an accidental side,\nand the State has a right and a duty to protect the general good\nagainst accidental {278} hindrances. On the whole, no doubt, the\nright relation between producer and consumer arises of itself, but\nmiscarriages may occur which call for interference on behalf of the\nexplicit [1] principle of the general good. The _general_ possibility\nof the individual\u2019s obtaining what he wants is a public interest, and\nthe State has a right to intervene with this end in view, both by\nexecution of necessary public works, by sanitary inspection and the\nlike, and by inspection and control of fraud in the case of necessary\ncommodities offered for sale to the general public. For the public\noffer of goods in daily use is not a purely private concern, but a\nmatter of the general interest. If indeed there was complete official\nregulation, there would be a risk of getting work like the Pyramids,\nthat represented no private want at all; but yet, in the system of\nprivate wants, there is a public interest that demands vigilance.\n\n[1] The _explicit_ idea of common good always belongs in Hegel to the\nState proper.\n\nA similar approximation of Bourgeois Society to the State is\nconstituted by the \u201cCorporation,\u201d which rests on the facts of class.\nEvery member of the Bourgeois Society belongs by his vocation to a\nclass, and this breaking up into classes is a consequence of the\ndivision of labour which prevails in the economic sphere, disguising\nthe common good as private interest or necessity. But in the\nformation of classes society begins as it were to recover from the\ndispersion which private interest has occasioned. As a member of his\nclass [1] or {279} \u201cestate,\u201d the citizen acquires solidarity with his\nfellows, and his particular interest becomes _ipso facto_ a common\none. As a member of the class, again, he is, or ought to be, a member\nof his \u201ctrade society\u201d or \u201ccorporation.\u201d In this he finds his honour\nor recognition, [2] a definite standard of life (apart from which\nhe is apt to assert himself by aimless extravagance, for want of a\nrecognised respectability), a standard of work, insurance against\nmisfortune, and (as a candidate for admission) the means of technical\neducation.\n\n[1] The term \u201c_St\u00e4nde_\u201d it must be remembered, has for a German the\nassociation of elements of the representative assembly; \u201c\u00e9tats\u201d,\nestates of the realm.\n\n[2] Cf. the English workman\u2019s phrase, \u201ca good tradesman,\u201d _i.e._ a\ncompetent member of his trade.\n\nIf the family is the first basis of the State, the classes or estates\nare the second. The Corporation or Trade Society is a second family\nto its members. It is the very root of ethical connection between the\nprivate and the general [1] interest, and the State should see to it\nthat this root holds as strongly as possible. [2]\n\n[1] \u201cWe can only say that these men, if they leave us, will bitterly\nregret it. ... The man who is so unselfish as to care nothing for\nhimself or his fellow-men will soon find himself, as years creep over\nhim, and grey hairs and glasses, completely cut out.\u201d--\u201cBranch Trade\nReport (Birmingham) to National Union of Boot and Shoe Operatives,\nJanuary, 1896.\u201d\n\n[2] Sects. 201 and 255. I omit Hegel\u2019s characterisation of the\nclasses, which has a good deal in common with theories which\nrepresent occupations as determining character. The contrast between\nagricultural and industrial or commercial life, between country and\ntown, is of great importance in his view. He almost seems to confine\nBourgeois industrialism as such to the life of town-dwellers; though,\nagain, ultimately the whole division into classes is characteristic\nof Bourgeois Society (cf. sects. 256 and 305).\n\n  \u201cIf,\u201d Hegel writes, [1] \u201cin recent days the \u201cCorporation\n  has been abolished, this has the significance {280}\n  that the individual ought to provide for himself. This\n  may be admitted; but the corporation did not alter the\n  individual\u2019s obligation to earn his livelihood. In our\n  modern States the citizens have only a limited share in\n  the universal business of the State; but it is necessary\n  to permit the ethical human being a universal activity\n  over and above his private end. This universal, which the\n  modern State does not always provide for him, he finds\n  in the Corporation. We saw before that the individual\n  providing for himself in the Bourgeois Society also acts\n  for others. But this unconscious necessity is not enough;\n  it needs the Corporation to bring it to a conscious and\n  thoughtful social ethics. Of course the Corporation needs\n  the higher superintendence of the State, or it would\n  ossify, shrink into its shell, and be degraded into a\n  wretched guild. But in and for itself the Corporation is\n  no closed guild; it is rather the bringing of an isolated\n  trade into an ethical connection, and its admission into\n  a sphere in which it wins strength and honour.\u201d [2]\n\n[1] Sect. 255.\n\n[2] It is obvious that this treatment of associations arising\namong classes in industry and commerce does not apply in principle\nexclusively to trade or professional societies. It would include,\n_e.g._, Friendly Societies and Co-operative Societies, by which\nmembers of the economic world bind themselves together for help,\nrecognition, and the assertion of their general interests.\n\n8. The State proper, or political constitution, presents itself to\nHegel as the system in which the family and the Bourgeois Society\nfind their completion and their security. He was early impressed,\nas we have seen, with the beautiful unity of the ancient Greek\ncommonwealths. And the first and last idea which governs his\nrepresentations of the modern State is that of the Greek commonwealth\nenlarged as it was from a sun to a solar {281} system. The family\nfeeling and the individual interest are in the modern State let go,\naccented, intensified to their uttermost power; and it is out of\nand because of this immense orbit of its elements that the modern\nState has its \u201cenormous strength and depth.\u201d It is the typical mind,\nthe very essence of reason, whose completeness is directly as the\ncompleteness of each of its terms or sides or factors; and secure\nin the logical confidence that feeling and self-consciousness, the\nmore they attain their fulness, must return the more certainly to\ntheir place in the reasonable system which is their very nature.\nAs ultimate power, the State maintains on one side the attitude of\nan external necessity towards the spheres of private life, of the\nfamily, and of the economic world. It may intervene by force to\nremove hindrances in the path of the common good, which accident and\nimmaturity may have placed there. But, in its essence, the State is\nthe indwelling and explicit end of these modes of living, and is\nstrong in its union of the universal purpose with the particular\ninterests of mankind. It is, in short, the incarnation of the general\nor Real Will. It has the ethical habit and temper of the family as a\npervading basis, combined with the explicit consciousness and purpose\nof the business world. In the organism of the State, _i.e._ in as\nfar as we feel and think as citizens, feeling becomes affectionate\nloyalty, and explicit consciousness becomes political insight. As\ncitizens we both feel and see that the State includes and secures\nthe objects of our affections and our interests; not as separate\nitems, thrown together by chance, but as purposes transformed by\ntheir relation to the common good, into {282} which, as we are more\nor less aware, they necessarily pass. This feeling and insight are\nthe true essence of patriotism. It is easier to be magnanimous than\nto be merely right, and people prefer to think of patriotism as a\nreadiness to make great sacrifices which are never demanded. But true\npatriotism is the every-day habit of looking on the commonwealth as\nour substantive purpose and the foundation of our lives.\n\nThe division of functions in the State is a necessary condition of\nits rational organisation. But, as Rousseau had insisted, it is\naltogether false to regard these separate functions as independent,\nor as checks on one another. There could be no living unity, if the\nfunctions of the State were ultimately independent and negative\ntowards each other. Their differentiation is simply the rational\ndivision of labour. The State is an image of a rational conception;\nit is \u201ca hieroglyph of reason.\u201d\n\nSovereignty, therefore, resides in no one element. It is,\nessentially, the relation in which each factor of the constitution\nstands to the whole. That is to say, it resides only in the organised\nwhole acting _qua_ organised whole. If, for example, we speak of the\n\u201cSovereignty of the People\u201d in a sense opposed to the Sovereignty of\nthe State--as if there were such a thing as \u201cthe people\u201d over and\nabove the organised means of expressing and adjusting the will of the\ncommunity--we are saying what is, strictly speaking, meaningless.\nIt is just the point of difference between Rousseau\u2019s two views. We\nsaw that Rousseau clearly explained the impossibility of expressing\nthe general {283} will except by a determinate system of law.\nBut what he seemed to suggest, and was taken to mean, by popular\nSovereignty, was no doubt just the view which Hegel condemns. It is\nessentially the same question as how a constitution can be made.\nStrictly, a constitution cannot be made except by modification of\nan existing constitution. If, to put a case, you have a multitude\nnew to each other in some extra-political colony, they must assume\na constitution, so to speak, before they can make one. Law and\nconstitution are utterances of the spirit of a nation.\n\nThe form of State which Hegel analyses is a modern constitutional\nmonarchy, with an executive (ministers sitting in the chambers, as\nhe is careful to urge) and Chambers or Estates representing the\nclasses developed in the civic community. Representation, he urges,\nis of bodies or interests rather than of masses of individuals, and\nthe Corporations or Trade Societies have also an important place\ndirectly, by their touch with the departments of the executive\ngovernment. [1] The general principle is, as indicated above, that\nthe problems of connection between considerable particular interests\nand the universal interests of the community are, so to speak,\nprepared on the ground of the Corporation and Bourgeois Society for\na solution in the interest of the common good by the Legislative and\nthe Executive Government.\n\n[1] Much as through inspectors and commissions the opinion of Trade\nUnions, Friendly Societies, and Co-operators is elicited by our\nGovernment Departments with a view to legislation, independently of\nthe House of Commons.\n\nThe logical division of power, in his language, {284} is that the\nLegislature has to establish universal principles, the executive has\nto apply these principles to particular cases, and the prince has to\nbring to a point the acts of the State by giving them, \u201clike the dot\non the i,\u201d the final shape of individual volition.\n\nThe distinction of States into Monarchy, Aristocracy, and Democracy,\nHegel refuses to regard as applicable to the modern world. At best,\nit could only apply to the undeveloped communities of antiquity. The\nmodern State is a concrete, and, according to its principle, all the\nelements of a people\u2019s life are represented in it as an indivisible\nunity.\n\nA curious point is Hegel\u2019s insistence on the function of the personal\nHead of the State. By a junction of the extremes, he connects it with\nthe recognition of free individuality, which is usually regarded as\nthe democratic principle of the modern world. There is no act, we may\nsay in illustration, according to the modern idea of an act, if it is\nnot done in the end by an individual, though in a developed political\nsystem the monarch\u2019s action may only consist in signing his name.\nIt is at least remarkable to compare this view with the tendency to\none-man government in the administration of the United States of\nAmerica.\n\nThe State, then, is on one side the external force and automatic\nmachinery implied in the maintenance and adjustment of the rights and\npurposes of the family and the Bourgeois Society as an actual life.\nOn the other side, and most essentially, it is that connection of\nfeeling and insight, working throughout the consciousnesses of {285}\nindividuals as parts in a connected structure, which unite in willing\na certain type of life as a common good in which they find their\nown. It has the same content as that of Religion; but in an explicit\nand rationalised form as contrasted with the form of feeling. Only\nthe separation of Church and State, and the division of the Churches\nagainst one another, have made it possible for the State to exhibit\nits own free and ethical character in true fulness, apart from both\ndogmatic authority and anarchic fanaticism.\n\n9. Publicity of discussion in the assembly of the classes or estates\nis the great means of civic education. It is not in the least true\nthat every one knows what is for the good of the State, and has only\nto go down to the House and utter it. It is in the work of expression\n[1] and discussion that the good takes form by adjustment of private\nviews to facts and needs brought to bear by criticism. \u201cThe views a\nman plumes himself on when he is at home with his wife and friends\nare one thing; it is quite another thing what happens in a great\nassembly, where one shrewd idea devours the other.\u201d [2]\n\n[1] It is a remarkable point in English politics to-day that\nlegislation is practically in the hands of the Government\ndepartments. Bills are rejected or \u201cknocked about in Committee\u201d; but\nthe mass of organised knowledge necessary to initiate legislation in\na complex society can hardly be found outside the gathered experience\nof an office which has continuity in dealing with the same problems.\nThis tendency more than justifies Hegel\u2019s point of view. An act of\nthe \u201cGeneral Will\u201d has not only, as he said, to be moulded by running\nthe gauntlet of public and critical discussion, but has even to be\nfirst drafted by the help of immense piles of experience, which the\ngeneral mind does not possess, and could not deal with, but which,\nnevertheless, enable its typical wish and intention to be embodied in\neffective form.\n\n[2] _Rechtsphil._, sect. 315.\n\n{286} The free judgment of individuals based on the publicity of\npolitical discussion is \u201cpublic opinion.\u201d In public opinion we\nhave an actual existent contradiction. As public, it is sound and\ntrue, and contains the ethical spirit of the State. As expressed\nby individuals in their particular judgments, on which they plume\nthemselves, it is full of falsehood and vanity. It is the bad which\nis peculiar, and which people pride themselves on; the rational\nis universal in its nature, though not necessarily common. Public\nopinion is a contradictory appearance, in which the true exists as\nfalse. It is no accident, but inevitable insight, that leads both of\nthese characters to be proverbially expressed, as in \u201cVox populi, vox\nDei,\u201d contrasted with Ariosto\u2019s\n\n    \u201cChe\u2019l Volgare ignorante ogn\u2019un\u2019 riprenda\n    E parli plu di qual che meno intenda\u201d; [1]\n\nor Goethe\u2019s\n\n    \u201cZuschlagen kann die Masse\n    Da ist sie respektabel;\n    Urtheilen gelingt ihr miserabel.\u201d [2]\n\nor the \u201cmostly fools\u201d of Carlyle.\n\n[1] \u201cThat the ignorant vulgar reproves everyone, and talks most of\nwhat it understands least.\u201d\n\n[2] \u201cThe masses are respectable hands at fighting, but miserable\nhands at judging.\u201d\n\nNow, as public opinion thus combines truth and falsehood, the public\ncannot be in earnest with both, _i.e._ both cannot be its real will.\nBut if we restrict ourselves to its express utterance, we cannot\npossibly tell what it is in earnest with--_because it does not know_.\nTherefore, the degree of passion {287} with which a given opinion\nis maintained throws no light on the question, on what points the\npublic is really in earnest, in the sense of the \u201creal will.\u201d This\ncan only be known from the substantive reality, which is the \u201ctrue\ninwardness\u201d of public opinion. This substantive reality, the true\nmerits of any case, is not to be got by the study of mere public\nopinion as expressed, but when it is successfully divined and\nasserted, public opinion will always come round to it. If we ask how\nit is to be divined or known, we must go back to the analogy of a\ntheory. The solution must be constructed so as to satisfy the real\nfacts or needs, and the real facts or needs only become known in\nproportion as it is constructed, just as in scientific discovery.\nThe man who can see and do what his age wills and demands is the\ngreat man of the age. Public opinion, then, demands to be at once\nesteemed and contemned; esteemed in its essential basis, contemned\nin its conscious expression. It is, however, the principle of the\nmodern world that every one is allowed to contribute his opinion.\nWhen he has contributed it, and so far satisfied the impulse of\nself-assertion, he is likely to acquiesce in what is done, to which,\nhe can feel, he has thrown in some element of suggestion or criticism.\n\n10. In concluding this chapter, we will attempt to estimate the\nnearness of such an analysis of the State to the actual facts of\nlife, admitting certain appearances against it, but rejecting\npessimistic views which rest on false abstractions.\n\nI will state the difficulties as they appeared to T.H. Green, a\ncautious and practical Englishman, {288} well experienced in local\npolitics, and acquainted with different classes of men. [1]\n\n  \u201cTo an Athenian slave, who might be used to gratify a\n  master\u2019s lust, it would have been a mockery to speak\n  of the State as a realisation of freedom; and perhaps\n  it would not be much less to speak of it as such to an\n  untaught and under-fed denizen of a London yard with gin\n  shops on the right hand and on the left.\u201d\n\n  \u201cIt is true that the necessity which the State lays on\n  the individual is for the most part one to which he is\n  so accustomed that he no longer kicks against it; but\n  what is it, we may ask, but an external necessity, which\n  he no more lays on himself than he does the weight of\n  the atmosphere or the pressure of summer heat and winter\n  frosts, that compels the ordinary citizen to pay rates\n  and taxes, to serve in the army, to abstain from walking\n  over the Squire\u2019s fields, snaring his hares, or fishing\n  his preserved streams, to pay his rent, to respect those\n  artificial rights of property which only the possessors\n  of them have any obvious interest in maintaining, or even\n  (if he is one of the proletariate) to keep his hands off\n  the superfluous wealth of his neighbour when he has none\n  of his own to lose?\u201d\n\n  \u201cA conception does not float in the air. It must be\n  somebody\u2019s conception. Whose conception, then, of general\n  good is it that these institutions represent?\u201d\n\n  \u201cIs it not seriously misleading, when the requirements of\n  the State have so largely arisen out of force directed\n  by selfish motives, and when the motive of obedience to\n  these requirements is determined by fear, to {289} speak\n  of them as having a common source with the morality\n  of which it is admitted that the essence is to be\n  disinterested and spontaneous?\u201d\n\n[1] _Principles of Political Obligation_, p. 8; cf. p. 127 ff.\n\nI have quoted these passages--the whole section should be carefully\nread--in order to state plainly a paradox which affects the theory\nof society from beginning to end. It continually shows itself in the\npessimistic criticism of economic motive, political motive, and of\nevery-day social motive.\n\nThe whole question really depends on our understanding of the\nrelation of abstract and concrete. It is plain, as Green says, that\nthe idea of a common good has never been the sole influence operative\nin the formation or maintenance of States. And, in as far as it has\noperated at all, it has only done so in very imperfect forms. Green\ngoes so far as to say that Hegel\u2019s account of freedom as realised in\nthe State does not seem to correspond to the facts of society as it\nis, or even as, under the unalterable conditions of human nature, it\never could be; though, no doubt, there is a work of moral liberation,\nwhich society, through its various agencies, is constantly carrying\non for the individual.\n\nNow, the truth of these criticisms may be granted in the same sense\nin which we grant the imperfection of knowledge (as currently\nconceived) or of morality--imperfections not accidental, but\ninherent in each particular form of human experience. The conflict\nof interests, the failure to reconcile rights, and the weight and\nopaqueness, so to speak, of law and custom to the individual mind,\nare contradictions of the same type and {290} due to causes of\nthe same kind as those which arise in the world of ethics and of\ntheory. And, though the new relations which spring up in society\nare perpetually resulting in new contradictions, there is no reason\nto compare the State unfavourably, in this respect, with Morality\nor with Science. The contradictions, in fact, are the material of\norganisation. [1]\n\n[1] Take, for instance, the chaos of the medical charities of London.\nIt consists of endeavours to adjust help to needs, which endeavours\nare themselves unadjusted to each other. Thus, precisely as in the\ntheoretical progress, the unadjustment of adjustments brings out ever\nnew contradictions which demand readjustment.\n\nWithout differing profoundly from Green in theory, therefore, we\nventure to assign a greatly diminished importance to his criticisms.\nThis is due in part to the growth of a more intimate experience,\nowing in some measure to his initiative, which seems to show the\nessentials of life to be far more identical throughout the so-called\nclasses of society than is admitted by such a passage as that cited\nabove about the dweller in a London yard. [1] It is due, further,\nand in connection with such experience, to the psychological\nconceptions developed in previous chapters, according to which the\nplace of actual fear of punishment in maintaining the social system\nis really very small, while {291} the place of a habituation, which\nis essentially ethical, is comparatively large. These suggestions,\nwhich lead us to lay decreasing stress on Green\u2019s criticism of Hegel,\npoint wholly in the general direction of his own convictions, and\nwe may finally meet the general difficulty, which expresses itself\nin pessimism, by considerations such as Green himself alleges in\nmitigation of his own criticism.\n\n[1] Not much stress should be laid on an isolated expression of this\nkind, used in making clear the difficulties of a theory which on\nthe whole he supported, and putting these difficulties, as was his\ncustom, as high as possible. But it is worth noting that no one,\nwho really knows the class thus rhetorically alluded to, fails to\nexperience in them the same great relations and recognitions which\nmake life worth living for more fortunate persons, and, as they feel\nvery keenly, the experience is often more emphatic there than in the\nricher class. Probably, in fundamental matters, there is as large a\nproportion of persons untaught and bred up between temptations among\nthe rich as among the poor.\n\nWe may approach the matter in this way. The paradox is, that if you\nscrutinise the acts which have made States, and which carry them on,\nor which go on under and within them, you will every where be able\nto urge that they spring from self-interest and ambition--not from a\ndesire for the common good. How then can we say that the State exists\nfor a common good? Hegel\u2019s large conception of a social fabric and\nthe temper of mind which maintains it should have done some thing to\nmeet this problem. But we may come a little closer to the precise\ndifficulty.\n\nNothing is so fallacious as mere psychological analysis applied\nto the estimation of the purposes which rule a mind. In every act\nthere is necessarily an aspect of the agent\u2019s particular self.\nOne way or another he is satisfied in it. So the pessimistic or\nsuperficial psychologist can always--not in some acts merely, but\nin all--discover a form of self-seeking. Life is a whole made up\nof particulars, and the universal is a connection within them, not\nanother particular outside them; it is a mistake of principle to\nsuppose that any act can be outside the tissue of aims, impulses, and\nemotions which affect the sensitive self. Great purposes work through\nthese affections and transform them, but {292} cannot obliterate\nthem without obliterating life. \u201cThere is nothing degrading in\nbeing alive.\u201d [1] But there is a kind of eye which sees all these\nparticulars apart from the substantive aims which give them their\ncharacter, and treats them as if they were the sole determining\nmotives of the agent. Hegel calls such a critic--he is thinking\nespecially of historians--\u201cthe psychological valet, for whom there\nare no heroes, not because they are no heroes, but because he is\nonly a valet.\u201d On the whole, a man is what he does. If his series\nof actions has the root of the matter in it, it is wrong either for\nhim to be deterred, or for a critic to carp, because they bring him\ngain or glory, or gratify him by activity and excitement. To shrink\nfrom particular occasions of action because one\u2019s self may find\nsatisfaction in them is to fall back into the mere general willing of\nthe abstract good. And \u201cthe laurels of mere willing are dry leaves\nthat never have been green.\u201d\n\n[1] _Rechtsphil._, sect. 123.\n\nWe may illustrate these ideas from the life of the ordinary members\nof States, and from the career of a great ruler or conqueror. [1]\n\n[1] Green, _Principles of Political Obligation_, sects. 121 and 128.\n\nThe life of an English labourer, for example, may concern itself with\nno such abstract ideas [1] as are expressed by the words \u201cState\u201d or\n\u201ccommon good.\u201d But, to begin with, he is a law-abiding citizen. He\nkeeps his hands off others and their belongings by the same rule\nby which he expects others to keep their hands off him and his\nbelongings. {293} [2] He recognises fairness of bargaining, and is\nprepared to treat others fairly, as he expects them to treat him. He\nis aware of his claims, that is to say, as depending on something in\ncommon between himself and others; and if he does not practically\nadmit any such community, \u201che is one of the dangerous classes,\nvirtually outlawed by himself.\u201d [3]\n\n[1] Although the literary class are liable very seriously to\nunder-rate the significance of forms of thought unfamiliar to them.\n\n[2] Habits, such as our habit of relying on security of life and\nproperty, are secondarily automatic, _i.e._ are very intimately\nconnected with ideas. See chap. viii.\n\n[3] Green, _Loc. cit_.\n\nSo far he is a loyal subject only. If he is to have a fuller sense\nof a social good, he must either take part in the work of the State,\nor at least be familiar with such work, through interest in his\nfellows share of it, and in the organisations which connect his class\ninterests with the public good. His mind must not merely work in\nits place in the social mind, but must be in some degree aware of\nthe connection between its place and the whole--of the appercipient\nstructure to which it belongs. He must, in short, have touch with\nthe connection which Hegel represents as that between the Bourgeois\nSociety and the State proper. And this, in modern States, is in\nprinciple open to him.\n\nAnd, further, he must have the feeling for his State, which is\nconnected with the idea of home and fatherland. In a modern nation\nthe atmosphere of the family is not confined to the actual family.\nThe common dwelling-place, history, and tradition, the common\nlanguage and common literature, give a colour of affection to the\nevery-day citizen-consciousness, which is to the nation what family\naffection is in the home circle.\n\n{294} Thus, it is not true that either the feeling or the insight\nwhich constitute a consciousness of a common good are wanting to the\nevery-day life of an average citizen in a modern State. It may seem\nfull of selfish care, but this is only a narrow view. If we look at\nthe spirit of the whole life we shall see that it is substantially\ndependent on the recognition of a good, and feels that dependence in\nconcrete form.\n\nAnd, secondly, to take the paradox in its extreme shape, in which the\norder of the State appears to arise out of the selfish ambition of\nthe most unscrupulous of men. The contradiction may be stated in the\nform that the actions of bad men are \u201cover-ruled\u201d for good. But this\nwould mean that the \u201cpsychological\u201d critic or historian had first\nmisstated the cause, and then had rectified his mis-statement by a\nmeaningless phrase. The great ideas and causes which were advanced,\nfor example, by the career of Napoleon, owed neither their nature nor\ntheir existence to his selfish ambition. They did not, however, owe\nthem to any non-human cause; to any operation of ideas otherwise than\nin the minds of men. They came into existence through the working of\ninnumerable minds towards objective ends by the inherent logic of\nsocial growth, with various degrees of moral insight, and they were\npromoted by Napoleon\u2019s career in virtue of the common character which\nunited his aims, in so far as they had a reasonable side, with the\nmovement shaped by the ideal forces of the age. There is no reason\nto doubt, if we do not wilfully narrow our view of the situation,\nthat a conception of good was as much operative in the cause as it is\npresent in {295} the effect--say, in the unity of Italy. We cannot\nattempt to deal with the problem of the existence of evil, on the\nground of ethical and political philosophy; and we are not concerned\nto deny or to minimise the presence of greed and selfishness as\ndistorting forces in the minds of men, or in the organisation of\nStates. All that we needed to show, was that what makes and maintains\n[1] States as States is will and not force, the idea of a common\ngood, and not greed or ambition; and that this principle cannot be\noverthrown by the facts of self-interest in ordinary citizens, or of\nselfishness in those who mould the destinies of nations.\n\n[1] Aristotle\u2019s saying of the State, that it \u201c_comes to be_ for the\nsake of life, but _is_ for the sake of good life,\u201d expresses in the\nfirst instance an apparent contrast between origin and purpose of\nStates. But its real point is that the purpose is implied in the\norigin, for the State is natural, and in every \u201cnatural\u201d genesis its\npurpose is implied; and the origin is implied in the purpose, for\nthe State, in the processes which maintain it, \u201coriginates,\u201d _i.e._\nrenews its material basis, daily, and must do so in order to \u201cbe.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n{296}\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nINSTITUTIONS CONSIDERED AS ETHICAL IDEAS.\n\n1. We have been guided throughout our argument by the idea that the\nrelation of a given mind to the mind of society [1] is comparable to\nthe relation between our apprehension of a single object and our view\nof nature as a whole. The former term, in each case, we cannot but\nsuppose to be an individualised case of the latter. The latter seems\ninevitably to imply a universal principle corresponding to every\nfeature of the former. We can never see through the connections, and\nthe connections of the connections--_e.g._ of gravitation and of\ncolour--in every part. But our ideal as theorists would be to analyse\nthe physical object into features, every one of which should be a\ncase of a natural law, and the whole taken together a case of the\nwhole system of natural law, which would be our scientific view of\nthe world.\n\n[1] I neglect, for the moment, the difference between the mind\nof society and mind at its best. The difference is practically\nconsiderable, but I shall attempt to make it appear, in the course\nof the present chapter, to be a difference of progress but not of\ndirection.\n\nIn treating of a human mind in its relation to {297} Society and\nthe State, our ideal is comparable to this. We should like to\nanalyse any given mind into features each of which should be an\nindividual case of a universal principle, and the whole of which,\ntaken together, should be a case of the whole system of principles\nincarnate in the world, and proximately in the social world. Plato,\nsimplifying for the sake of elucidation the City-state, which to our\nminds was already simple, represented a community, in diagrammatic\nform, as consisting in a threefold structure of classes, in which\nwere incarnate the three main features which he discriminated in\nthe individual soul--the desires necessary to living, the spirit of\naction, and the power of seeing things as a whole.\n\n2. The principles which constitute a society are facts as well as\nideas, and purposes as well as facts. This threefold character is\nunited in what we describe by the general term \u201cinstitutions,\u201d a term\nwhich would apply perfectly well to Plato\u2019s \u201cclasses\u201d in virtue of\nthe definite relations with which he invests them.\n\nIt is unnecessary to insist on the external aspect of institutions as\nfacts in the material world; but it will be worth while to gather up\nthe leading conceptions of our analysis by tracing the nature of some\nprominent \u201cinstitutions,\u201d as ideas, constituent elements of the mind,\nwhich are also purposes; that is, as ethical ideas. An institution\nmay have grown up without special ordinance, or may have been called\ninto existence by an act of public will. But it has always the\ncharacter of being recognised _as if_ it had been \u201cinstituted\u201d or\nestablished to fulfil some public or quasi-public {298} purpose. [1]\nAn old servant is sometimes said to be \u201cquite an institution\u201d--he\nis characterised by the function of keeping alive certain common\ntraditions of a school, perhaps, or a family--an annual custom may\nbe an institution in virtue of the same kind of recognition; Sunday\nis an institution; the word is indeed very vaguely applied, for\nobviously almost every object or event can have a significance of\nthis kind attached to it in jest or earnest. But for all that, we can\nsee pretty plainly what usage is driving at. An institution implies\na purpose or sentiment of more minds than one, and a more or less\npermanent embodiment of it. \u201cOf more minds than one,\u201d because it is\nto fix the meeting points of minds that the external embodiment is\nnecessary.\n\n[1] Why is not a memorial statue or building, which expresses a\npublic idea, an \u201cinstitution\u201d apart from its uses? Apparently because\nit has not the notion of bringing persons together or inducing\npersons to act in some definite way. An \u201cinstitution,\u201d then, belongs\nto the level of society, as such, conceived as a number of persons.\nThus, a work of art is hardly an institution, though it expresses the\n\u201cuniversal\u201d of many minds; but a weekly concert is an institution,\nbecause many persons act together in giving and attending it.\n\nIn institutions, then, we have that meeting point of the individual\nminds which is the social mind. But \u201cmeeting point\u201d is an unhappy\nterm, suggesting objects in space that touch at certain spots. Rather\nlet us say, we have here the ideal substance, which, as a universal\nstructure, is the social, but in its differentiated cases is the\nindividual mind. And it is necessary to observe that the material of\nthis fabric has determinate sources. Mind is not an empty point. It\nis the world as experienced. The institutions, which as ethical {299}\nideas constitute mind, are, like a theory, attempts at unity in face\nof needs, pressures, facts, and suggestions which arise in what we\ncall our surroundings, and to each of which mind reveals a different\nquality; as every tone of a landscape elicits its peculiar shade of\nfeeling, which but for it might have remained latent for ever. It\ntakes the whole world to call out the whole mind. But it will be\nenough if we can trace, in some prominent examples, the nature of an\ninstitution as at once a dealing with surroundings, [1] an ethical\nidea, and a social principle.\n\n[1] There are, of course, no absolute surroundings. At every point\nexperience rests on mind. But at any point at which we are observing,\nwe must take some facts as, comparatively speaking, given.\n\n3. The family starts from the universal physical fact of parentage,\nbut takes its ethical value mainly from the special phase of parental\nrelation which leads to the formation of a household. The association\nof parents and children in a household, which is permanent until\nbroken up into other households, is due to economic conditions.\nCalling to mind the original meaning of words, we see that we are\nasserting the formation of a house hold to be due to \u201chousehold\u201d\n[1] conditions. And this is something more than a pun. Whatever the\nsurroundings may be which favour the formation of households, whether\nthe difficulty of procuring livelihood, which makes the father\u2019s\ncontinued care essential, [2] or the chances offered by agriculture\nto a stable group, they operate as elements in a human world, in a\nworld which is constituted by {300} the focussing of \u201csurroundings\u201d\n(circumstances) in a whole. Conditions which have become \u201ceconomic\u201d\nhave ceased to be material. They are motives, interests, means to\nends. They bring the world into the mind, but in doing so they become\nfactors in the purposiveness and re-adjustment, which the mind, as\nunity asserting itself throughout varied suggestions, is busied in\nbringing to pass. By demanding permanence, for instance, economic\nconditions elicit in the relation of parent and child the simplest\nform of universality necessary to an ethical idea.\n\n[1] \u201cEconomy\u201d = household management.\n\n[2] It is said that the household does not readily form itself in\nvery easy conditions of life.\n\nWe will not venture upon the history of phases of the family life,\nbut will attempt at once to sketch its position and value in the\ntypical civilisation of a modern State. Only it must be insisted on\nonce more, [1] that the family or household as an ethical structure\nis not anterior to the State, but is rather a growth dependent on the\nspirit and protection of the State, and intentionally fostered by\nit as against forms of kinship which do less justice to the ethical\npossibilities of parentage.\n\n[1] Cf. p. 272.\n\nAs an ethical idea, then, the monogamous family, which is in the\nnormal case also a household, has a unique place in the structure of\nthe citizen mind.\n\nIts peculiarity is in being a natural union of feeling with ideal\npurpose. That is to say, the ideal purpose, a permanent interest\nin a comparatively permanent and external life, attaches itself\nby imperceptible links to the most universal incident of animal\nexistence. The mere remaining together of the units, a demand of\ntheir physical needs, is almost enough of itself to transform their\ninevitable {301} mutual dependence into a relation of intentional\nservice, rooted in affection, and tinged with some degree of\nforethought.\n\nAnd, being thus \u201cnatural,\u201d the idea of the family has a hold like no\nother upon the whole man. In this respect it anticipates the powers\nwhich have been claimed for the love of beauty. The very animal\nroots of life, and every detail of man\u2019s appetitive being, are made,\nwithout conscious effort or moralising interference, factors in a\nround of social service. The meal of a lonely individual [1] is\nperhaps, at best, a refined and lawful pleasure. But the family meal,\nquite apart from over-strained religionism, has in it, as a plain\nmatter of fact, the fundamental elements of a sacrament, none the\nless effective that they are not thought of by that name. And both\nthrough maintaining the fitness of the parents for their life work,\nand through the training of the children to the same end, the natural\nethics of the family have an indispensable logical hold upon the more\nexplicit common good known to the social will.\n\n[1] Note, however, what is said below of the secondary or transferred\nidea of the family. The solitary may partake of the family sacrament,\nso to speak, \u201cby faith.\u201d\n\nAnd, in the last place, it should be noted that a feeling and\natmosphere of this kind is not confined to members actually living in\nhouseholds formed by families. There is no race, it has been said,\nthat parts with its children so readily, or retains their affections\nso permanently, as the Anglo-Saxon race. When the type and spirit are\nonce formed, they are contagious and persistent; they {302} affect\nall who have seen or known them, and even those who have never formed\npart of a household bound by kinship.\n\nIf we contrast the idea of the household with monasticism as its\nrepudiation, and with the tribal state or phalanstery as its\nexaggeration, we shall see its uniqueness in the strongest light. The\nnaturalness of its foundation, and the completeness of the reciprocal\ninterest (involving monogamy) on which its idea rests, distinguish\nit from all other forms of union or disunion in which the sexes are\nconcerned. It may be added that the family, and it alone, has the\nright adjustment of population in its power. The fully trained and\nequipped human being can never be superfluous in the world. And the\nproduction of the fully trained and equipped human being depends on\nthe capacity of forming a true family and meeting its requirements,\nand when this capacity and idea regulate the union of the sexes no\ngrowth nor apparent decrease of population need cause anxiety.\n\nIt seems as idle to discuss whether civilisation is conceivable\nwithout the family as whether human nature can change. All that\nwe can attempt, as philosophers, is to ascertain the distinctive\npart which its idea plays in human life as such. There must be,\nwe can see, some such idea--an ethical idea covering some such\nsides of life--while man is a spiritual animal. But by what\nprecise \u201cinstitution\u201d such an idea might come to be represented in\ncircumstances which we do not know, it would be beyond the modesty of\nphilosophy to predict.\n\nThe institution of Property may be mentioned {303} as a corollary to\nthe household-family. Its natural basis and ethical value are very\nmarkedly correlative to those of the latter. The outlook upon life\nwhich it essentially implies is co-extensive with that demanded by\nthe household, although in the relations of acquisition and exchange\nmany further rights and duties may attach to it. It depends on the\nfact that, in order to express a will in an individual life (which\nis incomplete except as the life of a household), there must be a\npower of moulding the material world in the service of ideas, which\nis conditioned by free acquisition and utilisation. The institution\nof property, then, as an ethical idea, consists in the conception\nof individual (properly speaking, household) life as a unity in\nrespect to its dealings with the material instruments of living.\nIt is not merely the idea of provision for the future; still less\nthe certainty of satisfying wants as they arise from day to day. It\nis the idea that all dealings with the material conditions of life\nform part of a connected system, in which our conceptions and our\nabilities express themselves. It binds together the necessary care\nfor food and clothing with ideas of making the most of our life and\nof the lives dependent upon us. A being which has no will has so far\nno property--a child has in practice, and a slave had by Roman law,\nproperty in a secondary sense--and a being which has no property\nhas so far no actual will. The \u201cperson,\u201d or responsible head (or\nheads), of a household, is the true unit to whom the idea of property\nattaches, because he is the unit to which we normally ascribe an\nindividualised will, a single {304} distinctive shape of the social\nmind. A child has not yet such a will; a group of mature persons has\nmore than one. The change which is passing over the household in\nconsequence of the recognition of married women as individual wills\nis highly instructive on this point. They can hold and manage their\nown property, because it is admitted that they can have their own\nview of life. It is not proposed that young children should hold and\nmanage property, because every one knows that they have no mature\nindividualised view of life. The corporate person of the household\nis so far dissolved by legal recognition of its more individual\ncomponents; and it is most important, theoretically, to note that its\nunity is not diminished by the recognition, but is raised to a higher\npower.\n\n4. It might seem fanciful to say that our district is to our family\nas space to time; but it would suggest something of the point of\nview from which it is well to look at the structure of our ethical\nideas. It is desirable to realise how the simplest characters of our\nsurroundings and their necessary connections are ethically important,\nnot because they impose anything upon us, but because they respond\nto something within us, or rather, to a possibility which is to be\nrealised by the world, as in us its variety strives towards unity.\nParentage, we saw, was a universal animal fact, and from it, in\nan experience capable of unity and permanence, springs the family\nhousehold and all that it implies for our lives. One\u2019s district, as\nan element of life, implies, of course, some stability--a home, not\nmerely permanent as a {305} home, like the Scythian\u2019s waggon, but\nlocated on some spot of earth. The nomad, we must suppose, to a great\nextent carries his neighbourhood--his tribe--along with him, and for\nthat very reason the fact of neighbourhood has not its full effect on\nhim.\n\nBut when a permanent home is fixed on some spot of earth, presumably\nwith the beginnings of agriculture, a new condition begins to\noperate--the \u201cindifference\u201d of space. Perhaps we are surprised that\n\u201cindifference\u201d should be an ethical stimulus. But nothing is more\ninstructive than to note how qualities of our surroundings, which by\nthemselves seem negative or the barest natural necessities, spring\ninto significance when taken up into the unity of life. Locality\nmeans a potential neighbourhood. It may be long before any one comes\nnear you except your own cousinhood, your tribe or clan. But the\nindifference of space is a standing invitation, and it is pretty\ncertain that some day strangers will become your neighbours, and\nthat you will have to take up some mental attitude towards them.\nHistorians and jurists have described to us the struggle between the\nprinciple of kinship and the principle of neighbourhood. When we read\nthat a plebeian, in the eyes of a Roman patrician, simply could not\nmake a real marriage any more than the beasts of the field, this is\nnot, as it may have become by survival, intentional arrogance on the\npatrician\u2019s part. It was rather the state of mind of Mrs. Transome\ntowards Rufus Lyon, \u201csheer inability to consider him.\u201d A proof of\nwhat a struggle it involved to reach a new attitude of mind as\nregarded the resident alien is given by {306} the half-way house at\nwhich it was found necessary to pause in the process. The recognition\nof kinship on the ground of residence was the fiction, we are told,\nby which the mind assisted itself to a positive attitude towards\nthose whom the indifference of space insisted on bringing within its\nrange. And the positive attitude towards which it was groping its way\nwas of course the recognition of humanity, the equality of man in the\ntruest sense which that ambiguous phrase will bear.\n\nIn modern States, in which this struggle is on the whole behind\nus, our district or locality asserts its full indifference. Its\n\u201cnegative\u201d here becomes a \u201cpositive.\u201d That is to say, on the whole,\n[1] and under some reasonable reservations as to evidence of\nintention to accept duties, and to renounce incompatible ones, men\nare full members of the district to which they choose to belong. The\nchallenge thrown down by the indifference of space has resulted in a\nrecognition of universal humanity. Our district is our neighbourhood.\nWe will look a little more closely at the ethical idea implied. We\nnotice at once, at least in English experience, that each of us\nbelongs to a variety of districts which are concentric as regards\nhim. Each of these districts represents a different purpose, and we\nare told that for practical purposes great confusion results. But\nit is a useful training to be made aware of the distinct purpose of\neach {307} organised locality which surrounds us--to have the care\nof our health, of public order, of education, of the relief of the\ndestitute, and of religion according to our view of it, represented\nby different, or possibly different, boundary lines on the map. Each\nof these boundaries indicates some common element of thought and\nfeeling--some common interest--in the mind of the neighbourhood, and\nthe difference of the boundaries, where they differ--the difference,\n_e.g._, between the civil and ecclesiastical parish--may have a\nlong growth of ideas behind it. At any rate, all these are moral or\nphysical needs, which, like our household necessities, draw us out of\nourselves, and reveal us to ourselves as cases of a larger mind.\n\n[1] Settlement, scholarships, fellowships, and charities generally,\n\u201cclose\u201d to localities, and perhaps domicile, maintain qualifications\nin contradiction with actual residence, and in case of allegiance\neven depending in part on birth. But some fixity is, of course,\nconvenient; and I believe that intention plus residence will cancel\nalmost any opposing qualification.\n\nEvery locality, then, is, however imperfectly and unconsciously, a\nbody which has a mind. It is, as an idea which enters into us, the\nspiritual reflection of our adjacent surroundings, both human and\nnatural, as the family is of our animal parentage. The neighbourhood\nis for the mind its immediate picture of the world, the frame into\nwhich its further vista of society as a whole must be fitted, or, in\nother words, its sphere of direct relations. The family is a group\nof natural relations; but the neighbourhood consists of relations\nwhich are as natural in a different way, not through blood, but\nthrough contact. It is not a selection, but rather a specimen of\nlife as a whole, for it must include as a rule _all_ the necessary\nelements of the social fabric. It includes all that comes to us by\ndirect sense-perception from day to day; all our chance meetings and\ndealings with those outside our household, and probably the nearer\n{308} and more reliable illustrations of all social and political\nproblems. For it is a context of life which we know and feel in its\ntotal working, which is impossible with what we only gather from\nwritings or from hearsay.\n\nAs such a reflection of our direct surroundings, it colours our whole\nbasis of feeling, A peculiar tinge of happiness, anxiety, depression,\nor resolution attaches to the streets or fields which we pass through\nday by day, and the faces which we meet. How far these feelings are\ntrue interpretations of what we see, and how far they spring from\nsuperficial or sentimental associations, is one of the greatest tests\nof the mind and heart. Do we see the body of a soul, the symbols of\ncharacter and happiness, in the houses, the streets, the tillage, the\nworkshops, or the gardens?\n\nNo other element of mind can be the substitute for the neighbourhood.\nIt is the faith in which we live, so far as embodied in our contact\nwith a sensuous world. It is a microcosm of humanity, in which, by\nthe very indifference of space, we are liable to the direct impact of\nall possible factors. It is particularly the sphere of charity and\ncourtesy, of the right behaviour in immediate human relations of all\npossible kinds.\n\nThe District or Neighbourhood, in short, as an ethical idea, is the\nunity of the region with which we are in sensuous contact, as the\nfamily is that of the world bound to us by blood or daily needs.\nLocal self-government, for example, acquires a peculiar character\nfrom the possibilities of intimate knowledge of each other among\nthose who carry it on. A man\u2019s whole way of living {309} is in\nquestion when he sets up to be locally prominent, and though the\nresult may often be corruption or vulgarity, [1] these are only the\nfailure of what, at its best, is a true type of the relation of\nfellow-citizens.\n\n[1] The recriminations or interested intimacies of a vestry or parish\ncouncil rest at bottom on the personal knowledge which, rightly used,\ngives security to local life.\n\nAs with the family, we may illustrate the significance of\nNeighbourhood by the case in which it fails to be duly recognised,\nand that in which nothing else is recognised.\n\nTo a great extent, in the life of modern cities, especially when\nsupplemented by suburban residence, the principle is disregarded.\nIn a great city, the actual neighbourhood is more than can be dealt\nwith, and has often no distinctive physical character--at least no\nattractiveness--and the idea of a special relation to it falls away.\nThe fact, indeed, is less universal than is often asserted, and\nnearness in space, together with local government, retain and will\nretain a certain predominance over the mind. The total disregard\nof an ethical purpose connecting us with the surroundings nearest\nto us in bodily presence, tends to deprive the general life of its\nvitality, its sensuous health, strength, and beauty. In many ways,\ncircuitous perhaps, but ultimately effective, it may be that this\nfactor of immediacy will regain a proper place in the national mind.\nWe may observe that in as far as electoral districts are treated as\nmere circumscriptions of such and such numbers of electors, the life\nof a neighbourhood is disregarded. To make the constituency a mere\n{310} number (Hare\u2019s scheme) would be the climax of this tendency.\n\nIn the ancient City-state, on the other hand, the district was all\npowerful. The State was almost a sensuous fact. The members of the\nState were essentially friends and neighbours, who for business or\npleasure were meeting all day long. When the district thus absorbs\nthe State, there is a want of what we call freedom, though there\nmay be enough of sensuous unconstraint. The State and its ideal\npurposes are not clearly set above all flesh and blood. A great legal\nsystem is not created till the State ceases to be a neighbourhood.\nIndividual intimacy [1] and the \u201chard case\u201d obscure the idea of\nuniversal law. The possibility of representative government, of a\npolitical faith which does not work by sight, is not conceived.\nThe district, as a natural fact, was at first only a degree more\nliberating than the natural fact of kinship. [2] It was not conceived\nthat man, as man, belonged \u201cneither to this place nor to Jerusalem.\u201d\nWith the ideal unity of a modern nation such conceptions harmonise\nmuch more readily, and the neighbourhood can lend them flesh and\nblood without hiding them.\n\n[1] Imagine a Roman or English judge being addressed as Demosthenes,\nin his speech against Pantaenetus, addressed (in his client\u2019s name)\nthe Athenian jury: \u201cI know I have a hurried gait and a loud voice,\nand it annoys people; but I am as I was made, and I have a right\nto justice all the same.\u201d It sounds like a speech to a jury of\nschoolboys.\n\n[2] P. 300 above.\n\n5. \u201cClass\u201d is in democratic countries no longer a political\ninstitution. A man\u2019s vote is secured to him on a minimum\nqualification, and his practical influence and acceptance depend\nneither on {311} birth nor on occupation, but on the power which\nhe can exercise by his qualities or his possessions. This is a\nconsequence of the recognition of humanity as such, and has its bad\nside and its good side according to the baseness and nobility of the\ninfluences which tell _de facto_ upon human nature. It is horrible,\nwe may say, that influence should belong to wealth without any\nsecurity whatever for a discharge of social function. But this, given\nhuman nature as it is to-day, is a result of the same causes which\nenable us to boast, with some truth, that a man ranks in the general\nworld by his powers, character, and behaviour, and that we do not\nknow or care whether his livelihood comes to him as a miner or as a\nduke. Wealth has weight because people give it weight; but no one\nneed give weight to wealth in politics or social intercourse unless\nhe likes. It is a consequence, then, of the recognition of free\nhumanity that \u201cclass\u201d no longer is an institution in political right\nas such, while in social intercourse, though it practically exists as\nan institution, it claims to be an expression of what people are in\ncharacter and behaviour, and its differences are not annexed by any\niron bond to differences of occupation. [1]\n\n[1] It may be taken as proved that a \u201cgentleman\u201d can make his living\nas a labourer or mechanic--at least in the U.S.A., where irrational\ntradition is weaker than in England--and remain a gentleman in the\ndrawing-room sense of the term as well as in essentials. This being\nso, there can be no inherent impossibility in men born and bred\nas labourers or mechanics realising the same qualities. It would\nbe cant, I think, to say that full equality of social class, full\npleasantness and freedom of intercourse, could be attained without\nthose qualities.\n\nBut though occupation no longer determines either social or political\nclass, in the sense of {312} gradation by any formal bond, yet it\nremains and must always remain a determinant of class in a narrower\nsense, and one of the main ideas which constitute the ethical\nstructure of the mind.\n\nThe necessities which we compared roughly to time and space--the\nproximate permanent group and the adjacent locality--give a value to\nman\u2019s animal routine, and a significance to the area of his every-day\nperceptions. It is when the division of labour, the requital of\none service by a different one, becomes prominent in a community,\nthat a further grasp is laid upon the distinctive capacities of the\nindividual consciousness, in which must be reckoned the surroundings\nwhich constitute its horizon of possibilities. We still answer\nthe general question, \u201cWhat is he?\u201d by naming a man\u2019s industry or\nprofession. The family and the neighbourhood sustain and colour the\nindividual life, but the vocation stamps and moulds it. The more\ndefinite and articulate summons of the organising world--in which of\ncourse intelligence is active, ever discerning new purposes in old\nroutine--elicits a deeper response from, or takes a more concrete\nshape in, the particular centre of consciousness. The individual has\nhis own nature communicated to him as he is summoned to fit himself\nfor rendering a distinctive service to the common good. He becomes\n\u201csomething\u201d; an incarnation of a factor in the social idea.\n\nThe Roman word \u201cclass,\u201d which the English language has adopted, not\nfor every separate employment, but for the character and position\nroughly connected with a whole group of employments, has an origin\nworth recalling. Plato\u2019s classes {313} were \u201c_genera_\u201d = clans,\nextended families. The German classes were \u201cSt\u00e4nde\u201d = statuses,\npositions, estates (compare the French \u201c\u00e9tat,\u201d which practically =\ntrade). But the Roman \u201cclassis\u201d was \u201ca summoning\u201d to public service;\nthe first and second classes were the first and second summonings;\n[1] then indeed to military service in an order based on wealth. But\nthe idea may survive. Our \u201cclass\u201d may be thought of as the group or\nbody in which we are called out for distinctive service.\n\n[1] _Mommsen Rom. Hist_., i. 101, E. tr. The \u201c_classicus_\u201d was the\ntrumpet.\n\nOne\u2019s class, then, in the sense in which it indicates the type\nof position and service involved in one\u2019s occupation, approaches\nvery near the centre of one\u2019s individuality. In principle, as an\nethical idea, it takes the man or woman beyond the family and the\nneighbourhood; and for the same reason takes him deeper into himself.\nHe acquires in it a complex of qualities and capacities which put\na special point upon the general need of making a livelihood for\nthe support of his household. In principle, his individual service\n_is_ the social mind, as it takes, in his consciousness, the shape\ndemanded by the logic of the social whole. He is \u201ca public worker\u201d\n[1] by doing the service which society demands of him. And just\nbecause the service is in principle something particular, unique, and\ndistinctive, he feels himself in it to be a member of a unity held\ntogether by differences. And in this sense the bond of social union\nis not in similarity, but in the highest degree of individuality\nor specialisation, the ultimate point of which would be to feel\nthat I am rendering {314} to society a service which is necessary,\nand which no one but me can render--the closest conceivable tie,\nand yet one, which in a sense, really exists in every case. Your\nspecial powers and functions supply my need, and my special powers\nand functions supply your need, and each of us recognises this and\nrejoices in it. This ethical idea of unique service, or the service\nof a unique class, involves of course a more or less conscious\nidentity in difference. That is to say, the individual\u2019s mind is not\nreduced to his special service, or he would be a machine. Rather,\nthe whole social consciousness is present in him, but present in\na modified form, according to the point of view from which it is\nlooking. The problem is simply put by Plato\u2019s diagrammatic scheme of\nclasses. The statesman\u2019s function is to be wise for the community;\nthe carpenter\u2019s to carpenter for the community. But plainly the\ncommunity for which the statesman knows that he has to be wise, must\ninclude the carpenter\u2019s life and the conditions of his work, and the\ncommunity for which the carpenter knows that he has to work must\ninclude some of the order and organisation which belong to it in the\nstatesman\u2019s vision. The individual, in short, is unique, or belongs\nto a unique class, not as an atom, but as a case of a law, or term\nof a connection. This is what is meant by individuality in the true\nsense; the character of a unit which has a great deal that, being his\nvery self, cannot be divided from him; not one which has so little\nthat there is nothing by subtraction of which he can be imagined\nless. Such individuality is in a sense the whole ethical idea, but\nmore particularly is embodied in {315} the idea of a vocation. Our\nvocation, like our neighbourhood, and usually of course in connection\nwith it, stamps both mind and body; and what we consider most\nintimately ourself is really the structure of ethical ideas which\nwe are describing, with the feelings and habits in which they are\nrooted, but none of which are unmodified by them.\n\n[1] Greek \u03b4\u03b7\u03bc\u03b9\u03bf\u1fe6\u03c1\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2 [demiourgos], \u201cartisan.\u201d Homer speaks of\n\u201cthose who are public workers--the soothsayer, the doctor, and the\ncarpenter.\u201d\n\nLike the other ideas of which we have spoken, the idea of class\nor specialised function may be illustrated both by the extreme in\nwhich it is nothing, and the extreme in which it is everything.\nThe less a society is differentiated--the less that, considered as\na mind, it has developed intense and determinate capacities--the\nmore its structure repeats itself from household to household, [1]\nand fails to exhibit lines of formation pervading the community as\na whole. Dicey\u2019s _The Peasant State_ [2] gives an idea of a social\nmind thus undifferentiated, without classes, without ambitions, and\nwithout interests. Both in this case and in that of the Boers of the\nTransvaal it would be rash for an outsider to pronounce dogmatically\non the value of the life which is achieved. But as cases of social\nformation and of social minds, they illustrate our present theme. To\nsay that there is no specialised function, is the same as to say that\nthere is no developed intelligence.\n\n[1] Durkheim\u2019s \u201cSegmentary Structure,\u201d _De la Division_, p. 190.\n\n[2] See also H. Bosanquet, _Standard of Life_, p. 8.\n\n\u201cClass\u201d appears to be everything, an absolute and inflexible rule\nof precedence and privilege, when it has lost or has not gained the\npower of accommodating itself to function, and function to social\nlogic. Such denials of free adjustment, of {316} the career open to\ntalents, may take the form of a confusion of the principle of class\nwith that of birth, or even with that of private property. In the\nformer case function and position are inherited, in the latter they\nare bought and sold. The two confusions may even be combined, as when\npublic functions are inherited like or with a house or an estate. [1]\nSuch a \u201cclass\u201d system may be an oppression to its members, [2] or\nto the community, or to both. But the essence of the evil is that a\nfunction of mind is divorced from its characteristic of free logical\nadaptation within the social system. The institution has become\nossified; and instead of moulding itself, like a theory or a living\norganism, to the facts and needs which it is there to meet, it nails\nitself to an alien principle, and becomes a fallacy in social logic,\nor a dead organ in the social body.\n\n[1] As in the judicial privileges of the Baron of Bradwardine and his\nlikes.\n\n[2] The hereditary executioner in Maurus Jokai\u2019s novel, _Die sch\u00f6ne\nMichal_.\n\nIn both of these extreme cases individuality is minimised. In the\nformer the individual does not pretend to any high capacity. In\nthe latter he pretends to a considerable capacity, but this being\ncut apart from the principle of the whole, and pretending to be\neverything in itself to exist absolutely or for its own sake has lost\nthe connection which gave it value, and becomes a mere pretension.\n\nThere is a strange and sad institution in which, it may be suggested,\nthe two extremes of error are combined. This is the institution of\n\u201cthe {317} poor\u201d as a class, representing, as an ethical idea in the\nmodern mind, a permanent object of compassion and self-sacrifice.\n\u201cPoverty,\u201d it has been said, \u201chas become a status.\u201d The \u201cd\u00e9class\u00e9s\u201d\nhave become a social class, with the passive social function of\nstimulating the goodness of others. [1] Let any one consider\ncarefully, from the point of view which regards ethical ideas as\nan embodiment of human or social purposes, the offertory sentences\nof the Church of England. It is needless to press the criticism,\nfor no one would be likely to deny that here we have ideas gathered\nfrom other soils and climates, and rightly applicable only in the\nspirit, but not in the letter. \u201cGive alms of thy goods, and never\nturn thy face from any poor man; and then the face of the Lord\nshall not be turned away from thee.\u201d \u201cHe that hath pity upon the\npoor lendeth unto the Lord, and look, what he layeth out it shall\nbe paid him again.\u201d The victims of misfortune in a small community,\nunder strict regulations, as were the Jews, for the promotion of\nindustry, are one thing. The recognition of a class marked by _the\nfunction of dependence_--to use a contradictory expression--in a\nvast community whose industrial organisation rests on the individual\nwill, is another thing. The idea of pity and self-denial, inherited,\nI presume, largely from the Jewish scriptures as also from the New\nTestament, has tended, in the modern world, to become mechanical,\nand combine with a false class-conception. All who know the inner\nlife of evangelical Christians a {318} generation ago will admit\nthat, among earnest persons of this type, the notion of the\ntithe--the devotion of one tenth or more of the income to purposes\nof religion or benevolence--had been inherited as a guiding idea,\nrepresenting an end valuable _per se_, almost according to the\nletter of the offertory. I am not suggesting any vulgar charge of\nother-worldliness, but recalling a genuine conviction that the\nsurrender of a portion of income to a less fortunate class of the\ncommunity was in itself desirable and a religious duty.\n\n[1] The incurably sick and helpless in all ranks of society do, no\ndoubt, rightly fulfil such a passive function.\n\nIt would not be difficult to show that the true and highest idea\nof Christian charity is remote from this conception of a dependent\nstatus as inherent in a certain portion of society. What seems to be\nneeded here, as in so many aspects of morality and religion, is to\ncombine the inspiration and _abandon_ of the modern mind with the\ndefiniteness of purpose and lucidity of plan that characterised the\nancient City-state.\n\nSocialism, at its best, [1] unites with recent political economy\nand with those who try to \u201corganise\u201d or rationalise charity, in\nchallenging the preconception that poverty must be recognised as a\npermanent class-function. And this brave denial may remain written to\nits credit when the controversies of immediate method are forgotten.\n\n[1] I cannot think that in detail its advocates are consistent with\ntheir principles on this point. But controversy is not my object here.\n\nWe may attempt to indicate in a few words the direction in which\nthe ethical idea incarnate in the institution of the \u201cpoor\u201d is\ntending to supplement and modify itself as clearer notions of a\ncommonwealth arise. It may be observed, by {319} way of introduction,\nthat we cruelly misconceive the Greek mind when we ascribe to it\na want of love and compassion, because we miss in its utterances\nthe religious note of devotion to the poor. [1] To a great extent\nthe truest idea of charity was presupposed in the very axioms of a\nGreek commonwealth. The Greek spoke little of \u201cthe poor,\u201d because\nhe recognised no such status. [2] It would have meant to him a\nfunctionless class, a dislocation of the body politic. This, in\nfact, is what it did mean when pauperism began to press upon the\nGreeks, and the philosopher [3] at once diagnoses the evil, and uses\nthe term, \u201cpeople without means,\u201d _i.e._ without ways of supporting\nthemselves, instead of the older word, which rather suggests the\n\u201cobject of \u2018charity\u2019\u201d. To get them back into a function, \u201ca means,\u201d\nis the course which _ipso facto_ rises before him; not to create a\nnew ethical idea for their sake _qua d\u00e9class\u00e9s_.\n\n[1] Not altogether true, of course. In Homer \u201call strangers and poor\nmen come from Zeus.\u201d\n\n[2] It is a mistake to treat all these problems as automatically\nsolved for the ancients by slavery. The citizen population had\nenough dependence on industrial life to be liable to disaster from\nits dislocation, and that this happened so little was a true success\nwhile it lasted.\n\n[3] Aristotle, _Politics_, 1320, d. 29. The older word is \u03c0\u03c4\u03c9\u03c7\u03cc\u03c2\n[ptochos], \u201cone who crouches or cringes, a beggar\u201d; it always had a\nbad sense till it was ennobled in the _Gospels_ (Liddell and Scott).\nAristotle\u2019s word is \u1f04\u03c0\u03bf\u03c1\u03bf\u03c2 [aporos], \u201cwithout ways and means.\u201d\nDifferent from both is \u03c0\u03ad\u03bd\u03b7\u03c2 [penes], for which we have no proper\nword, having spoilt \u201cpoor\u201d by the idea of dependence. It means a\npoor man in the sense of one who is not rich enough to live without\nworking. The speeches in which Poverty \u03c0\u03b5\u03bd\u03af\u03b1 [penia] defends her\nmerits against Wealth, and in distinction from Beggary \u03c0\u03c4\u03ce\u03c7\u03b5\u03b9\u03b1\n[ptocheia], in Aristophanes\u2019 _Plutus_, are fine, though mixed with\nfallacies.\n\nThe full modern conception of the \u201cpoor\u201d as {320} an institution, if\nthey must be an institution, ought at least to avoid the pitfall of\nacquiescence. Granting the fire and love of the Christian mind to be\na gain, yet its object must be brought into relation with the true\nmeaning of a mind or a commonwealth. Devotion to man at his weakest\nmust not be separated from devotion to the possibilities of man at\nhis strongest--possibilities either existent or at least symbolised\nin the most unhappy of the functionless poor. Self-sacrifice for\nthe poor should not mean a tribute to the maintenance of a vicious\nstatus, but an abiding and pervading sense of the claims which the\nweaker humanity has to be made strong.\n\n6. The Nation-State, we have already suggested, is the widest\norganisation which has the common experience necessary to found\na common life. This is why it is recognised as absolute in power\nover the individual, and as his representative and champion in the\naffairs of the world outside. It is obvious that there can be but\none such absolute power in relation to any one person; and that, so\nfar as the world is organised, there must be one; and, in fact, his\ndischarge from one allegiance can only be effected by his acceptance\nof another. The analysis of the previous chapter releases us from the\ntask of setting out the elements which combine in the Nation-State,\nas the conception of sovereign and ultimate adjustment between the\nspheres which realise the elements of our ethical life. It should be\nnoted, however, that the principles of the family, the district, and\nthe class, not only enter into the nation in these definite shapes,\nbut affect the general fabric of {321} the national State through the\nsense of race, of country, and of a pervading standard of life and\nculture. The reaction of ideal unity on the natural conditions of a\nstate is exemplified by the tendency to substitute ideal frontiers--a\nmeridian or a parallel [1]--for frontiers determined by natural\nboundaries.\n\n[1] See, _e.g._, the map of North America.\n\nThe Nation-State as an ethical idea is, then, a faith or a\npurpose--we might say a mission, were not the word too narrow and\ntoo aggressive. It seems to be less to its inhabitant than the\nCity-state to its citizens; but that is greatly because, as happens\nwith the higher achievements of mind, it includes too much to be\nreadily apprehended. The modern nation is a history and a religion\nrather than a clear cut idea. Its power as an idea-force is not known\ntill it is tried. How little the outsider, and even members of the\ncommunity concerned, were able to gauge beforehand the strength of\nthe sentiment and conception that pervaded the United States through\nthe war of secession. [1] The place of the idea of the Nation-State\nin the whole of ethical ideas may be illustrated by the Greek\nconception of Happiness, as that organisation of aims, whatever it\nmay be which permits the fullest harmony to life. The State, as\nsuch, we saw, is limited to the office of maintaining the external\nconditions of a good life; but the conditions cannot be conceived\nwithout reference to the life for which they exist, and {322} it\nis true, therefore, to say that the conception of the Nation-State\ninvolves at least an outline of the life to which, as a power, it is\ninstrumental. The State, in short, cannot be understood apart from\nthe nation, nor the conditions from the life, although in exerting\npolitical force it is important to distinguish them. As an ethical\nidea, the idea of a purpose, it is essential to hold the two sides\ntogether, if we are not to walk blindly.\n\n[2] The dangers besetting the French Republic to-day (December, 1898)\nare, in essence, tests applied to the strength of a national idea. If\nthe idea cannot maintain itself, we must reluctantly suppose that it\nought not--that the common life has not the necessary depth.\n\n7. Our analysis of the Nation-State suggests a point of view which\nmay be applied to the vexed question of whether State action is to be\njudged by the same moral tests as private action.\n\nThe first step is to get a clear idea of the nature of State action.\nIt must be confined, one would think, to what is done in the name of\nthe State, and by something approaching to an act of will on its part\nas a State. We only pass moral judgment on individuals in respect\nof their acts of will, and we ought to extend the same justice to\na State. The question is complicated by the fact that a State has,\nas its accredited agents, individuals whose acts it must normally\navow. But it can hardly be saddled with moral responsibility for\ntheir personal misdoings, except under circumstances which are barely\nconceivable. [1] The State, as such, can have no ends but public\nends; and in practice it has none but what its organs conceive to\nbe public ends. If an agent, even under the order of his executive\nsuperior, commits a breach of morality, _bona fide_ in order to what\nhe conceives to be a public end desired by the State, he and his\nsuperior are certainly {323} blamable, but the immorality can hardly\nbe laid at the door of the public will.\n\n[1] _i.e._ That it should actually order a theft, murder, or the like.\n\nIndeed, a strict definition of State action might raise a difficulty\nlike that of defining the General Will--if the act was immoral,\ncan the State, _as such_, really have willed it? And waiving this\nas a mere refinement, it still seems clear that the selfishness or\nsensuality, which has at least a good deal to do with the immorality\nof private actions, can hardly be present in an act of the public\nwill, in the same sense as in a private volition. The State, as such,\ncertainly cannot be guilty of personal immorality, and it is hard to\nsee how it can commit theft or murder in the sense in which these\nare moral offences. To speak of the question as if it concerned the\nconduct of statesmen and their agents, instead of the volition of a\nState as such, seems to introduce confusion. We are discussing the\nparallel between public and private acts, and we are asked to begin\nby treating the public acts as private.\n\nIt may be said that this distinction between public and private acts\nleads to the casuistry of pure intention. We are saying, it will be\nurged, that the State remains pure, because its will is on the whole\ntowards a public interest, whatever crimes its agents may commit.\nAnd, no doubt, this line is often taken in practice. A successful\nagent finds his evil deeds are winked at; an unsuccessful one is\ndisavowed. In either case the State pleads innocence. But this danger\ncannot alter the conditions of a moral action, and we cannot impute\nthat as an action to the State, of which it knew no particulars,\nwhich it never {324} willed, and which can hardly indeed be the\nobject of a public will. It has a duty to see to the character of its\nagents and punish their excesses; but the conditions under which it\nis true that _qui facit per alium facit per se_, can seldom apply to\na public body with regard to actions of its agent which are not of a\nnature to embody public ends.\n\nPromises and treaties, however, are acts which embody public ends.\nAnd here the State, on its side, is bound to maintain good faith; but\nstill its agent is likely to go wrong if he mixes up the obligations\nof the State with his private honour. The question for him, if he\nhas to keep or break a public undertaking, is, to what is the State\nsubstantially bound, not to what extent would he be bound if he had\nmade the promise or engagement in question in his private capacity?\nHe, or the power which is to act, must consider the obligations and\naims of the State, as a whole, and work for the best fulfilment of\nthem as a whole. The question may be _parallel to_ that of a private\ncase of honour, but it is not _his_ honour nor _his_ promise that is\nin question. Just so, if he introduces his private conscience about\nreligion or morality into his public acts on behalf of the State,\nhe may cause frightful persecutions or disasters. The religious\npersecutions, and our position in India, supply examples.\n\nThe State, then, exists to promote good life, and what it does cannot\nbe morally indifferent; but its actions cannot be identified with\nthe deeds of its agents, or morally judged as private volitions\nare judged. Its acts proper are always public acts, {325} and it\ncannot, as a State, act within the relations of private life in which\norganised morality exists. It has no determinate function in a larger\ncommunity, but is itself the supreme community; the guardian of a\nwhole moral world, but not a factor within an organised moral world.\nMoral relations presuppose an organised life; but such a life is\nonly within the State, not in relations between the State and other\ncommunities.\n\nBut all this, it may be urged, is beside the question. The question\nis not, can a State be a moral individual (though this is certainly\none question)? but, does an interest of State justify what would\notherwise be immorality or wrong-doing on the part of an officer of\nState?\n\nAgain, I think, we must distinguish between acts essentially private\nand acts essentially public. To steal or murder, to lie, or to commit\npersonal immorality, for instance, as we said, cannot be a public\nact. Such acts cannot embody a general interest willed by the public\nwill. A State agent who commits them in pursuit of information or\nto secure a diplomatic result cannot be justified on the ground\nthat they are not his acts but the State\u2019s; and they are as immoral\nin him as in anyone else. Ultimately, indeed, it may be true that\nthere is no act which is incapable of justification, supposing some\nextreme alternative; and in this sense, but in this sense only, it\nmight be that, treating the interest of a commonwealth like any other\nethically imperative interest, such acts might be relatively capable\nof justification. But this justification would only mean that some\nsupreme interest was subserved by them, and would have {326} no\nspecial relation to the supposed public character of the interest.\nIt is then a case of the conflict of duties. And the commoner\noccurrence, which results in doubtful acts, probably is that an\nagent, charged with some public service, finds it easiest to promote\nit by some act of rascality, and acts on his idea. But over readiness\nto make capital out of an apparent conflict of duties is neither made\nworse nor better by the fact that one of the duties is the service of\nthe State. [1]\n\n[1] Cruelty, it has been said, is a good deal owing to laziness.\nIt is more comfortable to sit in the shade rubbing red pepper into\na man\u2019s eyes to make him confess than to run about in the sun\ncollecting evidence. I quote from memory, from a lecture, I think, by\nMr. Leslie Stephen.\n\nA public act which inflicts loss, such as war, confiscation, the\nrepudiation of a debt, is wholly different from murder or theft. It\nis not the act of a private person. It is not a violation of law.\n[1] It can hardly be motived by private malice or cupidity in the\nstrict sense, and it is not a breach of an established moral order\nby a being within it and dependent upon it for the organisation and\nprotection of his daily life. It is the act of a supreme power,\nwhich has ultimate responsibility for protecting the form of life of\nwhich it is the guardian, and which is not itself protected by any\nscheme of functions or relations, such as prescribes a course for the\nreconciliation of rights and secures its effectiveness. The means\nadopted by such a supreme power to discharge its responsibilities\nas a whole, are of course subject to criticism as respects the\nconception of good which they {327} imply and their appropriateness\nto the task of realising it. But it is mere confusion to apply\nto them names borrowed from analogous acts of individuals within\ncommunities, to impute them, as it were, to individuals under\ndyslogistic predicates and to pass moral judgment upon them in the\nsame sense as on private acts. The nearest approach which we can\nimagine to public immorality would be when the organs which act for\nthe State, as such, exhibit in their public action, on its behalf, a\nnarrow, selfish or brutal [2] conception of the interest of the State\nas a whole, in which, so far as can be judged, public opinion at the\ntime agrees. In such a case the State, as such, may really be said\nto be acting immorally, _i.e._ in contravention of its main duty to\nsustain the conditions of as much good life as possible. This case\nmust be distinguished, if I am right, from the case in which the\nindividuals, acting as the public authority, are corrupted in their\nown private interests [3] not shared with the public. For then the\ncase would rather be that the State, the organ of the public good,\nhad not been given a chance to speak, but had simply been defrauded\nby those who spoke in its name.\n\n[1] An act which violates its own law is not an act of the State. And\nthe State is not subject to the law of any other State.\n\n[2] _e.g._ If, with the knowledge of Parliament, and without a\nprotest from it, a price were offered for the killing of a hostile\nstatesman or general.\n\n[3] _e.g._ Bribed by a foreign potentate, or pursuing Stock Exchange\ninterests.\n\nWe do not suggest, then, that the action of States is beyond moral\ncriticism, nor that action of individuals in their interest is\nabove or below morality, except in the sense in which one moral\nclaim has constantly to be postponed to another. But we {328} deny\nthat States can be treated as the actors in private immoralities\nwhich their agents permit themselves in the alleged interest of the\nState; or, again, can be bound by the private honour and conscience\nof such agents; and we deny, moreover, that the avowed public acts\nof sovereign powers, which cause loss or injury, can be imputed to\nindividuals under the names of private offences; that someone is\nguilty of murder when a country carries on war, or of theft when it\nadopts the policy of repudiation, confiscation, or annexation.\n\n8. It is obvious that the idea of humanity, of the world of\nintelligent beings on the surface of our earth, conceived as a unity,\nmust hold such a place in any tolerably complete philosophical\nthinking, as in some way to control the idea of particular States,\nand to sum up the purposes and possibilities of human life. The idea\nof humanity is universal, and whatever limits we have tacitly in\nmind--whatever limits the Greek thinker had in mind while he based\nhis ethics on the distinction between man and beast--yet, when we\nrely on the idea of man as man, we are committed to treat in some way\nof the world of mankind.\n\n_(a)_ The first point which forces itself upon our attention is,\nthat the idea which we tacitly entertain when we refer to humanity,\nis not true of the greater part of mankind. No doubt, we are quite\naware of imperfection and inconsistency in the family and the State.\nBut here, in the case of mankind, the problem reaches an acuter form.\nAccording to the current ideas of our civilisation, a great part of\nthe lives which {329} are being lived and have been lived by mankind\nare not lives worth living, in the sense of embodying qualities for\nwhich life seems valuable to us. [1] It is true that, in all to whom\nwe give the name of man, we suppose a possibility of such living, in\nthe sense that they have an intelligence distinguishable from that of\nanimals. But it is a possibility which, for the most part, has been\nvery slightly realised, and which involves no conscious connection,\nso far as we can see, with any realisation. Our idea of man is not\nformed by simple enumeration, but by framing a law which explains the\nless perfect and consistent facts with reference to the more perfect\nand more consistent facts.\n\n[1] This idea is embodied in the doctrine of Salvation confined to\nthe few, and contains perhaps a similar error. But it has a _prima\nfacie_ truth.\n\n_(b)_ This being so, it seems to follow that the object of our\nethical idea of humanity is not really mankind as a single community.\nPutting aside the impossibilities arising from succession in time,\nwe see that no such identical experience can be presupposed in all\nmankind as is necessary to effective membership of a common society\nand exercise of a general will. It does not follow from this that\nthere can be no general recognition of the rights arising from\nthe capacities for good life which belong to man as man. Though\ninsufficient, as variously and imperfectly realised, to be the basis\nof an effective community, they may, as far as realised, be a common\nelement or tissue of connection, running through the more concrete\nexperience on which effective communities {330} rest. Such a relation\nas that of England and India brings the matter home. Englishmen\ncannot make one effective self-governed community with the Indian\npopulations. It would be misery and inefficiency to both sides. But\nour State can recognise the primary rights of humanity as determined\nin the life of its Indian subjects, and enforce or respect these\nrights, whether India be a dependency or an independent community.\nThe problem is not unlike that raised by the idea of a universal\nlanguage. As a substitute for national languages, it would mean a\ndead level of intelligence unsuited to every actual national mind,\nthe destruction of literature and poetry. As an addition to existing\nlanguages, or more simply, if it became customary for every people\nto be acquainted with the tongues of other nations, there would be a\ncommon understanding no less firm, and a vast gain of appreciation\nand enjoyment, a levelling up instead of levelling down. The\nrecognition of human rights through communities founded on organic\nunity of experience may be compared in just these terms to the idea\nof a universal society including the entire human race.\n\n_(c)_ The contrast between humanity and mankind has always uttered\nitself through a dichotomous mode of expression--Jew and Gentile,\nGreek [1] and barbarian, Mussulman and infidel, Christian {331} and\nheathen, white civilisations and the black and yellow races. It will\nbe noted at once that some of these divisions contradict each other,\nand this fact may suggest the probability that to every people its\nown life has seemed the crown of things, and the remainder of mankind\nonly the remainder. Such a suggestion may have a real bearing on our\nproblem, and we will return to it. In the meantime, however, it is\nplain that humanity [2] as an ethical idea is a type or a problem\nrather than a fact. It means certain qualities, at once realised in\nwhat we take to be the crown of the race, and including a sensibility\nto the claims of the race as such. Sensibility to the claims of the\nrace as such, is least of all qualities common to the race as such.\nThe respect of States and individuals for humanity is then, after\nall, in its essence, a duty to maintain a type of life, not general,\nbut the best we know, which we call the most human, and in accordance\nwith it to recognise and deal with the rights of alien individuals\nand communities. This conception is opposed to the treatment of all\nindividual human beings as members of an identical community having\nidentical capacities and rights. It follows our general conviction\nthat not numbers but qualities determine the value of life. But\nqualities, of course, become self-contradictory if they fail to meet\nthe demands imposed on them by numbers.\n\nAnd thus we recur to a suggestion noted {332} above. Every people,\nas a rule, seems to find contentment in its own type of life. This\ncannot contradict, for us, the imperativeness of our own sense of\nthe best. But it may make us cautious as to the general theory of\nprogress, and ready to admit that one type of humanity cannot cover\nthe whole ground of the possibilities of human nature. Our action\nmust, no doubt, be guided by what we can understand of human needs,\nand this must depend ultimately on our own type of life. But it\nmakes a difference whether we start from the hypothesis that our\ncivilisation as such stands for the goal of progress, or admit that\nthere is a necessity for covering the whole ground of human nature.\nAnd it may be that, as the ground is covered, our States may go the\nway which others have gone, without, however, leaving things as they\nare. If the State, moreover, is not ultimate nor above criticism, no\nmore is any given idea of humanity; and reference to \u201cthe interests\nof mankind\u201d only names the problem, which is to find out what those\ninterests are, in terms of human qualities to be realised.\n\n[1] It is remarkable that a limitation of the earth\u2019s surface,\nraising an idea of unity, has always, I believe, been presupposed.\nFor the Greeks, Delphi was the centre of the earth; for us, the earth\nbeing a sphere and returning into itself, gives a certainty that it\ndoes not stretch away to infinity, so making unity of its inhabitants\ninconceivable. The remark, I think, is Kant\u2019s.\n\n[2] \u201cHumanity\u201d = \u201chumaneness.\u201d Scotch \u201cHumanities\u201d = Greek and\nLatin. Oxford \u201cLiterae humaniores\u201d = classics and philosophy. Greek\n\u03c6\u03b9\u03bb\u03ac\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03c9\u03c0\u03bf\u03bd [philanthropon], a sense of what is due to man, _e.g._ of\npoetical justice.\n\n_(d)_ Neither the State, however, nor the idea of humanity, nor\nthe interests of mankind, are the last word of theory. And even\npolitical theory must so far point ahead as to show that it knows\nwhere to look for its continuation. We have taken Society and the\nState throughout to have their value in the human capacities which\nthey are the means of realising, in which realisation their social\naspect is an inevitable condition (for human nature is not complete\nin solitude), but is not by itself, in its form of multitudes, the\nend. {333} There is, therefore, no breach of continuity when the\nimmediate participation of numbers, the direct moulding of life by\nthe claims and relations of selves, falls away, and the human mind,\nconsolidated and sustained by society, goes further on its path in\nremoving contradictions and shaping its world and itself into unity.\nArt, philosophy, and religion, though in a sense the very life-blood\nof society, are not and could not be directly fashioned to meet the\nneeds and uses of the multitude, and their aim is not _in that sense_\n\u201csocial.\u201d They should rather be regarded as a continuation, within\nand founded upon the commonwealth, of the work which the commonwealth\nbegins in realising human nature; as fuller utterances of the same\nuniversal self which the \u201cgeneral will\u201d reveals in more precarious\nforms; and as in the same sense implicit in the consciousness of\nall, being an inheritance which is theirs so far as they can take\npossession of it.\n\nWe have thus attempted to trace in outline the content of the self,\nimplied, but imperfectly and variously reached, in the actual\nindividual consciousness. It is because of this implication, carrying\nthe sense that something more than we are is imperative upon us, that\nself-government has a meaning, and that freedom--the non-obstruction\nof capacities--is to be found in a system which lays burdens on the\nuntamed self and \u201cforces us to be free.\u201d What we feel as mere force\ncannot as such be freedom; but in our subtle and complex natures the\nrecognition of a force may, as we have tried to explain, sustain,\nregularise, and reawaken the operation of {334} a consciousness\nof good, which we rejoice to see maintained, if our intelligence\nfails of itself to maintain it, against indolence, incompetence,\nand rebellion, even if they are our own. This is the root of\nself-government, and true political government is self-government.\n\n\n\n\nINDEX.\n\nA.\n\nAbsolutism, Administrative, 63.\nActual Will, contrast Real Will, 118.\nAlbion, Launch of, 96 note.\nAlexander, Prof., 174 n.\nAll and each, as Society and Individual, 81, 180.\n    Will of All dist. General Will, 111.\nAllness, Judgment of, 112.\nAltruism in H. Spencer, 24.\n    and Egoism, 47, 81, 83.\nAmiel, cit, 236 note.\nAnalysis of motive, fallacy of, 291 ff.\nAnglo-Saxon race, 301.\nAnthropology in Hegel, 254.\nAppercipient masses, 165 ff.\n    cpd. social groups, 169.\nAristocracy, Monarchy and Democracy, 284.\nAristotle, 5 ff., 32, 129 ff., 295 note.\n    on the poor, 319 note.\nArmy, opp. crowd, 160 ff.\nArt, how far a social good, 333.\nArtisan or public worker, 313 note.\nAssociation, of persons and of ideas, 156 ff.\n    _see_ ORGANISATION.\nAthens, 115.\nAttention, 216, _see_ AUTOMATISM, APPERCIPIENT.\nAustin, theory of Law, 261.\nAuthority of Society over Individual in Mill, 62.\nAutomatism in society, 183, ch. viii.\nAutonomy, in Greece, 4.\n    moral, in Plato, 253.\n\nB.\n\nBagehot, _Physics and Politics_, 19.\nBaldwin, Prof., _Social and Ethical Interpretations_, 44, 253.\nBaron of Bradwardine, 316.\nBeauty, reconciliation of Nature and State (Schiller), 237.\nBeccaria, 56.\nBentham, 56 ff., 82, 180.\nBequest, power of, 272.\nBiology and Sociology, 21 ff.\n    double influence on Sociology, 23 ff.\nBirth, surviving as qualification, 306 note.\nBoeckh, 33 note.\n_Bona fides_, in political theory, 192.\nBourgeois Society (in Hegel), 27, 269, 273 ff.\nBoot and Shoe Operatives, Trade Report, 279 note.\nBradley, F.H., _Principles of Logic_, 49 note.\n    on Punishment, 222.\n    _Ethical Studies_, 267 note.\nB\u00fcchsensch\u00fctz, 33 note.\nBuckle, 28,\nBurlamaqui, 132.\nButcher, Prof, (on Nature), _Aristotle\u2019s Theory of Poetry and Fine\n    Art_ 131.\n\nC.\n\nCalvin at Geneva, 61.\nCapacities, social, distinction of, 168, 173.\nCash nexus, 276.\nCausation, physical, in human life, 31.\nCause, idea of, in Sociology, 21.\nCharity Organisers, 318.\nChristian consciousness, 263.\nChurch of England, offertory, 317.\nChurch and State, 285.\nCicero, 10.\nCitizen of the World, 8.\nCity and town, distinguished in, Rousseau, 92 note.\nCity-State, 36, 116.\n    as a district, 310.\nCivil condition, in Rousseau, 97, 100.\nCivil Dispute, 262 note.\n_Civil Government_ Locke, 101.\nCivil Liberty, in Rousseau, 97.\n_Civilisation of Christendom_, 137, 195.\nClass, 278, 310 ff.\n    derivation, 312.\n    its absence, 315.\nClasses in community, 7, 30.\nClan v. Family, 272.\nClosed Commercial State, Fichte, 246.\nCodification, 276 note.\nCollectivism, uncritical, 70, 181.\nCommonwealth and Soul, 6.\nComparative Politics, 41.\nCompetition and Co-operation, 24 ff.\nCompulsion ch. viii.,\n   in elementary education, 67.\nComte, 18 ff., 41.\nConditions and purpose, in Greek thinkers, 32.\n    which come close to life, 198.\nConditions, man and his, 31.\nConscience, morality of, 259.\n    in public acts, 324.\nConsciousness of Kind, 43.\nConsent, in Locke, 101.\nConstituencies, of mere numbers, 309.\nConstraint and self-assertion, 58.\nContinuity, idea of, 23.\nContract, true province of, 260, _see_ STATUS.\n_Contrat Social_, _see_ ROUSSEAU.\n    in Kant, 244.\n    in Fichte, 245.\n    in Hegel, 239, 261.\nConvention, Law treated as, 8.\nCo-operative Societies, 280 note.\nCorporation, or Trade Society, 278.,\nCosmopolitanism, 9.\nCrawford, Marion, _Corleone_, 226 note.\nCrime, sociological analysis of, 37.\nCriminal offence, 262 note.\nCrowd, 160 ff.\n    mind of a, 43.\nCulture, 275.\nCurtius, E., on Peloponnese, 33 note.\nCzar, the (in 1818), 248.\n\nD.\n\nDante, 31.\nDecadence in Rousseau, 85.\n_D\u00e9class\u00e9s_ as a class, 317.\nDe Coulanges, _La Cit\u00e9 Antique_, 44.\nDemarcation between self-regarding and other regarding action, 64, 68, 76.\nDemocracy, _see_ ARISTOCRACY.\nDemocratic principle, 74, 284.\n    true d. passion, 98.\nDe Morgan, Prof., _Budget of Paradoxes_, 20.\nDespotic Government, 53.\nDeterrent, _see_ PUNISHMENT.\nDicey, _The Peasant State_, 315.\nDifference and Identity compared with Invention and Imitation, 46.\nDijon, Academy of, 85.\nDistrict, the, as Ethical Idea, 304 ff.,\nDivision of Labour, 278.\nDress, 8.\nDreyfus-Brisac, M., editor of _Contrat Social_, 101.\nDuncker, 33 note.\nDuproix, _Kant et Fichte_, 236 ff.\nDurkheim, E., _Annee Sociologique_, 30\n    _De la Division du Travail Social_, 34, 37 ff., 43, 220 ff., 227 note, 315.\nDuty, dist. right and obligation, 208 ff.\n\nE.\n\nEach, _see_ ALL.\nEconomic view of History, 28.\n    facts, pressure of, 30.\n    world, the, 275.\nEgoism, _see_ ALTRUISM.\n_\u00c9mile_, Rousseau\u2019s, 98 note.\n_Emma_, Jane Austen\u2019s, 162.\nEnd and means in society, 81, 180 ff.\n    of Society and the State, 181.\nEnglish people, the, 116.\nEpicureanism, 9.\nEpiphenomena, 29.\nEquality and Inequality, natural in Rousseau, 87.\nEquivalence of punishment and offence, 228.\n\u00c9tats, 278 note.\nEternal Relations, in Montesquieu, 59.\nEthical purpose of Philosophy, 50.\n    obligation, paradox of, 55, 139.\n    aspect negative in Spencer and Huxley, 72-3, cp. 124.\n    use and wont, 259.\n    ideas, ch. xi.\n_\u00catre de raison_, State is not, 95.\n\u201cEvangel of a _Contrat Social_\u201d 14.\nExamination in Elementary Education, 67.\nExtenuating circumstances, 231.\nExternal aspect of action, 64, 188 ff.\n\nF.\n\nFamily meal, the, 301.\nFamily, monogamous, in Mill, 66, 269 ff., ch. xi.\n_Faust_, 97 note.\nFichte, on Kant, 190 note, ch. ix.\nFiction, historical of contract in Rousseau, 91 ff., 98.\nForce, in relation to end of State, ch. viii.\nForeigners Court at Rome, 10.\nForm and Matter, in life of peoples, 32.\nFreedom, _see_ ROUSSEAU.\n    Rousseau\u2019s idea of, 237 ff.\n    and thought (Hegel), 240.\n    as understood by Kant and Fichte (Hegel), 247.\nFreeman, _Comparative Politics_, 42.\nFrench Republic, 321 note.\nFriendly Societies, 280 note.\nFries, 249.\nFrontiers, ideal, 321.\nFyffe, _History of Modern Europe_, 248.\n\nG.\n\nGeddes, Prof. Patrick, \u201cParasitism,\u201d 26.\n    \u201cRegional Survey,\u201d 48 note.\nGeneral Will, 59, 93, ch. v.\n    \u201calways right,\u201d 121.\n    _see_ SOVEREIGNTY.\n    misunderstanding about (Hegel), 240.\nGeneva, Calvin at, 61.\nGeneva and Rousseau, 86.\nGenevese, Rousseau\u2019s father a, 98.\nGiddings, Prof., _Principles of Sociology_, 18, 51.\nGoethe, 41.\nG\u00f6tz, 237.\nGolden Age, the, 129.\nGood, meaning of, 182.\nGood Will, _see_ CONSCIENCE, MORALITY.\nGovernment Departments, legislation by, 285.\nGraduation of Punishment, 228.\nGravitation, 19.\nGreen, T.H., _Principles of Political Obligation_, 93, 110, 137,\n    141, 144, 188 ff., 203, 213, 227.\n    principle of State interference, 193.\n    criticism of Hegel, 288 ff.\nGreeks, poor among, 319.\nGrotius, 59.\n\nH.\n\nHappiness, Greek idea of, 321.\nHardenberg, 248.\nHare\u2019s scheme, 310.\nHegel, 13, 27, 203, chs. ix. and x.\nHenrici cit. by Green, 203.\nHerder, 237.\nHerodotus, 136.\nHesiod, 129.\nHindrance of hindrances, in State action, 192 ff., 199.\n_History of Aesthetic_, 235.\nHobbes, 13, 59, 77, 93, 104 ff.\nHolland, Prof., 56.\nHomer, 31, 135.\nHonour, private, in public acts, 324.\nHousehold, 271.\nHousing of poor, 198-9.\nHoward, \u201cthe Philanthropist,\u201d 56.\nHumanity, and man, 328 ff.\n    compared with idea of universal language, 330.\n    dichotomous appellations for, 330.\nHuxley, Prof., _Evolution and Ethics_, 26 ff., 73.\n\nI.\n\nIdeal, 274.\nIdeas, influence of, in economic sphere, 30.\n    and community, 7.\nIdentity, _see_ DIFFERENCE.\nImitation and Invention, 43, 211, 252 ff.\nImmorality, prevention of, by law, 65.\nIndifference of space, 305.\nIndividual, fuller and narrower meaning of term, 79.\n    independent existence of, 95.\nIndividualism, 70, 79, 80, 181.\nIndividuality, in Mill, 61, cp. 79, 125.\n    limits of, 176.\n    highest point of, 313 ff.\nIndividual Mind, _see_ MIND.\nIndustrial world, the, 275.\nInequality, _see_ EQUALITY.\nInfluence, Rousseau\u2019s double, 16.\nInsanity, as loss of systematic control, 163.\nInstitutions, ch. xi., real nature of, 170 ff.\nIntention, in theory of State coercion, 188 ff.\nInterference by State, ch. viii.\nIrreligion, prevention of, by law, 65.\nIsonomy, in Greece, 4.\n\nJ.\n\nJacobi, at Geneva, 237.\nJames, Prof. W., 140, 164.\nJoint-stock company and community compared, 76.\nJokai, Maurus, _Die Sch\u00f6ne Michal_, 316.\nJurisprudence, 34 ff.\nJuristic meaning of liberty, 135.\nJustice, administration of, 276.\n\nK.\n\nKant, 13, 59, 190, ch. ix., 263.\n_Klassenkampf_, 275 note.\nKlinger, _Sturm und Drang_, 237.\nKinship and Neighbourhood, struggle of principles, 305.\nKotzebue, murder of, 248.\nKrause cit. by Green, 203.\n\nL.\n\nLabourer, an English, and the State, 292.\nLaw of Nature (and of Nations), 10.\nLaw, sociological analysis of, 37.\n    and sentiment, 38.\nLaw, province of, in Mill, 63.\nLe Bon G., _Psychologie des Foules_, 43.\nLegislation, idea of, in Rousseau, 117 ff.\nLe Play, 28.\nLetter of the Law, 259, 276.\nL\u00e9vy, Bruhl M., 236 ff.\nLiberty, ch. vi.\n    in Bentham, 57 ff.\n    Mill\u2019s _Liberty_, 60 ff.\n    \u201creal\u201d, in Mill, 69.\n    in Spencer and Seeley, 71, 133.\n    _see_ NATURAL, CIVIL, MORAL, JURISTIC.\n    \u201cthe quality of man,\u201d 99, 118, 126.\n    in Locke, 101.\n    on convicts chains, 142 note.\n    bare and determinate Liberty contrasted, 194 ff.\nLife, human, some of its elements, 31.\nLimitation of earth\u2019s surface, Kant on, 330 note.\nLocality, mind of, 307.\nLoch, C.S., 142 note.\nLocke, 13, 101, 104 ff.\nLogic of social progress, 258.\n_Lucinde_, Schlegel\u2019s, 271.\n\nM.\n\nMafia, the, 226.\nMaine, origin of penal law, 227 note.\nMajority, will of, 4, 5.\n    \u201ctyranny of,\u201d 75, 240.\nMarriage, prohibition suggested by Mill, 68, 271.\nMarried Women\u2019s Property, 272.\nMarx, 28, 29 note.\nMaterialism, 28 ff.\nMatter and form, in life of peoples, 32.\nMaximisation, 187.\nMeans, _see_ END.\nMedical Charities of London, 290 note.\n_Merrie England_, 129 note.\nMetternich, 249.\nMill, J.S., 60 ff., 82, 118, 190, 194.\nMind and body of community, 7.\n    as a structure of systems, 173.\n    as a reflection of society, 174.\n    _see_ ASSOCIATION, ORGANISATION, APPERCIPIENT MASSES.\n    subjective and objective, 254-5.\n    absolute, 255.\n    of Society, 296.\nMinority, _see_ MAJORITY.\nMommsen, 313 note.\nMonarchy, 284.\n    _see_ ARISTOCRACY.\nMonasticism, 302.\nMontesquieu, 13, 40, 59.\nMoral freedom in Rousseau, 98, 100.\nMorality, province of, in Mill, 63.\n    of conscience, 259.\n    of State action, 322.\n_Moralit\u00e4t_, 265.\n\nN.\n\nNapoleon, 294.\nNation-State, 3, n, 116, 321 ff.\nNatural Law, 133 note.\nNatural Liberty in Rousseau, 97.\nNatural Right, 10 ff., 59.\n    on biological basis, 70.\nNature, 128 ff.\n    in Aristotle, 130 ff.\n    as self-assertion, 27.\n    State of, in Rousseau, 86.\n    in Burlamaqui, 132.\nNeighbourhood, _see_ KINSHIP, 308.\nNettleship, R.L., 79 note, 146.\nNewman, W.L., edition of Aristotle\u2019s _Politics_, 33 note.\nNew Testament, 10.\nNewton, Sir Isaac, 20.\nNihilism, Administrative, _see_ ABSOLUTISM.\n\nO.\n\nObligation, ethical and political, 55.\n    enforcement of moral, 67 ff.\n    dist. right, 206.\nOffer for Sale, a public matter, 278.\nOrganisation of ideas or persons opp. Association, 156 ff., 162.\nOrganism, comparison of society to, in Fichte, 245.\nOrigin of Inequality (Rousseau\u2019s Discourse), 86.\n\u201cOthers,\u201d in Society, 58, 66, 83, 113, 182, 207.\n    _see_ INTERFERENCE.\n\nP.\n\nParsimony, political, 185.\nPaternal Government, 270.\nPattison, Rev. Mark, on Calvin, 60.\nPerson or Persona in Law and Politics, 12, 93, 104.\nPhenomenology, 254 note.\nPhilanthropy and public honours, 219 note.\nPhilosopher, ancient, compared with Sociologist, 18.\nPhilosophical Theory described, 1.\nPhilosophy, purpose of, 50.\n    relation to social good, 333.\n    of Right (or Law) of Kant, 243.\n    of Hegel, 247 ff.\n    its position in _Philosophy of Mind_, 522 ff.\n    of Fichte, 244.\n_Pirate, the_ (Scott), 162.\nPlato, 5 ff., 20, 27, 32, 55, 74 note, 131, 139, 142, 218 note, 221, 253, 297.\nPolice State, 273.\nPolitical Economy, 27, 273.\nPolitical Obligation, paradox of, 55.\nPolitical Speculation, in 17th century,\nPolitics and Science, relations of, 5.\nPoor, the, as a class, 316, 320.\nPoore, G.V., _Rural Hygiene_, 34 note.\n    _Dwelling House_, 233 note.\nPosition in society, dist. Right and Obligation, 205.\nProperty, 260, 302.\nProportional systems, Stout on, 165.\nProtection, mere, as function of the State, 276.\n    of children\u2019s earnings, 272.\nProtestant consciousness, 263.\nPsychology, a natural science, 49.\n    two tendencies in, 51.\nPublic or State action, dist. private, 322.\nPublic opinion, 287.\nPublicity of discussion, 285.\nPunishment, ch. viii., 37 ff., 220 ff.\n    right of capital, in Rousseau, 90.\nPurposes and conditions in Greek philosophers, 32.\nPyramids, 278.\n\nR.\n\n\u201cReal\u201d Will, ch. v., and Actual, contrasted, 118.\nRebellion, duty of, 213-4.\nRe-establishment of Sciences and Arts (Rousseau\u2019s Discourse), 85.\nReferendum, 105 note.\nReformation of offenders, _see_ PUNISHMENT.\nReligion and State, 285, 333.\nRepetition, 44.\nRepresentation of the People, 104.\nRepresentative Government, 115, 244.\nRepublic of Plato criticised, 274.\nRepublic of San Marino, 106.\nRetribution, _see_ PUNISHMENT.\nReturn to Nature, 8, 23.\nReturns in Social Science, 42 note.\nRevolution, French, 14.\nReward, 217 ff.\n_Richard the Second_, Shakespeare\u2019s, 12.\nRight, science of, 34 ff.\n    _see_ PHILOSOPHY OF RIGHT.\n    of first occupant, 99.\n    dist. obligation, 206.\n    unrecognized, 210.\nRights, natural, 35 ff.\n    in Bentham and Spencer, 70 ff.\n    in Rousseau, 99.\n    system of, 127, 201 ff.\n    negative basis of, 191.\n    sphere of, 258-9.\nRitchie, Prof., _Natural Rights_, 12, 14\n    note, 88.\nRogers, J.D., 17 note.\nRoman Jurisprudence, 10.\nRoman Rule, 10.\nRousseau, 13 40, 59, 70 note, 74, chs. iv. and v., 142 note.\n    his idea of freedom, 237-8.\n    on force and right, 238 n., 282.\nRuskin (quoted) 252 n.\n\nS.\n\nSt. Paul, 29.\nSalamis, 115.\nScheme, general, in thought and in society, 162 ff.\n    unconscious operation of, 166.\nSchiller, _Rauber_ and _Letters on Aesthetic Education_, 237.\nScott, Sir Walter, 162.\nSeamanship, Technical training in, 192 note.\nSeeley, J., 42 note, 133.\nSelf, the given, 143.\nSelf-assertion and self-restraint, 27, 72.\nSelf-government, ch. iii., 101, 139, 155, 134, 334\nSelf-improvement as freedom, 144 ff.\nSelf-mastery, Plato\u2019s account of, 139.\nSelf-regarding conduct, 62 ff.\nShakespeare, 31.\nSidgwick, Prof., 44, 88.\nSimilarities, etc., in social consciousness, 43.\n_Sittlichkeit_, _see_ _Moralit\u00e4t_.\nSlavery, 8, 69.\nSocial contract, 59, ch. vi.\n    _see_ \u201c_Contrat Social_\u201c\n    groups compared with appercipient masses, 169.\n    Logic, 43.\n    observance = ethical use and wont, 259.\n    Physics, 20.\n    Spirit, 40, 122.\n    Science, ch. ii.\nSocialism, 318.\nSociety as self-restraint, 27, 73.\n    for Greeks implies self-assertion, 73 note.\n    as a psychical whole, 175, 178.\n    and Individual, demarcation between, 62, 64.\n    relation to plurality of individuals, 176.\n    dist. State, 184.\n    as restraint, 27.\n    compared with animal species, 23.\n    compared with individual organism, 24.\n    as viewed by Philosophy, 50.\nSociologists, criticism of, 21 ff.\nSociology, ch. ii.\nSocrates, 5 ff., 265.\nSophists, 265.\nSoul and Commonwealth, 6, _see_ MIND.\nSources in Sociology, 47.\nSovereign, fallacy respecting, in Rousseau, 94 ff.\n    nature of, 103, 108.\nSovereignty, as exercise of General Will, 232 ff.\n    of people, 282.\nSpencer, Herbert, 24 ff., 69 ff., 82, 145.\nSpinoza, 14 ff.\nStandard of Life, 30.\nSt\u00e4nde, 278 note.\nState, _see_ CITY-STATE AND NATION-STATE.\n    dist. Bourgeois Society, 27, 93, 273.\n    not an abstraction, 95.\n    inclusive notion of, 150 ff.\n    interference by, ch. viii.\n    analysis of, ch. x.\n    dist. Society, 184.\n    v. Nature, 237.\n    actual and ideal, 250.\n    political organism, 269, 280 ff.\n    and Religion, 285.\n    Regulation, 277.\nStatistics, 42.\nStatus to Contract, Durkheim, 277.\nSteinthal, 164.\nStephen, Mr. Leslie, on cruelty, 326 note.\nStoicism, 9, 263.\nStout, G.F., _Analytic Psychology_, 49, 162 note, 165 note.\nStruggle for life, 23.\nSubjectivity, 274.\nSuccesses in social research, not due to Sociology, 22.\nSuggestion in Society, 45, 183.\nSuper-organic, 26.\nSupply and Demand, 277 ff.\nSurvival of fittest, _see_ STRUGGLE FOR LIFE.\nSutherland, A., _Origin and Growth of the Moral Instinct_, 27 note.\n\nT.\n\nTacitus, _Annals_ and _Germania_, 129.\nTarde, G., 43 note, 44 ff.\nTeleological character of Philosophy, 52.\nThemistocles, 114.\nTheories of the first look, 80, 82, 96, 144.\nTheory, society compared to, 258.\nThomson\u2019s _Seasons_, 237.\nThring, Life of, 197 note.\nThucydides, 218 note.\nTithe, the, 318.\nTrade Societies, 277, 279 ff., 283.\nTraffic returns, French, 43.\nTraining for Seamanship, 192 note.\nTransvaal, 315.\nTruth, meaning of, 182.\n\nU.\n\nUniqueness of service, 25, 314.\nUnited States of America, 284, 321.\nUnits, Delimitation of political, 185.\nUnity of Social Mind, 177.\nUniversal good and common good, 110.\n    Judgment dist. Judgment of Allness, 112 ff.\n    Self, realised not solely in State, 332 ff.\nUniverse of Discourse, 163.\nUnlawful Games, Statutes respecting, 66.\n\nV.\n\nValet, the psychological, 292.\nVegetarianism, 8.\nVengeance dist. retribution, 227.\nVico, _New Science_, 13, 17, 40.\nVirtue, 268.\n\nW.\n\nWallace, Prof. W., _Lectures and Essays_, 85.\n    _Hegel\u2019s Philosophy of Mind_, 249, 265.\nWar, dist. hunting, 212.\nWartburg, demonstration at, 248.\nWater-drinking, 8.\nWebb, Mr. and Mrs., 22 note.\n_Wilhelm Meister\u2019s Lehrjahre cit_., 273 note.\nWill, Real or General, 96, ch. v.\n    in Hobbes and Locke contrasted, 106.\n    of All contrasted with General, 111.\n    Real with Actual, 118.\n    that wills itself, 146.\n    implies a whole, 177.\n    particular, how universalised, 267.\n    _see_ SOVEREIGNTY, SOCIAL OBSERVANCE.\nWycliffite cry, 12.","title":"The Philosophical Theory of the State","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":99295}