{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/wikisource_The_Religious_Aspect_of_Philosophy_Chapter_2/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/wikisource_The_Religious_Aspect_of_Philosophy_Chapter_2","id":"wikisource_The_Religious_Aspect_of_Philosophy_Chapter_2","license":"Public Domain / CC-BY-SA (see source)","rights_basis":"wikisource_site_inclusion_policy","source":"wikisource","source_url":"https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Religious_Aspect_of_Philosophy/Chapter_2","summary":null,"tags":["Headers_applying_DefaultSort_key","Subpages"],"text":"CHAPTER II.\n\nTHE GENERAL ETHICAL PROBLEM.\n\n\u201cCertain spirits, by permission, ascended from hell, and said to me,\n\u2018You have written a great deal from the Lord, write something also\nfrom us.\u2019 I replied, \u2018What shall I write?\u2019 They said, \u2018Write that\nevery spirit, whether he be good or evil, is in his own delight, \u2014 the\ngood in the delight of his good, and the evil in the delight of his evil.\u2019\nI asked them, \u2018What may your delight be?\u2019 They said that it was the\ndelight of committing adultery, stealing, defrauding, and lying. . . .\nI said, \u2018Then you are like the unclean beasts.\u2019 . . . They answered,\n\u2018If we are, we are.\u2019\u201d \u2014 Swedenborg, Divine Providence.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s nothing, either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.\u201d \u2014\nHamlet.\n\nWith which of the two considerations mentioned\nin our introduction shall a religious philosophy\nbegin? Of its two chief considerations, the moral code,\nand the relation of this code to reality, which is the\none that properly stands first in order? We have\nalready indicated our opinion. The philosophy of\nreligion is distinguished from theoretic philosophy\nprecisely by its relation to an ideal. If possible,\ntherefore, it should early be clear as to what ideal\nit has. The ideal ought, if possible, to be studied\nfirst, since it is this ideal that is to give character to\nour whole quest among the realities. And so the\nfirst part of religious philosophy is properly the\ndiscussion of ethical problems.\n\nI.\n\nThe theoretic philosopher might interpose just\nhere, and insist that as one can be moral only in a\nreal world, the philosopher has a theoretical right\nand duty to point out, first of all, wherein consists\nthe reality of the world and whereon is based our\nassurance of this reality. Yet this strictly logical\norder we must decline, in the present discussion, to\nfollow. Our interest is, first of all, with the ideal\nin its relation to human life. So much of the world\nof commonplace reality as we have to assume in any\nand every discussion of the ideal, we accept in this\nfirst book wholly without theoretical question. For\nsuch questions, in their relation to religious philosophy,\nthe proper place will come later. But at the\noutset we will suppose a moral agent in the presence\nof this concrete world of human life in which we all\nbelieve ourselves to exist. Beyond the bright circle\nof these commonplace human relations, all shall for\nthe present remain dark to this moral agent. His\norigin, his destiny, his whole relation to nature and\nto God, if there be a God, he shall not at the outset\nknow. But he shall be conceived as knowing that\nhe is alive in the midst of a multitude of living\nfellows. With them he is to have and to define and\nto develop certain moral relations. For his life, or\nfor human life in general, he is to form his ideal.\nThen later, after forming and striving to realize this\nideal of his, he is to come to the real physical world,\nand to ask of it how it stands related to these, his\nmoral needs. In the answer to this question he is to find, if at all, the completion of his religious\nphilosophy. When he comes to this second stage, which\nour second book is to treat, he may find himself\nobliged to analyze afresh and skeptically the na\u00efve\ntheoretic notions that he has possessed concerning\nnature, and so even concerning his own fellow-men. But\nfor his analysis itself he will have a fresher courage,\nbecause he will have filled himself with the love of\nan ideal, whose realization he will be hoping\nsomehow to find all through all the tedious wanderings\nof his theoretic study. If the order of his whole\nthought is thus not the order of the truth itself, still\nhis little inconsequence in beginning his religious\nphilosophy with assumptions that he proves only\nafter he has gone some distance in his investigation,\nmay be a useful concession both to his own human\nweakness and to the needs of his practical nature.\n\nWith the search for the ideal, then, we begin,\nexpressly assuming, in this part of the first book,\nwithout proof, as much of the world of daily life as may\nbe necessary to a study of the moral law in its\napplication to this daily life. Yet, with this explanation,\nwe are only at the beginning of the troubles\nthat arise in examining the relation between the\nbasis of ethics and the real world. These troubles\nform a great part of the obscurity of moral\ndoctrine.\n\nII.\n\nIn treating of ethical doctrine, it is common to\navoid by all sorts of devices the main and most\ndifficult problem of all. Men like to fill half a volume with a description of the \u201cmoral sentiments,\u201d or\nwith a panegyric of the \u201cmoral principle in man,\u201d or\nin these days especially, with a great deal of talk\nabout savages and about the \u201cevolution of the moral\nsense.\u201d Having occupied so many pages in entertaining\ndigressions, when they come, if they ever do\ncome, to the central problem, namely, the nature of\nmoral distinctions considered purely as such, such\nwriters have no time to do more than to appeal to\nthe common sense of readers, and then to pass on to\nconsequences. It seldom occurs to them that a\ndescription of the \u201cmoral faculties\u201d in this man or in\nthat, or a history of moral and immoral notions and\npractices as they have come up among men in the\norder of evolution, is no more a \u201cmoral philosophy,\u201d\nin the proper sense, than is a description of the\ncoinage or of the products of any country or of the world\na true explanation of the difference between\ncommercial solvency and insolvency.\n\nWe for our part shall be obliged, however, by our\nlimited space, to aim forthwith at the heart of the\nproblem of a philosophical ethic. What is the real\nnature of this distinction between right and wrong?\nWhat truth is there in this distinction? Is this\ntruth relative to particular conditions, or independent\nthereof? What ideal of life results? These\nthings we want to know; and we do not want to\nspend our time more than we shall be obliged to do\nin irrelevant descriptions of the mental states of this\nor that man. All mental states now interest us only\nin so far as we first see what logical bearing they\nmay have upon our problem. We shall have to describe a good deal, but that work will have only its\nproper subordinate place.\n\nAs for the main problem itself, we can best bring\nits nature home to ourselves by considering forthwith\nsome aspects of an old and often neglected\nquestion, namely, the very question before referred\nto about the proper relation of one\u2019s moral ideal to\nthe reality that he may have recognized.\n\nWe are to form a moral ideal apart, as we have\nsaid, from any theory of the physical universe\noutside of man. But is this practicable? Is not every\nmoral theory dependent in truth on a theory of\nthings? Is it possible for us to make for ourselves\nour ideal, and only afterwards to go to the real world\nand to see if our ideal is realized? Must not rather\nour ideal be founded, in the very nature of the case,\non what we know, or think we know, about the\nworld? Is not then this whole undertaking of ours\na blunder? Is a rational moral distinction possible\nsave through a knowledge of the facts about the\nworld? Can the ideal say to the world: \u201cI demand\nthat thou shouldst be like me?\u201d Must not the ideal\nrather humbly say: \u201cThus and thus it is in truth,\nand therefore I am what I am?\u201d\n\nThe nature of moral ideals and distinctions is\nplainly involved just here. We must look closely\nat these questions; for to answer them aright is to\nanswer the fundamental questions of all ethical\nphilosophy.\n\nTo understand then more justly the nature of this\ndifficulty, let us consider more closely the two possible\nanswers to the foregoing questions. Let us call a man who insists in spite of all upon going to the\nreal world, to find there in some way the sole basis\nfor his ideal distinctions between good and evil, an\nethical realist. Let us on the other hand call him\nwho would somehow demonstrate if he could some\nideal as the true and only moral ideal, without in any\nwise making it depend upon physical reality, a moral\nidealist. Let us then let the two parties discuss, in\ntheir opposing ways, the question at issue. Let us\nhear their views briefly stated and argued. First the\nview of the extreme ethical realists: \u201cGo to\nreality,\u201d they say, \u201cand to whatever reality you need to\nconsider. Thence derive your notion of duty.\nMorality must not be built in the air, but on a solid\nfoundation of natural fact. Your moral doctrine\nmay have to depend upon all that you can find out\nabout the universe.\u201d \u2014 On the other hand we have\nthe idealistic doctrine: \u201cMorality,\u201d say the supporters\nof this view, \u201cis for the first an ideal. From\nreality one learns the relations that are to be judged\nby the ideal, but cannot by any searching find the\nideal itself. From reality one can learn the means;\nthe End of action is an Ideal, independent of all\nreality save the bare existence of our choice of this End.\nAs Prometheus defied Zeus, so the moral consciousness\ncould and must defy the forces of nature in case\nthey made the ideal forever hopeless. If the good\nbe unattainable, that makes it no less the good. If\nthe existent world were the worst world imaginable,\nit would not be justified by the mere fact that it was\nthe real world. Ideals must be realized in so far as\nwe can realize them, but what can be realized need not therefore turn out to be the ideal. The\njudgments: This is, and, This is good, are once for all\ndifferent; and they have to be reached by widely\ndifferent methods of investigation.\u201d \u2014 Such are the two\nopposing views. We cannot yet repeat in detail the\narguments for each, but we can suggest a few of\nthem.\n\n\u201cSee,\u201d says the supporter of the first view, \u201chow\nabsurd it is to evolve moral theories out of one\u2019s\ninner consciousness. What happens to such theories?\nEither nature favors them, and then they survive in\nthe struggle for life, or they are unequal to the tasks\nof the real world, and then their supporters go mad,\nor die. But in the first case they are merely such\ntheories as could have been much better reached by\na process, not of guessing at truth, but of studying\nnature\u2019s laws. In the second case, the result is\nenough for common sense people. The moral theory\nthat is destined to die out for want of supporters can\nhardly triumph over more useful opinions. If we\nwant a moral theory, we must therefore consider what\nkind of action, what rule of life, wins in the battle\nof existence, and tends most to outlive its rivals.\nThat rule is the one destined to become universal.\u201d\n\nThe maintainers of the second view are ready with\ntheir answer. \u201cWhat sort of morality is this?\u201d they\nsay. \u201cIs this the morality of the martyrs? Is this\nan ideal that can satisfy us? The preservation of\ntruly valuable life may indeed be an end in itself,\nand therefore an action that tends, on the whole, to\ndestroy rather than to save such life may be bad from\nany point of view; but the moral thinker is not, on that account, bound to choose a code that will make\nits believers survive. The believers are not all who\nare affected by obedience to the code, and it may be\nthe believer's place to be sacrificed, either because\nhis life is worth less than his ideal, or because the\nunbelievers may somehow be bettered through his\ndeath. And, in general, what would be the\nconsequence of the consistent following out of the\nprinciple that the true goal is conformity to reality?\nAssume that, for instance, a man in society is to\nregulate his actions solely according to the demands\nthat society as a real power makes upon him, in view\nof his place in the social organism, and that morality\nthus expresses simply the requirements that the\nindividual must meet if he is to remain a successful\nmember of this social organism. Then, to get your\nmoral code, you are to examine the facts of social\nlife. You are to see, for example, what each man\nmust nowadays do if he is to be tolerable to his\nfellows. You will find something of this sort: It\nwill not do for him to kill his fellows, or to steal\nfrom them, or openly to insult them. It will be\nunprofitable for him to be caught in cheating them, or\nin lying to them. He will do well to help them as\nfar as his means allow, and so to get a reputation\nfor kind-heartedness and public spirit, as well as for\nstrict integrity. For such, at least in our society,\nare some of the requisite or useful kinds of adjustment\nto our environment. On these is founded our\nmoral code, if it is to be founded on reality alone.\n\n\u201cBut these requirements are not equally good in\nall societies. Once a power to kill certain kinds of people was a necessary condition to happy social life.\nA reputation for fearlessness, for prowess, for\nmilitary skill, for a certain kind of cunning, for perfect\nwillingness to take your weaker enemy\u2019s property;\nall this was a part of the necessary adjustment to\none\u2019s environment. Was all this then for that\nsociety true morality? If morality were the body of\nrules governing successful adjustment to the social\nenvironment, then morality would be relative to the\nenvironment, and would vary with it. So even now\nsuch rules vary with one\u2019s social position. Ministers\nof religion are considered to be best adjusted to\nthe environment if they are outwardly meek, save\nwhen defending their creeds against heretics. But\npoliticians are best adjusted when they are aggressive\nand merciless. A poet or artist is best adjusted\nif he has a reputation for very ideal and impersonal\naims, and he can then even afford to leave his debts\nunpaid; but a business man must be very concrete\nin behavior, severely definite in his dealings with his\nfellows. And so runs the world away. Find your\nplace, and farm it cleverly, for that is the whole\nduty of man.\n\n\u201cSuch would be,\u201d say our idealists, \u201cthe consequences\nof looking simply to reality for a definition\nof the moral code. There would no longer be a\ndifference between morality and cleverness. Practical\nskill in the art of living is what survives in this\nworld: and if it is survival, or tendency to survival,\nthat distinguishes a true from a false moral code,\nthen universal cleverness as a moral code would on\nthe whole tend to survive, with its adherents.\u201d\n\nBut a realistic opponent is not thus silenced.\n\u201cSuch caricatures,\u201d he insists, \u201cdo not fairly\nrepresent my doctrine.\u201d He, too, has an ideal but it is\nwholly dependent on reality. What he means by\nconformity to reality as the foundation of a moral\ncode is properly expressed by the more thoughtful\nadvocates of the doctrine of evolution. \u201cAdjustment\nto one\u2019s real surroundings is always,\u201d they say,\n\u201cone very important element in morality. But\nthere are higher and lower forms of adjustment.\nCannibals, or conquerors, or bad politicians, may be\nsufficiently adjusted to their environment to be\nmomentarily successful; but true philanthropists and\ntruly great statesmen are better than they, since the\nstatesmen and philanthropists have a higher form of\nadjustment than have the others, and are thus higher\nin the scale of progress. There is in the world a\nconstant evolution of higher out of lower forms of\nlife. This applies also to society. And on this fact\nof evolution depends the true morality. The ideal\nmorality is that form of adjustment of the social\nman to his environment towards which society in its\nprogress forever tends.\u201d How then shall we define\nour moral code? \u201cWhy, once more,\" says the\nevolutionist, \u201cby the facts. Do not make your code\nfirst and then judge the world. You will do well\nto accept the universe even if you did not make it.\nBut examine the world to see in what way it is tending.\nThen conform yourself to that tendency; try\nto hasten the realization of the coming ideal perfection.\nProgress does not depend on you, but you will\ndo well to assist progress. So, by experience, we are to find the direction in which society is moving,\nwe are to discover the goal toward which this\nmovement tends, and this object of life, once formulated,\nis to give us our moral code.\u201d\n\nAgain, however, the idealist objects. This, he\nadmits, is a view higher, no doubt, than the\npreceding; but is it a clear and consistent view? Will it\nbear criticism? In one respect, as appears to him,\nit fails badly. However certain and valuable the\nfacts about evolution may be, the theory that founds\nmorality wholly upon these facts of evolution is\ndefective, because it confuses the notion of evolution\nwith the notion of progress, the conception of growth\nin complexity and definiteness with the conception\nof growth in moral worth. The two ideas are not\nnecessarily identical. Yet their identity is assumed\nin this theory. How does it follow that the state\ntoward which a physical progress, namely, evolution,\ntends, must be the state that is to meet with moral\napproval? This is not to be proved unless you have\nalready done the very thing that the doctrine of\nevolution wishes to teach you to do, that is, unless you\nhave already formed a moral code, and that\nindependently of what you know of the facts of natural\nevolution. Why is the last state in an evolution\nbetter than the former states? Surely not because\nit is the last stage, surely not because it is physically\nmore complex, more definite, or even more permanent;\nbut solely because it corresponds to some\nideal that we independently form. Why should my\nideal necessarily correspond with reality? Why\nshould what I approve turn out to be that which exists? And why, if any correspondence is to exist,\nshould that particular bit of reality that comes at the\nend of a physical process called evolution be just\nthe one bit that is to answer my ideal demands? It\nwill be very satisfactory if such correspondence\nbetween the real and the ideal is found to result; but\nhow can I know beforehand that it must result?\n\nEvolution and progress: what do the terms respectively\nmean? Evolution, we learn, is an increase\nin the complexity, definiteness, individuality and\norganic connection of phenomena. But progress is\nany series of changes that meets with the constantly\nincreasing approval of somebody. The growth of a\ntree or of a thistle is an evolution. The climbing of\na hill for some purpose may throughout be a\nprogress. Evolution may or may not meet with the\napproval of anybody; and a pessimist might fully\naccept some proposed law of evolution. But unless\nthere is some approval from some source, we have\nno progress. How thoughtless then it is, our idealist\ninsists, to confound such different notions. But is\na case of evolution ever a process of degeneration?\nCertainly. You want to eat asparagus before it is\nfull grown. Hence every moment of its evolution\nafter a certain point is for you distinctly a degeneration.\nYou want the potatoes in your cellar to keep\nfresh. If they sprout, a process of evolution has\nbegun, but every moment of it is for you the reverse\nof progress. The egg that begins to incubate is in\nfull course of evolution; but what if it is wanted\nfor market? Might not the evolution of the whole\nworld conceivably be for the moral consciousness what such cases of evolution are for the purposes of\nordinary life?\n\n\u201cBut,\u201d the realist may say, \u201cin fact the world\ndoes grow better. The course of evolution is on the\nwhole a progress.\u201d \u201cBe it so,\u201d the idealist answers,\n\u201cbut how can we know it? Only by first setting\nup our moral ideal, and then comparing the facts\nwith this ideal. If we know what we mean by\nbetter, we can judge whether the world is growing\nbetter. But we may not pretend to determine what\nis better by simply observing how the world grows.\nGrowth and improvement are not identical ideas.\nOne may grow while growing ever worse.\u201d\n\nAnd thus a moral code, according to our idealist,\ndoes not, as a code, depend on physical facts; tells\nus nothing of what does exist, but tells us solely\nwhat ought to exist. If the ideal either does exist,\nor some day will exist, so much the better; but\nthrough all the changes of fate the terrible ought\nremains, and judges fearlessly the world, whether it\nbe good or whether it be evil. But here the realist,\nto whom the moral code that is not built on natural\nfact is just a dream, interposes what shall just here\nbe his final objection. \u201cBe it so,\u201d he says, \u201cjudge\nafter your heart's desire; but remember this, that\nsome other idealist beside you will be judging the\nworld in his own way, after what will seem to you\nthe folly of his heart, and his judgment and yours\nwill differ, as the dreams of any two dreamers must\ndiffer. Did Plato\u2019s ideal agree with Paul\u2019s? or did\nByron judge the world after the same fashion as\nWordsworth? Even so in the present day the ideals war their wars, shadowy struggles, such as one\nwould expect the tedious ghosts of Ossian\u2019s heroes\nto carry on in their cloudy cars; but reality will\nnever be one whit the wiser for all such deeds.\nFor when you forsake the real world you have no\nbasis left for your ideals but individual caprice,\nand every idealist will be his own measure of all\nthings, and an elastic measure at that.\u201d\n\nTo this, how can the idealist answer? Only, if at\nall, by the fact of his success in establishing such a\ncriterion as shall be independent of his own caprice,\nwithout being realistic.\n\nWe have let the contending doctrines fight some\npart of their old battles over again. How shall we\ndecide between them? Alas! the decision is the\nwhole labor of founding a moral doctrine. We have\nnot yet seen deeply enough into their opposition.\nThey may both be one-sided. The truth may lie in\nthe middle. But as yet we have no right to\ndogmatize. This capriciousness in the choice of ideals\nseems a grave defect in a moral system; we cannot\nsubmit to the objection that our boasted ideal is just\nour whim. Yet how shall we escape this? Equally\nunsatisfactory it seems to say: \u201cI believe in such\nand such ideal solely because I see it realized.\u201d\nThat is too much like saying, \u201cMight is right.\u201d\nAnd thus we should come to an equal capriciousness\non this side; for if might makes right, then another\nand opposing might, if triumphant, would make\nanother and opposing right. And in this wise there\nwould be no true distinction at all between right and\nwrong. There seems in fact so far only an accidental distinction. This ideal or that is the highest\nbecause somebody chances to choose it for his, or\nbecause the physical world chances to realize it. This\nis a perfectly empty distinction.\n\nBut difficulties must not discourage us so early in\nthe day. The world has talked of these matters\nbefore. Let us turn to the history of some of the\nspeculations about the ideal. They may suggest\nsomething to us.","title":"The Religious Aspect of Philosophy/Chapter 2","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":4054}