Chapter XXVI: Section II: is a historical sketch in four parts tracing the main (7)

[46] It should be noticed that Hartley's sensationalism is far from
leading him to exalt the corporeal pleasures. On the contrary, he
tries to prove elaborately that they (as well as the pleasures of
imagination, ambition, self-interest) cannot be made an object of
primary pursuit without a loss of happiness on the whole--one of his
arguments being that these pleasures occur earlier in time, and "that
which is prior in the order of nature is always less perfect than
that which is posterior."

[47] It may be observed that in the view of Kant and others (2) and
(3) are somewhat confusingly blended.

[48] Singularly enough, the English writer who approaches most nearly
to Kant on this point is the utilitarian Godwin, in his _Political
Justice_. In Godwin's view, reason is the proper motive to acts
conducive to general happiness: reason shows me that the happiness of
a number of other men is of more value than my own; and the
perception of this truth affords me at least _some_ inducement to
prefer the former to the latter. And supposing it to be replied that
the motive is really the moral uneasiness involved in choosing the
selfish alternative, Godwin answers that this uneasiness, though a
"constant step" in the process of volition, is a merely "accidental"
step--"I feel pain in the neglect of an act of benevolence, because
benevolence is judged by me to be conduct which it becomes me to
adopt."

[49] In Kantism, as we have partly seen, the most important
ontological beliefs--in God, freedom and immortality of the soul--are
based on necessities of ethical thought. In Fichte's system the
connexion of ethics and metaphysics is still more intimate; indeed,
we may compare it in this respect to Platonism; as Plato blends the
most fundamental notions of each of these studies in the one idea of
good, so Fichte blends them in the one idea free-will. "Freedom," in
his view, is at once the foundation of all being and the end of all
moral action. In the systems of Schelling and Hegel ethics falls
again into a subordinate place; indeed, the ethical view of the
former is rather suggested than completely developed. Neither Fichte
nor Schelling has exercised more than the faintest and most indirect
influence on ethical philosophy in England; it therefore seems best
to leave the ethical doctrines of each to be explained in connexion
with the rest of his system.

[50] Cf. A. Seth Pringle-Pattison, _The Philosophical Radicals.
Martineau's Philosophy_, p. 92.

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