Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

This case embraces in itself a series of important cases, as the case where we prefer a good to the same good with an admixture of the bad; and, on the other hand, where we prefer something bad, with an admixture of good, to the same bad purely for its own sake. Further, the cases in which we prefer the whole of a good to its part, and again, the part of something bad to its whole. Aristotle has already called attention to the fact that in the case of the good the sum is always better than the separate parts which together make up its sum. Such a case of summation presents itself wherever a state has a certain permanence. The same amount of joy which endures an hour is better than if it only lasted for a moment. Whoever denies this, like Epicurus when he would console us on account of the mortality of the soul, may easily be led into still more striking absurdities. For then an hour’s torture would be no worse than that of a moment. And, by combining both these propositions, we should have to assume that an entire life full of joy with a single moment of pain is in no way preferable to an entire life full of pain with a single moment of joy. This is a result at which not only every sound mind in general would demur, but also one respecting which Epicurus in particular, expressly asserts the contrary.

Closely related to this is the case (3) where one good is preferred to another, which, while forming no part of the first, is yet similar in every respect to one of its parts. It is not merely by adding a good to the same good but also by adding it to a good which is in every respect similar that we get a better for total. The case is analogous when to a similar bad another bad is thought of as added. When therefore, for example, a fine picture is seen, the first time as a whole, the second time only partially though exactly in the same way, we must then say that the first view, considered in itself, is better: Or, when one imagines something that is good and a second time not only imagines it even as perfectly as before, but also loves it, this latter sum of psychical acts is then something better.

Cases of difference in degree belong also to this third class, and are especially worthy of mention. If one good, e.g. one joy is in every respect quite equal to another, only more intense, then the preference which is given to the more intense is qualified as right, the more intense is the better. Conversely, the bad which is more intense, e.g. a more intense pain, is worse. That is to say: the degree of intensity corresponds with the distance from the zero point, and the distance of the greater degree of intensity from zero is compounded of its distance from the weaker degree of intensity plus the distance of this from zero. We have, therefore, really to do with a kind of addition, a view which has been disputed.

32. Many a one will, perhaps, think to himself that the three cases which I have set forth are so self-evident and insignificant that it is a matter for surprise that I have lingered over them at all. Self-evident they are of course, and this must be so, since we have here to do with what has to serve as a fundamentum. The case would be worse if they were insignificant; for, I confess it frankly, I have scarcely another further case to add: in all, or, at any rate, most of the cases not here included a criterion fails us completely.[38]

An example. All insight is, we have said, something good in itself, and all noble love is likewise something good in itself. We recognize both these things clearly. But who shall say whether this act of insight or that act of love is in itself, the better? There have, of course, not been wanting those who have given a verdict on this point; some have even asserted that it is certain every act of noble love for its own sake is a good so high that, taken by itself, it is better than all scientific insight taken together. In my judgment this view is not only doubtful but altogether absurd. For a single act of noble love worthy as it is, is yet a certain finite good. But every act of insight is also a finite good and if I keep adding this finite quantity to itself _ad libitum_, its sum is bound some time to exceed every given finite measure of good. On the other hand, Plato and Aristotle were inclined to regard the act of knowing considered in itself as higher than ethically virtuous acts, this also quite unjustly, and I only mention it since the opposition of opinions here is a confirmatory proof of the absence of any criterion. As often happens in the sphere of the psychical,[39] so also here, real measurements are impossible. Now where the inner preference is not to be detected there holds good here what was said in a similar case of simple goodness--as far as our knowledge and practical concern go it is as good as non-existent.

33. There are some who, in opposition to the clear teaching of experience, assert that only pleasure is good for its own sake, and pleasure is _the_ good. Assuming this view to be right, would it have the advantage, as many have believed, and as Bentham in particular maintained in its favour,[40] that we should at once attain to a determination of the relative value of goods, seeing that now we should have only homogeneous goods and these admit of being measured side by side? Every more intense pleasure would then be a greater good than one less intense, and a good having double the intensity would be equal to two of half the intensity. In this way everything would become clear.

A moment’s reflection only is needed to shatter an illusion born of such hope. Are we really able to find out that one pleasure is twice as great as another? Gauss[41] himself, who knew something about measurements, has denied this. A more intense pleasure is never really made up of twelve less intense pleasures distinguishable as equal parts within it, as a foot is made up of twelve inches. So the matter presents itself even in simpler cases. But how foolish would any one appear were he to assert that the pleasure he had in smoking a good cigar increased 127, or, let us say, 1077 times in intensity yielded a measure of the pleasure experienced by him in listening to a symphony of Beethoven or contemplating one of Raphael’s madonnas![42] I think I have said enough, and do not need to allude to the further difficulty involved in comparing the intensity of pleasure with that of pain.

34. Only therefore to this very limited extent are we able to derive from experience a knowledge of what is better in itself.

I can well understand how any one, reflecting upon this for the first time, will be led to fear that the great gaps which remain must, in practice, prove in the highest degree embarrassing. Yet as we proceed and make a vigorous use of what we do possess, we shall find that the most sensible deficiencies may fortunately turn out harmless in practice.

35. For, from the cases we adduced of preference qualified as right, the important proposition follows that the province of the highest practical good embraces everything which is subject to our rational operation in so far as a good can be realized in such matter. Not merely the self but also the family, the town, the state, the whole present world of life, even distant future times, may here be taken into account. All this follows from the principle of the summation of the good. To promote as far as possible the good throughout this great whole, that is manifestly the right end in life, towards which every act is to be ordered; that is the one, the highest command upon which all the rest depend.[43] Self-devotion and, on occasion, self-sacrifice are, therefore, duties; an equal good wherever it be, and therefore in the person of another also, is, in proportion to its value, and, therefore, everywhere equally to be loved, and jealousy and malignant envy are excluded.

36. And now, since all lesser goods are to be made subservient to the good of this widest sphere, light may also be shed from utilitarian considerations upon those dark regions where before we found a standard of choice wanting. If, for example, it was true that acts of insight and acts of noble love are not to be measured as to their inner worth in terms of one another, it is now clear that at any rate neither of these two sides may be entirely neglected at the expense of the other. If one person had perfect knowledge without noble love, and another perfect noble love without knowledge, neither would be able to use his gifts in the service of the still greater collective good. A certain harmonious development and exercise of all our noblest powers seems, therefore, from this point of view to be, at any rate, what we must strive after.[44]

37. And now after seeing how many duties of love towards the highest practical good come to light, we proceed to the origin of duties of law. That association which renders possible a division of labour is the indispensable condition of the advancement of the highest good as we have learnt to understand it. Man therefore is morally destined to live in society, and it is easily demonstrable that limits must exist in order that one member of society may not be more of a hindrance than a help to another,[45] and that these limits (though much in this respect is settled by considerations of natural common-sense) require to be more exactly marked by positive laws, and need the further security and support of public authority.

And while in this way our natural insight demands and sanctions positive law in general, it may, in particular, raise demands on the fulfillment of which depends the measure of the blessing which the state of law is to bring with it.

In this way does truth, bearing the supreme crown, give, or refuse, to the products of positive legislation its sanction, and it is from this crown that they derive their true binding force.[46] For as the old sage of Ephesus says in one of his pregnant Sibyl-like utterances: “All human laws are fed from the _one_ divine law.”[47]

38. Besides the laws referring to the limits of right, in every society there are other positive enactments as to the way in which an individual is to act inside his own sphere of right, how he is to make use of his liberty and his property. Public opinion approves industry, generosity, and economy each in its place, while disapproving idleness, greed, prodigality and much else. In the statutes no such laws are to be found, but they stand written within the hearts of the people. Nor are reward and punishment lacking as regards this kind of positive law. These consist in the advantages and disadvantages of good and bad reputation. There exists here, as it were, a positive code of morality, the complement of the positive code of law. This positive code of morality also may contain both right and wrong enactments. To be truly binding they need to be in accord with the rules which, as we have already seen, are capable of recognition by the reason, as a duty of love towards the highest practical good.

And so we have really found the natural sanction of morality which we sought.

39. I do not linger here to show how this sanction operates. Every one would rather say to himself: “I am acting rightly,” than “I am acting foolishly.” And to no one capable of recognizing what is better is this fact entirely indifferent in choosing. In the case of some it is nearly so, whereas for others it is of the very first importance. Innate dispositions are themselves diverse and much advance may be made by education and one’s own ethical conduct. Enough, truth speaks, and whoever is of the truth hears her voice.

40. Throughout the multiplicity of derived laws graven by nature herself upon the tables of the law, utilitarian considerations, as we have seen, form the standard. As now, in different situations, we resort to different means, so also with regard to these different situations different special precepts must hold good. They may be quite conflicting in their tenour without of course being really contradictory, since they are intended for different circumstances. In this sense, then, a relativity in ethics is rightly asserted.

Ihering has drawn attention to this,[48] but he is not as he seems to think, one of the first. On the contrary the doctrine was known of old and is insisted upon by Plato in his _Republic_.[49] Aristotle in his _Ethics_, and with special emphasis in his _Politics_ has affirmed it.[50] The scholastic philosophers also held fast to the doctrine, and in modern times men even of such energetic ethical and political convictions as Bentham[51] have not denied it. If the fanatics of the French Revolution failed to recognize it, still the clear-headed among their fellow-citizens, even in that time, did not fall into such a delusion. Laplace, for example, in his _Essai philosophique sur les probabilités_ occasionally bears witness to the true teaching and raises his voice in warning.[52]

Thus it happens that the distinguished investigator who has disclosed to us the spirit of Roman law and to whom, as the author of _Der Zweck im Recht_, we also are bound in many respects to tender our thanks, has yet here, as we see, done nothing else than render the doctrine unclear by confounding it with an essentially different and false doctrine of relativity. According to this doctrine, no proposition in ethics, not even the proposition that the best in the widest sphere ought to be the determining standard of action, would have unexceptional validity. In primitive times and even later, throughout long centuries, such a procedure would, he expressly says, have been as immoral as, in later times, the opposite conduct. We must, he thinks, on looking back into the times of cannibalism sympathize rather with the cannibals, and not with those who perhaps, in advance of their time, preached even then the universal love of neighbour.[53] These are errors which have been crushingly refuted not merely by philosophical reflection upon the fundamental principles of ethics, but also by the successes of Christian missionaries.

41. Thus the road leading to the goal which we set before us has been traversed. For a time it led us through strange and rarely trodden districts, finally, however, the results at which we have arrived smile upon us like old acquaintances. In declaring love of neighbour and self-sacrifice, both for our country and for mankind to be duties, we are only echoing what is proclaimed all around us. We should also find by going further into particulars that lying, treachery, murder, debauchery and much besides that is held to be morally base are, measured by the standard of the principles we have set up, condemned, one as unjust, another as immoral.

All this would seem, in a measure, familiar to us as the shores of his native land to the sea-farer when, after a voyage happily consummated, he sees them rise suddenly into view, and the smoke curling from the old familiar chimney.

42. And certainly we are at liberty to rejoice over this. The absolute clearness with which all this follows is good omen for the success of our undertaking, since it is the method by which we arrived at our result, which is obviously the most essential feature in it. Without it what advantage can our inquiry be said to have over that of others? Even Kant, for example, whose doctrines concerning the principles of ethics were quite different, arrived, in the further course of his statement, pretty much to the popular view. But what we miss in him is strict logical coherence. Beneke has shown that the Categorical Imperative as Kant used it, may be so employed as to prove, in the same case, contradictory statements and so everything and nothing.[54] If, none the less, Kant is able to arrive so often at right conclusions, this must be attributed to the fact that from the outset he had harboured such opinions. Even Hegel, had he not known in other ways that the sky was blue, would certainly never have succeeded by means of his dialectic in deducing this _à priori_. Did he not equally succeed in demonstrating that there were seven planets, a number accepted in his day, but which in our time science has long left behind?

The causes of this phenomenon, therefore, are easily understood.

43. But there is another point which appears enigmatical. How does it happen that the prevailing public opinion respecting law and morality is itself, in so many respects, obviously right? If a thinker like Kant was unable to discover the sources from which ethical knowledge flows, how can we believe that the common folk succeeded in drawing therefrom? And if this were not the case, how were they able, while ignorant of the premises, still to reach the conclusions? Here the phenomenon cannot possibly be explained from the fact that the right view was long before established.

This difficulty also resolves itself in a very simple manner when we reflect that much in our store of knowledge exists, and contributes towards the attainment of new knowledge, without the knowledge of the process itself being clearly present to consciousness.

It must not be supposed that in saying this I am an adherent of the wonderful philosophy of the unconscious. I am speaking here only of undeniable and well known truths. Thus it has often been observed that for thousands of years men have drawn right conclusions without bringing the procedure and the principles which form the condition of the formal validity of the inference into clear consciousness by means of reflection. Indeed when Plato first took the step of reflecting upon it, he was led to set up an entirely false theory which assumed that every inference was a process of reminiscence.[55] What was perceived and experienced on earth recalled to the memory knowledge acquired in a pre-mundane existence. Nowadays this error has disappeared. Still, false theories concerning the fundamental principles of syllogism are continually emerging, as, for example, when Albert Lange,[56] finds them in space-perceptions and in synthetic propositions _à priori_, or Alexander Bain[57] in the experience that the moods Barbara, Celarent, etc., have up to the present time been found to be valid in every case: mere crude errors which overlook the immediate intuitions forming the conditions of right conclusions, but which do not prevent Plato, Lange, and Bain from arguing in general exactly like other people. In spite of their false conception of the true fundamental principles, these still continue to operate in their reasoning.

But why do I go so far for examples? Let the experiment be made with the first “plain man” who has just drawn a right conclusion, and demand of him that he give you the premises of his conclusion. This he will usually be unable to do and may perhaps make entirely false statements about it. On requiring the same man to define a notion with which he is familiar, he will make the most glaring mistakes and so show once again that he is not able rightly to describe his own thinking.

44. Meantime, however dark the road to ethical knowledge might appear, both to the “plain man” and to the philosopher, we must still expect, since the process is a complicated one and many combined principles operate therein, that the traces of the operation of each separate principle will be evident in history, and this fact, even more than agreement in respect of the final results, is a confirmation of the right theory.

This also, if only the time permitted, in what fulness would I not be able to lay before you! Who is there, for example, who would not, as we have done, regard joy as something evidently good in itself, if only it were not joy in what is bad. Nor has there been any lack of writers on ethics who have asserted that pleasure and the good were strictly identical conceptions.[58] Opposed to these were others who bore witness to the inner worth of insight and such will be supported by all unprejudiced minds. Many philosophers have wished to exalt knowledge above all else as the highest good.[59] They recognized, however, at the same time, a certain inner worth in each act of virtue, while others have carried this view so far as to recognize only in virtuous action the highest good.[60]

On the one hand, therefore, we have had sufficient confirmatory tests in support of our view.

Next with regard to the principles of choice, how often do we not see the principle of summation applied as, for example, when it is said that the measure of the happiness of life as a whole and not that of the passing moment is to be considered.[61] And, again, passing beyond the limits of the self, when, for example, Aristotle says, that the happiness of a nation seems to be a higher end than that of an individual happiness,[62] and that in the same way in a work of art, or in an organism and similarly in the case of the family, the part always exists for the sake of the whole; everything is here subordinate to the “common” (“εἰς τὀ κοινόν”).[63] Even in the case of the whole creation he makes the same principle hold good. “In what,” he asks,[64] “regarding all created things consists the good, and the best, which is its final aim”? Is it immanent or transcendent? And he answers: “Both,” setting forth as the transcendent aim the divine first cause, likeness to which everything strives after, while the immanent aim is the world-order as a whole. The like testimony to the principle of summation might be taken from the lips of the Stoics.[65] It reappears in every attempt to construct a theodicy from Plato down to Leibnitz and even later.[66]

In the precepts of our popular religion, again, the operation of this principle is also distinctly visible. When it ordains us to love our neighbour as ourselves, what else is taught but that, in the right choice, equality (be it our own or that of others) shall fall with equal weight into the balance, from which follows the subordination of the single individual to the good of the collective whole; just as the ethical ideal of Christianity--the Saviour--offers himself as a sacrifice for the salvation of the world.

And when it is said: “Love God above all else” (and Aristotle also says that God is much rather to be called the best than the world as a whole),[67] here also there is a special application of the law of summation. For how else do we think of God than as the sum of all that is good raised to an infinite degree?

And so the two propositions: that we should love our neighbour as ourselves, and love God above all else, are manifestly so closely related that we are no longer surprised to find added the words that the one law is like unto the other. The law that we are to love our neighbour, it should be carefully noted, is not subordinated to that of love of God, and derived from it, it is, according to the Christian view, not right because God has required it, rather he requires it because it is by nature right;[68] and this rightness is made manifest in the same way, and with the same clearness by means, so to speak, of the same ray of natural knowledge.

Sufficient testimony has perhaps been offered to the shaping operation of those factors which have been separately set forth by us, and so we have, on the one hand, a strengthening of our theory while, on the other hand, we have in essentials the explanation of that paradoxical anticipation of philosophical results.

45. We are not to suppose, however, that all has now been said. Not every opinion regarding law and morality holding good in society to-day, and which has also the sanction of ethics, flows from these pure and noble sources which, even when hid, have none the less discharged their waters in rich abundance. Many such views have arisen in a way quite unjustifiable from a logical point of view, and an inquiry into the history of their origin shows that they take their rise in lower impulses, in egoistic desires through a transformation due, not to higher influences, but simply to the instinctive force of habit. It is really true, as so many utilitarians have pointed out, that egoism prompts men to make themselves agreeable to others and that such conduct continually practised, develops finally into a habit which is blind to the original ends. The chief reason for this is the limits of our mind, the so-called “narrowness of consciousness,” which does not allow of our always keeping clearly before us the more remote and final ends side by side with what is immediately in question. In such a way many a one may be frequently led, by the blind force of habit, to have regard also for the well-being of others with a certain self-forgetfulness. Further, it is true, as some have particularly insisted, that in history it must often have happened that a powerful person has selfishly reduced to subjection a weaker individual, and transformed him by force of habit more and more into a willing slave. And then in this slave-soul an αὐτὀς ἒφα comes in the end to operate with a blind, but none the less powerful force, an impelling “you ought,” as though it were a revelation of nature regarding good and bad. On every violation of a command he feels himself, like a well-trained dog, uneasy and inwardly tormented. When such a tyrant had, in this way, reduced many to subjection his prudent egoism would cause him to give commands helpful to the maintenance of his horde. These orders would in the same slavish manner become habitual, and as it were, natural to his subjects. And so regard for the whole of this community would gradually become for each subject something into which he felt himself driven in the manner above described. At the same time, we may easily recognize how, owing to the constant care exercised towards his subjects, habits must be formed in the tyrant himself favourable to a regard for the welfare of the community. It may even happen at last that, just as in the case of the miser, who sacrifices himself for the sake of his gold, the tyrant may be ready to die for the maintenance of his people. Throughout the whole process thus described ethical principles do not exercise the slightest influence. The compulsion which in this way arises, and the opinions which as a result approve or disapprove of a certain procedure have nothing whatever to do with the natural sanction and are devoid of all ethical worth. It may, however, be easily understood--especially if one considers how one tribe enters into relations with another and considerations of friendliness begin here too to prove advantageous,--how this kind of training may lead, indeed one may venture to say _must_, sooner or later, lead to opinions in agreement with the principles springing from a true appreciation of the good.

46. Thus also the blind, purely habitual expectation of similar events under similar circumstances which animals, and also we ourselves, practise in countless instances, often coincide with the results which a complete induction according to the principles of the calculation of probability would, in the same case, have brought about. The very similarity of result has led people even with a psychological education,[69] to regard the two processes as exactly identical, although they stand wide as the poles asunder, the one completing itself by means of a purely blind instinct, while the other is illumined by mathematical evidence. We ourselves should, therefore, be well on our guard against supposing in such pseudo-ethical developments the concealed influence of the true ethical sanction.

47. Great, however, as is the contrast, still even these lower processes have their worth. Nature--and this has been often insisted on[70]--frequently does well in leaving much which concerns our welfare to instinctive impulses like hunger and thirst rather than leave everything to our reason. This, also, is confirmed in our case.

In those very early times in which, as I conceded to Ihering, (why you will, perhaps, now be better able to see,) nearly every trace of ethical thought and feeling was absent, much nevertheless was done which was a preparation for true virtue. Public laws, however much in the first instance established under the influence of lower motives, were yet preliminary conditions for the free unfolding of our noblest capacities.

Nor is it a matter of no consequence that, under the influence of this training, certain passions became moderated and certain dispositions implanted which made it easier to follow the true moral law in the same direction. Catiline’s courage was assuredly not the true virtue of courage if Aristotle is right when he says that they only have such who go to danger and to death “τοῦ καλοῦ ἔνεκα,” “for the sake of the morally beautiful.”[71] Augustine might have made use of this instance when he said: “virtutes ethnicorum splendida vitia.” But who will deny that if such a man as Catiline had been converted, the dispositions he had acquired earlier would have made it easier for him to venture to extremes in the service of the good too? In this way, the ground was made receptive for the admission of truly ethical impulses and therein lay a powerful encouragement to the propagation of truth on the part of those who were foremost in the discovery of ethical knowledge, and first to hear the voice of a natural sanction. It is in this sense that Aristotle observed that it is not every one who can study ethics. He who is to hear about law and morality, must be already well conducted by dint of habit. In the case of others, he thinks, it is but a waste of pains.[72]

Indeed, still more may be said in praise of the services rendered to the recognition of natural law and morality by these pre-ethical, though not pre-historical, times. The legal ordinances and customs formed in this time, owing to the reasons previously assigned, approached so closely to what ethics demands, that this peculiar kind of mimicry blinded many to the absence of a more thorough going affinity. What, in the one case, a blind impulse and in the other, knowledge of the good exalts into a law, is often completely the same in substance. The legislative moral authority found therefore in these already codified laws and customs the rough drafts, as it were, of laws, which with a few changes, it could sanction without more ado. These were the more valuable because, as seems required from a utilitarian point of view, they were adapted to the special circumstances of the people. A comparison of the one constitution with the other made this noticeable, and early helped to lead to the important knowledge of the real relativity of natural right and of natural morality. Who knows whether otherwise, it would have been possible, even for an Aristotle, to succeed to the degree in which he did in steering clear of all cut and dried doctrinaire theories?

So much, therefore, concerning the pre-ethical times, in order that these may not be denied the acknowledgment which they deserve.

48. Nevertheless it was then night; though a night which heralded the coming day, and the dawn of that day witnessed assuredly the most glorious sunrise which, in the history of the world is yet to rise into full splendour. I say, is to rise, not has risen, for we still see the light struggling with the powers of darkness. True ethical motives, in private as in public life, are still far from being everywhere the determining standard. These forces--to use the language of the poet[A]--prove themselves still too little developed to hold together the structure of the world; and so nature,--and we have need to be thankful that it is so--keeps the machine going by hunger and love, and, we must also add, by all those other dark strivings which, as we have seen, may be developed from self-seeking desires.

[A] Schiller.

49. Of these, and their psychological laws the jurist must, therefore, if he would truly understand his time, and influence it beneficially, take cognizance, as well as of the doctrines of natural right and natural morality which our inquiry has shown to be not the first but--in so far as hope in the realization of a complete ideal may be cherished at all--will be the last in the history of the development of law and morality.

Thus the near relationships of jurisprudence and politics of which Leibnitz spoke, become evident in their full range.

Plato has said: “It will never be well with the state until the true philosopher is king, or kings philosophize rightly.” In our constitutional times we should express ourselves better by saying that there will never be a change for the better regarding the many evils in our national life until the authorities, instead of abolishing the limited philosophical culture required for law students by the existing regulations, shall rather strive hard to secure that for their noble profession they shall really receive an adequate philosophical culture.

NOTES

[1] (_p. 2_). Cf. “Über die Entstehung des Rechtsgefühls.” Lecture by Dr. Rudolf von Ihering, delivered before the Vienna Law Society, March 12, 1884 (_Allgem. Juristenzeitung_, 7 Jahrg., No. 11 seq., Vienna, March 16-April 13, 1884). Cf. further, v. Ihering, _Der Zweck im Recht_, vol. ii. Leipzig, 1877-83.

[2] (_p. 2_). For the first point, cf. _Allgem. Juristenzeitung_, 7 Jahrg. p. 122 seq., _Zweck im Recht_, vol. ii. p. 109 seq. For the second point _Allgem. Juristenzeitung_, 7 Jahrg. p. 171, _Zweck im Recht_, pp. 118-123. It is here denied that there is any absolutely valid ethical rule (pp. 118, 122 seq.); further every “psychological” treatment of ethics, according to which ethics is represented “as twin sister of logic” is contested.

[3] (_p. 4_). _Allgem. Juristenzeitung_, 7 Jahrg., p. 147; cf. _Zweck im Recht_, vol. ii. p. 124 seq.

[4] (_p. 4_). Aristotle, _Politics_, i. 2, p. 1252 b. 24.

[5] (_p. 4_). Cf. e.g. _Allgem. Juristenzeitung_, 7 Jahrg. p. 146.

[6] (_p. 5_). _Rep._ 2. 31.

[7] (_p. 5_). _Dig._ 1. 8, 9.

[8] (_p. 6_). Amongst the numerous adherents of this view and one of its best advocates is J. S. Mill in his _Utilitarianism_, chap. iii.

[9] (_p. 6_). Here also, along with many others, J. S. Mill may be cited. The motives of hope and fear are, according to him, the _external_; the motives first described, the feelings developed by habit, the internal sanction. _Utilitarianism_, chap. iii.

[10] (_p. 7_). Cf. espec. here a discussion in James Mill’s _Fragment on Mackintosh_, printed by J. S. Mill in the second edition of his _Analysis of the phenomena of the human mind_, vol. ii. p. 309 seq.; and Grote’s powerful essay published by A. Bain under the title, “_Fragments on Ethical Subjects_, by the late George Grote, F.R.S.,” being a selection from his posthumous papers, London, 1876; Espec. Essay 1, _On the Origin and Nature of Ethical Sentiment_.

[11] (_p. 9_). D. Hume, _An Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals_, London, 1751.

[12] (_p. 9_). Herbart, _Lehrbuch zur Einleitung in die Philosophie_, 81 seq. _Collected Works_, vol. i. p. 124 seq.

[13] (_p. 9_). This comparison with logic should be my best defence against the charge of placing Herbart’s doctrine in a false light. Were the logical criterion to consist in judgments of taste experienced on the appearance of thought-processes in accordance with or opposition to rule, it would then, in comparison with what it actually is (the internal self-evidence of a process in accordance with rule) have to be called external. Similarly Herbart’s criterion of ethics is rightly characterized as external, however loudly Herbartians may insist that in the judgment of taste which arises spontaneously on the contemplation of certain relations of will, an inner superiority regarding these relations is recognizable.

[14] (_p. 10_). In his _Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten_, Kant enunciates his Categorical Imperative in the following forms: “Act only in accordance with that maxim which you can at the same time will should become a universal law,” and “Act as if the maxim of your action were by your will to be raised to a universal law.”

In the _Critique of Practical Reason_ it runs “Act so that the maxim of your will could on each occasion be valid as a universal legislative principle,” i.e. as Kant himself explains, in such a way that the maxim, when raised to a universal law, does not lead to contradictions and consequent self-abrogation. The consciousness of this fundamental law was, for Kant, a fact of pure reason, thereby proclaiming itself to be legislative (sic volo sic jubeo). Beneke has already observed (_Grundlinien der Sittenlehre_, vol. ii. p. xviii., 1841; cf. his _Grundlegung zur Physik der Sitten_, a counterpart to Kant’s _Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten_, 1822) that it is nothing more than a “psychologische Dichtung,” and to-day no one able to judge is any longer in doubt concerning it. It deserves to be noted that even philosophers like Mansel, who have the highest reverence for Kant, admit that the Categorical Imperative is a fiction and absolutely untenable.

The Categorical Imperative has at the same time another and not less serious defect, i.e. that even when admitted, it leads to no ethical conclusions. Kant fails, as Mill (_Utilitarianism_, chap. i.) rightly says “in an almost grotesque fashion” to deduce what he seeks. His favourite example of a deduction, by which he illustrates his manner of procedure not only in his _Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten_ but also in the _Critique of Practical Reason_ is as follows: May a person, he asks, retain for himself a possession which has been entrusted to him without a receipt or other acknowledgment? He answers, No. For he thinks, were the opposite maxim to be raised to a law, nobody, under such circumstances, would entrust anything to anybody. The law would then be without possibility of application, therefore impracticable and so self-abrogated.

It may easily be seen that Kant’s argumentation is false, indeed absurd. If, in consequence of the law, certain actions ceased to be practised, the law exercises an influence; it therefore still exists and has in no way annulled itself. How ridiculous would it appear if the following question were treated after an analogous fashion: “May I yield to a person who desires to bribe me?” Yes, since, were I to think of the opposite maxim as raised to a universal law, then nobody would seek any longer to bribe another; therefore the law would be without application, therefore, impracticable, and so self-abrogated.

[15] (_p. 11_). Cf. J. S. Mill, _System of Deductive and Inductive Logic_, vol. iv. chap. iv. section vi. (towards the end); vol. vi. chap. ii. section iv. and elsewhere, e.g. in his _Utilitarianism_, _Essays on Religion_, and in his article on _Comte and Positivism_, part ii.

[16] (_p. 11_). Cf. with what has been said in the lecture the first chapter of the Nicomachian Ethics, and it will be seen that Ihering’s “fundamental thought” in his work _Der Zweck im Recht_, vol. i. p. vi., viz.: “that no legal formula exists which does not owe its origin to an end,” is as old as ethics itself.

[17] (_p. 12_). Cases may arise where the consequence of certain efforts remains in doubt, and two courses are open: one presenting the prospect of a greater good but with less probability, the other a lesser good but with a greater probability. In choosing here, account must be taken of the degree of probability. If A is three times better than B, but B has ten times as many chances of being attained as A, then practical wisdom will prefer course B. Supposing that, under like circumstances, such a procedure always takes place, then (in accordance with the law of great numbers) the better would, generally speaking, be realized, a sufficient number of cases being assumed, and so such a manner of choosing would still obviously correspond to the principle laid down in the text, i.e. “Choose the best that is attainable.” The full significance of this remark will be made still more evident in the course of the inquiry.

[18] (_p. 12_). This truth was familiar to Aristotle (cf. e.g. _De Anima_, iii. 8). The Middle Ages maintained it, but expressed it unfortunately in the proposition: _nihil est in intelluctu, quod non prius fuerit in sensu_. The notions “willing,” “concluding” are not gained from sensuous perception; the term “sensuous” would in that case have to be taken so generally that all distinction between “sensuous” and “super-sensuous” disappears. These notions have their origin in certain concrete impressions with psychical content (Anschauungen psychischen Inhalts). From the same source arise the notions “end,” “cause” (we observe, for example, a causal relation existing between our belief in the premises and in the conclusion), “impossibility” and “necessity” (we gain these from judgments which accept or reject not merely assertorically, but, as it is usually expressed, apodictically,) and many other notions which some modern philosophers, failing in detecting the true origin of them, have sought to regard as categories given _à priori_. I may mention, by the way, that I am well aware Sigwart and others influenced by him have recently questioned the peculiar nature of apodictic as opposed to assertorical judgments. But this is a psychological error which it is not the place to discuss here. Cf. note 27, p. 83 sub.

[19] (_p. 12_). This doctrine in germ is also found in Aristotle; cf. espec. _Metaph._: Δ 15, p. 1021 a. 29. This term “intentional,” like many other terms for important notions, comes from the scholastics.

[20] (_p. 13_). The question of the grounds of this division is discussed in more detail in my _Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkte_ (1874, Bk. ii. chap. vi.; cf. also chap. i. section 5). The statements there made regarding this division I still consider to be substantially correct in spite of many modifications respecting points of detail.

[21] (_p. 13_). Meditat. iii. “Nunc autem ordo videtur exigere, ut prius omnes meas cogitationes (all psychical acts) in certa genera distribuam.... Quaedam ex his tanquam rerum imagines sunt, quibus solis proprie convenit _ideae_ nomen, ut cum hominem, vel chimaeram, vel coelum, vel angelum, vel Deum cogito; aliae vero alias quasdam praeterea formas habent, ut cum volo cum timeo, cum affirmo, cum nego, semper quidem aliquam rem ut subjectum meae cogitationis apprehendo, sed aliquid etiam amplius quam istius rei similitudinem cogitatione complector; et ex his aliae _voluntates_ sive _affectus_ aliae autem _judicia_ appellantur.”

Strangely enough this clear passage has not prevented Windelband (_Strassb. philos. Abhandl._ p. 171) from ascribing to Descartes the view that the judgment is an act of volition. What led him astray is a discussion in the fourth Meditation on the influence of the will in the formation of judgment. Even scholastics like Suarez had ascribed too much to this influence, and Descartes goes so far in exaggeration of this dependence that he considers every judgment (even the self-evident judgments) as the work of the will. But to “produce the judgment” and “to be the judgment” are yet manifestly not one and the same. And, therefore, although Descartes, in the passage cited, allows his view as to the influence of the will to appear, and probably it is only on this account that he assigns to the judgment the third place in the fundamental classification of psychical phenomena, yet none the less he says without contradiction: _aliae_ voluntates--_aliae_ judicia appellantur.

More illusive are a couple of passages in his later writings, i.e. in his _Principia Philosophiae_ (i. 32), published three years after the Meditations, and in a work also written three years later: Notae in Programma quoddam, sub finem Anni 1647 in Belgio editum, cum hoc Titulo: Explicatio mentis humanae sive animae rationalis, ubi explicatur quid sit, et quid esse possit.” Particularly might the passage in the _Principles_ lead to the opinion that Descartes must have changed his view, and it is astonishing that Windelband has not appealed to this passage rather than to that in the Meditations. We read here:--Ordines _modi cognitandi_ quos in nobis experimur, _ad duos generales_ referri possunt; quorum unus est, _perceptio sive operatio intellectus_; alius vero _volitio sive operatio voluntatis_. Nam sentire, imaginari, et pure intellegere, sunt tantum diversi modi percipiendi; _ut et cupere, aversari, affirmare, negare, dubitare, sunt diversi modi volendi_.

At first sight this passage appears to be so clearly in contradiction to the one in the third Meditation that, as we have said, it is scarcely possible to avoid the supposition that Descartes had meantime rejected his thesis as to the three fundamental classes of psychical phenomena, so shunning Scylla only to plunge into Charybdis; avoiding the old mistake of confusing the judgment with the idea (Vorstellung), he would now seem to confound it with the will. But a more attentive examination of all the circumstances will suffice to exonerate Descartes from such a charge, and this on the following grounds: (1) There is not the slightest sign that Descartes was ever conscious of having become untrue to the view expressed in the Meditations. (2) Further, in the year 1647 (three years after the publication of the Meditations and shortly before writing the Notae to his Programma) the Meditations appeared in a translation revised by Descartes himself, where, remarkably enough, not the slightest alteration is to be found in the decisive passage in the third Meditation. “Entre mes pensées,” it reads, “quelques unes sont commes les images des choses, et c’est à celles-là scules que convient proprement le nom d’idée.... D’autres, outre cela ont quelques autres formes; ... et de ce genre de pensées _les unes sont appelées volontés ou affections, et les autres jugements_.” (3) In the _Principles_ itself he says directly after (i. No. 42) that all our errors depend upon our will (a voluntate pendere); but so far is he from regarding the “error” as an act of volition, that he says there is no one who errs voluntarily (nemo est qui velit falli). Still clearer is it that he does not regard the judgment like the desires and dislikes as inner activities of the will itself, but only as a product of the will, since he at once adds: sed longe aliud est velle falli quam velle assentiri iis, in quibus contingit errorem reperiri,” etc. He does not say of the will that it desires, affirms, assents, but that it wills the assent; so also, not that it _is_ true but that it desires the truth (veritatis assequendae cupiditas ... _efficit_, ut ... judicium ferant).

As to Descartes’ real view, therefore, there can be no doubt; his doctrine has not in this respect suffered the slightest change. It only remains, therefore, to come to an understanding of his obviously variable modes of expression, and this is, I believe, solved incontrovertibly in the following manner. Descartes, while regarding will and judgment as two classes differing fundamentally, none the less finds that in contradistinction to the first fundamental class--that of ideas--these have something in common. In the third Meditation he designates (cf. the above passage) as the common element the fact that although essentially based upon an idea, in both alike there is contained a further special form. In the fourth Meditation a further common character appears, i.e. that the will decides concerning them; not only can it determine and suspend its own acts, but also those of the judgment. It is this common character which he was bound to regard as especially, indeed all important, in the first part of the _Principles_, xxix.-xlii. Accordingly, he classes them, in opposition to the ideas (which he calls operationes intellectus) under the term operationes voluntatis. In the Notae to the Programma he calls them distinctly in the same sense, “determinationes voluntatis.” “Ego enim, cum viderem, praeter perceptionem, quae praerequiritur ut judicemus, opus esse affirmatione vel negatione ad formam judicii constituendam, _nobisque saepe esse liberum ut cohibeamus assensionem_, etiamsi rem percipiamus, ipsum actum judicandi, qui non nisi in assensu, hoc est in affirmatione vel negatione consistit, non retuli ad perceptionem intellectus sed ad determinationem voluntatis.” He does not even hesitate in the _Principles_ to term both these two classes of _modi cogitandi_, “_modi volendi_” the context seeming sufficiently to indicate that he means only to express thereby the fact that they fall within the domain of the will.

In further support of this explanation we may compare the scholastic terminology into which Descartes as a young man was initiated. It was customary to denote under the term _actus voluntatis_ not merely the movement of the will itself but also the act performed in obedience to the will. In accordance with this custom, the _actus voluntatis_ fell into two classes; the _actus elicitus voluntatis_ and the _actus imperatus voluntatis_. In a similar manner Descartes groups the class which, according to him, was only possible as an _actus imperatus_ of the will along with his _actus elicitus_. There is here, therefore, no question of a common fundamental character of the intentional relation.

Clear as all this is to those who carefully attach due weight to the various moments, it would yet appear that Spinoza (probably misled rather by the passage in the _Principles_ than by that cited by Windelband), anticipates Windelband in this misunderstanding of the Cartesian doctrine. In his _Ethics_, ii. prop. 49, he actually, and in the most real sense, regards the _affirmatio_ and _negatio_ as “_volitiones mentis_,” and by a further confusion, comes finally to obliterate the distinction between the two classes _ideae_ and _voluntates_. “_Voluntas et intellectus unum et idem sunt_” his thesis now reads, so overthrowing not only the three-fold classification of Descartes, but also the old Aristotelian dual classification. Spinoza has here, as usual, done nothing else than corrupt the teaching of his great master.

[22] (_p. 13_). I do not mean to say that the classification is, universally recognized to-day. It would not even be possible to regard as certain the Principle of Contradiction if in order to do so we were to await universal assent. In the present instance it is not difficult to understand that old, deeply-rooted prejudices cannot all at once be banished. But that even under such circumstances it has not been possible to urge a single important objection affords the best confirmation of our doctrine.

Some, as for instance, Windelband--while giving up the attempt at including judgment and idea (Vorstellung) in _one_ fundamental class, on the other hand believe it possible to subsume judgment under feeling, thus falling back into the error which Hume committed earlier in his inquiry into the nature of belief. According to these writers, to affirm implies an act of approval, an appreciation on the part of the feelings, while denial is an act of disapproval, a feeling of repugnance.

Despite a certain analogy the confusion is hard to understand. There are people who recognize both the goodness of God and the wickedness of the devil, the being of Ormuzd and the being of Ahriman, with an equal degree of conviction, and yet, while prizing the nature of the one above all else, they feel themselves absolutely repelled by that of the other. Since we love knowledge and hate error it is, of course, proper that those _judgments_ we hold to be right (and this is true of all those judgments which we ourselves make) are for this very reason dear to us, i.e. we estimate them in some way or other through feeling. But who on this account would be misled into regarding the judgments themselves which are loved as acts of loving?. The confusion would be almost as gross as if we should fail to distinguish wife and child, money and possessions, from the activity which is directed towards these, inasmuch they are the objects of affection. Cf. also what has been said (note 21) with regard to Windelband, where, misunderstanding Descartes, he ascribes to him the same teaching; further, note 26 (on the unity of the idea of the good) as well as what is urged by Sigwart in the note (in part much to the point) on Windelband (_Logic_, vol. i. chap. ii. p. 156 seq.). To those who, despite all that has been said, still wish further arguments for the distinction between the second and third fundamental classes, I may, perhaps, be allowed to refer them, by anticipation, to my _Descriptive Psychology_, which I have alluded to in the preface as an almost completed work, and which will appear if not as a continuation, yet still as a further development of my _Psychology from the Empirical Standpoint_.