Moral choice

“ The science of morality must be content in its search for causes to recognize the rationality of choice as a real determining agent in human affairs. And no account of the psychology of human action which regards conduct as due to self-determination, but leaves open the question whether the self is free to choose is, so it is argued, capable of providing an adequate theory of the admitted facts of moral consciousness. ”

“ The human faculties of perception, judgment, discriminative feeling, mental activity, and even moral preference, are exercised only in making a choice. He who does anything because it is the custom, makes no choice. ”

“ Again, we find every rational mind so made that it may be controlled by some leading desire of ruling purpose to which all other desires and purposes are subordinate, and that it is the nature of this ruling purpose which constitutes moral character. By moral character is meant that which results from our own choice instead of that which consists in qualities and propensities created by God. ”

“ Other ethical writers make the same distinction when they divide moral duties into the two classes of perfect and imperfect obligation, "the latter being those in which, though the act is obligatory, the particular occasions of performing it are left to our choice, as in the case of charity or beneficence." ”

“ Its modern forms have been greatly varied, but they all153 agree in founding the morally good in utility. That which experience shows to be useful, as promotive of personal or social interests and happiness, becomes thereby right, or the norm of moral choices and conduct. The theory, in all its modifications, is a "goods" theory,51 interpreting obligation as simply the behest to conform life to the attainment of the various forms of good, even the chief, as happiness or enjoyment, provided for in man's nature and condition. ”

“ As I consider virtue and vice to consist in action, and not in opinion, and as this action has its seat in the will, and not in the conscience, I shall confine my inquiries chiefly to the influence of physical causes upon that moral power of the mind, which is connected with volition, although many of these causes act likewise upon the conscience, as I shall show hereafter. The state of the moral faculty is visible in actions, which affect the well-being of society. ”

“ They concerned the powers and possibilities of man in the crowning endowments of his nature, and in the highest ascent of their evident intention and adaptation. They touched the great problems of personal and social welfare in the most vital relations and decisive interests. So the old sages became moralists and their great themes were the themes of virtue and duty. Not very deeply, however, did they, for centuries, succeed in penetrating the rational principles of the moral life and the authority of the moral judgments. ”

“ This answer instantly raises the fourth question, But what is the best and noblest manner of living reasonably? Answer, By so regulating our moral nature, which is made up of reason and the passions, that reason shall govern and passion obey; in other words, by so regulating our moral nature as to develop the virtues: for the virtues arise out of the governance which reason exercises over the passions. This answer calls forward the fifth question, But how is this adjustment to be effected? by what means are the moral virtues to be developed? Answer, By means of custom. ”

“ We speak not of external acts; and hence we lay aside the whole scheme of natural necessity. We speak of the acts of the will; and we ask, if these be not free from the dominion of moral necessity, from necessitating causes over which we have no control, can we be accountable for them? Can we be to praise or to blame for them? Can they be our virtue or our vice? ”

“ What we have aimed to present as a moral method is essentially this: to take into our reckoning all the factors in the situation, to take into account the other persons involved, to put ourselves into their places by sympathy as well as conceptually, to face collisions and difficulties not merely in terms of fixed concepts of what is good or fair, and what the right of each party concerned may be, but with the conviction that we need new definitions of the ideal life, and of the social order, and thus reciprocally of personality. ”

“ It is obvious that here the moral law which is above all relative duties must prevail; and that law depends on no social relation or conception of duty but on the awakened inner perception of man, the moral being. ”

“ We thus sum up the constituents of man's moral nature: intelligence, the conscience, free-will, and capacities for affection and doing. Where these are united the subject is organized for knowing duty and fulfilling it. But a final fact, of profound import, needs yet to be added, not as a further faculty, but rather as a consequence resultant from the union and co-action of these endowments, viz.: that this organism of faculties presents not simply a capacity as a possibility of the moral life, but a positive, vital motive adjustment and organic pre-disposition toward it. ”

“ But the question, 'Why should I be moral?' means, most naturally and usually, What inducements are there to me to do right?" The answer is that motives differ for different individuals. With some, outer social inducements, with others, the approbation and disapprobation of conscience are stronger. ”

“ The moral progress of the individual, born and bred under such a system of conventional morality, consists (1) in the adjustment of the self-seeking principle in him to the requirements of conventional morality, so that the modes in which he seeks self-satisfaction are regulated by the sense of what is expected of him. ”

“ But, may it not be said, that every system of ethics must, or ought, to terminate, in plain and general maxims for the use of life? and, though in such axioms no discovery is made, does not the beauty of the moral theory consist in the premises, and the chain of reasoning that leads to the conclusion? ”

“ The true doctrine of the causation of human actions maintains ... that not only our conduct, but our character, is, in part, amenable to our will; that we can by employing the proper means, improve our character; and that if our character is such that while it remains what it is, it necessitates us to do wrong, it will be just to apply motives which will necessitate us to strive for its improvement, and so emancipate ourselves from the other necessity; in other words, we are under a moral obligation to seek the improvement of our moral character. ”

“ These principles, whether lax or strict, low or high in moral tone, become, by an insensible and imperceptible adoption, their principles, and are carried out by them into the duties and avocations of future life. ”

“ And it may be admitted that, in some cases at least, it is right and proper that a man’s motives should thus influence our judgment. But the question is: What sort of moral judgment is it right and proper that they should influence? ”

“ Besides, independently of their intrinsic merits, whether intellectual or moral, the necessities of their daily life serve to impress them with respect for the great rules of morality, which in most cases were framed for their own protection. ”

“ If we look into the works on ethics, from Aristotle down to our own day—take up, for instance, the work of Herbert Spencer on the Data of Ethics, or that of Leslie Stephen on the Science of Ethics—I think you will find that in no two works is there any precise agreement as to what are the primary grounds of moral obligation. ”

“ I propose therefore to begin our inquiry into the detail of goodness—into the particular kinds of conduct which the man wishing to do good for the sake of its goodness is entitled to count good—by considering what is of permanent moral value in the institutions of civil life, as established in Europe; in what way they have contributed and contribute to the possibility of morality in the higher sense of the term, and are justified, or have a moral claim upon our loyal conformity, in consequence. ”

“ Evidently, then, with complete adaptation to the social state, that element in the moral consciousness which is expressed by the word obligation, will disappear. The higher actions required for the harmonious carrying on of life will be as much matters of course as are those lower actions which the simple desires prompt. In their proper times and places and proportions, the moral sentiments will guide men just as spontaneously and adequately as now do the sensations. ”

“ Even in matters which are, as it were, just within our reach, what would become of the world, if the practice of all moral duties, and the foundations of society, rested upon having their reasons made clear and demonstrative to every individual? ”

“ We are here, of course, purposely considering, not actual and arbitrary morality, but the essentials upon which all moralities are based. We shall deal more fully as we proceed with those psychic and emotional factors which do, in fact, colour and distort all moral values. To return to our analogy—we may say then, that a conventional moral rule stands for the credit of national morality, much as a five-pound note stands for the credit of national wealth. ”

“ What I have to note is that, in any case, the change supposes the necessity of a corresponding morality in the growth of the instincts, the public spirit, the hatred of indolence, the temperance and self-command which would be requisite to work it efficiently. The organisation into which we are born presupposes certain moral instincts, and, moreover, necessarily implies a vast system of moral discipline. Our hopes and aspirations, our judgments of our neighbours and of ourselves, are at every moment guided and moulded by the great structure of which we form a part. ”

“ The sense of duty, as involving the hard feeling of compulsion, of subjection to authority, and bound up with the sense of sin, a sense stronger in proportion to merit or the interval between first inclination and final moral willing, may and is giving place to a higher conception. In the family, this may already be found, where self-sacrifice and aid are matters of affection and rendered freely. In the higher ideal, we have that love of man for a higher and larger order than himself which morality represents as solidarity with society, a continually progressive society of free individuals ”

“ Now, as we recognised in a previous chapter, the inclinations and desires are natural to man. Without them human life would not be possible. Even if we would, we could not destroy them all. But the progress of the moral life consists in controlling and organising them. ”

“ For now let us observe that the ethical sentiment and idea, properly so-called, are independent of the ideas and sentiments above described as derived from external authorities, and coercions, and approbations—religious, political, or social. The true moral consciousness which we name conscience does not refer to those extrinsic results of conduct which take the shape of praise or blame, reward or punishment, externally awarded ”

“ The foregoing impressive sentiments of this celebrated writer disclose with clearness to the view of the human mind, the nature of moral principle and the foundation of all right and of all virtue. It is the reciprocation of sensation, the mutuality of condition, of powers and wants, that constitute the immortal basis of justice, and lead to the establishment of rules, whose operation must ever be in strict coincidence with the happiness of the human species. ”

“ Is it possible that any man of common sense can believe, that moral principles which are so important to the best interests of human society, should be placed upon such an immoral and vindictive foundation? Can any one imagine that a being, so destitute of moral justice and benevolence himself, could serve as a solid basis on which to rest these qualities in human nature? ”

“ Although they usually define the aim of life in terms of power, happiness, and love, they cannot fairly be charged either with insensitiveness to moral values, or with indifference to the ethical advancement of mankind. ”

“ Our consideration of the great truth of the distinction between right and wrong which marks human life in all ages and places, and of the existence and nature of the moral faculty discerning and enforcing this distinction, leads up to an inquiry into the aggregate complex of endowments which are essential to moral agency. The great fact of moral agency is implied and made certain in what has already been brought into view. But the pre-supposition of such moral agency is manifestly the moral agent, with all the requisite endowments for the sublime reality of ethical life. ”

“ What the exigencies of the modern age demand, more than aught else, is a new movement for the moral elevation of the race. Now the basic facts of man's moral nature, though insufficiently illustrated in practice, are universally admitted among civilized human beings. ”

“ Our fundamental ethical conception of him, however, is that of a moral being and moral ruler. And to be moral means to love and choose the right as right. We must keep in mind here the relation between moral law and will, or the choices of the will. Moral authority does not exist as will, but as right. ”

“ Every moral rule, every sentiment, as also every institution, must be tested, from period to period, to see if it works still in a practical and healthful direction to help the individual [172] to do right and for the betterment of the race. ”

“ They would appear as various expressions of the fact that the moral order acts not capriciously or like a human being, but from the necessity of its nature, or, if we prefer the phrase, by general laws,—a necessity or law which of course knows no exception and is as ‘ruthless’ as fate. ”