Moral evolution

“ As in the physical world, so in the moral, we have the survival of many different genera and species,—various ideals of conduct or institutions of life, some of which may be grouped together by strong resemblances, others of which stand to each other in the relation of lower to higher organisms; the survival of archaic institutions in the higher as well as their history of progress showing their affinities with the lower. "History is the palæontology of moral ideals," and provides us with a better means of studying the growth of morality than exists for the study of the growth of species. ”

“ A special question has place here—whether moral quality belongs even to the personal dispositions, propensities and inclinations that lie back of the exercise of the feelings, as attitudes or habitudes of the soul with respect to good and evil? The facts of life unquestionably show the existence of such propensities or tendencies derived through heredity and descending from generation to generation. The scientific theory of evolution recognizes them and draws many of its conclusions, both psychological and moral, from them. ”

“ But the view for which I contend is, that Morality properly so-called—the science of right conduct—has for its object to determine how and why certain modes of conduct are detrimental, and certain other modes beneficial. These good and bad results cannot be accidental, but must be necessary consequences of the constitution of things, and I conceive it to be the business of Moral Science to deduce from the laws of life and the conditions of existence what kinds of action necessarily tend to produce happiness and what kinds to produce unhappiness. ”

“ They insist that there has been no moral growth in human nature, as a whole, to accompany the evolution of rational faculties and powers; and that, while human conduct has been gathering its potent gains of prudence, ingenuity, skillfulness, and the like—which are qualities relative to means and ends—it has gained, on the whole, in the absolute qualities of rightness and goodness, either nothing at all or less. ”

“ That this principle is the only right one is shown by our former observations, according to which, as society develops, more and more actions are the result of reflection. And in case a state of moral perfection is attainable, it can be arrived at only as each member of the society acts from perfect reflection, not from impulse or instinct. ”

“ Did all the moral lawgivers who have reformed the world break the law of thought, when, going behind the phenomena of human conduct, with their relations pointing to one idea of right and wrong, they conceived the idea of a new and a better rule of life? ”

“ The old argument, used to prop the belief in conscience as an original, higher gift, and so, in the original creation of fixed species,—the argument that the same fundamental rules of moral conduct are to be found in all societies,—has already been answered in the demonstration that uniformities of human nature and necessary similarities in all social constitution render the fundamental rules of forbearance, aid, honesty, and truth necessary to all societies alike ”

“ Nevertheless, if our preceding considerations be correct, the uniformities in social relations admit of the establishment of certain general rules which the moral man will follow under most circumstances.
We come finally to the definition of conscience. In humanity as a whole, and in the single societies of which it is composed, a certain moral evolution may be perceived which we have found reasons for believing to be internal as well as external, a matter of heredity as well as of instruction. In this internal sense, conscience, as innate capacity, or tendency, may be said to be an instinct. ”

“ But human beings are not automata, and the theory which regards the moral evolution from the standpoint of the ideals actually existent in society must take into consideration the actual realization which enters into the practical ideals of a large part of society, of the contrast of those ideals with a conceived higher standard at present impracticable. ”

“ Much has been written in late years about "the evolution of the moral life," by writers who seek to account for it through the action of merely naturalistic forces in the human constitution and in its physical environment. ”

“ 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. ”

“ But we need no special moral faculty to teach us morality; it is prompted by thoughts and feelings that, as the result of a process of compromise, are thoughts and feelings adjusted to a social order. ”

“ The one held it to arise from an innate moral sense, the other from the results of experience. The philosophy of evolution includes in its explanation both series of facts from which these two schools argued. It shows how ancestral experiences of right and wrong conduct become organized in the race, and are transmitted as moral tendencies to offspring. These tendencies are advanced in their progress a step by the experience of each individual life. ”

“ 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 ”

“ And since goodness and badness exhaust the field of moral possibilities, if the propositions that goodness means progress, and badness regress, are both true, we must be able to convert them, and maintain that all progress is due to goodness and all regress to badness. ”

“ It gives us no idea of the process and progress of morality. We have yet to show how the moral order is produced, and to examine the meaning and the law of moral progress.
As the moral organism may be compared to a species of which the various moral individuals are the members, so the moral ideal may be regarded as a species of which the various ideals in the minds of good men are the different individuals. ”

“ The seeming paradoxy of this statement results from the tendency, so difficult to avoid, to judge a conclusion which presupposes an ideal humanity, by its applicability to humanity as now existing. In the ideal state, towards which evolution tends, any falling short of function implies deviation from perfectly moral conduct. ”

“ To find a classification of the virtues that will not run into infinite detail or be a simple affirmation of the general principle, the internal development of moral character under its emotional and intellectual aspects may furnish a sufficient method. The general formula of primary individual virtues is: "Be strong." The condition of vitality of the individual as a complex of instincts, is expressed by the formula: "Be temperate." And the class of virtues referring to the conditions of intellectual efficiency, has the general rule: "Be truthful." ”

“ In order to appreciate the solidity of this basis it is necessary to understand the origin of morals, and to see that the fundamental precepts of moral law are not mere chance inventions of a few exceptional minds, or the teachings of doubtful revelations, but are the necessary growth and products of human nature, in the course of the evolution of society from rude beginnings to a high civilisation. ”

“ But history, considered as a realm of actions, can be made especially fruitful of sound influence upon the active, moral side of human nature. The moral judgment is strengthened by a knowledge of the evolution of mankind in good and evil. ”

“ None but those committed to a preconceived theory can fail to recognize the workings of such a faculty as the moral sense. It is clear that the perceptions of propriety or impropriety of conduct do not originate with the intellect but with the emotional faculties. ”

“ To these questions, the answer must be, first, that evolution, in the theistic conception, if supposed capable of developing the faculty of conscience, must also be regarded as consistent with existence and place of the moral law. The infinite intelligence and purpose back of the creative evolution, and through it originating a power for ethical perception, must be conceded to be equally capable, in that method of forming the universe, of establishing the principle and law of duty in the relations in which rational and self-determining creatures are to live. ”

“ Again, the great author of the Evolution theory himself, in his Descent of Man, has given us an account of morality which suggests a remark of the same kind. He seems to have come to the conclusion that what is called our moral sense is merely an indication of the superior permanency of social compared with personal impressions. ”

“ In that case, the proof that both the moral man and the immoral man will with their own will, and act through their own limbs, that both possess arms, hands, senses, feelings, understanding, in short, that both are human beings, must show, in the same manner, an approximation of the moral to the immoral man. ”

“ Only in so far as the moral law has become internal, is the delight in heroic or benevolent energy spontaneous; in so far, we may speak of the existence of a moral, as of an æsthetic, sense. A man of fine moral sensibility may, indeed, like the artist, perceive finer moral discords than can be measured by formulæ ”

“ We are brought, then, face to face with the fact that there are certain directions in which the process of civilization appears to be much more certainly a process of moral development, as evinced in human conduct and character, than it does in others; certain particulars of conduct, that is, in which the fact of moral progress is undeniable, and certain others in which, at least, it is open to doubt. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ But I may safely say that civilization is a certain cumulative succession of modifications or changes in the state and character of men—which indicates the conception quite distinctly enough, and excludes every matter of debate. In like manner I may avoid the disputations of the ethical schools, and yet set out a notion of morals that will serve every present purpose of thinking, if I say that moral philosophy has for its subject human conduct, considered with reference to whatever absolute qualities may be found in it. ”

“ It is the problem how far the known facts and probable theories regarding the development of morality can make any contribution towards determining the standard of worth for our ideas, our sentiments, and our conduct. Now if we read the accredited exponents of the doctrine of evolution we shall find amongst them a considerable variety of view regarding the bearing of the theory of evolution upon this properly ethical problem—the problem of the criterion or standard of goodness. ”

“ If we resume the moral progress of the nineteenth century, allowing for its inconsistencies, carefully weighing its negative and positive results, and taking as a balance what is original in its contribution to the ethical development of the human race, we will find that this contribution mainly lies in the direction of tolerance and of altruism. ”

“ Clearly these are all features of human life; and, if the theory of evolution applies to human life, we must expect it also to have some contribution to make to this portion of man's development,—to the growth of the customs, institutions, and ideas which enter into and make up his morality.
But by the 'ethics of evolution' is meant something more than the 'evolution of ethics' or development of morality. ”

“ The reference of moral growth to social necessities does not involve the denial of a germinal sense of right and wrong or of germinal moral ideals, but this sense and these ideals arise, through reflection, from experience. We are here concerned only with the actual conduct of men traceable in the early forms of society. ”

“ Through the need and faculty of reciprocal help, through sexual selection—which of course is a very essential factor of social life—there originated language, and reflection, and all the intellectual qualities; and through these again originated the moral qualities, which are most important in constituting the specific worth of man, and which were finally developed into self-consciousness and free moral responsibility. ”

“ By the application of evolutional science to the study of morals, we have been enabled to trace back the whole history of moral ideas to the time of their earliest inception,—to understand the reasons of them, and to explain them without the help of any supernatural theory. ”

“ Just how much they will have kept or changed of the deliquescent morality of to-day, when in a hundred years or so they do distinctively and powerfully emerge, I cannot speculate now. They will certainly be a moral people. They will have developed the literature of their needs, they will have discussed and tested and thrashed out many things, they will be clear where we are confused, resolved where we are undecided and weak. ”