Social ethics

“ It is, indeed, very difficult to separate ethics from sociology. It is the business of sociology to furnish norms and standards to ethics, and it is the business of ethics as a science to take the norms and standards furnished by the social sciences, to develop them, and to criticize them. ”

“ Every one of our actions, whether we wish it or not, exercises some influence on other human beings in the social community in which we live. By our conduct we help to uphold or undermine the principles on which the various social institutions are based ”

“ In any other view it is a maze, a mystery, a hopeless embroilment.
That ethics is involved in society is of course admitted; what is not admitted is, that ethical terms should be settled under the social science in the first place. I may refer to the leading term "law," whose meaning in sociology is remarkably clear; in ethics remarkably the reverse. The confusion deepens when the moral faculty is brought forward. In the eye of the sociologist, nothing could be simpler than the conception of that part of our nature that is appealed to for securing obedience. ”

“ Our ethics is only a vague outline, not a matured system, and in the details of social contact—as between employer and workman, rich and poor, Negro and white, and so on—there is such a lack of accepted standards that men have little to go by but their crude impulses. ”

“ This is the enormous advantage which society derives from the honor of its members, and for the sake of which society permits the individual to do things which are otherwise both by ethics and law positively forbidden. ”

“ The next task would be rather to show the significance of ascetic rationalism, which has only been touched in the foregoing sketch, for the content of practical social ethics, thus for the types of organization and the functions of social groups from the conventicle to the State. ”

“ Believing that the social problems are at the foundation personal and moral problems, the author would solve them “in accordance with the principles of justice and equity.” He discusses the following subjects: Scope and method of social ethics. Christian ethics, The family, Marriage, Family life and relationships, The state, The national state, State intervention, The civic power, The Christian state, Public morality and the state, The social mind and the press, Ethics of war, Ethics of art, Science and Education. ”

“ More important is it to deal with the springs of action, to teach the equal standard of purity for men and women, and the moral responsibility of parenthood to adolescent youth, and at the same time to impress upon [47] the whole community its responsibility of oversight of morals for the good of the next generation. Conviction of personal and social responsibility as superior to individual preferences is the only safety of society in all its relations, from eugenics through economics to ethics and religion. ”

“ This view of morality, which, for the most part, is indorsed by modern thought, makes ethics dependent upon sociology for its criteria of rightness or wrongness. Indeed, we cannot argue any moral question nowadays unless we argue it in social terms. ”

“ There is a growing recognition of the fact that though these conventions and arrangements may in past periods of history have been promotive of human welfare and therefore moral, they are, as applied to the more complex social and economic relations of modern society, the very embodiment of unreason and injustice. ”

“ Nevertheless, whether actually existing or only approached, we must here recognize as hypothetically possible a state in which these primary moral laws are conformed to; for the purpose of observing, in their uncomplicated forms, what are the negative conditions to harmonious social life. Whether the members of a social group do or do not co-operate, certain limitations to their individual activities are necessitated by their association ”

“ More positively influential in the formation of moral ideas and feelings are social institutions. Thus the place which a whole group of moral qualities that we designate as domestic virtues are assigned in the ethical standard is determined by the place which circumstances may have given the family in the social organism. ”

“ These events epitomized and exaggerated, but at the same time challenged, the code of ethics which regulates much of our daily conduct, and clearly showed that so-called social relations are often resting upon the will of an individual, and are in reality regulated by a code of individual ethics. ”

“ This system of ethics maintains that we have from nature social affections which lead us into friendly fellowship with our kind, and incline us to consult the interests of others, no less than private feelings, which excite us to promote our own personal advantage. It holds that we grow up to be the moral agents that we are through an innate sense of duty, which at once approves of our conduct when we do right, and disapproves of it when we do wrong. ”

“ As traditional and authoritative ethics weaken in the social process, the ethics formulated in the light of function bring to the general standard of the community a continuous and creative reinforcement. ”

“ It is the aim of the Ethical Societies to extend the area of moral co-operation so as to include a part, at least, of the inner moral life; to unite men of divers opinions and beliefs in the common endeavor to explore the field of duty; to gain clearer perceptions of right and wrong; to study with thoroughgoing zeal the practical problems of social, political, and individual ethics, and to embody the new insight in manners and institutions.... ”

“ In holding that actual social relations afford the law of what should be, we must not forget that these actual relations have a negative as well as a positive side, and that the new law must be framed in view of the negatives, the deficiencies, the wrongs, the contradictions, as well as of the positive attainments. A moral law, to sum up, is the principle of action, which, acted upon, will meet the needs of the existing situation as respects the wants, powers, and circumstances of the individuals concerned. ”

“ Not man as an individual, independent of social relations, of family, people, state, society; not man or humanity in the abstract; but man in society, the social individual, the member of the social union, is the subject for whose moral action, for the adaptations of whose conduct to the highest aims of social life, it is the business of scientific ethics to establish normal principles. ”

“ A fashionable counter-theory which proves to be unjustifiable. On the one hand, while we find that individual life and social life both imply maintenance of the natural relation between efforts and benefits; we also find that this natural relation, recognized before Government existed, has been all along asserting and reasserting itself, and obtaining better recognition in codes of law and systems of ethics. ”

“ No rule of conduct can be set up as an abstract right or wrong; we must form our ethics on our social results; and in the world's moral progress the really effective results have generally come by shock of attack upon, or of resistance to, some cherished conventions of the day. ”

“ Historical study, then, reveals the growth of personal and social morality through the action of forces, which tend to drive men into conduct that makes for their welfare more surely than did their primitive animal impulses. Conscience arises through these same forces. Though subject to perversion and infinitely variant in detail, community-morals and individual conscience have been the chief means of making man's life safe and wisely directed. ”

“ Throughout this volume we have assumed that much of our ethical maladjustment in social affairs arises from the fact that we are acting upon a code of ethics adapted to individual relationships, but not to the larger social relationships to which it is bunglingly applied. ”

“ In several respects this work, among the many of its kind appearing in recent years, is eminently valuable, especially for the ample treatment given to ethics in the world of action in civil society, admidst the relations of political, economic, and family life. To trace the growth of morality, and to discover its laws and principles, with a view to their application to present social conditions and problems for progressive moral development, is the proper aim of ethical science as here unfolded. ”

“ Relations to Ethics. [Footnote: For a full statement of my views regarding the relations of sociology and ethics, see my article on "The Sociological Basis of Ethics," in the International Journal of Ethics for April, 1910.] Ethics is the science which deals with the right or wrong of human conduct. Its problems are the nature of morality and of moral obligation, the validity of moral ideals, the norms by which conduct is to be judged, and the like. While ethics was once considered to be a science of individual conduct it is now generally conceived as being essentially a social science. ”

“ It is well to remind ourselves, from time to time, that "Ethics" is but another word for "righteousness," that for which many men and women of every generation have hungered and thirsted, and without which life becomes meaningless. ”

“ Once let us realize that it is the real interest of the individual to act in harmony with the total well-being of the society to which he belongs, and that it is the true interest of this generation to care for succeeding generations—that human nature contains desires making for the realization of this wider self which it would be painful to thwart—ethical conduct is at once justified, and the false antagonism of individual and social welfare disappears. ”

“ If this be at all true, it may indicate what I take to be the aim of our society, or rather of us as members of an ethical society. We hold, that is, that the great problems of to-day have their root, so to speak, in an ethical soil. They will be decided one way or other by the view which we take of ethical questions. The questions, for example, of what is meant by social justice, what is the justification of private property, or the limits of personal liberty, all lead us ultimately to ethical foundations. ”

“ For action is indeed the sole medium of expression for ethics. ”

“ And truly it demands something godlike in him who has cast off the common motives of humanity, and has ventured to trust himself for a taskmaster. High be his heart, faithful his will, clear his sight, that he may in good earnest be doctrine, society, law, to himself, that a simple purpose may be to him as strong as iron necessity is to others!
If any man consider the present aspects of what is called by distinction society, he will see the need of these ethics. The sinew and heart of man seem to be drawn out, and we are become timorous, desponding whimperers. ”

“ It is encouraging to know, however, that life in its highest forms, that is, as represented by the most cultured aggregates of the human species, is evolving rapidly and irrepressibly toward the ideal, that is, toward a social state in which the interests and life of each individual being are more and more equally precious. What are civilization and morality? What do we mean by ethical progress? The growth of consideration for others—nothing more—simply cessation of, or abstinence from, exploitation. ”

“ Rash indeed, would be the man, who, if required to dispense, not only with law and usage, but with all religious faith, all distinctions as to the moral worth of types of conduct, all sense of duty, all pride and self-reverence, should undertake to build an orderly and stable society on the spontaneous sympathies and social instincts of men. ”

“ And so daily and hourly do we feel that the moral imperfections of the community are fit subjects for such altruistic efforts as may help to raise the average morality.
While we thus recognize that our well-being depends so greatly on the well-being of others—their health and bodily capacities, their sense and knowledge, and their moral qualities—that due regard for others is essential to the happiness of self, we see further that each member of the body social gains directly by the possession and exercise of such qualities as lead or enable him to help his fellows. ”

“ I wish some member of our Society, competent to do it full justice, would take up the subject, and enforce upon the consciences of all the social and moral wrong they are guilty of by their neglect of their duties in these respects. ”

“ My experience of this Ethical Society led me to regard it as excellent in its assertion of free discussion, but as committed so strongly to the stress on individual moral character, as the basis of social progress, as to make it the enemy of that political-economic democracy which I was coming to regard as the chief instrument of social progress and justice. This moral individualism was not, however, equally developed in the other ethical societies which were coming into existence at the close of the century. ”

“ This morality means the principles of Justice, Truth, Temperance, Honesty, Manliness, Forbearance, Considerate Kindliness, Industry, Thrift, Foresight, Responsibility. These are [525] political and social, and perhaps also economical, necessities of modern communities. They are now the first great wants of society. Speaking generally, they can be taught to the masses of the people, and to the whole people, best, and, in fact, only by the State. ”

“ It is not a science of group tyranny, needing, as a corrective to its one-sidedness, a science of ethics that shall regard conduct from the side of the individual. It is quite competent to comprehend in its view at once the benefits of restraints or sacrifices on the one hand, and their costs on the other, and to seek the point of equilibrium between them. It accordingly holds the balance true between the individual as restrained and the individual as a member of the public and hence beneficiary of the restraint. No science of ethics, therefore, can assist sociology to its conclusion. ”