Part 3

So undisputed is this claim to inviolability of conscience in twentieth-century England that the State, in framing her laws, modifies their application by the interspersion of caveats in the form of "conscience clauses."

The principle on which the conscience proviso is allowed to negative the universal applicability of the State's demand for service or compliance with her rules appears, however, to be somewhat arbitrary and uncertain, and can hardly be said to be devised solely in deference to any possible religious sanction, since, although a man's conscience is allowed to exempt him from vaccinating his children, the plea of religious sanction, in the case of a man professing the polygamous doctrine of Brigham Young, would not exempt him from amenability to the law concerning bigamy; or, again, the conscience of a Quaker or of a Christadelphian is recognized as a stronger qualification for exemption from combatant service than the equally recalcitrant consciences of, e.g. an Atheist or a Member of the Church of England. Yet the standardization of "privileged" denominational consciences is strongly disavowed! In spite, however, of a certain illogical inconsistency in practice, it is virtually conceded as a right that a man should justify any conduct by the plea of "conscience," even, in many cases, when it militates directly against the good of the State.

Even more than the State and public opinion does the Protestant Church insist upon the authority and inviolability of "conscience." Driven, step by step, from the time of the Reformation, by the encroachments of science and the progress of Rationalism, from her defence of the infallibility of Doctrine and Scripture, the Protestant Church has sought to render her position impregnable by increased insistence upon the inviolability and sanctity of revelation and conscience. Lecky, speaking of the trend of "Protestant Rationalism," says: "Its central conception is the elevation of conscience into a position of supreme authority as the religious organ, a verifying faculty discriminating between truth and error."

The most recent stalwarts of the Church of England are equally insistent upon this point, thus the Rev. G. L. Richardson writes: "We shall appeal to and invigorate the conscience in proportion as we rely upon the Holy Spirit as the one source of spiritual power.... 'The fellowship of the Holy Ghost' and His grace through the Church is the master word of the twentieth century." This passage well illustrates the supreme importance, with regard to her position, which the Church attaches to the appeal to conscience at the present day. In another passage the same author says, "the authority of conscience is ... paramount for the individual." Dr. J. N. Figgis in his "Churches in the Modern State" says that any doctrine which would "destroy the springs of spiritual life in the individual conscience would be disastrous to civic as well as to religious life."

Having raised the individual conscience to a pinnacle of ethical omniscience, the ecclesiastic next proceeds to bring it into line with, or rather into synchronous subordination to, the aggregate "Church Conscience." "The Church is a Divine society, her members will feel an obligation to be loyal to her discipline.... The conscience of her members will respond with approval or shame when they keep, or neglect to keep, her standards." From this the resulting "code and sentiment" is the "Church Conscience."

Mr. G. K. Chesterton throws further light on this interrelationship. "The 'Church Conscience' is rather to be conceived as a fortress to which the individual may return for shelter and strength when the attacks of temptation threaten to overwhelm him. At such times it is well to feel that we are not dependent on the 'inner light' of conscience alone, but that we can throw ourselves on a social force mightier than our own, and behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a Divine company and a Divine Captain."

Whilst Church and State are in agreement regarding its importance and sanctity, the same unanimity is not exhibited in dealing with the origin and character of conscience. Equally divided in this respect are the philosophers and psychologists.

Priests are fond of telling us that conscience is "the voice of God within us." To some men it appears strange that the voice of the same God should frequently induce men to oppose each other with such particular bitterness. This objection is sometimes met by the explanation that although it is the voice of God speaking through the medium of our souls, we fail to recognize or interpret rightly its significance. This explanation, again, is not altogether satisfactory, since, if that were the case, the voice of God must be so uncertain a guide it were better not to rely on it.

When we look back through the pages of History and consider the actions of men and the motives to which they ascribe them, and see what an orgy of blood, of persecutions, of burnings, of torturings, of blind passions and religious frenzy, of diabolical imaginings and monstrous eschatology has been conceived at the instigation of conscience and religion, and prescribed in the name of God, we are inclined to inquire more deeply into the meaning and credentials of this watchword of all ages.

FOOTNOTES:

"Hypocrites, who from interested motives profess opinions which they do not really believe, are probably rarer than is usually supposed."--"Rise and Influence of Rationalism in Europe."

A few years ago the Animal Defence and Anti-Vivisection Society distributed pamphlets from their headquarters in Piccadilly, beginning "Do not ask of your doctor his opinion on this matter, ask your conscience," etc.

This distinction is commonly made between conscience and the intellectual faculty of reason; thus, when a man says, "My conscience tells me," he usually means, "No reason will deter me."

Mormon leader and preacher, died in 1877, leaving seventeen wives.

The establishment of bona fide membership of either of the above-mentioned religious societies (inter alia) by a "conscientious objector" was recognized by Military Service Tribunals (acting under official instructions) as sufficient cause for a verdict of exemption.

"Rationalism in Europe," 1913 edition, p. 167.

"Conscience, its Origin and Authority" (1915).

"Conscience, its Origin and Authority," p. 150.

"Orthodoxy," p. 137, quoted by G. L. Richardson.

THE VALIDITY OF MORAL JUDGMENTS

Any investigation of the phenomenon of moral conduct, and of its interpretation, brings us face to face with two sets of conflicting theories. These may, for convenience, be roughly divided into the two principal schools of thought which have been termed respectively the "Moral Sense" or "Intuitive" schools and the "Rationalistic schools of ethics." Certain writers in their search for the springs of moral conduct have attempted to place the issue between Naturalism or Determinism (by no means synonymous or necessarily connected) on the one side, and Theism on the other; and, in their eagerness to discredit the former to the advantage of the latter, imagine they demolish Determinism (at any rate in the ethical sphere) by "pushing it to its logical conclusion" and by showing that it "has connected completely and indissolubly, as far as observation can carry us, mind with matter; it has established a functional relation to exist between every fact of thinking, willing or feeling, on the one side, and some molecular change in the body on the other side, and man, with all his ways and works, is simply a part of nature, and can, by no device of thought, be detached from or set above it."

What, after all, is involved in the acceptance of such a conclusion? What is there to fear? To concede this, it is thought, would mean to relegate man to the position of a mere "automaton," freed from "accountability to God, responsibility to man, and the fears of conscience."

So far from ridding man of responsibility, the clear recognition by him of the true nature of his environment and antecedents, the laws by which they influence him, and his inherent capacity of resistance--in other words, the two processes observable in the world, action contrary to, and action along, the line of least resistance--does, on the contrary, greatly increase his responsibility of action and his power to know himself.

Is not mind and matter subject to the same law? Do they not react to the same God? What matter, then, if we adopt the formula of Pampsychism and assert that "all individual things are animated albeit in divers degrees"? or endorse the conclusion of Professor James Ward, who "finds no ground for separating organic life from psychical life"? and continues: "All life is experience. We cannot therefore assume that experience has no part in the building up of the organism, and only begins when viable organism is already there."

The belief that there can be no life without mind does not necessarily imply that there can be no mind without body. As John Stuart Mill pointed out, Determinism does not imply Materialism, a man may be a spiritual being but yet subject to the law of causation. Neither does it deny the dynamic character of will, but allows that not only our conduct but our character is in part amenable to our will. The causality involved in human actions would, however, enable any one who knew perfectly our character and our circumstances to predict our actions.

Such considerations, however, although contributory, do not, of themselves, decide the question with which we are here concerned, namely, What is the real meaning and what the authority of "conscience," or of that mental act which takes place in our minds when we call certain conduct "right" and certain conduct "wrong"?

Apart from the question of the ultimate sanction of moral conduct, there have always been two explanations of the mental act variously known as "ethical judgment," "moral faculty," "moral sense" or conscience. On the one side there have been those who considered that moral judgment was an emotion, an intuition, or instinctive recognition of right or wrong, which implied no rational or intellectual process beyond that which is involved in registering or perceiving the fact. And on the other side there have been those who treat moral approbation as essentially an act of judgment--the result of the reasoning and intellectual function of the mind.

The earliest exponents of a morality that in no way depended upon the work of Reason were the ancient Epicureans and Cyrenaics; since for them good was pleasure and evil was pain, the sources and tests of all ethical truth were necessarily, in consequence, the feelings and emotions.