CHAPTER V.. Ethics in Relation to Conduct.

ETHICS IN RELATION TO CONDUCT.

=86.= The question to be discussed in this chapter must be clearly distinguished from the two questions hitherto discussed, namely (1) What is the nature of the proposition: ‘This is good in itself’? 142

=87.= and (2) What things are good in themselves? to which we gave one answer in deciding that pleasure was not the only thing good in itself. 144

=88.= In this chapter we shall deal with the third object of ethical enquiry: namely answers to the question ‘What conduct is a means to good results?’ or ‘What ought we to do?’ This is the question of Practical Ethics, and its answer involves an assertion of causal connection. 146

=89.= It is shewn that the assertions ‘This action is right’ or ‘is my duty’ are equivalent to the assertion that the total results of the action in question will be the best possible; 146

=90.= and the rest of the chapter will deal with certain conclusions, upon which light is thrown by this fact. Of which the first is (1) that Intuitionism is mistaken; since no proposition with regard to duty can be self-evident. 148

=91.= (2) It is plain that we cannot hope to prove which among all the actions, which it is possible for us to perform on every occasion, will produce the best total results: to discover what is our ‘duty,’ in this strict sense, is impossible. It may, however, be possible to shew which among the actions, which we are likely to perform, will produce the best results. 149

=92.= The distinction made in the last § is further explained; and it is insisted that all that Ethics has done or can do, is, not to determine absolute duties, but to point out which, among a few of the alternatives, possible under certain circumstances, will have the better results. 150

=93.= (3) Even this latter task is immensely difficult, and no adequate proof that the total results of one action are superior to those of another, has ever been given. For (a) we can only calculate actual results within a comparatively near future: we must, therefore, assume that no results of the same action in the infinite future beyond, will reverse the balance--an assumption which perhaps can be, but certainly has not been, justified; 152

=94.= and (b) even to decide that, of any two actions, one has a better total result than the other in the immediate future, is very difficult; and it is very improbable, and quite impossible to prove, that any single action is in all cases better as means than its probable alternative. Rules of duty, even in this restricted sense, can only, at most, be general truths. 154

=95.= But (c) most of the actions, most universally approved by Common Sense, may perhaps be shewn to be generally better as means than any probable alternative, on the following principles. (1) With regard to some rules it may be shewn that their general observance would be useful in any state of society, where the instincts to preserve and propagate life and to possess property were as strong as they seem always to be; and this utility may be shewn, independently of a right view as to what is good in itself, since the observance is a means to things which are a necessary condition for the attainment of any great goods in considerable quantities. 155

=96.= (2) Other rules are such that their general observance can only be shewn to be useful, as means to the preservation of society, under more or less temporary conditions: if any of these are to be proved useful in all societies, this can only be done by shewing their causal relation to things good or evil in themselves, which are not generally recognised to be such. 158

=97.= It is plain that rules of class (1) may also be justified by the existence of such temporary conditions as justify those of class (2); and among such temporary conditions must be reckoned the so-called sanctions. 159

=98.= In this way, then, it may be possible to prove the general utility, for the present, of those actions, which in our society are both generally recognised as duties and generally practised; but it seems very doubtful whether a conclusive case can be established for any proposed change in social custom, without an independent investigation of what things are good or bad in themselves. 159

=99.= And (d) if we consider the distinct question of how a single individual should decide to act (α) in cases where the general utility of the action in question is certain, (β) in other cases: there seems reason for thinking that, with regard to (α), where the generally useful rule is also generally observed, he should always conform to it; but these reasons are not conclusive, if either the general observance or the general utility is wanting: 162

=100.= and that (β) in all other cases, rules of action should not be followed at all, but the individual should consider what positive goods, he, in his particular circumstances, seems likely to be able to effect, and what evils to avoid. 164

=101.= (4) It follows further that the distinction denoted by the terms ‘duty’ and ‘expediency’ is not primarily ethical: when we ask ‘Is this really expedient?’ we are asking precisely the same question as when we ask ‘Is this my duty?,’ viz. ‘Is this a means to the best possible?.’ ‘Duties’ are mainly distinguished by the non-ethical marks (1) that many people are often tempted to avoid them, (2) that their most prominent effects are on others than the agent, (3) that they excite the moral sentiments: so far as they are distinguished by an ethical peculiarity, this is not that they are peculiarly useful to perform, but that they are peculiarly useful to sanction. 167

=102.= The distinction between ‘duty’ and ‘interest’ is also, in the main, the same non-ethical distinction: but the term ‘interested’ does also refer to a distinct ethical predicate--that an action is to ‘my interest’ asserts only that it will have the best possible effects of one particular kind, not that its total effects will be the best possible. 170

=103.= (5) We may further see that ‘virtues’ are not to be defined as dispositions that are good in themselves: they are not necessarily more than dispositions to perform actions generally good as means, and of these, for the most part, only those classed as ‘duties’ in accordance with section (4). It follows that to decide whether a disposition is or is not ‘virtuous’ involves the difficult causal investigation discussed in section (3); and that what is a virtue in one state of society may not be so in another. 171

=104.= It follows also that we have no reason to presume, as has commonly been done, that the exercise of virtue in the performance of ‘duties’ is ever good in itself--far less, that it is the sole good: 173

=105.= and, if we consider the intrinsic value of such exercise, it will appear (1) that, in most cases, it has no value, and (2) that even the cases, where it has some value, are far from constituting the sole good. The truth of the latter proposition is generally inconsistently implied, even by those who deny it; 174

=106.= but in order fairly to decide upon the intrinsic value of virtue, we must distinguish three different kinds of disposition, each of which is commonly so called and has been maintained to be the only kind deserving the name. Thus (a) the mere unconscious ‘habit’ of performing duties, which is the commonest type, has no intrinsic value whatsoever; Christian moralists are right in implying that mere ‘external rightness’ has no intrinsic value, though they are wrong in saying that it is therefore not ‘virtuous,’ since this implies that it has no value even as a means: 175

=107.= (b) where virtue consists in a disposition to have, and be moved by, a sentiment of love towards really good consequences of an action and of hatred towards really evil ones, it has some intrinsic value, but its value may vary greatly in degree: 177

=108.= finally (c) where virtue consists in ‘conscientiousness,’ i.e. the disposition not to act, in certain cases, until we believe and feel that our action is right, it seems to have some intrinsic value: the value of this feeling has been peculiarly emphasized by Christian Ethics, but it certainly is not, as Kant would lead us to think, either the sole thing of value, or always good even as a means. 178

=109.= Summary of chapter. 180