CHAPTER V. The Origin of the Moral Emotions

THE ORIGIN OF THE MORAL EMOTIONS

We may feel disinterested resentment, or disinterested retributive kindly emotion, on account of an injury inflicted, or a benefit conferred, upon another person with whose pain, or pleasure, we sympathise, and in whose welfare we take a kindly interest, p. 108.--Sympathetic feelings based on association, p. 109 sq.--Only when aided by the altruistic sentiment sympathy induces us to take a kindly interest in the feelings of our neighbours, and tends to produce disinterested retributive emotions, p. 110 sq.--Sympathetic resentment to be found in all animal species which possess altruistic sentiments, p. 111 sq.--Sympathetic resentment among savages, p. 113 sq.--Sympathetic resentment may not only be a reaction against sympathetic pain, but may be directly produced by the cognition of the signs of anger (punishment, language, &c.), pp. 114-116.--Disinterested antipathies, p. 116 sq.--Sympathy springing from an altruistic sentiment may also produce disinterested kindly emotion, p. 117.--Disinterested likings, ibid.--Why disinterestedness, apparent impartiality, and the flavour of generality have become characteristics by which so-called moral emotions are distinguished from other retributive emotions, p. 117 sq.--Custom not only a public habit, but a rule of conduct, p. 118.--Custom conceived of as a moral rule, p. 118 sq.--In early society customs the only moral rules ever thought of, p. 119.--The characteristics of moral indignation to be sought for in its connection with custom, p. 120.--Custom characterised by generality, disinterestedness, and apparent impartiality, p. 120 sq.--Public indignation lies at the bottom of custom as a moral rule, p. 121 sq.--As public indignation is the prototype of moral disapproval, so public approval is the prototype of moral approval, p. 122.--Moral disapproval and approval have not always remained inseparably connected with the feelings of any special society, p. 122 sq.--Yet they remain to the last public emotions if not in reality, then as an ideal, p. 123.--Refutation of the opinion that the original form of the moral consciousness has been the individual's own conscience, p. 123 sq.--The antiquity of moral resentment, p. 124.--The supposition that remorse is unknown among the lower races contradicted by facts, p. 124 sq.--Criticism of Lord Avebury's statement that modern savages seem to be almost entirely wanting in moral feeling, pp. 125-129.--The antiquity of moral approval, p. 129 sq.

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