Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/619

Rh ETHICS 597 framing a system of psychology, will naturally direct his attention to the impulses arising out of bodily wants, whose obvious end is the preservation of the material organism ; and this, together with a philosophic wish to simplify, may lead him to the conclusion that all human impulses are similarly self-regarding. This, at any rate, is Hobbes s cardinal doctrine in moral psychology, that each man s appetites or desires are naturally directed either to the preservation of his life, or to that heightening of it which he feels as pleasure ? including the aversions that are similarly directed &quot; f romward &quot; pain. Hobbes does not distinguish instinctive from deliberate pleasure -seeking ; and he confidently resolves the most apparently unselfish emotions into phases of self-regard. Pity he finds to be grief for the calamity of others, arising from imagination of the like calamity befalling oneself; what we admire with seeming disinterestedness as beautiful (pulchmm) is really &quot; pleasure in promise ; &quot; when men are not immediately seeking present pleasure, they desire power as a means to future pleasure, and thus have a deriva tive delight in the exercise of power that prompts to what we call benevolent action. Since, th.-n, all the voluntary actions of men tend to their own preservation or pleasure, it cannot be reasonable to aim at anything else ; in fact, nature rather than reason fixes this as the end of human action, to which it is reason s function to show the means. Hence if we ask why it is reasonable for any individual to observe the rules of social behaviour that are commonly called moral, the answer is obvious that this is only indirectly reasonable, as a means to his own preservation or pleasure. It is not, however, in this, which is only the old Cyrenaic or Epicurean answer, that the distinctive point of Hobbism lies ; but rather in the doctrine that even this indirect reasonableness of the most fundamental moral rules is entirely conditional on their general observance, which cannot be secured without the intervention of government. E.g., it is not reasonable for me to perform my share of a contract, unless I have ade quate reason for believing that the other party will perform his ; and this adequate reason I cannot have, except in a state of society in which he will be punished for non-per formance. Thus the ordinary rules of social behaviour are only hypothetically obligatory in any society, until they are actualized by the establishment of a strong central authority. On the other hand, Hobbes yields to no one in maintaining the paramount importance of moral regulations. The precepts of good faith, equity, requital of benefits, forgiveness of wrong so far as security allows, the prohibi tion of contumely, pride, arrogance, and other subordinate rules, he still calls &quot;immutableand eternal laws of nature,&quot;- meaning that, though they do not unconditionally bind us to realize them, they always bind to a desire that they should be realized. The pre-social state of man, in his view, is also pre-moral ; but it is therefore utterly miserable. It is a state in which every one has a right to everything that may conduce to his preservation f but it is therefore also a state of war in which every man s hand is against his neighbour s, a state so wretched and perilous that it is the first dictate of rational self-love to emerge from it J He even identifies the desire with the pleasure, apparently regard ing the stir of appetite and that of fruition as two parts of the same &quot; motion.&quot; 2 In spite of Hobbes s uncompromising egoism, there i.i a noticeable discrepancy between his theory of the ends that men naturally seek and his standard for determining their natural rights. This latter is never Pleasure simply, but always Preservation though on occasion he enlarges the notion of &quot; preservation&quot; into &quot; preservation of life so as not to be weary of it.&quot; His view seems to be that in a state of nature most men will fight, rob, &c., &quot; for delectation merely&quot; or &quot;for glory,&quot; and that hence all men must be aPoyrd an indefinite rigbi to fight, rob, &c., &quot;for preservation.&quot; into social peace and order. Hence Hobbes s ideal constitu tion naturally comes to be an unquestioned and unlimited though not necessarily monarchical despotism. Whatever the government declares to be just or unjust must be taken to be so, since to dispute its dictates would be the first step towards anarchy, the one paramount peril outweighing all particular defects in legislation and administration. It is perhaps easy to understand how, in 1651, a peace-loving philosopher, weary of the din of warring sects, should regard the claims of individual conscience as essentially anarchical, and the most threatening danger to social well- being ; but however strong might be men s yearning for order, a view of social duty, in which the only fixed positions were selfishness everywhere and unlimited power somewhere, could not but appear offensively paradoxical. However, offensive or not, there was an originality, a force, an apparent coherence in Hobbism which rendered it undeniably impressive ; in fact, we find that for two genera tions the efforts to construct morality on a philosophical basis take more or less the form of answers to Hobbes. From an ethical point of view Hobbism divides itself naturally into two parts, which are combined by Hobbes s peculiar political doctrines into a coherent whole, but are not otherwise necessarily connected. Its theoretical basis is the principle of egoism, that it is natural and so reason able for each individual to aim solely at his own pre servation or pleasure ; while, for practically determining the particulars of duty it makes morality entirely depen dent on positive law and institution. It is this latter part or aspect of the system which is primarily attacked by the first generation of writers that replied to Hobbes. This attack, or rather the counter-exposition of orthodox doctrine, is conducted on different methods by the Cambridge moralists and by Cumberland respectively. The latter retains the legal view of morality, and endeavours, while showing the actuality of the laws of nature, to systematize them by reducing them to a single principle. The former, regarding morality primarily as a body of truth rather than a code of rules, insist on its absolute character and intuitive certainty. Cudworth was the most distinguished of the little group of thinkers at Cambridge in the 17th century, commonly known as the &quot; Cambridge Platonists,&quot; who, embracing what they conceived to be Platonic principles, but also ( j_ strongly influenced by the new thought of Descartes, en- WO rt!i. deavoured to blend rational theology with religious philo sophy. In his treatise on Eternal and Immutable Morality (which was not published till more than 40 years after his death in 1688), his main aim is to maintain the &quot;essential and eternal distinctions of good and evil &quot; as independent of mere will, whether human or divine. These distinctions, he insists, have an objective reality, cognizable by reason or intellect as much as any physical fact ; and he endeavours to refute Hobbism which he treats as a &quot; novantique philosophy,&quot; a mere revival of the relativism of Protagoras by the following argumeMum ad hominem. He argues that Hobbes s atomic materialism involves the conception of an objective physical world, the object not of sense that varies from man to man, but of the intellect that is the same in all; there is therefore an inconsistency in refusing to admit a similar exercise of intellect in morals, an objec tive world of duty, which the mind by its normal activity clearly apprehends as such. Cudworth, in the work above mentioned, gives no systematic exposition of the ethical principles which he holds to be clearly apprehended. But we may supply this deficiency from the Enchiridion Ethimm of Henry More, another thinker of the same school. More gives a list of 23 &quot; Noomata Moralia,&quot; the truth of which will, he says, be immediately manifest. Some of these are purely egoistic, as (e.g.) that goods differ in quality as The Can bridge moral - More.