Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/521

Rh out of the sensational psychology is that which is now to engage our attention.

19. By ethics are meant generally those principles and practical rules of conduct which move and guide us in the pursuit of that which we esteem to be right and good, and in the avoidance of that which we esteem to be wrong and evil. Now to a mere sensational creature (and such the sensational psychology represents man to be), what alone can be esteemed good and right? Obviously nothing, except its own sensational pleasure. And what alone to such a being can be esteemed evil and wrong? Obviously nothing, except its own sensational pain. The sole end of its existence, the sole rule and principle of its conduct, must therefore be the attainment of sensual enjoyment, and the avoidance of sensual suffering; for pleasure naturally allures, and pain naturally repels the whole animated creation, and here there is no principle to counteract in any degree the allurement and the repulsion. Here the only duty, the only obligation, is to enjoy. Here sensational happiness is equivalent to an approving conscience, while a disapproving conscience is identical with sensational misery. And here, too, our own pleasures and pains must be pursued and shunned by each of us in total disregard of the claims and feelings of our fellow-men. These necessarily go for nothing, for, as I have shown you, our sensations (and we are supposed to have nothing but sensations), our sensations can give us