Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 9.djvu/212

198 number of other duties. We do call chastity and temperance and justice virtues, although we regard it as obligatory on a man to be chaste, temperate, just. We also call hospitality, generosity and charity virtues in cases where they go beyond the strict limits of duty. "The relation of virtue and duty is complicated," says Prof. Alexander. "In its common use each term seems to include something excluded from the other," observes Prof. Sidgwick. But, indeed, the relation is not complicated, for there is no other intrinsic relation between them than their common antagonism to "wrong". That something is a duty implies that its non-performance tends to evoke moral indignation, that it is a virtue implies that it tends to evoke moral approval. That the virtues actually cover a comparatively large field of the province of duty is simply owing to their being dispositions of mind. We may praise the habits of justice and gratitude even though we find nothing praiseworthy in an isolated just or grateful act.

There has been no less confusion with regard to the relation between duty and merit. Like the notions of "good" and "virtue," the "meritorious" derives its origin from the emotion of moral approval, but while the former merely express a tendency to give rise to such an emotion, "meritorious" involves that the object to which it refers merits praise, that it has a just claim to praise, or, in other words, that it ought to be recognised as good. This makes the term "meritorious" more emphatic than the term "good." but at the same time it narrows its province in a peculiar way. Just as the expression that something ought to be done implies the idea of its not being done, so the word "meritorious" suggests the idea of a goodness which is not duly recognised. And as it is meaningless to speak of duty in a case where the opposite mode of conduct is entirely out of question, so it would be an absurdity to attribute merit to somebody for an act the goodness of which is universally admitted. Thus "meritorious" involves a restriction. It would be almost blasphemous to call the acts of a God conceived to be infinitely good meritorious, since it would suggest a limitation of his goodness.

The emphatic claim to praiseworthiness made by the "meritorious" has rendered it objectionable to a great number of moralists. It has been identified with the super-obligatory—a conception which is to many an abomination. From what has been said above, however,