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 THE LOGIC OF CLASSIFICATION. 249 quently not rewarded and vice is frequently unpunished here, before we can reach the conclusion that there is a hereafter for us, when wrongs shall be righted and justice shall be done. What now of Ethics and Beligion? Obviously, if the metaphysical implications above enumerated be accepted, Ethics must be regarded as the foundation of Eeligion, rather than Keligion as the foundation of Ethics. Moral concep- tions are prior, in order of thought, to religious conceptions ; and without the first the second could not be understood. "We may quite well draw out an ethical system without any reference to religion ; but we cannot draw out a religious system without distinct reference to, without presupposing or embodying, ethical notions. Not only are men's ideas of the Deity and of His righteousness relative to the moral consciousness (hence the diversity in theistic beliefs among people of different ages and of different countries), but the very possibility of the Deity's holding intercourse with man at all is the moral consciousness. For, suppose a Divine revelation made : how is it to be known by us ? how can its truth be tested ? Clearly, by its moral bearings, or else not at all. To urge its acceptance, in the first instance, on the plea that it comes from the Deity, is a manifest hysteron proteron. We must reverse the method and judge whether it is likely to have come from the Deity by the kind of revelation that it is. Again, both Political Economy -and Education have a relation to Ethics. The leading principle of Political Economy is indeed the dominance in man of self-interest. It supposes that the unit of society is always a person disposed to buy in the cheapest market and to sell in the dearest. But although this is its leading principle, and that on which the science is founded, it cannot altogether ignore the fact that man has generous, self-sacrificing and benevolent impulses in him : and, in whatever extent it recognises this, to that extent it accepts the ethical position. But the case is stronger for Education. There are con- siderable moral bearings here. It is the object of the teacher to form the pupil's character as well as to train his mind ; and, for this purpose, he needs himself to know the power of the various moral motives, and needs to exercise great care in the application of them. Ethical considerations must also weigh with the writers and compilers of school- books. Lessons bearing on truthfulness, industry, manli- ness of character, chivalry, independence, and so forth, must be chosen ; such as would encourage the corresponding vices,