Page:Philosophical Review Volume 11.djvu/636

620 mind whatever—that is to say, of mind objective as well as of mind subjective (to use the Hegelian terms); and this, it need hardly be said, is not the usual meaning of the term. Professor Ladd refers to the psychological elements in Aristotle's ethics, but (not to mention the wider scope of Aristotle's psychology) we are expressly warned by Aristotle himself that the kind of exactness appropriate in psychology would be out of place in ethics.

It is in regard to the other two divisions of the scheme, however, that a more serious difficulty may be felt. According to Professor Ladd, the second division (that entitled "The Virtuous Life") is mainly historical, while the third, in which the discussion of ethical theories is included, is regarded as metaphysical. In place of 'historical,' the term 'descriptive' would have been more appropriate; for no part of the work can strictly be said to be 'historical' or to use 'the historical method,' in the current meaning of these terms, though of course historical comparisons are frequent. What Professor Ladd actually gives us here is a description of the various types of virtue which he regards as going to make up the moral ideal of the present day. And the difficulty which, I think, will be apt to be felt is, that the separation between the description of the virtuous life and the discussion of the ethical theories is neither advisable in itself nor consistently carried out. The result, in fact, seems to be that, on the one hand, the description of the virtuous life is really influenced by Professor Ladd's private ethical theory—it could not be pretended, I think, that the description is 'objective' in the sense in which Sidgwick's account of common sense morality is so—while, on the other hand, the discussion of ethical theories is defective, for the previous account of the virtuous life is assumed to be theoretically valid, and the theories of which Professor Ladd disapproves are rejected as inadequate interpretations of this true morality.

I will now deal briefly with some of the particular topics in their order. The most interesting and instructive chapter in the psychological division of the work is, I think, that in which Professor Ladd gives an account of what he calls "the feeling of obligation. This expression, 'feeling of obligation,' is hardly, perhaps, the best designation for the "ought-consciousness," and may give rise to misunderstanding, especially as Professor Ladd seems to distinguish the 'feeling of obligation' from "the judgment, I ought not to do this or I ought to do that," which the feeling is said (p. 73) to accompany, and also speaks of the feeling as an "emotional disturbance." Elsewhere he speaks of "the emotional excitement out of which emerges the consciousness