Page:Philosophical Review Volume 13.djvu/662

648 that its failings, pronounced as we shall find them, are not the transparent errors with which it is commonly charged; and, more than this, that such correction as it needs it can obtain from within, by the development of its own plain implications. A subjectivism thus criticized and developed v/ill be found to contain all the theoretical and practical objectivity that the eclectic believes must be imported into it; all the emphasis upon the wisdom-element in virtue that the intellectualist can desire; and, I hope, all the sanctity of moral values that the spirit of piety requires. Whether, when all is said and done, the developed theory deserves to retain the name of its simpler form is a question not worth discussion here.

The fundamental weakness of the cruder subjectivism lies in the fact that it treats conduct atomistically,—breaks up the course of a man's life into a series of absolutely independent volitions, of each of which in its isolation the dictum runs, that if meant well it is well. Now this is neither true to fact nor true to the inner spirit of subjectivism itself; for if such a theory means anything, it means that the act is judged as the expression of a subject, a character; and the character thus expressed, the intellectual and emotional constitution of the agent, is itself the issue of previous conduct. We might perhaps add that ethical subjectivism is atomistic in its view of society, that each man appears to move in the light of an eternally separate and self-sufficient conscience. The opinion has, however, already been expressed, that this defect, where it exists, is quite superficial; and that subjective ethics may without violence be combined with modern theories of the social genesis and inheritance of ethical norms.

The moral judgment has for its objects volitions, actual or ideal. Although thus restricted in its field, it does not at the same time exclusively possess this, even as against other judgments of worth. The same conduct which is good or bad may likewise be beautiful, sublime, tragical, or ridiculous,—attributes proper to various phases of aesthetic appreciation. There is, in fact, no good or evil which may not to a properly receptive