Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 07.djvu/274

* ETHICS. 242 ETHICS. but this is due to the fact that the thing de- fined is. as we have seen, very complex in char- acter. The definition will rim somewhat as fol- lows: Moral conduct is the voluntary action of a self-conscious person, in so far as that action is amenable to a standard of obligation imposed on him by social influences or by a supreme plan of life that draws its materials from society. In moral conduct the plan of life is always first adopt- ed by the agent from the community in which he is reared, whether family, clan, tribe, or religious organization; but it may afterwards be more or less modified by his intelligence, emotions, and per- sonal experience. Let it. be remarked, by the way, that apart from the use of the word moral as an epithet applicable to all phenomena thus defined, it is also frequently used to denote those actions that conform to the obligation mentioned in the definition. In the former sense the antonym of 'moral' is 'non-moral' ; in the latter it is 'im- moral.' We are now able to understand how the conduct of moral idiots, i.e. beings without any com- munity of obligation with other men, stands re- lated to morality. These persons seem never to have adopted from their social environment a supreme plan of life. This failure is largely due to defect of instincts. They never seem to care for the valuation set by society upon different human ends. They seem to choose from the out- set selfish ends. They seem, in a word, to be non-moral rather than moral. And this exemp- tion from morality is not due to lack of intelli- gence, but to abnormality in emotional endow- ment; and in many cases there seems to be no remedy at hand. But there are other persons to whom the above description does not apply, and yet who, on superficial examination, appear to be moral imbeciles. These persons have adopted a supreme plan of life from their social environ- ment. But the environment may be exceptional; that is. it may widely diverge from the general character of other social environments of the same time and in the same region. These moral agents are insensible to the ordinary moral ideas of the time, because these ideas are incompatible with ideas they have long held. Perhaps the in- sensibility has become chronic; perhaps it is still remediable. Only experiment can determine. These persons are not moral idiots, that is, not non-moral. They are moral unfortunates; they may not even be seriously immoral in the sense of coming far short of meeting such moral obliga- tions as they have come to recognize. Still other persons have begun life with the normal ideals, but for one reason or another they have not lived up to these ideals, and have gone so far as In give up the ideals entirely. All these differ- ences must be taken into consideration when one is asking whether a particular departure from ordinarily recognized morality means immorality or non-morality. It is immorality only when the mural obligation, practically ignored, is still rec- ognized as binding. Bui this leads to other questions. Of two dif- ferent moral standards, can one be said to be more moral than tl ther? Is there a standard (or testing the relative excellence of actual moral standards? Is the morality that is subject to evaluation by comparison with a morality which oughl to be? ii so, what is this standard ? How is it ascertained? What imposes it as a standard d actual morality? These questions have often been thought to be absolutely unanswerable by any science of ethics, for it has been said that science describes but does not prescribe; that a science of ethics, in the sense of a systematic pres- entation of actual moral judgments, can indeed be constructed, but not a science which shall criticise actual morality and suggest improve- ments. Such a statement as to the limitations of science is inadequate. It is perfectly true that no science directly prescribes. The science of ge- ometry does not prescribe surveying, nor does the science of electricity prescribe electric lighting. What a science can do is to describe the con- ditions, which must be met before a given aim can be attained; and among several means to the attainment of an end, it can point out that which involves the least effort or that which is the best under given circumstances. Every so-called practical science is a more or less systematic knowledge of the conditions which must be met before a certain result can be obtained; but it cannot be accurately said to prescribe the result. The result is prescribed by some need and the means to its attainment described by the science. Now ethics is a practical science. It makes no absolute prescriptions. All it does is to study the facts of the moral life, and as a result it may be more or less able to describe the conditions that must be fulfilled before what it discovers to be the end of the moral life can be realized. This study does reveal many imperfections in ac- tual morality, but these imperfections which we now have to mend are imperfections of means and not of ultimate end. This discussion will enable us to answer the questions placed at the begin- ning of the paragraph. Of two moral standards, in. the sense of moral rules prescribed for the at- tainment of a certain moral end, one may be more moral than another, in the sense of being better adapted to attain the moral end. The standard by which two such differing moral standards may be tested is that of conduciveness to the moral end. The existing morality, in so far as it consists of such rules, may easily be defective, and a more adequate knowledge of all the pertinent facts may result in the discovery of a morality that ought to replace the actual mo- rality. This discovery is the business of science; the acceptance of the obligation to forsake ac- tually observed rules and to adopt the newly dis- covered rules of action is the work of the moral agent as a person with a supreme plan reasonably pursued. Thus it appears that while ethics is concerned with the morality that is, it may also discover conditions formerly unknown: and this discovery may react on the morality that is. mak- ing it more like what it ought to be: i.e., it may make moral action more commensurate with the moral end. Scientific ethics might conceivably do even more. In case it were discovered that actual mo- rality had no single ultimate end consciously U rived at, but different ends set up in different communities and at different times, it. might also discover how it came about that there was tints a multiplicity of ends: and it might even dis- cover that there was a way of harmonizing these various ends. It might he able to describe an end which, if realized, would include the realization of all, or of the larger number, of these historical ends. Bui here again a science could not as a eience prescribe this inclusive end. Unless the end. as inclusive, appealed to men, ethics could