Page:What I believe - Russell (1925).pdf/41

THE GOOD LIFE is not done; there are certain traditional rules according to which ap- _ proval and disapproval are meted out quite regardless of consequences. But this is a topic with which we shall deal in the next chapter.

The superfluity of theoretical ethics is obvious in simple cases. Suppose, for instance, that your child is ill. Love makes you wish to cure it, and science tells you how to do so. There is not an intermediate stage of ethical theory, where it is demonstrated that your child had better be cured. Your act springs directly from desire for an end, together with knowledge of means. This is equally true of all acts, whether good or bad. The ends differ, and the knowledge is more adequate in some cases than in others. But there is no conceivable way of making people do things they do not wish to do. What is possible is to