[Footnote 18: Locke examines the Innate Principles put forth, by Lord Herbert in his book De Veritate, 1st, There is a supreme governor of the world; 2nd, Worship is due to him; 3rd, Virtue, joined with Piety, is the best Worship; 4th, Men must repent of their sins; 5th, There will be a future life of rewards and punishments. Locke admits these to be such truths as a rational creature, after due explanation given them, can hardly avoid attending to; but he will not allow them to be innate. For, First, There are other propositions with, as good a claim as these to be of the number imprinted by nature on the mind.
Secondly, The marks assigned are not found in all the propositions.
Many men, and even whole nations, disbelieve some of them.
Then, as to the third principle,—virtue, joined with piety, is the best worship of God; he cannot see how it can be innate, seeing that it contains a name, virtue, of the greatest possible uncertainty of meaning. For, if virtue be taken, as commonly it is, to denote the actions accounted laudable in particular countries, then the proposition will be untrue. Or, if it is taken to mean accordance with God's will, it will then be true, but unmeaning; that God will be pleased with what he commands is an identical assertion, of no use to any one.
So the fourth proposition,—men must repent of their sins,—is open to the same remark. It is not possible that God should engrave on men's minds principles couched on such uncertain words as Virtue and Sin. Nay more, as a general word is nothing in itself, but only report as to particular facts, the knowledge of rules is a knowledge of a sufficient number of actions to determine the rule. [Innate principles are not compatible with Nominalism.]
According to Lord Herbert, the standard of virtue is the common notions in which, all men agree. They are such, as the following,—to avoid evil, to be temperate, in doubtful cases to choose the safer course, not to do to others what you would not wish done to yourself, to be grateful to benefactors, &c. Conscience is what teaches us to carry out those principles in practice. It excites joy over good actions, and produces abhorrence and repentance for bad. Upon it, our repentance of mind and eternal welfare depend. (For an account of Lord Herbert's common notions, see Appendix B., Lord Herbert of Cherbury.)]
[Footnote 19: In this respect, Butler differs from both Shaftesbury and Hutcheson. With Shaftesbury, the main function of the moral sense is to smile approval on benevolent affections, by which an additional pleasure is thrown into the scale against the selfish affections. The superiority of the 'natural affections' thus depends on a double pleasure, their intrinsically pleasureable character, and the superadded pleasure of reflection. The tendency of Shaftesbury is here to make benevolence and virtue identical, and at the same time to impair the disinterested character of benevolence.]
[Footnote 20: With this view, we may compare the psychology of Shaftesbury, set forth in his 'Characteristics of Men, Manners, and Times.' The soul has two kinds of affections—(1) Self-affection, leading to the 'good of the private,' such as love of life, revenge, pleasure or aptitude towards nourishment and the means of generation, emulation or love of praise, indolence; and (2) Natural affections, leading to the good of the public. The natural or spontaneous predominance of benevolence is goodness; the subjection of the selfish by effort and training is virtue. Virtue consists generally in the proper exercise of the several affections.]
[Footnote 21: Butler's definition of conscience, and his whole treatment of it, have created a great puzzle of classification, as to whether he is to be placed along with the upholders of a 'moral sense.' Shaftesbury is more explicit:
'No sooner does the eye open upon figures, the ear to sounds, than straight the Beautiful results, and grace and harmony are known and acknowledged. No sooner are actions viewed, no sooner the human affections discerned (and they are, most of them, as soon discerned as felt), than straight an inward eye distinguishes the fair and shapely, the amiable and admirable, apart from the deformed, the foul, the odious, or the despicable' 'In a creature capable of forming general notions of things, not only the outward beings which offer themselves to the sense, are the objects of the affections, but the very actions themselves, and the affections of pity, kindness, and gratitude, and their contraries, being brought into the mind by reflection, become objects. So that, by means of this reflected sense, there arises another kind of affection towards these affections themselves, which have been already felt, and are now become the subject of a new liking or dislike.' What this 'moral sense' approves is benevolence, and when its approval has been acted upon, by subjecting the selfish affections, 'virtue' is attained.]
[Footnote 22: It is instructive to compare Mandeville's a priori guesses with, the results of Mr. Maine's historical investigation into the condition of early societies. The evidence shows that society originated in the family system. Mandeville conjectured that solitary families would never attain to government; but Mr. Maine considers that there was a complete despotic government in single families. 'They have neither assemblies for consultation nor themistes, but every one exercises jurisdiction over his wives and children, and they pay no regard to one another.' The next stage is the rise of gentes and tribes, which took place probably when a family held together instead of separating on the death of the patriarch. The features of this state were chieftainship and themistes, that is, government not by laws, but by ex post facto decisions upon cases as they arose. This gradually developed into customary law, which was in its turn superseded, on the invention of writing, by written codes. Maine's Ancient Law, Chap. V.]