After the subject of morals has been studied in the detail, it has, indeed, been found practicable to comprise the whole, by a kind of generalization, in one comprehensive recognition of regard to our fellows. But, in the first place, this is far from a primitive or an intuitive suggestion of the mind. It came at a late stage of human history, and is even regarded as a part of Revelation. In the second place, this high generality must be accompanied with detailed applications to particular cases and circumstances. Life is full of conflicting demands, and there must be special rules to adjust these various demands. We have to be told that country is greater than family; that temporary interests are to succumb to more enduring, and so on.
Supposing the Love of our Neighbour to unfold in detail, as it expresses in sum, the whole of morality, this is only another name for our Sympathetic, Benevolent, or Disinterested regards, into which therefore Conscience would be resolved, as it was by Hume.
But Morals is properly considered as a wide-ranging science, having a variety of heads full of difficulty, and demanding minute consideration. The subject of Justice, has nothing simple but the abstract statement—giving each one their due; before that can be applied, we must ascertain what is each person's due, which introduces complex questions of relative merit, far transcending the sphere of intuition.
If any part of Morals had the simplicity of an instinct, it would be regard to Truth. The difference between truth and falsehood might almost be regarded as a primitive susceptibility, like the difference between light and dark, between resistance and non-resistance. That each person should say what is, instead of what is not, may well seem a primitive and natural impulse. In circumstances of perfect indifference, this would be the obvious and usual course of conduct; being, like the straight line, the shortest distance between two points. Let a motive arise, however, in favour of the lie, and there is nothing to insure the truth. Reference must be made to other parts of the mind, from which counter-motives may be furnished; and the intuition in favour of Truth, not being able to support itself, has to repose on the general foundation of all virtue, the instituted recognition of the claims of others.
8. Fourthly, Intuition is incapable of settling the debated questions of Practical Morality.
If we recall some of the great questions of practical life that have divided the opinions of mankind, we shall find that mere Intuition is helpless to decide them.
The toleration of heretical opinions has been a greatly contested point. Our feelings are arrayed on both sides; and there is no prompting of nature to arbitrate between the opposing impulses. If the advance of civilization has tended to liberty, it has been owing partly to greater enlightenment, and partly to the successful struggles of dissent in the war with established opinion.
The questions relating to marriage are wholly undecideable by intuition. The natural impulses are for unlimited co-habitation. The degree of restraint to be put upon this tendency is not indicated by any sentiment that can be discovered in the mind. The case is very peculiar. In thefts and murder, the immediate consequences are injury to some one; in sexual indulgence, the immediate result is agreeable to all concerned. The evils are traceable only in remote consequences, which intuition can know nothing of. It is not to be wondered, therefore, that nations, even highly civilized, have differed widely in their marriage institutions; agreeing only in the propriety of adopting and enforcing some regulations. So essentially has this matter been bound up with the moral code of every society, that a proposed criterion of morality unable to grapple with it, would be discarded as worthless. Yet there is no intuitive sentiment that can be of any avail in the question of marriage with a deceased wife's sister.
9. Fifthly, It is practicable to analyze or resolve the Moral Faculty; and, in so doing, to explain, both its peculiar property, and the similarity of moral judgments so far as existing among men.
We begin, by estimating the operation of (1) Prudence. (2) Sympathy, and (3) the Emotions generally.