If we look more closely at this process called Compassion, which we have shown to be the primary ethical phaenomenon, we remark at once that there are two distinct degrees in which another's suffering may become directly my motive, that is, may urge me to do something, or to leave it undone. The first degree of Compassion is seen when, by counter-acting egoistic and malicious motives, it keeps me from bringing pain on another, and from becoming myself the cause of trouble, which so far does not exist. The other higher degree is manifested, when it works positively, and incites me to active help. The distinction between the so-called duties of law and duties of virtue, better described as justice and loving-kindness, which was effected by Kant in such a forced and artificial manner, here results entirely of itself; whence the correctness of the principle is attested. It is the natural, unmistakable, and sharp separation between negative and positive, between doing no harm, and helping. The terms in common use—namely, "the duties of law," and "the duties of virtue," (the latter being also called "duties of love," or "imperfect duties,") are in the first place faulty because they co-ordinate the genus with the species; for justice is one of the virtues. And next, they owe their origin to the mistake of giving a much too wide extension to the idea "Duty"; which I shall reduce to its proper limits below. In place, therefore, of these duties I put two virtues; the one, justice, and the other, loving-kindness; and I name them cardinal virtues, since from them all others not only in fact proceed, but also may be theoretically derived.... Both have their root in natural Compassion. And this Compassion is an undeniable fact of human consciousness, is an essential part of it, and does not depend on assumptions, conceptions, religions, dogmas, myths, training, and education. On the contrary, it is original and immediate, and lies in human nature itself. It consequently remains unchanged under all circumstances, and reveals itself in every land, and at all times. This is why appeal is everywhere confidently made to it, as to something necessarily present in every man; and it is never an attribute of the "strange gods." [1] As he, who appears to be without compassion, is called inhuman; so "humanity" is often used as its synonyme.
The first degree, then, in which this natural and genuine moral incentive shows itself is only negative. Originally we are all disposed to injustice and violence, because our need, our desire, our anger and hate pass into the consciousness directly, and hence have the Jus primi occupantis. (The right of the first occupant.) Whereas the sufferings of others, caused by our injustice and violence, enter the consciousness indirectly, that is, by the secondary channel of a mental picture, and not till they are understood by experience. Thus Seneca (Ep. 50) says: Ad neminem ante bona mens venit, quam mala. (Good feelings never come before bad ones.) In its first degree, therefore, Compassion opposes and baffles the design to which I am urged by the antimoral forces dwelling within me, and which will bring trouble on a fellow-being. It calls out to me: "Stop!" and encircles the other as with a fence, so as to protect him from the injury which otherwise my egoism or malice would lead me to inflict on him. So arises out of this first degree of compassion the rule: Neminem laede. (Do harm to no one.) This is the fundamental principle of the virtue of justice, and here alone is to be found its origin, pure and simple,—an origin which is truly moral, and free from all extraneous admixture. Otherwise derived, justice would have to rest on Egoism,—a reductio ad absurdum. If my nature is susceptible of Compassion up to this point, then it will avail to keep me back, whenever I should like to use others' pain as a means to obtain my ends; equally, whether this pain be immediate, or an after-consequence, whether it be effected directly, or indirectly, through intermediate links. I shall therefore lay hands on the property as little as on the person of another, and avoid causing him distress, no less mental than bodily. I shall thus not only abstain from doing him physical injury, but also, with equal care I shall guard against inflicting on him the suffering of mind, which mortification and calumny, anxiety and vexation so surely work. The same sense of Compassion will check me from gratifying my desires at the cost of women's happiness for life, or from seducing another man's wife, or from ruining youths morally and physically by tempting them to paederastia. Not that it is at all necessary in each single case that Compassion should be definitely excited; indeed it would often come too late; but rather the rule: Neminem laede, is formed by noble minds out of the knowledge, gained once for all, of the injury which every unjust act necessarily entails upon others, and which is aggravated by the feeling of having to endure wrong through a force majeure. Such natures are led by reflecting reason to carry out this principle with unswerving resolution. They respect the rights of every man, and abstain from all encroachment on them; they keep themselves free from self-reproach, by refusing to be the cause of others' trouble; they do not shift on to shoulders not their own, by force or by trickery, the burdens and sorrows of life, which circumstances bring to every one; they prefer to bear themselves the portions allotted to them, so as not to double those of their neighbours. For although generalising formulae, and abstract knowledge of whatever kind, are not in the least the cause, or the real basis of morality; these are nevertheless indispensable for a moral course of life. They are the cistern or reservoir, in which the habit of mind, that springs from the fount of all morality (a fount not at all moments flowing), may be stored up, thence to be drawn off, as occasion requires. There is thus an analogy between things moral and things physiological; among many instances of which we need only mention that of the gall-bladder, which is used for keeping the secretion of the liver. Without firmly held principles we should inevitably be at the mercy of the antimoral incentives, directly they are roused to activity by external influences; and self-control lies precisely in steadfast adherence and obedience to such principles, despite the motives which oppose them.
In general, the feminine half of humanity is inferior to the masculine in the virtue of justice, and its derivatives, uprightness, conscientiousness, etc.; the explanation is found in the fact that, owing to the weakness of its reasoning powers the former is much less capable than the latter of understanding and holding to general laws, and of taking them as a guiding thread. Hence injustice and falseness are women's besetting sins, and lies their proper element. On the other hand, they surpass men in the virtue of loving-kindness; because usually the stimulus to this is intuitive, and consequently appeals directly to the sense of Compassion, of which females are much more susceptible than males. For the former nothing but what is intuitive, present, and immediately real has a true existence; that which is knowable only by means of concepts, as for instance, the absent, the distant, the past, the future, they do not readily grasp. We thus find compensation here, as in so much else; justice is more the masculine, loving-kindness more the feminine virtue. The mere idea of seeing women sitting on the judges' bench raises a smile; but the sisters of mercy far excel the brothers of charity. Now animals, as they have no power of gaining knowledge by reason, that is, of forming abstract ideas, are entirely incapable of fixed resolutions, to say nothing of principles; they consequently totally lack self-control, and are helplessly given over to external impressions and internal impulses. This is why they have no conscious morality; although the different species show great contrasts of good and evil in their characters, and as regards the highest races these are traceable even in individuals.
From the foregoing considerations we see that in the single acts of the just man Compassion works only indirectly through his formulated principles, and not so much actu as potentiâ; much in the same way as in statics the greater length of one of the scale-beams, owing to its greater power of motion, balances the smaller weight attached to it with the larger on the other side, and works, while at rest, only potentiâ, not actu; yet with the same efficiency.
Nevertheless, Compassion is always ready to pass into active operation. Therefore, whenever, in special cases, the established rule shows signs of breaking down, the one incentive (for we exclude of course those based on Egoism), which is capable of infusing fresh life into it, is that drawn from the fountain-head itself—Compassion. This is true not only where it is a question of personal violence, but also where property is concerned, for instance, when any one feels the desire to keep some valuable object which he has found. In such cases,—if we set aside all motives prompted by worldly wisdom, and by religion—nothing brings a man back so easily to the path of justice, as the realisation of the trouble, the grief, the lamentation of the loser. It is because this is felt to be true, that, when publicity is given to the loss of money, the assurance is so often added that the loser is a poor man, a servant, etc.
It is hoped that these considerations have made it clear that, however contrary appearances may be at first sight, yet undoubtedly justice, as a genuine and voluntary virtue has its origin in Compassion. But if any one should suppose such a soil too barren and meagre to bear this great cardinal virtue, let him reflect on what is said above, and remember how small is the amount of true, spontaneous, unselfish, unfeigned justice among men; how the real thing only occurs as a surprising exception, and how, to its counterfeit,—the justice that rests on mere worldly wisdom and is everywhere published abroad—it is related, both in quality and quantity, as gold is to copper. I should like to call the one δικαιοσύνη πάνδημος (common, ordinary justice), the other οὐρανία (heavenly justice).[2] For the latter is she, who, according to Hesiod,[3] leaves the earth in the iron age, to dwell with the celestial gods. To produce such a rare exotic as this the root we have indicated is surely vigorous enough.
It will now be seen that injustice or wrong always consists in working harm on another. Therefore the conception of wrong is positive, and antecedent to the conception of right, which is negative, and simply denotes the actions performable without injury to others; in other words, without wrong being done. That to this class belongs also whatever is effected with no other object than that of warding off from oneself meditated mischief is an easy inference. For no participation in another's interests, and no sympathy for him, can require me to let myself be harmed by him, that is, to undergo wrong. The theory that right is negative, in contradistinction to wrong as positive, we find supported by Hugo Grotius, the father of philosophical jurisprudence. The definition of justice which he gives at the beginning of his work, De Jure Belli et Pacis (Bk. I., chap. 1., § 3), runs as follows:—Jus hic nihil aliud, quam quod justum est, significant, idque negante magis sensu, quam aiente, ut jus sit, quod injustum non est.[4] The negative character of justice is also established, little as it may appear, even by the familiar formula: "Give to each one his own." Now, there is no need to give a man his own, if he has it. The real meaning is therefore: "Take from none his own." Since the requirements of justice are only negative, they may be effected by coercion; for the Neminem laede can be practised by all alike. The coercive apparatus is the state, whose sole raison d'être is to protect its subjects, individually from each other, and collectively from external foes. It is true that a few German would-be philosophers of this venal age wish to distort the state into an institution for the spread of morality, education, and edifying instruction. But such a view contains, lurking in the background, the Jesuitical aim of doing away with personal freedom and individual development, and of making men mere wheels in a huge Chinese governmental and religious machine. And this is the road that once led to Inquisitions, to Autos-da-fé, and religious wars. Frederick the Great showed that he at least never wished to tread it, when he said: "In my land every one shall care for his own salvation, as he himself thinks best." Nevertheless, we still see everywhere (with the more apparent than real exception of North America) that the state undertakes to provide for the metaphysical needs of its members. The governments appear to have adopted as their guiding principle the tenet of Quintus Curtius: Nulla res efficacius multitudinem regit, quam superstitio: alioquin impotens, saeva, mutabilis; ubi vana religione capta est, melius vatibus, quam ducibus suis paret.[5]
We have seen that "wrong" and "right" are convertible synonymes of "to do harm" and "to refrain from doing it," and that under "right" is included the warding off of injury from oneself. It will be obvious that these conceptions are independent of, and antecedent to, all positive legislation. There is, therefore, a pure ethical right, or natural right, and a pure doctrine of right, detached from all positive statutes. The first principles of this doctrine have no doubt an empirical origin, so far as they arise from the idea of harm done, but per se they rest on the pure understanding, which a priori furnishes ready to hand the axiom: causa causae est causa effectus. (The cause of a cause is the cause of the effect.) Taken in this connection the words mean: if any one desires to injure me, it is not I, but he, that is the cause of whatever I am obliged to do in self-defence; and I can consequently oppose all encroachments on his part, without wronging him. Here we have, so to say, a law of moral repercussion. Thus it comes about that the union of the empirical idea of injury done with the axiom supplied by the pure understanding, gives rise to the fundamental conceptions of wrong and right, which every one grasps a priori, and learns by actual trial to immediately adopt. The empiric, who denies this, and refuses to accept anything but the verdict of experience, may be referred to the testimony of the savage races, who all distinguish between wrong and right quite correctly, often indeed with nice precision; as is strikingly manifested when they are engaged in bartering and other transactions with Europeans, or visit their ships. They are bold and self-assured, when they are in the right; but uneasy, when they know they are wrong. In disputes a just settlement satisfies them, whereas unjust procedure drives them to war. The Doctrine of Eight is a branch of Ethics, whose function is to determine those actions which may not be performed, unless one wishes to injure others, that is, to be guilty of wrong-doing; and here the active part played is kept in view. But legislation applies this chapter of moral science conversely, that is, with reference to the passive side of the question, and declares that the same actions need not be endured, since no one ought to have wrong inflicted on him. To frustrate such conduct the state constructs the complete edifice of the law, as positive Right. Its intention is that no one shall suffer wrong; the intention of the Doctrine of Moral Right is that no one shall do wrong.[6]
If by unjust action I molest some one, whether in his person, his freedom, his property, or his honour, the wrong as regards quality remains the same. But with respect to quantity it may vary very much. This difference in the amount of wrong effected appears not to have been as yet investigated by moralists, although it is everywhere recognised in real life, because the censure passed is always proportional to the harm inflicted. So also with just actions, the right done is constant in quality, but not in quantity. To explain this better: he, who when dying of starvation steals a loaf, commits a wrong; but how small is this wrong in comparison with the act of an opulent proprietor, who, in whatever way, despoils a poor man of his last penny! Again: the rich person who pays his hired labourer, acts justly; but how insignificant is this piece of justice when contrasted with that of a penniless toiler, who voluntarily returns to its wealthy owner a purse of gold which he has found! The measure, however, of this striking difference in the quantity of justice, and injustice (the quality being always constant), is not direct and absolute, as on a graduated scale; it is indirect and relative, like the ratio of sines and tangents. I give therefore the following definition: the amount of injustice in my conduct varies as the amount of evil, which I thereby bring on another, divided by the amount of advantage, which I myself gain; and the amount of justice in my conduct varies as the amount of advantage, which injury done to another brings me, divided by the amount of harm which he thereby suffers.