There are three successive states of morality answering to the three principal stages of human life; the personal, the domestic, and the social stage. The succession represents the gradual training of the sympathetic principle; it is drawn out step by step by a series of affections which, as it diminishes in intensity, increases in dignity. This series forms our best resource in attempting as far as possible to reach the normal state; subordination of self-love to social feeling. These are the two extremes in the scale of human affections; but between them there is an intermediate degree, namely, domestic attachment, and it is on this that the solution of the great moral problem depends. The love of his family leads Man out of his original state of Self-love and enables him to attain finally a sufficient measure of Social love. Every attempt on the part of the moral educator to call this last into immediate action, regardless of the intermediate stage, is to be condemned as utterly chimerical and profoundly injurious. Such attempts are regarded in the present day with far too favourable an eye. Far from being a sign of social progress, they would, if successful, be an immense step backwards; since the feeling which inspires them is one of perverted admiration for antiquity.
Since the importance of domestic life is so great as a transition from selfish to social feeling, a systematic view of its relations will be the best mode of explaining the spirit of Positive morality, which is in every respect based upon the order found in nature.
The first germ of social feeling is seen in the affection of the child for its parents. Filial love is the starting-point of our moral education: from it springs the instinct of Continuity, and consequently of reverence for our ancestors. It is the first tie by which the new being feels himself bound to the whole past history of Man. Brotherly love comes next, implanting the instinct of Solidarity, that is to say of union with our contemporaries; and thus we have already a sort of outline of social existence. With maturity new phases of feeling are developed. Relationships are formed of an entirely voluntary nature; which have therefore a still more social character than the involuntary ties of earlier years. This second stage in moral education begins with conjugal affection, the most important of all, in which perfect fullness of devotion is secured by the reciprocity and indissolubility of the bond. It is the highest type of all sympathetic instincts, and has appropriated to itself in a special sense the name of Love. From this most perfect of unions proceeds the last in the series of domestic sympathies, parental love. It completes the training by which Nature prepares us for universal sympathy: for it teaches us to care for our successors; and thus it binds us to the Future, as filial love had bound us to the Past.
I placed the voluntary class of domestic sympathies after the involuntary, because it was the natural order of individual development, and it thus bore out my statement of the necessity of family life as an intermediate stage between personal and social life. But in treating more directly of the theory of the Family as the constituent element of the body politic, the inverse order should be followed. In that case conjugal attachment would come first, as being the feeling through which the family comes into existence as a new social unit, which in many cases consists simply of the original pair. Domestic sympathy, when once formed by marriage, is perpetuated first by parental then by filial affection; it may afterwards be developed by the tie of brotherhood, the only relation by which different families can be brought into direct contact. The order followed here is that of decrease in intensity, and increase in extension. The feeling of fraternity, which I place last, because it is usually least powerful, will be seen to be of primary importance when regarded as the transition from domestic to social affections; it is, indeed, the natural type to which all social sympathies conform. But there is yet another intermediate relation, without which this brief exposition of the theory of the family would be incomplete; I mean the relation of household servitude, which may be called indifferently domestic or social. It is a relation which at the present time is not properly appreciated on account of our dislike to all subjection; and yet the word domestic is enough to remind us that in every normal state of Humanity, it supplies what would otherwise be a want in household relations. Its value lies in completing the education of the social instinct, by a special apprenticeship in obedience and command, both being subordinated to the universal principle of mutual sympathy.
The object of the preceding remarks was to show the efficacy of the Positive method in moral questions by applying it to the most important of all moral theories, the theory of the Family. For more detailed proof, I must refer to my treatise on Positive Polity, to which this work is introductory. I would call attention, however, to the beneficial influence of Positivism on personal morality. Actions which hitherto had always been referred even by Catholic philosophers to personal interests, are now brought under the great principle of Love on which the whole Positive doctrine is based.
Personal virtues placed upon a social basis
Feelings are only to be developed by constant exercise; and exercise is most necessary when the intrinsic energy of the feeling is least. It is therefore quite contrary to the true spirit of moral education to degrade duty in questions of personal morality to a mere calculation of self-interest. Of course, in this elementary part of Ethics, it is easier to estimate the consequences of actions, and to show the personal utility of the rules enjoined. But this method of procedure inevitably stimulates the self-regarding propensities, which are already too preponderant, and the exercise of which ought as far as possible to be discouraged. Besides, it often results in practical failure. To leave the decision of such questions to the judgment of the individual, is to give a formal sanction to all the natural difference in men’s inclinations. When the only motive urged is consideration for personal consequences, every one feels himself to be the best judge of these, and modifies the rule at his pleasure. Positivism, guided by a truer estimate of the facts, entirely remodels this elementary part of Ethics. Its appeal is to social feeling, and not to personal, since the actions in question are of a kind in which the individual is far from being the only person interested. For example, such virtues as temperance and chastity are inculcated by the Positivist on other grounds than those of their personal advantages. He will not of course be blind to their individual value; but this is an aspect on which he will not dwell too much, for fear of concentrating attention on self-interest. At all events, he will never make it the basis of his precepts, but will invariably rest them upon their social value. There are cases in which men are preserved by an unusually strong constitution from the injurious effects of intemperance or libertinage; but such men are bound to sobriety and continence as vigorously as the rest, because without these virtues they cannot perform their social duties rightly. Even in the commonest of personal virtues, cleanliness, this alteration in the point of view may be made with advantage. A simple sanitary regulation is thus ennobled by knowing that the object of it is to make each one of us more fit for the service of others. In this way and in no other, can moral education assume its true character at the very outset. We shall become habituated to the feeling of subordination to Humanity, even in our smallest actions. It is in these that we should be trained to gain the mastery over the lower propensities; and the more so that, in these simple cases, it is less difficult to appreciate their consequences.
The influence of Positivism on personal morality is in itself a proof of its superiority to other systems. Its superiority in domestic morality we have already seen, and yet this was the best aspect of Catholicism, forming indeed the principal basis of its admirable moral code. On social morality strictly so called, I need not dwell at length. Here the value of the new philosophy will be more direct and obvious, the fact of its standing at the social point of view being the very feature which distinguishes it from all other systems. In defining the mutual duties arising from the various relations of life, or again in giving solidity and extension to the instinct of our common fraternity, neither theological nor metaphysical morality can bear comparison with Positivism. Its precepts are adapted without difficulty to the special requirements of each case, because they are ever in harmony with the general laws of society and of human nature. But on these obvious characteristics of Positivism I need not further enlarge, as I shall have other occasions for referring to them.
After this brief exposition of Positive morality I must allude with equal brevity to the means by which it will be established and applied. These are of two kinds. The first lay down the foundations of moral training for each individual: they furnish principles, and they regulate feelings. The second carry out the work begun, and ensure the application of the principles inculcated to practical life. Both these functions are in the first instance performed spontaneously, under the influence of the doctrine and of the sympathies evoked by it. But for their adequate performance a spiritual power specially devoted to the purpose is necessary.
Moral education consists partly of scientific demonstration of ethical truth, but still more of culture of the highest sympathies