The chief classes of ethical ideas of Herbart are briefly explained as follows:
1. Good will. It is manifested in the sympathy we feel for the sorrow or joy of another person. It is illustrated by the example of Sidney and Howard already cited.
2. Legal right. It serves to avoid strife by some agreement or established rule; e.g., the government of the United States fixes the law for pre-empting land and for homestead claims so that no two persons can lay claim to the same piece of land.
3. Justice, as expressed by reward or punishment. When a person purposely does an injury to another, all men unite in the judgment, "He must be punished." Likewise, if a kind act is done to anyone, we insist upon a return of gratitude at least.
4. Perfection of will. This implies that the will is strong enough to resist all opposition. David's will to go out and meet Goliath was perfect. A boy desires to get his lesson, but indolence and the love of play are too strong for his will. There is nothing which goes so far to make up the character of the hero as strength of will which yields to no difficulties.
5. Inner freedom. This is the obedience of the will to its highest moral incentive. It is ability to set the will free from all selfish or wrong desires and to yield implicit obedience to moral ideas. This of course depends upon the cultivation of the other ideas and their proper subordination, one to another.
The five moral ideas just given indicate the lines along which strength of moral character is shown. They are of some interest to the teacher as a systematic arrangement of morals, but they are of no direct value in teaching. They are the most abstract and general classes of moral ideas and are of no interest whatever to children.
In morals the only thing that interests children is moral action. Whether it be in actual life or in a story or history, the child is aroused by a deed of kindness or courage. But all talk of kindness or goodness in general, disconnected from particular persons and actions, is dry and uninteresting. This gives us the key to the child's mind in morals. Not moralizing, not preaching, not lecturing, not reproof, can ever be the original source of moral ideas with the young, but the actions of people they see, and of those about whom they read or hear. Moral judgments and feelings spring up originally only in connection with human action in the concrete. If we propose then to adapt moral teaching to youthful minds, we must make use of concrete materials, observations of people taken from what the children have seen, stories and biographies of historical characters. A story of a man's life is interesting because it brings out his particular motives and actions. This is the field in which instruction has its conquests to make over youthful minds.
We will gather up the fruits of our discussion in the preceding chapters. Having fixed the chief aim in the effort to influence and strengthen moral character, we find concentration to be the central principle in which all others unite. It is the focusing of life and school experiences in the unity of the personality. The worth and choice of studies is determined by this. Interest unites knowledge, feeling, and will. The culture epochs supply the nucleus of materials for moral-educative purposes. Apperception assimilates new ideas by bringing each into the bond of its kindred and friends, spinning threads of connection in every direction. The inductive process collects, classifies, and organizes knowledge, everywhere tending toward unity.