A Review of the Systems of Ethics Founded on the Theory of Evolution

by Cora May Williams

The course of our reasoning does not pretend to predict an absolute social equilibrium, which must include the immortality of man on the earth, together with the prevention of every accident and of every disappointment whatsoever. A word has already been said as to the probable necessity of the death of the individual; and with death are given also disease and age and their attendant mental evils. We may suppose, however, under an increased healthfulness of general conditions, an increase of vitality which shall make death, in an ever greater proportion of cases, rather the issue of a gradual failure of the powers than the result of violent illness. That the tendency is in this direction is demonstrated by the gradual increase of the length of life. A high degree of mental, moral, and physical harmony in human society is no more "wonderful" or inconceivable than the high degree of harmony already attained in the movements of our own solar system. On the one hand, social progress means the attainment of results which call less and less for reform; and, on the other hand, we are accustoming ourselves to social change; reforms, the like of which would once have convulsed the world are now accomplished with little inconvenience, and we are able to go forward with a rapidity of which no former age was capable.

We may look at social development from still another point of view, as a process by which the preservation of the individual gradually becomes coördinate with the preservation and welfare of the species. Darwin surmises that the work of the benevolent or intellectually great man for his people may be as important for its welfare and the determination of its conquest in the struggle for existence as is the propagation of offspring. As social organization progresses, and the relations of men become more intimate and complex, all the acts of the individual grow to be of greater and greater significance for his kind, while, reciprocally, the health and happiness of the individual increase in importance for his kind. And thus, from both sides, virtue and health, virtue and happiness, also tend towards coincidence in the individual life, and environment comes more and more to favor the virtuous. Sympathy, which is for the general good in many relations, increases in strength as inward characteristic and acts with more and more certainty and universality, so that the society which has been merciful and helpful in a degree towards many individuals comes to show mercy and helpfulness in a greater degree, and with more uniformity, towards more and more individuals; while, at the same time, the welfare and the happiness of the individual become more and more coördinate with the welfare of society as a whole, and the latter is accordingly more universally sought. This does not necessarily mean that it is sought from motives of self-interest; on the contrary, as society progresses, the individual is more and more moulded to such harmony with its needs that he finds his happiness in seeking its welfare.

The earlier punishments of offenders were extreme and cruel; the majority, in endeavoring to protect itself, had little regard for the individual, as the individual also had little regard for the welfare of the majority. With social progress, however, the majority become more humane even towards their enemy, the criminal. The checks which the fear of extreme physical punishment alone could impose at an earlier period are gradually succeeded by the checks furnished in the approval and disapproval of society as a whole, and of those to whom the individual is bound by ties of affection and of respect. That is, in the sympathetic feelings themselves a dependence on others is developed which acts as an effectual preventive and stimulus, and must become more and more effectual as society advances and the range of sympathy widens. This increasingly altruistic form of even the checks to evil is taken no account of by the pessimist. As the necessity for severity decreases, severity even in social disapproval must lessen; as the individual comes to yield more readily and promptly to a slight spur, extremer methods will be discarded. Thus fear will be, by degrees, replaced by hope. This development is seen not only in sectarian matters but also in the history of religious thought; nearly every religion has had its heaven and its hell, but with social progress and the broadening of sympathy, the hell falls more and more into disrepute, the motive of heavenly reward being rather emphasized.

As sympathy broadens, we come to feel, not alone pain at the pain of others, but in an increased degree and with regard to ever wider circles, pleasure also in their pleasure. The altruistic pleasure afforded by the relief of pain, as the more necessary to the preservation of existence, has been the earliest developed. A great good in its province, it may contain, nevertheless, an element of vanity that opposes itself to a further evolution. There is no doubt that a certain kind of benevolence would greatly miss the gratification and self-aggrandizement experienced in the relief of poverty and suffering. The higher but not yet so universal capacity is that of rejoicing in others' good and happiness as well as sympathizing in their sorrow. This capacity shows itself as yet chiefly in the more intimate relations of love and friendship. In these, too, the influence of approval and disapproval is powerful, and the pleasure we give a friend in being worthy of his esteem may make our best happiness. Here we have a hint of an increasing union of love for the individual and love for the ideal which must tend to raise friendship itself to the highest plane.

As a result of our considerations, we may deny the truth of Rolph's assertion that the stimulus of want will be forever necessary in order to secure exertion—that is, if by want is meant misery or great pain of any sort; if merely desire is meant, which the anticipation and early accomplishment of satisfaction may prevent from becoming pain, we may admit the statement. In this case, however, the argument which Rolph deduces against the possibility of a final state of social harmony is invalid.

But it is not the intention of our argument to assert that all desires without exception will be fulfilled in any future condition of society. What may be said is that, in an increasing degree, sympathy will endeavor to satisfy the wants of the individual, while, on the other hand, the approval and fellow-feeling of society, and the consciousness of having performed his duty, will come to represent to the individual, in a greater and greater degree, recompense for personal loss. This change of direction in desire and gratification is no weakening of it: it is no more necessarily true that the man of perfect principle is poorer in emotion than the man whose passions lead him to sacrifice his fellow men than it is true that the average man of civilized society is poorer in emotion than the brutal savage. Merely, human evolution is a continual development of higher and more complex emotions, which rise into force on the proper occasion to modify the more primitive ones, or, more accurately speaking, the lower emotions of the savage themselves take on a higher form through organization with later ones.

Spencer, in criticising theories of altruistic morals, endeavors to show that time and energy are lost in the distribution, through others, of the happiness or means of happiness which might with more profit, because a better understanding of need, be sought by the individual himself; and he remarks, that it is a question how much of the happiness which means also vitality the individual may rightly sacrifice to society. But the refusal of individuals to sacrifice anything of personal gratification must lead, under present conditions of desire, to extreme sacrifice on the part of other individuals; so that the principle of the illegitimacy of sacrifice logically contradicts itself. It is not perfectly clear what is meant by a "division and redistribution" of happiness, or the means of happiness, against which Spencer directs his argument. It is probable that the author has in mind, and is especially opposing, a particular school of theorists whose ideas we will consider later on. Suffice it to say, at this point, that social harmony can never be reached by the stubborn continuance of each in his line of inharmonious conduct, but can only be attained by such gradual moulding of habit and desire that by natural organization individuals will come to be in harmony with each other. It is the history of social evolution that the individual, though always determining what are his own needs, as it is obvious that he can best do, is increasingly aided in satisfying them by coöperation, while he also gives increasing aid in return. Against the list of the advantages of egoism enumerated by Spencer and others, I would muster the advantages of altruism, for by coöperation alone can the individual attain the pleasures which now so often lie beyond his reach; by it alone can society attain a higher plane; and the pleasures of altruism are the highest and the most unfailing. The selfish man will suffer disappointment and loss as well as the benevolent man, and he will lack the refuge of sympathy and of the power to find happiness in the happiness of others. What man who has felt the joys of sympathy would exchange even the hardships it brings for the brutal liberty and unmoved selfishness of the savage! what man who has known the joys of the higher, the more unselfish love, would exchange them for the ungoverned and quickly-palling pleasures of the profligate! These joys first lend life worth and meaning; through association and altruism, coöperation in action and feeling, man first becomes a power in the world. Yet the man who is capable of the higher sympathy is incapable of a selfish calculation of its personal advantages to him.

Wundt has an objection to Evolutional Ethics as it is understood by this treatise, on the score of the assumptions with regard to moral inheritance involved. "How, out of tendencies stored up in the nervous system, moral conceptions arise, is, and remains, a mystery," he says.[265] The problem is nothing more or less than that of the connection of brain-function and psychical process, in inheritance; and we may say again that we no more perceive the necessity of explaining the "how" of this before accepting the evident facts, than we see the necessity of explaining, in the same sense, the connection between light and heat, or between the seen vibrations and the heard note. Moreover, the "mystery" belongs as much to the conservation of character in the individual life as to its conservation in the race; if an explanation be necessary before acceptance of the facts in the one case, it is assuredly necessary in the other also; and its necessity must be fatal to Physiological Psychology. It is time that that ancient scarecrow of superstition, "a mystery," were removed from the field of science. When Wundt further proceeds to interpret Spencer's theory of heredity as one of the inheritance of distinct and definite ideas in their original form, he reads into the theory what Spencer himself, with his conceptions of instinct and reflex action, never put there, and what, moreover, no modern writer on philosophy has distinctly asserted. This present treatise is much more open to Wundt's criticism than is Spencer's work, though it makes no positive assertion as to the nature of "instinct" and so-called "automatism," but leaves the question as to their unconscious character open. The appearance of common psychical phenomena at the period of puberty, and with characteristics peculiar, moreover, to the particular lines of descent, would be enough to establish the fact of heredity, if no other testimony were forthcoming; and yet no one can "explain" the sudden appearance of these phenomena at a certain age.

But the most of the objections to Evolutional Ethics are not on such score as this. A while ago, the conservatives in Ethics declared that the theory of Evolution, even if true, had nothing to do with morals, which occupied a region far above the plane of science. Now, the most of the conservative schools content themselves with merely asserting that evolution may be true even in application to Ethics, but that it is useless in this province, since it adds nothing of value to theory or practice. It may be well to examine into this assertion. A priori, we could scarcely suppose that increased knowledge in any branch could fail to be of importance to that branch and to affect it in some manner. Knowledge is power, and we should presume not less so in Ethics than in any other science.

The assertion that Evolution adds nothing to theory would indeed be as just with regard to other sciences as with regard to Ethics; or, rather, it would be more just with regard to the natural sciences. For they at least recognized, before the appearance of the theory of Evolution, the element of constancy ordinarily called law, and attempted to formulate this constancy as a basis of thought and action. To these concepts of constancy and the predictions founded upon them, the theory of Evolution merely added greater certainty and a more extended range, supplying the bond of union between various branches, and showing the inner relation of many before disconnected theories; its whole force was one of clarification. But the work of Evolution for Ethics, though of a similar nature, has been of even greater degree and significance; it has unified and clarified the attempts made to discover a basis for moral principles and has rendered that foundation for the first time secure; it has cleared away, with one sweep, the rubbish of ancient superstition, made exact methods possible, and raised Ethics to the plane of a Science. If it had added anything absolutely new and entirely unconnected with previous theory, it would be as unintelligible to us as Calculus to a Fiji-Islander; if it had no intimate and vital connection with foregoing ideas, it would meet with no comprehension or acceptance. Science, too, is an evolution, not a creation. The value of the theory of Evolution lies in the very fact that it is simply an addition, though a large one, to previous thought, a higher phase of conception which rises naturally out of the old. But the cavillers say on the one hand: "It teaches a theory of conscience as instinct, therefore we may still cling to the old and unaltered doctrine of the veiled and sacred 'mystery of Feeling'"; and on the other hand: "We already accepted a basis of reason and Utility, therefore our theory, not being overthrown, needs no alteration." Both schools forget that, in science as elsewhere, the new develops from the old, but evolution brings with it, nevertheless, a difference of degree that finally issues in difference of kind. It has been said even by one belonging to the advanced school of Ethics, that, if the course of Evolution could be shown to prescribe immoral conduct, the duty of the moral man would be to oppose evolution even if he perished in the attempt. The conception which lies at the basis of this assertion is as erroneous as that which asserts that man must go forward on the path taken by evolution whether he will or no.[266] To suppose the will of society opposing the course of Evolution is to suppose a self-contradiction. Nature and man's will are not two different things in this process; man is the part of nature which is involved in the evolution considered. Our prediction of the direction of social development is a prediction of his will; he will will in certain ways constant in the broad sense in which all nature is constant, constant as character and reason are constant. The individual has assuredly the power to oppose himself to all other individuals, if he so wills; and his influence will not be lost; but it is exactly this willing and the mutual influence of individuals upon each other which the theory of Evolution, as applied to Ethics, endeavors to take into account. The result in prediction cannot be properly likened, as it is likened by Stephen,[267] to the inference of the future of an organic whole from its present parts. It does not define the progress in society as a whole from a study of the individual; it is, on the contrary, an inference of the future of the whole from its past and present considered in the light of general natural laws, and is as legitimate as the computation of the future position of heavenly bodies from their observed past movements and present position; though we can doubtless make only general predictions from general observations. Or, if we approach the question from another side, we may say that the science of Ethics endeavors to ascertain the ideal by which the welfare of all may be attained, and that the solution of this problem cannot be given otherwise than through rules for the attainment of the general health in the broadest sense of the word; for this corresponds to a final harmony of desires through survival of the fittest.