APPENDIX II[103]
THE EXERCISE OF FORCE IN THE INTEREST OF FREEDOM
Force is a moral adiaphoron. The stigma attaching to the use of force belongs rather to its abuse. The employment of force is good or bad according as the ends for which it is used are good or bad.
The precept of non-resistance in the Sermon on the Mount is to be understood as a piece of ethical irony.
The right, or to be more explicit, the duty, of society to coerce individual members of it rests on the same ground and holds within the same limits as the duty of the individual to coerce himself. Self-coercion depends on the difference in the quality of one’s impulses, on the choice one is bound to make between competitive ends. Self-coercion is of two kinds: stimulative and repressive; stimulative to overcome inertia, repressive to subject wrong to right impulses.
He who denies the duty of self-coercion, to be consistent, must fall back on the position of the Cynics. For the Cynics were indeed consistent. They asserted not only the right of the individual to be free from outside compulsion, but also the right of each individual moment of the individual’s life to be lived without regard or subjection to future moments. Hence they rejected civilization and its tasks, inasmuch as the prosecution of any task involves the subordination of the present to the content of some future moment.
But if the coercion of a man by himself be admitted, it follows that the exercise of force upon a man by society must in principle be likewise admitted. For we are social by nature; we take an interest in the achievement by each one of his ends, and we regard such achievement as a social-benefit.
As to the limits within which outside interference is to be permitted and welcomed, these can best be ascertained by fastening attention upon the end to be attained. And here the positive conception of freedom seems to be the most helpful,—freedom defined as the release in each one of his essential self, that is, of his distinctive gift and capability, or of that in him which is unique or most nearly so. A society in which such valuable contributions were elicited from each would be the ideal society. Stimulative and repressive social coercion are justified in so far as they provoke energy and check disturbing impulses,—always of course without discouraging spontaneity, which is the very good to be secured.
The antithesis of reason and force common in discussions of this subject seems misleading and inadequate; since reason is a faculty of inference and not of preference, has to do with the adapting of means to ends, and does not of itself afford guidance in the choice of ends.
The concept of freedom as defined is more illuminating. Let freedom and force be contrasted, not reason and force.