A Handbook of Ethical Theory

by George Stuart Fullerton

The word "nature," thus used, has had a fluctuating meaning. Sometimes the thought has been predominantly of human nature, and sometimes the appeal has been to nature in a wider sense.

Aristotle, who finds the "good" of man in happiness or "well-being," points out that this is something relative to man's nature. The well- being of a man he conceives as, in large part, "well-doing," and well- doing he defines as performing the proper functions of a man. [Footnote: Nichomachean Ethics, Book I, chapters iv, vii, viii.] If we ask him what is proper or natural to man, he refers us to what man, when fully developed, becomes: "What every being is in its completed state, that certainly is the nature of that thing, whether it be a man, a house, or a horse." [Footnote: Politics, i, 2.] He conceives man's nature, thus, as that which it is in man to become. Toward this end man strives; and it is this which furnishes him with the law of his action.

But, it may be asked, how shall this end be defined in detail? Individual men, who arrive at mature years, are by no means alike. Some we approve; some we disapprove. We evidently appeal to a standard by which the individual is judged. The appeal to the nature of man helps us little unless we can agree upon what we may accept as a just revelation of that nature—a pattern of some sort, divergence from which may be called unnatural, and is to be reprobated.

Neither Aristotle, nor those who, after him, took human nature as the moral norm, were without some conception of such a pattern. They kept in view certain things that men may become rather than certain others. They accepted as their standard a type of human nature which tends, on the whole, to realize itself more and more in the course of development of human communities. But as different human societies differ more or less in the characteristics which they tend to transmit to their members, in the kind of man whom they tend to form, we find the ideal of human nature, with which we are presented, somewhat vague and fluctuating. Different traits are dwelt upon by different moralists. Still, the appeals to human nature have a good deal in common; upon man's rational and social qualities especial stress is apt to be laid.

116. HUMAN NATURE AND THE LAW OF NATURE.—"Every nature," said Marcus Aurelius, [Footnote: Thoughts, translated by George Long, viii, 7.] "is contented with itself when it goes on its way well; and a rational nature goes on its way well, when in its thoughts it assents to nothing false or uncertain, and when it directs its movements to social acts only, and when it confines its desires and aversions to the things which are in its power, and when it is satisfied with everything that is assigned to it by the common Nature."

In the last clause the Stoic turns from the contemplation of man's nature, taken by itself, and dwells upon the nature of the universe, which he conceives to be controlled by reason. He thus gains an added argument for the obligations laid upon man by his own nature. He writes:

"Every instrument, tool, vessel, if it does that for which it has been made, is well, and yet he who made it is not there. But in the things which are held together by Nature there is within and there abides in them the power which made them; wherefore the more is it fit to reverence this power, and to think that, if thou dost live and act according to its will, everything in thee is in conformity to intelligence." [Footnote: Ibid vi, 40.]

The law of man's nature is, thus, regarded as a part of the law of Nature—"We are all working together to one end, some with knowledge and design, and others without knowing what they do." [Footnote: Ibid, vi, 42.] And, this being the case, man may take pattern, when he is inclined to fall below the standard of duty appropriate to him, by considering humbler creatures: "Dost thou not see the little plants, the little birds, the ants, the spiders, the bees working together to put in order their several parts of the universe? And art thou unwilling to do the work of a human being? And dost thou not make haste to do that which is according to thy nature?" [Footnote: Ibid, v, 1. ] The delinquent is, hence, judged guilty, not merely of derogation from his high estate, but also of impiety. [Footnote: Ibid, ix, 1. ]

117. VAGUENESS OF THE LAW OF NATURE.—The question of the influence of religious belief upon a theory of morals I shall discuss elsewhere. [Footnote: See chapter xxxvi.] Here it is only necessary to point out that, if there is vagueness in the appeal to human nature, it can scarcely be dissipated satisfactorily by simply turning to Nature in a broader sense. Shall we, when in doubt as to human behavior, copy that of the brutes? The industry of some humble creatures it seems edifying to dwell upon; but from the fact that bees are stung to death by their sisters in the hive, or that the spider is given to devouring her mate, we can hardly draw a moral lesson for man.

The appeal to a Law of Nature so often made in the history of ethical speculation has furnished but a vague and elusive norm. He who makes it is apt to fall back upon the moral intuitions with which he is furnished, and to pack a greater or less number of them into his notion of Natural Law. [Footnote: See SIR HENRY MAINE'S fascinating chapters on the "Law of Nature," Ancient Law, chapters in and iv. The innumerable appeals to the Law of Nature contained in Grotius's famous work on the "Law of War and Peace" are very illuminating. ]