(2) Self-consciousness knits the desires into a system, and thus attains to the conception of "well-being," which implies the satisfaction of desire in general, and not merely of this or that desire. [Footnote: Prolegomena to Ethics, Sec 128.]
(3) "Good" is that which satisfies some desire. Any good at which an agent aims must be his own good; and "true good" is nothing else than "permanent well-being." [Footnote: Prolegomena to Ethics, Sec Sec 190, 92, 203.]
(4) A desire is determined by the nature of the creature desiring; man can attain satisfaction only in the realization of his capacities. His true good lies only in their complete realization—in his becoming all that it is in him to become. [Footnote: Prolegomena to Ethics, Sec Sec 171-2, 180.]
(5) But man is a social being, and has an interest in other persons than himself. Hence his complete self-satisfaction implies the satisfaction of his social as well as of his other impulses. That is, his true good includes the good of others. [Footnote: Prolegomena to Ethics, Sec Sec 199- 205.]
(6) We can only discover what our "capacities" are by observing them as so far realized, and thus gaining the idea of future progress. The ultimate end is unknown to us. [Footnote: Prolegomena to Ethics, Sec 172.]
(7) But we see enough to recognize that man's capacities can be realized, his self-satisfaction intelligently sought, only in a social state based upon the notion of the common good. The right reveals itself in the actual evolution of society. [Footnote: Ibid., Sec Sec 172-76, 205.]
123. THE DOCTRINE AKIN TO THAT OF FOLLOWING NATURE.—The self- realization doctrine has much in common with the doctrine of following nature. Thus:
1. It evidently does not recommend the realization of all the capacities of the individual as such, but holds in view a "pattern" man.
2. This is social man, the true representative of human nature as conceived by the ancient Stoic. Green holds before himself "the ideal of a society in which everyone shall treat everyone else as his neighbor, in which to every rational agent the well-being or perfection of every other such agent shall be included in that perfection for which he lives." [Footnote: Prolegomena to Ethics, Sec 205.] The same thought was more pithily expressed by Marcus Aurelius in the aphorism that "what is good for the hive is good for the bee."
3. We find, too, the analogue of that wider appeal to nature which suffused the Stoic doctrine with religious feeling. In the above brief recapitulation of the steps in the self-realization doctrine I have omitted this aspect, as I wished to confine myself to the ethical doctrine pure and simple. But Green conceives of the Divine Consciousness as already having before it the consummation toward which man strives in his efforts at self-realization; he regards man as working toward the attainment of a Divine Purpose. The self-realizationist may prefer, sometimes, to use language more abstract. He may say: "Man's consciousness of himself as a member of society involves a reference to a cosmic order." [Footnote: MUIRHEAD, The Elements of Ethics, Book I, chapter in, Sec 10.] But the difference of language scarcely carries with it a substantial difference of thought. [Footnote: "Though the philosopher as such may shun the term 'God' on account of its anthropomorphic associations, and may prefer to speak of the 'conscious principle,' or of the 'universal self,' yet the latter has in substance the same meaning as the former." FITE, An Introductory Study of Ethics, chapter xiii, Sec 4.]