Willing may consist in a consciousness of the immediate act or in a consciousness of the remotest purpose to the realization of which this act contributes. If in consequence of threatened punishment I will the required act, but not its ultimate purpose, I can frustrate the latter in a hundred different ways. To punishment, therefore, must be added a second means of furthering the welfare of society, through actions of free will. The performance of acts of this kind is called morality.
The special form of morality anywhere at any time depends obviously on many circumstances. It is conceivable that in a tribe sparingly endowed with natural resources and pressed by enemies, morality may demand the killing of the aged and of female children. On a higher level of culture such actions must be immoral, because they do not harmonize with other moral commandments, or because, when food is plentiful, an increase in numbers is highly desirable. The Catholic church regards divorce as immoral, but in Japan public opinion regards the enforced continuation of the matrimonial tie as immoral. It is obvious that morality is a growth. But it grows very slowly, remaining nearly constant for long stretches of time; and so we often meet moral commandments which no longer fit the people upon whom they are imposed.
Kant has more strongly than any one else taken the opposite view. Morality, according to him, is something definite, eternal, absolute, not dependent on circumstances—categorical, as he calls it, not hypothetical. How can this doctrine be reconciled with what we have said above?
We mentioned that actions benefiting the total social group are not the result of reflection, of reasoning, but the immediate result of experience on the part of the most provident and most influential members of the group. Errors and superstitions naturally play their part in the formation of the first moral rules. But subsequent experience gradually improves them, so that they soon become of real benefit to the whole society. How are these rules then transmitted to following generations? By impressing them upon the child. Young children can be given commandments; but explanations of their purpose would in most cases be useless. They are therefore given categorically, as imperatives supported by the authority of parents, elders, priests. Under these circumstances, of course, it is not to be expected that the children will later recall any purpose when they become conscious of these rules. The rules appear in their consciousness as something unconditional, absolute—in their totality as conscience.
One may here raise this question: Why does not society, after its children have grown into men and women, inform them of the purpose of these rules? This information is not given partly because society as a whole is not clearly conscious of the purpose, partly because it is better to leave to these rules their absolute character. The commander of an army does not explain the purpose of an order sent to an inferior officer. This has its disadvantages in so far as the latter, knowing the purpose, might improve details of the order which the commanding officer, from his distant position, could not properly adjust to the actual conditions. But on the whole it is preferable to require strict adherence to the order and not to permit reflection before its execution, for reflection might easily give room to thoughts of self-preservation. Similarly, society demands absolute obedience because thus, on the whole, the moral rules are more strictly carried out, with greater benefit to society. Nevertheless, the rules have their justification only in their purpose, the welfare of society. And conflicts between the literal commandment and this purpose are by no means rare. The white lie, for example, has given much trouble to moral theorists. To the unbiased moral consciousness it is in innumerable cases the proper act. What commander of an army could be tolerated who would refuse to deceive the enemy? How could we meet children, the sick, the insane, if we had made up our minds never to tell a lie?
Understanding the value of the (apparent) absolutism of the moral rules, we also understand why moral sentiment is so highly estimated as compared with a mere number of correct acts. Moral sentiment is the only reliable source of correct action. If we judge a person exclusively or mainly by his success in correct activity, we are likely to discourage his attempting a difficult task. In order to give the greatest possible encouragement, we tell him that it is his free will to do good that determines our estimation of his social value, no matter whether he succeeds or not. However, the question whether a man’s will is to be called good or bad, can be answered only by pointing out a social purpose, the furtherance of the welfare of the whole. Without this the will to do good, the feeling of duty, is like the rope by means of which Münchhausen descended from the moon.
The absolutism of morality explains the close relation of morality to religion. Religion, morality, and sometimes political law, are under God’s protection; the laws of reasoning and of artistic creation are not. The latter are also gifts of God, but left unprotected. Error and bad taste are no sins. Religion, if without direct protection by threatened punishment, would be found by each individual; but each would find a different one, and since only one religion is supposed to be the true one, uniformity has to be enforced by threats. Morality still more needs protection by threatened punishment coming from God, since individual desires differ greatly, and would never give rise directly to uniform moral rules. These rules are the product of the experience of generations, and always meet with more or less resistance from the individual. Human authority is frequently not strong enough to overcome this resistance. So God’s protection is needed—and found very easily. What can a father reply to his ever questioning child: Why must I give away a part of what I like to keep myself, or tell what I shall be punished for? He gives the same answer which he gives to the question who made the horses and the whole world: “God made these rules.” Perhaps it would be best if the child were always told that God did not impose these rules upon man as something foreign to his nature, simply because God capriciously chose to do so; but that he gave man these rules because they are needed for the highest development of human life. Only a will which acts morally because this significance of morality is understood can be said to be truly free.
We have frequently spoken of communities, of groups of human beings. Now, man belongs to many communities at the same time: family, town, state, nation, friends, the profession, the denomination, and so on, up to mankind as a whole; which one is meant? They are all meant, but so that in case one obligation excludes another, the one toward the narrower circle of associates takes precedence. We do not approve of women devoting to charity what they owe to their children. But where the narrower circle leaves us free from obligation, the wider circle claims us as its subjects. One of these circles, the widest of all, is mankind; but morality did not begin with recognizing this. Only those are permitted to enjoy the benefits of one’s morality who are clearly felt to belong to the same community. The expansion of political, linguistic, religious communities enormously increases the number of individuals toward whom each one feels moral obligations.
But this expansion alone would not have broken down the barrier between one and all the rest of mankind. This barrier has been removed by the acceptance of monotheism. Other factors may have contributed toward this result. The categorical character of the moral rules, their independence of conditions, must have favored their universal application to any human being. The development of the idea that all human beings are essentially alike, and of the idea of the unity of the world, must have greatly strengthened the universality of the moral rules. The development of the moral ideal, as we saw, tended to unify the conception of God. But this conception of a single God, monotheism, then gave a new impulse to the universal application of the moral rules. When each people has its own god, his commandments are valid only to his own people. But when it is recognized that only one God exists, his commandments can hardly be confined to the territory of one people. Plato and Zeno, accepting this consequence, teaching that human beings are like the members of one flock, introduced a doctrine new to the Greeks. Christ, reciting the Mosaic law, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine enemy,” adds to it: “But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you,” and thus takes the decisive step. But mankind is still far from having accepted this doctrine completely. To plunder private property on the high seas in time of war is no longer regarded as meritorious, but scarcely begins to cast shame on him who makes himself guilty of it, as plundering on land does.
QUESTIONS