[51] This Section is devoted to an exposition of the manner in which facts which are not pleasures or pains, but causes of pleasures or of pains, become so closely associated in thought 279 with the pains and pleasures of which they are causes, as not only to become themselves pleasurable or painful, but to become also, by their association with acts of our own by which they may be brought about, motives of the greatest strength. The value of a due understanding of this fact, both for the purposes of psychological science and for those of practical education, is evidently very great: and the author, to whose mind the bearings of speculative philosophy on the practical interests of the human race were ever present, has not failed to make some ethical and political applications of the psychological truth which he has here so excellently illustrated.—Ed.
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE ACTS OF OUR FELLOW-CREATURES, WHICH ARE CAUSES OF OUR PAINS AND PLEASURES, CONTEMPLATED AS CONSEQUENTS OF OUR OWN ACTS.
WE are now in a condition to explain the Phenomena, which have been classed under the titles of Moral Sense, Moral Faculty, Sense of Right and Wrong, Moral Affection, Love of Virtue, and so on, which are all names of similar import.
We have already remarked, that, of all the Causes of our Pleasures and Pains, none are to be compared in point of magnitude, with the actions of ourselves, and our Fellow-creatures. From this class of causes, a far greater amount of Pleasures and Pains proceed, than from all other causes taken together. It follows, that these causes are objects of intense affection to us; either favourable, if they are the cause of Pleasure; or unfavourable, if they are the cause of Pain.
The actions from which men derive advantage have all been classed under four Titles; Prudence, Fortitude, Justice, Beneficence.
We apply the names Prudent, Brave, Just, 281 Beneficent, both to our own acts, and to the acts of other men.
When those names are applied to our own acts, the first two, Prudent and Brave, express acts which are useful to ourselves, in the first instance; the latter two, Just, and Beneficent, express acts, which are useful to others, in the first instance.
When we apply the same names, not to our own acts, but to the acts of other men, the first two, Prudent and Brave, express acts which are useful to them in the first instance; the latter two, Just and Beneficent, express acts which are useful to others, in the first instance.