A Vision of the Future, Based on the Application of Ethical Principles

by Jane Hume Clapperton

Having shown that practically infants, children, young men and women, adults and old people of every social class are similarly engaged in seeking happiness, each according to his tastes and tendencies controlled by his personal, social and spiritual development; having shown also that thinkers and writers offer no condemnation, I proceed to point out that this universal habit is in harmony with evolution. It tends to personal evolution, i.e., to expansion and elevation of character and capacities. Moreover, it tells favourably on general life. It tends to social evolution, i.e., to expansion and elevation of the social organism or collective society so long as the method pursued by each individual is unhurtful to the other organic units incorporated in that society.

To seek to attain happiness at the expense of other human beings whose happiness is thereby sacrificed, is of course evil. It is anti-social, or vicious, i.e., it is wholly adverse to personal evolution and social evolution, in other words, to general progress. But given a society that has carefully surrounded its units by conditions of personal freedom (harmonious with general well-being) in which to seek innocent happiness, the normal man or woman on a level with the average of his race is not in any danger of preferring the vicious course.

That we confuse a wholesome love of pleasure with selfishness arises from the fact that individual selfishness unhappily is developed by our present evil system of life. Notwithstanding, it is easy to show the real value of pleasure by its ready alliance with unselfishness. A significant feature is this—people take pleasure in uniting for pleasure. Sensuous pleasures are taken as a rule, socially, it being recognized that to civilized man the presence of the enjoyment of others enhances his personal enjoyment. The physiological effect of pleasure is to promote health and activity. “Every pleasure raises the tide of life; every pain lowers the tide of life,” says Herbert Spencer. The pleasures of love are essentially and pre-eminently invigorating and social. It is only when they are selfishly pursued that evil creeps in, and what should produce the purest happiness becomes degraded into a source of misery.

It seems hardly necessary to point out further that asceticism and purism are immoral because directed against an element in happiness. Whenever science finds out means to alleviate suffering or free the condition of pleasure from accidental accompaniments that are evil, it is clearly the duty of man to hail the discovery and apply it that he may add to the sum of human happiness.

Before touching on environment, i.e., the social condition under which alone general happiness becomes possible, I may classify desires into primary and secondary in order to make the subject clearer. Primary desires are those common to all physical beings, the satisfaction of which (in man) is necessary to healthful ordinary social life. Secondary desires are those whose satisfaction is necessary to some individuals, but not to all.

Desires for food, clothing, shelter, also for work alternating with rest, and for love, belong to the first class. They are primary and fundamental. But desires that imply a development of cultured intellect, of delicate sensibilities, of high moral and emotional attainments, of aesthetic tastes, and of spiritual life are secondary desires, i.e., they are not common to all at the present stage of the evolution of man. That they may become so is devoutly to be desired; but if we expect to reach a high standard of life in the social organism without first securing for its individual units the satisfaction of primary needs, we indulge a vain delusion. Does a tree throw out fruitful branches before it is rooted in the soil at its base? Development depends on the satisfaction of primary needs, and proportionally to these being made secure will the satisfaction of the higher desires become necessary to happiness.

Now in relation to primary needs, the conditions which it is the duty of society as a whole to secure for the individual are, first: Freedom to act for the end of securing satisfaction of desire; second, opportunity for acquiring the means of satisfaction; third, ability to adopt the means; fourth, protection of life and action. And these conditions have a wide implication. The first implies some control of individual conduct as regards propagation, that each social unit may possess a sound constitution and the comfort of physical health. The second implies access to nature. The third implies education to give knowledge and skill. The fourth implies an organized society with an appropriate, scientifically arranged system of industry.

That our present confused industrial and social system—the survival of an archaic state—is inimical to happiness, few thinkers will deny. Discontent is not confined to the poor. Where wealth abounds there is little, if any, real happiness. “The towers of Westminster,” says Edward Carpenter, “stand up by the river, and within, the supposed rulers contend and argue.... The long lines of princely mansions stretch through Belgravia and Kensington; lines of carriages crowd the park; there are clubs and literary cliques and entertainments, but of the voice of human joy there is scarcely a note.... And I saw the many menacing, evil faces, creeping, insincere worm-faces, faces with noses ever on the trail, hunting blankly and always for gain; faces of stolid conceit, of puckered propriety, of slobbering vanity, of damned assurance.

“O faces, whither, whither are you going?

“No God, no truth, no justice, and under it all no love.