As in his treatment of freedom we found Fouillée beginning with the idea of freedom, so here in a parallel manner he lays down the idea of an end of action as an incontestable fact of experience, although the existence of such an end is contested and is a separate question. This idea operates in consciousness as a power of will (volonté de conscience). Intelligence, power, love and happiness-in short, the highest conscious life—are involved in it, not only for us, but for all. Thus it comes about that the conscious subject, just because he finds himself confronted by nature and by over-individual ends, proposes to himself an ideal, and imposes at the same time upon himself the obligation to act in conformity with this full consciousness which is in all, as in him, and thus he allows universal consciousness to operate in his own individual life. Here we have conscience, the idea of duty or obligation, accounted for, and the principle of autonomy of the moral person laid down. The ethical life is shown as the conscious will in action, finding within itself its own end and rule of action, finding also the conscious wills of others like itself. Morality is the indefinite extension of the conscious will which brings about the condition that others tend to become “me.” Through the increasing power of intellectual disinterestedness and social sympathy, the old formula “cogito, conscius sum” gives place to that of “conscii sumus,” and this is no mere intellectual speculation, but a concrete principle of action and feeling which is itself akin to the highest and best in all religions.
One of the features of this ethic is its insistence upon the primacy of self-consciousness. Indeed, it has its central point in the doctrine of self-consciousness, which, according to Fouillée, implies the consciousness of others and of the whole unity of mankind. Emphasising his gospel of idées-forces, he outlines a morality in which the ideal shall attract men persuasively, and not dominate them in what he regards as the arbitrary and rather despotic manner of Kant.
By advocating the primacy of self-consciousness Fouillée claims to establish an ethic which towers above those founded upon pleasure, happiness and feeling. The morality of the idées-forces is not purely sentimental, not purely intellectual, not purely voluntarist; it claims to rest on the totality of the functions of consciousness, as revealed in the feelings, in intellect and will, acting in solidarity and in harmony.
He endeavours to unite the positive and evolutionary views of morality to those associated with theological or metaphysical doctrines, concerning the deity or the morally perfect absolute. He claims, against the theologians and on behalf of the positivists, that ethics can be an independent study, that it is not necessarily bound up with theological dogmas. There is no need to found the notion of duty upon that of the existence of God. Our own existence is sufficient; the voice of conscience is within our human nature. He objects, as did Nietzsche, to the formality and rigour of Kant’s “categorical imperative.” His method is free from the legalism of Kant, and in him and Guyau is seen an attempt to relate morality itself to life, expanding and showing itself creative of ideals and tending to their fulfilment.
From the primacy of self-consciousness which can be expressed in the notion, Je pense, donc j’ai une valeur morale, a transition is made to a conception of values. Je pense, donc j’evalue des objets. The essential element in the psychology of the idees-forces then comes into play by tending to the realisation of the ideals conceived and based on the valuation previously made. Finally, Fouillée claims that on this ethical operation of the idées-forces can be founded the notion of a universal society of consciences. This notion itself is a force operating to create that society. The ideal is itself persuasive, and Fouillee’s inherent optimism, which we have observed in his doctrine of progress, colours also his ethical theory. He has faith in men’s capacity to be attracted by the ideals of love and brotherhood, and insists that in the extension of these lies the supreme duty, and the ideal, like the notion of duty itself, is a creation of our own thought. The realisation of the universality, altruism, love and brotherhood of which he speaks, depends upon our action, our power to foster ideas, to create ideals, particularly in the minds of the young, and to strive ever for their realisation. This is the great need of our time, Fouillée rightly urges.[[31]] Such a morality contains in a more concentrated form, he thinks, the best that has been said and thought in the world-religions; it achieves also that union of the scientific spirit with the aspirations of man, which Fouillée regards as so desirable, and he claims for it a philosophical value by its success in uniting the subjective and personal factors of consciousness with those which are objective and universal.
[31] The work of Benjamin Kidd should be compared in this connection, particularly his Social Evolution, 1894; Principles of Western Civilisation, 1902; and The Science of Power, 1918 (chap, v., “The Emotion of the Ideal”).
Similar in several respects to the ethical doctrines of Fouillée are those of his step-son. Guyau insists more profoundly, however, upon the “free” conception of morality, as spontaneous and living, thus marking a further reaction from Kant’s doctrine. Both Fouillée and Guyau interacted upon one another in their mental relationship, and both of them (particularly Guyau) have affinities with Nietzsche, who knew their work. While the three thinkers are in revolt against the Kantian conception of ethics, the two Frenchmen use their conceptions to develop an ethic altruistic in character, far removed from the egoism which characterises the German.[[32]]
[32] We find the optimism and humanitarian idealism of the Frenchmen surprising. May not this be piecisely because the world has followed the gospel of Nietzsche? We may dislike him, but he is a greater painter of the real state of world-morality than are the two Frenchmen. They, with their watchword of fraternité, are proclaiming a more excellent way they are standing for an ethical ideal of the highest type.
Guyau, after showing in his critique of English Ethics (La Morale anglaise contemporaine, 1879) the inadequacies of a purely utilitarian doctrine of morality, endeavoured to set forth in a more constructive manner the principles of a scientific morality in his Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction.
He takes as his starting-point the position where John Stuart Mill fell foul of the word “desirable.” What, asks Guyau, is the supreme desire of every living creature? The answer to this question is “Life.” What we all of us desire most and constantly is Life, the most intensive and extensive in all its relationships, physical and spiritual. In the principle of Life we find cause and end—a unity which is a synthesis of all desires and all desirables. Moreover, the concept or the principle of Life embraces all functions of our nature—those within consciousness and those which are subconscious or unconscious. It thus relates intimately purely instinctive action and reflective acts, both of which are manifestations of Life and can enrich and increase its power.