"A motive is substantially nothing more than pleasure or pain operating in a certain manner. Now pleasure is in itself a good; nay, even setting aside immunity from pain, the only good.... It follows, therefore, immediately and incontestably that there is no such thing as any sort of motive that is in itself a bad one. If motives are good or bad, it is only on account of their effects" (Bentham, Principles of Morals and Legislation, ch. x., §2). Over against this, place the following from Kant: "Pure reason is practical of itself alone, and gives to man a universal law which we call the Moral Law.... If this law determines the will directly [without any reference to objects and to pleasure or pain] the action conformed to it is good in itself; a will whose principle always conforms to this law is good absolutely in every respect and is the supreme condition of all good."
If now we recur to the distinction between the "what" and the "how" of action in the light of these quotations, we get a striking result. "What" one does is to pay money, or speak words, or strike blows, and so on. The "how" of this action is the spirit, the temper in which it is done. One pays money with a hope of getting it back, or to avoid arrest for fraud, or because one wishes to discharge an obligation; one strikes in anger, or in self-defense, or in love of country, and so on. Now the view of Bentham says in effect that the "what" is significant, and that the "what" consists ultimately only of the pleasures it produces; the "how" is unimportant save as it incidentally affects resulting feelings. The view of Kant is that the moral core of every act is in its "how," that is in its spirit, its actuating motive; and that the law of reason is the only right motive. What is aimed at is a secondary and (except as determined by the inner spirit, the "how" of the action) an irrelevant matter. In short the separation of the mental and the overt aspects of an act has led to an equally complete separation of its initial spirit and motive from its final content and consequence. And in this separation, one type of theory, illustrated by Kant, takes its stand on the actuating source of the act; the other, that of Bentham, on its outcome. For convenience, we shall frequently refer to these types of theories as respectively the "attitude" and the "content"; the formal and the material; the disposition and the consequences theory. The fundamental thing is that both theories separate character and conduct, disposition and behavior; which of the two is most emphasized being a secondary matter.
Different Ways of Emphasizing Results.—There are, however, different forms of the consequences or "content" theory—as we shall, for convenience, term it. Some writers, like Spencer as quoted, say the only consequences that are good are simply pleasures, and that pleasures differ only in intensity, being alike in everything but degree. Others say, pleasure is the good, but pleasures differ in quality as well as intensity and that a certain kind of pleasure is the morally good. Others say that natural satisfaction is not found in any one pleasure, or in any number of them, but in a more permanent mood of experience, which is termed happiness. Happiness is different from a pleasure or from a collection of pleasures, in being an abiding consequence or result, which is not destroyed even by the presence of pains (while a pain ejects a pleasure). The pleasure view is called Hedonism; the happiness view, Eudaimonism.[115]
Different Forms of the "Attitude" Theory.—The opposite school of theory holds that the peculiar character of "moral" good is precisely that it is not found in consequences of action. In this negative feature of the definition many different writers agree; there is less harmony in the positive statement of just what the moral good is. It is an attribute or disposition of character, or the self, not a trait of results experienced, and in general such an attribute is called Virtue. But there are as many differences of opinion as to what constitutes virtue as there are on the other side as to what pleasure and happiness are. In one view, it merges, in its outcome at least, very closely with one form of eudaimonism. If happiness be defined as the fulfillment of satisfaction of the characteristic functions of a human being, while a certain function, that of reason, is regarded as the characteristic human trait whose exercise is the virtue or supreme excellence, it becomes impossible to maintain any sharp line of distinction. Kant, however, attempted to cut under this union of happiness and virtue, which under the form of perfectionism has been attempted by many writers, by raising the question of motivation. Why does the person aim at perfection? Is it for the sake of the resulting happiness? Then we have only Hedonism. Is it because the moral law, the law of reason, requires it? Then we have law morally deeper than the end aimed at.
We may now consider the bearing of this discussion upon theories of moral knowledge and (2) of moral authority.[116]
I. Characteristic Theories of Moral Knowledge.—(1) Those who set chief store by the goods naturally experienced, find that past experiences supply all the data required for moral knowledge. Pleasures and pains, satisfactions and miseries, are recurrent familiar experiences. All we have to do is to note them and their occasions (or, put the other way, to observe the tendency of some of our impulses and acts to bring pleasure as a consequence, of others to effect misery), and to make up our ends and aims accordingly. As a theory of moral knowledge, Hedonism is thus almost always allied with empiricism, understanding by empiricism the theory that particular past experiences furnish the method of all ideas and beliefs.
(2) The theory that the good is some type of virtuous character requires a special organ to give moral knowledge. Virtue is none the less the Good, even when it is not attained, when it is not experienced, that is, as we experience a pleasure. In any case, it is not good because it is experienced, but because it is virtue. Thus the "attitude" theory tends to connect itself with some form of Intuitionalism, Rationalism, or Transcendentalism, all of these terms meaning that there is something in knowledge going beyond the particular experiences. Intuitionalism holds there is a certain special faculty which reveals truths beyond the scope of experience; Rationalism, that beside the particular elements of experience there are universal and necessary conceptions which regulate it; Transcendentalism, that within experience there is a factor derived from a source transcending experience.[117]
II. Characteristic Theories of Moral Control.—The result school tends to view authority, control, law, obligation from the standpoint of means to an end; the moralistic, or virtue, school to regard the idea of law as more fundamental than that of the good. From the first standpoint, the authority of a given rule lies in its power to regulate desires so that after all pleasures—or a maximum of them, and a minimum of pains—may be had. At bottom, it is a principle of expediency, of practical wisdom, of adjustment of means to end. Thus Hume said: "Reason is, and ought only to be, the slave of the passions"—that is, the principles and rules made known by reason are, at last, only instruments for securing the fullest satisfaction of desires. But according to the point of view of the other school, no satisfaction is really (i.e., morally) good unless it is acquired in accordance with a law existing independently of pleasurable satisfaction. Thus the good depends upon the law, not the law upon the desirable end.
§ 3. GENERAL INTERPRETATION OF THESE THEORIES
The Opposition in Ordinary Life.—To some extent, similar oppositions are latent in our ordinary moral convictions, without regard to theory. Indeed, we tend, at different times, to pass from one point of view to the other, without being aware of it. Thus, as against the identification of goodness with a mere attitude of will; we say, "It is not enough for a man to be good; he must be good for something." It is not enough to mean well; one must mean to do well; to excuse a man by saying "he means well," conveys a shade of depreciation. "Hell is paved with good intentions." Good "resolutions," in general, are ridiculed as not modifying overt action. A tree is to be judged by its fruits. "Faith without works is dead." A man is said "to be too good for this world" when his motives are not effective. Sometimes we say, "So and so is a good man," meaning to say that that is about all that can be said for him—he does not count, or amount to anything, practically. The objection to identifying goodness with inefficiency also tends to render suspected a theory which seems to lead logically to such identification. More positively we dwell upon goodness as involving service; "love is the fulfilling of the law," and while love is a trait of character, it is one which takes immediate action in order to bring about certain definite consequences. We call a man Pharisaical who cherishes his own good character as an end distinct from the common good for which it may be serviceable.