In Mr. Spencer's opinion, the evidence here brought to a focus ought to dissipate once for all the belief in a moral sense, as commonly entertained. A long experience of mankind, however, prevents him from indulging in such an expectation. Among men at large, lifelong convictions are not to be destroyed either by conclusive arguments or multitudinous facts. Only to those who are not by creed or cherished theory committed to the hypothesis of a supernaturally created human species will the evidence above summed up prove that the human mind has no originally implanted conscience. Mr. Spencer himself at one time espoused the doctrine of the intuitive moralists, but it has gradually become clear to him that the qualifications required practically obliterate the doctrine as enunciated by them. It has become clear to him, in other words, that if among civilized folk the current belief is that a man who robs and does not repent will be eternally damned, while an accepted proverb among the Bilochs is, that "God will not favor a man who does not steal and rob," it is impossible to hold that men have in common an innate perception of right and wrong.
At the same time, while the inductions drawn by Mr. Spencer from the data of ethics show that the moral-sense doctrine in its original form is not true, they also show that it adumbrates a truth, and a much higher truth. For the facts cited, chapter after chapter, unite in proving that the sentiments and ideas current in each society become adjusted to the kinds of activity predominating in it. A life of constant external enmity generates a code in which aggression, conquest, revenge, are inculcated, while peaceful occupations are reprobated. Conversely, a life of settled internal amity generates a code inculcating the virtues conducing to harmonious co-operation,--justice, honesty, veracity, regard for others' claims. The implication is that, if the life of internal amity continues unbroken from generation to generation, there must result not only the appropriate code, but the appropriate emotional nature,--a moral sense adapted to the moral requirements. Men so conditioned will acquire to the degree needful for complete guidance that innate conscience which the intuitive moralists erroneously supposed to be possessed by mankind at large. There needs but a continuance of absolute peace externally and a rigorous insistence on non-aggression internally, to insure the moulding of men into a form naturally characterized by all the virtues. This general induction is re-enforced by especial induction. Now as displaying this high trait of nature, now as displaying that, Mr. Spencer has instanced various uncivilized peoples who, inferior to us in other respects, are morally superior to us. He has also pointed out that such peoples are, one and all, free from inter-tribal antagonisms. The peoples showing this connection between external and internal peacefulness on the one hand, and superior morality on the other, are of various races. In the Indian Hills are found some who are by origin Mongolian, Kelarian, Dravidian; in the forests of Malacca, Burma, and in secluded parts of China exist such tribes of yet other bloods; in the East Indian archipelago are some belonging to the Papuan stock; in Japan there are the amiable Ainos, who have no traditions of internecine strife; and in North Mexico exists yet another such people unrelated to the rest, the Pueblos. Our author holds that no more conclusive proof could be wished than that supplied by these isolated groups of men, who, widely remote in locality and differing in race, are alike in the two respects that circumstances have long exempted them from war, and that they are now organically good. May we not reasonably infer, asks Mr. Spencer, in conclusion, that the state reached by these small, uncultured tribes may be reached by the great cultured nations, when the life of internal amity shall be unqualified by the life of external enmity?
We bring to an end our review of the "Synthetic Philosophy" by pointing out that the ethical doctrine constituting the culmination of the system which is set forth in the "Principles of Ethics" is fundamentally a corrected and elaborated version of the doctrine propounded in "Social Statics" issued as long ago as 1850. The correspondence between the two works is shown not only by the coincidence of their constructive divisions, but also by the agreement of their cardinal ideas. As in the one, so in the other, Man, in common with lower creatures, is held to be capable of indefinite change by adaptation to conditions. In both he is regarded as undergoing transformation from a nature appropriate to his aboriginal wild life, to a nature appropriate to a settled civilized life; and in both this transformation is described as a moulding into a form fitted for harmonious co-operation. In both works, too, this moulding is said to be effected by the repression of certain primitive traits no longer needed, and the development of needful traits. As in the first work, so in this last, the great factor in the progressive modification is shown to be sympathy. It was contended in "Social Statics," as it is contended in the "Principles of Ethics," that harmonious social co-operation implies that limitation of individual freedom which results from sympathetic regard for the freedoms of others; and that the law of equal freedom is the law in conformity to which equitable individual conduct and equitable social arrangements co-exist. Mr. Spencer's theory in 1850 was, as his theory still is, that the mental products of Sympathy which constitute what is called "the moral sense," arise as fast as men are disciplined into social life; and that along with them arise intellectual perceptions of right human relations, which become clearer as the form of social life becomes better. Further, in the earlier work it was inferred, as it is inferred in the latest, that there is being effected a conciliation of individual natures with social requirements; so that there will eventually be achieved the greatest individuation, along with the greatest mutual dependence,--an equilibrium of such kind that each, in fulfilling the wants of his own life, will aid in fulfilling the wants of all other lives. We observe, finally, that, in the first work, there were drawn essentially the same corollaries respecting the rights of individuals and their relations to the State that are drawn in the "Principles of Ethics."
A word may be said in conclusion about the difference between the relation of Mr. Spencer on the one hand and Darwin on the other to the thought of the Nineteenth Century. The fact is not to be lost sight of that the principles of the Evolutionary, or, as Mr. Spencer prefers to term it, the Synthetic, philosophy were formulated before the publication of the "Origin of Species." What the ultimately general acceptance of the theory propounded in Darwin's work did for Mr. Spencer was precisely this: it greatly strengthened the biological evidence for the evolutionary hypothesis. That hypothesis was upheld, however, by evidence drawn not merely from biology, but from many other sources. Moreover, while the Darwinian theory of natural selection, supplemented as it was by the adoption of the Lamarkian factors,--the effect of use and disuse and the assumed transmissibility of acquired character,--merely attempted to explain the mode in which the changes in organic life have taken place upon the earth, the evolutionary hypothesis put forth by Mr. Spencer professed to be applicable to the whole sphere of the knowable. It is further to be borne in mind that Mr. Spencer has devoted a large part of his life to tracing in detail the applications of his fundamental principles to social, political, religious, and ethical phenomena. Darwin, on the other hand, strictly confined himself to the biological field, and left to disciples the task of indicating the bearing of the Darwinian theory upon sociology, theology, and morals.
AUTHORITIES.
The Complete Works of Herbert Spencer (The Synthetic Philosophy).
Also, "Facts and Comments," by Herbert Spencer (Appleton's).
John Fiske's "Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy."
F.H. Collins's "Epitome of the Synthetic Philosophy."
A.D. White's "Herbert Spencer: The Completion of the Synthetic Philosophy."