Elements of Morals / With Special Application of the Moral Law to the Duties of the Individual and of Society and the State

by Paul Janet

The moderns, on the other hand, have divided morality particularly in its relations to the different objects of our actions; and, in private morality, they have considered, above all, the duties.

The ancients reduced all virtues to four principal ones: prudence, temperance, courage, and justice. This division was transmitted to us, and it is these four virtues which the catechism teaches under the name of cardinal virtues.

The moderns reduced duties to three classes: the duties towards ourselves, towards others, and towards God. Some add a fourth class, namely, duties towards animals.

That portion of morality which treats of the duties towards ourselves, is called individual morality; that which treats of the duties towards God, is called religious morality; that which treats of the duties towards other men, social morality. As to the duties towards animals, they are of so secondary an order, that it is not worth while to classify them apart; we shall include them in social morality.

Social morality is by far the most extended in precepts and applications, the various relations of men with each other being extremely numerous. It may be subdivided into three parts: 1, general duties of social life, or morality properly called social; 2, duties towards the State, or civil morality; 3, duties towards the family, or domestic morality.

We will begin with the study of social morality, social duties towards men in general, and we will first establish their principles and different varieties.

Let us in a few pages rapidly take a summary review of the general principles of social morality.

18. General principles of social duties: to do good, not to do evil.—All human actions, in regard to others, may be reduced to these two precepts: 1, to do good to men; 2, not to do them harm. To this all the virtues of social morality may be reduced. But before exhibiting these virtues and vices more in detail, let us explain what is understood by the expressions to do good and to do evil.

In the most general and apparent sense to do any one good would seem to be to give him pleasure; to do him harm, would seem to be to give him pain. Yet, is it always doing good to a person to procure him pleasure? and is it always doing him harm, to cause him pain? For example, Kant[6] says, “Shall we allow the idler soft cushions; the drunkard wines in abundance; the rogue an agreeable face and manners, to deceive more easily; the violent man audacity and a good fist?” Would it really be doing good to these men to grant them the object of their desires, what may satisfy their passions? On the other hand, the surgeon who amputates a mortified limb, the dentist who pulls out a bad tooth, the teacher who obliges you to learn, the father who corrects your faults or restrains your passions, do they really do you harm because they give you pain? No, certainly not. There are, then, cases where to do some one good is to cause him pain, and to do him harm is to procure him pleasure.

One may reasonably reduce all principles of social morality to these two maxims of the gospel: “Do not do to others what you do not wish them do to you;”—“Do to others as you wish to be done by.” These two maxims are admirable, certainly; but they must be interpreted rightly. If, for instance, we have done wrong, do we generally wish to be corrected and punished? When we are yielding to a passion, do we wish to be repressed in it, have it repelled? On the contrary, do we not rather wish to be allowed to enjoy it, and have the free range of our vices? Is not this generally what we all wish, when the voice of duty is mute and does not silence our passionate feelings? If this is so, should we wish to do to others as we wish in similar circumstances, namely, in the gratification of passions, to be done by? Should we not rather do to them what we should not like them do to us, that is, punish and correct them? It is evidently not in that sense we are to understand the two evangelical maxims; for they would be then no other than maxims of remissness and improper kindness; whilst they, on the contrary, express most admirably a moral truth; only when they speak of what we wish, they mean a true and good wish, not the desires of passion; the same when we recommend men to do good, we mean real good and not apparent good; as also in recommending to do no harm, we mean real harm, not the illusory harm of the senses, imagination and passions.