The ethics of Hercules

by Robert Chenault Givler

These four classes exhaust the uses to which this concept has been put. What, then, shall we declare to be the common element in them which we may call the essence of virtue with respect to human beings? In giving our answer, it is necessary to call attention to the fact that our third use of the word “virtue” (signifying the medicinal efficacy of drugs) will occupy a minor, or even negligible place in our definition. As for the rest, seeing that the virtues are one and all traits which are commended or praised, they may be considered as action-patterns or action-tendencies which human beings manifest. We can also go further than this. Employing the physiological principles hitherto used in defining ethical concepts, it appears at once that the word “virtue” means that energy is either being mobilized or expended to obtain what the organism considers to be a dependable good. This can also be stated in another way, by saying that those human traits which have been expressly denominated virtues are some of the attributes of what is commonly called a “good” man. (See Ex. 21, p. 38.) In this restricted sense, furthermore, the virtuous, or good, man is the one whose acts are called right. And this leads us at once to a very important question.

Why is it, we ask, that so few of the innumerable human traits that are commended every day—not only by words of praise, but also by that subtler and more emphatic sign of unconscious imitation—have been chosen as virtues, while so many others have been left out of the list? The four cardinal virtues,—courage, prudence, temperance, and justice,—exemplify this high degree of selectiveness, while this inventory omits all mention of human skill in any form, in spite of the fact that when the list was made by Plato, human skill in the fine arts had reached one of its limits of excellence.

The answer here sought is highly significant as a comment upon ethical speculation in a pre-scientific age. The list of cardinal virtues is merely an index of the bias of its maker with regard to the outstanding problems of his own time. These four traits which Plato elevated to the top of his system are not, then, to be taken as an indication of what Plato saw most frequently exhibited by the citizens of Athens, but, if anything, just the contrary. Anyone who has read Plato’s “Republic” will recall that his aim was to describe an ideal, that is, a not-yet-existing state, and that these four virtues were lauded, not because they had been found in actual life to be either sufficient or practicable, but rather because they seemed to Plato to fit into his ideal scheme. Now it is seldom denied that courageous men, prudent men, temperate men, and just men are to be soundly commended, or do we in any sense deny it here. Our only question is, Should these four traits be called the cardinal or supreme virtues before the whole list of commendable traits has been scrutinized? The answer which the scientifically trained mind gives is in the negative. Something else, however, is even more important for the foundation of an empirical ethics, namely, the question: Are those traits which we openly praise to be regarded, in the study of actual conduct, of prior importance to those which, by being unconsciously imitated, receive our silent, and therewith more significant approval? This, however, is the same as asking whether man has ever dared to face with courage and sincerity the real ethical problem.

A glance at another well-known list of selected virtues reveals even less of a tendency toward the statistical method in ethics than even Plato showed. We refer to those significantly unobtrusive virtues which characterized the ethics of primitive Christianity, and which were doubtless derived from the Beatitudes. Readers of the English Bible may recall that the epithet “blessed” was employed by Jesus to describe (1) those who were poor in spirit, (2) those who mourn, (3) the meek, (4) those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, (5) the merciful, (6) the pure in heart, (7) the peacemakers, (8) those who have been persecuted for righteousness’ sake, (9) those falsely reproached, (10) the poor, and (11) those who weep, which persons, in the average, are an entirely different class of organisms from those whom Plato would have called “blessed,” that is, commendable.[21] There is evidence to believe that this novel emphasis upon a certain type of person,—a type hitherto openly unpraised in the ethical thought of man,—gave rise to the tendency to elevate such traits as humility, kindliness, self-denial, meekness, patience, and the like, to a supreme position in the minds of primitive Christians.

However, this class of virtues is again not to be considered as indicative of the only traits which people commend, either openly, or by more subtle and significant signs. It is even safe to say that no group of Christians, be it either small or large, existing in a remote or a modern generation, were ever naïvely satisfied, or brought by dint of training, to act on the principle that these unobtrusive traits were the chief virtues. The reason for this plainly lies in the one-sidedness of such traits. Paulsen, in his “System of Ethics,” points out that whereas the Greeks found positive values in (1) scientific knowledge, (2) esthetic and other pleasures, (3) temperance, (4) courage, (5) justice, (6) honor and high-mindedness, (7) bodily cultivation, (8) economic solvency, (9) family life, and (10) the state, the early Christians considered almost none of these things to be worth their while. And whereas it would be more or less insulting to the memory of Jesus to call the doctrines of the early Christians an extension of his teachings, yet we can say that the unobtrusive virtues which early official Christianity sought to emphasize, are one and all withdrawing reactions, and as such must be rejected as the sole basis of a scientific ethics.

We reject them because they are not based upon a sufficient consideration of the total needs of man’s body,—that on which his life and mind depend. Man has not only a flexor system, but an extensor system of muscles as well, and it must be plain from the discussions in the preceding chapters that both of these systems are ethical mechanisms. However, official Christianity has often seen fit, by its exclusive emphasis upon those virtues which involve withdrawing reactions, literally to declare that the extensor system shall be denied a stimulus. The Greeks were far wiser; for even though they may have failed to achieve a conception of virtue which took into consideration the wholesome balance between flexor and extensor activities, they nevertheless did not err in propounding a doctrine that ignored the simplest principles of human behavior.

As a matter of historical record, primitive Christians did not succeed, by the exhibition of these unobtrusive virtues, in making themselves either inconspicuous or immune to their persecutors. If anything, indeed, they were all the more actively hounded because of their queer traits. And why? For the simple reason that the typical Christian virtues, being withdrawing reactions, and consequently allied to and confused with the attitudes of secretiveness and dissimulation, led the Roman officials quite reasonably to suspect that the early Christians were dangerous to the state. And it can be substantiated that primitive Christianity was far from being a patriotic movement. In those days, at least, the man who did not retaliate a blow was regarded first with amazement, then with contempt, then fear, and finally with the most diabolical hatred. Such a silent man might know something very important, might have knowledge of a world-wide insurrection ready to break tonight. Tear him to pieces, then; he shall at least not maintain that exasperating smile! How is such a meek man “blessed”? It may be true that our sentiments can partially apologize for a system of ethics based upon the functions of the flexor system alone, yet the sense of proportion which we inherit from the Greeks demands that we strike out on new paths which are not littered with the blunders of the past.

We must not forget to say, however, that one reason why these unobtrusive virtues have been given a chief place, not only in official Christianity, but also in Mohammedanism and Buddhism, is because of the simple, even though disquieting, fact that the flexor system is by nature stronger than the extensor system. Man, then, is by endowment more inclined to be humble and secretive than to be bold and frank, since the larger and stronger and more often activated muscles of his body are those which produce withdrawing reactions. That is also why man is prone to introspection, and to cultivate an inner life, and why also, to borrow a phrase of Dr. Morton Prince, he is frequently more interested in his own “mental mud-puddle” than in the external environment. Again, this physiological fact is responsible for each man having his own house, his nest, into which he retreats to escape from the novelties he can no longer adjust to, and where he may “bathe his receptors in comfort-giving stimuli.” And so, one is finally tempted to say that the unobtrusive virtues have obtained such a vogue because they are the only ones which over sixty per cent of mankind can appreciate and will ever really attempt to achieve. Perhaps, also, it is for the same reason that today the word “virtue” signifies almost exclusively chastity, a trait of character and an action-pattern which any physician will tell you is dependent for its existence and maintenance upon the contractions of very powerful flexor muscles.

The upshot of all this discussion is that from the study of man’s body as an ethical machine, it appears that he who would formulate a list of the chiefly desirable traits or virtues should first carefully consider the total needs of the organism. This new catalogue of virtues will be based upon the realization that man possesses both a flexor and an extensor mechanism. We know already that many ailments of the body are traceable to a lop-sided use of it, by which is usually meant the acquisition of chronic fatigue-postures in the flexor muscles. Indeed, chronic postures are recognized to be of such paramount importance, that experts have been employed to devise adequate stretching exercises (actuating the disused extensor system) in order to restore the organic balance of a nation. Moreover, just as the hygiene of the body depends upon a liberal use of all of its muscles, so likewise the ethical balance of the organism can be maintained only by the cultivation and commendation of a sufficient variety of traits to provide an outlet for all the action-tendencies which man naturally possesses. Virtue, then, we may henceforth regard as being based directly upon our physiological needs, and not upon the assumption, so frequently employed in the past, that ideals must be unattainable in order to be respectable.

Moreover, a strictly natural science of ethics will have a regard for the fact of individual differences among men, and, recognizing that blood-pressure, metabolism, talents, and capacities differ so widely as to make it impossible for any one trait to be the “highest” virtue for all persons, it will place the emphasis solely upon the needs of the individual case. Already this development has become wide-spread. The juvenile courts, the Society for Mental Hygiene, the National Child Welfare Association are all examples of an ethical technique based entirely upon the sciences of physiology, psychology, and medicine. This emancipation of ethics from official religion is one of the most momentous events in the history of civilization.