The two are not absolutely irreconcilable: each of them corresponds to a different period of evolution; the emotional view to the instinctive stage, the stage of moral chaos; the intellectualist view to the reflective stage of rational organisation; but it is clear that one alone can claim the mark of its origin. In other words, we may say: in the moral consciousness there are two elements—judgment and feeling. A judgment (approving or condemnatory) on our own conduct and that of others is the result of a deeper process—not an intellectual one—of an emotional process of which it is only the clear and intelligible manifestation in consciousness. It would be a psychological absurdity to suppose that a bare, dry idea, an abstract conception without emotional accompaniments, and resembling a geometrical notion, could have the least influence on human conduct. No doubt, we must admit that the evolution is rather that of moral ideas than of the moral sentiment, which, in itself, is no more than a tendency to act—a predisposition; but an evolution of purely speculative ideas, with no emotional accompaniment, will have no results in the practical order. We may note that the opposition between these two views is constantly reflected in the history of moral theory. In England, where psychology predominates, the doctrine of feeling has had numerous champions, from Shaftesbury down to the present day. In Germany, where metaphysics are predominant, the intellectualist doctrine, since Kant, occupies the first place, except with Schopenhauer and his adherents. It is quite natural that the metaphysicians, intellectualists by temperament and by profession, should have adopted this position.
For the rest we are concerned here with the moral sentiment, and with that alone; the other elements of morality do not form part of our study. It consists, at bottom, in movement or arrest of movement, in a tendency to act or not to act; it is not, in its origin, due to an idea or a judgment; it is instinctive, and herein lies its strength. It is innate, not like an alleged archetype, infused into man, invariable, illuminating him everywhere and always, but in the same way as hunger and thirst and other constitutional needs. It is necessary; it forces one to act (when not kept in check by counter-tendencies), as the sight of water forces the duckling to plunge into it. Thus we must say that the man who impulsively throws himself into danger to save another is more thoroughly moral than he who only does so after reflection; one must be blinded by intellectualist prejudices to maintain the contrary. Natural morality is a gift—theologians would say a grace; it is artificial, acquired morality, which is measured by the quantity of resistance overcome. Finally, like every other tendency, it results in satisfaction or dissatisfaction (e.g., remorse).[[178]] In short, its innateness and its necessity place it in the motor, not in the intellectual order.
These characteristics being determined, let us follow the progress of its evolution. It presents two aspects: first, the positive, corresponding to the genesis of the beneficent feelings, or active altruism, an internal evolution—i.e., one of the primary feeling, in and through itself; secondly, negative, corresponding to the rise of the sense of justice, an external evolution—i.e., one produced under the pressure of conditions of existence and coercive means.
I. We include under the name of beneficence, or active altruism, such feelings as benevolence, generosity, devotion, charity, pity, etc.; in short, those foreign or contrary to the instinct of individual self-preservation. Their fundamental conditions are two psychological facts already studied:
1. Sympathy, in the etymological sense, i.e., an emotional unison, the possibility of feeling with another, and like him. Could a society be based on this state alone? In extreme cases this might happen; but such a society would be transitory, precarious, unstable: we have found similar examples in the gregarious state, animal or human. Stability requires stronger ties, that is to say, moral ones.
2. The altruistic tendency, or tender emotion, which exists in all men, except in those to be referred to at the end of this chapter. It belongs to our constitution, as much as the fact of having two eyes or a stomach.
Now the question put to us is this: How is active altruism developed, and by what psychological mechanism? How do disinterested feelings arise from primitive egoism? Setting aside all metaphysical solutions, such as Schopenhauer’s theory of universal pity, compassion (Mitleid) for all beings, founded on a vague consciousness of community of being and identity of origin—a monistic conception,—I shall confine myself to a strictly psychological explanation.
Benevolence arises from a particular form of activity accompanied by pleasure: this vague and obscure formula will be explained presently.
The fundamental tendency consists, in the first place, of preserving, and then of extending one’s self, of being and well-being, i.e., expending activity. Man may devote this activity to things: he cuts, hacks, destroys, overthrows,—these are destructive activities; he sows, plants, builds, and exercises preservative or creative activities. He may apply it to animals or to men; he injures, maltreats, destroys, or he cares for, helps, saves. Destructive activity is accompanied by pleasure, but by a pathological one, since it is the cause of evil. Preservative or creative activity is accompanied by pure pleasure, leaving behind it no painful feeling; consequently, it tends to repeat and increase itself: the object or the person which is the cause of pleasure becomes a centre of attraction, the starting-point of an agreeable association. To sum up, we have (1) a tendency to the display of our creative activity; (2) the pleasure of succeeding; (3) an object or living being to play a receptive part; (4) an association between this being or object and the pleasure experienced; whence a continually increasing attraction towards this being or object. The conservative tendency in action and the law of transference (see Part I., Chap. [XII].) are the essential agents in the rise of altruism.
This may be justified by several examples. If we reflect on the preceding, it will be understood that benevolence may well be the result of chance, and have, in its origin, no intentional character. A man, without paying any special heed to it, happens to throw some water on a plant which was drying up beside his door; next day he chances to notice that it is beginning to revive; he repeats the operation, intentionally; he becomes more and more interested in the plant, grows attached to it, and would not like to be deprived of it.[[179]] This is a very trivial, everyday occurrence, and there is no one who has not experienced something of the sort; this is all the better, as showing us the rise of the feeling in all its simplicity. If this happens in the case of a plant, how much more easily in that of an intelligent animal or a man!