Ethical Culture. It has been said by a prominent leader of the movement for ethical culture that the one dogma admitted is the doctrine of personality. The movement eliminates from its teaching all hitherto received religions, admits no Christian symbolism, and acknowledges neither a personal Creator nor a personal Saviour. Christ is, however, highly reverenced as a man. The world as it should be is regarded not as an unattainable though beautiful ideal to be admired and longed for, but as a possible reality to be achieved by strenuous concerted action. The means by which it is hoped to bring about this much-to-be-desired result is the reaction on each other of carefully selected and highly cultivated personalities. Such virtues, therefore, as kindness, pity, justice, charity, temperance, and chastity are deemed less necessary as a personal moral duty in each human being than as a means by which a perfect world may be attained. Man's duty is towards no divine being, but to his fellow-man. In place of that help from above which theologians deem needful to attain even a short step in the direction of perfection, the power of conscience is considered as sufficient for all needs, and disciples are counselled that they should
More strictly, then, the inward judge obey,
since they no longer believe in divine anger or approval.
Germs of the movement may be found in many writers, and Emerson seems to have foreseen it when he said: "The mind of this age has fallen away from theology to morals. I conceive it to be an advance." But the obvious founder of ethical societies was Felix Adler (born 1851), who, in 1876, established in New York a Society of Ethical Culture. He also set in motion such useful work as training-schools, kindergartens, and nursing. In 1885 his associate, W. Salter, established the Chicago Ethical Society. Both have written extensively on the subject; while English supporters of the movement include Sir Leslie Stephen, Sir J. Seeley, Professor Sidgwick, and others. Several ethical societies exist in Britain, carrying out much educational and philanthropic work. There are both Sunday services and Sunday schools, and in many cases the branches are more or less closely affiliated with labour and its associations. With regard to this community of work and aim, it may be noted that while ethical culturists look forward to a time when no man shall exploit his fellow human beings for personal ends, absolute equality for all is not promised, being recognized as impossible.—Bibliography: Felix Adler, Creed and Deed; W. M. Salter, Ethical Religion.
Eth´ics, otherwise called Moral Philosophy or Morals, is the science which treats of the nature and laws of the actions of intelligent beings, considered as to whether they are right or wrong, good or bad. Its subject-matter is human conduct and character in view of a standard or ideal. It refers to constant elements in human nature, and, like æsthetics and logic, is of universal application. The science is more or less closely connected with theology, psychology, politics, political economy, and jurisprudence, but what most strictly belongs to it is the investigation of the principles and basis of duty or the moral law, and an inquiry into the nature and origin of the faculty by which duty is recognized. Various answers have been given to the question why we call an action good or bad, such as that it is consistent or not with the will of God, or with the nature of things, or with the greatest happiness of the greatest number, or that an inward faculty decides it to be such or such; and a great variety of ethical systems has been proposed. The foundations of the leading systems were laid in antiquity, the names of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, the Cynics, and the Stoics being especially prominent. All the Greek philosophers, however, considered ethics from an individualistic standpoint, and paid little attention either to politics or to sociology. The introduction of Christianity brought a new element into ethical speculation, and among Christians ethics were intimately associated with theology, and morality was regarded as based on and regulated by a definite code contained in the sacred writings. The speculations of the Greeks were not, however, disregarded, and some of the ablest Christian moralists (as Augustine, Peter Lombard, Erigena, Anselm, and Aquinas) endeavoured to harmonize the Greek theories with the Christian dogmatics. Most modern ethical systems consider the subject as apart from theology and as based on independent philosophical principles, and they fall into one of two great classes—the utilitarian systems, which recognize as the chief good, happiness, or the greatest possible satisfaction of the tendencies of our nature; and the rationalistic systems, which recognize that ideas of law and obligation can have their source only in reason. Utilitarianism has been rightly called universal hedonism, as distinguished from the hedonism of Epicurus, which was egoistic. The first of the modern Utilitarian school in England was Hobbes (1588-1679). Among subsequent names are those of Cudworth, Locke, Clarke, Shaftesbury, Butler, Hutcheson, Hume, Adam Smith, Reid, Paley, Whewell, Bentham, J. S. Mill, &c. Paley held that men ought to act so as to further the greatest possible happiness of the race, because God wills the happiness of
men, and rewards and punishes them according to their actions, the divine commands being ascertained from Scripture and the light of nature. Bentham's utilitarianism is considerably different from Paley's. It was entirely dissociated from theology or Scripture, and maintained that increase of happiness ought to be the sole object of the moralist and legislator, pleasure and pain being the sole test of actions. To utilitarianism as a special development belong the later 'evolution ethics' represented by Herbert Spencer, in which biological conceptions, such as 'the preservation of the human race', take the place of the Benthamite criterion for determining what is good and bad in actions. Another theory of ethics places the moral principle in the sentimental part of our nature, that is, in the direct sympathetic pleasure or sympathetic indignation we have with the impulses which prompt to action or expression. By means of this theory, which he treats as an original and inexplicable fact in human nature, Adam Smith explains all the phenomena of the moral consciousness. In considering the ethical systems of the Rationalistic school, systems which recognize that the ideas of law and obligation can have their source only in reason, the question, what is the source of the laws by which reason governs, gives rise to a number of psychological theories, amongst which we may notice Clarke's view of the moral principles as rational intuitions or axioms analogous to those of mathematics; Butler's theory of the natural authority of conscience; the position of Reid, Stewart, and other members of the later Intuitional school, who conceive a moral faculty implanted in man which not only perceives the 'rightness' or 'moral obligation' of actions, but also impels the will to perform what is seen to be right. Very similar, as far as classification goes, is the position of Kant, who holds that reason recognizes the immediate obligation of certain kinds of conduct, and that an action is only good when done from a good motive, and that this motive must be essentially different from a natural inclination of any kind.—Bibliography: H. Sidgwick, The Method of Ethics; A. C. Bradley, Ethical Studies; H. Spencer, Principles of Ethics; L. Stephen, The Science of Ethics; The English Utilitarians; W. Wundt, Ethics; J. Martineau, Types of Ethical Theory; A. Sutherland, The Origin and Growth of the Moral Instinct; E. Westermarck, The Origin and Development of Moral Ideas; W. R. Sorley, The Moral Life; C. Read, Natural and Social Morality.
Ethiopia, or Æthiopia (Heb. Cush), in ancient geography, the country lying to the south of Egypt, and comprehending the modern Nubia, Kordofan, Abyssinia, and other adjacent districts; but its limits were not clearly defined. It was vaguely spoken of in Greek and Roman accounts as the land of the Ichthyophagi or fish-eaters, the Macrobii or long-livers, the Troglodytes or dwellers in caves, and of the Pygmies or dwarf races. In ancient times its history was closely connected with that of Egypt, and about the eighth century B.C. it imposed a dynasty on Lower Egypt, and acquired a predominant influence in the valley of the Nile. In sacred history Ethiopia is repeatedly mentioned as a powerful military kingdom (see particularly Is. xx, 5). In the sixth century B.C. the Persian Cambyses invaded Ethiopia; but the country maintained its independence till it became tributary to the Romans in the reign of Augustus. Subsequently Ethiopia came to be the designation of the country now known as Abyssinia (q.v.), and the Abyssinian monarchs still call themselves rulers of Ethiopia.
Ethiopian Language, The, or more accurately the Geez language, is the old official and ecclesiastical language of Abyssinia, introduced into that kingdom by settlers from South Arabia. In the fourteenth century it was supplanted as the language of the Christian Church of Abyssinia by the Amharic. It is a Semitic language resembling Aramaic and Hebrew as well as Arabic. It has a Christian literature of some importance. The principal work is a translation of the Bible, including the Old and New Testaments and Apocrypha, to which are appended some non-canonical writings, such as the Shepherd of Hermas and the Book of Enoch. The language is to some extent represented by the modern dialects of Tigre, and by that spoken by some nomadic tribes of the Sudan. For the Ethiopian or Abyssinian Church, see Abyssinia and Copt.
Eth´moid Bone (Gr. ēthmoeides, like a sieve), a light spongy bone situated in the upper part of the cavity of the nose. The olfactory nerves pass upward through its numerous perforations to reach the brain.
Ethnol´ogy and Ethnog´raphy, sciences dealing with man, the aim of the former being to analyse and interpret the meaning of the social phenomena of mankind, as shown in their customs, languages, institutions, &c., the latter being more concerned with descriptive details and the orderly collection of facts relating to particular tribes and localities. Both terms, however, are used very loosely and in a variety of ways, often being confused with anthropology, the general science or natural history of mankind, of which the other two are parts. Anthropology, again, is sometimes used in the narrower sense implied in the word somatology, the study of the physical structure and distinctive characteristics of the various races of mankind. When the term ethnology is used by the politician or