thy action might become a universal law," and every maxim repugnant to this supreme principle of ethics is immoral.1

It is interesting to compare the teaching of Kant with that of Mr Herbert Spencer. In his essay entitled "Prison Ethics," Mr Spencer says, "granted that we are chiefly interested in ascertaining what is relatively right, it still follows that we must first consider what is absolutely right, since the one conception presupposes the other. That is to say, though we must ever aim to do what is best for the present times, yet we must ever bear in mind what is abstractedly best; so that the changes we make may be towards it, and not away from it. Unattainable as pure rectitude is and may long continue to be, we must keep an eye on the compass which tells us where it lies, or we shall otherwise be liable to wander in some quite opposite direction." 2 Mr Bain points out that the word absolute as here used does not mean to imply a right and wrong apart from humanity and its relations. By "absolute," as distinguished from "relative," morality, Mr Spencer means "the mode of conduct which, under the conditions arising from social union, must be pursued to achieve the greatest welfare of each and all. He holds that the laws of life, physiologically considered, being fixed, it necessarily follows that when a number of individuals have to live in social union, which necessarily involves fixity of conditions in the shape of mutual interferences and limitations, there result certain fixed principles by which conduct must be restricted, before the greatest sum of happiness can be achieved. These principles constitute what Mr Spencer distinguishes as Absolute Morality, and the absolutely moral man is the man who conforms to these principles, not by external

1 op. cit., Part ii., Introduction, p. 8. 2 Essays, 2d series, p. 257.

" 1

coercion nor self-coercion, but who acts them out spontaneously." The purely humanitarian view as to the origin of morality here stated, is so divergent from what may be termed the supernatural view of Kant, that it appears to be almost impossible to reconcile them. There is but one mode of doing this. To show that what is called morality is the product of the evolution of the divine idea in man under the conditions imposed by his present life, to be perfected only when man's higher being has proved itself victor in the conflict it is ever sustaining with the malign influences of material existence.

1 "Mental and Moral Science" (2d edition), p. 723.

PART I.

CHAPTER I.

THE SENSE OF RIGHT.

IN the introduction an examination has been made of the opinions entertained by the leading writers of the intuitional and utilitarian schools of moralists, and we have seen that, so far as concerns the mere criterion of morality, there is not necessarily any great difference between them. It is true that, as Mr Bain observes,1 the rational moralists of the intuitive school gave no account of the "final end" of morality. This was, however, because they considered that right conduct was required for its own sake as being alone consistent with eternal reason, and in accordance with this principle they must have looked for the same result as that supposed by utilitarians the "greatest amount of happiness altogether." On the other hand, it has been shown that the inductive school has little claim to do more than establish a criterion of morality. The moral faculty of the utilitarians is in reality only a sense of expediency or prudence, even when it takes the form of the organized experience of Mr Herbert Spencer.2 Mr Darwin has approached the nearest of any writer belonging to the inductive school to the perception of 1 "The Emotions and the Will" (2d edition), p. 257. 2 See supra, p. 30 seq.

His ex

the true basis of morals in human nature. planation of the origin of conscience is, however, not satisfactory, since the social instincts which he regards as at the foundation of all morality, are wholly insufficient to originate the idea of right which is essential to the moral faculty.

The hypothesis of Mr Darwin is certainly a great advance on the ordinary form of utilitarianism, and he is superior to both the inductive and the intuitional school in the plan he has pursued for discovering the real origin of the moral sense. He has traced what he conceives to be its beginnings in the animal mind, and hence, even supposing his account of such origin to be incorrect, a true theory of moral development may well take for its starting-point that which Mr Darwin's hypothesis requires, supplying, however, certain data which it does not embrace. Whatever may have been man's origin, he must, as man, have had certain faculties when he first appeared on the earth. If he were derived by "the operation of natural selection" from a lower animal form, his faculties, moral and intellectual, must have reached a certain stage of progress at that particular point at which he could be described as human. This is just the point, however, from which, supposing man to have suddenly appeared on the earth, he would probably have started in his advance towards the high development now exhibited by particular races. It is evident, therefore, that the question of man's origin is of secondary importance in the enquiry as to the actual evolution of morality, although it is intimately connected with that as to the source of man's moral nature.

Let us see then what was the moral state of primeval Mr Darwin says:-"In order that primeval man, or the ape-like progenitors of man, should have

man.

become social, they must have acquired the same instinctive feelings which impel other animals to live in a body; and they no doubt exhibited the same general disposition. They would have felt uneasy when separated from their comrades, for whom they would have felt some degree of love; they would have warned each other of danger, and have given mutual aid in attack or defence. All this implies some degree of sympathy, fidelity, and courage.' In another place, when speaking of sexual selection, Mr Darwin says that in primeval times man would probably have lived "either as polygamists or temporarily as monogamists. Their intercourse, judging from analogy, would not then have been promiscuous. They would, no doubt, have defended their females to the best of their power from enemies of all kinds, and would probably have hunted for their subsistence, as well as for that of their offspring. They would have been governed more by their instincts, and even less by their reason than are savages at the present day. They would not at that period have partially lost one of the strongest of all instincts common to all the lower animals, namely, the love of their offspring; and, consequently, they would not have practised infanticide. There would have been no artificial scarcity of women, and polyandry would not have been followed; there would have been no early betrothals; women would not have been valued as mere slaves." 2 This description is founded, however, on the idea that mankind is derived from more than one pair of ancestors, otherwise much of it is inapplicable. Supposing the first progenitors of mankind to have consisted of a single pair, the only social instincts they could have exercised would be "the parental and filial affections, which apparently lie at the basis of the social affections." 1 "The Descent of Man," i., 161. 2 do., ii., 367.