A Handbook of Ethical Theory

Renew：Part 28
Author：George Stuart Fullerton
Update：08-15-2023
Tags：Religion Spirituality
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Chapter List

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter xxix.] holds that man"s reason promulgates a law which takes no account of the impulses and desires of man. Thus, also, Henry Sidgwick, who differs from Kant in making the attainment of happiness the goal of human endeavor, and who, consequently, is not tempted to disregard the desires of man, yet refers to the reason independently certain maxims, which he regards as self-evident, touching our own good and the good of our neighbor. [Footnote: _The Methods of Ethics_, chapter iii.]
Chapter XX.] I shall dwell upon the fact that the accidental may play a very significant role in law. In given instances the laws of a community may be, not the outcome of its will in any sense, but something imposed upon it. Such laws cannot but be felt to be oppressive and a restriction of freedom.
Chapter xvi.] It aims at the satisfaction of many desires--at what may be termed satisfaction _on the whole_.
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter xxiv.] I have cited some utterances which sound egoistic, and such citations might be multiplied.
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter i, Sec 2.] that a single moral law, so abstractly stated as to cover the whole sphere of conduct, must be something so vague and indeterminate as to be practically useless as a guide to action. The admonition, "do right," does not mean anything in particular to the man who is not already well instructed as to what, in detail, const.i.tutes right action. Nor do we make ourselves more intelligible, when we say to him "be good."
Chapter x.x.x. A man may mean to do right, and may, through ignorance or error, be guilty of an act that we condemn.
Chapter x.x.xvi.] As to cheerfulness and good manners, it is only necessary to reflect upon the baleful influence exercised upon the young--who have here my entire sympathy--by a bilious and depressing piety, or by those who are rudely and superciliously moral.
Chapter 24
Chapter xxiv, Sec 96.] If G.o.d will not reconcile, ultimately, benevolence and self- interest, proclaimed Reid, man "is reduced to this miserable dilemma, whether it is best to be a fool or a knave." [Footnote: _Essays on the Active Powers of Man_, Essay III, Part III, chapter viii. It would be absurd to believe that either Paley or Reid lived down to the level of his doctrine. Both were very decent men, and capable of disinterestedness.] Some of the utterances of Kant and of Green seem to point in the same direction, but both have made it abundantly plain that they, personally, and whatever their intellectual perplexities, were moved by something much higher than egoism. [Footnote: See chapters xxiv, Sec 97; xxvi, 3; and xxix.]
Chapter XIX, and broadening the outlook for a future and more perfect rationality, for no better reason than that it is our whim? Shall we _believe_ and join ourselves with other _believers_, for no better reason than that something happens to tempt our will?
Chapter XI, I suggest that the reader look up what Hobhouse has to say on impulse, desire and will, in his volume, _Morals in Evolution_; also that he consult the same topics in James"
Chapter XXV in this volume); and S. Alexander, in his work ent.i.tled _Moral Order and Progress_, maintains that pleasures differ in kind, and cannot be compared merely in their intensity (see page 202).