thinkers of this class to regard the heroic few as fools, and men of lofty moral aspirations as mere dreamers.

106. The difficulty, indeed, is not so fatal as has been sometimes asserted. Human nature is so far uniform, and, therefore, estimates of happiness so far alike, that we can deduce the ordinary rules of morality without much practical difficulty. The great moral commonplaces hold good upon any assumption; and in morality we have not got far beyond commonplace. It must be admitted, however, that this uncertainty as to the meaning of the fundamental conception leaves an apparently arbitrary assumption at the very base of the proposed science; and, moreover, tends to lower the resulting type of morality. In the proposed calculation, the most tangible pleasures are likely to be rated above their value, and the standard of happiness prevalent amongst the majority of the race will be taken as determining the standard of morality. Morality becomes the art by which men obtain the greatest amount of gratification without attending to its quality.

To

107. How, then, are we to escape this uncertainty without attempting the impracticable task of an a priori deduction of morality? To give a satisfactory reply would be to indicate the true weakness, not only of Hume, but of his most distinguished disciples. A scientific morality, as I have said, would imply not only a psychology, but a sociology. understand the conditions of human welfare, we must understand the laws of growth and equilibrium, both of the individual and the race. We must, therefore, acquire a conception of society as a complex organism, instead of a mere aggregate of individuals in arbitrary or indefinitely variable combination; and, therefore, regulated and developed by processes not discoverable by simple inspection of the constituent atoms. If the laws which express those processes could be accurately stated, we should have, if not an actual moral code, the necessary basis for a moral code. Morality, according to the analogy already suggested, is to sociology what a sanitary code is to physiology; and the analogy may help us a step further. It must be defined as the art of attaining social health, not as the art of attaining the maximum of happiness, although we may admit that the two ends are ultimately identical. But is it not as necessary to have a definition of health in this case

as of happiness in the other? The answer is suggested by the analogy. A physician does not start from defining health, but he aims at discovering the laws in virtue of which an organism preserves its equilibrium, and develops the greatest amount of strength, activity, and sensibility. He assumes that such an organism will enjoy greater happiness than one which does not conform to the rules laid down. If, instead of pursuing this method, he had made the attainment of pleasure at once the ultimate and immediate end, he would have arrived at different conclusions. The man, he would have said, is the happiest who gets the greatest amount of pleasures from his palate, his senses of hearing, touching, and so forth. But how from such a test could he deduce the right rule of life? How could he determine whether the nose was a worthier organ than the eye, or what amount of energy should be devoted to each mode of gratification? Some obvious rules of temperance or the like might be discovered; but he would be obviously in want of some method for bringing the conflicting series of observations into unity, and, so to speak, gathering the various indications to a focus. That want is supplied by the laws of organic unity. The ultimate criterion is the tendency of a given rule of life to maintain the organism in the highest degree of vigour. The various modes of enjoyment are correlated by the tendency to preserve or destroy the equilibrium of the body; and a precisely analogous place is filled in ethical speculation by the study of the social organism.

108. A scientific sociology would bring the various estimates of happiness to a single focus. An individual may prefer sensual to intellectual gratification, but if it were proved that a rule which encouraged sensuality at the expense of the intellect tended to the decay of the social body, that it lowered its vitality, destroyed its equilibrium, and ultimately diminished even its powers of sensual gratification, he must either admit that the rule was a bad one, or declare that he preferred his own taste to the welfare of society. The existence of a certain social passion is undoubtedly necessary for the existence of society or of morality; but if its existence be once assumed, the moral question might be brought by sociology to a single test. Such and such rules tend, it would be

shown, to the permanent vitality of society; everybody, then, must approve them who wishes well to society. This is the ultimate postulate of derivative morality, and one with which it is impossible to dispense. But if sociology were once constituted, it would supply a single and decisive test instead of the vague and complex calculus suggested by the cruder forms of utilitarianism, or what is called the greatest happiness principle.

109. Now, as we have already seen in speaking of Hume's philosophy, and as we shall hereafter see in treating of his political speculations, this conception of a social organism was just what was wanting to him. His scepticism reduced society to a mass of atoms, capable of being cast into any mould, and producing any set of results. A crude empiricism replaced a true experiential philosophy. Any cause might be joined to any effect; and, therefore, the tendency of actions to produce happiness, or, as he vaguely says, the fact that they are 'useful' or 'agreeable '—words never defined nor distinguished -could not be scientifically estimated. We must know how the organs are combined into a whole, as well as observe what amount of pleasure they produce; and the combination seemed to Hume to be more or less arbitrary. The expression of his theories in terms of social philosophy is individualism, and no scientific views can be reached when all methods of observation start from the individual, instead of taking into account the whole of which he forms a constituent part. One of the most important, for example, of moral questions is that which concerns the relations of the sexes; and a marked peculiarity of the school descended from Hume is its tendency to tamper with the moral code by which those relations are regulated. The case is significant in many ways. The only method by which the utilitarian can approach the subject is by endeavouring to reckon the good and evil produced in individual cases. Here the indelibility of the marriage law inflicts a hardship; there it prevents a cruelty. We must strike an average as best we may of the good and ill effects, and condemn or approve the law accordingly. The old theological sanction implies a superstitious view, and may, therefore, be set aside altogether. Every law inflicts some evil, because it forbids some gratification, and, therefore, the

presumption is always against law. The scientific sociologist would have to take into account a series of observations to . which the utilitarian is apt to be altogether blind. He would observe, perhaps, that the family is the primary germ of all society; that, in proportion as its sanctity has been maintained, society has been in a healthy and vigorous condition; that men in all ages have felt the necessity of regulating the strongest instinct of our nature, so as to bring it upon the side of the social, instead of the anti-social, tendencies; that the theological sanction, however superstitious in form, is the expression of the experience of many ages, blindly feeling its way to promote the welfare of the race, and preserving those races in which it has been allowed to operate with sufficient strength; that, therefore, the presumption is in favour of the social regulations in which it is embodied, however its form may be obsolete; and thus, that if any remedy is required for existing grievances, it should be applied tentatively and cautiously. A full understanding, in short, of the functions discharged by the family in the social organisation would probably reveal many ulterior and vitally important consequences of any change in its constitution to which the rough calculations of the utilitarian are necessarily insensible. We are not, at present, if we ever shall be, scientific sociologists, but the bare recognition of the possibility of such a science, the knowledge that there are laws, if only we could discover them, implies the application of a method of enquiry totally different from that which suggests itself to a crude utilitarian.

110. Finally, we may remark that the same imperfection explains Hume's inadequate appreciation of the true value of the great moral forces. The conscience had always been associated with a belief in supernatural penalties. Those penalties had become incredible. Therefore, the instincts called conscience had no real significance. A real historical sense, which is but another side of a true conception of sociology, would have suggested to him a more adequate measure of feelings, which have played so vast a part in the development of the human race, even if he had not personally sympathised with them. But Hume, like other philosophers

1 I shall remark hereafter how these principles were marked out by Godwina distinguished disciple of Hume's philosophy.

of his time, was content to class the Puritan creed as 'enthusiastic,' and the Catholic as superstitious;' and, seeing the weakness of these beliefs, to infer, very illogically, the nullity of their passions. This inadequate view of history, or, in other words, of the unity and continuity of the case, is thus the main source of Hume's defects as a moralist, as well as of other shortcomings.

III. One side of Hume's theory remains to be considered, and it is of vital importance to the later history of moral speculation. How is morality to be preserved? What are the motives upon which we must ultimately rely to secure observance of the moral law, whatever its criterion or the faculty which discovers it? A moral law, supernaturally revealed and enforced by supernatural sanctions, may be enforced upon beings corrupt by nature. But if the law be derived from man as well as imposed upon man, it must reflect the qualities of the legislator. To anyone, then, who, like Hume, declines to look outside the visible universe for the explanation of any phenomena, it follows that the ultimate source of the virtuous affections must be discovered in the human heart. The theological dogmas, regarded by divines as imposed from without, can only be the modes by which the human intellect in its earlier stages interpreted its own aspirations to itself. Hume, therefore, agrees to some extent with Shaftesbury, in restoring the nobler element which theologians had banished from our nature. Man, according to Hume, has made God after his own image, and whatever appears in the divine ideal must be a reflection from. the intellect which framed it.

112. It is, therefore, an essential part of Hume's theory to demonstrate the reality of the altruistic sentiments. A scientific method must admit the existence of feelings recognised by consciousness. We admire, so his argument runs, conduct which is useful. But useful? For what? For somebody's interest, surely. Whose interest, then? Not our own only; for our approbation frequently extends further. It must, therefore, be the interest of those who are served by the character or action approved of; and these, we may conclude, however remote, are not totally indifferent to us.' Powerful

Hume's Works, iv. 206,