Christianity and Ethics Part 8

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SECTION C

CHARACTER

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CHAPTER VII

MODERN THEORIES OF LIFE

Bearing in mind the three fundamental ideas lying at the root of all ethical inquiry--End, Norm, and Motive--we have now to deal with the shaping forces of the Christian life, the making of character. In this section, therefore, we shall be engaged in a discussion of the ideals, laws, and springs of moral action. And first, What is the supreme good?

What is the highest for which a man should live? This question determines the main problem of life. It forces itself irresistibly upon us to-day, and the answer to it is the test of every system of morals.

But before endeavouring to determine the distinctively Christian ideal, as presented in the teaching of Jesus and interpreted by the growing Christian consciousness of mankind, it may be well to review briefly some of the main theories of life which are pressing their claims upon our attention to-day. Many of these modern views have arisen as a reaction against traditional religion. From the seventeenth century onwards, and especially during the nineteenth, there has been a growing disposition to call in question the Christian conception of life. The antagonism reveals itself not only in a distrust of all forms of religion, but also in a craving for wider culture. The old cert.i.tudes fail to satisfy men who have acquired new habits of reflection, and there is a disinclination to accept a scheme of life which seems to narrow human interests and exclude such departments as science, art, and politics. One reason of this change is to be found in the wonderful advance of science during the last century. Men's minds, withdrawn {100} from primary, and fixed upon secondary causes, have refused to believe that the order of nature can be disturbed by supernatural intervention. Whether the modern antipathy to Christianity is justified is not the question at present before us. We may see in the movements of our day not so much a proof that the old faith is false, as an indication that if Christianity is to regain its power a radical re-statement of its truths, and a more comprehensive application of its principles to life as a whole must be undertaken.

In the endeavour to find an all-embracing ideal of life two possibilities present themselves, arising from two different ways of viewing man.

Human life is in one aspect receptive; in another, active. It may be regarded as dependent upon nature for its maintenance, or as a creative power whose function is not merely to receive what nature supplies, but to re-shape nature's materials and create a new spiritual world.

Receptivity and activity are inseparable, and form together the harmonious rhythm of life.

But there has ever been a tendency to emphasise one or other of these aspects. The question has constantly arisen, Which is the more important for life--what we receive or what we create? Accordingly two contrasted conceptions of life have appeared--a naturalistic and an idealistic.

Under the first we understand those theories which place man in the realm of sense and explain life by material conditions; under the second we group such systems as give to life an independent creative power.

I

NATURALISTIC TENDENCY

1. Naturalism has usually taken three forms, an idyllic or poetic, a philosophic, and a scientific, of which Rousseau, Feuerbach, and Haeckel may be chosen as representatives.

(1) According to Rousseau, man is really a part of nature, {101} and only as he conforms to her laws and finds his satisfaction in what she gives can he be truly happy. Nature is the mother of us all, and only as we allow her spirit to pervade and nourish our being do we really live. The watchword, 'back to nature' may be said to have given the first impulse to the later call of the 'simple life,' which has arisen as a protest against the luxury, ostentation, and artificiality of modern times.

(2) The philosophical form of naturalism, as expounded by Feuerbach, inveighs against an idealistic interpretation of life. The author of _The Essence of Christianity_ started as a disciple of Hegel, but soon reversed the Hegelian principle, and p.r.o.nounced the spiritual world to be a fiction of the mind. Man belongs essentially to the earth, and is governed by his senses. Self-interest is his only motive, and egoism his sole law of life. It was only what might be expected, that the ultimate consequences of this philosophy of the senses should be drawn by a disciple of Feuerbach, Max Stirner,[1] in whose work, _The Individual and His Property_, the virtues of egoism are extolled, and contempt is poured upon all disinterestedness and altruism.

(3) The latest form of naturalism is the scientific or monistic, as represented by Haeckel. It may be described as scientific in so far as its author professes to deduce the moral life from biological principles.

In the chapter[2] devoted to Ethics in his work, _The Riddle of the Universe_, his p.r.o.nouncements upon morality are not scientifically derived, but simply dogmatically a.s.sumed. The underlying principle of monism is that the universe is a unity in which no distinction exists between the material and the spiritual. In this world as we know it there reigns only one kind of law, the invariable law of nature. The so-called spiritual life of man is not an independent realm having its own rights and aims; it belongs wholly to nature. The moral world is a province of the physical, and the key to all the departments of reality is to be found in science {102} alone. The doctrine of evolution is brought into the service of monism, and the attempt is made to prove that in the very process of biological development human thought, moral sentiment, and social instincts have been evolved. With a curious sacrifice of consistency, Haeckel does not agree with Feuerbach in exalting egoism to the place of supremacy in the moral life. He recognises two kinds of duty--duty to self and duty to society. The social sense once created is permanent, and rises to ever-fresh developments. But benevolence, like every other obligation, is, according to evolutionary monism, a product evolved from the battle of existence. Traced to its source, it has its spring in the physical organism, and is but an enlargement of the ego.[3]

The monistic naturalism of Haeckel offers no high ideal to life. Its Ethics is but a glorified egoism. Its dictates never rise above the impulses derived from nature. But not religion only with its kingdom of G.o.d, nor morality only with its imperatives, nor art with its power of idealising the world of nature, but even science itself, with its claim to unify and organise facts, proves that man stands apart from, and is higher than, the material world. The very existence of such activities in the invisible realm renders vain every attempt to reduce the spiritual to the natural, and to make truth, goodness and beauty mere outgrowths of nature.

2. On its ethical side naturalism is closely a.s.sociated with the theory of life which bears the name of _utilitarianism_--the theory which regards pleasure or profit as the aim of man. In its most independent form Hedonism can hardly be said to exist now as a reasoned theory.

Carried out to its extreme consequences it reduces man to a mere animal.

Hence a type of reflective egoism has taken the place of animal gratification, and the idea of ulterior benefit has succeeded to that of immediate pleasure.

The names a.s.sociated with this theory of morals are those of Hobbes, Bentham, and the two Mills. Hobbes, {103} who preaches undiluted egoism,[4] may be regarded as the father of utilitarianism. But the t.i.tle was first applied to the school of Bentham.[5] Bentham's watchword was 'utility' expressed in his famous formula--'The greatest happiness of the greatest number.' While renouncing the abstract ideal of equality, he yet a.s.serted the equal claim of every individual to happiness. In its distribution 'each is to count for one, and no one for more than one.'

Hence Bentham insisted upon an exact quant.i.tative calculation of the consequences of our actions as the only sufficient guide to conduct. The end is the production of the maximum of pleasure and the minimum of pain.

J. S. Mill modified considerably the principle of utility by introducing the doctrine of the qualitative difference in pleasures.[6] While Bentham a.s.sumed self-interest as the only motive of conduct, Mill affirmed the possibility of altruism in the motive as well as in the end or criterion of right actions.[7] Thus the idea of utility was extended to embrace higher moral ends. But the ant.i.thesis between the 'self' and the 'other'

was not overcome. To introduce the notion of sympathy, as Adam Smith and others did, is to beg the question. Try as you will, you cannot deduce benevolence from selfishness. The question for the utilitarian must always arise, 'How far ought I to follow my natural desires, and how far my altruistic?' There must be a constant conflict, and he can only be at peace with himself by striking a balance. The utilitarian must be a legalist. The principle of self-sacrifice does not spring from his inner being. Truth, love, sacrifice--all that gives to man his true worth as a being standing in vital relation to G.o.d--are only artificial adaptations based on convenience and general advantage.

3. Evolutionary ethics, as expounded by Spencer and others, though employing utilitarian principles, affords an ampler and more plausible account of life than early {104} Hedonism.[8] The evolutionists have enriched the idea of happiness by quietly slipping in many ends which really belong to the idea of the 'good.' As the term 'gravitation' was the magic word of the eighteenth century, so the word 'evolution' is the talisman of the present age. It must be admitted that it is a sublime and fruitful idea. It explains much in nature and history which the old static notion failed to account for. It has a great deal to teach us even in the spiritual sphere. But when applied to life as a whole, and when it is a.s.sumed to be the sole explanation of moral action, it is apt to rob the will of its initiative and reduce all moral achievements to merely natural factors in an unfolding drama of life. The soul itself, with all its manifestations and experiences, is treated simply as the resultant and harmonious effect of adaptation to environment. Man is regarded as the highest animal, the most richly specialised organism--the last of a long series in the development of life, the outstanding feature of which is the acquired power of complete adjustment to the world, of which it is a part. Strictly speaking, there is no room for a personal G.o.d in this mechanical theory of the universe. The world becomes inevitably 'the Be all and the End all.' Hence, as might be expected, while evolutionary Ethics claims to cover the whole range of this present life, it does not pretend to extend into the regions of the hereafter.

It is concerned only with what it conceives to be the highest earthly good--the material and social well-being of mankind. But no theory of life can be p.r.o.nounced satisfactory which explains man in terms of this earth alone. The 'Great Unknown' which Mr. Spencer posits[9] as the ultimate source of all power, is a force to be reckoned with; and, known or unknown, is the mightiest factor in all life's experiences. Man's spiritual nature in its whole range cannot be treated as of no account.

'The powers of the world to come' have an essential bearing upon human {105} conduct in this world. They shape our thoughts and determine our ideals. Hence any view of life which excludes from consideration the spiritual side of man, and limits his horizon by the things of this earth must of necessity be inadequate and unsatisfactory.

4. Closely connected with, and, indeed, arising out of, the evolutionary theory, another type of thought, prevalent to-day, falls to be noted--_the socialistic tendency_. It is now universally recognised that the individual cannot be treated as an isolated being, but only in relation to society of which he is a part. The emphasis is laid upon the solidarity of mankind, and man is explained by such social facts as heredity and environment. Marx and Engels, the pioneers of the socialistic movement, accepted in the fullest sense the scientific doctrine of evolution. So far from being a mere Utopian dream, Marx contends that Socialism is the inevitable outcome of the movement of modern society. The aim of the agitation is to bring men to a clear consciousness of a process which is going forward in all countries where the modern industrial methods prevail. Democracy must come to itself and a.s.sume its rights. The keynote of the past has been the exploitation of man by man in the three forms of slavery, serfdom, and wage-labour. The keynote of the future must be the exploitation of the earth by man _a.s.sociated to man_. The practical aim of Socialism is that industry is to be carried on by a.s.sociated labourers jointly owning the means of production. Here, again, the all-pervading ideal is--the general good of society--the happiness of the greatest number. The reduction of all aims to a common level, the equalising of social conditions, the direction and control of all private interests and personal endeavours, are to be means to one end--the material good of the community. Socialism is not, however, confined to an agitation for material welfare. The industrial aspect of it is only a phase of a larger movement. On its ethical side it is the outcome of a strong aspiration after a higher life.[10] The world is awakening to {106} the fact that the majority of the human family has been virtually excluded from all partic.i.p.ation in man's inheritance of knowledge and culture. The labouring cla.s.ses have been from time immemorial sunk in drudgery and ignorance, bearing the burden of society without sharing in its happiness. It is contended that every man ought to have an opportunity of making the most of his life and obtaining full freedom for the development of body and mind. The aim to secure justice for the many, to protect the weak against the strong, to mitigate the fierceness of compet.i.tion, to bring about a better understanding between capital and labour, and to gain for all a more elevated and expansive existence, is not merely consistent with, but indispensable to, a true Christian conception of life. But the question which naturally arises is, how this reformation is to be brought about.

Never before have so many revolutionary schemes been proposed, and so many social panaceas for a better world set forth. It is, indeed, a hopeful sign of the times that the age of unconcern is gone and the temper of cautious inaction has yielded to scientific diagnosis and courageous treatment. It must not be forgotten, however, that the exclusively utilitarian position tends to lower the moral ideal, and that the exaggerated emphasis upon the social aspect of life fails to do justice to the independence of the individual. The tendency of modern political thought is to increase the control of government, and to regard all departments of activity as branches of the state, to be held and worked for the general good of the community. Thus there is a danger that the individual may gradually lose all initiative, and life be impoverished under a coercive mechanical system.

Socialism in its extreme form might easily become a new kind of tyranny.

By the establishment of collectivism, by making the state the sole owner of all wealth, the sole employer of labour, and the controller of science and art, as well as of education and religion, there is a danger of crushing the spiritual side of man, and giving to all life and endeavour a merely naturalistic character and content.

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5. It was inevitable that an exaggerated insistence upon the importance of society should provoke an equally one-sided emphasis upon the worth of the individual, and that as a protest against the demands of Socialism there should arise a form of subjectivism which aims at complete self-affirmation.

(1) This tendency has received the name of _aesthetic-individualism_. As a conception of life it may be regarded as intermediate between naturalism and idealism. While rooted in a materialistic view of life, it is moulded in the hands of its best advocates by spiritual aspirations. Its standpoint may be characterised as a theory of existence which seeks the highest value of life in the realm of the beautiful, and which therefore endeavours to promote the supreme good of the individual through devotion to art. Not only does the cultivation of art tend in itself to elevate life by concentrating the soul upon all that is fairest and n.o.blest in the world, but the best means of enriching and enn.o.bling life is to regard life itself as a work of art. This view of existence, it is claimed, widens the scope of experience, and leads us into ampler worlds of interest and enjoyment. It aims at giving to personality a rounded completeness, and bringing the manifold powers and pa.s.sions of man into harmonious unity. As a theory of life it is not new. Already Plato, and still more Aristotle, maintained that a true man must seek his highest satisfaction not in the possession of external things, but in the most complete manifestation of his faculties.

Individual aestheticism largely animated the Romantic movement of Germany at the beginning of last century. But probably the best ill.u.s.tration of it is to be found in Goethe and Schiller; while in our country Matthew Arnold has given it a powerful and persuasive exposition. It was the aim of Goethe to mould his life into a work of art, and all his activities and poetic aspirations were subordinated to this end. The beautiful harmonious life is the true life, the well-rounded whole from which must be banished everything narrow, vulgar, and distasteful, and in which {108} everything fair and n.o.ble must find expression. 'Each individual,'

says Schiller, 'is at once fitted and destined for a pure ideal manhood.'

And the attainment of this ideal requires from us the most zealous self-culture and a concentration of effort upon our own peculiar gifts.[11]

A new form of aestheticism has lately appeared which pretends to combine morality and culture. 'The New Ethic,'[12] as it is called, protests against the sombreness of religious traditions and the rigidity of moral restrictions, and a.s.signs to art the function of emanc.i.p.ating man and idealising life. But what this movement really offers under its new catchword is simply a subtler form of epicureanism, a finer self-indulgence. It is the expression of a desire to be free from all restraint, to close one's eyes to the 'majesty of human suffering,'

allowing one's thoughts to dwell only upon the agreeable and gay in life.

It regards man as simply the sum-total of his natural inclinations, and conceives duty to be nothing else than the endeavour to bring these into equilibrium.

That the aesthetic culture of life is a legitimate element in Christian morality can hardly be denied by any one who has pondered the meaning in all its breadth of the natural simplicity and spiritual beauty of the manifestation of the Son of Man. The beautiful, the good, and the true are intimately connected, and const.i.tute together all that is conceivably highest in life. Christian Ethics ought to include everything that is gracious and fair; and any theory of life that has no room for joy and beauty, for laughter and song, for appreciation of artistic or poetic expression, is surely deficient. But it is one thing to acknowledge these things; it is another to make them the whole of existence. We live in a world in which much else besides beauty and joy exists, and it is not by shirking contact with the unlovely phases of experience, but by resolutely accepting the ministry of sorrow they impose, {109} that we attain to our highest selves. The narrow Puritanism of a past age may need the corrective of the broader Humanism of to-day, but not less must the Ethic of self-culture be reinforced by the Ethic of self-sacrifice.

We may not cultivate the beauty of life at the cost of duty, nor forget that it is often only through the immolation of self that the self can be realised.

(2) While the Romantic movement, of which Goethe was the most ill.u.s.trious representative, did much to enlarge life and enn.o.ble the whole expanse of being, its extreme subjectivism and aristocratic exclusiveness found ultimate expression (_a_) in the pessimism of Schopenhauer, and the arrogance of Nietzsche. The alliance between art and morality was dissolved. The imagination scorned all fetters and, in its craving for novelty and contempt of convention, became the organ of individual caprice and licence. In Nietzsche--that strange erratic genius--at once artist, philosopher, and rhapsodist--this philosophy of life found brilliant if bizarre utterance. If Schopenhauer reduces existence to nothing, and finds in oblivion and extinction its solution, (_b_) Nietzsche seeks rather to magnify life by striking the note of a proud and defiant optimism. He claims for the individual limitless rights; and, repudiating all moral ties, a.s.serts the complete sovereignty of the self-sufficing ego. With a deep-rooted hatred of the prevailing tendencies of civilisation, he combines a vehement desire for a richer and unrestrained development of human power. He would not only revalue all moral values, but reverse all ideas of right and wrong. He would soar 'beyond good and evil,' declaring that the prevailing judgments of mankind are pernicious prejudices which have too long tyrannised over the world. He acknowledges himself to be not a moralist, but an 'immoralist,' and he bids us break in pieces the ancient tables of the Decalogue. Christianity is the most debasing form of slave-morality. It has made a merit of weakness and servility, and given the name of virtue to such imbecilities as meekness and self-sacrifice. He calls upon the individual to exalt himself. The man of {110} the future is to be the man of self-mastery and virile force, 'the Superman,' who is to crush under his heel the cringing herd of weaklings who have hitherto possessed the world. The earth is for the strong, the capable, the few. A mighty race, self-a.s.sertive, full of vitality and will, is the goal of humanity.

The vital significance of Nietzsche's radicalism lies less in its positive achievement than in its stimulating effect. Though his account of Christianity is a caricature, his strong invective has done much to correct the sentimental rose-water view of the Christian faith which has been current in some pietistic circles. The Superman, with all its vagueness, is a n.o.ble, inspiring ideal. The problem of the race is to produce a higher manhood, to realise which there is need for sacrifice and courage. Nietzsche is the spiritual father and forerunner of the Eugenics. The Superman is not born, he is bred. Our pa.s.sions must be our servants. Obedience and fidelity, self-discipline and courage are the virtues upon which he insists. 'Be master of life. . . .' 'I call you to a new n.o.bility. Ye shall become the procreators and sowers of the future.'

While there is much that is suggestive in Nietzsche's scathing criticisms, and many pa.s.sages of striking beauty in his books, he is stronger in his denials than his affirmations, and it is the negative side that his followers have fastened upon and developed. Sudermann, the novelist, has carried his philosophy of egoism to its extreme. This writer, in a work ent.i.tled _Sodom's End_, affirms that there is nothing holy and nothing evil. There is no such thing as duty or love. Only nerves exist. The 'Superman' becomes a monster. Such teaching can scarcely be taken seriously. It conveys no helpful message. It is the perversion of life's ideal.

As a pa.s.sing phase of thought it is interesting, but it solves no problems; it advances no truths. It resembles a whirlwind which helps to clear the air and drive away superfluous leaves, but it does little to quicken or expand new seeds of life.

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II

IDEALISTIC TENDENCY

1. Modern Idealism was inaugurated by Kant. Kant's significance for thought lies in his twofold demand for a new basis of knowledge and morality. He conceived that both are possible, and that both are interdependent, and have but one solution. The solution, however, could only be achieved by a radical change of method, and by the introduction of new standards of value. Kant's theory of morals was an attempt to reconcile the two opposing ethical principles which were current in the eighteenth century. On the one side, the Realists treated man simply as a natural being, and accordingly demanded a pursuance of his natural impulses. On the other side, the Dogmatists conceived that conduct must be governed by divine sanctions. Both theories agreed in regarding happiness as the end of life; the one the happiness of sensuous enjoyment; the other, that of divine favour. Both set an end outside of man himself as the basis of their ethical doctrine. Kant was dissatisfied with this explanation of the moral life. The question, therefore, which arises is, Whence comes the idea of duty which is an undeniable fact of our experience? If it came merely from without, it could never speak to us with absolute authority, nor claim unquestioning obedience. That which comes from without depends for its justification upon some consequence external to our action, and must be based, indeed, upon some excitement of reward or pain. But that would destroy it as a moral good; since nothing can be morally good that is not pursued for its own sake. Kant, therefore, seeks to show that the law of the moral life must originate within us, must spring from an inherent principle of our own rational nature. Hence the distinctive feature of Kant's moral theory is the enunciation of the 'Categorical Imperative'--the supreme inner demand of reason. From this principle of autonomy there arise at once the notions of man's freedom and the law's {112} universality.

Self-determination is the presupposition of all morality. But what is true for one is true for all. Each man is a member of a rational order, and possesses the inalienable independence and the moral dignity of being an end in himself. Hence the formula of all duty is, 'Act from a maxim at all times fit to be a universal law.'

It is the merit of Kant that he has given clear expression to the majesty of the moral law. No thinker has more strongly a.s.serted man's spiritual nature or done more to free the ideal of duty from all individual narrowness and selfish interest. But Kant's principle of duty labours under the defect, that while it determines the form, it tells us nothing of the content of duty. We learn from him the grandeur of the moral law, but not its essence or motive-power. He does not clearly explain what it is in the inner nature of man that gives to obligation its universal validity or even its dominating force. As a recent writer truly says, 'In order that morality may be possible at all, its law must be realised _in_ me, but while the way in which it is realised is mine, the content is not mine; otherwise the whole conception of obligation is destroyed.'[13] If the soul's function is purely formal how can we attain to a self-contained life? Moreover, if the freedom which Kant a.s.signs to man is really to achieve a higher ideal and bring forth a new world, must there not be some spiritual power or energy, some dynamic force, which, while it is within man, is also without, and independent of, him? 'Duty for duty's sake' lacks lifting power, and is the essence of legalism. Love, after all, is the fulfilling of the law.

2. To overcome the Kantian abstraction, and give content to the formal law of reason was the aim of the idealistic writers who succeeded him.

Fichte conceived of morality as action--self-consciousness realising itself in a world of deeds. Hegel started with the _Idea_ as the source of all reality, and developed the conception of Personality attaining self-realisation through the growing consciousness of the world and of G.o.d. Personality involves capacity. The {113} law of life, therefore, is, 'Be a person and respect others as persons.'[14] Man only comes to himself as he becomes conscious that his life is rooted in a larger self.

Morality is just the gradual unfolding of an eternal purpose whose whole is the perfection of humanity. It has been objected that the idea of life as an evolutionary process, which finds its most imposing embodiment in the system of Hegel, if consistently carried out, destroys all personal motive and self-determining activity, and reduces the history of the world to a soulless mechanism. Hegel himself was aware of this objection, and the whole aim of his philosophy was to show that personality has no meaning if it be not the growing consciousness of the infinite. The more recent exponents of his teaching have endeavoured to prove that the individual, so far from being suppressed, is really _expressed_ in the process, that, indeed, while the universal life underlies, unifies, and directs the particular phases of existence, the individual in realising himself is at the same time determining and evolving the larger spiritual world--a world already implicitly present in his earliest consciousness and first strivings. The absolute is indeed within us from the very beginning, but we have to work it out.

Hence life is achieved through conflict. The universe is not a place for pleasure or apathy. It is a place for soul-making. No rest is to be found by an indolent withdrawal from the world of reality. 'In one way or another, in labour, in learning, and in religion, every man has his pilgrimage to make, his self to remould and to acquire, his world and surroundings to transform. . . . It is in this adventure, and not apart from it, that we find and maintain the personality which we suppose ourselves to possess _ab initio_.'[15] The soul is a world in itself; but it is not, and must not be treated as, an isolated personality impervious to the mind of others. At each stage of its evolution it is the focus and expression of a larger world. A man does not value himself as a detached subject, but as the {114} inheritor of gifts which are focused in him. Man, in short, is a trustee for the world; and suffering and privation are among his opportunities. The question for each is, How much can he make of them? Something above us there must be to make us do and dare and hope, and the important thing is not one's separate destiny, but the completeness of experience and one's contribution to it.[16]