Book Reviews

( Originally Published 1909 )

COURS DE MORALE THÉORIQUE ET PRATIQUE. Par L. Dugas, Docteur ès lettres, Professeur agrégé de philosophie au lycée de Rennes. Paris : Henry Paulin et Cie, Editeurs. 1906.

This book (462 pages) aims at being a handbook of moral instruction. The author points out that he does not wish to preach or to edify. He desires "sans soucis de l'édification" to have to do "avec la préoccupation unique de la vérité." He divides his book into two parts. The first he calls "Morale théorique," the second part he calls "Morale pratique." He defines "la Morale" as "la détermination des moeurs idéales, non l'observation, ni l'explication des moeurs réelles." It is a normative science ; it lays down rules, while psychology reveals laws. Logic is the science of normal thought; "la Morale" the science of the normal will.

Historically, ethics ("la Morale") has not been independent of metaphysics and religion, but logically and "en droit" it is independent, if by that is meant that it has a method of its own distinct and proper to itself. But ethics and metaphysics act and react, limit and complete each other. In support and elucidation of this M. Dugas remarks : "La Morale, par example, doit changer, suivant qu'on croit ou non à l'immortalité de l'âme, au libre arbitre," etc. He further defines "la Morale" as the science of the good (la science du bien). The good is an end, and as such, ideal; not empiric and not real.

It is, however, obligatory, and therefore in some degree real. It is grounded (a son principe) in human instinct, and is an inspiration and impulse of the heart. The good is ideal in that it is never completely realized, but it is obligatory, and there-fore realizable. We learn what it is by being it. "Selon le mot d'Aristote, on devient cithariste en jouant de la cithare." All art is a product of Nature. Good customs existed before systematized morality, which was instinctive before it was rational. Reason reflected on morality and thereby transformed it; out of that which was a generous impulse of the heart reflection made a duty; reason defined, fixed and universalized the good. To elaborate a science is not in the deepest sense to create it ; the first inspiration, the true invention, came from else where, "du génie spontané, de l'esprit qui souffle ou il veut." It is from a natural impulse of the heart, from a natural love of the good (sentiment du bicn) that we get the idea of value. This sentiment or natural impulse of the heart toward goodness has a rhythmic development, now full of aspiration, now full of weakness. It is this sentiment, freed from its weakness, which is the ground of morality (principe de la morale). Rea-son does not create this sentiment, nor direct it from the out-side ; but it enables it to become consistent with itself. The reason, moreover, with which "la Morale" has to do is not so much abstract reason, as practical reason embodied in the experience of life. The moral sentiment formed and developed in the school of life, brought into order and enlarged by reason, is the ground of morality (principe de la morale).

Ethics ("la Morale") is then a complex science at once deductive and inductive. Deductive in that it lays down rules and draws conclusions from them, inductive in that it starts from the observation of human life and has regard, in its application of its rules, to sociological and psychological facts. But above all it is dialectic in its method; that is to say, it pushes its principles right back to their source in feeling (sentiment) ; it establishes a standard and vindicates this standard in face of the facts of individual and social life.

This is, almost in his own words, M. Dugas' synopsis of his point of view. He divides his treatise into two parts: (1) "La Morale théorique, " by which he explains that he means the theory of duty in itself, the definition of the ideal of conduct for man in general; and (2) "la Morale pratique," by which he means the delineation of duties, particular ends of conduct, a man's duty toward himself, toward his fellows, toward his family, toward his country.

M. Dugas begins his examination of "la Morale théorique" by asking, What is the good? and how do we recognize it? And by way of answer he asks another question, What is the moral conscience in its nature, history and worth?

The moral conscience is one form of our self consciousness ; objectively it is our recognition of the good; subjectively it is our resolution to do or be the good. M. Dugas does not hold that conscience, either in the form of the consciousness of the good or in the form of the good will, exists in all men. There are some men "atteints de cécité morale, denués de toute idée de bien et de mal," who yet devote themselves to the culture of the arts and sciences and who are good citizens and good husbands and fathers simply because they like it. Such persons can commit crimes with no sense of guilt and without remorse. The normal conscience is a natural gift like the perception of beauty it is developed and illuminated by education ; and the good will, in the sense of the resolution to be and to do the good, is the result of habit working on the original gift. So that conscience is at once natural and acquired, its principle or ground exists in human nature and is developed, trained, enlightened and perfected by education and experience.

He then proceeds to analyze the good; rejects hedonism and utilitarianism, but points out that Will opened a "door of escape." Through this door we proceed to the solution that happiness is "un mot magique qui soulève les âmes," but we achieve it best by not thinking of it. Happiness is sought by all men, but all have not the same nature and therefore can-not achieve happiness by the same means. What is desirable is not to fight against that instinct, but to raise our conception of happiness. The question is not whether to seek happiness or not, but where to place happiness.

The chapter which follows, on "Morale du Sentiment," is peculiarly characteristic of M. Dugas' method and position. He defines the "Morale du sentiment" as the "Morale altruiste." Hé considers this in three different forms : Sympathy, love of approbation (l'honneur), and pity. In considering sympathy he quotes at length from Adam Smith, but concludes that sympathy cannot be the adequate "base" of morality; for (1) at times morality requires that one should outrage the feelings of others; (2) the ideal spectator in sympathy with whom Smith describes the moral man as acting, is none other than the man's own conscience, while (3) to found morality on sympathy in Smith's sense is to reduce to nothing conscience, and is to conceive of morality as the result of society (la vie en commune) rather than its principle or law.

A great amount of space is given to the examination of the sentiment of honor as a base of morality. "L'honneur" is de-fined as love of approbation, and is said to be composed partly of fear of public opinion and partly of self-respect. A very high value is given to it in the moral life, but on the whole it is said to be, together with sympathy. the objectification of conscience, or the recognition which a man looks for but on which he does not necessarily rely.

Schopenhauer's doctrine of pity has a short examination. Pity, M. Dugas decides, is indispensable to morality; but the selection of it alone as the source of morality he finds arbitrary.

Chapter V gives us perhaps best of all the central conception of M. Dugas' system, and indicates at the same time most clearly the limitation of his thought. The chapter treats of Duty in itself (le devoir lui-meme). The word Duty is equivocal ; it may mean "the thing due," "the good," or it may mean duty "in itself"; that is, "the law that commands us to do the good."

Duty in itself is the law of the individual conscience. "Conscience," says M. Dugs, "does not limit itself to the recognition of the good; it prescribes it and constitutes its law." Rejecting the Kantian conception of duty, as well as the criticism thereof by Schopenhauer, he accepts with whole-hearted approval the following from Höffding: "The idea of duty, as Höffding has well said, cannot be the primary idea in morality. 'Duty is practically a demand (pose une exigence), and this cannot arise apart from the idea of end. The idea of end is there-fore primarily in morals, and ethics should begin by postulating a conscience which accepts that end.' " The moral end being given, duty presents itself as the command to aim at that end, and persistently to follow it. There can be no conception of end to which this notion of duty is not necessarily attached. It ex-presses the necessity of detaching one's self habitually from the inclination of the moment, and devoting one's self habitually to an idea prescribed by reason. Duty (p. 73) is to feeling what reason is to instinct; it replaces it without destroying it. Feeling (sentiment) is a natural impulsion, blind and fugitive; duty is the will enlightened and rationalized; feeling is an isolated fact; duty is the law, the orientation of the whole life forever fixed in the direction one time indicated by feeling. From this it follows that duty is not the whole of morality, but represents the stage intermediate between instinctive morality and morality acquired, become the habit of acting according to reason, an observance of duty which thinks no more of duty but has be-come natural, and is that which Aristotle calls virtue.

In the chapter which follows on the relation of duty to happiness, we get incidentally a fuller definition of the good than was given us in the chapter devoted to that conception. If happiness be taken for the end of life and duty for the obligation to follow that end, the happiness which is meant must be that element in happiness which lies within our control, and not "happiness in general," which is largely the result of circumstances. It must, moreover, be that happiness which our reason shows us to be best, and not the inclination of the moment. Happiness thus understood is the good. But does this good consist in the fullest life and highest culture of the individual, or in the life that is happiest, though modest and humble? Is it perfection that we aim at or happiness? Happiness we are told is a condition which aspires ever to surpass itself; perfection or the desire for the better is an element in happiness; it is, indeed, of the essence of life. On the other hand, progress is not in itself a good; it must be conceived as producing happiness, or it does not commend itself to us. So that the good is really a synthesis of activity and happiness, of progress and order. We now see that the good is not an intuition a priori, but a product of human wisdom, evolved by experience and reason.

Such, M. Dugas says, is the form of the good. To its content he devotes three and a half pages. Is it the perfection of the individual considering society as his milieu? Or the progress of society, considering the individual as its agent? The answer is : It is neither. The individual and society exist "l'un par l'autre and non l'un pour l'autre." The good, however, is said finally to reside in personality, which is alone capable of feeling pleasure and pain, and is the sole vehicle of conscience; and as such it is individual, but as the individual can live and develop only in society his good has always a social aspect.

Thirty-six pages are devoted to the analysis of the idea of responsibility, but of these only a very small portion is occupied with the question of moral freedom. It is taken almost for granted that a man is responsible who in his act is free from external constraint, or from abnormal personal condition (as sleep-walking or mental derangement), and who is aware of what he is doing. Responsibility is relative to freedom of the will and degree of the intelligence. The greater part of the discussion addresses itself to such questions as : To whom are we responsible? and, In what does responsibility consist? By this latter question M. Dugas seems to mean, what do we pay, or win, in case our act is judged hood or had. For he replies, "Responsibility consists in merit or demerit, or in the sanctions, pain or praise." There are th ree tribunals before whom a man is judged. These are the legal court, public opinion and his own conscience. Of these a man's conscience is the ultimate, not only as the only judge who can wholly know the quality of a man's act, but also as the sole and adequate ground of the man's acceptance or rejection of the justice of the "sanctions" of the courts or public opinion. Finally, says M. Dugas, responsibility is nothing but the feeling of our personal worth diminished or increased, or the feeling of the justice of the sanctions by which our merit or demerit is confirmed.

It has at times an effect almost suffocating to have so much time spent in considering the question of merit or demerit. But it would be unjust to M. Dugas not to say that he points out that as morality develops and character is ennobled, less and less thought is bestowed on "merit" and "sanction." He also attributes the recognition of the justice of sanction in the case of punishment to the sense of the need of the expiation of personal guilt, and remarks that this is necessary to the man's moral regeneration This is a remarkable statement in a treatise as studiously non-religious as it is non-metaphysical in its ultimate arguments.

The first part, "Morale theorique," closes with a chapter on solidarity, which is part of the analysis of responsibility. Throughout this chapter M. Dugas seems to write with strong feeling. He is incensed at the effect of the modern doctrine of solidarity which, in emphasizing the thought of the individual as a product of his time, race and circumstances, tends to relieve or rob the individual of merit or of blame in a word, of responsibility. He denounces "la théorie de la réversibilité des fautes et des merites" (Joseph de Maistre) as ''simplement monstreuse." The true sentiment of solidarity is for M. Dugas, but an extension of individual responsibility, as in the perception of the law of inheritance and in the observation of the "repercussion" and action and interaction of social facts. An individual is not responsible for any social consequences of his act except in so far as he foresaw and willed those consequences. A society is not responsible except in so far as any group of persons wills an act which was fully understood and willed by each member of the group. Moreover solidarity is reciprocal, in the sense that a man only owes duties to others if the others recognize and discharge duties to him ; and can only claim with justice his rights when he is discharging all his duties.

It would be perhaps unjust to call M. Dugas' system individualistic. But it is nevertheless true that his warmest enthusiasm, and he is very enthusiastic, is always called forth by the individual aspect of morality. Certain points in his thought, moreover, give the impression that his conception of the individual is perhaps to some extent atomistic. The center of his system is the individual conscience. This is not regarded as the result of the interaction of human minds (society), each individual point of consciousness being an identical power of self-distinction and self-identification depending for its being as much on the not-self or the other-self, as on the self (if there is any sense in which the self exists apart from the not-self). Society may educate (for M. Dugas) the individual conscience. But the conscience is something "given."

It is perhaps this same element in his thought which enables him to talk of natural-right as le droit de l'homme, "en tant qu'homme, non en tant que citoyen d'un état" (p. 235), and which causes him to found natural right, not on anything which can be found in the nature of man, but on that which is most "mysterious and unknown" in him, viz., on his possibilities of development. Very abstract and negative is his idea of liberty : "Liberty is the right to do anything which is not injurious to others" (p. 234). Very abstract and empty is his notion of duty-in-itself as abstracted from all particular duties. In discussing and defining duty-in-itself, M. Dugas inevitably makes this unfortunate term assume a number of different meanings. At one time it is the perception of any good, at an-other the perception of the morally good, or that which the man has learnt to judge morally desirable. At another time it becomes the moral imperative, that is, the logical necessity of a conscious creature aiming at a goal. Yet again it is the trained habit of aiming at the goal of the good, and finally the good will or the good character of the man in whom this habit has become "second nature." M. Dugas does not use this term "second nature." But it seems to express his thought. Nothing could be further from his thought than the idea that in the thoroughly moralized will the man has simply found his own true nature. The law of conscience, "Thou shalt do the thing thou seest to be good," is never represented as the ultimate and inevitable necessity of human nature as such. It is not represented as involved in the judgment "this is good." It is never represented as the inevitable condition of the man's realizing bis nature as a member of a community.

"La Morale Pratique" contains a multitude of wise and balanced judgments. But they impress one, when they are really practical, as the judgments of an enlightened common sense, rather than as the outcome of any particular philosophical principles.

The style of the book is throughout delightful ; many passages in the second part are of an almost passionate eloquence.

MARY GILLILAND HUSBAND.

London.