04 Conscience and Reason

CHAPTER IV. CONSCIENCE AND REASON.

IT seems well now to say something of the relation of Conscience to Reason. I have already said that I regard conscience as the imperative aspect of moral reason. Conscience then, in mathematical language, is a function of the moral reason. But I take it that conscience is also a function of reason other than moral. In so far as conscience is a function of moral reason I hold that Intuitionism is true. In so far as conscience is a function of reason other than moral Intuitionism seems to me not true. The intuitional view of ethics is in principle this: that we know the Tightness of actions intuitively, or, in other words, when the conscience tells us that some action is wrong, it is not that we have reasoned out that it is wrong, but that by a special faculty called conscience we know it to be wrong. This is, I believe, a false psychology. Conscience is much too complex a thing to be explained as a special faculty. At the same time it seems to me clear that Intuitionism is partly true, and that we have an intuitive knowledge that there are certain things which we ought to do. Unless there is some ’ought ’ intuitively known, there can be no ought at all. For by no possible process of reasoning can you get an ought out of a not-ought. But if there be some one moral duty known by intuition, other moral duties may be deduced from it by a process of ordinary reasoning. We have here an ethical syllogism by which an ethical or moral proposition is deduced from an ethical proposition and another proposition not ethical. Thus I ought to do x. To do x it is necessary to do y, Therefore I ought to do y. But it is important to notice that doing y must be an exercise of my volition, otherwise the syllogism is fallacious. We could not argue that because I ought to speak the truth, and because I cannot speak the truth without increasing my own happiness, therefore I ought to increase my own happiness. For here, in the non-ethical premise, the increasing of my own happiness may not express an activity of my volition, but only a result which will follow on speaking the truth. This being so the conclusion does not follow. The only conclusion that could be drawn from these two premises would be that it is not a moral duty to me not to increase my happiness; or in other words, that it is right to increase my happiness. In the above syllogism then it is necessary that doing x and doing y should both express an activity of the subject’s volition. If this is so the ’ ought ’ of the conclusion is moral, as is the ought of the ethical premise. This kind of ethical reasoning which can be ex- pressed in the form of the above syllogism is not uncommon. There are instances of it in the New Testament. Thus in the Epistle to the Romans St. Paul writes, " We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves . . . for Christ also pleased not himself" (Romans 15:1; Romans 15:3).

It is here implied that Christians ought to be imitators of Christ, and this imitation makes necessary the duty of pleasing not ourselves.

There is a very remarkable moral appeal in St. John’s first Epistle : " If God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No man hath beheld God at any time : if we love one another God abideth in us, and his love is perfected in us." It is here taken for granted that we ought to shew love to those who have shewn love to us. The argument may be expressed in two syllogisms :

1. We ought to shew love to those who have shewn love to us.

God has shewn love to us, Therefore we ought to shew love to God.

2. We ought to shew love to God.

We cannot shew love to God except by shewing love to one another, Therefore we ought to shew love to one another. The conclusion here has been deduced from one ethical proposition, namely, ’ We ought to shew love to those who have shewn love to us,’ and two non- ethical propositions, ’ God hath shewn love to us,’ and ’ We cannot shew love to God except by shewing love to one another.’ This last seems to be what St. John means when he says : ’ No man hath beheld God at any time.’

It becomes clear then that to derive an ethical pro- position, which is an expression of moral duty, by a process of reasoning, it is necessary to have one ethical proposition to start with and no more than one. All the other propositions made use of are non-ethical. It would of course be utterly useless to attempt to deduce ethical propositions by a logical process unless we had some admitted ethical proposition to form the ethical premise of the first syllogism. Nor is it of any use to have more than one.

We see then that if to do x, which is my moral duty, it is necessary for me to do y, then to do y becomes to me a moral duty, and the reason why the doing of y is a moral duty is that the doing of # is a moral duty. If we proceed further to enquire why the doing of a; is a moral duty, one of two reasons must be found for this. Either the doing of a? is a moral duty because it is necessary to the doing of a, say, itself a moral duty. Or the doing of x is a moral duty because it is intuitively seen to be such. In this case the reason for it lies in the nature of the case. Unless there is some one moral duty the reason of which lies in the nature of the case, there can be no moral duty at all, and no science of ethics worthy of the name of science. There must be at least one intuitively known moral duty, and there may of course be more than one, if there are any at all.

Thus if the moral intuitions were to remain constant moral duties would vary according to the growth of experience interpreted by reason other than moral. Say that it is a moral intuition to shew gratitude and to make return for benefits received from another person who has voluntarily bestowed them. Endless moral duties may flow by a perfectly logical sequence from this one. A Christian and another not a Christian have, say, both alike this moral intuition of grati- tude. Yet what consequences follow from it to the Christian who believes St. John’s words that "God so loved us," which consequences do not apply to the case of the non-Christian who does not know God’s love ! If we know that we have freely received, we know also that we ought freely to give. Ignorance of the fact that we have freely received would mean that we could not know that we ought freely to give, even though the moral intuition to show gratitude for benefits were ours. A critical case for testing any theory of the variations of conscience is that of the trial of Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac. I have never yet seen a satisfactory explanation of this moral perplexity. Yet it seems to me that if the above analysis of the conscience be true, we can explain this incident without any shock to the moral reason. For if we suppose, as just now, that it is a moral intuition to shew gratitude and to make return for benefits received, but that it is not a moral intuition not to kill on this point I propose to say something presently then the moral perplexity is removed. For Abraham has, according to the story in Genesis, received a child in his old age, whose birth had been announced beforehand to him by a messenger from God. The child is born in due course. He is obviously from the circumstances of his conception and birth a divine gift. What gratitude can the father shew for this signal favour? It seems to me possible that the people among whom Abraham was living were in the habit of sacrificing their children to their gods. If so, here was Abraham’s trial. Does he owe less to his God than these people were ready to give to theirs? Ought he not to sacrifice his son to the God who has given him? And it must be remembered that the whole point of the story depends on the fact that this which God demanded of Abraham, and which accorded with his moral reason, was quite contrary to his altruistic instincts. The temptation, as we use the word, was to disobey. The temptation was not to slay his son. All the instincts of a father’s affection rebelled against the command ; and yet he owed his son to God. His moral duty was hard to fulfil, but it was clear. It was God’s trial of him, and he stood the test. There is nothing to shock the moral reason in the conclusion of the story. Had Abraham wanted to slay his son, had an evil instinct prompted him to take his son’s life, and had he made a divine command an excuse for doing what he wanted to do, the story would have shocked our moral reason. As it is, I do not think it need at all. But it may be said that this explanation of a great moral difficulty, though satisfactory in its conclusion, proceeds from a false hypothesis, namely, that it is not an intuitively known moral duty to refrain from killing a fellow-man. Against such a supposition I can imagine that some may recoil with horror, as possibly it seems to them so obviously intuitive not to murder. But I think that an impartial investigation of the matter will shew that the hypothesis made above to justify the story of Abraham’s meditated sacrifice of Isaac is correct after all. For let it be remembered first of all that we do not even to-day with all our enlightenment consider it in all cases wrong to take a fellow-man’s life. It is true that the taking of life is regulated by law, yet still life is taken away, and even Christians take part in war which involves the slaughter of their fellows. I am not here discussing the ethics of war, for this is alien to the present subject, but I am insisting on the fact that man does even to-day under certain circumstances take away the life of man and that deliberately. This is a fact to be borne in mind. Further, I do not think that we are justified in regarding it as a primary moral intuition not to kill. For how would those who take this view explain the conduct of Moses recorded in Exodus 2:11-12? When people regard it as a moral intuition to abstain from murder, they are confusing, as it seems to me, two things, namely, moral intuition and virtuous instinct. It has become with us an instinct to refrain from murder, and we shudder and recoil from the very thought of bloodshedding in revenge or hatred. This is one of those instincts of which I spoke in the last chapter, which have been acquired for us as instincts by the virtues of former generations. We do not count it a virtue to abstain from murder, because our instinct to do so is so strong apart from all motive of self-respect. But if it is said : Well, but it is certainly vicious to murder, I reply that of course it is. We know that we ought not to murder if we are tempted to do so, that is to say if some instinct tends to overpower the virtuous instinct of abstention from murder, such as the instinct of revenge or the instinct to have some- thing for our own which is kept from us by the life of another. And we know all the more that we ought not to murder because we feel within us the virtuous instinct against which the lower instinct is striving. It is our moral reason which tells us that the one instinct is lower than the other. But the moral duty of abstention from murder is really based on the general moral duty of refraining from hatred or injury of another. Jesus Christ traced murder to its proper source : " Ye have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt not kill ; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment : but I say unto you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment ; and whosoever shall say to his brother Raca [an expression of contempt] shall be in danger of the council; and whosoever shall say Thou fool [an expression of condemnation] shall be in danger of the Gehenna of fire " (St. Matthew 5:21, ff.). As I understand this passage, we have here three gradations of punishment. Our Lord is not instituting a legal system. Such was far from the intention of Him Who declared unmistakably that His kingdom was not of this world. The three degrees of punish- ment ascending from the cognisance of the local court through trial by the Sanhedrim, the highest spiritual jurisdiction, to the punishment of the worst criminal, are designed to shew the ascending gravity of the sins of anger, contempt, and condemnation. [See Lange’s Gospel of St. Matthew on this passage.] The root sin is, according to Christ’s teaching, anger or hatred. We may compare St. John’s words in his first Epistle (1 John 3:15) : " Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer, and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him." The moral reason then gives the duty of abstention from hatred or injury. The moral life of men in its earlier stages was of course only struggling towards the recognition of this, and the duty of abstention from murder would receive an early recognition, murder being the extreme instance of hatred.

It is nothing to the purpose to say that abstention from murder only came about to make the life of a community at all possible, and that the law of the community, established in its own interest, made murder criminal. Human law such as this could not prove lasting unless it had its basis in the great moral law of God. Men who suffered the penalty of the law of their community would recognise the justice and not merely the necessity of their sentence. Human law, while it supports itself by an appeal to cosmic principles what is implied in this expression later chapters will reveal is yet based on eternal laws of God. That it is possible that human law should not be based on eternal laws of God I fully recognise, for this is what we mean when we speak of a law as unjust. Unjust laws must in time give place to just laws, and the laws of man approximate more and more to the eternal laws of God. But the kingdoms of this world, which enforce the law, are not free from the cosmic spirit, yet are they God’s agents for advancing the eternal law until they become "the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ." In saying this I am anticipating much that will be worked out more fully in later chapters of this essay.

I have said enough now to justify the line I took up in regard to the story of Abraham’s meditated sacrifice of his son Isaac. The gratitude he owed to God was a moral duty proceeding from self-respect. In obeying the command of God he acted morally, and his obedience was a righteous obedience. Of course it may be said that Abraham’s notions of what God required of him were crude. This seems to me undeniable ; and it were absurd to expect to find in Abraham Christian thoughts about God. God’s commands to men are, it would seem, a function of their moral state, and these cannot appear the same to a being with moral reason fully developed and to a being whose moral reason is as yet/ only struggling to an understanding of itself.

It seems to me that one of the earliest intuitions of the moral reason would be the nobility and the duty of gratitude. And along with the cognition that we ought to shew gratitude is the instinct to do it. But it may be said that the instinct is often but a weak one, and unable of itself to withstand stronger and selfish instincts. This is true. The weakness of the instinct of gratitude may result from our own selfishness which blinds us to the extent to which gratitude is due. For we find ourselves unable often to see that when we have received a benefit from some other person, the benefit has been bestowed disinterestedly. We are too ready to assume that when people do us good they have some ulterior motive other than the satisfaction of doing the good. And it is possible to withhold gratitude on the ground that it is not really due. The instinct to show gratitude is not blind. The reason must first be satisfied that gratitude is due, and the instinct then becomes very strong.

It may seem that gratitude is a merely mercenary instinct. It is such an obvious duty to pay our debts, and one that no self-respecting person can refuse to recognise and act upon. It is something if it be allowed that self-respect as distinguished from selfishness (and the two are absolutely distinct) is the basis of gratitude, for this is to allow that it has its root in the moral reason. " What is thine is mine, and what is mine is my own " is the thought of selfishness, that is the natural unspiritualised thought. " What is mine is thine " is a thought that springs from self- respect, even if there be appended to the words, " because I owe it to thee." Only a being endowed with moral reason can have a cognition of a debt. This may at first seem strange, but I think that reflection will convince us that self-respect is necessary to the acknowledgment that we owe anything. But it may seem that we are passing from the ’ ought ’ to the notion of what we owe, which is not necessarily the same; that while it is likely that ’ ought ’ is in origin the preterite of ’ owe,’ the two words have so separated from one another that it is mere equivocation to bring them together again. This equivocation I am most anxious to avoid, and although I think that in the end it will come to be recognised that all moral duties can be performed from a motive of gratitude, I am bound to recognise that we have a cognition of other duties in the first place which do not seem to be reasoned from the intuitively known moral duty of gratitude. But what it does seem to me important to recognise is the fact that gratitude is both instinct and duty. As conduct does not proceed wholly from reason, but requires instinct to carry it out, and as the instinct of gratitude can become stronger than all other instincts, it is of the very greatest importance.

We have, as it seems, knowledge of other moral duties than gratitude through the discipline of law and moral training, but these moral duties, which it is the part of education to set before us, could never become moral duties unless they were seen to have their basis in the moral reason. In what way then we may ask are these supported by an intuition of the moral reason? My own view of the matter is this, that by the moral reason we discern, as I have already said, the dignity and worth of being, and we recognise the nobility of sacrificing ourselves for the good of others ; and it is just because we see that the laws of restriction which are imposed upon us by early training require us to control our instincts for the good of others that these laws become to us expressions of moral duty. In so far as these general moral laws are based on reason, they depend on the moral intuition that we ought to live for the good of others. We recognise that a being who deliberately chooses a selfish life is contemptible, and that true self-realisation conies from sacrifice of self in the interests of others. We inherit the rules from the past, but they justify themselves to reason because we soon detect that temptation to evade them proceeds from selfish desires; and these are just what moral reason demands that we should control. For my own part I have no objection to interpret moral duty in terms of the promotion of the happiness of others, provided that it be not stated that it is a moral duty to promote my own happiness. This I could not allow. I naturally desire my own happiness, and what I naturally desire there can be no moral duty to me to promote. To seek my own happiness does not seem to be a requirement made by my moral reason. It may be otherwise when we substitute the word ’ Good ’ for happiness ; but this will require some further investigation, which I think it better to reserve for the next chapter. My view of conscience then is this : that it is the requirement seemingly made by circumstances interpreted by reason to carry out that which the moral reason absolutely and without condition declares to be good. I believe it to be the voice of God in the soul of man, as I have already said. But that it is a voice saying ’ Do this/ without giving us any knowledge of the reason why we are to do it, I cannot allow.

It seems well now, before concluding this chapter, to say something of the distinction which has been made by moralists between "moral duties" and "positive duties." Here, says Butler in the Analogy, "lies the distinction between what is positive and what is moral in religion. Moral precepts are precepts the reasons of which we see; positive precepts are precepts the reasons of which we do not see. Moral duties arise out of the nature of the case itself, prior to external command. Positive duties do not arise out of the nature of the case but from external command, nor would they be duties at all were it not for such command received from him whose creatures and subjects we are." [Analogy of Religion, Part II., chap. i.]

We must observe that there is a twofold distinction made here. There is a distinction between what is "moral" and what is "positive," and a distinction between "precepts" and "duties." A precept, in Butler’s language, is an external command which may or may not find an echo or response in the conscience. If the precept does find a response in the conscience and moral reason, it is a moral precept, but not otherwise. The precept ’Thou shalt not steal’ is a moral precept if it finds itself supported by the moral reason. And it is by the moral reason that the reason of it is discerned. The precept ’Do this in remembrance of me’ does not find itself interpreted by the moral reason. We do not then see the reason of it. This is a positive precept.

It must be clearly understood that the reasons or reason of a moral precept are moral reasons. To shew more clearly what is meant by this we will consider the precept ’ Do this in remembrance of me.’ Now suppose that we were told that unless we obeyed this precept we could not be partakers of Christ in the fullest sense; and suppose, for the purpose of the argument, that we believed this. It may be said that we now see the reason of the precept. Does it then become to us a moral precept? Clearly it does not become to us a moral precept, because we now know the reason of it in the sense explained. This may be a cause-and-effect reason, a practical reason, but it is not a moral reason. Unless it be to me a moral duty to become a partaker of Christ, then the precept ’ Do this in remembrance of me ’ does not become to me a moral precept, just because I know that if I do not obey it I shall fail to become a partaker of Christ.

If, however, it were to me a moral duty to become a partaker of Christ, which partaking I knew to depend upon "doing this," it would become my moral duty to "do this,’’ and the precept would be to me a moral precept.

We want now to understand in what sense the word ’duty’ is applicable in the expression "positive duty." What is there in common between "moral duties" and "positive duties" to justify the application of the same term ’duties’ to both? A precept is a command, and thus we can see the appropriateness of this term as applied to a moral precept ’ Thou shalt not steal ’ and a positive precept ’ Do this in remembrance of me.’ But in what sense can the term ’ duty ’ be applied to what Butler calls a ’positive duty’? There is really no justification for the use of the term ’ duty’ here except it be a moral duty to obey the author of the positive precept, in which case, let it be noticed, it becomes a moral duty to "do this," and the precept itself becomes a moral one.

If then there is any distinction at all between moral duties and positive duties it may be said to lie in this: that while ’ a moral duty is a duty of obedience to a precept which finds a response in the conscience and moral reason, a positive duty is a duty of obedience to him who has given the precept, the moral reason of which we cannot see. For my own part I think the distinction between moral and positive duties is not a desirable one. Nor would it ever have been made but for the fact that there was no clear recognition of the fact that duty must justify itself to moral reason, and must not appeal merely to prudence. Bishop Butler in his anxiety to persuade people that it is as imprudent to disobey the positive precepts of Christ as it is to disobey the moral precepts has tried to include obedience to both as of the same order by using a common term ’ duties ’ for both. The result is, as it appears to me, some confusion of idea.

If I think that in disobeying a positive precept of Christ I shall perhaps be the loser myself in the long run, it may be prudent to obey, but it does not become to me a moral duty so to do. If I obey merely because I think I shall lose if I do not, I do not act morally. But if I think that in not heeding such a precept I am depriving myself of some good, such good commending itself to my moral reason and not merely appealing to my prudence, I recognise that it would become to me a moral duty to obey. Unless we have some clear definition of the Good we shall be unable to decide whether or not it would be likely to become a moral duty to obey a positive precept.

Butler’s point of view was that we ought to render obedience to God because We are His creatures and subjects. But then it must be remembered that it is only through the conscience that we can know assuredly that God has spoken. An external positive precept purporting to come from God has not the force of a moral precept whose reason we discern with our moral reason. There is, if we may say so, an element of uncertainty about every positive precept, while we may become quite sure that God has spoken in a precept which commends itself to our moral reason. Thus there are men who listen with strict attention to the dictates of conscience, but who pay little heed to the ordinances of religion because they are not persuaded of their divine origin. For my own part I do not think that obedience should be rendered to a positive precept of Christ by one who was in doubt as to the claims of Christ and the efficacy of His means of grace, on the ground that His claims might be true and it were imprudent to disobey. I do not myself hold that what is called self-love, unless it is rational and morally rational, forms any part of man’s moral duty. Self-love, unless it means self-respect, or respect for the worth of self as a man, means nothing better than selfishness, which is exactly that which it is the function of the moral reason to correct. On this more will be said in the next chapter.

What prudence demands of us is not moral duty, what self-respect demands is. If my self-respect demands of me obedience to any person, it becomes to me a moral duty to obey; if obedience proceeds from fear of consequences, it has no moral quality. I have no duty to do anything from fear. Fear may be a useful instinct, but it is not that which should prompt us to perform our moral duty. But if it be said that the fear of God is a moral quality, I should reply that it certainly is if it be coupled with love for Him. Reverence for the Perfection of the Divine Being is man’s highest duty and privilege, but that Perfection must be known in part before such reverence is possible. I hold that every moral duty is a duty of obedience to the demands of divine Perfection; and it is to set forth this truth that I have entered upon the present enquiry as to the reason of man’s moral nature.