Chapter XXXII, conclusion.

A few words are needful respecting the attitude to be assumed towards the doctrines that have been enunciated. Probably many will eagerly search out excuses for disregarding the restraints set up by the moral law as herein developed. The old habit of falling back upon considerations of expediency—a habit which men followed long before it was apotheosized by Paley—will still have influence. Although it has been shown that the system of deciding upon conduct by direct calculation of results is a fallacious one—although the plea that, however proper certain rules of action may be, occasional exceptions are necessary, has been found hollow (Lemma II.), yet we may anticipate further apologies for disobedience, on the score of “policy.” Amongst other reasons for claiming latitude, it will very likely be urged that, whereas the perfect moral code is confessedly beyond the fulfilment of imperfect men, some other code is needful for our present guidance. Not what is theoretically retically right, but what is the best course practicable under existing circumstances, will probably be insisted on as the thing to be discovered. Some again may argue, that whichever line of conduct produces the greatest benefit as matters stand, if not positively right, is still relatively so; and is, therefore, for the time being, as obligatory as the abstract law itself. Or it will perhaps be said, that if, with human nature what it now is, a sudden re-arrangement of society upon the principles of pure equity would produce disastrous results, it follows that, until perfection is reached, some discretion must be used in deciding how far these principles shall be carried out. And thus may we expect to have expediency re-asserted as at least the temporary law, if not the ultimate one. Let us examine these positions in detail.

To say that the imperfect man requires a moral code which recognises his imperfection and allows for it, seems at first sight reasonable. But it is not really so. Wherever such a code differs from the perfect code, it must so differ in being less stringent; for as it is argued that the perfect code requires so modifying as to become possible of fulfilment by existing men, the modification must consist in omitting its hardest injunctions. So that instead of saying—” Do not transgress at all,” it is proposed, in consideration of our weakness, to say—“Transgress only in such and such cases.” Stated thus, the proposition almost condemns itself; seeing that it makes morality countenance acts which are confessedly immoral.

Passing by this, however, suppose we inquire what advantage is promised by so lowering the standard of conduct. Can it be supposed that men will on the whole come nearer to a full discharge of duty when the most difficult part of this duty is not insisted on? Hardly: for whilst performance so commonly falls below its aim, to bring down its aim to the level of possibility, must be to make performance fall below possibility. Is it that any evil will result from endeavouring after a morality of which we are as yet but partially capable? No; on the contrary, it is only by perpetual aspiration after what has been hitherto beyond our reach, that advance is made. And where is the need for any such modification? Whatever inability exists in us, will of necessity assert itself; and in actual life our code will be virtually lowered in proportion to that inability. If men cannot yet entirely obey the law, why, they cannot, and there is an end of the matter; but it does not follow that we ought therefore to stereotype their incompetency, by specifying how much is possible to them and how much is not. Nor, indeed, could we do this were it desirable. Only by experiment is it to be decided in how far each individual can conform; and the degree of conformity achievable by one is not the same as that achievable by others, so that one specification would not answer for all. Moreover, could an average be struck, it would apply only to the time being; and would be inapplicable to the time immediately succeeding. Hence a system of morals which shall recognise man’s present imperfections and allow for them, cannot be devised; and would be useless if it could be devised.

Those who, by way of excusing a little politic disobedience, allege their anxiety to be practical, will do well to weigh their words a little. By “practical,” is described some mode of action productive of benefit; and a plan which is specially so designated, as contrasted with others, is one assumed to be, on the whole, more beneficial than such others. Now this that we call the moral law is simply a statement of the conditions of beneficial action. Originating in the primary necessities of things, it is the development of these into a series of limitations within which all conduct conducive to the greatest happiness must be confined. To overstep such limitations is to disregard these necessities of things—to fight against the constitution of nature. In other words, to plead the desire of being practical, as a reason for transgressing the moral law, is to assume that in the pursuit of benefit we must break through the bounds within which only benefit is obtainable.

What an insane notion is this that we can advantageously devise, and arrange, and alter, in ignorance of the inherent conditions of success; or that knowing these conditions we may slight them! In the field and the workshop we show greater wisdom. We have learnt to respect the properties of the substances with which we deal. Weight, mobility, inertia, cohesion, are universally recognised—are virtually, if not scientifically, understood to be essential attributes of matter; and none but the most hopeless of simpletons disregard them. In morals and legislation, however, we behave as though the things dealt with had no fixed properties, no attributes. We do not inquire respecting this human nature what are the laws under which its varied phenomena may be generalized, and accommodate our acts to them. We do not ask what constitutes life, or wherein happiness properly consists, and choose our measures accordingly. Yet, is it not unquestionable that of man, of life, of happiness, certain primordial truths are predicable which necessarily underlie all right conduct? Is not gratification uniformly due to the fulfilment of their functions by the respective faculties? Does not each faculty grow by exercise, and dwindle from disuse? And must not the issue of every scheme of legislation or culture, primarily depend upon the regard paid to these facts? Surely it is but reasonable, before devising measures for the benefit of society, to ascertain what society is made of. Is human nature constant, or is it not? If so, why? If not, why not? Is it in essence always the same? then what are its permanent characteristics? Is it changing? then what is the nature of the change it is undergoing? what is it becoming, and why? Manifestly the settlement of these questions ought to precede the adoption of “practical measures.” The result of such measures cannot be matter of chance. The success or failure of them must be determined by their accordance or discordance with certain fixed principles of things. What folly is it, then, to ignore these fixed principles! Call you that “practical” to begin your twelfth book before learning the axioms?

But if we are not as yet capable of entirely fulfilling the perfect law, and if our inability renders needful certain supplementary regulations, then, are not these supplementary regulations, in virtue of their beneficial effects, ethically justifiable? and if the abolition of them, on the ground that they conflict with abstract morality, would be disadvantageous, then, are they not of higher authority, for the time being, than the moral law itself?—must not the relatively right take precedence of the positively right?

The confident air with which this question seems to claim an affirmative answer is somewhat rashly assumed. It is not true that the arrangement best adapted to the time, possesses, in virtue of its adaptation, any independent authority. Its authority is not original, but derived. Whatsoever respect is due to it, is due to it only as a partial embodiment of the moral law. The whole benefit conferred by it is attributable to the fulfilment of that portion of the moral law which it enforces For consider the essential nature of all advantages obtained by any such arrangement. The use of every institution is to aid men in the achievement of happiness. Happiness consists in the due exercise of faculties. Hence an institution suited to the time, must be one which in some way or other ensures to men more facility for the exercise of faculties—that is, greater freedom for such exercise—than they would enjoy without it. Thus, if it be asserted of a given people that a despotism is at present the best form of government for them, it is meant that the exercise of faculties is less limited under a despotism, than it would be limited under the anarchical state entailed by any other form of government; and that, therefore, despotism gives to such a people an amount of liberty to exercise the faculties greater than they would possess in its absence. Similarly, all apologies that can be made for a narrow suffrage, for censorship of the press, for restraint by passports, and the like, resolve themselves into assertions that the preservation of public order necessitates these restrictions—that social dissolution would ensue on their abolition—that there would arise a state of universal aggression by men on each other—or, in other words, that the law of equal freedom is less violated by the maintenance of these restrictions, than it would be violated were they repealed.

If, then, the only excuse to be made for measures of temporary expediency is, that they get the commands of the moral law fulfilled better than any other measures can, their authority may no more be compared with that of the moral law itself, than the authority of a servant with that of a master. Whilst a conductor of force is inferior to a generator of it—whilst an instrument is inferior to the will which guides it, so long must an institution be inferior to the law whose ends it subserves, and so long must such institution bend to that law as the agent to his principal.

And here let it be remarked, that we shall avoid much confusion by ceasing to use the word right in any but its legitimate sense; that, namely, in which it describes conduct purely moral. Rightness expresses of actions, what straightness does of lines; and there can no more be two kinds of right action than there can be two kinds of straight line. If we would keep our conclusions free from ambiguity, we must reserve the term we employ to signify absolute rectitude, solely for this purpose. And when it is needful to express the claims of imperfect, though beneficial, institutions, we must speak of them, not as “relatively right,” or “right for the time being,” but as the least wrong institutions now possible.

The admission that social arrangement can be conformed to the moral law only in as far as the people are themselves moral, will probably be thought a sufficient plea for claiming liberty to judge how far the moral law may safely be acted upon. For if congruity between political organization and popular character is necessary; and if, by consequence, a political organization in advance of the age will need modification to make it fit the age; and if this process of modification must be accompanied by great inconvenience, and even suffering; then it would seem to follow that for the avoidance of these evils our endeavour should be to at first adapt such organization to the age. That is to say, men’s ambition to realize an ideal excellence must be checked by prudential considerations.

“Progress, and at the same time resistance,”—that celebrated saying of M. Guizot, with which the foregoing position is in substance identical—no doubt expresses a truth; but not at all the order of truth usually supposed. To look at society from afar off, and to perceive that such and such are the principles of its development, is one thing: to adopt these as rules for our daily government, will turn out on examination to be quite a different thing. Just as we saw that it is very possible for the attainment of greatest happiness to be from one point of view the recognised end of morality, and yet to be of no value for immediate guidance (Chap. III.), so, it is very possible for “progress, and at the same time resistance,” to be a law of social life, without being a law by which individual citizens may regulate their actions.

That the aspiration after things as they should be, needs restraining by an attachment to things as they are, is fully admitted. The two feelings answer to the two sides of our present mixed nature—the side on which we continue adapted to old conditions of existence, and the side on which we are becoming adapted to new ones. Conservatism defends those coercive arrangements which a still-lingering savageness makes requisite. Radicalism endeavours to realize a state more in harmony with the character of the ideal man. The strengths of these sentiments are proportionate to the necessity for the institutions they respond to. And the social organization proper for a given people at a given time, will be one bearing the impress of these sentiments in the ratio of their prevalence amongst that people at that time. Hence the necessity for a vigorous and constant manifestation of both of them. Whilst, on the one hand, love of what is abstractedly just, indignation against every species of aggression, and enthusiasm on behalf of reform, are to be rejoiced over; we must, on the other hand, tolerate, as indispensable, these displays of an antagonistic tendency; be they seen in the detailed opposition to every improvement, or in the puerile sentimentalisms of Young England, or even in some frantic effort to bring back the age of heroworship. Of all these nature has need, so long as they represent sincere beliefs. From time to time the struggle eventuates in change; and by composition of forces there is produced a resultant, embodying the right amount of movement in the right direction. Thus understood, then, the theory of “progress, and at the same time resistance,” is correct.

Mark now, however, that for this resistance to be beneficial, it must come from those who think the institutions they defend really the best, and the innovations proposed absolutely wrong. It must not come from those who secretly approve of change, but think a certain opposition to it expedient. For if the true end of this conflict of opinion is to keep social arrangements in harmony with the average character of the people; and if (rejecting that temporary kind of opinion generated by revolutionary passion) the honest opinion held by each man of any given state of things is not an intellectual accident, but indicates a preponderating fitness or unfitness of that state of things to his moral condition (pp. 240. 427); then it follows that only by a universal manifestation of honest opinions can harmony between social arrangements and the average popular character be preserved. If, concealing their real sympathies, some of the movement party join the stationary party, merely with the view of preventing too rapid an advance, they must inevitably disturb turb the adaptation between the community and its institutions. So long as the natural conservatism ever present in society is left to restrain the progressive tendency, things will go right; but add to this natural conservatism an artificial conservatism—a conservatism not founded on love of the old, but on a theory that conservatism is needful—and the proper ratio between the two forces is destroyed; the resultant is no longer in the right direction; and the effect produced by it is more or less vitiated. Whilst, therefore, there is truth in the belief that “progress, and at the same time resistance,” is the law of social change, there is a fatal error in the inference that resistance should be factitiously created. It is a mistake to suppose this the kind of resistance called for; and, as M. Guizot’s own experience testifies, it is a further mistake to suppose that any one can say how far resistance should be carried.

But, indeed, without entering upon a criticism like this, the man of moral insight sees clearly enough that no such self-contradicting behaviour can answer. Successful methods are always genuine, sincere. The affairs of the universe are not carried on after a system of benign double-dealing. In nature’s doings all things show their true qualities—exert whatsoever of influence is really in them. It is manifest that a globe built up partly of semblances instead of facts, would not be long on this side chaos. And it is certain that a community composed of men whose acts are not in harmony with their innermost beliefs, will be equally unstable. To know in our hearts that some proposed measure is essentially right, and yet to say by our deeds that it is not right, will never prove really beneficial. Society cannot prosper by lies.

And yet it will still be thought unreasonable to deny discretionary power in this matter. Neglecting prudential considerations in the endeavour to put society on a purely equitable basis, will probably be demurred to, as implying an entire abandonment of private judgment. It must be confessed that it does so. But whoso urges this objection, may properly ask himself how much his private judgment, as applied to such a subject, is worth?

What is the question he proposes to solve? Whether it is, or is not, the time for some desired change to be made?—whether the people are, or are not, fit for some higher social form than they have hitherto lived under? Where now are his qualifications for answering this question? Has he ever seen the millions for whom he would prescribe? Some tenth part of them perhaps. How many of these does he recognise? Probably of one or two thousand he can tell you the names and occupations. But with how many of these is he acquainted? Several hundreds, it may be. And of what fraction of them does he personally know the characters? They are numbered by tens. Then it must be by what he reads in books and newspapers, witnesses at meetings, and hears in conversation that he judges? Partly so: from the salient points of character thus brought under his notice, he infers the rest. Does he then find his inferences trustworthy? On the contrary, when he goes amongst men he has read of, or heard described, it usually turns out that he has got quite a wrong impression of them. Does this evidence from which he judges lead all persons to like conclusions? No: with the same sources of information open to them, others form opinions of the people widely different from those he holds. Are his own convictions constant? Not at all: he continually meets with facts which prove that he had generalized on insufficient data; and which compel a revision of his estimate. Nevertheless, may it not be that by averaging the characters of those whom he personally knows, he can form a tolerably correct opinion of those whom he does not know? Hardly: seeing that of those whom he personally knows, his judgments are generally incorrect. Very intimate friends occasionally astound him by quite unexpected behaviour; even his nearest relatives—brothers, sisters, and children do so: nay, indeed, he has but a limited acquaintance with himself; for though from time to time he imagines very clearly how he shall act under certain new circumstances, it commonly happens that when placed in these circumstances his conduct is quite different from that which he expected.

Now of what value is the judgment of so circumscribed an intelligence upon the question—Is the nation ready for such and such measures of reform, or is it not? Here is one who professes to say of some thirty millions of people, how they will behave under arrangements a little freer than existing ones. Yet nine-tenths of these people he has not even seen; can identify only a few thousands of them; personally knows but an infinitesimal fraction; and knows these so imperfectly that on some point or other he finds himself mistaken respecting nearly all of them. Here is one who cannot say even of himself how certain untried conditions will affect him, and yet who thinks he can say of a whole nation how certain untried conditions will affect it! Surely there is in this, a most absurd incongruity between pretension and capability.

When the contrast between present institutions and projected ones is very great—when, for example, it is proposed to change at once from pure despotism to perfect freedom—we may, indeed, prophesy with certainty that the result will not fulfil expectation. For whilst the success of institutions depends on their fitness to popular character, and whilst it is impossible for popular character to undergo a great change all at once, it must follow that to suddenly substitute for existing institutions others of a quite opposite nature, will necessitate unfitness, and, therefore, failure. But it is not in cases like this that the power of judging is contended for. As elsewhere shown (p. 432), one of these extreme changes is never consequent upon that peaceful expression of opinion presupposed by the hypothesis that the citizen should be cautious in advocating reform; on the contrary, it is always a result of some revolutionary passion which no considerations of policy can control. Only when an amelioration is being peaceably discussed and agitated for—that is, only when the circumstances prove its advent at hand—can the proposed discretion be exercised: and then does the right use of this discretion imply an acquaintance with the people accurate enough to say of them, “Now they are not fit;” and, again, “Now they are fit”—an acquaintance which it is preposterous to assume—an acquaintance which nothing short of omniscience can possess.

Who, then, is to find out when the time for any given change has arrived? No one: it will find itself out. For us to perplex ourselves with such questions, is both needless and absurd. The due apportionment of the truth to the time is already provided for. That same modification of man’s nature which produces fitness for higher social forms, itself generates the belief that those forms are right (p. 427), and by doing this brings them into existence. And as opinion, being the product of character (pp. 25, 159), must necessarily be in harmony with character, institutions which are in harmony with opinion, must be in harmony with character also.

The candid reader may now see his way out of the dilemma in which he feels placed, between a conviction, on the one hand, that the perfect law is the only safe guide, and a consciousness, on the other, that the perfect law cannot be fulfilled by imperfect men. Let him but duly realize the fact that opinion is the agency through which character adapts external arrangements to itself—that his opinion rightly forms part of this agency—is a unit of force, constituting, with other such units, the general power which works out social changes—and he will then perceive that he may properly give full utterance to his innermost conviction; leaving it to produce what effect it may. It is not for nothing that he has in him these sympathies with some principles, and repugnance to others. He, with all his capacities, and desires, and beliefs, is not an accident, but a product of the time. Influences that have acted upon preceding generations; influences that have been brought to bear upon him; the education that disciplined his childhood; together with the circumstances in which he has since lived; have conspired to make him what he is. And the result thus wrought out in him has a purpose. He must remember that whilst he is a child of the past, he is a parent of the future. The moral sentiment developed in him, was intended to be instrumental in producing further progress; and to gag it, or to conceal the thoughts it generates, is to balk creative design. He, like every other man, may properly consider himself as an agent through whom nature works; and when nature gives birth in him to a certain belief, she thereby authorizes him to profess and to act out that belief. For—

Not as adventitious, therefore, will the wise man regard the faith that is in him—not as something which may be slighted, and made subordinate to calculations of policy; but as the supreme authority to which all his actions should bend. The highest truth conceivable by him he will fearlessly utter; and will endeavour to get embodied in fact his purest idealisms: knowing that, let what may come of it, he is thus playing his appointed part in the world—knowing that, if he can get done the thing he aims at—well: if not—well also; though not so well.

And thus, in teaching a uniform unquestioning obedience, does an entirely abstract philosophy become one with all true religion. Fidelity to conscience—this is the essential precept inculcated by both. No hesitation, no paltering about probable results, but an implicit submission to what is believed to be the law laid down for us. We are not to pay lip homage to principles which our conduct wilfully transgresses. We are not to follow the example of those who, taking “Domine dirige nos” for their motto, yet disregard the directions given, and prefer to direct themselves. We are not to be guilty of that practical atheism, which, seeing no guidance for human affairs but its own limited foresight, endeavours itself to play the god, and decide what will be good for mankind, and what bad. But, on the contrary, we are to search out with a genuine humility the rules ordained for us—are to do unfalteringly, without speculating as to consequences, whatsoever these require; and we are to do this in the belief that then, when there is perfect sincerity—when each man is true to himself—when every one strives to realize what he thinks the highest rectitude—then must all things prosper.