We have seen that any piece of conduct may be looked at, and moral judgements passed on it, from three points of view—as the pursuit of an end, the observance of a rule, and the expression of an attitude of mind or motive. This gives us the three basic ethical concepts which, in their interrelation, constitute the framework of the moral life: the right, the good, and the morally good; or the rule, the end and the motive. In this lecture, I want to indicate in outline the way in which these fundamental elements seem to me to be related within the structure of the moral life, and how that structure is related to the constitution of human nature. The account which I am going to give will be general and abstract, stating the pattern which seems to me to be common to all men and all morality, primitive and civilised alike. Later lectures will amplify this outline, and fill in the details and clothe the bare skeleton with flesh and blood. In so doing, I trust they will also confirm its accuracy and meet the objections that may be urged against it.

I trust, however, that the preliminary analysis which I am going to give here will commend itself to the reader as essentially sound, in harmony with the deliverances of the moral consciousness and with the conclusions of psychology and anthropology. To anyone who, at the end of the lecture, is still hesitating to accept its main contention, I would suggest that he regard it as a hypothesis to be further tested by reference to the material with which we shall be concerned in later lectures, a hypothesis to be accepted or rejected according as it succeeds or fails in enabling us to give an intelligible account of that material. I have adopted the procedure of stating the conclusion first, while most of the detailed evidence in support of it will be given later, because I think this should make it easier to follow the argument of the lectures as a whole. That argument as a whole contains the real evidence for the views which I am going to state here in a preliminary and provisional way. This procedure will have the further advantage of enabling me to explain at the outset the precise sense in which I shall use certain ethical terms in the sequel.

Let us begin then with the relation between the right and the good, or rules and ends in morals, one of the most controversial topics not only in contemporary ethics, but in the history of moral theory. For the most stubborn and deep-seated difference which divides writers on ethics is that between those who find in the attractiveness of the good the fundamental feature of the moral life and those who find the essence of morality in obedience to right rules. The contrasted concepts in terms of which this difference is expressed vary from writer to writer. We find it expressed not only in such antitheses as that between the right and the good, between rules and ends, but also in that between duty and the moral ideal, between standards and purposes, between principles of order and interests, between the good will and happiness, between social justice and ideal morality. Though the differences between the concepts contrasted in these different formulations are not unimportant, the principle on which all the antitheses are based seems to be essentially the same, and the affinities of a writer are disclosed by whichever of the two contrasted concepts he regards as supplying the key to the understanding of morality. To use the language of the schools, that affinity marks him as a teleological or deontological moralist.

But though most ethical theorists regard one of the contrasted concepts as more fundamental than the other, they all agree that the other is also important and that it is part of the business of ethics to explain both and to show the relation between them. This explanation takes one or other of two main forms, according as it is or is not held that one of the concepts is dependent on the other and that therefore its moral characteristics can be deduced from or expressed in terms of it. On the one hand, it may be held (as, for example, by Sir David Ross) that though one of the contrasted concepts is more fundamental, neither can be derived from or expressed in terms of the other: that both stand for ultimate and irreducible, but only externally related or altogether unrelated elements in the moral life. This view has the merit of keeping close to the facts of the moral life in which the contrasted elements seem to be equally important and to exist without any sense of disharmony, now the one now the other receiving special emphasis; but it has the disadvantage of leaving us without any real unity in the moral life—a disadvantage which is not only serious from the point of view of theory but has the important practical result of leaving the moral agent without any principle on which he can decide what in particular circumstances he ought to do.1 On the other hand, it may be held, and this is the more common view, that the contrasted concepts are not really unrelated: that not only is one more fundamental but that the other is dependent on it and can be deduced from it or expressed in terms of it. Speaking generally and without going into refinements, this can be done in one of two ways. According to the one, good is regarded as the fundamental concept, and right acts are regarded as those which produce or promote good ends. The duty of the moral agent is therefore to produce as much good as he can, or to realise the best that is within his power. Those who take this view emphasise ends, interests, purposes, ideals, and explain the moral life mainly in terms of such concepts. According to the other, the essence of morality is to be found in the ought; its fundamental concepts are right, duty and obligation; and good is explained in terms of obedience to rules or principles. Both these views have the theoretical merit of achieving tidiness and unity of principle, but they are apt to leave the impression that they have succeeded in doing this at the cost of doing less than justice to one or other of the main aspects of the moral life. The ordinary moral consciousness tends to offer a strong resistance when we try to formulate all its judgements in terms of either of these theories. For some acts seem to it to be morally significant primarily because of the goods which are realised in or through them; others because of the rules with which they comply. Such resistance by the moral consciousness to an interpretation of its judgements should be regarded by the ethical theorist as a danger signal, a presumption, though not necessarily a proof, that he has missed something of importance.

I do not propose here to enter into a detailed examination of either the merits or the demerits of these views. I want rather to suggest and defend another way of regarding the relation between the contrasted concepts. According to it, the contrasted concepts are equally fundamental and irreducible in the sense that neither can be deduced from or expressed in terms of the other, but the relation between them is much more intimate than Ross suggests. Indeed, they are so intimately related that not only do they not interfere with the unity of the moral life, but they are both necessary to constitute that unity. For they enter into the moral life in different ways, as for example warp and woof, or form and matter, or structure and function. If this is so, the relation between them is not so much one of opposition as of mutual implication. Each is a different but necessary condition of living a good life or doing a morally good deed.

According to this view no isolated moral rule contains the grounds of its rightness, and no isolated end the grounds of its goodness within itself. Rather we find the grounds of the rightness of moral rules in a form of life which is also the realisation of a system of ends; and we find the grounds of the goodness of good ends in the same form of life which also involves obedience to certain rules. That form of life is both unconditionally good and the source of moral obligation. All the acts which form part of it or in which it is being realised are both directed to ends and comply with rules; but because of the way in which they function in the whole, the one or the other aspect may be more in evidence; and so in the case of some acts we may think primarily of the rules with which they comply, and in the case of others of the goods which are being realised in and through them. But all have both characteristics; and in passing a final moral judgement on them we have to take account of both.

As an approach to this way of regarding the matter, let us look at some other spheres in which a similar state of affairs seems to prevail. The conditions in these other spheres, however, should be regarded as nothing more than suggestive analogies and the point of the analogies should not be pressed unduly.

Consider the activity of playing a game. We distinguish between the end or purpose which the players in a game have in view and the rules with which in playing the game they have to comply. Their end is to win the game and it is this end that gives zest and direction to their activities. But in their efforts to realise this end they have to comply with the rules of the game. They do not play in order to comply with the rules, but to win; and yet in order to win they have to comply with the rules. So that a good game is one in which the players wholeheartedly pursue their end according to the rules.2 In order that there may be a game at all two conditions have to be fulfilled. An end must be pursued and rules must be observed.

Or take the nature of knowledge. In discussing the nature of knowledge, we distinguish between the given elements, sensa, percepts or whatever other name we call the elements of which knowledge consists, and principles of relation or categories, such as cause and effect, substance and attribute, etc., according to which they are organised. In order to have knowledge at all, we must have elements to organise and principles of organisation. The two have different but equally important functions to fulfil and one cannot be reduced to or take the place of the other. Neither by itself can give us knowledge. When we try to get knowledge in any sphere our purpose is not merely to comply with the categories or principles of thought, but in order to achieve our purpose, which is to get a knowledge of the facts, we have to order the elements according to these principles.

Or take again the nature of inference. In inference we I argue from premises to a conclusion, but in doing so we have to comply with the principles or laws of inference. We don't argue in order to comply with logical rules, but we cannot achieve our aim in arguing, which is to reach a valid conclusion, without complying with these rules.

Similarly, I suggest, in living the moral life, there are ends to be pursued, interests to be promoted, purposes to be fulfilled, ideals to be realised, such for example as building a house, writing a book, promoting a piece of social legislation, providing the means of happiness for an aged parent; and there are also rules to be observed, such for example as the rules of truth-telling and promise-keeping, the laws of copyright, the Corporation Byelaws about house-building. We don't live our lives, any more than we play a game, in order to comply with such rules. A man may comply with any code of rules, such for example as the rules implied in the list of prima facie duties given by Ross,3 and yet his life may be empty and purposeless. In order that his life may be worth living he must have ends to pursue. It is they that supply its driving power and give it zest and direction. He does not pursue them merely to obey the rules, but in pursuing them he has, in order to be moral, to observe the rules.4 This is at least part of the truth contained in the view that the end does not justify the means. This view emphasises the fact that the activities in which an end is realised have other morally significant characteristics in addition to their being the realisation of the end; and these characteristics have to be taken into consideration in passing final judgement on them. In other words, they are not mere means to an end; and it is not the end alone which has value. In passing a value judgement on the end, we have to consider it as the end realised in and through activities which are elements in or parts of a form of life in relation to which they have other morally significant characteristics than being the realisation of the end.

In the moral life, then, there are ends to be pursued and rules to be observed, and moral goodness consists in pursuing the ends according to the rules.5 Moral goodness is not itself one of the ends to be pursued, nor does it consist merely in obeying the rules. It is realised or manifested in pursuing the ends according to the rules. It is, in fact, like the spirit of a game in that, for its expression, it requires not one but two conditions—the observance of rules and the pursuit of ends. What gives a life moral worth, however, is neither the value of the ends pursued nor the observance of the rules obeyed, but the spirit shown in the pursuit and the observance. But in order that this spirit may have an opportunity of manifesting itself, there must be both ends and rules.

Now the purposes or ends which I have so far used as illustrations have only a relative or hypothetical goodness, and some, at any rate, of the rules which I have mentioned have only a conditional validity or authority. We have, therefore, to consider whether the same line of argument applies to all ends which the moral consciousness regards as good, including those which are said to have intrinsic goodness, and to all the rules which it regards as right, including those which are claimed to be self-evidently right. I believe the same line of argument does apply, but in order to show that it does, it is necessary to consider (1) the nature of the ends which we regard as good, the source from which they are derived, and the guarantee of their worth; (2) the nature of the rules which we regard as right, how we discover them, and the source of their authority; and (3) the relation of the different goods to one another, the relation of the different rules to one another, and the relation of the ends and rules to one another. These are very large questions, and here I can only sketch briefly the view which I should take regarding them consistent with the line of argument which I have been developing.

The view which I want to suggest is that if the moral spirit is to have an opportunity of manifesting itself, the ends pursued and the rules obeyed by the moral agent must not be just any ends and rules. The ends must have a certain character, and the rules must be of a certain kind. And there must not be just a mere plurality of ends and rules. There must be a certain congruity between the ends, and the rules must be mutually adjusted. Otherwise different ends and different rules will conflict among themselves. Nor may there be a duality of unrelated elements, the good, the system of ends, on the one side, and the right, the system of rules, on the other. There must be a mutual affinity based on an underlying unity between the right and the good.

It is not easy to state the relation between the right and the good as I conceive it in terms of the relation between ends and rules because of what seem to me certain misleading implications in the latter terms, especially in the term ‘end’. The term ‘end’ tends to suggest that the good or value which we call the end is a relatively static state of affairs and that the acts in and through which it is realised are means to this end and have value only as such; whereas, as I shall try to show later, many of the values or goods which we seek to realise exist only in the activities in and through which they are said to be realised. These activities are not means to the ends but the realisation of the ends. The term ‘rule’ as used in morals just describes certain characteristics which belong to acts, such, e.g., as being an act of truth-telling or promise-keeping; and in the acts which have such characteristics, ends are also being realised.

With this explanation, the view of the relation between ends and rules which I am suggesting might be stated as follows. The ends which are really good, as distinct from those which when considered in isolation seem to be good, are those which fit into a particular form or pattern of life; and the rules which are really right are statements of the characteristics of the acts, in which ends which are really good are realised, in virtue of which the acts and the ends which are realised in them constitute the pattern of this form of life. If this is the relation between them, when we try to discover which ends are really good we must take account of the structure of the pattern of life in which they are realised and of the characteristics of the acts which constitute it; and when we try to discover which rules are really right we must take account of the way in which the sorts of acts which are prescribed by the rules fit into the pattern of the form of life in which good ends are realised. In other words, the final guarantee of the goodness of ends and of the rightness of rules is to be found in a form of life in which not only are there content and structure, but within which content and structure mutually determine one another.

In order to show why this must be so, it is necessary to consider the second question which I mentioned at the beginning of this lecture—the relation of morality to the constitution of human nature. I do not think the two questions, the one about the structure of the moral life and the other about the relation of morality to human nature, can be kept separate in our attempts to answer them; for both the contents and the structure of the moral ideal derive from the constitution of human nature.

Let us look, then, at the constitution of human nature, and consider it first from the point of view of the ends which it prescribes, in order to show that we cannot discover which of them are really good without taking account of the structural pattern of the whole of which they form parts. It is difficult to describe human nature not only because of its complexity, but also because it is only partly given and partly to be realised. The realisation is perhaps always incomplete but it is more partial and imperfect in some persons than in others, and even in some aspects of one person's life than in others. Moreover, even of the relatively given elements some exercise a more or less controlling and directing influence on the development of others. In virtue of them man is an agent in his own development. Nevertheless, the factors in human nature which make man a moral being can be stated relatively shortly and simply. They are his possession of desires and interests or dispositions to desire, which are rooted in his instinctive nature; his intelligence or capacity to learn by experience; his power of imagination, which enables him to anticipate the results of his actions; his self-consciousness or awareness of himself as one amid the variety of his desires and experiences; his consequent capacity for reflection, which enables him to detach himself from the flow of his passing experiences and to view his life as a whole; and his rationality or capacity to see things in their interrelations, which arouses in him a desire for some measure of consistency in his life.

Man, then, has certain natural needs which give rise to instinctive impulses, which in turn find expression in activities directed to satisfy the needs. The forms which these instinctive impulses take in a being which possesses imagination and self-consciousness we call desires. In man even the most specific of his needs, such as those for food or shelter, and the desires and activities to which they give rise, and the ends towards which they are directed, are relatively general. The ends which will satisfy the needs are not specific. They are sorts of things; they can only be described in general terms. Accordingly, the desires for them are relatively plastic in the sense that they can be satisfied in different ways. But as each desire is a desire of a self-conscious individual who has other desires as well, one way of satisfying it may conflict with or contribute towards the satisfaction of other desires. Now considered by itself the end of each desire seems good. It makes a claim on the interest of the desiring self. But in the actual experience of the self which is also the subject of many other desires those ways of satisfying a particular desire which conflict with the satisfaction of other desires are regarded as so far bad; and those which contribute to the satisfaction of other desires are regarded as good. Accordingly, as the result of experience, which may be more or less reflective and in which the exercise of constructive imagination may play a more or a less important part, the self-conscious agent builds up the idea of a system of ends or activities in which many desires can find compossible satisfaction. Moreover, not all desires are co-ordinate or of the same degree of generality or comprehensiveness. Some, as e.g. the desires for order and security and friendship, are more general, in the sense that if they are to be satisfied at all other desires must be satisfied in some ways and not in others. Thus the more general desires, the central desires or major interests as they are sometimes called, exercise a certain control over others and help to organise them into systems. Now the welfare of the self is more deeply implicated in these systems than in isolated desires. Their claims are, therefore, more imperative, and so the satisfaction of desires in ways which are required by them is regarded as right, and their satisfaction in ways which are inconsistent with them as wrong.

But the requirements even of these central desires or major interests may clash with one another, with the result that the self, to which they all belong, still remains unsatisfied. If, therefore, the self is to be satisfied, its major interests have to be reconciled under the control of a still more central interest which we may call the interest of the self as a whole or the policy of the will, which is just the self on its active side. The relation of the will to the desires and systems of desire is twofold. On the one hand, the will has no content but that of the desires. Therefore, it can only be satisfied through the satisfaction of the desires. On the other hand, not all satisfactions of desires satisfy the will or the self as a whole, but only their satisfaction at times and in ways which are consistent with its central policy. Thus the relation of the will to the particular desires is both positive and negative. Positively it reinforces those desires whose expression is required to further its central policy. Negatively it opposes any expression of a desire which is inconsistent with its policy with a ‘not now’, or ‘not in this way’, or, it may be, ‘not at all’. In other words, it presents its demand, the demand of the unitary policy of the self, whether positive or negative, as an ought. The policy for which the will stands and in the name of which it enunciates its demands is not merely a good but the good, not a prima facie or seeming good but good unconditionally. We may, therefore, call it the personal moral ideal.

There are many other questions about the nature of this ideal and the factors which determine the degree of integration of an individual's interests and the comprehensiveness and consistency of his ideal which cannot be discussed here.6 Some of them will engage us later. There are, however, two further considerations which should be mentioned at this stage. (1) Not only are the amount of integration of the self and the adequacy of its ideal matters of degree, but the extent to which the ideal has been reflectively built up and is consciously before the mind also varies from individual to individual and from time to time in the life of the same individual. As far as an individual acts deliberately or as a moral agent at all, there must be some measure of integration of his interests; and in order that he may realise his major interests, there must be a relatively high degree of integration; but the process of integration may be more or less reflective and the unitary principle according to which it takes place may be operative in the mind of the individual rather than before it as an object of conscious reflection. (2) I mentioned that the needs of man and the desires to which they give rise are general and plastic in the sense that they can be satisfied in different ways. This is what makes it possible so to integrate them that they can find expression and satisfaction consistent with the policy of the will or the good of the self as a whole. Now if they were indefinitely plastic, they would, at least after a time, offer no resistance to their self-conscious direction and control by the will; and one of the most characteristic features of the moral life would disappear, namely, the conflict between will and desire, between duty and interest, between ‘the law of the mind’ and ‘the law of the members’. But they are far from being indefinitely plastic. They rebel against certain ways of controlling and integrating them. However much they may be directed and controlled and certain expressions of them repressed, because they are rooted in our instinctive nature they will from time to time assert themselves with an urgency which, for most men at least, makes the conflict between them and the will a warfare from which there is no discharge. True the extent to which this is so in the case of what we may call the cruder and more isolated desires varies from individual to individual and depends on many factors, but especially on the extent to which and the ways in which they have been given expression in the past. But even for those who have brought their cruder passions into subjection, desires rooted in other partial interests tend to assert themselves in opposition to the will, and the conflict continues at another level.

What concerns us at present, however, is that the ideal of the individual, the policy for which the will stands and which it is trying to realise, has a unitary character corresponding to the unity of the self as self-conscious. It is, indeed, the objective counterpart of that unity. Therefore, we cannot discover which desired ends are really good except by considering whether they fit into this unitary pattern.

So far I have described only one aspect of this pattern—its vertical or non-temporal aspect—the aspect which enables us to arrange desired ends or interests on a scale as more or less central or integral, and to reject as bad those which are inconsistent with the central policy of the will or the good of the self in its unitary character. But it has also a horizontal or temporal aspect; and the two aspects are intimately connected and can only be understood in relation to one another; for the moral ideal or the form of life in which the good of the self as a whole can find expression is not a static state of affairs which can be realised all at once. It consists of, and can only be realised in, and not merely as the result of, a series of activities. It has, therefore, a successive structure which determines the temporal order into which different goods must be fitted if they are to be realised at all. This horizontal or temporal structure is an essential aspect of the moral life, but its importance and its implications seem to be seldom realised by ethical writers.

It is, of course, generally recognised that there are entities which cannot exist all at once, like a song or a symphony. A purpose or an interest is an entity of this kind, and much more so a system of purposes or a form of life. Accordingly, the moral ideal, the system of ends or interests which constitute the good for man, must be conceived as having a temporal as well as a vertical pattern. For this reason, as I shall illustrate in detail later,7 the vertical pattern, according to which interests are arranged in what we call their order of value, does not by itself enable us to decide what end or interest should be realised at a given moment. For conflicts take place between interests and a choice has to be made between ends, not merely or even mainly because one is higher and another lower or because the two are in principle incompatible, the manifestations of incompatible attitudes of mind. They take place much more frequently between ends and interests, like the production of food, the promotion of health, the pursuit of knowledge, and the enjoyment of beauty, which are not only all good and in principle quite compatible, but which are all necessary elements in the good life. The reason for these conflicts is our finite limitations which prevent us from doing more than one thing at a time. Therefore, we cannot realise all at once the goods which together constitute the good life or the moral ideal. They can only be realised over a period of time, though one or other of them may be being realised during every part of that period. But just because there are limits to what we can do at once, we have at a given moment to make a choice, and the choice often involves loss as well as gain, giving up something good as well as realising something good. Thus the good life has a negative aspect, an aspect of self-sacrifice, as well as a positive aspect, an aspect of self-realisation. Some of the implications of these facts and some of the difficulties which arise from neglecting them we shall have to consider later. All I want to note now is that if most of our interests are to be at all realised they must be realised one after another. Hence the importance of the temporal pattern which determines the order of their realisation. It is true that in realising a more specific end I may also be realising a more general end. It is also true that there are goods, such as keeping an appointment or helping the victim of an accident, which must be realised at a particular time or not at all. But even in such cases, in deciding whether or not a good should be realised, account must be taken of the temporal pattern of the way of life which is the good of the self as a whole.

In view of these considerations it is apt to be misleading to describe the moral ideal as the moral end or the ultimate end. Such a description tends to suggest that the moral ideal or the good for man is a state of affairs which can be realised all at once at some future date, and that present activities are means to this end and have value only as such; whereas in fact they are parts of or elements in the realisation of the ideal. To avoid these misleading suggestions I prefer to speak of the moral ideal as a form or way of life. For a form of life exists only in being lived, and in being lived it is spread out in time; and the activities in which it is lived are parts of it, not means either to it or to some other end beyond it.

What is important from the point of view of the present argument, however, is that the system of ends which constitutes the moral ideal and the activities in which they are realised has a structure or pattern. That pattern in virtue of its being the policy of the will, which is an attempt to embody the good of the self as a whole, presents itself to the individual, not merely as the good, but as an ought, a source of obligation that he should do and refrain from doing what it here and now requires for its realisation. Those ends which enter into it are really good; the sorts of acts in which it is realised are really right. The ends which are good are its content, the rules which are right are those which prescribe acts which fit into its structural pattern.

It is true that as long as we consider the individual by himself the principles connecting his different interests into the unitary system, which is the good of his self as a whole, and the rules which prescribe the sort of acts which fit into this pattern are not usually called moral rules. They are not included in ordinary moral codes. They tend to be regarded rather as maxims of prudence. But even from the point of view of enlightened self-interest, even when there is no question of the activities of the individual directly affecting others, what is required by the good of his self as a whole presents itself to him as an ought as against the solicitations and allurements of particular desires. And this ought is a moral ought; the acts and abstentions which it prescribes are moral duties; and they are accompanied by the same feeling of obligation as the duties which concern his relations with other people.8 For it is not only with the interests of other people that a person's desires may conflict. They may also conflict with one another;9 and it is the duty of the individual to realise those and only those which further his policy as a whole. If it is held that to do so is only to be prudent, the answer seems to be that in some circumstances it is a moral duty to be prudent.

Nevertheless, from the moral point of view the isolated individual is an abstraction. Just as an end or an act has to be considered in relation to the other ends and acts of the individual whose it is, so the individual has to be considered in relation to other individuals who with him form the society or community of which he is a member. This is so not merely because every man known to history or anthropology, and therefore every man with whom ethics is concerned, is in fact a member of a society, and most of his duties arise out of his relations to others, but for the more fundamental reason that, as psychologists tell us,10 self-consciousness, which is a condition of the possibility of morality, is itself a social product, a product which could only develop in a social medium. This, however, does not mean that, once self-consciousness has emerged, the moral agent has no duties which are not social duties, any more than it means that he ceases to be a moral being when he is alone. Moreover, for the satisfaction of most even of his non-social interests, such as his interest in food and shelter, knowledge and beauty, man is dependent on the co-operation of other people. Their satisfaction, therefore, requires at least a minimum of mutual trust and goodwill, and the observance of rules governing the relations between individuals which are necessary to make this co-operation possible.

Nor is this all. Co-operation with others and the observance of the rules which make it possible is not just a means to the realisation of other ends. The individual finds the co-operation itself good. For one of man's deepest needs is for friendly relations with at least some others; and the sorts of acts in which such relations find expression, i.e. the acts which comply with the rules which are the conditions of friendly co-operation, are not merely means to, or conditions of friendly relations. They are themselves expressions of, or elements in such friendship. They not only promote friendship; they are friendship. In thinking of friendship we normally dwell more on the inner attitude, the spirit of loyalty and mutual trust, than on the friendly actions in which it finds expression. And it is true that without this spirit there is no friendship; but neither is there friendship unless that spirit finds expression in friendly actions. In all moral action there is both an inner and an outer side; but it is with the outward and visible forms in which the moral spirit manifests itself that we are at present concerned; and from that point of view co-operative action is not merely the means to, or the consequence of friendship; it is friendship itself.

Still more important, however, is the fact that man is social not only in the sense that he desires the co-operation and friendship of others but also in the sense that he has a natural interest in their welfare and a disposition to desire the realisation of their ends because they are theirs. This, indeed, is one of the most central and integral of all his desires; and if it is to find expression and realisation, his other desires must find realisation in some ways and not in others. Accordingly, the process of building up the personal ideal of the individual, his conception of the sort of life that is worth while, throughout involves the fitting of his ends into a system or pattern which includes the ends of others as well; so that the personal ideal of the individual is a social ideal, the idea of a way of life in which different people co-operate to realise the ends of all of them.11 Thus the personal and the social ideal are not two ideals but two aspects of one ideal. There are important differences between them, with some of which we shall be concerned later, and for purposes of exposition it is desirable to treat them separately, but the one cannot be understood except in relation to the other.

Now the social character of the self introduces enormous complexity into its ideal.12 It becomes a way of life in which different people co-operate and into which the ends of different people have to be fitted. But it still has the vertical and temporal structural pattern which we have described; only in this pattern the ends of different individuals have to be so organised that they can find realisation consistently with each other. Among the most important links in this structure are the rules governing the relations between the individuals who co-operate, rules which are implied in the co-operation through which alone the system of ends can be realised. The observance of these rules—the rules which are embodied in moral codes—is not just a means to the co-operation, nor is the co-operation just a means to the realisation of ends. The activities which comply with the rules are themselves the co-operation, and the co-operation in accordance with them is the realisation of the ideal. It is the ends which fit into this structure which are really good; and it is the rules which are implied in it which are really right. It is in pursuing these ends in compliance with these rules that the individual realises his moral ideal—an ideal which presents itself to him as the good and his own good, the source of moral obligation and the ground of rightness. Despite its social character this ideal is sometimes, and I think not inappropriately, called the good of the self as a whole, that is, the good of a self which is not only self-conscious but social. But this description has been criticised on the ground that the demands which the social pattern makes on the individual, though he recognises them as right because they are the requirements of what he himself regards as the ideal form of life, sometimes involve the sacrifice not only of many of his major personal interests, but even of life itself—thus it would appear preventing the realisation of his personal ideal altogether.13

Now it is quite true that undoubtedly difficult practical problems arise from the conflict between the conditions of the personal development or personal happiness of the individual and the requirements of the social ideal.14 Similar problems arise from the fact that the individual may be prevented, through no fault of his own, from realising the ends at which he aims. This may be due to the absence of intelligence or goodwill on the part of those on whose co-operation their realisation in part depends, or to some defect, for which he cannot be held responsible, in his grasp of the situation in relation to which he has to act, or to the hazards and accidents of a time-conditioned existence.15 But however difficult these problems may prove in practice, the solution, in principle, seems to be contained in what has been said above. For, as I have already pointed out, though an action cannot be morally good unless the individual aims at such ends, the action does not derive its moral value from the ends at which it aims, much less from the actual achievement of these ends, but rather from the spirit or personality which finds expression in it. Now in doing what he believes to be required by his ideal, the individual always achieves the realisation and expression of his moral personality, the one thing which gives his life moral worth. No doubt it may appear rather paradoxical that while the actual ends at which an individual aims may not be achieved, his greatest good, the expression of his moral personality and the development of his character, is always achieved in the pursuit. But as far as morality is concerned this apparent paradox has to be accepted. Any attempt to consider the questions to which it gives rise would take us beyond ethics. The important consideration, however, from our present point of view is that, by whatever name we call it, an ideal such as we have described, which has both a personal and a social aspect, is the only form of life in which a being constituted as man is, a being who is not only a creature of desires but also self-conscious and social, can find the good which will satisfy his whole nature. However imperfect may be his conception of it, that conception determines, and provides the final justification for the ends which he should pursue and for the rules with which in pursuing them he should comply.

What we find then is this. When we consider the ends which men pursue, to discover which of them are really good, we find that we have to consider these ends, which have their origin in man's needs and the desires to which these needs give rise, as parts of a system of ends in which not only the ends of the individual but those of other individuals as well are so integrated that they can find realisation consistently with one another. Only the ends which fit into the structure of this system are really desirable; and they are desirable only in the form in which they fit into it. So that we cannot discover which ends are good without taking account of the structural pattern of the form of life in which they are realised; and this structural pattern finds expression in principles and rules determining the nature of the acts in which the ends are realised and the relations of particular ends and of the individuals whose the ends are to one another. In other words, in trying to discover which ends are good we have to take account of moral rules and principles. With these rules the individual in pursuing his ends has to comply. His duty is not simply to comply with the rules; but to pursue his ends in compliance with them. So that his duty always involves the pursuit of ends and the observance of rules.

We could arrive at the same conclusion regarding the mutual interdependence of good ends and right rules by beginning with the rules which are regarded as right, asking which of them are really right; and why, and subject to what conditions, they are right. But if my argument so far has been sound, to do so in general terms would be only to repeat from a different angle much of what has already been said. In my next lecture I shall give a more detailed account from another point of view of the rules which different societies regard as right, of the way in which in the course of experience they become adjusted to one another, and of the way in which their authority, within the limits within which they are binding, is to be found in such an ideal or form of life as I have described above. But even at the risk of repetition, some further consideration of the view of the nature and authority of moral rules and their relation to the moral ideal, to which the line of argument which I have been pursuing leads, and a comparison of it with some other views may not be out of place here. It may help to make my position clearer; and it will indicate some of the questions with which it will be necessary to deal later.

With one possible exception—and that exception I should regard not as a rule but a principle—the ordinary moral rules which we regard as right, those which find expression in the institutions and customs and codes of different societies, are, according to the view which I am advocating, empirical generalisations based on the experience of mankind as to the conditions necessary for realising the form of life which is worth while. We have seen that this form of life—whether we call it the moral ideal, the good for man or the good of the self as a whole—consists of desired ends and acts, in and through which they are realised, organised into a pattern with a unity corresponding to the unity of the self as self-conscious. The final test of the rightness of acts is whether they both fit into this pattern and are the realisation of such ends. Now acts which have certain general characteristics or are of certain sorts, such as respecting life, telling the truth, helping others and so on, are normally found by experience, whether actual experience or ideal experiment, to satisfy this test. And still more clearly acts which have the opposite characteristics, such as not respecting life or not telling the truth, are usually found to be inconsistent with and to hinder the realisation of the pattern. However immediately satisfying the performance of such acts may be, they tend to leave behind them a growing conviction that they were not on the whole what we wanted. Now moral rules are just assertions that acts of the former kind are right, and that acts of the latter kind are wrong. They are, therefore, generalisations true for the most part but not universally so; and they do not contain the grounds of their rightness within themselves. Both they and the exceptions to them which are right derive their authority from the structure of the moral ideal, the form of life which is both good and the source of moral obligation.

Now it is generally agreed that this is true of many of the rules which we regard as right, such as the rules embodied in the institutions of particular peoples with regard to such things as the distribution and ownership of property, the relations between partners in an enterprise, between friends, between the sexes, between masters and men and so on. Such rules are the results of experiments in social co-operation in trying to conceive and live a good life, and they are retained or modified as men on the whole find or do not find the form of life to which they give rise acceptable. Modification of them may be called for, either because the resulting form of life is internally inconsistent, or because it fails to make adequate provision for the needs either of some or of all of those who co-operate in it. The final test as to the rightness of any of these rules is: Do the acts which it prescribes on the whole help or hinder men in their attempts to satisfy their whole nature as beings who are self-conscious and social?

It is, however, often contended that this account does not apply to all rules which are regarded as right, but that some rules, such as the rules of truth-telling and promise-keeping, are self-evident intuitions, laws of reason or, as the Stoics called them, laws of nature, more like the categories of thought than the generalisations of science. According to this view such rules are self-authenticating, independent of the institutions of all societies, and not requiring any justification from any form of life, actual or ideal. Contemporary writers who take this view, however, recognise that such rules are unlike other rational principles in that they are not universally binding. The moral consciousness recognises exceptions to them which are not morally wrong. This happens both when the claims of different rules clash, as they sometimes do, and when much greater harm would result from observing a particular rule, as in such rare though not unimportant instances as refusing to endanger the life of a person who is ill by telling him the truth, or deceiving a would-be murderer as to the whereabouts of his intended victim, or misleading an enemy in war-time. The duties which such rules impose are, therefore, now generally regarded, even by those who claim that their obligatory character is self-evident, not as actual or absolute but only as prima facie obligations, that is, as constituting claims to consideration which are actually binding only in the absence of more urgent claims. The evidence which seems to me to show that even in this modified form these rules are not self-evident I shall consider later. All I need say here is that the fact that they admit of any exceptions suggests that, however important their general observance, and however fundamental they may be as conditions of individual and social well-being, they are not self-authenticating, but that both the rules and the exceptions to them require justification from some other source. The view which I am suggesting is that this justification is to be found in the way of life which I have called the moral ideal, a way of life whose conditions the rules are.

The one possible exception, to which I referred above, the one rule which seems to be not an empirical generalisation but a rational principle, which like the categories is true universally and admits of no exception which is not morally wrong, is the principle of justice or equity, which seems to be implied in one form or another in every moral code and in the ideal, if not always in the practice, of every society, from the lex talionis of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, to Kant's Kingdom of Ends and Bentham's each to count for one and no one for more than one, from the tit-for-tat of children and the Code of Hammurabi to the Confucian or Christian Golden Rule. This principle does not normally insist on absolute equality in the treatment of different individuals, though in its cruder forms it is apt to be a demand for simple equality. What it requires is that where people are treated differently there should be a relevant reason for the difference. From time to time and from people to people, men seeing differences of privileges and opportunities as between individuals or groups ask the reason for the difference of treatment and are dissatisfied unless a sufficient reason for the difference can be produced. It is true that the differences, such as differences of rank, wealth, capacity physical or mental, place of birth or residence, race, family, etc., which have seemed to men at different times and in different countries sufficient to justify difference of treatment, have varied enormously, but the persistence of the demand seems to show the operation in the minds of men of a principle, however imperfect may be their grasp of its full nature and implications. What they take to be the requirements of this principle determines the rules governing the relations between individuals which they try to embody in their customs and institutions and laws. But from time to time, men appeal from the accepted rules and existing institutions to the principle itself, and it is in the light of it or through its semi-conscious operation in their minds that they modify their social institutions and the rules which determine the respective rights and duties of different individuals.

Now the real basis of this principle—a basis which comes to light especially in its more developed forms—is the nature of personality and the recognition by the individual that others are personalities, manifestations of the moral consciousness, like himself. What precisely would be the effect of the full recognition of this principle of the fundamental moral equality of men as persons and of its embodiment in our moral and social institutions cannot yet be said with certainty. We have in principle recognised it in the legal and political spheres and we have tried to embody it in arrangements to ensure equality before the law and in political democracy. We have also made great concessions to it in the sphere of education and we have tried to use it as a criterion for modifications of the law of marriage and divorce, while its implications in the economic sphere are still a matter of keen controversy. With these implications we are not at present concerned. Their working-out is, I think, a matter of experience, and experience decides by experiment, not by a priori considerations. What we are concerned with is the principle itself, though, as I have already indicated, I should hold that we cannot fully understand any moral principle except in its detailed working-out in practice.

I have called this principle rational on the ground that, once the equality of men as persons is recognised as a fact, it seems unreasonable to treat them differently, unless there are differences between them to justify difference of treatment. The difficulty of applying the principle is due to the difficulty of being sure which differences between persons are morally significant, and so warrant difference of treatment.16 The negative requirements of the principle seem much clearer than the positive. If men are in fact persons, subjects of ends or ends in themselves, the principle of justice rules out as wrong certain ways of treating them, ways of treating them as if they were things not persons, mere means to the ends of others and not self-governing individuals with ends of their own. Perhaps these negative results are all that the principle of justice strictly interpreted will guarantee. It is true that its universal application, even in this sense, would take us a long way towards the conception of a satisfactory moral and social order. Nevertheless, such an interpretation gives us only a negative conception of duty as the avoidance of that which is morally wrong. It does not give us the positive character of the moral ideal or the whole duty of man. To get the latter we have to add to the negative requirements of the principle of justice not only the recognition of the need for co-operation as a means to realising other ends, but also the desire of men for co-operative, friendly relations as good in themselves, and especially the direct desire for the welfare of others, which is one of the most deep-rooted interests of man, though it is often prevented from getting free expression by the pressure of other interests. When we add to these social desires the recognition of other men as persons—the basis of the principle of justice—we see that the ideal required to satisfy a being who is the subject of such desires involves the positive promotion of the ends of other people as theirs; and that whatever further rules or sorts of acts are involved in doing this are not only justified but obligatory.

This positive ideal which gives us the whole duty of man is, however, merely formal. Its requirements full can be expressed only in very general terms. Attempts to give it concrete form in the conception of a detailed way of life embodied in rules and institutions are only partially successful. At best they are only imperfect approximations to its requirements. The distinction between the formal ideal—the objective counterpart of the unity of a self which is self-conscious and social—and what I shall call the operative ideals—the detailed forms of life in which different peoples have tried, more or less successfully, to articulate its requirements—is the basis of the distinction often drawn by writers on ethics17 between ideal morality and the morality of social justice, or between the morality of perfection and the morality of my station and its duties. The latter are attempts, only partially successful, to give concrete expression to the requirements of the former.

The formal ideal not only requires compliance with the more or less negative demands of the principle of justice strictly interpreted, but it has, as we have seen, a further positive character which makes additional demands on the agent. The operative ideals are only partial embodiments either of these positive requirements or even of the more negative demands of the principle of justice. The duties which they prescribe are only the minimum of morality. They are what others have a right to expect of us. But they are not merely negative. They do not just require that we leave other people alone to pursue their own ends within the limits of the accepted social pattern. They also at times require that we assist them or co-operate with them in their attempts to realise their ends. On the other hand, the maximum of morality, the whole duty of man, the demand of the morality of perfection, is to comply with the requirements of the formal ideal. This is the demand which in our best moments we make on ourselves, even though others have no right to expect it of us. These requirements, as I have said, are only inadequately expressed in existing institutions and ways of life. It is in the light of them that we try to improve institutions and operative ideals. It has indeed been contended,18 and not without justification, that the full demands of the formal ideal do not admit of being completely expressed in rules, that rules belong to the sphere where rights and duties are reciprocal, “the world of claims and counterclaims”; distinct from the sphere of ideal morality, “the world of spiritual membership”, to use Bosanquet's phrases.19

Be this as it may, it is the demands of the formal ideal, which the systems of rules regarded as right by particular peoples, and the institutions and forms of life in which they are embodied, are trying to express. And the relation of the rules to the form of life, whose requirements they are attempts to express, seems to provide the explanation of what intuitionists have called the greater stringency of certain rules, in virtue of which their claims take precedence over those of less stringent rules. Though the intuitionists find this characteristic of moral rules useful in solving the difficulties which clashes between the requirements of different rules, whose rightness they claim to be self-evident, create for their theory, they do not find it easy to explain it. Indeed, important though it is for their theory, they say very little about it, and what they say is hesitating and unconvincing. In the end they seem driven to account for it in terms of a greater sense or feeling of urgency which, they say, some rules produce in the moral agent. According to the view urged here, the more stringent rules are those which are more fundamental to the form of life whose conditions they are in the sense that, if breaches of them became general, the way of life would collapse more completely.

We may now sum up the results of our enquiry so far. We considered the moral ideal as the pursuit of ends, and tried to discover what ends are really good, and what are the conditions of their realisation. And we found that those ends are really good which fit into the pattern of a form of life in which different people co-operate to realise the ends of all of them; and that moral principles and rules are the principles according to which this form of life is organised and the conditions of the co-operation between individuals which are involved in living it. We next considered the moral ideal as the observance of rules, and tried to discover what rules are really right, and what are the grounds of their rightness. And we found that right rules are statements of the characteristics in virtue of which acts fit into, or are expressions of, the structural principle of the form of life in which good ends are realised, and more particularly statements of the conditions of co-operation between individuals involved in living such a form of life. In other words, we found that, when we try to understand moral ends, we have to introduce the idea of moral rules; and when we try to understand moral rules, we have to introduce the idea of moral ends. We are, therefore, driven to the conclusion that the moral ideal or the good for man cannot be explained in terms of either the pursuit of ends or the application of rules alone. Its explanation requires both.

Thus an action is capable of fitting into, or failing to fit into, the pattern of a way of life in two different but interconnected ways. On the one hand it is forward-looking; it is an attempt to bring about a certain state of affairs; and this state of affairs may or may not fit into the pattern of the ideal way of life. On the other hand, whether or not it succeeds in bringing about the state of affairs at which it aims, it has characteristics which belong to it as an act in virtue of which it is or is not appropriate to its context in a way of life. These two aspects of the act—its intended consequences and its relation to its context—are interconnected, and in passing moral judgement on it we have to take account of its fittingness in both respects. An act is morally obligatory if, and only if, in virtue of all its characteristics or its whole nature, it fits into or is required by the pattern of the way of life which is the moral ideal.

But while living a morally good life involves both the pursuit of ends and the observance of rules, moral goodness is neither one of the ends which we pursue or directly aim at, nor yet is it merely the observance of rules. It is achieved or realised in the conscious pursuit of those ends which fit into the form of life which is the moral ideal, in compliance with those rules which are involved in the structural pattern of this form of life. The development of character is a by-product of this pursuit and compliance; and a morally good character is the permanent disposition to act in this way.20

Now this means that there is no such thing as a duty to be moral in the sense of a duty whose end is the development of character, or which directly aims at producing or promoting moral goodness. Every duty is a moral duty and, in that sense, a duty to be moral. But every duty is also a duty to do a particular act, such as visiting a sick friend, relieving the victim of a road accident, keeping an appointment, promoting knowledge or producing food. Each of these acts is the pursuit of an end or the initiation of a state of affairs, and it also complies with a certain rule or rules. The act is one of a series of interconnected acts; the end or good which it seeks to realise is one of a system of ends which are the ends of the series of acts; and the rule or rules with which it complies are members of a system of rules which are the principles of interconnection of the ends and acts. Now the acts which it is our duty to do are the acts which fit into, and are the realisation of, the form of life which is the moral ideal, i.e. the acts which aim at ends which are really good, and comply with rules which are really right. In doing these acts, character is developed and moral goodness is realised. But the development of character and the production of moral goodness are not themselves among the ends aimed at. They are realised in and through the doing of acts which aim at other ends and directly seek to realise other goods. The ends which are pursued in such acts are the ends which I earlier described as the ends of desires which are rooted in human nature and required to satisfy its needs—ends such as food and shelter, health and freedom, knowledge and beauty and friendship. But it is these ends as ordered and unified into the pattern required to satisfy the self as a whole. Strictly speaking, all these ends are non-moral ends; but because they are the constituent elements of the moral ideal or the moral good, and because for that reason it is our duty to realise them, they are often referred to as moral ends or moral goods; but this is apt to cause confusion. The fact is that the terms ‘moral’ and ‘moral good’ are used in a large number of different senses; and if we are to avoid confusion, we must distinguish carefully between some of these senses.

For example, we use the term ‘moral’ to describe, among other things, both the different constituents of the moral ideal and the moral ideal itself which these elements in their interrelation constitute. But however useful this usage may be for certain purposes, it is liable to cause confusion. For as used of the constituent elements of the moral ideal, the term ‘moral’ is a relational property, indicating that the things to which it is applied are elements in the moral ideal, and that their moral significance, the reason why it is our duty to pursue and realise them, cannot be understood without reference to the whole in which they are elements. But these elements which in their interrelation constitute the moral ideal are all non-moral goods, the ends of desire. The moral ideal has in fact no contents but these non-moral goods, the ends of desire, and therefore it can be realised only through their being realised. Therefore it is our duty to realise them, not in their own right, but as elements in the moral ideal, i.e. because in doing so we are realising the moral ideal.

What, however, is more liable to cause confusion and has, I think, in fact done so, is the use of the term ‘moral good’ to describe both the quality of mind or motives of the moral agent and also the character of the moral ideal, the system of goods which will satisfy the whole nature of man. Let us see how the two things which are thus described are distinguished from and related to one another. The constituent elements of the moral ideal are, as has just been said, particular non-moral goods, the ends of desire or of systems of desires. But we call the whole system in which they are so integrated as to satisfy the whole nature of man the moral good, in order to distinguish it from the particular goods—the non-moral goods—which constitute it. But the moral good in this sense is not itself another good in addition to the non-moral goods of which it consists. It has no content but the non-moral goods; but it is not a mere aggregate of non-moral goods, but an integrated system in which some ends of desire are subordinated to others, and some have to be realised in certain ways and at certain times, and some repressed altogether. Thus the moral good or ideal makes a demand on the moral agent that he do or refrain from doing those acts, and realise or repress those ends, which are here and now required for its realisation. It is this demand which is experienced as the sense of duty or obligation. The acts which are thus demanded we call morally right. They are the acts which fit into the moral ideal and comply with the rules which are implied in it. Now when we do the acts which we believe to be right in this sense from a sense of duty, or because we believe them to be right, we are said to be morally good. In doing them we are developing and expressing our moral character, and realising or revealing our moral goodness. Here we are using the term ‘moral good’ or ‘moral goodness’ to describe a quality of the moral agent himself; and it is important that we should not confuse moral good or moral goodness in this sense, i.e. as a quality of the moral agent, with the moral good as the system of ends or goods which is the moral ideal.

The moral goodness of the agent is not one of the ends pursued by the agent, and, therefore, it is neither the whole nor any part of the moral good as a system of ends. Moreover it does not derive its character of moral goodness from the goodness of the ends of which it is the pursuit. Yet it cannot exist except in the pursuit and realisation of such ends. It belongs to the attitude of mind or the spirit which finds expression in this pursuit and realisation. Moral goodness, then, or goodness of character is not an end at which it is our duty to aim directly in any of our actions. Yet it is realised or manifested only in the pursuit of the ends and the performance of the actions which are required by the moral ideal. Accordingly, the relation of moral goodness to the moral ideal, the good for man, is quite different from the relation of other or non-moral goods to that ideal. The latter form a part of the ideal or the good for man, the former is realised in the pursuit of the latter as elements in the good for man.

This view of the relation of the different elements in the moral life to one another seems to me not only to account for the main facts of the moral life in a way which avoids difficulties and paradoxes which embarrass many other theories; it even helps us to see the sources of these difficulties and paradoxes. In the first place, it enables us to avoid the vicious circle which has often been pointed out in the teaching of Kant and Green and many idealists, who hold that the object of the good will is the good will, or that the moral ideal is the pursuit of the moral ideal, or that moral goodness or goodness of character is the end pursued in morally good actions. As against this position, I suggest that the good will finds expression in the pursuit of non-moral goods, when these are pursued as elements in the moral ideal or the good for man. To repeat: there is a sense in which it is our duty to be morally good, but we cannot be morally good in the abstract. To be morally good is to perform our particular duties in the spirit of duty. In other words, to be morally good is to manifest a good will; and a good will is manifested in setting oneself to initiate the particular state of affairs which the moral ideal here and now requires. It may be an act of kindness, the fulfilment of a promise, the pursuit of knowledge, the relief of distress, the production of food, the promotion of beauty, or whatever else the ideal here and now requires.

In the second place, this view gives to moral goodness the unique position claimed for it by the moral consciousness and by most ethical writers; for, according to it, moral goodness not being part of the end aimed at, but rather realised in the pursuit of other ends, does not come into conflict with other goods. We are not called upon to choose between the pursuit of knowledge or beauty or pleasure and moral goodness. We are called upon to choose between the different non-moral goods, that is, to choose between the different goods other than moral goodness; and when we choose whichever is required by the moral ideal, and pursue it for that reason, we realise or express our moral goodness in the pursuit, and the pursuit is morally good.

There are, in fact, no duties which are not moral duties but there are no duties which are merely moral duties, that is, duties to be moral and nothing more. Our moral duties are also duties to do particular acts. This explains why a theory, like Intuitionism, which insists on comparing moral goodness with other forms of good, as if we had to choose between the different kinds, gets into the paradoxical situations to which Ross calls attention21 but from which on his theory we cannot escape. The paradoxes arise from the fact that, according to such a theory, it is necessary to ask such questions as “whether in any given situation it is rather our duty to promote some good moral activity or some good intellectual activity in ourselves”.22 On the view which I am defending, such a question is not legitimate, for it never in practice arises. If in any given situation it is my duty to promote some good intellectual activity, it is my moral duty to do so; and, therefore, in promoting a good intellectual activity I am in the same act promoting a good moral activity. So that there can be no conflict between the two. The alternatives with which actual life presents us are, for example, between a good intellectual activity and doing an act of kindness or a piece of social service or taking a rest in the interests of our health, that is between different non-moral goods. The alternatives are never between any of these and doing our moral duty. If in particular circumstances it is my duty to engage in some intellectual activity, then it is my moral duty to do so, and in doing it I am expressing my moral goodness and promoting my moral character. The other so-called duties between which and it I am called on to choose are not my actual duties at all but what would be my duties, if the circumstances were different and if it were not here and now my duty to engage in intellectual activity.

It seems to me no small advantage of the theory I am advocating that it saves us from unreal paradoxes of this kind, paradoxes which arise from theories which regard moral goodness as one among several goods between which we may be called on to choose. According to such theories, moral goodness must be comparable, if not even commensurable, with other goods; and yet, as the theorists themselves admit, the deliverance of the moral consciousness compels them to regard it as ‘infinitely superior’ to all other goods.23 The present theory takes the view that no conflicts between moral goodness and other goods arise; so that no choice or comparison between it and them is necessary. It is good in a different sense or a good of a different order from all other goods. This is so because it enters into the moral life in a different way from them.

In the third place, this theory enables us to reconcile two convictions of the moral consciousness which many theories seem to find in conflict. The one is that in the good life there are other goods besides moral goodness, that it includes, for example, such goods as knowledge, aesthetic experience, happiness, friendship, freedom, health and other non-moral goods. The other is that morality is concerned with the whole of life and has jurisdiction over all of it. According to the present theory, moral goodness and these other goods enter into the good life in different ways and not only do not conflict but are necessary to one another. The latter are the ends to which it is directed, the former is realised in the pursuit of them. On the other hand, in any set of circumstances in which we are called upon to act there is something good to be realised in order to meet the demands of the moral ideal, and the good will is revealed in the pursuit of that, whatever in detail it happens to be; so that there is no situation in which the good will cannot be realised.

In the fourth place, in the conception of the moral ideal as the objective counterpart of the unity of the self as self-conscious, this theory provides a unitary principle for the determination of our duties. No doubt, as we have seen, in order that this principle may prescribe particular duties, it must be embodied in plans and policies and systems of institutions. But above all such detailed embodiments of the ideal, which at best are only imperfect realisations of it, there is the formal ideal itself to be used in our original moral reflection as the standard in the light of which we can pass judgement, not only on particular acts but also on institutions and ways of life; and its unitary nature, however indefinite when expressed in general terms, and however difficult it may be to apply in particular situations, gives a guarantee that the more we reflect the more likely we are to discover what our duties are.

Finally, this theory enables us to see how the possibility of moral progress can be reconciled with the possibility of genuine or absolute moral goodness for all men in all societies, whatever their stage of development or degree of enlightenment; for, according to it, moral goodness consists in loyalty to the requirements of one's own conception of the ideal, whatever in detail that conception and its requirements may be, and this is possible for all men, that is for all beings who have any ideal of conduct and are not mere animals ruled by each instinctive impulse as it arises. However crude and unenlightened men may be, they can do what they believe to be right, because they believe it to be right. Progress in moral goodness, therefore, consists in increasing loyalty to one's own ideal. On the other hand, we can get progress in moral insight or enlightenment, that is, in our grasp of the nature and needs of man and what he requires for his satisfaction, both as regards the ends which they prescribe and the rules which are necessary for their realisation. In other words, while moral goodness in the sense of devotion to one's own conception of the ideal is possible at all stages of development, the conceptions of the ideal which men entertain, the operative ideals in the light of which they decide their duties and obligations, vary from age to age and from individual to individual and even from time to time in the life of the same individual. They grow in worth and adequacy, in consistency and comprehensiveness, as they approximate more closely to the formal ideal. If we call progress in this latter sense progress in enlightenment, we see that progress in moral goodness and progress in enlightenment need not keep pace with one another.

According to this theory, moral goodness alone is good absolutely and to be realised always. Other goods are relative in two senses. The whole system of goods which constitutes the moral ideal is relative to the constitution of human nature; and its constituent elements, the non-moral goods which enter into it, are not only relative to the needs of human nature, but they are also relative to one another in the sense that none of them is to be pursued always. Any one of them may at times have to give place to another, according to the requirements of the pattern of life which is the moral ideal. Moral rules are generalisations regarding the sorts of acts and the relations between individuals which either mankind as a whole or particular peoples have found to be involved in the realisation of that ideal or the living of that form of life. Their nature is determined by, and their authority is derived from, the structure of the ideal. This ideal, which is both the moral and the social ideal, is the standard by which ends and rules, policies and patterns, have to be tested; but it is abstract and formal apart from the detailed forms of living in which different societies have tried to give it concrete expression. These expressions, however, are all partial and imperfect, and the formal ideal is always above them as the critic of their incompleteness and imperfections.

If these contentions are sound, the aspect of morality to which a consideration of the moralities of people other than ourselves is relevant is the outward and visible aspect, that which is concerned with the ends which are good and the rules which are right and the pattern of the form of life which in their interrelation they constitute. It is men's ideas about these which vary from age to age and from people to people, while moral goodness is the same in all ages and among all peoples. It is to them, therefore, that the researches of social anthropologists are specially relevant; and it is with them that we shall be mainly concerned in the sequel.