Up to this point lie lias merely analyzed tho various parts of human nature, and has pointed out the course of action corresponding to each. But in a system or organ ism the parts do not exist for themselves but for the whole. The idea of human nature is not completely expressed by saying that it consists of reason and the several passions. " Whoever thinks it worth while to consider this matter thoroughly should begin by stating to himself exactly the idea of a system, economy, or constitution of any particular nature ; and he will, I suppose, find that it is one or a whole, made up of several parts, but yet that the several parts, even considered as a whole, do not complete the idea, unless in the notion of a whole you include the relations and respects which these parts have to each other." This fruitful conception of man s ethical nature as an organic unity Butler owes directly to Shaftesbury and indirectly to Aristotle ; it is the strength and clearness with which he has grasped it that gives peculiar value to his system.
The special relation among the parts of our nature to which Butler alludes is the subordination of the particular passions to the universal principle of reflection or con science. This relation is the peculiarity, the cross, of man ; and when it is said that virtue consists in following nature, we mean that it consists in pursuing the course of conduct dictated by this superior faculty. Man s function is not fulfilled by obeying the passions, or even cool self- love, but by obeying conscience. That conscience has a natural supremacy, that it is superior in kind, is evident from the part it plays in the moral consti tution. We judge a man to have acted wrongly, i.e., unnaturally, when he allows the gratification of a passion to injure his happiness, i.e., when he acts in accordance with passion and against self-love. It would be impossible to pass this judgment if self-love were not regarded as superior in kind to the passions, and this superiority results from the fact that it is the peculiar province of self-love to take a view of the several passions and decide as to their relative importance. But there is in man a faculty which takes into consideration all the springs of action, including self- love, and passes judgment upon them, approving some and condemning others. From its very nature this faculty is supreme in authority, if not in power ; it reflects upon all the other active powers, and pronounces absolutely upon their moral quality. Superintendency and authority are constituent parts of its very idea. We are under obligation to obey the law revealed in the judgments of this faculty, for it is the law of our nature. And to this a religious sanction may be added, for " consciousness of a rule or guide of action, in creatures capable of considering it as given them by their Maker, not only raises immediately a sense of duty, but also a sense of security in following it, and a sense of danger in deviating from it." Virtue then consists in following the true law of our nature, that is, conscience. Butler, however, is by no means very explicit in his analysis of the functions to be ascribed to conscience. lie calls it the Principle of Reflexion, the Reflex Principle of Approbation, and assigns to it as its province the motives or propensions to action. It takes a view of these, approves or disapproves, impels to or restrains from action. But at times he uses language that almost compels one io attribute to him the popular view of conscience as passing its judgments with unerring certainty on individual acts. Indeed his theory is weakest exactly at the point where the real difficulty begins. We get from him no satisfactory answer to the inquiry, What course of action is approved by conscience] Everyone, he seems to think, knows what virtue is, and a philosophy of ethics is complete if it can be shown that such a course of action harmonizes with human nature. When pressed still further, he points to justice, veracity, and the common good as comprehensive ethical ends. His whole view of the moral government led him to look upon human nature and virtue as connected by a sort of pre-established harmony. His ethical principle has in it no possibility of development into a system of actual duties ; it has no content. Even on the formal side it is a little difficult to see what part conscience plays. It seems merely to set the stamp of its approbation on certain courses of action to which we are led by the various passions and affections ; it has in itself no originating power. How or why it approves of some and not of others is left unexplained. Butler s moral theory, like those of his English contemporaries and successors, is defective from not perceiving that the notion of duty can only have real significance when connected with the will or practical reason, and that only in reason which wills itself have we a principle capable of development into an ethical system.
It has frequently been made the ground of objection to Butler s philosophy of man s moral nature that he did not carry his analysis far enough, and that he accepted as ultimate facts what are really compounded of simpler elements. His distinction between self-love and the passions has in particular been rejected on the plea that the end of appetite or desire is not the object suited to satisfy it, but pleasure, or at least the removal of uneasi ness. This last, however, is fairly included under Butler s expression, "gratification of the passions." The removal of uneasiness no doubt results in pleasure, but it is not the pleasure that removes the uneasiness. What is really sought is the object that will satisfy us, that will fill up the want in our existence, and with which we, so to speak, identify ourselves. With regard to the general objection, even were it granted that self-love and benevolence are developments from the passions, the relations between them would none the less hold good. Self-love is not superior to the passions, because it has been originally created their superior, but because under the sphere of its inspection and decision the particular desires are included ; it stands above them because they form the objects upon which it works. Further, growth or development, deeply considered, does not invalidate authority or superiority in kind. The ethical consciousness, like all other parts of our nature, grows ; it is only by degrees and slowly that man comes to the full recognition of the reason that lies in him and forms his true personality. He is moral at first only Swa/x.ei, and the varying conditions of experience are requisite in order to afford the means of development from this mere poten tiality. The customary observances and legal precepts, in which the common ethical consciousness of humanity has given expression to itself, are being continually tested by comparison .with the formal requirements of the inner law of duty, and change gradually as they are found at various epochs to be imperfect realizations of reason. The ulti mate goal of all such progress is that state of ethical observance in which rights and duties come to be recog nized as the outcome of human personality, and the reali/a tion of true freedom.
Bartlett, Memoirs of Butler, 1839. The be^t edition of Butler s works is that in 2 vols., Oxford. Editions of the Analogy fire very numerous ; that by Fitzgerald, 1849, contains a valuable Life and Notes. Whewell has published an edition of the Three Sermons, with Introduction. The analyses of the Analogy by Duke (1847) and Wilkinson (1847), Chalmers s Prelections (posthumous works, ix. ), Napier s Lectures, (1864), and Swainson s Handbook may be consulted with advantage. For the history of the religious works contemporary with the Analogy, see Lechler, Gcs. d. Engl. Dcis- mus ; 1 attisoh, in Essays and Rcvicics ; Hunt s Religious Thought in England, vols. ii. and iii. ; A. S. Farrar, Critical Ilhlory of Fret Thought. For Butler s ethics see Mackintosh, "Whewell, and JoufT- roy. It is quite surprising that German historians of ethics should ignore Butler. Feuei Lu, Fichte, Wuttkc, and Trendelenburg totally omit mention of his name ; Vorlamkr, in his Gcs. d. Phil. Moral, Rcchts- laid Slaats-lc/l"^. d. Engldndcr u. Franzoscn, de votes three pages to Butler and fii t^en to Boliujrhvokc.
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