The movement of personality under the direction of reasonableness carries us over into metaphysical ethics. The nature of personality as the principle of reflective ethical valuation involves its ultimate relations in and to the cosmos. The rational self as center of judgment and action in terms of objective or universal values must be more than a member of a given social historical order. The reflective person cannot finally render account to himself for the principles of his own practical judgments without making reference to his place as a center of rational activity in a system which must be rational or spiritual. The ultimate centers of ethical judgment and action are persons, and, since persons judge and act in accordance with rational principles, they must be members of a rational order. Ultimately the principles of ethical valuation express the actual relations of persons to the world-order.
On the other hand, such a world-order, to afford place and function for ethical personality, must be itself active and moving. It must be a dynamic, spiritual cosmos in which the social and historical evolution of persons is an integral element. Historical ethics leads to metaphysics, but the type of metaphysics must in turn be such as to take account of ethical development.
| J. A. Leighton |
| Hobart College.. |
