HISTORICAL.
Two fundamental forms of practical morality are found in antiquity, — the ascetic and the natural, — and survivals of the former are found in most modern systems. 'Natural' morality requires only an anthropological explanation, in which the determination of man by his environment is taken into account. The so-called metaphysical explanation of ethics appears, on the other hand, to have arisen with the development of ascetic morality. Asceticism and metaphysic occur in history as complements of each other; and in modern ethical theories, when one goes beyond an anthropological explanation and metaphysic is employed in the establishment of an ethical system, the ascetic tendency shows itself, for the most part without the representatives of the 'Metaphysik der Sitten' being conscious of it. Asceticism implies a pessimistic conception of the world, and, like it, is determined by unsatisfactory economical, social, or political conditions. One must note, however, that asceticism is not necessarily united, as in the earliest Buddhism, with a nihilistic metaphysic. Ancient asceticism was not everywhere united with a metaphysical pessimism, any more than pessimism in modern times implies an asceticism (cf. Schopenhauer). The pessimism of the Platonists, of the apocalyptic Jews, and of the Christians, has reference to this world only, and finds compensation for its sacrifice by an optimistic faith in another world. Amongst the ancients there were especially two systems or schools, which developed a formal metaphysic of morals, — Platonism and Stoicism. Plato, it is true, like all the ancients, and like every one nowadays religiously disposed, regarded natural morality under a religious aspect, i.e., he regarded it from the standpoint of man's dependence on a world-ruling power. This 'natural' ethics, directed, as it is, exclusively to the organization of the commonwealth, is established by Plato entirely anthropologically. Over against this 'natural' morality is the 'ascetic.' Plato is led to the establishment of this 'ascetic' ethics by a metaphysical doctrine, which in a certain sense has served as a type for every metaphysic of morals. With Plato the necessary reciprocal relation between asceticism and metaphysic comes clearly to light. The moral consists neither in moral acts
