conative impulses and emotions. Among these are the two self instincts and emotions, present even among some animals. About these as a nucleus, develops in man the self-regarding sentiment and later a fully organized moral self or personality. McDougall[1] has given a careful account of this development, which those who fancy that the evolution of the higher aspects of the moral life from the instincts is debasing ought to read. I only wish to add that after the self or personality has developed in the manner that McDougall has described, the individual comes to recognize the value of this acquisition, and to interpret the significance of all external values as well as the virtues in the light of their significance for the self as a whole.
The inclusion of the self in his system of values has always been difficult for man. In India it was first perhaps seriously attempted in later Brahmanism and Buddhism. The problem came to the front in the west with the ideal of the sage, variously formulated by Stoics, Epicureans, and Skeptics. The mystery religions and Christianity sought to effect transformations of the self. The chapters in the psychology of religion upon asceticism, purgation, mysticism, conversion, and sanctification deal with the various ways in which man has attempted to transform his entire self. On account of the inherent difficulty in evaluating the mind in its systematic unity as organized in the self, involving as it does, the use of judgments of individuality and purpose, the intelligent comprehension of the self as a value has been restricted to ethical philosophers, and the chief credit in this field is of course due to the neo-Hegelians.
II.
The foregoing account has attempted to sketch in exceedingly broad lines the evolution of the various types of values from the instincts. Under other topics much of the material that would be necessary to fill in the details of this sketch could be found in the works of McDougall, Shand, Westermarck, Stout, and others. What has been said here has perhaps been sufficient to show that it would be entirely feasible to write the history of the evolution
- ↑ Introduction to Social Psychology, Chaps. VII-IX.
