pline in the family, the church, the state, and society. And the restraints thus engendered remain the life-long accompaniments of the feeling. Furthermore, there may be excellent people in whom the feeling never breaks through as an explicit reflective consciousness. But while all these facts are fairly rendered by the empirical theory, it is not a complete account of the sense of obligation—unless we mean by that feeling the dread of suffering externally inflicted penalties! If there exist a moral consciousness in which there is no other sense of obligation than the fear of punishment, the empirical theory is adequate to it. But those who are conscious of the constraining voice of goodness, however conceived, must find that theory forever inadequate. Here, therefore, as at so many other points, differences in ethical theory may be the counterparts of differences in our moral experience.
The Theological theory of obligation is perhaps the most popular theory, though it has not been generally accepted by philosophers. Like the Empirical theory it seems to discover an objective basis for the ought-feeling. And the practical importance of morality inclines man to look favorably upon a theory which reinforces the inherent authority of moral law with the weight of infinite external sanctions. The Theological hypothesis explains our consciousness of moral obligation as the effect of commands and prohibitions laid upon human beings by the Infinite Being. Now, in the light of experience and history, it must be admitted as beyond reasonable doubt that the feeling of duty has been among civilized peoples and more and more with the progress of civilization, intensified by faith in God as the moral governor of the universe. The persuasion that God attaches penalties to wrong-doing has been a reinforcement of the feeling of the inherent right of goodness to control the human will. But it is not that feeling. Whoever, therefore, is conscious of such a homage to goodness will recognize the insufficiency of the present hypothesis to account for it. Suppose God commands the right and forbids the wrong, and that He rewards the obedient and punishes the disobedient; your knowledge of these facts would, of course, evoke
