the confusion of two principles which have long since become clearly differentiated, it is well worth while to examine with some care the ablest, or at any rate the most successful, opponent of Hobbes and the true founder of English Utilitarianism.
It would be quite impossible adequately to treat of any important ethical system, without taking some account of the views of the author's contemporaries; but this is particularly necessary in the case of early writers. In their works we are almost sure to find in artificial combination principles which are now regarded as logically distinct, and the only possible explanation of the actual form of the system in question is often to be sought in contemporary influences. Sometimes, of course, an investigation of this sort is difficult, and, however carefully prosecuted, yields no very certain results. Fortunately we are not thus hampered in the case of Cumberland. We shall find difficulty and uncertainty enough in certain aspects of his system, but there is little doubt with regard to the formative influences in his case. In his view of the nature of man, our author stands in the closest and most obvious relation to Grotius and to Hobbes,—his relation to the former being that of substantial agreement; to the latter, that of opposition. We must, then, consider in the briefest possible way the ethical views of these two authors—particularly as regards the then current conception of Laws of Nature and also notice the tendencies represented by the various opponents of Hobbes.
Of course, the idea of Laws of Nature was by no means original with Grotius. A Stoical conception at first, it had exercised a profound influence upon Roman Law, and had reappeared as an essential feature in the system of Thomas Aquinas. Here, however, as Sidgwick points out, it "was rather the wider notion which belongs to Ethics than the narrower notion with which Jurisprudence or Politics is primarily concerned."[1] It is one of the most important services of Grotius that he distinguished between the provinces of Ethics
- ↑ Hist. of Ethics, p. 159.
