Page:Philosophical Review Volume 7.djvu/315

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301
REVIEWS OF BOOKS.
[Vol. VII.

there to see" (Vol. I, p. 5). Here then are certain phenomena which demand description and explanation, a requirement which can only be met by an examination of the facts themselves. The methods of speculative idealism and of empirical subjective psychology are alike unsound in principle and harmful in practice. "There is no ethical system of the speculative persuasion which does not lay stress upon some true and important fact of ethical experience; but it can be said also that there is no such system which does not exclude a multitude of other facts just as true, and, in part at least, just as important, and which is not, for that reason, inadequate as a system to many aspects of the moral life" (Ibid., p. 13). The same criticism may be urged upon the second of the above-mentioned methods. In each case, "instead of directing our attention so far as possible impartially to all parts of experience [we] turn to some single fact, which, for one reason or another, lies right in our line of vision " (p. 13). The objective method, on the other hand, will base its conclusions upon an exhaustive examination of all the phenomena of the moral life itself, wherever they are accessible.

But when we turn from a study of this enlightened programme, we are reminded only too painfully that it is easier to preach than to practice. Professor Wundt's doctrine, it may be remembered, is that morality is definable as the service of the general will, a will which, indeed, is nothing over and above the individuals which make up the race, for it consists of all those active tendencies which such individuals have in common. On the other hand, it is something other than the sum of these wills, and though it possesses no personality of its own, it is none the less the most real of realities. The evidence offered for this view of morality is supplied by an answer to the question: What are the ends which in our judgment are universally recognized as moral? (Part III, p. 426). The ends of human activity may be divided into three classes, individual, social, and humanistic. In the first case the object pursued is either pleasure or self-perfection. Now actions undertaken in obedience to the former motive are regarded as morally worthless. Perfection, on the other hand, cannot be an end in itself, for its sole value is as a means to the attainment of additional pleasure either for self or another. Hence our author concludes that actions performed for the realization of any strictly personal ends are in themselves ethically worthless. But, if this be admitted, we are forced to the same conclusion with regard to all conduct prompted by the idea of the happiness or the perfection of other persons. "If morality does not permit me to look upon myself as