Principia Ethica 35

Principia Ethica 35

Moreover moral rules, as has been said, are, in general, not directly

means to positive goods but to what is necessary for the existence of

positive goods; and so much of our labour must in any case be devoted

to securing the continuance of what is thus a mere means--the claims of

industry and attention to health determine the employment of so large

a part of our time, that, in cases where choice is open, the certain

attainment of a present good will in general have the strongest claims

upon us. If it were not so, the whole of life would be spent in merely

assuring its continuance; and, so far as the same rule were continued

in the future, that for the sake of which it is worth having, would

never exist at all.

 

 

=101.= (4) A fourth conclusion, which follows from the fact that what

is ‘right’ or what is our ‘duty’ must in any case be defined as what is

a means to good, is, as was pointed out above (§ 89), that the common

distinction between these and the ‘expedient’ or ‘useful,’ disappears.

Our ‘duty’ is merely that which will be a means to the best possible,

and the expedient, if it is really expedient, must be just the same. We

cannot distinguish them by saying that the former is something which

we ought to do, whereas of the latter we cannot say we ‘_ought_.’ In

short the two concepts are not, as is commonly assumed by all except

Utilitarian moralists, simple concepts ultimately distinct. There is

no such distinction in Ethics. The only fundamental distinction is

between what is good in itself and what is good as a means, the latter

of which implies the former. But it has been shewn that the distinction

between ‘duty’ and ‘expediency’ does not correspond to this: both

must be defined as means to good, though both _may also_ be ends in

themselves. The question remains, then: What is the distinction between

duty and expediency?

 

One distinction to which these distinct words refer is plain

enough. Certain classes of action commonly excite the specifically

moral sentiments, whereas other classes do not. And the word

‘duty’ is commonly applied only to the class of actions which

excite moral approval, or of which the omission excites moral

disapproval--especially to the latter. Why this moral sentiment should

have become attached to some kinds of actions and not to others is

a question which can certainly not yet be answered; but it may be

observed that we have no reason to think that the actions to which

it was attached were or are, in all cases, such as aided or aid the

survival of a race: it was probably originally attached to many

religious rites and ceremonies which had not the smallest utility in

this respect. It appears, however, that, among us, the classes of

action to which it is attached also have two other characteristics in

enough cases to have influenced the meaning of the words ‘duty’ and

‘expediency.’ One of these is that ‘duties’ are, in general, actions

which a considerable number of individuals are strongly tempted to

omit. The second is that the omission of a ‘duty’ generally entails

consequences markedly disagreeable to _some one else_. The first of

these is a more universal characteristic than the second: since the

disagreeable effects on other people of the ‘self-regarding duties,’

prudence and temperance, are not so marked as those on the future

of the agent himself; whereas the temptations to imprudence and

intemperance are very strong. Still, on the whole, the class of actions

called duties exhibit both characteristics: they are not only actions,

against the performance of which there are strong natural inclinations,

but also actions of which the most obvious effects, commonly considered

goods, are effects on other people. Expedient actions, on the other

hand, are actions to which strong natural inclinations prompt us

almost universally, and of which all the most obvious effects, commonly

considered good, are effects upon the agent. We may then roughly

distinguish ‘duties’ from expedient actions, as actions with regard to

which there is a moral sentiment, which we are often tempted to omit,

and of which the most obvious effects are effects upon others than the

agent.

 

But it is to be noticed that none of these characteristics, by which

a ‘duty’ is distinguished from an expedient action, gives us any

reason to infer that the former class of actions are more useful than

the latter--that they tend to produce a greater balance of good.

Nor, when we ask the question, ‘Is this my duty?’ do we mean to ask

whether the action in question has these characteristics: we are asking

simply whether it will produce the best possible result on the whole.

And if we asked this question with regard to expedient actions, we

should quite as often have to answer it in the affirmative as when we

ask it with regard to actions which have the three characteristics

of ‘duties.’ It is true that when we ask the question, ‘Is this

expedient?’ we are asking a different question--namely, whether it will

have certain kinds of effect, with regard to which we do not enquire

whether they are good or not. Nevertheless, if it should be doubted

in any particular case whether these effects were good, this doubt is

understood as throwing doubt upon the action’s expediency: if we are

required to _prove_ an action’s expediency, we can only do so by asking

precisely the same question by which we should prove it a duty--namely,

‘Has it the best possible effects on the whole?’

 

Accordingly the question whether an action is a duty or merely

expedient, is one which has no bearing on the ethical question whether

we ought to do it. In the sense in which either duty or expediency

are taken as ultimate _reasons_ for doing an action, they are taken

in exactly the same sense: if I ask whether an action is _really_ my

duty or _really_ expedient, the predicate of which I question the

applicability to the action in question is precisely the same. In both

cases I am asking, ‘Is this event the best on the whole that I can

effect?’; and whether the event in question be some effect upon what

is _mine_ (as it usually is, where we talk of expediency) or some other

event (as is usual, where we talk of duty), this distinction has no

more relevance to my answer than the distinction between two different

effects on me or two different effects on others. The true distinction

between duties and expedient actions is not that the former are actions

which it is in any sense more useful or obligatory or better to

perform, but that they are actions which it is more useful to praise

and to enforce by sanctions, since they are actions which there is a

temptation to omit.

 

 

=102.= With regard to ‘interested’ actions, the case is somewhat

different. When we ask the question, ‘Is this really to my interest?’

we appear to be asking exclusively whether its _effects upon me_ are

the best possible; and it may well happen that what will effect me in

the manner, which is really the best possible, will not produce the

best possible results on the whole. Accordingly _my true interest_ may

be different from the course which is really expedient and dutiful. To

assert that an action is ‘to my interest,’ is, indeed, as was pointed

out in Chap. III. (§§ 59-61), to assert that its effects are really

good. ‘My own good’ only denotes some event affecting me, which is good

absolutely and objectively; it is the thing, and not its goodness,

which is _mine_; everything must be either ‘a part of universal good’

or else not good at all; there is no third alternative conception

‘good for me.’ But ‘my interest,’ though it must be something truly

good, is only one among possible good effects; and hence, by effecting

it, though we shall be doing _some_ good, we may be doing less good

on the whole, than if we had acted otherwise. Self-sacrifice may be a

real duty; just as the sacrifice of any single good, whether affecting

ourselves or others, may be necessary in order to obtain a better

total result. Hence the fact that an action is really to my interest,

can never be a sufficient reason for doing it: by shewing that it is

not a means to the best possible, we do not shew that it is not to my

interest, as we do shew that it is not expedient. Nevertheless there is

no necessary conflict between duty and interest: what is to my interest

may also be a means to the best possible. And the chief distinction

conveyed by the distinct words ‘duty’ and ‘interest’ seems to be not

this source of possible conflict, but the same which is conveyed by

the contrast between ‘duty’ and ‘expediency.’ By ‘interested’ actions

are _mainly_ meant those which, whether a means to the best possible

or not, are such as have their most obvious effects on the agent;

which he generally has no temptation to omit; and with regard to which

we feel no moral sentiment. That is to say, the distinction is not

primarily ethical. Here too ‘duties’ are not, in general, more useful

or obligatory than interested actions; they are only actions which it

is more useful to praise.

 

 

=103.= (5) A fifth conclusion, of some importance, in relation to

Practical Ethics concerns the manner in which ‘virtues’ are to be

judged. What is meant by calling a thing a ‘virtue’?

 

There can be no doubt that Aristotle’s definition is right, in the

main, so far as he says that it is an ‘habitual disposition’ to

perform certain actions: this is one of the marks by which we should

distinguish a virtue from other things. But ‘virtue’ and ‘vice’ are

also ethical terms: that is to say, when we use them seriously, we mean

to convey praise by the one and dispraise by the other. And to praise

a thing is to assert either that it is good in itself or else that it

is a means to good. Are we then to include in our definition of virtue

that it must be a thing good in itself?

 

Now it is certain that virtues are commonly regarded as good in

themselves. The feeling of moral approbation with which we generally

regard them partly consists in an attribution to them of intrinsic

value. Even a Hedonist, when he feels a moral sentiment towards

them, is regarding them as good-in-themselves; and Virtue has been

the chief competitor with Pleasure for the position of _sole_ good.

Nevertheless I do not think we can regard it as part of the definition

of virtue that it should be good in itself. For the name has so far

an independent meaning, that if in any particular case a disposition

commonly considered virtuous were proved not to be good in itself, we

should not think that a sufficient reason for saying that it _was_ not

a virtue but was only _thought_ to be so. The test for the ethical

connotation of virtue is the same as that for duty: What should we

require to be proved about a particular instance, in order to say

that the name was wrongly applied to it? And the test which is thus

applied both to virtues and duties, and considered to be final, is the

question: Is it a means to good? If it could be shewn of any particular

disposition, commonly considered virtuous, that it was generally

harmful, we should at once say: Then it is not really virtuous.

Accordingly a virtue may be defined as an habitual disposition to

perform certain actions, which generally produce the best possible

results. Nor is there any doubt as to the kind of actions which it is

‘virtuous’ habitually to perform. They are, in general, those which

are duties, with this modification that we also include those which

_would_ be duties, if only it were possible for people in general to