Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

Rights of others.

This condition may not be sufficient, but it is necessary. Thou shall do no violence; thou shall not steal; thou shall not commit adultery; thou shall not oppress; these are rules which all men acknowledge as the very foundations of Morality. However far we may go, we must begin here.

And here we find, as we said we should find, conditions of rightness corresponding to the primary springs of human action for we find a classification of Rights corresponding to the classification of primary Desires, to which we were led. As the primary Desires of men are the Desire of Personal Safety, of Possessions, of Family, and of Civil Society; so the primary kinds of Rights among men are everywhere the Rights of the Person, the Rights of Property, the Rights of the Family, and Political Rights, which depend upon the constitution of the community to which they belong, and the place of each man in it.

But these large classes of Rights thus corresponding to the leading Desires and Affections of men, do not quite exhaust the kinds of Rights commonly recognized among men. We cannot make a good and complete arrangement of Rights without putting, as one large class, Rights of Contract ;Rights arising from agreement among men for though these may often be about Property, and may thus seem to enter into the class of Rights of Property, they may also be about other things as well, and do really depend upon a different principle.

As the other classes of Rights correspond, each to each, to leading Desires of men, we may ask to what Desire do the Rights of Contract correspond; and to this the answer must be, that such Rights do not depend exactly upon a Desire, but upon what may be called more fitly a Need; one of the most universal and dominant Needs of man in his social condition; the Need of a mutual understanding among

men, so that one man may regulate his intentions and actions by those of another: a Need of which the satisfaction is possible through the existence of Language.

So then we have five acting principles,-Springs of Action, and Sources of Rights among men ;-the Desire and Love of Personal Safety; of Property; of Family; and of Civil Society; and along with these, Language, or the Desire of a mutual understanding which Language enables them to gratify. And we have in like manner, five classes of Rights;— those of Person, Property, Family, State, and Contract.

This symmetrical division of the Springs of Human Action and of Rights existing in Human Society is the starting point of our system of Morality; being, as we have said, the point where the Springs of Human Action come in contact with the supreme Rule of Rightness on which Morality depends. For though the adjective right in a moral sense, and the substantive Right in a legal sense, are words of very different extent, the one is necessarily comprehended within the sphere of the other. Nothing can be a man's Right but that which it is right he should have, though he may not have a Right to everything which it would be right for others to give him. And thus when we have once arrived at the existence of Rights, we have reached a point from which we may go on to Rightness of a higher kind, and may thus construct the whole edifice of a system of Morality.

In what manner, it may be asked, do we rise from mere legal Rights to moral Rightness? I reply, that we do so in virtue of this principle :—that the Supreme Rule of man's actions must be a rule which has authority over the whole of man; over his intentions as well as his actions; over his Affections, his Desires, his Habits, his Thoughts, his Wishes. The man's being cannot be right, except all these be right. If he abstain from outward violations of the Rights of others, he may satisfy Law, but he does not satisfy Morality. It is

not enough that he do not steal; it is also necessary that he do not covet; and not only so, but that he do not nourish a love of wealth which leads to covetousness;-that his affections be fixed, his thoughts employed on other things, not on mere worldly goods. And thus we rise from legal obligation to moral Duty; from legality to Virtue; from blamelessness in the forum of man, to innocence in the court of conscience. Every Right points to an ascending series of Virtues; and again, all the different Virtues run and melt into each other and converge to one supreme and central Idea of Goodness, the union and the origin of them all.

To this scheme of Morality various objections may be made, some of which I will here state, and reply to as briefly and as distinctly as I can.

(I.) It may be said that in the system which has thus been described, Morality is founded upon Law, that is, upon the Laws which actually exist among men; and that such a Morality must necessarily be narrow, low, and formal ; being bounded by the nature and extent of its foundation.

To this we reply, that our Morality, though it derives a portion of its form from our classification of Rights, and so far, of Laws, is not at all bounded by the nature and extent of Law, but on the contrary is necessarily immeasurably more comprehensive, deep and high than Law is, in virtue of the principle just stated as the leading principle of our Morality;that Morality claims empire over the whole man, including internal purpose, affection, and thought; whereas Law is concerned only with outward actions.

We may add to this reply, that Law, or Rights, are in our system, not the foundation, but only the starting point, of Morality. Though we begin from them, we do not build Indeed with us, Rights, and the Laws which establish them, instead of being the foundation of Morality, are only the foundation of the mode in which Morality re

upon them.

gards external things, such as property, family ties, and the like and the way in which Morality regards such things must, in all systems, be greatly regulated by existing laws;— nor is this the case in ours more than in other systems.

(II.) But again it may be objected that our Morality, being derived from existing Law, must necessarily be controlled by existing Law; so that however absurd, unjust, or oppressive be the Laws, the precepts of our Morality must be conformed to them.

To this we reply, our Morality is not derived from the special commands of existing Laws, but from the fact that Laws exist, and from our classification of their subjects. Personal Safety, Property, Contracts, Family and Civil relations, are everywhere the subjects of Law, and are everywhere protected by Law; therefore we judge that these things must be the subjects of Morality, and must be reverently regarded by Morality. But we are not thus bound to approve of all the special appointments with regard to these subjects, which may exist at a given time in the Laws of a given country. On the contrary, we may condemn the Laws as being contrary to Morality. We cannot frame a Morality without recognizing Property, and Property exists through Law; but yet the Law of Property, in a particular country, may be at variance with that moral purpose for which, in our eyes, Laws exist. Law is the foundation and necessary condition of Justice; but yet Laws may be unjust, and when unjust, ought to be changed. The cases in which Morality and Law come into conflict, are difficult problems in all systems of Morality. We have no greater difficulty in propounding and in solving such problems than any other Moralists.

(III.) It may be objected that by deriving Morality from existing Laws we make it depend upon something accidental, partial, variable in different countries and times;

b

whereas we require that Morality should be something necessary, universal, uniform in all places and times.

And to this we reply, as before, that we do not derive Morality from Law in such a way as to make it share the accidental, partial, variable character of Law. We derive it from the fact that Law everywhere establishes, or endeavours to establish, Personal Security, Property, Contracts, Families and States; which objects of Law are, we conceive, universal, constant, and the necessary conditions of man's moral existence. So that Morality, however it may begin by borrowing a suggestion from Law, may still be said to be in its nature necessary, universal and eternal.

(IV.) Again, it may be said that the necessity of which we here speak, when we say that the fundamental kinds of Rights exist necessarily, is the necessity arising from mutual fear. Property, for example, is established by Law, as a kind of term of truce to the endless quarrels concerning the objects of human desire which would otherwise take place among men.

But that mutual fear alone could not establish property and the other kinds of Rights, is evident from this: that such Rights do not exist among brute animals, in spite of their mutual fears and conflicting desires. Rights do not arise from mutual fear, but from the whole nature of man; and especially from his nature as being capable of living under rules of action, and incapable of living otherwise. He cannot live except under rules of external action, directing and controlling him; hence men have Rights. He cannot live except with the recognition of rules of internal action, giving a character to his intentions and purposes, as wrong or right; and thus he must have Morality.

(V.) The same answer might be made if it were urged that by making our Morality begin from Rights, we really do found it upon Expediency, notwithstanding our condemnation

« ElőzőTovább »