In addition to this, the moral educator may do something to inspire the child to want to act rightly. If he is brought into contact with the child young enough, while its character is still being formed, and the system of its wants and desires is still being developed, he may do much to influence it, to turn its desires in the right direction. Moral education may help the child to learn to want the right things. And that is of supreme importance. But moral education can never make a child good.[1]
§ 4. Plan of the Book. At this point, it seems worth while to anticipate for a moment, and to sketch, in the merest outline, the general argument of the book. This brief analysis is not, of course, completely self-explanatory; but it will perhaps be enough to indicate roughly the scope of our study, and the general lines on which we try to answer the question that Ethics asks. That answer, we have already suggested, may be provisionally phrased thus: "The good for man consists in the development of a strong character in the activities of a socially valuable position in the community." Now, in trying to understand all that this means, we must first trace the natural development of character, and examine in detail the various elements which go to constitute it. This is done in Part I. Then, in Part II., we consider the relation between
- ↑ The reader who is acquainted with works on ethics may be surprised that no attention has been paid to certain important questions with regard to the nature of ethics and its place among the sciences. I have considered it inadvisable to discuss these controversial questions in a book such as this; but I may perhaps be allowed to refer, for a statement of my views, to an article on "Ethics and Casuistry" in the International Journal of Ethics, July 1914.
