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388 CEITICAL NOTICES: And I do not see how Sidgwick himself in the argument of his last lecture (VIII.) really maintains the view which he has vin- dicated so persistently for Butler, Hume (in some moods) and Hutcheson, viz., the reality of desires which terminate upon their objects. I think he is right in saying (127) that Green has primarily ignored his argument. If I understand it right (it is repeated from The Methods of Ethics) it is very curious, and most significant of Sidgwick's position. Pleasure is to be shown to be the one thing "ultimately and intrinsically desirable" (p. 127). To do this, we separate off objective relations, and show that, if they are conceived as ultimately desirable apart from the consciousness accompanying them, this is only under a misappre- hension. And granting this separation, which seems to me quaint and untenable (have we here a starting point of Mr. Moore?), we should have to admit the conclusion. Next, the consciousness accompanying them is cut down, so far as its ultimately desirable element is concerned, to feeling in the sense of pleasure, though the vraisemblance of the argument depended altogether on the word "consciousness," which admitted consciousness of objects. Is not Green right then in saying (p. 128 foot) that in the last resort, according to Sidgwick "we can give no meaning to good but pleasure"? Sidgwick replies that he "admits and discusses the view that consciousness may be and is conceived to be prefer- able on other grounds ". This seems an ambiguous sentence. What does the author admit ? Not, surely, that consciousness may be preferable on other grounds, but only that it may be conceived to be so. For, as I understand his argument, it is mistakenly so conceived because the grounds are not " distinguished in reflective analysis". Therefore Green's statement, qualified by "in the last resort," holds good. Is not Butler's desire for objects thus in principle cut away ? I think Sidgwick retains it for one purpose, to get across from my pleasure to the pleasure of others. I suggest therefore that his view is "limited Psychological Hedonism," viz., that he thinks Pleasure and nothing else to be desirable in the sense of possessing the quality which alone, on a clear view, can excite desire. (I suppose an action previous to experience of its pleasurableness would have to be set down as instinctive or appetitive. 1 ) This psychological conviction a very natural one, and very hard to escape from he turns into an intuition. But he retains the doctrine of desires terminating in their objects so far and no further as to enable me to desire another's pleasure, and perhaps to get life started by experience of satisfactions. Otherwise, no objects but my own pleasure are desirable for their own sakes, i.e., such as, when distinctly viewed, to excite desire. If we think we I 1 am quite aware of the argument of Methods of Ethics, I., iv. But is it reconcilable at bottom with that of III., xiv., repeated in Lect. VIII. of the present volume ?