Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 11.djvu/331

330 s. COIT : happiness on the ground of its tendency to produce the latter. It would indeed be reasoning in a circle to say, for example, that one must aim at one's own peace of conscience because that would tend to promote the general welfare, and then to say that one must do what tends to promote the general welfare, because that would bring peace of conscience. The latter ground of justification, however, being false, neither the peace of conscience nor anything else than the tendency to promote the general welfare being the true ground of moral justification, no such reasoning in a circle is involved in the mere adoption of another aim than uni- versal happiness. If the distinction between ultimate criterion and final aim be kept in mind, it will be seen that that object which a man ought to make the final aim need not be identical with that object, the tendency to produce which is the essence of morality. To be sure, the word end or aim might be applied to the latter, and generally has been, but with the result of confusing two entirely distinct psycho- logical acts. Final aim, as used in this essay, means that part of a man's general purpose which is not a means to anything further ; consequently, that object the attainment or production of which permits us to say concerning any act or disposition of the will that it has succeeded, and the failure to attain which renders the act a failure. The final moral aim of action would therefore be that object, the failure to attain or produce which would make action a moral failure. In the second place, it should be noticed that not universal happiness but the tendency to bring it about is the truly ethical conception. The sense of duty is satisfied without the actual realisation of universal happiness, but not without the tendency toward it; that is, the act and character must be such that, if unhindered by outward causes, they would produce it. Therefore out of the very nature of morality it might be deduced that universal happiness is not the true final aim of conduct, although the tendency toward it is the standard of moral worth, the sense of duty being satisfied without the former, but not without the latter. But to determine positively whether universal happiness ought to be the ultimate aim or not, we must consider what the results would be. We find that certain psychological laws of the emotions and will would make it an impracticable aim. The notion of it, on account of its abstractness, would require a high degree of rationalisation in a man in order to take hold of his imagination and stir his enthusiasm. To obtain the vaguest sort of a conception of it is difficult even for minds specially trained to abstract thinking. And per-