It would seem to follow that the ideal life excludes regard for our own good. Hutcheson holds, however, that "the actions which flow solely from self-love, and yet evidence no want of benevolence, having no hurtful effects upon others, seem perfectly indifferent in a moral sense, and neither raise the love or hatred of the observer."[1] Such actions belong to the sphere of natural, rather than to that of moral good. But the one sphere may easily overlap the other, and natural good may become moral. "He who pursues his own private good, with an intention also to concur with that constitution which tends to the good of the whole; and much more he who promotes his own good, with a direct view of making himself more capable of serving God, or doing good to mankind; acts not only innocently, but also honourably, and virtuously: for in both these cases, a motive of benevolence concurs with self-love to excite him to the action. And thus a neglect of our own good may be morally evil, and argue a want of benevolence toward the whole."[2] Nay, self-love may be interpreted as, in the last analysis, a form of benevolence. Since "every moral agent justly considers himself as a part of this rational system, which may be useful to the whole, … he may be, in part, an object of his own benevolence."[3] Why should a man not be benevolent to himself? "A man surely of the strongest benevolence may justly treat himself as he would do a third person, who was a competitor of equal merit with the other; and as his preferring one to another, in such a case, would argue no weakness of benevolence; so, no more would he evidence it by preferring himself to a man of only equal abilitys."[4] "Self-love is really as necessary to the good of the whole, as benevolence; as that attraction which causes the cohesion of the parts, is as necessary to the regular state of the whole, as gravitation." [5] In these words Hutcheson seems to anticipate the very latest version of Utilitarianism, making "the good of the whole" the end, and strict impartiality—"each to count for one and no one for more than one"—the working rule, of the moral life. In
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