*I class the principle of moral feeling under that of happiness,
because every empirical interest promises to contribute to our
well-being by the agreeableness that a thing affords, whether it be
immediately and without a view to profit, or whether profit be
regarded. We must likewise, with Hutcheson, class the principle of
sympathy with the happiness of others under his assumed moral sense.
Amongst the rational principles of morality, the ontological
conception of perfection, notwithstanding its defects, is better
than the theological conception which derives morality from a Divine
absolutely perfect will. The former is, no doubt, empty and indefinite
and consequently useless for finding in the boundless field of
possible reality the greatest amount suitable for us; moreover, in
attempting to distinguish specifically the reality of which we are now
speaking from every other, it inevitably tends to turn in a circle and
cannot avoid tacitly presupposing the morality which it is to explain;
it is nevertheless preferable to the theological view, first,
because we have no intuition of the divine perfection and can only
deduce it from our own conceptions, the most important of which is
that of morality, and our explanation would thus be involved in a
gross circle; and, in the next place, if we avoid this, the only
notion of the Divine will remaining to us is a conception made up of
the attributes of desire of glory and dominion, combined with the
awful conceptions of might and vengeance, and any system of morals
erected on this foundation would be directly opposed to morality.
Pages:
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113