Feelings are only to be developed by constant exercise; and exercise is most necessary when the intrinsic energy of the feeling is least. It is therefore quite contrary to the true spirit of moral education to degrade duty in questions of personal morality to a mere calculation of self-interest. Of course, in this elementary part of Ethics, it is easier to estimate the consequences of actions, and to show the personal utility of the rules enjoined. But this method of procedure inevitably stimulates the self-regarding propensities, which are already too preponderant, and the exercise of which ought as far as possible to be discouraged. Besides, it often results in practical failure. To leave the decision of such questions to the judgment of the individual, is to give a formal sanction to all the natural difference in men’s inclinations. When the only motive urged is consideration for personal consequences, every one feels himself to be the best judge of these, and modifies the rule at his pleasure. Positivism, guided by a truer estimate of the facts, entirely remodels this elementary part of Ethics. Its appeal is to social feeling, and not to personal, since the actions in question are of a kind in which the individual is far from being the only person interested. For example, such virtues as temperance and chastity are inculcated by the Positivist on other grounds than those of their personal advantages. He will not of course be blind to their individual value; but this is an aspect on which he will not dwell too much, for fear of concentrating attention on self-interest. At all events, he will never make it the basis of his precepts, but will invariably rest them upon their social value. There are cases in which men are preserved by an unusually strong constitution from the injurious effects of intemperance or libertinage; but such men are bound to sobriety and continence as vigorously as the rest, because without these virtues they cannot perform their social duties rightly. Even in the commonest of personal virtues, cleanliness, this alteration in the point of view may be made with advantage. A simple sanitary regulation is thus ennobled by knowing that the object of it is to make each one of us more fit for the service of others. In this way and in no other, can moral education assume its true character at the very outset. We shall become habituated to the feeling of subordination to Humanity, even in our smallest actions. It is in these that we should be trained to gain the mastery over the lower propensities; and the more so that, in these simple cases, it is less difficult to appreciate their consequences.