The study of the history of moral conceptions appears to show us that most changes in this province are the result of a change of views concerning the effects of actions with regard to the welfare of society; hence, that they were the fruit of experience. This process of change takes place, however, very gradually; the rules which are the result of experience are handed down, for the most part, without statement of reasons; and only in a very limited measure do the new generations labor for a progressive development of moral conceptions. We cannot wonder that a clear consciousness of the highest reasons of moral precepts is seldom to be found. Yet in civilized societies, the conviction is general that at least an average conformity to rules of morality is the indispensable condition of the safety and the good of society. The answer to the question: What would happen if every one were to act thus? has been regarded, from earliest times, as decisive with regard to the moral quality of an act. When we recognize that actions which we call good and bad are so called because of their causal relation to pain and pleasure, the belief must arise in us, that the worth of qualities of character depends on the promise they contain of future action. The most important power for the happiness or misery of humanity is the character of human beings. Hence the morally good, excellence of character, is to be regarded as preeminently Good. And so it appears that our instinctive judgments are justified by the deliberations of calm reason. The question: Why shall I act in accordance with the general welfare? is answered by these considerations; because such action is right and reasonable, enjoined by conscience and reason, by human nature itself in its higher development. He who does not recognize this fact, who does not find in it the highest and holiest of commandments, and who yet desires to act reasonably and well, recognizing duties to all men, does not see what he himself really will. The conception of right-doing is the motive of the human being, in so far as he is good. The teacher who desires to have moral influence will endeavor to awaken this motive in his hearers or readers. For this purpose he must appeal to their actual characters. And it is as much a _petitio principii_ to assume, in Ethics, the existence of moral feelings, as to assume, in Optics, the existence of sight. Just as there are blind persons, so there are persons without moral feelings. These are, however, comparatively few; some trace of moral feeling, of conscience, is to be found in almost every member of society.