Elements of Morals: With Special Application of the Moral Law to the Duties of the Individual and of Society and the StateJanet, Paul
Philosophy
Elements of Morals: With Special Application of the Moral Law to the Duties of the Individual and of Society and the State
Janet, Paul
Ethics
On the other hand, the servant owes his master: 1, an absolute honesty. As
it is the servants who do the marketing and pay the bills, they have the
funds of the family in their hands. The more one is obliged to trust them
the more are they bound to restrain themselves from the slightest act of
dishonesty. 2. They owe obedience and exactness in the duties pertaining
to their service. 3. They should, as much as possible, attach themselves
to the persons whose service they have entered; the longer they stay with
them, the more will they be considered as part of the family, and the
greater will be their right to the regard and affection due to age and
fidelity.
=130. Duties of children toward servants.=--It is not only the master and
mistress of the house that have duties to fulfill toward servants, but the
children also. The latter are, in general, too much disposed to treat
servants as instruments of their wishes and the playthings of their
caprices. Although slavery is no longer allowed, some children, if let
alone, would very soon re-establish it for their own benefit. To command,
insult, beat, are the not uncommon modes of procedure with children that
are left entirely free in their relations with inferiors. The latter, on
the other hand, do not hesitate to employ force, in the absence of the
masters, and pass readily from slavery to tyranny. All such conduct is
reprehensible. The servant should never be allowed to strike; but he
should himself not be struck or insulted. In childhood, it is for the
parents to oversee the relations between their servants and children.
Later it is for the children themselves, when they have reached the age of
reason, to know that they must not treat servants like brutes. The same
observations may be applied to workmen, in circumstances where workmen are
in some respect in the service of the family.
Although servants are no longer slaves, nor even serfs, one may still,
modifying its meaning, quote Seneca's admirable protestation against
slavery: "They are slaves! rather say they are men! They are slaves! Not
any more than thou! He whom thou callest a slave, was born of the same
seed as thyself; he enjoys the same sky, breathes the same air, lives and
dies the same as thou." Seneca closes this eloquent apostrophe with a
maxim recalling the Gospel: "Live with thy inferiors, as thou wouldst thy
superior should live with thee."
As to the duties of servants to their masters, they belong to the class of
professional duties which we shall take up further on (Chap. XIII.).
CHAPTER XI.
DUTIES TOWARD ONE'S SELF--DUTIES RELATIVE TO THE BODY.
SUMMARY.
=Have we duties toward ourselves?=--The person of a man should not only
be sacred to others, it also should be so to himself.
Even though man ceased to be in any relation with other men (as, for
example, in a desert island), he would still have duties to perform.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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