Thus defined, the calculus of utility involved in judging the merit of an act may be difficult, but is possible of an empirical solution. There remains only one question of human destiny to be settled, but it is an important one. What, namely, is the relation between the happiness experience gives me a right to expect, and the virtue of my conduct? For Hume’s ethics are not egoistic. The utility that measures the excellence of my act is not merely, nor even primarily, its agreeableness to me; but also, and perhaps in larger measure, its agreeableness to others. How for this large element of altruism in all good actions am I, the actor, to be paid, if paid I am to be? To this question Hume gives an elaborate reply in a section of his “Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals” entitled “Why Utility Pleases.” The answer is simple enough. There is in the human heart a sentiment we call sympathy, or, to use Hume’s favorite word, “humanity.” To possess this sentiment is to rejoice in another’s joy, grieve with another’s grief. To possess such a sentiment is to possess the reward of all altruism; for happiness bestowed upon another is bread cast upon the waters that returns to us after days as few or as many as may be required to produce in our own soul the sympathetic image of the happiness we have wrought in another’s. Such is the theory of human duty and of human destiny which Hume has worked out by the method of Empiricism, which pretends not to a knowledge of God, nor of a system of things broader than the world of our experience. We may allow his own words to contrast the resulting attitude toward life and duty with the theological: “I deny a providence, you say, and supreme governor of the world, who guides the course of events and punishes the vicious with infamy and disappointment, and rewards the virtuous with honor and success in all their undertakings. But surely I deny not the course itself of events, which lies open to every one’s enquiry and examination. I acknowledge that in the present order of things virtue is attended with more peace of mind than vice and meets with a more favorable reception from the world. I am sensible that according to the past experience of mankind, friendship is the chief joy of human life, and moderation the only source of tranquillity and happiness. I never balance between the virtuous and the vicious course of life but am sensible that to a well-disposed mind every advantage is on the side of the former. And what can you say more, allowing all your suppositions and reasonings?” V IMMANUEL KANT 1724-1804 The religion of Immanuel Kant can be put in one phrase, “We cannot know that there is a God; but we ought to live as though there were one”--the difficulty lies in interpreting the phrase.