[183] Hamilton, Lectures, ii. 440: "Pleasure is the reflex of the spontaneous and unimpeded exertion of a power of whose energies we are conscious. Pain, a reflex of the overstrained or repressed exertion of such a power." Cf. Aristotle, Eth. N., vii. 12, p. 1153 a 14, x. 4, p. 1174 b 20. [184] Théorie scientifique, p. 78. [185] Cf. Wundt, Physiol. Psych., p. 470; Fechner, Vorschule der Aesthetik, ii. 243 f. [186] Exam. of Hamilton's Philosophy, 5th ed., p. 559. [187] See Fechner, _loc. cit._ [188] Social Statics, p. 79. [189] Data of Ethics, p. 186. [190] Mind, vi. 85. CHAPTER VIII. THE EVOLUTIONIST END. [Sidenote: Want of harmony between evolutionism and hedonism.] In showing the important bearing which evolution has on the causes of pleasure, the argument of the preceding chapter has also made clear that the ends of evolutionism and of hedonism cannot be made to explain one another. The theory which starts with a maximum of pleasure as the ultimate end, but points to the course of evolution as showing how that end is to be realised, is confronted by the fact that the development of life does not always tend to increased pleasure, and that the laws of its development cannot therefore be safely adopted as maxims for the attainment of pleasure. The same objection may be taken to the method of interpreting the evolutionist end by means of the pleasurable results of conduct. The two do not correspond with that exactness which would admit of one doing duty for the other as a practical guide. And a further difficulty has been shown to stand in the way of this method. For, on coming to analyse pleasure, we find that it may, by habituation, arise from any--or almost any--course of conduct which the conditions of existence admit of. The evolutionist, therefore, can have no surer idea of greatest pleasure--even although this may not be a very sure one--than that it will follow in the train of the greatest or most varied activity which harmonises with the laws of life. [Sidenote: Necessity of investigating independent evolutionist end.] We must therefore forsake the method of eclecticism, and inquire whether the theory of evolution can make any independent contribution towards determining an end for conduct. We are frequently told that it prescribes as the end "preservation," or "development," or "the health of the society." But to obtain a clear meaning for such notions, we must see what definite content the theory of evolution can give them,--without considering, at present, the grounds for transforming them into ethical precepts. Now, it may be thought--and the suggestion deserves careful examination--that we may find in the characteristics of evolution itself[191] an indication of the end which organisms produced by and subject to evolution are naturally fitted to attain. These characteristics must therefore be passed under review, that their ethical bearings may be seen. * * * * *