There are two defects of the moral fanatic which can now be signalized:
First, he wrongly believes that whatever is not of morality is against
it. He therefore is tempted to frown upon the natural pleasures; to
banish them if he can, and, if not, to admit them only within the
narrowest possible limits as a reluctant concession to the weakness of
human nature. In consequence, the moral fanatic commits the enormity of
introducing the taint of the sense of sin into the most innocent
enjoyments, and thus perverts and distorts the conscience. Secondly, he
is always inclined to seek a moral reason for that which has only a
natural one; to forget that, like the great conquerors of antiquity,
Morality respects the laws of the several realms which it unites into a
single empire, and guarantees to each the unimpaired maintenance of its
local customs. These remarks are intended to serve as a general caution.
I find that young people, when they have become awakened on ethical
subjects, often betray a tendency toward moral asceticism. I find that
teachers, in the earnest desire to impress the laws of the moral empire,
are sometimes betrayed into disregarding the provincial laws of the
senses, the intellect, and the feelings; are apt to go too far in
applying moral prescriptions to the minutiae of conduct; are apt to leave
the impression that pleasant things, just because they are pleasant, are
therefore sinful.
But we have now to take a further step, which will bring us close to our
special subject for to-day, viz., the efficient motives of good conduct.
The non-moral faculties are not only not anti-moral, as has been shown,
but, when appealed to in the right way, they lend to Morality a
friendly, an almost indispensable support. The aesthetic, the
intellectual, and the emotional faculty have not in themselves a moral
quality, but when used as auxiliaries they pave the way for moral
considerations pure and simple, and have in this sense an immense
propaedeutic value. Without entering in this place into the philosophy of
aesthetics, it is enough to say that the beautiful, like the good,
results from and depends on the observance of certain limits and certain
relations. And it will not seem far-fetched to suggest that pupils who
have been trained to appreciate moderation, restraint and harmony of
relations in external objects, will be predisposed to apply analogous
measures to matters of conduct, and that a standard of valuation will
thus be created in their minds which must prove favorable to right
action. AEsthetics may become a pedagogue unto ethics. The same
pedagogical function may be claimed for the intellect. The intellect
traces the connection between causes and effects. Applied to conduct, it
shows the connection between acts and their consequences. It is the
faculty which counsels prudence. One does not need to accept the
egoistic theory of morals to concede that self-interest is an ally of
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