It must be added, however, that this modern "altruism," when analyzed
to its final view, does not become "disinterested benevolence." For
the greatest general good is viewed as conditioning the best good of
each individual, and the individual is to include it for the sake of
his own share. So this so-called "altruism," after all, is still ruled
by the self-regarding aim, and stands only for the broadest and most
successful utilitarianism.
(3) Evolutionist Utilitarianism. This is its recent and present
most characteristic form. The variety of types of evolutionism,
however, has prevented the bringing of it, thus far, into a definite
universally accepted formulation. Although, as already stated,[53]
monistic evolutionism, whether materialistic or pantheistic, by
excluding freedom from the universe, leaves no place for moral action
or responsibility, it still continues to speak about obligation and
the reality of personal character. In this case the "obligation" can
be only acquiescence in the fatalistic onward evolution of nature with
its inevitable events. Theistic evolution, however, holding itself as
only the mode of the divine creation, though it has difficulties in
explaining the genesis of an authoritative conscience, maintains both
its existence in some sense and a ground for the obligation which it
urges. Its utilitarianism differs from earlier forms in substituting an
historical and biological explanation of the origin and force of the
moral sentiments for the purely psychological one. These sentiments
are declared to be "the results of accumulated experiences of utility,
gradually organized and inherited."[54] In its better forms of
statement this process of organizing a guiding instinct or intuition is
represented as the divine work of transferring the moral law over us
into our subjective consciousness--a process, however, that moves on
the principle of utility and is always incomplete.[55]
Against the whole utilitarian theory, as a widely urged explanation
of the ground of right and the sense of obligation, the following
considerations are decisive:
First, the idea of right is generically distinct and different from
that of happiness or utility. However closely related they refuse
to be identified and must not be confounded. In reference to any
particular act or to any general course of conduct, beyond the question
of pleasure or advantage arises the further question: Is it right?
Every day of their lives men are required to forego enjoyment and the
forwarding of what appears to be their interests, in order to do right
and follow their conscience. Perceived adaptations to happiness are not
the same as the obligation to right. Utilitarianism stands apart from
the moral idea, in a by-play with the idea of profit.[56]
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