|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 52
Perhaps the last and greatest difficulty in the paths of those who are
attempting to define and attain a social morality, is that which arises
from the fact that they cannot adequately test the value of their
efforts, cannot indeed be sure of their motives until their efforts are
reduced to action and are presented in some workable form of social
conduct or control. For action is indeed the sole medium of expression
for ethics. We continually forget that the sphere of morals is the
sphere of action, that speculation in regard to morality is but
observation and must remain in the sphere of intellectual comment, that
a situation does not really become moral until we are confronted with
the question of what shall be done in a concrete case, and are obliged
to act upon our theory. A stirring appeal has lately been made by a
recognized ethical lecturer who has declared that "It is insanity to
expect to receive the data of wisdom by looking on. We arrive at moral
knowledge only by tentative and observant practice. We learn how to
apply the new insight by having attempted to apply the old and having
found it to fail."
This necessity of reducing the experiment to action throws out of the
undertaking all timid and irresolute persons, more than that, all those
who shrink before the need of striving forward shoulder to shoulder with
the cruder men, whose sole virtue may be social effort, and even that
not untainted by self-seeking, who are indeed pushing forward social
morality, but who are doing it irrationally and emotionally, and often
at the expense of the well-settled standards of morality.
The power to distinguish between the genuine effort and the adventitious
mistakes is perhaps the most difficult test which comes to our fallible
intelligence. In the range of individual morals, we have learned to
distrust him who would reach spirituality by simply renouncing the
world, or by merely speculating upon its evils. The result, as well as
the process of virtues attained by repression, has become distasteful to
us. When the entire moral energy of an individual goes into the
cultivation of personal integrity, we all know how unlovely the result
may become; the character is upright, of course, but too coated over
with the result of its own endeavor to be attractive. In this effort
toward a higher morality in our social relations, we must demand that
the individual shall be willing to lose the sense of personal
achievement, and shall be content to realize his activity only in
connection with the activity of the many.
The cry of "Back to the people" is always heard at the same time, when
we have the prophet's demand for repentance or the religious cry of
"Back to Christ," as though we would seek refuge with our fellows and
believe in our common experiences as a preparation for a new moral
struggle.
As the acceptance of democracy brings a certain life-giving power, so it
has its own sanctions and comforts. Perhaps the most obvious one is the
curious sense which comes to us from time to time, that we belong to the
whole, that a certain basic well being can never be taken away from us
whatever the turn of fortune. Tolstoy has portrayed the experience in
"Master and Man." The former saves his servant from freezing, by
protecting him with the heat of his body, and his dying hours are filled
with an ineffable sense of healing and well-being. Such experiences, of
which we have all had glimpses, anticipate in our relation to the living
that peace of mind which envelopes us when we meditate upon the great
multitude of the dead. It is akin to the assurance that the dead
understand, because they have entered into the Great Experience, and
therefore must comprehend all lesser ones; that all the
misunderstandings we have in life are due to partial experience, and
all life's fretting comes of our limited intelligence; when the last and
Great Experience comes, it is, perforce, attended by mercy and
forgiveness. Consciously to accept Democracy and its manifold
experiences is to anticipate that peace and freedom.
INDEX[1]
Alderman, basis of his political success, 226, 228, 240, 243, 248, 267;
his influence on morals of the American boy, 251, 255, 256;
on standard of life, 257;
his power, 232, 233, 235, 246, 260;
his social duties, 234, 236, 243, 250.
Art and the workingman, 219, 225.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|