CHAPTER I
THE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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1. The Exercise of Volition as the Pre-supposition of All Moral Development.--2. Temperance.--3. Prudence.--4. Courage.--5. Idealism.
1. The Exercise of Volition as the Pre-supposition of All Moral Development.
The human race as a whole has inherited from its animal progenitors certain natural instincts and impulses, such as those of food and sex, of curiosity and acquisition, of sympathy and resentment. These instincts have been developed in the organism as means of adjusting it to the environment; they enable the living being to avail itself of the resources of the natural world and thus to preserve its existence and maintain its strength. The preliminary condition of all moral development is that the objects of these instincts and impulses originally pursued from inherited nervous tendency, shall become ends of conscious desire. That the self shall be capable of intelligent volition is the pre-requisite of its own realization. Volition first manifests itself as an organizing agency in the control of action by intelligent desire. In this, the simplest form of voluntary action, an object is pursued because it corresponds to, and contributes to the realization of, an idea already present in the mind of the self. Thus the will initiates that process of expansion whereby the self grows by appropriating from the external world those objects that appeal to it. With the ability to act in fulfillment of desire there appears for the
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first time in the history of the living organism the possibility of self-expression and self-development. Its advent means the attainment of freedom as well as the assumption of responsibility on the part of the living individual. Hence the ability to satisfy desire through intelligently directed effort must be present as the foundation upon which all further, building of personality rests.
Since it is the indispensable preliminary of all personal development,--the first condition of Self-realization with all men,--the ability of volition to achieve successfully objects of desire seems to demand recognition as, in its continuous exercise, the first of the virtues of the moral life. Certainly, the inability to pursue and attain objects of desire would render all moral development impossible; the case of the individual thus incapacitated would be quite hopeless morally. Indeed, the exercise of this fundamental capacity of volition is so necessary that without it the individual could not be regarded as a moral agent at all. Since it is the possession of every normal human being, however, the activity in question is rather taken for granted as the pre-supposed basis of all conduct, than esteemed as a distinct factor in moral attainment.
As its first necessary step forward, Self-realization requires of all men such adjustment of natural impulses and desires as will make them a means to the preservation and comfort of the individual. On its negative side this activity of adjustment is identical with the virtue of temperance. 2. Temperance.-Temperance is the habit of restraining single impulses and desires in the interest of individual well-being. Signifying the control of natural instinct by active intelligence it is the fundamental virtue of the moral life. In emphasis of this point Paulsen says:
“Temperance or moderation, the ability to resist temptation to .sensuous pleasure, is the precondition of humanization. The
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animal is essentially blind impulse, in the satisfaction of which its life consists. Man, too, is endowed with an animal nature, but its purpose is to serve as the soil for the higher spiritual life; this soil is prepared by the discipline of the natural impulses.” 1
Our natural desires are thus habitually restrained, but not because they a-re in themselves evil and ought to be uprooted from our nature. From the Self-realization standpoint, all normal instincts and impulses of man are, on the contrary, good in themselves; moral value attaches only to their expression and never to their suppression as an end sought for its own sake. Goodness, belongs only to the affirmation of human nature, never to its negation, except when this is a means to a fuller and more complete affirmation. And it is as a means of see-tiring the fullest satisfaction of our nature rather than of repressing it that temperance is placed in the first rank of the virtues. For the single impulse or desire, if permitted all the gratification which it does on its own account demand, will hinder or prevent the satisfaction of other desires. Hence the greatest possible satisfaction of all desires and capacities makes necessary the habitual restraint of single ones within the limits set by the rightful claims of others. By temperance we understand, therefore, not abstinence,
not repression, but, in general, moderation in all exercise and indulgence. Thus we take the word in the Greek sense, meaning by temperance the measured life, the ordered life-the life which observes the “golden mean” in all its activities, not refraining from any wholesome pleasure or normal gratification but at the same time scrupulously avoiding excess in every case. But it should be especially noted that true moderation-as Aristotle himself observed of the “golden mean”--does not permit of the same fixed amount of gratification to all desires in all individuals,
1 PAULSEN System of Ethics, trans. by Thilly, p. 485.
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Interpreted in the light of Self-realization, moderation signifies not the mathematical but the organic mean in the conduct of life-that each impulse be made, in its expression, a means to the promotion of individual well-being. Now it is manifest that the natural desires differ in strength with different individuals, as also the conditions under which these desires may be satisfied vary from person to person. Hence what constitutes moderation in the gratifying of a desire will be different for every person. It is then the duty of each person to determine what amount of restraint the organization of all his activities imposes upon each single impulse; and in the habitual observance of this limit consists temperance for him. Moreover, many individuals cannot indulge certain desires even slightly without danger of going to excess, frustrating the satisfaction of other desires equally legitimate and introducing disorder and confusion into their lives. In such cases temperance, moderation as we have understood it, requires abstinence, complete and entire. The observance of temperance, for instance, compels many individuals to abstain altogether from alcoholic liquors and others to avoid all games associated with gambling. Besides these extreme instances there are in all of us desires especially strong and eager, apt at all times to slip the leash and work havoc with our lives; over there temperance enjoins the practice of strictest restraint.
The rule of temperance extends to all human activities- prescribing moderation in our amusements, our speech, our expenditures, as well as our eating and drinking. It is a fact frequently commented on, that reformers who, in the name of temperance, zealously wage war upon a certain indulgence or excess, are often guilty of intemperance themselves in the way of exaggeration and unwarranted assumptions. But while the virtue of temperance should thus be, realized in all fields of conduct, still it
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cannot be denied that its chief reference is to a few especially strong desires. Aristotle limited the application of temperance to the fundamental animal appetites, those of food and drink and sex,2 and his judgment in this matter has been in a large measure confirmed by subsequent experience and reflection. For these three desires or, joining the two former, the two-the desire for food and the impulse of sex-express the elemental needs of life itself, in the individual, and the species; hence nature has made them strong in their appeal and insistent in their demands. They are often called the, “physical appetites” to indicate their intimate connection with our animal life, an appetite being well-defined as a “desire with a massive bodily basis.”3 Now the power and urgency of these appetites have made them most difficult of all natural tendencies to control and regulate in the interest of an intelligently ordered life. Volition has accepted the challenge they offered, however; and, arouseulties involved, and stung by successive defeats, has made with these appetites the supreme struggle for self-control. Hence the practice of temperance in human life still means primarily the exercise of restraint in matters,of eating and drinking and of the sexual relationship. It will be appropriate then to take note of some of the implications of temperance when manifest in these particular departments of life. The exercise of temperance in the pleasures of eating may first be considered. The food instinct is, of all instincts, perhaps the most deeply ingrained in the organism. This is what we should expect; as the activity of the lower forms of life is for the most part spent in a ceaseless search for food. Nor is it otherwise with primitive man who must wage a constant battle with nature to escape ever-imminent starvation. Thus natural necessity has made
2 ARISTOTLE: Nicomachean Ethics, Bk. 111, Chap. XIII.
3 MEZES: Explanatory Ethics, p. 222.
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the craving for food strong within us,-much stronger than is required by present conditions of life in civilized societies, since for none but a limited class of unfortunates does the securing of sufficient food for bodily sustenance require constant thought and attention. Not only have improved methods of production,and distribution increased the available supply of food, but the protection against hardship and exposure secured through better housing, warmer clothing, and easier transportation, for civilized man, has at the same time decreased the amount of food needed to maintain his bodily energies. Add the further fact that man by the possession of intelligence is able to plan and prepare food in such manner as particularly to please his taste, and the situation appears to be plainly one provocative of excessive indulgence. Over-eating is too often regarded as an offense of a trifling character; certainly it is one committed constantly by persons otherwise temperate in their habits and disinterested in their serving of friends and community. But the offense-in its proper designation, the.vice of gluttony-brings many evils in its train, lessening, as it does man's efficiency and increasing his hours of discomfort and misery. It would be difficult indeed to over-estimate the amount of peevishness, discouragement, and bad temper due, directly to excess in eating. ere then is a most important field for the exercise of temperance. Temperance calls for the habitual control by volition of the desire for food with a view not to the obtaining of the greatest amount of pleasure out of eating but of maintaining the body in the best possible health and highest, state of efficiency. The attention that has recently been given to the subject of food, the manufacture and advertisement of health-foods, the discussion of the merits of various systems of diet, is in its way a healthy sign; for it shows that people in general are -awakening to the importance of the careful regulation of diet, especiallyTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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for those who lead sedentary lives under the artificial conditions of our present civilization. We may expect to derive great assistance from scientific research in this matter of selecting and preparing our food, but obviously much must always be left to the judgment and will of the individual. For no rule can be laid down which will cover all cases. The quality and quantity of food which should be eaten depends both upon the constitution of the individual and upon his environment and occupation. A diet too meager for a man of massive frame, performing exhausting physical labor, will perhaps be too hearty for the brain-worker of light build. Moreover, a change of occupation and surroundings on the part of the same individual may often call for a changed rule of eating, and this alteration of diet is made especially difficult by the existence of previous habits of a contrary nature. Thus the man who as engineer or surveyor has spent years in vigorous exercise out-of-doors and comes to take a desk in a city office, finds that he needs scarcely half the food he consumed formerly while his old habits tempt him continually to eat the same amount. Thus there is constant need with most human beings for self-control in indulging the appetite for food, but the reward of vigilance in this matter is heightened individual efficiency and greater possibilities of personal achievement. A second appetite which requires habitual restraint if personal development is to proceed unimpeded is that for drink-not of course for food in liquid form, but for intoxicating liquors. So important is self-control in the matter of this appetite that the word ” temperance “ has been restricted in popular speech to this particular manifestation of it and thus has come to mean moderation or abstinence in the use of alcoholic beverages. The subject of drinking as thus understood has been so complicated by discussion and controversy that hundreds of pages wouldTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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be needed for its adequate treatment. Hence it is possible in the present outline only to indicate the general principles which must be applied in reaching a rational solution of the problem. The first question which arises when the subject is approached from the standpoint of Self-realization is, ” Is the appetite for intoxicating or exhilarating beverages a natural or normal one? “ If it can be proved that this appetite is abnormal or perverted, then, all indulgence in alcoholic liquors is forbidden at the outset. The truth of this view may appear to be demonstrated by the fact that all fermented drinks contain a poisonous principle -alcohol-and since it seems impossible to regard the desire for what is poisonous as a normal desire, the appetite appears to be condemned as perverted and monstrous. But unfortunately-for th 'is argument-it applies also to tea and coffee, which contain a poisonous element as well, and few would be willing to condemn tea and coffee drinking on the same g rounds. Mo`âer the desire for beverages that stimulate and enliven is too widespread among various races and in different times to allow of its being branded offhand as unnatural and perverted. If, then, as seems more reasonable, we regard this appetite as natural, it is subject to the same rule of temperance that holds in the case of all desires-strict control in the interest of the due satisfaction of other desires, involving moderation for the majority, and abstinence in the case of those who, by individual constitution and special surroundings, are in constant danger of excess. Only, in the case of the appetite for liquor, the consequences of excess are so disastrous, including the loss of intelligence and self-control, the temporary destruction of that personality itself which is the sole aim of morality to conserve and develop, that an exceptional degree of restraint is imperatively demanded. In view of this danger which should need no emphasis to one acquainted with the facts of actual life, abstinence is theTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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safer course for a large proportion of mankind. Certainly it is required with the young and with all who have reason to suspect that, because of heredity or on other grounds, they have the slightest tendency to excess. For the rest, the use of intoxicants should be limited to those places and occasions where social and conventional safeguards reduce the danger to a, practical zero. Finally, it should be borne in mind that the question of the existence of public drinking-places where such customs as that of treating prevail, is one quite apart from that of ” drinking “ itself. This latter is a social and not an individual matter and should be settled on grounds of social welfare entirely. The other impulse of such strength as to be difficult of control is that of sex. Since its satisfaction is the condition of the continued existence of the human species, the demands of this impulse are bound to be imperative with human beings, and it must remain a dominating influence in human society. In Greek Ethics the same rule of temperance is applied to the sex impulse as to the other bodily appetites-the rule of moderation, permitting only such degree of indulgence as would be consistent with the total interest of the individual as a citizen of the state. On this principle, any indulgence injurious to the health of the individual or violating the family rights of a fellow-citizen, would be condemned as vicious excess,-the vice of licentiousness. But we find in this principle no ground for the Christian ideal of chastity which permits this desire to be indulged only under the conditions of monogamous marriage. This ideal of sexual morality professed now by all civilized societies, is based upon the principle first enunciated by Christianity, of the infinite worth of all human personality, Greek or barbarian, male or female, bond or free. For, it should be noticed that the sex impulse differs from the other natural instincts of man in having, not an inanimate thing, but a living person for its object.THE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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Its indulgence is therefore subject to the higher law which governs the relations of persons in an intelligent community--i.e. that human personality should always be treated as an end and never as a, means. To treat another person as an instrument for selfish gratification is thus to commit a moral offense of gravest character. In the growth of real reverence for personality is to be found the only solution for the vexed problem of sex-relations, for the “social evil” and other irregularities and excesses. Reverting to the subject of temperance as manifest in the habitual control of every desire, the growth of this virtue is most effectively encouraged by providing normal and wholesome expression for all our natural impulses. For, whenever through mistaken -teaching or unfavorable conditions, any of the desires natural to human personality are denied their normal satisfaction, the result is likely to be either excess in some other direction or a perverted and unnatural expression of the impulse whose rigul satisfaction is prevented. In former times this result was produced by a false asceticism taught in the name of religion; at present it is brought about by unfortunate conditions of life-particularly in sparsely settled and backward rural districts on the one band, and in the congested urban centers on the other. Because of comparative isolation and inadequate facilities for social intercourse, the country-bred youth is apt to have his natural desire for stirring games, for the relish of eating and drinking in good company, for love-making and courtship, to a large extent denied, and consequently be 'led into forms of vicious excess. At the opposite extreme, conditions of modern city life, as Miss Addams has convincingly shown in her Spirit of Youth and the City Streets, prevent a large proportion of the young from obtaining the wholesome recreation which they normally crave; such conditions offer in the life of the crowded streets, opportunities for unwholesomeTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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excitement, and, through commercialized enterprises for furnishing pleasures such as saloons, dance-halls, and cheap theaters, tempt the growing boy or girt to debasing and vicious indulgence. Hence all efforts to establish playgrounds, social centers, places of amusement, where healthful recreation may be obtained, particularly by the youth in both country and city, should be welcomed and encouraged by all those interested in moral development, as most important aids in fostering self-control and temperance among our people. “Let us cherish these experiments as the most precious beginnings of an attempt to supply the recreational needs of our industrial cities. To fail to provide for the recreation of youth is not only to deprive all of them of their natural form of expression, but is certain to subject some of them to the overwhelming temptation of illicit and soul-destroying pleasures.”4 In conclusion it may be added that the best safeguard against over-absorption in the pursuit of pleasure, even tho of a natural and wholesome sort, is found in such training as gives efficiency in a chosen line of work-occupation, trade, or profession-and thus furnishes the individual with a controlling interest and constant source of pride and satisfaction.5 3. Prudence The limitation placed upon the gratification of various single desires in the exercise of temperance is not an end in itself. It is a means to the maximum satisfaction of all the desires natural to the human self. Now, as has been previously pointed out, the amount of satisfaction permitted to any desire depends upon the inclusiveness of its object--the degree to which it includes the objects of other desires and provides for their satisfaction. But among these desires there is one whose object may with truth be said to comprehend the objects of all4 JANE ADDAMS: The Spirit of Youth-and the City Streets, p. 103.
5 PAULSEN: Op. cit., p. 486.
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other desires characteristic of man as a natural being. This is the desire for continued security and comfort during the period of natural existence. Itself the conscious expression of the powerful instinct of self-preservation, this desire, we have already seen, constitutes one of the dominating motives of human action.6 As such, it is an effective instrument in the organization of conduct; since the end which it seeks is of highest importance,-is one whose attainment is necessary to Self-realization. Considered in comparison to larger ideal aims and aspirations, the preservation of natural existence seems an end narrow and poor, indeed. But the maintenance of natural life during the few years of its allotted course, with the enjoyment which accompanies such physical preservation and well-being, is for the human individual the indispensable condition of his participating visibly in the attainment of larger and more comprehensive ideals. Hence physical security with its attendant pleasure is an end of high moral value. The habit of furthering natural well-being and comfort through the subordination of single desires and impulses is identical with the virtue of prudence. Defined in this way, prudence is just the other and positive aspect of temperance, while temperance is the negative side of prudence. The end of prudence is most effectually secured through the attainment of several objects sufficiently general to include, when taken together, practically all the things which man naturally desires. Prudence is therefore practiced through the pursuit and attainment of these general objects, adopted as purposes.HEALTH
The first of these purposes is to maintain and increase as far as possible, Health. The welfare of man as a natural
6 Cf. Part 111, Chap. IV, § 2.
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being has its foundation in bodily health. Hence of all the “natural” goods of human life this is the greatest and most essential. Health is secured through the attainment of certain objects and conditions which are themselves ends of desire. - The first essential of continued health is food and drink in proper kind and amount. That the obtaining of food in quantity barely sufficient for bodily sustenance is sometimes difficult or impossible for the human individual-even in civilized countries--is proved by the recent investigations of school authorities in some of our large cities which show that many children are unable to profit by the instruction they receive because they come to school ill-nourished on account of inadequate breakfasts. When the means of the individual are sufficient to provide himself and his dependents with food necessary to life, then arises the further question, to which allusion has been made, of determining its quality and regulating its quantity in a manner suited to individualeds (under, of course, the artificial conditions of human life). As long as the great majority of human beings were scattered, in their residence, over wide areas it was comparatively easy to secure an abundant quantity of fresh, pure drinking-water. But with the increase of population and the crowding of individuals into cities the sources of water-supply have become contaminated by sewage and refuse. Hence provision for this fundamental physical need, of pure water, is indeed a difficult problem in our centers of population. Yet the need is as important as that of food itself and, as a matter of public hygiene, its satisfaction is also a matter of public morality. A second necessity of good health is appropriate clothing. Clothing is needed to protect the body against the “elements”--cold, wind, sun, rain, and snow-in practically all regions of earth. Clothing of course serves another purpose--that of adornment-and the clothing weTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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wear owes much of its complication to the effort to satisfy the demands both of beauty and comfort. The desire to wear garments that please the eye in texture, color, and shape is certainly legitimate and laudable; still it should always be subordinated to the other, the chief purpose of clothing, to protect the body against hostile influences of air and water and sun. But if it is wrong to sacrifice bodily comfort to considerations of beauty and proportion, what shall be said of the tendencies observable in present societies to risk health, and perhaps to shorten life, in order to follow a vapid succession of senseless fashions in dress! In the third place suitable shelter is required for the preservation of health. In all save tropical climes man must have for his physical security a house closed against rain and snow, and properly heated. Now that the art of house-building gives us, as a matter of course, dwellings which are tight and warm, we must be on our guard lest through their very ” tightness “ our houses exclude the sunlight and become receptacles for the storing of bad air. Full ventilation and plenty of fresh air are required in any house which is to fulfill the purposes of good health for its inmates. Cleanliness is a fourth essential of good health. The cleanliness needed is not one of body and clothing merely, which of course comes first, but also of house, of grounds, of street, and of all public buildings and conveyances. Cleanliness in this sense embraces all that is implied in modern sanitation---such disposal of all human waste, all refuse and rubbish of all sorts, and such isolation and care of cases of contagious disease, that the micro-organisms which threaten human health shall not multiply or be further disseminated among human beings. Good health cannot be maintained, in the fifth place, without a moderate amount of physical exercise andTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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wholesome amusement. The manual laborer receives this exercise--although often of an excessive and unbalanced sort and under most unhealthful conditions-through his daily toil. Those of sedentary occupation, however, must make special provision to secure it in the gymnasium, and through outdoor games and pastimes. Only through such exercise can the brain-worker keep his bodily organs in such healthful tone and his physical functions so vigorous as to permit his brain and higher centers to act with maximal efficiency. PROPERTY A second object whose possession is made a definite purpose in the practice of prudence is property. We have just seen that the maintenance of health requires the possession and use of certain material objects such as articles of clothing and means of shelter. Even food, the prime requisite of life itself, must be gathered and stored either by the individual or the society of which he is a member if a quantity sufficient for human needs is to be always available. Indeed we find the ability to provide in the present for future well-being first manifested among living forms in the instinct of animals to hoard food for days to come or even for a season ahead, as when the squirrel stores nuts for the coming winter. Some students of moral evolution look upon the hoarding or acquisitive instinct, which is strongly marked in many animal species, as the basis of the right of private ownership and the institution of property, in human society. No doubt, the idea of acquiring property owes much of its strength as a motive to action, to this instinct which man inherits from the lower forms. But property or wealth considered as an end in moral development has also a rational basis in the principle of use or occupation which enunciates the right of every human individual to possess those material objects whichTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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he does or must use, to preserve his own existence and secure his own well-being. The habit of acquiring, through industry, property sufficient for individual needs, and of protecting and conserving this property when required, has come to be regarded as a distinct virtue. This virtue, designated as thrift or frugality, is usually defined as moderation in the acquisition and expenditure of wealth, a mean which avoids the extremes of miserliness and of prodigality. It does not surprise us that the practice of obtaining and of safeguarding material possessions should have been raised to the rank of an individual virtue when we reflect that, second to the control of the major animal appetites, there is no more effective means of securing the ends of prudence than that furnished by the ownership of property. It is the best agency which intelligence has devised to offset the radical changes in physical strength and capacity which occur during the course of individual existence, and thus to provide for a life's well-being. Man passes from an infancy of helplessness, through a childhood and youth of limited strength, to a maturity when power and capacity reach their maximum; thence he passes down through stages of decreasing efficiency to a helpless old age. He also has periods of illness and physical disability. During a full third of his life, therefore, the human individual is unable fully to supply his own natural needs. He must then be an unwelcome burden upon the shoulders of others unless& during his maturity, when his powers are full-orbed, be is able to accumulate sufficient property to support himself during his old age and also to care for his offspring during their period of helplessness and incapacity, thus squaring himself with society for similar care given to him during his own infancy, and thereby establishing his own economic independence. In a similar manner, through industry and saving, the individual is able to provide for his own supportTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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in periods of sickness and enforced idleness. Hence thrift, though it appears inferior to some other virtues which realize a more comprehensive end, is nevertheless of utmost importance, as one of the foundation stones on which these higher virtues must rest. A man's first duty to society is to provide for himself and his offspring; the exercise of thrift is the only way to maintain industrial independence and economic integrity. Without this virtue it is exceedingly difficult to develop the higher personal and social capacities of human nature; the utterly thriftless, as we know, seldom reach any higher levels of moral development. We must always be on our guard, therefore, lest by indiscriminate individual giving or unwise social charities, we deprive any number of individuals of the stimulus and occasion supplied by natural need, for the development of this virtue. To describe the different kinds of property which man may advantageously possess, to discuss the different forms which wealth may take, would carry us far afield-into the domain. of Economics, in fact. Of material possessions those which have greatest ethical value have already been mentioned. All human individuals must possess comfortable clothing and adequate, sanitary dwellings if they are to maintain that health and vigor which is the basis of all further achievement. The ethical value of owning a home is a thing that should be emphasized in this day of restless moving from one habitat to another and of close crowding in tightly packed city apartments. The possession of house and grounds with which the interest of individual or family is identified and in whose conveniences and adornments the tastes of the owner find expression produces not merely a sense of physical security but also a feeling of personal power and stability to be gained in no other way. Another class of objects whose possession.is necessary to the natural welfare of theTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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individual is that of tools and instruments. One of the traits that distinguish man from the animals is the ability to fashion tools by whose use he can avail himself more easily and effectually of the resources of the natural environment. Made at first by the individual for his own use and employed most effectively by their maker, tools were, next to the clothing actually worn, the first class of objects to be recognized as private property. They still constitute a class of private possessions most important to the individual in providing for his own natural well-being. The right of the individual to own those material instruments which are necessary for efficient performance in the special field of his activity, be it physical or mental (and this applies, of course, not merely to mechanical instruments but to books, pictures, musical instruments, etc., etc.), is grounded deep in the conditions of human life and cannot be gainsaid. The invention of machinery and the organization of industry have in a large degree deprived the laborer of this right to his tools--and have also taken from him his rightful share in the product of his labor. That such an industrial system is ethically indefensible is becoming more and more generally recognized, however, and the conviction is growing that capitalism must be superseded by a more equitable arrangement. In addition to these special classes of property, prudence demands, lastly, that the individual possess a surplus in some form of wealth easily convertible into any of the necessities of life, in order that in such emergencies as accident or illness he may have the means of sustenance and be able to secure the necessary remedies. REPUTATION The third purpose is one whose object although not itself material is nevertheless a necessary factor in the material well-being of the human individual. This object is favor.THE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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able reputation in the community-the esteem of one's fellows. Man is a gregarious animal and from the beginning men have found it advantageous to live and work together. At first they cooperated for purposes of defense against common enemies. Then the same cooperation was found to be profitable in the field of industry-there involving division of labor and exchange of products. Finally the same principle was extended to the fields of art and science, of education and invention. But in all @ts forms this cooperation has its basis in mutual confidence. Without this confidence the material benefits which accrue to individuals through the organization of industry cannot be secured. The man who has entirely lost the confidence of his fellows cannot carry on with profit any of those economic activities which are essential to his continued existence and natural well-being. He cannot secure a fair recompense for the product of his labor, since no one will trust the honesty of his work; he cannot buy the necessaries of life since no one will credit his ability or intention to pay. In our civilized societies he is frequently unable to secure the opportunity to work at all--as is shown in the case of ex-convicts who find it impossible to gain honest employment. He is, in fact, a social renegade, an outcast, and as such is deprived of the means of natural subsistence. Conversely, in the degree to which the individual gains good reputation among his fellows, in proportion as he rises in their estimation, is he able to procure for himself all the means of comfort and security. That honesty is the best policy is an axiom universally admitted in the business world; hence the prudent man cannot afford to neglect his reputation. Rather, he must guard his reputation most carefully, making it one of his chief aims to win and to retain the esteem of his follows (if for no other reason) because only through such means can he secure his own natural well-being.THE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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The objects of the three purposes just described, Health, Wealth, and Fame, as they are sometimes denominated, are often called the three ” natural “ goods of human life. The value of these three objects as ends of action is so obvious that their pursuit absorbs the minds of the majority of men. Nor is this to be wondered at, for man is first of all a natural being and he must maintain his existence and efficiency in the material world before he realizes his capacities as a self-conscious person; it is not to be regretted that men seek health, comfort, and every other natural advantage, but only that when they secure these benefits they do not use them as means to a larger and more comprehensive good. Intelligence speedily discovers that the three objects under discussion are the most effective means to self-preservation under the conditions of human life, and thus the instinct of self-preservation is called in, and communicates to them great impelling power. The motive-force of the last two ends, property and reputation, which are less closely connected than the first with the preservation of physical existence, is reinforced by the acquisitive and social instincts of which they are, at least in part, an expression. Thus the three ends in question possess exceptional strength as motives. Society avails itself of this fact in discharging its functions of government. Appeal is made to the strength of these motives to secure from the individual, obedience to those laws and regulations which are required for the general welfare. Individuals who break these laws are punished by death or imprisonment, by fine, and by loss of standing as citizens-one, two, and even, in extreme cases, by all of these penalties. The same motives are appealed to, with penalties of course much less severe, by parents in training their children. Punishment, involving physical pain or close confinement, the loss of possessions, disgrace in the family circle, are the penalties commonly inflictedTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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in household and school, to secure that order and discipline which are necessary to individual development and social welfare. When, through an external and artificial system of rewards and penalties, the strength of these motives is thus utilized to support the claims of the larger goods of the social and personal. life, they are called the sanctions of morality.
4. Courage.
While we acknowledge the importance of material comfort and. well-being as the condition of further achievement on the part of the human self, still we must .not forget that the objects secured by prudence are important only as means to the broader personal and social ends of human life. Moral development requires that the natural goods which we have been considering should be strictly subordinated to the more comprehensive spiritual goods. Whenever any conflict arises between the narrower interests of man's physical nature on the one hand and the deeper concerns of his self-conscious personality on the other the moral ideal demands that material well-being shall be sacrificed, that pain, privation, and even death, shall be undergone, in the realization of larger and more inclusive ends. In the words. of the formula already adopted, Self-realization requires, as its second step in the individual sphere, the adjustment of material comfort and well-being to those more comprehensive ends through whose attainment the higher spiritual capacities of man gain adequate expression. On its negative side, in the subordination of natural well-being with its attendant pleasures to a greater good, this adjustment is identical with the virtue of courage. Courage is thus the habit of sacrificing individual safety and comfort in the attainment of a larger and more comprehensive good. It is not, like temperance, involved in prudence or to be interpreted as one of its aspects; it rather marks a step beyond
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prudence and as such is essentially different from, and in some respects antagonistic to, that virtue.Among the different virtues courage was the first to win recognition,.and admiration in human history. Primitive societies depended for their existence upon the ability of their members to cooperate in protecting themselves against common enemies. Hence it was natural that an habitual readiness to endure pain and risk death in defending the clan or tribe against ever-threatening foes, should come to be regarded as the whole duty of the individual, both to himself and his fellows. As man's life became more secure and the relations of human societies more peaceable, the field for the exercise of courage was increasingly restricted. The importance of this virtue was lessened and its prestige diminished until in civilized societies of the present it is reckoned as but one and by no means the most important of the many virtues that enter into the moral life. Nevertheless, there is a sense in which courage may still be accounted the supreme and inclusive virtue--identical in essence with goodness itself. Moral development has its source in will and its progress depends upon the continued exercise of this power. But progressive self-expansion through effort of will requires--as has been shown in the foregoing--the constant sacrifice of objects already attained and proved satisfactory, for the sake of larger ends which are new and untried. Moral development is therefore throughout its course a venture; it demands from the agent that habitual willingness to take risks, to endure suffering and privation, in pursuit of remote and apparently inaccessible ideals, which is the essence of courage. Nay, the very will to be a self the horizons of whose life are continually enlarging, which is the basis of all the virtues, is courage--courage of the most fundamental sort. The moral life is throughout a “great adventure” calling for courage, even for heroism, at every
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stage in its course; and the merely prudent soul which requires to be assured of success before undertaking each new enterprise will never come within sight of the goal.As man's natural well-being is most effectually furthered through the attainment of health, wealth, and reputation, so the subordination of such welfare to larger ends involves the sacrifice of one or of all of these ” goods.“ Now it is according as one or the other of these objects is sacrificed -whether, that is, health or wealth or reputation, is put in jeopardy-that different forms of courage are distinguished. Courage in its first form, requiring the sacrifice of health, is known as PHYSICAL COURAGE This is the readiness to endure physical pain or risk death in the service of some higher cause. As courage was the first virtue to win approval in the history of mankind, so, among the varieties of courage, physical was the first to receive favorable recognition and general applause. Such admiration of courage, particularly of physical courage, along with greatest admiration for the man displaying courage of this type, was inevitable, we have perceived, in view of the conditions of primitive human existence. In the early stages of social development, man lived in constant danger; the element of hazard pervaded the whole of human life. Men were without adequate shelter, or clothing, or tools or weapons. They were obliged to snatch at every advantage which changing circumstances offered them in the continuous battle against ever-present enemies, natural, animal, and (not the least menacing) human. Hence the quality most needed, and therefore most highly prized, in the individual, was the willingness to take his life in his hands in the effort to avert some threatening peril from the tribe or clan. Such bravery would con-
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tribute to success, in the hunt, upon exploring expeditions, in warfare; upon the success of its members in these fields does the very existence of the clan depend. So great and so obvious is the social value of physical courage in the earlier periods of human development that as a natural consequence men have come to admire mere daring, the willingness to endure pain, even to risk life, when there is no adequate cause. We in civilized societies share this tendency, although perhaps in a weakened form; for we feel a thrill of admiration almost instinctive over the climb to dizzy heights, or the swim through dangerous rapids , while our reason at the same time may condemn the acts as unwarranted and foolhardy. The readiness to suffer pain or endanger one's life is not itself a virtue, of course; since, as we have just seen, physical well-being is an end of high value and we are justified in sacrificing it only when in this way we attain some larger end. Yet human experience shows that the realization of these larger ideals so frequently calls for the sacrifice of material comfort and well-being that it is not strange that an habitual willingness to place health and safety in jeopardy should come to be regarded as itself virtuous.As human societies continue and develop, the advantages of leadership and discipline in hunting and in warfare become increasingly apparent. More and more authority is given to chief or sovereign and under his direction a selected group of the strongest and most enterprising men are trained and drilled for purposes of fighting. Organized warfare now becomes possible, and is regarded as the most worthy and admirable of human pursuits. A new theater is thus provided for the display of courage, and of all forms of physical courage, that exhibited on the field of battle is deemed the noblest. In this period of semi-civilized or barbarous society patriotism is thought to find true expression only in military courage-in the eagerness of
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the warrior to lay down his life fighting the enemies of his sovereign upon the field of battle. The battlefield itself with the presence of thousands in disciplined array' the waving of standards, the clash of arms, and the shouts of victory seemed to provide the appropriate dramatic setting for the finest kind of courage. Emotions were stirred by the pomp of military display; imagination was kindled by tales of heroic exploits in battle. The highest praise, the most enthusiastic plaudits, were given to the victorious warriors, while of all weaknesses cowardice in warfare was deemed the most contemptible. Owing to the influences, partly political and partly psychological, which act upon human societies in the period between savagery and civilization, military courage acquired a prestige and importance among the virtues which is quite undeserved. Its presence in an individual served as an ample excuse, even a complete justification for unbridled cruelty, lust, and avarice. Even the clear vision of Aristotle was dazzled by the spectacular and often melodramatic character of military exploits and to the question as to what is the noblest form of courage, he answers not that displayed by facing death at sea or from disease, but on “the noblest occasions, i.e. such occasions as present themselves in war; for that is the greatest and noblest of perils.”7 The march of social progress at last replaces the militant social organization with the industrial. The individual citizen is now comparatively secure; he is protected in his life and labor by the authorized agencies of society; society requires of him not daring in the chase or upon the battlefield but, primarily, industry, sobriety, and public spirit. Wars have become less and less frequent until now among civilized nations they promise to cease entirely. Does this mean, then, that physical courage is no longer necessary to social warfare and that consequently we may expect it7 ARISTOTLE:: Nicomachean Ethics, Bk. III Chap. IX.
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to disappear from the ranks of the virtues? Many have believed that this is the result towards which industrialism is tending. Some, indeed, have found in this supposed fact a reason for perpetuating war, and for fostering the military spirit; because, they maintain, the kind of courage developed in war-the bravery, the hardihood, the discipline, of the soldier--is one of the noblest qualities developed in man, too good, in fact, to lose. William James disposes of this argument in defense of war, while at the same time answering the question concerning the future standing of physical courage in human societies organized upon an industrial basis in his stirring and trenchant essay on The Moral Equivalent of War. He is in the first place a firm believer in the value of the qualities of bravery and hardihood bred by the military life.
“Militarism is the great preserver of our ideals of hardihood, and human life with no use for hardihood would be contemptible. Without risks or prizes for the darer, history would be insipid, indeed; and there is a type of military character which every one feels that the race should never cease to breed, for every one is sensitive to its superiority.”
He believes that states pacifically organized, if they are to remain peaceful, must preserve some of the old elements of army discipline.
“We must make new energies and hardihoods continue the manliness to which the military mind so faithfully clings. Martial virtues must be the enduring cement; intrepidity, contempt of softness, surrender of private interest, obedience to command must still remain the rock upon which states are built-unless, indeed, we wish for dangerous reactions against commonwealths fit only for contempt, and liable to invite attack whenever a center of crystallization for military-minded enterprise gets formed anywhere in their neighborhood.”THE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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But he believes that it is quite possible within a permanently peaceful society to keep alive, and even to develop, the military spirit, through an incessant warfare waged against nature and natural ills. He proposes instead of a military conscription, a conscription of the whole youthful population, to form for a certain number of years part of an army enlisted to fight against Nature. “The military ideals of hardihood and discipline would be wrought into the growing fiber of the people -7 no one would remain blind, as the luxurious classes are blind, to man's real relations to the globe he lives on, and to the permanently sour and hard foundations of his higher life. To coal and iron mines, to freight trains, to fishing fleets in December, to dish-washing, clothes-washing, and window-washing, to road-building and tunnel-making, to foundries and stoke-holes, and to the frames of sky-scrapers, would our gilded youth be drafted off, according to their choice, to get the childishness knocked out of them, and to come back into society with healthier sympathies and soberer ideas. They would have paid their blood-tax, done their own part in the immemorial human warfare against nature, they would tread the earth more proudly, the women would value them more highly, they would be better fathers and teachers of the following generation.” ECONOMIC COURAGE Next to health, the thing deemed most necessary for the human individual to possess, if he is to live in comfort and security, is wealth. The institution of property, as it has been developed in social evolution, offers to human intelligence its most effective weapon for combating the uncertainties of life--for equalizing seasons of plenty with seasons of scarcity, periods of health and productivity with periods of illness and incapacity. But just because theTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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possession of money has proved such an effective means of furnishing the individual with all physical comforts and pleasures-with a luxurious abode, tempting food, skilled and obsequious attendance-is its pursuit and, in many cases, even its possession, liable to be materializing and debasing. For ceaseless preoccupation with money sought always as the price of physical comfort and security, tends to confine the attention of the individual more and more completely to concerns of his own physical well-being, to restrict his gaze more and more exclusively to narrow prudential considerations, rendering him insensible to the appeal of universal principles and shutting him in to the earth, the prosaic, and the sordid. Moreover, the continued possession and enjoyment of wealth make the pleasures and luxuries it will purchase increasingly necessary; life appears to be unsupportable without them. Thus the individual is made blind to the higher psychic satisfactions which he is missing through his absorption with money-getting, is rendered oblivious to the social injustice which may be involved in his possession of wealth. It is a well-known fact that the ownership of property makes a man more conservative in his attitude towards all proposed changes in social and political arrangements. He inclines to fear political reform, even changes in social convention, lest they diminish the value of his property or interfere with plans he has on foot for augmenting his wealth. Thus there is bred in the individual a spirit of caution essentially inimical to. moral development which depends upon the ability of the individual to risk what he has already won for the sake of still larger rewards. In his novel Open Country Maurice Hewlett shows, in a picturesque and forcible fashion, how the pursuit and possession of property checks and finally destroys the personal development of many members of modern civilized society. His hero, Senhouse, defines salvation as the “use and perfectingTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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of faculty” and declares that “liberty to learn is the only way of it.” Now money, I say, is the one cause of slavery and work our one hope of salvation. Therefore, our civilization as they disastrously term it, is a condition of acquiring slavery easily and of obliterating the hope of salvation.“ ”Civilization is a condition of freedom to use your faculties to their fullest extent; and your faculties are every power of mind and heart and muscle and sense. Very well. Now I say that every sovereign you put into a man's pocket seduces him away from the use of his faculties, and every machine you devise directly deprives him of one of them-and then where are we? Why here; that what is true of a man is true of a million of men and that, so far from being more civilized than the Periclean Athenians, we are actually less so than the neolithic dweller on the South Downs, who hacked up the earth with a red deer's horn and drove his cattle to the dew-pond at sun-down, and back again into an enclthe wolves. And that's very odd, with art and poetry behind us and before, we might by this time be like the sons of Gods.” Exaggerated, this is, and largely untrue; but in its statement of the demoralizing influences of the institution of private property, as at present developed, containing more than a grain of truth. The pursuit of wealth may present a serious obstacle, in some cases even an absolute bar, to the exercise of man's spiritual capacities. It may prevent the individual from seeking truth and power and beauty in his own life, and from laboring to extend these higher satisfactions to the rest of humanity. When this is the case, Self-realization requires that wealth be surrendered. Since surrender involves pain,--the mental discomfort of work and anxiety, and perhaps also physical suffering caused by actual privation and want,--its practice deserves to rank as one of the varieties of courage. It has been distinguished by noTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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special name in ethical reflection; we might, possibly, call it economic courage. But while it has received no distinctive label, this kind of courage is by no means unknown in human society. It has been shown, and is being shown, by all those aspiring human souls who sacrifice all the wealth they possess or all the opportunity they have of ever possessing any wealth of their own, in their devotion to the spiritual well-being of humanity. It is a courage which the well-to-do class needs to exercise, in making those social and political reforms which must come if social justice is to prevail, and all men be given a chance of truly human development. 'Keen-visioned students of present society see in the women of the propertied classes one of the chief obstacles to needed social reforms, because, while they possess as a rule readier sympathies than men, they are more attached to the comforts and luxuries of wealth, and lack the courage to give them up even to save their fellow-beings from perishing by starvation or by exposure, or from sufferings worse than death. It is just this kind of courage which we may suppose the “rich young ruler” lacked, to whom Jesus said: “One thing thou lackest yet: sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou sbalt have treasure in Heaven: and, come, follow me. But when he heard these things [conscious apparently of his own fatal weakness], he became exceedingly sorrowful; for be was very rich. And Jesus, seeing him, said: How hardly shall they who have riches enter the Kingdom of God!”8 MORAL COURAGE The willingness to sacrifice reputation or endure reproach for the sake of a larger social or personal good constitutes a third form of courage. This form of courageTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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has been somewhat ineptly named “moral” courage. Reference has already been made to the important influence which the individual's reputation among his fellows exerts upon his own private fortunes. If he stands well in the community, others will look with sympathy upon his efforts to provide for his present and future well-being. Unless his success interferes with their own interests his fellow-men will be glad to see him succeed. Certainly they will not trouble themselves to put obstacles in his path. Let a man lose his reputation, however, let him forfeit his standing in the community, and all this is changed. Other men regard him with ill-concealed suspicion, if not with open hostility. They question his motives; they criticize his actions. His successes awaken jealousy and resentment; his failures are occasions for rejoicing. It is consequently no light thing to sacrifice one's reputation in human society. Such sacrifice entails suffering and sacrifice too severe to be undergone without loss of self-r;ct and sanity, except indeed as the individual is inspired and strengthened by his knowledge of the greater good which he serves through his suffering. To be sure the suffering is not primarily physical (although physical hardships are likely to follow eventually from social condemnations. But the pain is none the less real because “mental”--the anguish of soul produced by severed friendships, by looks of scorn and contempt, by unjust suspicions and ill-founded resentments. Of this sort is the suffering which has been endured by those individuals of every generation who have remained steadfast in their adherence to unpopular causes. Such men must indeed-as the familiar saying is-have the courage of their convictions. The history of every nation abounds in examples of men who have suffered disgrace on account of their loyalty to righteous causes. The contempt and odium incurred by Abolitionists in many of our communities before the Civil War, is an illustrationTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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from American history. Religion, science, art--yes, every great cause, every lofty ideal,--has its heroes who have endured ignominy and derision for its sake. Steadfast and consistent devotion to principle upon the part of individual members of human society is practically certain to result in a greater or less degree of unpopularity and misunderstanding; therefore those individuals who would organize their lives, and thus realize their larger selves, must be prepared to exercise moral courage. Indeed, this virtue must be cultivated by those who have convictions and propose to follow them. Moreover, the need of moral courage was perhaps never greater than in our modern civilized societies. Not that public opinion exerts a stronger pressure upon the individual than it did in earlier periods of social development. The savage who, on individual initiative, went counter to the customs of his tribe--those of religion or of marriage, for instance--met summary punishment at the hands of his indignant fellows; if he was not killed outright, he was driven forth as an outlaw, to be the victim of whatever hostile force he encountered. But with the organization and complication of life that have accompanied increasing civilization, the range of its influence has been enormously extended, until it now affects the smallest details of daily life touching matters that formerly were regarded as the individual's own concern. Fashion extends her tyrannical rule to every department of our lives--to the utmost minutia@ of our clothing, to the decorating of our homes, to our methods of education, to our art and our literature, even to modes of worship and forms of religious belief. Now it is absolutely necessary for the individual who would preserve the integrity of his own personality, frequently to repudiate this form o 'f social control and assert his right to regulate his conduct and manner of life in accordance with his own convictions. This is not to recommend or even to excuseTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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a foolish contrariety of views or habits, still less a self-conscious eccentricity in word and manner. In matters where no principle is affected or any particular taste or preference involved, it is usually saving both of time and of money to follow the current fashion. But where the individual finds his own principles violated, or his own personal taste seriously offended by a prevailing fashion, it is his duty to refuse to follow it, although the cost may be the derision and dislike of his fellows. For self-development must proceed from within, and no man can build up a self-contained and unified character who is the slave of public opinion.5. Idealism.
The virtue of courage has been explained as the subordination by the human individual of his material interests, whether of health or of property or of reputation, to more inclusive and far-reaching ends. The most comprehensive and therefore the highest ends which can be attained by man in the individual sphere are the ideal objects of his spiritual capacities of thought, action, and feeling. These ideal objects--Truth, Power, and Beauty--are themselves so intimately related that they form, when taken together, an articulated unity, which in its synthesis represents the whole good of the individual self. Now the realization of these ideal objects at the expense of material comfort and well-being, constitutes the virtue of idealism. Idealism is therefore the highest virtue of the individual life; it marks the culminating point in the development of the human individual as a self-conscious person. The virtue of Idealism as thus understood takes two forms: the combined harmonious development of the three capacities above named, with consequent realization of the three corresponding ideals, producing in the individual the three qualities of wisdom, efficiency, and refinement, which in their union constitute culture; and the special
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and persistent exercise of that one capacity, intellectual, technical, or aesthetic, which is strongest in the particular individual, with resulting achievement in an exceptional degree of the end of Truth, Power, or Beauty. Let us consider idealism in each of these two manifestations. CULTURE By culture is meant the unimpeded and harmonious activity of all man's higher personal faculties. It represents, indeed, the complete spiritual development of the human individual. The spiritual capacities of man have their source in the activity fundamental to intelligent personality itself, i.e. volition; but this fundamental activity in the higher stages of its development has three specialized expressions, those of thought, action, and feeling. Hence culture has three departments, the intellectual, the technical, the aesthetic. It consists in the attainment of Truth, Power, and Beauty,--not as three separate ideals, to be sure, but in their organic inter-dependence and unity. The first essential of culture is the exercise of thought in the acquisition of knowledge. Thought is the ability to form ideas which can be verified--that is to say, which are true. The work of thought is to interpret the outcome of previous experience in realizing ends, with a view to the guidance of future conduct. The human individual is not limited, however, to the results of his own experience. The results of the experience of past generations of mankind in the realization of objects, may be communicated to him through the medium of language, and thus his mental outlook may be enlarged to include those objects which the conduct of other men has proved real. The effect of thinking on the part of the individual, therefore, in connection with the processes of intelligent instruction, is to furnish him with a world of objects which are possibleTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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ends of action. This does not mean that the outcome of education and enlightenment is merely to reveal to the individual the existence of a certain number of objects, to which he is limited in selecting ends of action. On the contrary, through processes of abstraction and comparison, analysis and synthesis, he may work over the results of experience, combining its materials in new ways and thus constructing original ideals, whose reality may be tested in subsequent experiences of pursuit and attempted attainment. More than this, many of these objects are themselves changing, so that each successive moment presents to the agent a situation which, in its totality, is essentially new and thus, for purposes of action, contains many unforeseen possibilities. l@ever will his knowledge, no matter how great, enable him to predict with absolute certainty the issue of his own conduct; he must nevertheless be willing to advance and prepared to meet many unexpected and surprising developments. So many ideas have been verified in human experience, so great a body of truth has thus been accumulated, that no individual mind is longer able to contain its detail of fact. The day of the encyclopedic scholar like Leibniz or Aristotle, who was reputed to be master of every known branch of learning, is now past. All that intellectual cultivation can now hope to obtain is a knowledge of the most important truths concerning each principal class of objects. To this knowledge should be added a firsthand acquaintance with the methods whereby ideas are verified in these main departments of knowledge; for no belief which the individual is unable himself to test through action, deserves to be regarded as a part of his knowledge. The cultivated mind must possess a knowledge of the most important facts which have been discovered concerning inorganic nature, along with some practice in the method of experiment and in the use of mathematics as applied in this field; it must 356 THE LIFE OF. SELF-REALIZATION understand the fundamental features of organic life, the structures and functions of living forms, the conditions of their origin and the laws of their growth, besides being somewhat acquainted with the methods of investigation which have brought these facts to light; it must have a comprehensive knowledge of human history-of the origin and development of the human species, and of the characteristics and relationships of the different races of men, and also of the evolution of social and political institutions, recording as it does the achievements of the human spirit in its effort at self-realization-supplemented by accurate information regarding the methods and standards of historical research and criticism; it must know the leading truths from the field of the normative sciences, the world, that is, of values and appreciation, and possess a consequent insight into the demands which human personality makes of the real world, and the resources available to satisfy these demands. Such knowledge will extend the world of the individual beyond the limits of his immediate present, to encompass the experience of past generations of mankind with the vast system of objects which it has shown to be real; such breadth of intellectual vision is perhaps the most distinctive mark of culture. But amount of knowledge alone does not constitute culture. Ideas as mere ideas are distinguished from reality; they are essentially characterized by their unreality. The idea is of itself therefore incomplete; it demands to be realized. The idea is in fact a purpose, which, until it is actually achieved, remains fragmentary and partial. Hence culture can never consist simply in the possession of ideas by an individual, even if the majority of these ideas have been verified in the lives of other men. Culture has frequently been discredited because it has been identified with the acquisition of much information upon many subjects. Now it is possible for a person to possess knowledgeTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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in the shape of a great store of ideas, without any ability to put these ideas into practice. He may appear to be embarrassed in action, or even hindered from acting altogether, by the very wealth of his ideas, which causes him at the time of action to be confused by a multitude of inappropriate and irrelevant considerations. Knowledge of this sort is in no sense a real possession of the individual; it becomes real in him only when realized in his conduct. In cases -where this does not occur we have that half-culture -or as it is frequently but erroneously called, over-culture -which, although it may have been laboriously and honestly acquired, is little better than no culture at all, and which when mistaken for the genuine culture, causes this latter to be depreciated and derided. True culture in contradistinction from such counterfeit is an organic growth, a development of personality through the realization of ideas which are chosen as ends of action. It calls for more than the mere possession of ideas, it requires that they be vitalized in the action of the self, that they be realized in personal life. Culture then consists, secondly, in power of action. It involves the training of the faculty of action in the human individual. The result of such training is technical skill or efficiency. By efficiency or technical skill is meant the ability to realize the ideals of intelligence through the employment of those instrumentalities which the specific situation calls for. The exercise of the faculty of action reveals to the agent what means are required for the attainment of different ends, thus enabling him more effectively to achieve his purposes, and at the same time giving him new knowledge of the inner connection of objects. Despite the indispensable part which action plays in the development of intelligence the exercise of this power has not always been recognized as a necessary element in culture. This is due to the fact that pure thought alongTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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with the higher sentiments, such as the aesthetic and the religious, has been supposed to move in a higher plane than that of practical affairs. But recent insight into the dependence of thought upon action for its verification makes such a view no longer tenable. One suspects that this view was possible only because a thorough training in modes and manners of action was assumed to have already occurred in the experience of all those who aspired after the higher fruits of culture; but this is an unwarranted assumption -at least in societies where the opportunity for culture is not limited to a privileged few who are prepared from infancy for its attainment. Now the fields in which the faculties of action may be trained are so many, and the methods so diverse, that it is difficult to give any complete account of them. The home, the school, and finally society and the state, should all furnish technical training. Of the many kinds of training which it is possible and advantageous to give the faculty of action, a few may be mentioned-with no idea of a systematic classification, but rather of illustrating by concrete instances what is meant by such technical training. From earliest childhood the individual should have experience in handling physical objects, and in manipulating mechanical forces, so that he may acquire skill in utilizing the materials and guiding the processes of nature. Manual training in the primary schools is of great educational value because it subserves just this purpose. Systematic gardening, and the continued care and direction of domestic animals, also furnish the child with valuable technical training-in this case, in the employment and control of the lower forms of life. A thorough training in gymnastics and practical hygiene, received early in life, should give the individual the ability to utilize all the resources of his physical organism down to the last ounce of energy. With such training as a preliminary and preparation, the powers of action should beTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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exercised in those larger fields where alone they can find full and free expression-the social and political. 'In the local community, the social club, and the state, he may have his technical faculties trained in a multitude of ways, and acquire in result the ability to realize the ends of human well-being through practice of the arts of business, of government, of entertainment, of education, etc. It is only necessary that the individual have the will to act, the initiative to put his own ideas in practice, and then, having acted, that he be eager to learn from his own experience, and the experience of others interpreted in the light of his own, better and more efficient methods of realizing his ends. Only through thus acting, and profiting by the results of his own action, can the individual augment his powers of action and acquire that practical efficiency which is a necessary part of true culture. Useful training in the arts of social and political life is furnished to our young people in high schools and colleges by student societies and enterprises of various sorts-debating and literary societies, journalistic and athletic activities-and for the reason that the experience they furnish is an essential part of true culture, these organizations and activities, when properly regulated, should be encouraged and fostered by the authorities of such institutions. Our capacity for feeling furnishes a third element requisite to culture. Feeling is the response of the self, as subject, to the objective conditions which affect its own existence and development; when pleasant it reflects the strengthening and perfecting of the unity of self-consciousness through the appropriating of new objects. Pleasure thus accompanies all action that is successful in attaining its object, whether this object be particular and limited, like an,article of food, or comprehensive and universal, like one of the great causes of social progress. Through such a development of the faculties of thought and actionTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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as we have been considering, however, these pleasures of attainment are prolonged and harmonized, since the individual is given a source of permanent enjoyment in the sustained and successful pursuit of a progression of ends, each of which has its place within a single supreme ideal. Culture should therefore substitute for the fitful and conflicting pleasures of the undeveloped self, a lasting happiness and tranquility. But feeling makes its distinctive contribution to culture in &aesthetic enjoyment or the sense of beauty; since in some cases it is possible for the self to feel all the pleasures of an intimate and personal union with an object without actually appropriating it through the usual effort of action. Thus, for instance, we may make a landscape ours and feel possessed of its most essential features through the sense of beauty which it awakens in us, though we do not own, and cannot hope to own, a square foot of the ground which enters into it. Because it does not involve the activities of thought and action which are necessary to give -us the pleasure of fulfilled desire, aesthetic enjoyment is called pure or disinterested pleasure. Certain objects have the ability to set our faculties of perception and imagination, or even of judgment and reasoning, in such free and harmonious play as to produce in us the pleasure of immediately possessing them in their inner meaning and significance. Such possession we describe as an appreciation of their beauty. It would be going too far, however, to call the aesthetic experience pure feeling, if by this was meant that it contained only affective elements. Intellectual processes enter, of course, into the representation of the object; technical skill comes in to a degree also in the bodily adjustments made in contemplating a beautiful object. But the aesthetic experience is predominantly an emotional experience, nevertheless; it should be recognized as the distinctive contribution of feeling to our spiritual life. Now culture demands that the aestheticTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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sensibilities of the human individual be developed, that his sense of beauty be quickened and refined. With his feeling for beauty undeveloped he may find only a brief and occasional pleasure in a bright color, an obvious harmony of tones, a simple symmetry of figure. His taste must then be trained and improved until he finds constant and enduring pleasure in more subtle schemes of color, more complicated harmonies of tone, and more detailed symmetries of figure. Not that the real beauty of objects, which only the cultivated tastes can appreciate, is always proportionate to the complication of their structure or to elaboration of detail. But cultivation of taste is accompanied by an increased ability to appreciate the harmonies which are not apparent upon the surface but, at first concealed by variety and apparent discord, gradually reveal themselves and, shining through the mass of details, give them a wealth of meaning and suggestibility that is almost endless. The result of aesthetic cultivation is thus to reveal to the individual more beauties in land and sea and sky, in the social world, and in his own inner life, where the Ideal in its progressive realization exhibits that beauty which “never was on land or sea.” The objects of Aesthetic appreciation may be divided into three classes, those of nature, of art, and of social intercourse. In the first class belong the landscape, the seascape, the starry heavens; in the second, architecture, statuary, painting, music, literature; in the third, conversation, and manners of speech and dress. To appreciate beauty in all of these fields the emotional faculties should be trained, and such training should be deliberately undertaken, wisely planned, and patiently carried through. There is no more telling evidence of genuine culture than an appreciation of beauty in nature, a taste for the best music, the best pictures, the best books, and a delight in the courtesies and amenities of social life, in agreeable conversation, graceful carriage,THE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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and attractive dress. Unfortunately, the impression is wide-spread, even in civilized countries, that aesthetic appreciation is an ability belonging to a limited class especially gifted with artistic ability and that the majority of men have no concern with it. This idea is of course quite false and must be opposed in the interest of the higher human welfare. The artist only possesses to an exceptional degree powers of selective perception, imaginative synthesis, and emotional response, which we all possess and may cultivate if we will. We may avail ourselves of the work of the artist to quicken our own sense of beauty; he will find in our admiration and enjoyment the inspiration of still finer and nobler works. Only thus through the interest and cooperation of the whole community or nation in the encouragement of art and the preservation of natural beauty can the full anesthetic development of individual members be achieved. -This brief statement of the essentials of culture will have missed its aim if it has not shown with clearness that thought, action, and feeling, are not three independent activities, but only three aspects of the one process through which the self in its spiritual nature develops and expands. Each one of these three capacities involves, and depends upon, the other two. Thought is verified in action and this verification is signified in feeling; action is guided by thought and impelled by feeling; feeling is aroused by an object of thought whose comprehension enlists the powers of action. In true culture, therefore, intellectual, technical, and Aesthetic activities blend in the unity of developed personality. The ideal ends of Truth, Power, and Beauty, which are the goals of thought, action, and feeling, respectively, are themselves but different expressions of the supreme ideal of complete self-organization sought by the fundamental activity of volition through which self-conscious personality is itself constituted. The three subordinateTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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virtues of Wisdom, Efficiency, and Refinement, all merge within the comprehensive excellence of culture. ACHIEVEMENT In addition to culture, idealism or the full realization of the psychic capacities of the human self, demands the prolonged and progressive exercise of that ability, intellectual, technical, or aesthetics which is most marked in the individual. Such sustained and successful pursuit of the end most in line with the individual's own talent is what we mean by achievement. It is an admitted fact that men differ in their abilities--in the strength of one capacity as compared to the strength of others. Indeed, the divergence in this respect is so wide, the resulting combinations of different abilities in different amounts are so many, that the attempt to classify individuals into distinct types or groups on the basis of their predominant abilities appears quite hopeless. Each individual falls into a class by himself, his own particular combination of abilities rendering him different from every other individual. Nevertheless, it does seem possible to divide individuals, roughly, into three groups in accordance with the predominance of intellectual, technical, or aesthetic abilities, in their nature. The first and last types appear at first glance to be more clearly marked and hence more easily distinguishable. No doubt there are individuals in whom intellect predominates, men who are ” born thinkers “ like Kant and Spencer. The aesthetic type or ” artistic temperament “ is perhaps even more sharply distinguished, its peculiarities are more conspicuous; to this type belong the poets, the musicians, the painters,-the Shelleys, Chopins, and Rembrandts. The third class-the technical or practical-is really so large, occupying so extensive a field and divisible into so many subordinate classes, that it loses all distinctnessTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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and seems to have no exact boundaries. Yet it cannot be denied that there are men who are characteristically “men of action.” Only this superior technical ability is usually displayed in one province of the practical sphere--in that of mechanics or engineering, as in the case of an Edison or an Eads; in plant- or animal-breeding and control, where men like Burbank show their skill; in medicine and surgery, of which many men in the past century have shown themselves masters; in state-craft and diplomacy where men as widely different as Bismarck and Lincoln show supreme natural ability; in education and religion; in social organization and moral reform; in all these and many other fields as well. According to his type of ability, then, the individual is fitted to achieve intellectually, as scholar and investigator, aesthetically in the field of art, or technically, in practical pursuits,--the world of action being so large, however, that special ability in it is usually confined to one of its province The difficulty which immediately arises in connection with this subject of an achievement which is necessarily specialized, is its seeming conflict with culture. Certainly the interests of the two do appear to be antagonistic. Culture is many-sided and symmetrical, achievement is one-sided and extreme; culture is extensive and universal, achievement is intensive and particular. How reconcile the balanced and proportionate development of all the faculties of the human self with the exaggerated and disproportionate exercise of a special one? This is the way the problem states itself in the minds of many educators, moralists, and other students of human nature and human life-and as thus stated it is, of course, insoluble. Now the assertion may well appear to be a rash one yet the truth is that there is really no problem here at all, for the interests of “culture” and “specialization” are not essentially antagonistic when these two are properly understood.THE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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Achievement through the exercise of some special ability in the individual, does not hinder but rather encourages the development of his other powers, provided this ability preponderates in his nature. So far from checking and frustrating the expression of his other capacities, the continued and successful use of this, his special talent, is the most effectual, yes the only, method of enlivening and inspiring his whole nature, so that all his powers may function at their maximum of efficiency. The man who, for example, has marked musical gifts, will not have his intellectual development cut short or his practical efficiency diminished by achievement in the line of his distinctive ability. On the contrary, without the stimulus of this achievement which his nature demands, his powers of thought will languish, his capacity for action will be deadened, and his whole personality be dwarfed and stunted; while on the other hand, if his special talent be given the opportunity for expression it craves, his intellectual perceptions are quickened, his technical skill increased, and his whole nature is vitalized and expanded. This does not mean that his intellectual and technical development will equal his 8aesthetic achievement; but that inequality is rooted in his own nature and to destroy it would be to destroy the proportions of his own individuality. The case is the same if the exceptional ability is of the intellectual or practical type rather than of the Aesthetic. The born engineer or politician will learn most fully to interpret the meaning of the world and to enjoy its beauty, in a life which permits of the special exercise of his distinctive ability; the born thinker will best acquire technical skill and aesthetic sensibility in connection with his special scientific researches. Achievement is consequently not to be regarded as the enemy of culture. As culture is the culmination of individual development, so achievement is the apex and crown of culture, its very pinnacle, whereTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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the individual attains that triumphant mastery of objective conditions, that complete self-possession, for which the will that is fundamental within him is ever yearning. It is true that the individual who exercises to a special degree an ability which is not strongest by natural endowment will miss the fruits of culture and develop a one-sided character. Obviously, this happens often enough. Sometimes it occurs through careless acceptance by the individual of i. certain pursuit because circumstances make it easy to do so; in other instances, it follows from a real ignorance in the individual of his nature and special abilities; in still others -and these the most numerous of all-economic pressure forces the individual to engage in an activity inappropriate to his own nature and hence uninteresting and even distasteful to him. Here of course there is no possibility of true culture; but neither is there any opportunity for genuine achievement. Such achievement as we have been considering realizes ends of universal value. The pursuit of Truth and Power and Beauty is a quest in which all human individuals participate in so far as they exercise their spiritual capacities. In fact, such achievement, if it is to be truly progressive, requires the cooperation of many individuals-men living in different places and times, perhaps, but united by ties of sympathy and mutual understanding through their devotion to common ends. Such cooperation enables the single individual to profit by the achievements of other men and then to repay this debt by turning over the products of his own skill to the uses of his fellow-workers. As the result of this cooperative effort on the part of mankind, a great deal has been achieved in the intellectual, technical, and aesthetic spheres: much truth has been discovered; man's power of control over the objective conditions of his life has been greatly increased; many forms of beauty have been defined and exemplified. The moreTHE INDIVIDUAL VIRTUES
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general problems of an introductory character in each of these three lines of activity have been in a large measure solved. But the consequence of this initial step has been to disclose a multitude of special problems demanding solution in each of these fields. To one of these special subjects of study, branches of action, or departments of sensibility, the individual must address himself if he expects to contribute anything to human achievement. This means a still stricter limitation of his activities. The field of knowledge has been divided into the particular sciences, and these sciences have in most cases been again sub-divided; the multiplicity of fields in which technical skill may be exercised has already been alluded to; the Aesthetic sphere has also been partitioned off among a variety of special arts. Some suggestion of the different fields which are open to individual achievement in the present state of human culture may be given by the following table, which of course is not exhaustive.
Mathematics Physics Electronics Chemistry MECHANICAL Astronomy Geology Mineralogy Meteorology INTELLECTUAL (The Field of Thought) Botany Zoology Anthropology Ethnology Sociology HISTORICAL Economics Politics Psychology Logic Ethics Aesthetics PhilosophyTHE LIFE OF SELF-REALIZATION
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Land INORGANIC Sea Air TECHNICAL Plant (The World of Action) ORGANIC Animal Human Law and Government War and Armament Production and Manufacture SOCIAL Transportation and Distribution Association and Entertainment Education and Religion Landscape and Seascape VISUAL Buildings Statuary Pictures AESTHETIC (The Sphere of Feeling) AUDITORY Music Poetry VERBAL Drama Fiction
