Let us now, as a means of rendering our conception of the moral end more concrete, consider briefly each of the forms of interest.

1. Interest in self. We must free ourselves from any notion that an interest in self is non-moral, if not actually immoral. The latter position is seldom consciously assumed, but it is not uncommon to have interest in self, under the name of prudence, marked off from the moral sphere. Interest in self, if the interest is pure, is just as much an interest in the moral end as interest in anything or anybody else. Interest in self may take the form of selfishness, or of sentimentalism; but this is only an impure interest, an interest not in self, but in some consequences to which the self may be directed. Interest in self may take many forms, according to the side of self which is the object of attention, and according to the range of the self taken into account. A rudimentary form is prudence, but even this, instead of being non-moral, is, in proper place and degree, moral, as moral as benevolence; and, if not in its proper place, immoral. From such an interest there are all stages up to the interest in self as it most deeply and broadly is, the sense of honor, moral dignity, self-respect, conscientiousness, that attempt to be and to make the most of one's self, which is at the very root of moral endeavor.

2. Interest in others. The generic form of interest in others is sympathy, this being specified by the various forms of social organization of which the individual is a member. A person is, we have seen, one who can conceive of ends and can act to realize these ends. Only a person, therefore, can conceive of others as ends, and so have true sympathy.

True interest in others is pure, or disinterested, in the sense of having no reference to some further and external consequence to one's self. Interest in others need not be moral (or pure) any more than interest in self is necessarily immoral (or impure). It is a mistake to distinguish interest in self as egoistic and interest in others as altruistic. Genuine interests, whatever their object, are both egoistic and altruistic. They are egoistic simply because they are interests—imply satisfaction in a realized end. If man is truly a social being, constituted by his relationships to others, then social action must inevitably realize himself, and be, in that sense, egoistic. And on the other hand, if the individual's interest in himself is in himself as a member of society, then such interest is thoroughly altruistic. In fact, the very idea of altruism is likely to carry a false impression when it is so much insisted upon, as it is nowadays in popular literature, as the essence of morality. The term as used seems to imply that the mere giving up of one's self to others, as others, is somehow moral. Just as there may be an immoral interest in self, so there may be an immoral 'altruism.' It is immoral in any case to sacrifice the actual relationships in the case, those which demand action, to some feeling outside themselves—as immoral when the feeling to which the sacrifice is offered up is labelled 'benevolence', as when it is termed 'greediness'. It is no excuse when a man gives unwisely to a beggar that he feels benevolent. Moral benevolence is the feeling directed toward a certain end which is known to be the fit or right end, the end which expresses the situation. The question is as to the aim in giving. Apart from this aim, the act is simply relieving the agent's own feelings and has no moral quality. Rather it is immoral; for feelings do have a moral capacity, that is, a relation to ends of action, and hence to satisfy them on their account, to deprive them of their practical reference, is bad. Aside from what this illustrates, there is a tendency in the present emphasis of altruism to erect the principle of charity, in a sense which implies continued social inequality, and social slavery, or undue dependence of one upon another, into a fundamental moral principle. It is well to "do good" to others, but it is much better to do this by securing for them the freedom which makes it possible for them to get along in the future without such 'altruism' from others. There is what has been well termed an "egotism of renunciation"; a desire to do for others which, at bottom, is simply an attempt to regulate their conduct. Much of altruism is an egoism of a larger radius, and its tendency is to "manufacture a gigantic self", as in the case where a father sacrifices everything for his children or a wife for her husband.

Some ethical writers have gone to the other extreme and held that all benevolence is a disguised or an enlightened selfishness, since having a necessary reference to self. The reference to self must be admitted; unless the action springs from an interest of the agent himself the act may be outwardly useful, but cannot be moral. But the argument alluded to inverts the true relation involved. If a man's interests are such that he can find satisfaction only in the satisfaction of others, what an absurdity to say that his acting from these interests is selfish! The very fact of such identity of self with others in his interest is the proof of his unselfishness.

3. Interest in Science and Art. Man is interested in the world about him; the knowledge of the nature and relations of this world become one of his most absorbing pursuits. Man identifies himself with the meaning of this world to the point that he can be satisfied only as he spells out and reads its meaning. (See, for example, Browning's "Grammarian's Funeral".) The scientific interest is no less a controlling motive of man than the personal interest. This knowledge is not a means for having agreeable sensations; it is not dilettanteism or "love of culture"; it is interest in the large and goodly frame of things. And so it is with art; man has interests which can be satisfied only in the reconstruction of nature in the way of the useful and the beautiful.

It seems as if here interests violated their general law, and, in the case of use at least, were an interest in some ulterior end. But it may be questioned whether a carpenter whose aim was consciously beyond the work he was doing, would be a good workman—and this whether the further end is his own private advantage, or social benefit at large. The thought of the further benefit to self and of the utility to accrue to some one else, will, if it becomes a part of what he is doing, undoubtedly intensify his interest—it must do so, for it enlarges its content. But to identify one's own or another's well-being with work, and to make the work a mere means to this welfare, are two quite different things. The good artisan "has his heart in his work". His self-respect makes it necessary for him to respect this technical or artistic capacity, and to do the best by it that he can without scrimping or lowering. To a good business man business is not the mere means to money-making; and it is sentimentalism (and hence immoral) to demand that it be a mere means to the good of society. The business, if it is a moral one (and any business, so far as it is thus carried on, is moral), is carried on for the sake of the activity itself, as a realizing of capacity in a specific situation.

XXXVI.

We seem, however, to meet here, in relation to science and art, a difficulty which threatens our whole theory. Can it be claimed, it may be asked, that devotion to science or art constitutes goodness in the same sense that devotion to the interests of one's family or state constitutes it? No one doubts that a good father or a good citizen is a good man, in so far forth. Are we ready to say that a good chemist or good carpenter, or good musician is, in so far, a good man? In a word, is there not a reference to the good of persons present in one case and absent in another, and does not its absence preclude the scientific and artistic activities from any share, as such, in the moral end?

It must be remembered that the moral end does not refer to some consequence which happens, de facto, to be reached. It refers to an end willed; i.e., to an idea held to and realized as an idea. And this fact shows us the way to meet the query, in part at least. If, when we say good carpenter, or good merchant, we are speaking from the standpoint of results, independently of the idea conceived as end in the mind of the agent; if we mean simply, 'we like what that man does', then the term good has no moral value. A man may paint 'good' pictures and not be, in so far, a good man, but in this sense a man may do a great deal of 'good', and yet not be a good man. It was agreed at the outset that moral goodness pertains to the kind of idea or end which a man clings to, and not to what he happens to effect visibly to others.

If a scientific man pursues truth as a mere means to reputation, to wealth, etc., we do not (or should not) hesitate to call him immoral.

What reason is there why we should not call him moral if he does his work for its own sake, from interest in this cause which takes him outside his "own miserable individuality", in Mill's phrase? After all, the phrase a 'good father' means but a character manifesting itself in certain relations, as is right according to these relations; the phrase has moral significance not in itself, but with reference to the end aimed at by character. And so it is with the phrase 'a good carpenter.' That also means devotion of character to certain outer relations for their own sake. These relations may not be so important, but that is not lack of moral meaning.

XXXVII.

So far we have been discussing the moral ideal in terms of its inner side—capacity, interest. We shall now discuss it on its outer or objective side—as 'adjustment to environment' in the phrase made familiar by the evolutionists. Certain cautions, however, must be noted in the use of the phrase. We must keep clearly in mind the relativity of environment to inner capacity; that it exists only as one element of function. Even a plant must do something more than adjust itself to a fixed environment; it must assert itself against its surroundings, subordinating them and transforming them into material and nutriment; and, on the surface of things, it is evident that transformation of existing circumstances is moral duty rather than mere reproduction of them. The environment must be plastic to the ends of the agent.

But admitting that environment is made what it is by the powers and aims of the agent, what sense shall we attribute to the term adjustment? Not bare conformity to circumstances, nor bare external reproduction of them, even when circumstances are taken in their proper moral meaning. The child in the family who simply adjusts himself to his relationships in the family, may be living a moral life only in outward seeming. The citizen of the state may transgress no laws of the state, he may punctiliously fulfill every contract, and yet be a selfish man. True adjustment must consist in willing the maintenance and development of moral surroundings as one's own end. The child must take the spirit of the family into himself and live out this spirit according to his special membership in the family. So a soldier in the army, a friend in a mutual association, etc. Adjustment to intellectual environment is not mere conformity of ideas to facts. It is the living assimilation of these facts into one's own intellectual life, and maintaining and asserting them as truth.

There are environments existing prior to the activities of any individual agent; the family, for example, is prior to the moral activity of a child born into it, but the point is to see that 'adjustment', to have a moral sense, means making the environment a reality for one's self. A true description of the case would say that the child takes for his own end, ends already existing for the wills of others. And, in making them his own, he creates and supports for himself an environment that already exists for others. In such cases there is no special transformation of the existing environment; there is simply the process of making it the environment for one's self. So in learning, the child simply appropriates to himself the intellectual environment already in existence for others. But in the activity of the man of science there is more than such personal reproduction and creation; there is increase, or even reconstruction of the prior environment. While the ordinary citizen hardly does more than make his own the environment of ends and interests already sustained in the wills of others, the moral reformer may remake the whole. But whether one case or the other, adjustment is not outer conformity; it is living realization of certain relations in and through the will of the agent.

XXXVIII.

Since the performance of function is, on the other side, the creation, perpetuation, and further development of an environment, of relations to the wills of others, its performance is a common good. It satisfies others who participate in the environment. The member of the family, of the state, etc., in exercising his function, contributes to the whole of which he is a member by realizing its spirit in himself. But the question discussed in section XXXVI recurs under another aspect. Granting that the satisfying of personal interests realizes a common good, what shall we say of the impersonal interests—interests in science and art. Is the good carpenter or chemist not only in so far a good man, but also a good social member? In other words, does every form of moral activity realize a common good, or is the moral end partly social, partly non-social?

The ground here taken is that the moral end is wholly social. This does not mean that science and art are means to some social welfare beyond themselves. We have already stated that even the production of utilities must, as moral, be its own end. The position then is that intellectual and artistic interests are themselves social, when considered in the completeness of their relations—that interest in the development of intelligence is, in and of itself, interest in the well-being of society.

Unless this be true there is no moral end at all, but only moral ends. There is no comprehensive unity in life, but a number of ends which, being irreducible to a common principle, must be combined on the best principle of compromise available. We have no 'The Good', but an aggregate of fragmentary ends.

For the same reason it follows that in the case of a collision of social with intellectual ends—say the conflict of a man's interests as a member of a family with his interests in new scientific discovery—no reconciliation is possible. If the interests are forms of social interest, there is a common end in both, on the basis of which the conflict can be resolved. While such considerations do not prove that there is but one end, and that social, they may well make us hesitate about carelessly taking a position of which they are the logical consequence.

Of course, every one recognizes that a certain amount of scientific and artistic interest is social in character. A certain amount of interest in truth, or in intelligence, a certain amount of susceptibility to beauty, a certain amount of devotion to utility, are universally recognized to be necessary to make judicious, agreeable and efficient social members. The whole system of modern education has meaning only on this supposition.

More than this: A certain amount of intelligence, and a certain amount of susceptibility to embodied ideals, must exist to give moral conduct. A moral end is, as we have seen, always a conception, an idea. The very act of bringing conduct out of the impulsive into the moral sphere, depends upon the development of intelligence so as to transform a feeling into the perception of a situation. And, as we watch moral development from childhood to maturity, is it not evident that progress consists in power to conceive of larger and better defined ends? to analyze the situation which demands active response, the function which needs exercise, into specific relations, instead of taking it partially or even upon some one else's say so? Conduct, so far as not based upon an intelligent recognition and realization of the relationships involved, is either sentimental, or merely habitual—in the former case immoral, and in the latter failing of the complete morality possible.

If the necessary part played in conduct by artistic cultivation is not so plain, it is largely because 'Art' has been made such an unreal Fetich—a sort of superfine and extraneous polish to be acquired only by specially cultivated people. In reality, living is itself the supreme art; it requires fineness of touch; skill and thoroughness of workmanship; susceptible response and delicate adjustment to a situation apart from reflective analysis; instinctive perception of the proper harmonies of act and act, of man and man. Active art is the embodiment of ideals; the clothing of ideas otherwise abstract in their peculiar and fit garb of concrete outward detail; passive art is the quick and accurate response to such embodiments as are already made. What were human conduct without the one and the other?

Granting the necessity of knowledge and of its artistic application in conduct, the question arises as to where the line is to be drawn. Evidently, if anywhere, at specialisms, remote philosophic or mathematical endeavors; life-times spent in inventive attempts without appreciable outcome. But to draw the line is not easy. The remote of one generation is the social tool of the next; the abstract mathematics and physics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are the great social forces of the nineteenth—the locomotive, the telegraph, the telephone, etc. And how, in any case, can we tell a scientific investigator that up to a certain experiment or calculation his work may be social, beyond that, not? All that we can say is that beyond a certain point its social character is not obvious to sense and that the work must be carried on by faith.

Thus it is that we dispose of objections like Bradley's (Ethical Studies, p. 202): "Nothing is easier than to suppose a life of art or speculation which, as far as we can see, though true to itself, has, so far as others are concerned, been sheer waste or even loss, and which knew that it was so." That we can not see any social result in such cases has nothing to do with the question whether or not the interests themselves are social. We may imagine a life of philanthropic activity, say of devotion to emancipation of slaves in a country wholly given over to slavery, or of a teacher in an unenlightened country, which, as far as we can see, (though, in this case, as in the one referred to by Mr. Bradley, everything depends upon how far we can see) has been sheer waste, so far as influence on others is concerned. The point is whether in such cases the life lived is not one of devotion to the interests of humanity as such.

XXXIX.

Let us consider the problem on its other side. What kind of an interest is our interest in persons, our distinctively social interest? Suppose we attempt to separate our interests in truth, beauty, and use from our interest in persons: What remains in the persons to be interested in? Is not a necessary part of out interest in persons, an interest in them as beings fulfilling their respective intellectual and artistic capacities; and if we cut this out of our social interest, have we not maimed and stunted our interest in persons? We wish the fullest life possible to ourselves and to others. And the fullest life means largely a complete and free development of capacities in knowledge and production—production of beauty and use. Our interest in others is not satisfied as long as their intelligence is cramped, their appreciation of truth feeble, their emotions hard and uncomprehensive, their powers of production compressed. To will their true good is to will the freeing of all such gifts to the highest degree. Shall we say that their true good requires that they shall go to the point of understanding algebra, but not quaternions, of understanding ordinary mechanics, but not to working out an electro-magnetic theory of light? to ability to appreciate ordinary chords and tunes, but not to the attempt to make further developments in music?

And this throws light upon the case referred to by Mr. Bradley. Social welfare demands that the individual be permitted to devote himself to the fulfilling of any scientific or artistic capacity that he finds within himself—provided, of course, it does not conflict with some more important capacity—irrespective of results. To say to a man: You may devote yourself to this gift, provided you demonstrate beforehand its social bearing, would be to talk nonsense. The new discovery is not yet made. It is absolutely required by the interests of a progressive society that it allow freedom to the individual to develop such functions as he finds in himself, irrespective of any proved social effect. Here, as elsewhere, morality works by faith, not by sight.

Indeed the ordinary conception of social interests, of benevolence, needs a large over-hauling. It is practically equivalent to doing something directly for others—to one form or another of charity. But this is only negative morality. A true social interest is that which wills for others freedom from dependence on our direct help, which wills to them the self-directed power of exercising, in and by themselves, their own functions. Any will short of this is not social but selfish, willing the dependence of others that we may continue benignly altruistic. The idea of "giving pleasure" to others, "making others happy", if it means anything else than securing conditions so that they may act freely in their own satisfaction, means slavery.

As society advances, social interest must consist more and more in free devotion to intelligence for its own sake, to science, art and industry, and in rejoicing in the exercise of such freedom by others. Meantime, it is truth which makes free.

Where, finally, does the social character of science and art come in? Just here: they are elements in the perfection of individuality, and they are elements whose very nature is to be moving, not rigid; distributed from one to another and not monopolistic possessions. If there are forms of science and art which, at present, are static, being merely owned collections of facts, as one may have a collection of butterflies in a frame, or of etchings in a closed portfolio, this is not because they are science and art, but imperfect science and art. To complete their scientific and artistic character is to set these facts in motion; to hurl them against the world of physical forces till new instruments of man's activity are formed, and to set them in circulation so that others may also participate in their truth and rejoice in their beauty. So far as scientific or artistic attainments are treasured as individual possessions, so far it is true that they are not social—but so far it is also true that they are immoral: indeed that they are not fully scientific or artistic, being subordinated to having certain sensations.

The intellectual movement of the last four or five centuries has resulted in an infinite specialization in methods, and in an immense accumulation of fact. It is quite true, since the diversity of fact and of method has not yet been brought to an organic unity, that their social bearing is not yet realized. But when the unity is attained (as attained it must be if there is unity in the object of knowledge), it will pass into a corresponding unity of practice. And then the question as to the social character of even the most specialized knowledge will seem absurd. It will be to ask whether men can coöperate better when they do not know than when they do know what they want. Meantime the intellectual confusion, and the resulting divorce of knowledge from practice, exists. But this constitutes a part of the environment of which action must take heed. It makes it one of the pressing duties that every man of intelligence should do his part in bringing out the public and common aspects of knowledge. The duty of the present is the socializing of intelligence—the realizing of its bearing upon social practice.

XL.

We have attempted to show that the various interests are social in their very nature. We have not attempted to show that this can be seen or proved in any given case. On the contrary, in most, if not all cases, the agent acts from a faith that, in realizing his own capacity, he will satisfy the needs of society. If he were asked to prove that his devotion to his function were right because certain to promote social good, he might well reply: "That is none of my affair. I have only to work myself out as strength and opportunity are given me, and let the results take care of themselves. I did not make the world, and if it turns out that devotion to the capacity which was given me, and loyalty to the surroundings in which I find myself do not result in good, I do not hold myself responsible. But, after all, I cannot believe that it will so turn out. What is really good for me must turn out good for all, or else there is no good in the world at all." The basis, in a word, of moral conduct, with respect to the exercise of function, is a faith that moral self-satisfaction (that is, satisfaction in accordance with the performance of function as already defined) means social satisfaction—or the faith that self and others make a true community. Now such faith or conviction is at the basis of all moral conduct—not simply of the scientific or artistic. Interest in self must mean belief in one's business, conviction of its legitimacy and worth, even prior to any sensible demonstration. Under any circumstances, such demonstration can extend only to past action; the social efficiency of any new end must be a matter of faith. Where such faith is wanting, action becomes halting and character weak. Forcible action fails, and its place is taken by a feeble idealism, of vague longing for that which is not, or by a pessimistic and fruitless discontent with things as they are—leading, in either case, to neglect of actual and pressing duty. The basis of moral strength is limitation, the resolve to be one's self only, and to be loyal to the actual powers and surroundings of that self. The saying of Carlyle's about doing the "duty that lies nearest", and of Goethe's that "America is here or nowhere", both imply that faith in the existing moral capacity and environment is the basis of conduct. All fruitful and sound human endeavor roots in the conviction that there is something absolutely worth while, something 'divine' in the demands imposed by one's actual situation and powers. In the great moral heroes of the world the conviction of the worth of their destiny, and of what they were meant to do, has amounted to a kind of fatalism. They have done not simply what they could do, but what they must do.

On the other hand, effective social interest is based upon what is vaguely called 'faith in humanity', or, more specifically, belief in the value of each man's individuality, belief in some particular function which he might exercise, given appropriate conditions and stimuli. Moral interest in others must be an interest in their possibilities, rather than in their accomplishments; or, better, in their accomplishments so far as these testify to a fulfilling of function—to a working out of capacity. Sympathy and work for men which do not grow out of faith in them are a perfunctory and unfertile sort of thing.

This faith is generally analyzed no further; it is left as faith in one's 'calling' or in 'humanity'. But what is meant is just this: in the performing of such special service as each is capable of, there is to be found not only the satisfaction of self, but also the satisfaction of the entire moral order, the furthering of the community in which one lives. All moral conduct is based upon such a faith; and moral theory must recognize this as the postulate upon which it rests. In calling it a postulate, we do not mean that it is a postulate which our theory makes or must make in order to be a theory; but that, through analysis, theory finds that moral practice makes this postulate, and that with its reality the reality end value of conduct are bound up.

In calling it a postulate we do not mean to call it unprovable, much less unverifiable, for moral experience is itself, so far as it goes, its verification. But we mean that the further consideration of this postulate, its demonstration or (if the case so be) its refutation, do not belong to the realm of ethics as such. Each branch of human experience rests upon some presupposition which, for that branch, is ultimate. The further inquiry into such presuppositions belong not to mathematics, or physics, or ethics, but to metaphysics.

Unless, then, we are to extend our ethical theory to inquire into the possibility and value of moral experience, unless, that is, we are to make an excursion into the metaphysics of ethics, we have here reached our foundation. The ethical postulate, the presupposition involved in conduct, is this:

In the realization of individuality there is found also the needed realization of some community of persons of which the individual is a member; and, conversely, the agent who duly satisfies the community in which he shares, by that same conduct satisfies himself.

Otherwise put, the postulate is that there is a community of persons; a good which realized by the will of one is made not private but public. It is this unity of individuals as respects the end of action, this existence of a practical common good, that makes what we call the moral order of the world.

Its significance may be further developed by comparing it with the scientific postulate.

All science rests upon the conviction of the thorough-going and permanent unity of the world of objects known—a unity which is sometimes termed the 'uniformity of nature' or the 'reign of law'; without this conviction that objects are not mere isolated and transitory appearances, but are connected together in a system by laws or relations, science would be an impossibility. Moral experience makes for the world of practice an assumption analogous in kind to that which intellectual experience makes for the world of knowledge. And just as it is not the affair of science, as such, or even of logic (the theory of science) to justify this presupposition of science, or to do more than show its presence in intellectual experience, so it is not the business of conduct, or even of ethics (the theory of conduct) to justify what we have termed the 'ethical postulate'. In each case the further inquiry belongs to metaphysics.

XLI.

We have now concluded that an end which may be termed indifferently 'The Realization of Individuality', 'The Performance of Specific Functions', 'The Satisfaction of Interests', 'The Realization of a Community of Individuals' is the moral end. Will this end serve the two aims (see Sec. XVI) required of a criterion, or standard: (1) Will it unify individual conduct? (2) Will it afford a common good? We have just been endeavoring to show that it does both of these things; that as the realization of one's specific capacity, it unifies individual conduct, and that, as the performance of function, it serves to satisfy the entire community. To take up just these points, accordingly, would involve a repetition of what has been said, and we shall therefore take up instead some aspects of the individual and social unity of conduct, not already considered.

1. The System of Individual Conduct. We must be careful not to interpret the idea of specific function too rigidly or abstractly. It does not mean that each one has some supreme mission in life to which everything else must be sacrificed—that a man is to be an artist, or a soldier, or a student, or a day-laborer and nothing else. On the contrary, the idea of function is that which comprehends all the various sides of life, and it cannot be narrowed below the meaning we have already given: the due adjustment of capacity and surroundings. Wherever there is any capacity or any circumstance, no matter how trivial, there is something included in the exercise of function, and, therefore to be satisfied—according to its place, of course, in the whole of life. Amusements and all the minor details of life are included within the scope of morality. They are elements in the exercise of function, and their insignificance and triviality does not exclude them from the grasp of duty and of the good. It is a mistake to suppose that because it is optional or indifferent—as it constantly is—what acts among the minor details of life are to be done or left undone, or unimportant whether they are done or left undone at all, therefore such acts have no moral value. Morality consists in treating them just as they are—if they are slight or trivial they are to be performed as slight and trivial. Morality does not simply permit the performance of such acts, but demands it. To try to make, in the interests of duty, a serious matter out of every detail of life would be immoral—as much so, in kind, as to make light of momentous matters.

Consider, also, how this conception of the end stands in definite relation to concrete acts; how it explains the possibility of decision as to whether this or that proposed act is right. We do not have to trace the connection of the act with some end beyond, as pleasure, or abstract law. We have only to analyze the act itself. We have certain definite and wholly concrete facts; the given capacity of the person at the given moment, and his given surroundings. The judgment as to the nature of these facts is, in and of itself, a judgment as to the act to be done. The question is not: What is the probability that this act will result in the balance of maximum pleasure; it is not what general rule can we hunt up under which to bring this case. It is simply: What is this case? The moral act is not that which satisfies some far-away principle, hedonistic or transcendental. It is that which meets the present, actual situation. Difficulties indeed, arise, but they are simply the difficulty of resolving a complex case; they are intellectual, not moral. The case made out, the moral end stands forth. No extraneous manipulation, to bring the case under some foreign end, is required.

And this suggests the elasticity of the criterion. In fact moral conduct is entirely individualized. It is where, when, how and of whom. There has been much useless discussion as to the absolute or relative character of morals—useless because the terms absolute and relative are not defined. If absolute is taken to mean immobile and rigid, it is anything but desirable that morals should be absolute. If the physical world is a scene of movement, in which there is no rest, it is a poor compliment to pay the moral world to conceive of it as static and lifeless. A rigid criterion in a world of developing social relations would speedily prove no criterion at all. It would be an abstract rule, taking no account of the individualized character of each act; its individuality of capacity and of surroundings, of time, place and relationships involved. A truly absolute criterion is one which adjusts itself to each case according to the specific nature of the case; one which moves with the moving world. On the other hand, if relative means uncertain in application, changing in time and place without reason for change in the facts themselves, then certainly the criterion is not relative. If it means taking note of all concrete relations involved, it is relative. The absoluteness, in fine, of the standard of action consists not in some rigid statement, but in never-failing application. Universality here, as elsewhere, resides not in a thing, but in a way, a method of action. The absolute standard is the one applicable to all deeds, and the conception of the exercise of function is thus absolute, covering all conduct from the mainly impulsive action of the savage to the most complex reaches of modern life.