The Moral Economy Part 5

The balance as between asceticism and sensuality comes in, it seems to me, if we remember that to drink well one must not have drunken for some time, {90} that to see well one's eye must be clear, that to make love well one must be fit and gracious and sweet and disciplined from top to toe, that the finest sense of all--the joyous sense of bodily well-being--comes only with exercises and restraints and fine living.[7]

The temperance praised by the Greeks is of like quality, with a further reference to the reasonableness which it fosters. A prudence which is mastered, which has become a spontaneity, delivers reason from bondage, and makes the whole of life easily conformable to it. Thus Castiglione, who is so often reminiscent of Plato and Aristotle, draws a contrast between continence, as the "conquest" of prudence, and temperance as its "beneficent rule."

Thus this virtue does not compel the mind, but infusing it by very gentle means with a vehement belief that inclines it to righteousness, renders it calm and full of rest, in all things equal and well measured, and disposed on every side by a certain self-accord which adorns it with a tranquillity so serene that it is never ruffled, and becomes in all things very obedient to reason and ready to turn its every act thereto and to follow wherever reason may wish to lead it, without the least unwillingness.[8]

Such is that prudence which, though rich in its own right, is nevertheless subordinate to greater good.

It is proper to regard prudence as inferior in principle to purpose and good-will, or even as ign.o.ble when confirmed in its narrowness. It {91} denotes an organization of life in which as yet no interest has risen above the rest; it bespeaks the common populace of interests, disciplined, but not moved to any eminent achievement. The fact that the validity of the principle of prudence is so readily granted is significant of this. Prudence requires no interest to be other than itself, but meets it on its own ground. There is no elevation of motive.

But prudence is the first and most instructive lesson in morality. It has a peculiar impressiveness, not only because it is so promptly and unmistakably verified, but because it is so close to life. Its meaning is unlikely to be obscured through being abstracted from the real interests whose saving is the proof of its virtue. Furthermore, although prudence is not the highest principle in life, it is a mistake to suppose that it is therefore unnecessary in the highest spheres of life. There is a problem of prudence that underlies every practical problem whatsoever. If interests are to be organized they must be not only subordinated but also co-ordinated, that is, adjusted within every medium in which they meet. Without moderation, caution, self-control, thrift, and tact there is no serving man or G.o.d. As life increases in complexity it is easy to forget these basal precepts. Nature has provided a model, both simple and fundamental, in physical health.

{92} "The body," says Burke, "is wiser in its own plain way, and attends its own business more directly than the mind with all its boasted subtilty." [9]

The prudential organization of life furnishes the first type of _formalism_. Prudence requires that the interest shall be limited in order that it may not antagonize other interests and thus indirectly defeat itself. Discipline is justified, in other words, by its fruits.

But discipline involves an initial moment of negation, in which the movement of the interest is resisted. It must be checked, and its headway overcome, if it is to be redirected. The exaggeration of this moment of negation, or a steady persistence in it, is _asceticism_.

Its fault lies in its emptiness, in its destruction or perversion of that which it was designed only to protect against itself.

Asceticism appears most frequently as a subordinate motive in some general condemnation of the world on religious grounds, and must receive further consideration in that connection. Its proper meaning as a purely prudential formalism is best exhibited in the Greek Cynics.

These philosophers were moved to mortify the flesh, and to deny their social interests, by extreme caution. They discovered that the safest method of adjustment was simplification. If one permits one's self no desires, one need not suffer {93} from their conflict, nor need one treat with the desires of others. Now this would be a very perfect solution of the problem of adjustment, if only there were something left to adjust. If a Cynic can attain to a state of renunciation in which he wants nothing, he will be sure of having what he wants; only, unfortunately, it will be nothing. Epictetus has thus represented the Cynic's boast:

Look at me, who am without a city, without a house, without possessions, without a slave; I sleep on the ground; I have no wife, no children, no praetorium, but only the earth and heavens, and one poor cloak. And what do I want? am I not without sorrow? Am I not without fear? Am I not free?

Now it is clear that the sum of the Cynics' attainments is not large.

It consists, indeed, almost wholly in a certain hardened complacency, and a freedom to make faces at the world. To the onlooker, whose comment Epictetus also records, their aspect is mean:

No: but their characteristic is the little wallet, and staff, and great jaws; the devouring of all that you give them, or storing it up, or the abusing unseasonably all whom they meet, or displaying their shoulder as a fine thing.[10]

In other words, since the Cynic continues to live after having rejected the proper instruments and forms of life, he must make a living out of the charitable curiosity excited by his very unfitness. {94} And asceticism of this prudential type tends always to be both empty and monstrous; empty because it denies life, and monstrous because life is not really denied, but only perverted and awkwardly obstructed.

There is a materialistic evil corresponding to the prudential organization of life which is known as meanness, vulgarity, or _sordidness_. It denotes a failure to recognize anything better than the fulfilment of the simple interests in their severalty. Although guarded and adjusted these still determine the general tone of life.

The controlling motive, the standard of attainment, is never anything higher than the elementary desire with its attendant satisfaction. In its negative aspect this is termed _aimlessness_, and is identical with the Christian vice of idleness, so graphically described by Jeremy Taylor:

Idleness is called _the sin of Sodom and her daughters_, and indeed is _the burial of a living man_, an idle person being so useless to any purposes of G.o.d and man, that he is like one that is dead, unconcerned in the changes and necessities of the world; and he only lives to spend his time, and eat the fruits of the earth: like a vermin or a wolf, when their time comes they die and perish, and in the meantime do no good; they neither plough nor carry burdens; all they do is either unprofitable or mischievous.[11]

Thus aimlessness denotes a failure to attain anything of worth; a lack of consecutiveness and {95} unity. The correction of this fault lies in a new principle of organization.

IV

This new principle of organization consists in the _incorporation of interests_, that is, their subordination to a _purpose_ that embraces them, unifies them, and carries the whole to a successful issue. The incorporation of interests is peculiarly an intellectual process. It is this to which Socrates refers when he says that _knowledge is virtue_. Purpose requires, in the first place, that one should define and foresee the end, and in the second place, that one should be sagacious and watchful in the service of it. Purpose is the virtue of the understanding, of a mind which is adventurous enough to project an enterprise, but has enough of home-keeping wit to judge nicely of cause and effect or of part and whole.

There are many virtues which contribute to purpose, and of these none is more indispensable than _patience_, or the capacity to labor without hire for a prize deferred. "Better is the end of a thing," says the Preacher, "than the beginning thereof: and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit." Steadiness of purpose under adverse or confusing circ.u.mstances is called _persistence, courage, loyalty,_ or _zeal_, with {96} differences of meaning that reflect the nature either of the purpose or the circ.u.mstances.

But since purpose is so much an intellectual virtue, special importance attaches in this economy to _truthfulness_. If one's purpose be some form of personal achievement, one must deal honestly with one's self.

And this is not easily done. Epictetus told his pupils that men were loath to admit any fault that they held to be really blameworthy:

Some things men readily confess, and other things they do not. No one then will confess that he is a fool or without understanding; but quite the contrary you will hear all men saying, I wish that I had fortune equal to my understanding. But men readily confess that they are timid, and they say: I am rather timid, I confess; but as to other respects you will not find me to be foolish. A man will not readily confess that he is intemperate; and that he is unjust, he will not confess at all. He will by no means confess that he is envious or a busybody. Most men will confess that they are compa.s.sionate.[12]

Now if one is to attain anything difficult, he cannot afford to indulge in vanity or self-satisfaction; for action can be kept true to its end only when the least obliquity is marked and corrected. Hence the strong man does not attribute his failure to fortune or to his amiable virtues, but to his folly; for he knows that to be the crucial fault which it lies within his power to remedy. On the other hand, if the purpose be one {97} which involves the co-operation of several persons, it is necessary that these should deal openly and candidly with one another. Truthfulness is a condition of any collective undertaking.

It is interesting to observe the growing recognition of the need of publicity wherever democratic inst.i.tutions prevail. Secrecy is a sort of treason. If men are to work together for their common welfare they must be truly in touch with one another; otherwise there is a spy at their councils, an incalculable force that may counterwork their plans.

_Achievement_, the value which the virtue of purpose conditions, needs no moralist's justification. The world never tires of praising it, for it is the world's business. By achievement I mean the fulfilment by subordinated and c.u.mulative effort of an interest deliberately adopted for its greatness of value. Life is now controlled not by the accident of desire, but by the due preference of the better. It has begun to be rational not only in its method, but also in its aim. It is now more fruitful, because more broadly conceived, being engaged in enterprises which continue, and which draw from many sources. Hence a man can better endure the spectacle of his own life, for it seems not to be wholly mean or ineffectual. In that his conduct is unified, consistent, and directed to some worthy {98} end, he is possessed of that quality of character which is respected in him both by himself and by his fellows.

It is unfortunate that there is no better term than _sentimentalism_ with which to indicate that variety of formalism which is characteristic of the purposive economy. The fallacy consists essentially in the abstraction of the purpose from its const.i.tuent interests. The true value of a purpose lies in its function of organization; and is, therefore, inseparable from the interests to which it gives unity and fulfilment. But its form, or even its mere name, may, through a.s.sociation, come to acquire a fict.i.tious value.

When this fict.i.tious value gives rise in contemplation or discourse to a certain emotional satisfaction, we employ the term "sentimentalism"

in the conventional sense. This is the sentimentalism of those

"Who sigh for wretchedness, yet shun the wretched, Nursing in some delicious solitude Their slothful loves and dainty sympathies."

I wish, however, to emphasize a more insidious variety of this error, in which it may be more profoundly and fatally confusing. I refer, in the first place, to what may be described as _deferred living_. There is a popular illusion to the effect that a life purpose is to be fruitful only at the end; that it is something to be prepared for in youth, worked for in maturity, and attained--well, {99} it is difficult to say when. This is the fallacy of heaven transferred to earth. "Man never is, but always to be blest." Life is conceived as a sentence at hard labor, the only sure compensation being the ultimate deliverance.

Now there is but one justification of a life purpose, and that is its conserving of the whole of life; it must save each day and each hour.

There is no more virtue in the future than in the present. "The greatest disaster," says a Greek proverb, "is for a man to be opened and found empty"; and this does not refer to an autopsy. It is at least one function of a life-purpose to make life distributively and continuously good. That one's life shall be pointed with a purpose does not mean that it shall be reduced to a point. The very virtue of organization lies in its making room for the free play of immediate and particular interests, in its surrounding them at a distance with invisible safeguards.

A second important case of sentimentalism is _nationalism_. The value of the state lies in its protection and development of the concrete life of the community. The true object of patriotism is social welfare. But for the state as a provident economy, there may be subst.i.tuted as an object of loyalty what is only an idea or a name; and when this is done men are easily persuaded to play into the hands of unscrupulous leaders. {100} To the abominable tyrannies which have thus been made possible I need not refer. In Hegel's philosophy of history,[13] as well as in many modern political theories, this error has been deliberately affirmed. But for ill.u.s.tration I prefer to turn to the case of Plato. The _Republic_ was conceived, it is true, without bias of party or race, but there is none the less a strain of arbitrariness and illiberality in it. This is due to the fact that the state is conceived by itself, with a quality and perfection of its own that displaces the interests of its citizens.[14] A state which is defined otherwise than as a provision for the very diversity of life, an organization responsive to pressure from every const.i.tuent desire, fails from over-simplification. This I take to be the meaning of Aristotle's comment on the _Republic_:

The error of Socrates must be attributed to the false notion of unity from which he starts. Unity there should be, both of the family and of the state, but in some respects only. For there is a point at which a state may attain such a degree of unity as to be no longer a state, or at which, without actually ceasing to exist, it will become an inferior state, like harmony pa.s.sing into unison, or rhythm which has been reduced to single foot. The state is a plurality, which should be united and made into a community by education.[15]

There is a chapter in the _Discourses_ of Epictetus, ent.i.tled: "To or against those who obstinately Persist in what they have determined."

{101} There could, I think, be no better formulation of purpose grown hard and unworthily self-sufficient. This form of materialism I have termed _egoism_ and _bigotry_, since the purpose may be either personal or social in scope. But in either case the diagnosis of Epictetus goes to the root of the evil. He thus describes his experience with one of his companions, "who for no reason resolved to starve himself to death":

I heard of it when it was the third day of his abstinence from food, and I went to inquire what had happened.

"I have resolved," he said.

"But still tell me what it was which induced you to resolve; for if you have resolved rightly, we shall sit with you and a.s.sist you to depart; but if you have made an unreasonable resolution, change your mind."

"We ought to keep our determinations."

"What are you doing, man? We ought to keep not to all our determinations, but to those which are right; for if you are now persuaded that it is right, do not change your mind, if you think fit, but persist and say, we ought to abide by our determinations. Will you not make the beginning and lay the foundation in an inquiry whether the determination is sound or not sound, and so then build on it firmness and security?" . . .

Now this man was with difficulty persuaded to change his mind. But it is impossible to convince some persons at present; so that I seem now to know, what I did not know before, the meaning of the common saying, That you can neither persuade nor break a fool. May it never be my lot to have a wise fool for my friend: nothing is more untractable. "I {102} am determined," the man says. Madmen are also; but the more firmly they form a judgment on things which do not exist, the more ellebore they require.[16]

The wise fool is, as Epictetus says, more intractable than the aimless and unwitting fool; because there is substance to his folly. There is at least some truth on his side. But his folly is folly none the less.

He hardens himself against that which would save him; while boasting himself a lover of light, he shuts his eyes lest any ray of it penetrate to him. Thus the egoist, through the atrophy of his sympathies and his preoccupation with a narrow ambition, gratuitously impoverishes his life; and it is difficult to convince him of his loss, because he indubitably has some gain.