It is from the
point of view of the social ruler, that you learn reserve, moderation,
and sobriety in your aims; you learn to think that something much less
than the Utopias--universal happiness and universal virtue--should be
propounded; you find that a definite and limited province can be
assigned, separating what the social power is able to do, must do, and
can advantageously do, from what it is unable to do, need not do, and
cannot with advantage do; and this or a similar demarcation is
reproducible in ethics.
[PRECEPTS OF ETHICS MAINLY SOCIAL.]
The precepts of ethics are mainly the precepts of social authority; at
all events the social precepts and their sanctions have the priority
in scientific method. Some of the highest virtues are sociological;
patriotic self-sacrifice is one of the conditions of social
preservation. The inculcation of this and of many other virtues would
not appear in ethics at all, or only in a supplementary treatment, if
social science took its proper sphere, and fully occupied that sphere.
Once more. The great problem of moral control, which I would remove
entirely from a science of education, would be first dealt with in
Sociology.
Pages:
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202