The Scottish Philosophy [20]
a thousand other springs which are counter to self-interest, have as considerable a part in the movements of this machine. There are more wheels and counterpoises in this engine than are easily imagined." With such affections, " man is naturally social, and society is natural to him;" and in illustrating this position, he sets himself vigorously against the social theory of Hobbes, who represents the original state of man as one of war. Virtue consists in the proper exercise of these two classes of affections. Vice arises when the public affections are weak and deficient, when the private affections are too strong, or affections spring up which do not tend to the support of the public or private system. He shows that virtue, as consisting in these affections, is natural to man, and that he who practises it is obeying the ancient Stoic maxim, and living according to nature. The virtues which he recommends fall far beneath the stern standard of the Stoics, and leave out all the peculiar graces of Christianity: they consist of, -- "a mind subordinate to reason, a temper humanized and fitted to all natural affection, an exercise of friendship uninterrupted, thorough candor, benignity, and good-nature, with constant security, tranquillity, equanimity."
He would establish a morality on grounds independent of religion. "Whoever thinks that there is a God, and pretends formally to believe that he is just and good, must suppose that there is, independently, such a thing as justice, truth, and falsehood, right and wrong, according to which he pronounces that God is just, righteous, and true." " If virtue be not really estimable in itself, I can see nothing estimable in following it for the sake of a bargain; " and he complains of those who " speak so much of the rewards and punishments, and so little of the worth or value of the thing itself." He remarks very justly: " By building a future state on the ruins of virtue, religion in general, and the cause of a deity, is betrayed; and by making rewards and punishments the principal motives to duty, the Christian religion in particular is overthrown, and its greatest principle, that of love, rejected and exposed." He admits, how {34} ever, that a good God, as a model, has an effect on our views of morals and conduct; and allows that "fear of future punishment and hope of future reward, how mercenary and servile however it may be accounted, is yet, in many circumstances, a great advantage, security, and support to virtue."
Such is his view of the nature of virtue. But Shaftesbury is quite aware that the question of the character of the virtuous act is not the same as that of the mental faculty which looks at it and appreciates it. This faculty he represents as being of the nature of a sense. Locke had allowed the existence of two senses, an external and an internal; and had labored in vain to derive all men's ideas from these two sources. Hutcheson, perceiving that the inlets to the mind were too few according to the theory of Locke, calls in other senses. These senses become very numerous in the systems of some of the Scottish metaphysicians, such as Gerard. In the writings of Shaftesbury, two occupy an important place, -- the sense of beauty and the moral sense.
"No sooner," he says, "does the eye open upon figures, the ear to sounds, than straight the Beautiful results, and grace and harmony are known and acknowledged. No sooner are actions viewed, no sooner the human affections and passions discerned (and they are most of them as soon discerned as felt), than straight an eye distinguishes and sees the and , the and , apart from the , the , the , or the ." Though in all this advancing quite beyond the "Essay on the Human Understanding," yet he seems to be anxious to connect his view of the moral sense with the reflection or inward sense of Locke. "In a creature capable of forming general notions of things, not only the outward beings which offer themselves to the sense are the objects
He would establish a morality on grounds independent of religion. "Whoever thinks that there is a God, and pretends formally to believe that he is just and good, must suppose that there is, independently, such a thing as justice, truth, and falsehood, right and wrong, according to which he pronounces that God is just, righteous, and true." " If virtue be not really estimable in itself, I can see nothing estimable in following it for the sake of a bargain; " and he complains of those who " speak so much of the rewards and punishments, and so little of the worth or value of the thing itself." He remarks very justly: " By building a future state on the ruins of virtue, religion in general, and the cause of a deity, is betrayed; and by making rewards and punishments the principal motives to duty, the Christian religion in particular is overthrown, and its greatest principle, that of love, rejected and exposed." He admits, how {34} ever, that a good God, as a model, has an effect on our views of morals and conduct; and allows that "fear of future punishment and hope of future reward, how mercenary and servile however it may be accounted, is yet, in many circumstances, a great advantage, security, and support to virtue."
Such is his view of the nature of virtue. But Shaftesbury is quite aware that the question of the character of the virtuous act is not the same as that of the mental faculty which looks at it and appreciates it. This faculty he represents as being of the nature of a sense. Locke had allowed the existence of two senses, an external and an internal; and had labored in vain to derive all men's ideas from these two sources. Hutcheson, perceiving that the inlets to the mind were too few according to the theory of Locke, calls in other senses. These senses become very numerous in the systems of some of the Scottish metaphysicians, such as Gerard. In the writings of Shaftesbury, two occupy an important place, -- the sense of beauty and the moral sense.
"No sooner," he says, "does the eye open upon figures, the ear to sounds, than straight the Beautiful results, and grace and harmony are known and acknowledged. No sooner are actions viewed, no sooner the human affections and passions discerned (and they are most of them as soon discerned as felt), than straight an