Notes Expository and Critical on Certain British Theories of Morals

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Edmonston & Douglas, 1868 - Ethics - 156 pages

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Page 4 - The desires and other passions of man are in themselves no sin. No more are the actions that proceed from those passions, till they know a law that forbids them; which, till laws be made, they cannot know: nor can any law be made till they have agreed upon the person that shall make it.
Page 77 - Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do.
Page 2 - Sudden glory' is the passion which maketh those 'grimaces' called 'laughter'; and is caused either by some sudden act of their own that pleaseth them, or by the apprehension of some deformed thing in another by comparison whereof they suddenly applaud themselves.
Page 4 - For moral philosophy is nothing else but the science of what is good, and evil, in the conversation, and society of mankind. Good, and evil, are names that signify our appetites, and aversions; which in different tempers, customs, and doctrines of men, are different...
Page 3 - ... another; yet when all is reckoned together, the difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit, to which another may not pretend, as well as he.
Page 101 - But there is no known Epicurean theory of life which does not assign to the pleasures of the intellect, of the feelings and imagination, and of the moral sentiments, a much higher value as pleasures than to those of mere sensation. It must be admitted...
Page 107 - I must again repeat, what the assailants of utilitarianism seldom have the justice to acknowledge, that the happiness which forms the utilitarian standard of what is right in conduct is not the agent's own happiness, but that of all concerned; as, between his own happiness and that of others, utilitarianism requires him to be as strictly impartial as a disinterested and benevolent spectator.
Page 61 - ... you cannot form a notion of this faculty, conscience, without taking in judgment, direction, superintendency. This is a constituent part of the idea, that is, of the faculty itself : and to preside and govern, from the very economy and constitution of man, belongs to it. Had it strength, as it has right ; had it power, as it has manifest authority, it would absolutely govern the world.
Page 1 - But whatsoever is the object of any man's appetite or desire, that is it which he for his part calleth good, and the object of his hate and aversion, evil, aud of his contempt, vile and inconsiderable.
Page 116 - This firm foundation is that of the social feelings of mankind; the desire to be in unity with our fellow-creatures, which is already a powerful principle in human nature, and happily one of those which tend to become stronger even without express inculcation, from the influences of advancing civilization.

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