that truth shall not be demanded of those who deal
in horses and dogs; the youth from Texas who claims
that the French philosopher, Janet, cannot be an authority
on morals, since he asserts that he who cheats at cards
must feel a burning shame. With the ethics of
the ancient Hebrews, of the Greeks, of the Romans,
our young moralist has had the opportunity to acquire
some familiarity, and he can compare them, if he will,
with the Christian ethics of his own day. He
knows something of history and biography; he has read
books of travel, and has some acquaintance with the
manners and customs of other peoples. Were he
given to reflection, it ought not to surprise him
to find a Portuguese sea-cook maintaining that it
is wrong to steal, except from the rich; or to learn
that a Wahabee saint rated the smoking of tobacco
as the worst possible sin next to idolatry, while
maintaining that murder, robbery, and such like, were
peccadilloes which a merciful God might properly overlook.
Material for reflection he has in abundance—and
he often remains relatively dogmatic and unplagued
by doubt. But only relatively so; and only so
long as the claims of conflicting authorities are not
forced upon his attention, rendered importunate in
the light of discussion, made so familiar as to seem
real and substantial. It is the tendency of the
widening of the horizon to arouse men to reflection,
to stimulate to criticism. From such criticism
the science of ethics has its birth.
What is true of the individual is true of men in the
mass. The blind life of social classes long laid
in chains by custom and tradition may come to be illuminated
by new ideas, and passive acquiescence may give way
to active participation in social endeavor. Nor
can primitive peoples remain wholly primitive except
in isolation. With the increased intercourse
between races and peoples, men are brought to a clear
consciousness that the accepted in morals is manifold
and diverse; the next step is to question whether
it is, in any given instance, of unquestionable authority;
thus do men become ripe for the search for the acceptable.
CHAPTER V
ETHICAL METHOD
15. INDUCTIVE AND DEDUCTIVE METHOD.—Professor
Henry Sidgwick has defined a method of ethics as “any
rational procedure by which we determine what is right
for individual human beings to do, or to seek to realize
by voluntary action.” [Footnote: The
Methods of Ethics, Book I, chapter i, Sec I.]
He points out that many methods are natural and are
habitually used, but claims that only one can be rational.
By which he means that the several methods of determining
right conduct urged by the different schools of the
moralists must be reconciled, or all but one must be
rejected. [Footnote: Ibid., chapter i,
Sec 3.]
In this chapter I shall not discuss in detail the
schools of the moralists and the specific methods
which characterize them. I am here concerned
only with the general distinction between the scientific
methods of deduction and induction, and its bearing
upon ethical investigations.
