Man's moral nature by R. M. Bucke

8/9/2019 Man's moral nature by R. M. Bucke

1/222

-O|Itr

Itr5r^ia


2/222


3/222

MAN SMORAL NATURE

AN ESSAYBY

RICHARD MAURICE BUCKE, M.D.MEDICAL SUPERINTENDENT OF THE ASYLUM FOR

THE INSANE, LONDON, ONTARIO

" I am a man who is preoccupied of his own soul.

NEW YORKG. P. PUTNAM S SONS

TORONTO, ONT. : WILLING & WILLIAMSON1879

[All Rights Reserved}


4/222

COPYRIGHT1879

BY G. P. PUTNAM S SONS


5/222

1 DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO THE MAN WHO INSPIRED IT TO THE MANWHO OF ALL MEN PAST AND PRESENT THAT I HAVE KNOWN

HAS THE MOST EXALTED MORAL NATURETO

WALT WHITMAN.


6/222

SOCRATES: " But the difficulty begins as soon as we raise the questionwhether these principles are three or one ; whether, that is to say, we learnwith one part of our nature, are angry with another, and with a third partdesire the satisfaction of our natural appetites ; or whether the whole soulcomes into play in each sort of action : to determine that is the difficulty."GLAUCON : "Yes, there lies the difficulty."SOCRATES: "Then let us now try and determine whether they are

the same or different."JOWETT S PLATO, REP.


7/222

ADVERTISEMENT.

No conclusion in this book is considered by itsAuthor as absolute or even certain ; the book is simplya record of the way things look to him. The series ofthoughts which gave rise to it was involuntary and irrepressible. To write these down and formulate themwas not a choice but a necessity. The Author cannottherefore claim that he writes the book to make theworld wiser. He certainly does not write it for moneyor fame, neither does he look for either as his rewardin fact he is far from being certain that he deservesany reward ; but if he succeeds in relieving his own mindof some of the problems which have weighed upon itfor more than twenty years, he will consider himselfwell paid ; and should he also succeed in transplantingsome of these problems into other and better minds,where they may reach a higher development and receivea truer, a more perfect solution, this would be a compensation indeed not for writing the book, which wasnot a labor and needed no compensation, but for theyears of mental travail that these problems have imposed upon him.

vii


8/222


9/222

TO THE READER.THIS book has been not so much written as it

has grown. " Backward I see in my own dayswhere I sweated through fog with linguists andcontenders; " but that was before this book began ; at present, " I have no mockings and arguments I witness and wait." The thought grewand its shadow fell on the paper, voila tout.As long ago as I can recollect, the questions discussed in this essay the nature of good and evil

the causes and proportions of happiness andunhappiness whether mankind was gettingbetter or worse what is the meaning of viceand virtue and whether there were such thingsin nature as rewards and punishments and if sowhat these meant these questions and othersallied to them continually seemed to demandsome answer. They received many answers whichwere in turn accepted and discarded. But thesoil was being prepared by this constant growthand

decomposition of ideas, just as isthe material

soil by the constant growth and disintegration of


10/222

TO THE READER.vegetable forms for the growth of higher species.At last years ago now a THOUGHT pushed upward through this soil thus prepared. I knew atonce that this thought contained what I had solong looked for it contained it as the acorncontains the oak. The acorn contains the oak,but the oak is not in the acorn so the thoughtcontained the solution, but the solution was notin the thought. The thought grew it put outleaves and branches. It grew in me, but I hadnothing to do with it I had absolutely no control over it. It has grown into this book as independently of my volition as the oak is independent of the will of the soil. The chapters of thebook are its branches, and the words are itsleaves. It seemed to me from the first, as itseems to me now, that this thought has somenovelty, truth, and importance. But perhaps Iam quite mistaken. I merely offer my opinion

I take no responsibility in the matter. Thethought is no more mine than it is yours if youread the book and understand it. I no moremade the thought than I made myself it grewof its own accord, and now it can take care ofitself ; or if it cannot do that, it can do as plentyof other thoughts have done it can die.


11/222

INTRODUCTION.

THE object of this essay is to discuss themoral nature to point out, in the first place, itsgeneral relation to the other groups of functionsbelonging to, or rather making up, the individualman, and also its relations to man s environment.Secondly, to show its radical separation fromthese other groups of functions ; then to attemptto decide of what organ it is a function to consider whether it is a fixed quantity, or whether,like the active nature and the intellectual nature,it is in course of development. And if the moralnature is progressive, to try to find out what theessential nature of this progress is upon whatbasis the progress itself rests the direction ofthe progress in the past and in the future itscauses its history and the law of it and topoint out the conclusions which can be drawnfrom this progress as to the character of theuniverse in which we live. * xi


12/222


13/222

CONTENTS.CHAPTER I. PAGE

LINES OF CLEAVAGE iCHAPTER II.

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS 1 1CHAPTER III.

THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE 45CHAPTER IV.

Is THE MORAL NATURE A FIXED QUANTITY ? 123CHAPTER V.

THE HISTORY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MORALNATURE 157CHAPTER VI.

THE INFERENCE TO BE DRAWN FROM THE DEVELOPMENTOF THE MORAL NATURE AS TO THE ESSENTIAL FACTOF THE UNIVERSE 189

xiii


14/222


15/222


16/222

" Les regions speculative et active du cerveau n ontde communicationsnerveuses qu avec les sens et les muscles pour apercevoir et modifier lemonde exterieur. Au contraire, la region affective, qui constitue sa prin-cipale masse, n a point de liens directs avec le dehors, auquel la rattach-ent indirectment ses relations propres avec 1 intelligence et 1 activite.Mais, outre ses liaisons cerebrales, des nerfs speciaux la lient profonde-ment aux principaux organes de la vie nutrition, d apres la subordinationnecessaire de 1 ensemble des instincts personnels a 1 existence vegetative."AUGUSTE COMTE.


17/222

ALL things, man included, are parts of one great vwhole. The object of this chapter is to point outthe most obvious and most natural divisions ofthis whole, which we call the universe. These divisions can never be absolute ; the whole is tootruly one whole for that, but they are sufficiently vreal for our present purpose. The first plane ofseparation is between man and that which is outside man. Now, it is obvious that the externaluniverse acts on man, and that man reacts upon *and toward the external universe. The external universe acts on man through his senses ;it acts on man in other ways than through hissenses, but these need not be considered here.Man reacts upon and toward the external universe in three ways, namely, by his active nature ;by his intellectual nature ; by his moral nature

^that is, he acts upon it, thinks about it, and feelstoward it.

It is alone that part of the external universewhich we call material which acts on man through*/his senses that part of which we ordinarily feel


18/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.our knowledge to be the surest; but in reality,strangely enough, as will soon appear, this is oneof the aspects of the external world, of which wecan know nothing. Man s receptive facultiesthen, his senses, correspond to only a small partof the external universe but man s reactive faculties tally with all the external universe which isanything at all to us in our present state of existence. These considerations apply only to thedynamic or spiritual part of man, not to the staticor material part. Man himself, then, pursuingthe analysis we have begun, is divided, first, intostructure and function in other words, he is astatic being and a dynamic being. Of this staticbeing, however, we really have no knowledge,and its existence is open to the gravest doubt-here I shall not consider it. Did it exist it wouldcorrespond with what is called matter in the external world, but this shares the discredit of thematerial part of man, and will be equally uncon-sidered here. The first line of cleavage, then, inman, is that which may be drawn between his receptive and his reactive functions. In the external world, certain forces, such as motion, heat,and light, are correlative with man s receptive

jfaculties, but these receptive faculties are by noH means broad enough to tally with even a largepart of these forces, and it is beyond a doubtthat only a small part of these forces which exist


19/222

LINES OF CLEAVAGE.

immediately about us are known to us directlyor indirectly. Though man s reactive functionstally far more completely with the external worldthan do his receptive functions, yet we shall seereason to believe, as we proceed, that these alsosignally fail to cover the field that is opposed tothem. So far as we see at present, then, the linesof cleavage are : i. Between man, and all thatis outside man, including his fellow men. 2. Between the statical, and dynamical part of man,and between the statical and dynamical aspect ofthe world. This is probably a false line. 3. Thefirst line of cleavage in man himself is betweenhis receptive and reactive functions. 4. Then thereactive functions are themselves split into three \/parts by the lines between the active nature andthe intellectual nature, and between the intellectual nature and the moral nature. In the externalworld there are, as we shall see, lines of cleavagecorresponding to these two last.Man s active nature, or that part of him withwhich he performs all acts of which he is capable ^

which is represented statically by the musclesand the motor tract of the brain and cord thispart of man s nature corresponds with force inthe external world. This section of the reactivefunctions lies on one side of the intellectual nature, as the moral nature will be seen to lie uponthe other.


20/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.The intellectual nature that part of us bywhich we know which has its statical represen

tative in the cerebrum and higher centres of thecerebro-spinal nervous system tallies, we allknow how imperfectly, with phenomena and relations of coexistence and sequence in the worldwhich lies without us. Its principal division isinto the external or receptive and registeringfunctions of the intellect, such as perception andmemory, and the internal or reflective functions,such as ratiocination and comparison. To the former correspond, in the outer world, the so-calledconcrete sciences, such as zoology, botany, geology and mineralogy. To the latter correspondthe so-called abstract sciences, such as mathematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, andsociology ; the relations of these to one anothermake up, speaking generally, what is called philosophy.The moral nature, statically represented, as willbe shown farther on, by the great sympathetic, isin relation in the outer world, not with forcesnor with relations, but with qualities, and as it iscertain that the active nature of man does notenter into relation with all forces, nor his intellectual nature with all relations, so it is equallycertain that man s moral nature falls infinitelyshort of entering into relation with all qualities.Now, to realize this division of man s reactive


21/222

LINES OF CLEAVAGE.

functions, it must be clearly seen that, as his intellectual nature only confronts phenomena andrelations, it does not confront those parts of theuniverse which are confronted by the active andmoral natures, which is simply saying, in otherlanguage, that we know and can know nothingabout force and

nothingabout qualities ; this

may seem paradoxical, but it is true. We naturally think we know something about force because we are familiar with many phenomenawhich we attribute to it, but a moderate amountof reflection will satisfy any candid mind thatwe know nothing of force itself. So with qualities. We seem to know a great deal about them,while, in fact, we know nothing at all. This, perhaps, cannot be proved ; it is not easy to provea negative ; moreover, I do not propose to proveanything in this book; proof never convinces;but to say what is true in the right manner (ifone could do it), that convinces. But whoeverdenies it, let him say what it is about his ownchild or wife that makes him love them whileother children and women, equally dear to others,are indifferent to him. Thus we see that everything with which we come into direct contact isforce ; force acts on our senses ; our active nature, by means of force, acts upon forces in theouter world. The intellectual nature, removedback from the outer world behind the outer sen-


22/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.sory motor tract, deals with relations. The moralnature, still farther withdrawn into the inmostrecesses of ourselves, whether considered physically or spiritually, deals with something stillfarther removed from force than are those relations which confront the intellect, and has to dowith an unknown quantity which, for want of abetter name, we call qualities. The relation ofthe intellect to these other two groups of reactivefunctions may, perhaps, be made clearer by a comparison which seems to me singularly exact. Asunbeam dispersed by a prism falls upon a screen ;in the middle of the dispersed ray is a space oflight ; this represents the intellect ; below thelight are the heat rays, and above it the chemicalrays. Let the heat rays represent the moral natureand the chemical rays the active nature, and theparallel between the solar ray and the whole reactive part of man is very complete. We have,then, three groups of existence in the outer world,and corresponding to them, three groups of functions in the inner world, the first being undoubtedly the raison d etre of the last, for without thepreexistence of the first we could not conceivethe last coming into being.For greater clearness the results of this chapter may be summed up in a tabular form asfollows :


23/222

LINES OF CLEAVAGE.

Man.External-!World.

Senses orReceptiveFunctions.Forces.

R eactiv eFimctions.Force, Phenomena,Qualities.

Active Nature.Forces, as Motion,

Heat, and Light.

IntellectualNature.Phenomena, andRelations of Co- -\existence and Sequence.

MoralNature.Qualities.

External or Receptive andRegistering Functions, asPerception, Conception,and Memory.Concrete Sciences, as Botany, Zoology and Geology.

Internal or Reflecting Func-tions, as Ratiocination,Comparison, and Judgment,

Abstract Sciences, as Mathematics, Astronomy,Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Sociology.

Positive Functions :Love and Faith.Beauty, Goodness.Negative Functions :Hate and Fear.Ugliness, Evil.


24/222


25/222

CHAPTER II.THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS.


26/222


27/222

WHAT is the moral nature ? and what are thelines between it and the active nature, between itand the intellectual nature,, and between it andsense impressions ? The moral nature is a bundle of faculties. Most of these faculties, thoughnot all of them, are called passions and emotions.All passions and all emotions belong to, are partof, the moral nature, but the whole moral natureis not included in these two expressions. Love,faith, hate, fear, are the most prominent functionsof the moral nature, if they are not, indeed, thewhole of it. These are pure moral qualities ; thatis, each one of them is a distinct moral function,and, therefore, a simple moral function. Theline between the active nature and the moralnature is not difficult to draw, though it is constantly overlooked. The active nature and themoral nature scarcely ever come in direct contact, the intellectual nature nearly always intervening between them. An act which is promptedby passion or emotion is directed by the intelligence ; for instance, I desire something I think13


28/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.how I shall obtain it then go and get it ; I hatesome one I think of some act that will injure himthen do it ; I love some one think what actsgive pleasure to that person then perform them.But people have a way of speaking of certain actsas being good of other acts as being bad ofcertain conduct as being moral of certain otherconduct as being immoral ; is it the act, is it theconduct which is good, bad, moral, or immoral ?It is not. No act or conduct can be good, bad,moral or immoral. Goodness, badness, moralityand immorality belong solely to the moral nature.Acts are always outside the moral nature, and canhave no moral quality. To kill a man is called animmoral act a crime but it is only called so because of the moral state which accompanies andprompts the act. Under many circumstances,homicide, although the act is precisely the same,has no moral significance ; in certain circumstancesof self-defense in certain circumstances of mental alienation for example. Again, we know thatthe crime may be committed without the act" Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after herhath committed adultery with her already in hisheart." To many these arguments will be unnecessary. Those who desire more illustrationsof the position taken can easily think of as manyas they choose for themselves. I shall take for

"^ granted that the line between the active nature


29/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. ^and the moral nature is plain enough. But theline between the intellectual nature and the moralnature, though true and certain, is not quite soeasy to draw or to see when it is drawn, for thesetwo lie closer together than do the active natureand moral nature, and the functions of the intellectual nature are less easily defined, and aremore like the functions of the moral nature thanare those of the active nature. To the ordinaryapprehension, however, I hope to make this linealso sufficiently clear.The intellect knows ; the moral nature feelsthat seems clear enough. Perception, conception,memory, r,eason, comparison, understanding,judgment, belong to, are parts of, the intellect.Love, hate, faith, fear, belong to, are functions of,the moral nature; that seems quite clear, and willprobably be disputed by very few. But we allknow that these two sets of functions are, in theirmanifestations, commonly blended together. Thatis to say, the idea of a thing or person havingarisen in the mind, a feeling of pity, tenderness,love, hate, dislike, fear, annoyance, or a feelingof some kind arises at or about the same time,and is directed toward the same thing or person ;and to all appearance the idea and the feelingarise together and are simply two aspects of onemental act. Now, what I wish to argue is thatthis is not the correct view to take of the matter


30/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.at all ; but that either the idea at first arises andthen the feeling which may be said to color it ,or that the feeling having arisen primarily, iteither suggests the idea by association and thencolors it ; or the idea being suggested by something else besides the feeling, it is, all the same,colored by it, to a greater or less degree.The essential distinctions of these two sets of

functions is shown in the first place by the factthat a continuous current of ideational statesand a continuous current of emotional statesconstantly exist, and flow on side by side withoutinterfering with one another, except through association of certain ideas with certain emotionalstates. Any idea may exist at the same timeas, and therefore be associated in consciousnesswith, almost any emotional state that is to say,there is no fixedness of relation between ideasand emotional states. Any idea may exist without the coexistence of any emotional state. Anysimple emotional state faith, love, fear, or hate,may exist without being associated with any idea,that is, without the simultaneous existence of anythought. Moreover, there is no relation betweenthe intensity of emotional and intellectual actiongoing on at the same time ; for, during states ofstrong emotional excitement the intellect may bevery active or the reverse, and during periods ofintense intellectual activity there may be either


31/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. x ya great deal of emotional excitement or verylittle. And further, there is an absence of relation of development between the intellectual andmoral nature which could hardly exist were thesetwo not radically distinct from one another ; forin any given individual the intellect may behighly developed and the moral nature very ill-developed, or the reverse ; so that we often seeclever men with bad hearts and men of excellentmoral qualities who are very stupid. We allknow instances of these two classes of men aswell in actual life as in history. And passingfrom ordinary life downward to that life which isbelow the ordinary level of humanity, the lowerlevel upon which the individual stands may bedue to the deficiency of the intellectual or of themoral nature. For if the intellect is below thestandard proper to ordinary man we say theman is a fool ; if it is still further deficient wesay he is an idiot. But if it is the moral naturewhich is deficient in development we say the manis a criminal, if not in act at least by nature ; andif the moral nature is still further deficient wesay the man is a moral idiot. But the fool mayhave a kind and affectionate heart and the criminal a quick wit. The intellectual idiot may stillhave the fundamental affections of our race fairlydeveloped, and the moral idiot, though his intellect is not likely to be of a high order, may be a


32/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.long way from a fool. It is undoubtedly truethat there is a certain relation between intellectual and moral elevation and defect, so that theyare apt to coexist, but this tendency is not greaterthan is the tendency of any two parts of an organism to be perfect or defective together inaccordance with the more or less perfect impulsesand conditions by which the life has been originated and is maintained.To show the line between the intellectual nature and the moral nature, it will be necessary todiscuss the nature of the relation manifestly avery close one which exists between them ; andto get at this relation, it will be necessary to resolve in thought both the intellectual and moralnatures as far as possible, by a process of mentalanalysis, into their ultimate elements. Now, theultimate elements of the intellectual nature areconcepts that is, simple ideas ; as, for instance,the idea of a color, a shape, a distance, a weight,or a sound ; these concepts are formed by a process entirely unknown to us from the impressionsmade by external forces upon our senses. Theseimpressions themselves, no doubt very differentfrom our idea of them, are outside the mind, thatis to say, unthinkable by us. These concepts arethe elements of which the intellectual nature isbuilt up ; the getting of them we call conception;the combining, separating, and comparing of them,


33/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. I9either as simple concepts or as already combinedgroups of concepts, we call reasoning, abstraction,imagination ; the registering of the simple orcompound concepts we call memory, and so on.Now, the simplest of these concepts that we canreach by our best efforts of analysis, such as theidea of time, space, or size, is undoubtedly anextremely complex thing, built up of elementswhich do not singly enter into consciousness,just as any piece of matter a grain of sand, forinstance is an extremely complex thing, the ultimate atoms of which do not form objects of sense.The concepts in ordinary use, such as the idea ofan author, a book, a dinner, or a holiday, one cansee at a glance are infinitely more complex.Let us now turn for a moment to the moralnature ; this is much more simple than the intellectual nature, and by and by we shall see whatappears to be the true anatomical explanationof this fact. The elements of the moral natureare moral states, most of them being what wecall emotions. These moral states are simpleand compound ; but there is this remarkable difference between compound moral states and compound concepts, that whereas concepts can becompounded to almost any conceivable degreewithout the union of emotional states in the compound, moral states can hardly be compoundedat all without combining them with.concepts. A


34/222

20 MAN S MORAL NATURE.plausible anatomical reason for this will also appear later. The chief simple elements of themoral nature are love, faith, hate, and fear. Amoment s reflection upon these four leading elements of the moral nature reveals to us twostriking modes in which they differ fromjxiricejDts.In the first place, they stand in pairs, the two ele-vments of each pair love, hate faith, fear beingdirectly antithetic to each other. In the secondplace, they are all, by their nature, strongly con- .trasted to intellectual states by being continuous, vwhile these last may be called, by contrast, instantaneous ; this consideration will be more fullydwelt upon in another connection. I need scarcelysay that it must be borne in mind that these moralstates have all of them a wide range in degree.That, for instance, there is no difference in kindbetween a casual liking and the most intense love

between a slight feeling of dislike and the bitterest hate between the faith that makes us takethe word of an acquaintance for a few dollars, andthe faith which enables the martyr to walk exult-ingly to the stake between the feeling of uneasiness that something may be going wrong and theagony of extreme terror. And this capability ofvarying in degree forms a third strong line of de-markation between concepts and emotional states ;for concepts, though they certainly stand outmore strongly and clearly in the mind at some


35/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. 2 itimes than they do at others, yet have mo. suchrange of intensity as belongs to moral states. Ido not pretend that I can say positively whatmoral states are simple and what are compound,or that I can analyze these last so as to showwith certainty the elements of which they arecomposed. I venture the assertion, however, thatthe few moral states already mentioned, love, 1/faitR, hate, and fear, are simple. The groundsupon which I rest this assertion are that they areeach of them capable of existing in the mind without the concurrent existence of any intellectualstate, and that they defy analysis into simpler elements. These moral elements seem to me to differ in construction from concepts by being simpler^than these last ; for whereas, concepts analyzedto the last elements that the mind can reach, stillseem, as mentioned above, aggregates of simpleelements which the mind cannot grasp, moral elements show no sign of this composite formation,*/but seem to be absolutely homogeneous.Are there any other simple moral states besidesthe four mentioned ? I do not know. It will besafest in the present state of knowledge on thesubject-

to rest content with these to reducewhat compound moral states we can into theseand intellectual movements, and to leave thedoubtful states alone.The mind, then, is made up of simple moral


36/222


37/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. 23tinctly see to be^omposed of these and concepts.I do not say that this small number and this largenumber make up the whole moral nature, but atall events they make up enough of it to pass forall. Arguments which are based upon this largepart are as stable as if based on the whole ; and,

:;;.

indeed, my present impression is that the simpleelements which I shall enumerate, and the compounds which they form with one another andwith concepts, do make up the whole moral na-v/ture. These simple elements are four in number :they are, faith, love, fear, and hate. The test of%the simplicity of these four moral states is, first,ythat they defy analysis ; secondly, that they are\/any of them capable of existing in the mind alone,unassociated with any other moral state or withany concept ; and thirdly, and as a consequence ofXthe foregoing, the remtoval from the mind, eitheractually or in imagination, of any other element,whether intellectual or moral, is not necessarilyfollowed by the removal of any one of these whichmay be present. Three of these terms, love, hate,and fear, do not require to be explained or defined;but the other, faith, stands in need of a few wordsof explanation. Faith is the opposite of fear aslove is the opposite of hate. It is a purely moralfunction. It is strangely confounded in the popular mind with belief, which is a purely intellectual function. There is a connection between faith


38/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.and belief which has led to this confusion, andthis connection I will explain. Faith is defined bythe author of the Epistle to the Hebrews as " thesubstance of things hoped for, the evidence ofthings not seen." This is an excellent definition,but requires to be itself explained. As I havesaid, faith is the opposite of fear, as love is theopposite of hate. Faith is almost synonymouswith trust, confidence, and courage. My idea isthat each of these words is used for faith in different intellectual connections. The best way toget an idea of what faith is, is to take a subject, such as our condition after death, or thecharacter of the government of the universe asa whole in relation to ourselves on neither ofwhich subjects can our intellect throw any lightand study the attitude of our minds towardthose subjects. Now, in ; knowledge, or rather

A want of knowledge, of either of these subjects,the savage and the civilized man are on equal

J terms, for they neither of them know anythingabout them at all ; still, the mental attitude of thecivilized man is very different from the mentalattitude of the savage as toward these two subjects. If, then, the mental "attitude is different,and if the intellectual nature has never dealt withthese questions, as it certainly has not, then thedifference must be due to a shifting of the moral

\attitude toward these subjects. And I think I


39/222


40/222

26 MAN S MORAL NATURE.variations being governed by the state of thehealth and by other things, while

the evidence,or rather want of evidence, and the belief on the>/subject remain fixed. Our mental attitude, toward the government of the universe is decidedin the same way by the degree of developmentof the moral nature, and especially by the degreeof development of faith. The gods of savagesare demons. The God of the better samples ofChristians is a Being in whom goodness greatlypreponderates over evil. The one believes asfirmly in his god or gods as does the other, andone has as much and as little evidence uponwhich to base his belief as the other has. Butone has less and the other has more faith. Thecharacter of the belief, therefore, is not in anydegree determined by want of knowledge on theone hand, or by increased knowledge on the other,but

solely by the amount of faith, of which thebelief is simply an index. The belief itself isvalueless in every sense. The faith which substitutes the higher belief for the lower is the mostvaluable of all our possessions. It is throughthis assaciation that belief came to be consideredso important ; since men, having a certain gradeof faith associated with a certain belief, easily fellinto the error that the belief was the cause of thefaith, was necessary to it, was even the faith itself ; though a greater error than this, and, in its


41/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. 27effects, a more injurious one to humanity, couldscarcely be imagined. It is evident, to whoeverwill think of it, that with different persons, or withthe same person at different times, the degree offaith may and does vary greatly with the samebelief. So, the same degree of faith may and 1/does coexist with a wide range of belief. Thisbeing so, it is plain that the belief of any givenperson only indicates the amount of his faith in avery broad and general sense ; and the significance of what is called religious belief consists inthis, that it is a test, and though a rough one,still the only test which we are capable of applying, to measure the faith of any given man orclass of men. For a long time after the foun-odation of Christianity, for example, all faith,speaking generally, which was not associated inthought with the Christian belief, was lower thanthat which was

interpretedin terms of the intel

lect by this belief ; therefore, not to hold theChristian belief was a true mark of inferiority.This test is still applied, and this feeling stillremains, and is likely to remain, in millions ofminds for a long time yet, though the propositionupon which it rests is no longer true ; for in thefront ranks of humanity at present, and on anaverage, the Christian belief represents a lowerphase of faith than exists in the minds of thosewho reject this doctrine.


42/222

28 MAN S MORAL NATURE.Let us pass now to compound moral states and

attempt to resolve some of them into simple moralstates and concepts ; that is, let us see which ofthem can be shown to be composed of the foursimple moral elements, faith, love, hate, and fear,with or without the union of one or more concepts.Joy, high spirits, exultation, enthusiasm, and triumph are love and faith in their original non-differentiated form, generally, though by no meansnecessarily, combined with a more or less compound concept. And here I wish to say that, ina very low form of the moral nature, as it is seenin young children, and in all animals except thevery highest, the two positive elements, love and^faith, seem to be not yet separated, but to existas one primitive function, and it is probable that,if we could go far enough back in the process ofdevelopment, we should find the two negativeelements, hate and fear, also merged into oneprimary form. In the course of development the

^original negative element is in advance of theoriginal positive element, and in it separation occurred soonest. In young children, before loveand faith*make their appearance as separate functions, they may be observed existing in this primitive, non-differentiated form, and in this state wecall them high spirits or joy. In the course of development of the individual man, after the divisionof the primitive positive element has become fully


43/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. 2gestablished, and love and faith have come intoexistence as two separate well-defined functions,the primitive, non-differentiated form still makesits appearance at times ; but the separate elementsinto which it has divided, and their compounds,are by far more common than is this archaicform. Envy is hate combined with a certain verycompound concept. Anger and hate are the samething ; there is no difference between hating aman and being angry with him ; or, if there is adifference, it is simply that anger is a more transitory and less intense form of the same passion.The word jealousy is probably used, as nearly allwords are which express compound emotionalstates, in several senses by different people, andperhaps by the same people at different times.Sometimes it is simply hate combined with a verycomplex concept. At other times it is composedof the two moral states, love and fear, combinedwith a very compound intellectual state. Andthis last is probably the condition to which theword most properly belongs. Grief is usually considered to be a simple emotional state, but this itcertainly is not, because in the first place it cannot exist without the concurrent existence of aconcept which enters into and makes part of it,and, in the second place, it cannot exist withoutthe moral state, love, which also enters into andforms part of it. Now, no moral state can be


44/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.called simple that requires for its existence anothermoral state or a concept. .A mother loses herchild by death, and her grief is intense ; but if youcould destroy in her heart love for the child hergrief would cease at once. Grief, then, in thiscase, is love combined with a certain conceptdeath but combined with this concept, and underneath it and concealed by it, is another moralstate. Now, what moral state has been, both inman and animals, since the beginning of the world,combined with the concept death ? You knowthat the moral state I allude to is fear. Grief,then, in the case supposed, is love combined withthe concept, death, which concept is combinedwith the moral state, fear. This analysis is hardto follow, because the associations in this compound have existed so long that the union hasbecome what we may call organized ; still, I knowthat this, or something very like it, is the truecomposition of grief. The analysis is easier tofollow and realize if we suppose that the child isnot dead but dying ; here you can detect plainlylove and the fear of death constituting the passion, grief. Now, is it not plain why the analysis is easier to make in the last case than in thefirst ? The reason is, that grief in the case of actual death existed in the minds of our ancestors formillions of years before they became intelligentenough to grieve for imminent death, and also


45/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. ^because the association of fear with the concept,death, existed in their minds for perhaps millions of generations before the compound whichwe call grief came into existence. The constituents of grief, then, in the case of the dying child,have not had time to become organized into anapparently simple passion to anything like thesame degree as in the case of the dead child.The opposites of joy, high spirits, exultation,enthusiasm, and triumph, which are compoundsof love and faith, or rather which are these twomoral functions in their archaic, non-differentiatedform, are sadness, low spirits, depression, dejection, and despair. These are compounds ofhate and fear in varying degrees of intensity, andin varying proportions, and combined or not withconcepts. Hope is a compound of love and faithwith a concept. It is not love and faith in theirundivided archaic form, but the two separatefunctions combined with a concept. Repentanceis, in the same way, a compound of hate and fear

hate of an act committed, and fear of the consequences. Let the hate be reduced and the fearincreased, and the repentance becomes remorse.Let the hate be reduced to a minimum and thefear increased to a maximum, and the feeling isdespair. These are all immoral states, as will beseen farther on, since^ they are madg up of thene^atrye moral functions. Amongthe compounds*


46/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.of faith and hate are pride, the combative passions,and probably others ; but these analyses have nowbeen carried far enough for our present purpose.The analyses given are of the most simple ofordinary mental states. They are, doubtless, veryincomplete, and probably some of them very incorrect. Most ordinary mental states are made /up of compounds of compounds of simple states,and even of compounds of compounds of compounds, and defy even such imperfect analysisas the above. There are no compounds of loveand hate or of faith and fear, because these, being ^the opposites of one another, in -the sense thatheat and cold are opposites, are mutually excluVsive the one of the other. The compound emotions are always on this view : i. Compoundsof love and faith. 2. Compounds of hate andfear. 3. Compounds of love and fear. 4. Compounds of faith and hate. But each of thesecompounds constitutes a large class the varietyin the individual compound states being due, inthe first place, to variation in the proportion _ofthe two moral constiluenjts, and, in the secondplace, to the union of the compound moral statewith a wide range of concepts. Does it appearstrange that the immense variety of human passion, sentiment, and emotion could be producedby the combination of so few simple elements ?If it does, consider the compounds of carbon and


47/222

THE MORAL NATURE AND ITS LIMITS. 33hydrogen, their enormous number and great dissimilarity, and I think that the strangeness willdisappear.

Concepts and emotional states being the elements by means of whose union the mind is built omen is greater than it is among ordinary men, probably by six or eight years at the least.Without stopping to comment further on thisfact now, let us pass on to the third fact which wehave to consider in this connection. This factis that married men and women live longer bysome five years on an average than men andwomen who are not married. The only reasonassigned for this difference is that men pick thehealthiest women to marry, and that women pickthe healthiest men. Now, although I am willing to allow that this consideration is entitled tosome weight, still I am satisfied it is more thanbalanced in the female sex by the loss of life incident to parturition; and strange to say, there is agreater difference between the length of life ofmarried and single women than there is betweenthe length of life of married and single men.


103/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 85The real explanation of this fact from our presentpoint of view lies on the surface. Why do menand women marry ? In ninety-nine cases out ofa hundred they marry because they love oneanother. This ought to be the sole reason formarriage, and it really is nearly the sole reason.If the capacity for loving in a given individualreaches a certain point, it is just about certain thatthat individual will marry, for two reasons. Thefirst is, that given a certain capacity for loving,and the individual man or woman will seek tomarry. And the rule holds here as in othermatters, " Seek, and ye shall find." The secondreason is, that nothing attracts love like love.No beauty, accomplishments, or wealth, make aman or woman half so attractive to the oppositesex as a loving heart. The result is, since thegreater the capacity for love the better is themoral nature, that, on the average, the highermoral natures marry and the lower ones do not.So here again we find the higher moral natureassociated with greater length of life.The fourth and last fact is that women livelonger than men by some two to four years onan average. The exact difference of length oflife of women and men is not perhaps known ;but it is certain that women live longer than menby about the time above mentioned. It is statedabove (p. 65) that the moral nature is more


104/222

86 MAN S MORAL NATURE.and the intellectual less developed in womenthan in men, also that the great sympathetic isprobably larger while the brain is certainlysmaller in the female than in the male sex of ourspecies. Now, is it true that the moral nature ishigher in women than it is in men ? I believe it is.And there is no doubt that the balance of opinionis in favor of this view. I believe women have,on an average, a greater capacity of love andfaith than men have, and, on an average, a lesscapacity for hate and fear. The woman s excessof faith is shown chiefly in her superior power ofendurance and her greater patience under suffering and ill-usage. In matters of religion I donot know that women have more faith than men ;they certainly have a greater capacity of belief ;but this, as we have seen above, is quite a different thing, and is due largely to the inferiority oftheir intellectual nature. I think there is nodoubt that women surpass men in their power ofloving. Maternal love has always, and I thinkjustly, been considered the most intense and enduring of all forms of this passion. I believe allphysicians will agree that women have less fearof death than men have. If this were granted itwould almost follow that women have less fearthan men. Finally, though one cannot provesuch points as this, I am satisfied that womenhate less than men do. Women are very sub-


105/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 87ject to passing anger and petty spite, but theyvery seldom hate deeply. There are very fewmurders committed by women in comparison tothe number committed by men, though womenon an average have greater provocation to thecommission of this act than men have, and fullyas great facilities for its accomplishment. It issaid that there is only one suicide committed bywomen for three committed by men ; and thatfemale criminals are in proportion to male criminals as one to five. But some one may say : Ifwomen have a higher moral nature than menhave, how is it that there are no religious foundersand so few supreme artists among the membersof this sex? The reason is, that although the essential factor in a religious founder is faith, andin a supreme artist love, yet a high grade of intellect must go along with the high moral natureif anything great in either of these lines is tobe achieved. Well, we know that the averageweight of a woman s brain is forty-four ounces,against forty-nine and one-half ounces for theaverage weight of a man s brain ; but the knowledge of this fact is not necessary to assure usthat woman s intellect is very much below thelevel of man s. Lacking, therefore, one essentialfactor of greatness, woman cannot be great in thesame way that the greatest men are great ; butshe can be great in the sense of being good, and


106/222

88 MAN S MORAL NATURE.in this sense she is greater than man. And sofar as civilization has yet gone, which does notseem to me to be very far, women have been,and are, in the best and truest sense of the word,the acknowledged civilizers of the race.Now, these four facts taken together are

tolerably exhaustive. All men and women areeither married or not married. All men areeither Jews or not Jews. All men are eithergreat or not great. And finally, the race is divided into men and women. If it is said thatthe longevity of the Jews is not connected withtheir high moral nature, but is an unexplainedpeculiarity of their race, I say, that explanationdoes not apply to the other three cases. And Isay that I want an explanation that will cover allthe facts. If it is said, as to the second case,that great moral and intellectual activity implya high vitality, and therefore, on the average,a long life, I say that objection in part admitsmy argument, and that in part it is not true,for men on the whole are higher mentally thanwomen, and yet women live longer than men.The fact is, the only thing that can be shown,as far as I can see, to be common to Jews, greatmen, married people, and women, as against non-Jews, ordinary men, unmarried people, and men,is a higher moral nature. In the three first casesthere is, doubtless, along with the higher moral


107/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. ggnature, a better intellectual nature, which, as Ihave shown, is a necessary accompaniment of theformer in cases where the conditions are thesame ; but there is no visible connection betweena good intellect and length of life. And in thelast case this condition is reversed, for in womenthe intellectual nature is lower than in men,while the moral nature is higher and the lengthof life greater. If, however, you adopt the hypothesis that the moral nature is a function of thegreat sympathetic, there is a very plain connection between elevation of the moral nature andlongevity; and what I say is, that to account forthe facts you must adopt that hypothesis; for Isay that the only explanation which will coverall the facts is that the moral nature, being afunction of the great sympathetic, and the greatsympathetic being par excellence the organ ofvitality, longevity and moral elevation are necessarily connected.The second clause of this argument need notdetain us long. It is: Length of life depends onthe degree of perfection of the great sympathetic. No one, I think, who realizes what thewell-understood functions of the great sympathetic are, will deny that this proposition isalmost self-evident, since it is known that thisnervous system underlies and controls all theessentially vital functions, such as digestion,


108/222

MAN S MORAL NATUKE.secretion, circulation, and, above all, nutrition.Death is really, in nine cases out of ten, due to

I might almost say is failure of nutrition,therefore failure of the great sympathetic. Forthe degenerative changes which usher in andlead to death in old age, though they are moreclearly seen by us to result from this cause, arereally not more especially due to failure of nutrition than are many other conditions which leadto death.

It is my belief, then, that the arguments urgedin this eighth general consideration, though theymight not be conclusive of themselves, are entitled to very great weight when taken alongwith the other arguments contained in this chapter, and that they will go a long way toward persuading the attentive and unprejudiced readerthat the moral nature is one of the functions ofthe great sympathetic.

In further considering this part of our subject,we have to look at the problem from two sides,the converse of each other. First, we have toconsider the different ways emotions are causedor excited, and see whether these causes are suchas act upon the cerebro-spinal nervous system orupon the great sympathetic. Then, secondly, anemotion being excited, we have to consider theexpression of this emotion, that is, its effect upon


109/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. g xthe economy, and see whether those organs supplied by the sympathetic are primarily affectedand most affected by the nervous disturbancewhich is the physical accompaniment of the emotion, or whether those organs supplied by thecerebro-spinal nervous system are those which arefirst and most affected.We have, then, to consider, in the first place,emotional excitants, and to try to determine fromtheir seat and nature which nervous system itis that they act upon in giving rise to an emotional state. Now emotions are aroused in threeways : first, spontaneously from some conditionof the body or part of the body ; secondly, theyare excited by thoughts through associationsformed in the past either of the individual or ofthe race ; thirdly, they are excited by impressions.received through the senses without the intervention of thought.A complete list of the instances in which emotions arise spontaneously, or from some conditionof the body or part of the body, would be much toolong to be recited here. I will first mention oneor two physiological and then proceed to a fewpathological conditions.Let us first notice the relation which existsbetween age and the activity of the moral naturein general. In childhood and youth you knowthat there is a constant and rapid succession of


110/222

9 2 MAN S MORAL NATURE.emotional states. A healthy, active child iseither in a state of joy or grief nearly all thetime while awake. Boys and girls are almostconstantly either playing, quarreling, or sulking ;that is, there is some active emotional conditionpresent nearly all the time. Young men andwomen that is, very young men and womenare almost equally liable to this constant domination of one emotional state after another.Youth is the age of impulse and passion it isthe age of bad poetry in the male and of hysteriain the female. This law is as well exemplified inthe lower animals as it is in man lambs, kittens, puppies, and probably the young of all animals, are much more emotional than adults ofthe same species. But from childhood to maturity is not the age during which the higher centresof the cerebro-spinal nervous system are especiallyactive. These children who are so fond of playand so apt to sulk, and these poetical young menand hysterical young women are not particularlyeither thoughtful or studious. There is, in fact,no reason to suppose that there is during thisperiod any extraordinary activity of any of thehigher cerebral centres. I say advisedly,

"

highercerebral centres," because we know that in youththe sensory motor tract of the cerebro-spinal nervous system is more active than it is in later life.But we also know that there is a most elaborate


111/222


112/222

94 MAN S MORAL NATURE.the testes or ovaries; for if all the other conditions be present, and these organs alone be eitherabsent or materially injured by disease, or immature, or atrophied, or if they be functionally inertfrom any other cause, this particular emotionalstate cannot be produced ; while the absence ordisease of no other organ will operate as a positive bar to its existence. The presence in themind of the image of a person of the oppositesex, although to the unthinking it seems to be thechief factor in the production of this emotionalstate, has in reality nothing at all to do with it inany fundamental sense, for this emotion may exist without any such image being present, and,being fully aroused, it may in many people bereadily transferred from one mental image toanother, whereas if it were dependent upon theimage this could not happen. It is in this waythat we may account for those cases, frequentlyseen, in which a man, upon a very short acquaintance, marries a second woman, upon the breaking off of an engagement with a first. Again, inthe higher animals in whom we must admit amental structure in sexual matters, almost, if notquite identical with our own though some ofthem will not transfer their affections from oneobject to another, or will do so only with greatdifficulty, and after a certain period of mourning,yet in others there seems little or no cohesion


113/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 95between the mental image and the emotionalstate, so that the sexual glands being active, andthe emotional condition in question being present,the individual upon whom the sexual favors maybe bestowed is a matter, apparently, of entire indifference. These considerations seem to meconclusive against the theory that this emotionalcondition is dependent upon the mental image,and the reasons above given seem also to establish the position that the state of the sexual secreting glands is the real determining cause ofthe emotion. This being the case, we have nextto ask, with which nervous system these glandsare most intimately connected ? You know whatthe answer to this question is. The ovaries receive no nerves but from the sympathetic, andthe testes, as pointed out above, receive nervesfrom the cerebro-spinal nervous system only because they are exposed and require to be endowed with sensibility for their protection. Butif the sympathetic nerves be the connecting linkbetween the organ whose condition excites theemotion and the nerve centre in which that emotion arises, that centre must be the great sympathetic system.The pathological conditions which give rise toactive emotional states are extremely numerous,and I wish particularly, in this connection, todraw attention to the fact that it it is invariably


114/222

96 MAN S MORAL NATURE.in lesions of organs well supplied by the sympathetic that these perversions of the emotionalnature occur. As a rule, in diseases of organswhich are comparatively scantily supplied by thesympathetic, such as the bones, muscles, or lungs,there is little or no derangement of the moralnature ; on the other hand, in diseases of thestomach, heart, liver, kidneys, suprarenal glands,and of the testes, ovaries, and uterus, there isalways some, and often great, disturbance of theemotions. In cancer of the stomach, ulcerationof the stomach, and chronic gastritis, there is agood deal of emotional disturbance. All physicians who have been much engaged in generalpractice have seen cases of dyspepsia in whichconstant low spirits and occasional attacks ofterror rendered the patient s condition pitiablein the extreme. I have observed these casesoften, and have watched them closely, and I havenever seen greater suffering of any kind than Ihave witnessed during these attacks. Now, howdo we know that these pathological conditions ofthe stomach produce terror and low spirits byimpressions conveyed through sympathetic nervesto^sympathetic ganglia and not by impressionsconveyed through the pneumogastrics to thebrain ? We infer it because all the accompanying morbid phenomena are certainly due to disturbance of the sympathetic. Thus, a man is


115/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 97suffering from what we call nervous dyspepsia.Some day, we will suppose in the middle of theafternoon, without any warning or visible cause,one of these attacks of terror comes on. Thefirst thing the man feels is great but vague discomfort. Then he notices that his heart is beating much too violently. At the same time,shocks or flashes as of electrical discharges, soviolent as to be almost painful, and accompaniedby a feeling of extreme distress, pass one afteranother througn his body and limbs. Then in afew minutes he falls into a condition of the mostintense fear. He is not afraid of anything ; heis simply afraid. His mind is perfectly clear.He looks for a cause of his wretched condition,but sees none. Presently his terror is such thathe trembles violently and utters low moans ; hisbody is damp with perspiration ; his mouth isperfectly dry; and at this stage there are notears in his eyes, though his suffering is intense.When the climax of the attack is reached andpassed there is a copious flow of tears, or else amental condition in which the person weeps uponthe least provocation. At this stage a largequantity of pale urine is passed. Then the heart saction becomes again normal, and the attackpasses off. There is nothing imaginary about thisdescription. It is taken word for word from theaccount given to the present writer by the actual

5


116/222

98 MAN S MORAL NATURE.sufferer, who is himself a highly intellectual medical man. Neither is the description a summaryof a number of attacks, but it refers to one particular attack which was witnessed by the writer,and I am satisfied is absolutely accurate.Now, what I wish to call attention to is, that

all disturbance of function accompanying one ofthese attacks is disturbance of function presidedover by the sympathetic. We have seen abovethat the secretions are controlled by this nervoussystem, and I have mentioned how the salivary,lachrymal, urinary, and cutaneous secretions arealtered both by diminution and increase in theseattacks. The heart s action is almost certainlyunder the control of the sympathetic, and it isgreatly disturbed. The trembling, as more fullyexplained farther on, is probably the phenomenonproduced when voluntary muscles are acted uponand thrown into action by the sympathetic nervous system. On the other hand we have no indication that, during the attack described, thecerebro-spinal nervous system is in any way excited or disturbed. The intellect is clear; thereasoning and perceptive faculties alike in perfectorder; the control of the will over the voluntarymuscles, through the medium of this nervoussystem, is in no way interfered with ; and, in fact,so little is the centre of ideation involved, that, asI have stated, no mental image is associated with


117/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 99the emotion of terror the man suffers simplyfrom fear, not from fear of something. It seems,then, clear to me that the great sympathetic isthe nervous system acted upon by the abnormalcondition of the stomach, which nervous systemin its turn reacts upon the economy, and consequently that the terror in question is one of itsfunctions.When the terror thus excited continues forsome little time, it associates itself with an idea,and then the person affected is afraid of somedefinite thing happening (see p. 16); and it isvery curious to notice how the fear attaches itself, not to the thing which the person has mostcause to be afraid of, but to the ideas which occupy the most prominent place in his mind.Thus, among many cases of this kind known tome, where the condition in question is more orless chronic, I will cite three to illustrate thispoint. Case No. i is that of a priest, a goodand wise man, and with him the terror is associated with the idea of endless misery, though heis well aware of the absurdity of this idea, or, atleast, of the absurdity of his being especially ex-

4 posed to this danger. Case No. 2 is a lawyer,and a very shrewd and successful business man *with him the terror is always associated withideas of business mistakes and loss of money,though he scarcely ever made a business mistake


118/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.in his life, and never lost any money, though hehas made a great deal. Case No. 3 is a medicalman of good ability, and with him the terror isalways associated with ideas of sudden death, incurable disease, and poison, though he is a healthyman, and as little liable to be poisoned as any oneliving.The lungs receive a very small supply of sym

pathetic nerves, and we know that long-continueddisease of their tissue, ending in destruction oflarge parts of this tissue, and at last in death,will often scarcely give rise to low spirits, neverto extreme depression or to violent emotion ofany kind. The heart receives a very largesupply of sympathetic nerves, and its diseases,as fatty degeneration of its substance, and calcareous degeneration of its arteries, are accompanied by very great depression of spirits, andoften by agonies of anxiety and terror. Imperfections of the cardiac valves and contractionsof the cardiac orifices are not, in_ the sense inwhich I am speaking, diseases at all ; for there isin these cases no tissue change there is simplya change in the mechanical conditions.The liver is moderately well supplied with

sympathetic nerves, and there is a moderateamount of disturbance of the moral nature incases of disease of its tissue, as in cancer, andimpairment of its functions, as in congestion; but


119/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. IO ias disease of the liver, either structural or functional, seldom or never occurs without structuraldisease or at least functional derangement ofthe stomach accompanying it, it is difficult to estimate the amount of the disturbance of the emotions caused by the hepatic conditions themselves.

Emotional conditions excited by disease ofthe kidneys are undoubtedly due, in great part, tothe destructive changes going on in these organs,but they are also, to a certain extent, due to theursemic poisoning which necessarily accompaniesthem, and so the effects of the blood change andof the organic change mask one another.But the pathological condition most clearly infavor of my present argument is, beyond question, Addison s disease of the suprarenal glands.The number and size of sympathetic nerves sentto these small bodies is extraordinarily great.Moreover, they receive no cerebro-spinal nervesat all. Any one who has ever seen cases of thisdisease is aware of the extraordinary effect produced by disease of these bodies upon the moralnature. Long before the patient is obliged bythe degree of his illness to abandon his usualoccupations, he is greatly troubled with listless-ness, languor, and low spirits, and as the diseaseadvances these symptoms increase, and attacksof terror and extreme low spirits are common.


120/222


121/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 103phase of the mental state is a thought the realization by consciousness that something is occurring or exists in the outer world ; and if anemotion is excited, it is so secondarily, by theassociation in the past of the idea directly excitedwith the emotion which is excited in the secondplace. This rule holds good, as regards the sensesof sight and touch, more absolutely than as regards the other senses, and it is more true ofsight than of any other sense.The impressions received through the sense oftaste can hardly be said, as a general thing, toexcite thought. They do excite a sort of emotion. The sense qf smell varies greatly in different individuals in its power of exciting thoughtor emotion. Oliver Wendell Holmes describeswonderfully well how in some people it calls upemotions. In others this sense excites ideas veryreadily, so that they can name a drug or otherodorous body more readily from its smell thanfrom its look. Others again cannot name thecommonest things from their odor. The excitation of this sense with them awakens a pleasantor a disagreeable sensation, and the effect stopsthere.

But the sense of hearing stands apart fromthe other senses in the degree to which it iscapable of transmitting impressions directly toeither the centres of intellectual or emotional


122/222

104 MAN S MORAL NATURE.life. Our knowledge of the anatomy of the nervous system is not minute enough to enable us tosay why there exist these differences betweenthe senses ; why, for instance, sight awakensonly ideas, and hearing either ideas or emotionsaccording to certain differences in the sounds.We Know that if we trace the optic nerves inwardwe find that they arise, by means of the optictracts, from the posterior and superior part of themesocephale, and are more or less connected withother parts of the brain in that neighborhood.If we trace the portio mollis of the seventh inward we find that it divides into two roots, one ofwhich passes deeply into the central part of themedulla oblongata, the other winds around the corpus restiforme to the floor of the fourtlj ventricle.In this connection it is worthy of remark that theauditory ganglion from which the portio mollissprings is the lowest down of all the ganglia ofthe medulla oblongata ; it is, therefore, the mostcontiguous of all the intercranial ganglia to thelarger masses of the great sympathetic ; this factincreases the likelihood of some closer relationbetween the roots of the auditory nerve and thegreat sympathetic than obtains in the cases of theother nerves of special sense but it proves nothing. But if it were possible to trace the roots ofthis nerve, and if upon tracing them to their originit were found that one of them belonged to, or


123/222


124/222

I 6 MAN S MORAL NATURE.pine trees on a summer s day, and hear, withoutlistening, the wind sigh and moan through theboughs, the emotional nature is moved irrespectively of any idea that may be excited. So, atthe bedside of a sick child, its moans and cries ofpain affect us quite out of proportion to, andirrespective of, the value our minds may setupon them ; for, even if we know that the childis not dangerously ill, nor suffering very much,still we cannot prevent, as is said in common language, its cries going to our heart. And they dogo to the heart, or at least to the nervous centre of the emotional nature, direct. So a cry ofpain or distress, heard suddenly, awakens a corresponding emotion in the hearer before anythought is aroused.The types of these two classes of sounds are,on the one hand, spoken language, and, on theother hand, music. The former we know appealsdirectly to the intellect, and does or does notarouse emotion, according as the thought awakened is or is not associated with an emotionalstate. The latter we also know appeals directly tothe emotions, and only awakens thought secondarily, if it does so at all. Now, does that classof sounds which appeals directly to the moralnature, possess any quality which the other classdoes not possess, which would make us think thatit, rather than the latter, acts upon the sympa-


125/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 107thetic ? It has three such qualities, namely, continuity, rhythm, and range of intensity. We haveseen above (p. 65 et seq.} that continuity is onecharacteristic of moral states as distinguishingthem from intellectual states ; we have seen alsothat it is a characteristic of the functions of thegreat sympathetic nervous system as distinguishing them from the functions of the cerebro-spinalnervous system. A moment s reflection makesit clear that continuity is also a characteristic ofsounds that awaken emotion as distinguishedfrom sounds that awaken thought. It is seen insuch sounds as the murmur of wind throughtrees, the roar of waves on the beach but it isespecially noticeable in music and poetry ; inthese the successive waves of sound are madeto depend upon one another, so that the partsof each clause of the music or poem are interdependent, and require to be read, sung, orplayed through in order that the full effect intended maybe produced. So, secondly, all musicis rhythmic, and all language which appeals mostdirectly to the emotions, that is to say, all poetry,is also rhythmic. Now, rhythm is one of the leading qualities of the functions of the great sympathetic. All motions governed by it are rhythmic

the heart s motion, the peristaltic motion ofthe intestinal canal, and the contractions of theuterus in labor. I myself have no doubt that the


126/222

Io8 MAN S MORAL NATURE.period of utero-gestation, the determining causeof which has puzzled the world so much, as wellas the periodic recurrence of ovulation, are bothdue to the same cause, namely, the rhythm or periodicity of function of the great sympatheticnervous system. Doubtless the chief advantageof regularity of time in taking meals is due tothe fact that the gastric and salivary glands, andother organs concerned in digestion, being governed by the sympathetic, their functions are bestperformed rhythmically. The rhythmic, daily riseand fall of temperature, both in health and disease, is another example of the rhythm of a function which is under the control of this nervoussystem. And, thirdly, musical tones possess aquality which corresponds closely with what Ihave called range of intensity (p. 71, et seq.}, andthis seems to me to form another link between them and the great sympathetic nervoussystem.We have finally to consider the expression ofthe emotions, to see if we can determine fromwhich nervous system these phenomena proceed.It will not be necessary for our purpose here todiscuss the whole of this branch of the inquiry,and I shall limit the few remarks I have to maketo the expression of joy, grief, hate, fear; to theexpression of, or if the term be preferred, theeffect of, long-continued, excessive passion of any


127/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. IO9kind ; and to a summary of the whole subject ofthe expression of the moral nature.

If joy is at all marked in degree it alters theheart s action ; if excessive and sudden it arrestsit momentarily ; if more moderate in degree itmakes it more frequent and stronger. Excessivejoy causes pallor for a short time, and then slightflushing ; moderate joy heightens the complexion.If joy is at all extreme it excites lachrymation inpersons of mobile nervous organization. Suddenand great joy destroys the appetite, apparentlyby checking the salivary and gastric secretions ;moderate joy stimulates the appetite, doubtlessby exciting the secretions which assist in digestion.

Now, all the above are disturbances of functions which are controlled by the sympathetic ;but we know that joy also gives rise to movementsof various kinds for instance, laughter, clappingof the hands, stamping of the feet, which areperformed by voluntary muscles under the controlof the cerebro-spinal nervous system. The peculiarity of these movements is that they are allrhythmical, and we know what a tendency thereis for the functions of the sympathetic

to beperformed rhythmically. And further, they are all

objectless ; the intellect takes no cognizance ofthem, and no purpose or intention underlies them.

Now, I do not mean to argue that it is the


128/222

IIO MAN S MORAL NATURE.great sympathetic which excites the muscles toaction in the production of these movements ;but what I would suggest is that the great sympathetic, being the nervous system primarily excited, it excites the cerebro-spinal system bymeans of its elaborate connection with the laiter,and the cerebro-spinal system acting under theinfluence of the great sympathetic, the characterof the action of the former is stamped by the influence of the latter.

Grief is expressed by tears, pallor, loss of appetite phenomena which belong to functionsunder the control of the sympathetic; by sobbing,wringing of the hands, and swaying to and froof the head and body motions which are underthe control of the corebro-spinal nervous system,and which.are rhythmical. Excessive grief kills.I have known of one death, which will be referredto again in Chapter V., and which was plainly dueto this cause. The fatal result of grief is due tointerference with nutrition or with the heart s action, the event in either case being brought aboutthrough the sympathetic.Hate or rage, if intense, is marked by pallorand partial arrest of the heart s action ; if moderate, by flushing; if considerable, but still not intense, the flushing is extreme, the face becomespurple, the veins of the neck and forehead swell.Monkeys, as well as men, are said to redden


129/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. Illwith passion. Some authors say the pupils alwayscontract in rage, and this we can easily understand ; for if the muscular coat of the arteries berelaxed, as it is shown to be by the distension ofthe vessels, which causes the flushing, then theradiating fibres of the iris, wnich are also suppliedby the sympathetic, would be equally in a semi-paralyzed state, and the circular fibres, whichare supplied by the third nerve, would have lessthan usual to antagonize their ordinary tonicity,and the pupils would contract. In great ragethere is often trembling. This phenomenon Ishall consider further under the head of fear.The above-mentioned are the primary signs ofrage, and they are all functional changes effectedthrough the sympathetic. Other signs of rage,such as snarling, setting the teeth, clenching thefists, are manifestly secondary. They result froman intention in ourselves, or in our ancestors, todo something in consequence of rage, and are notthe direct effect of the passion itself.The disturbances of function which accompanyfear are frequent and feeble action of the heart,pallor, and dilatation of the pupils. And I wishparticularly to remark that whereas in rage thereis flushing of the face and contraction of the pupils, as I have shown above, in fear there is pallorof the face and dilatation of the pupils the muscular coats of the arteries and the radiating fibres


130/222

112 MAN S MORAL NATURE,of the iris, being both supplied by the sympathetic, are both stimulated to contract under theinfluence of terror, and are both relaxed in rage.In fear there is also suppression of the salivaryand gastric secretions, extreme dryness of themouth, and complete abeyance of the appetite;there is frequently increase, sometimes verymarked, of the urinary and intestinal secretions.Trembling is one of the most characteristic

signs of fear. This is a movement of the voluntary muscles ; but it is not a voluntary movement, the will having no control whatever over it.Trembling occurs in other emotional conditionsbesides fear, as in joy and rage. The shaking ofague, though not associated with any emotionalstate, is, I have no doubt, closely connected withemotional trembling. No author with whoseworks I am acquainted gives any explanation ofthis phenomenon. Were I to attempt an explanation myself, it would be that trembling is the peculiar movement of the voluntary muscular tissuewhen thrown into action, not by its own propernervous system, the cerebro-spinal, but by thesympathetic. And I would argue that this wasthe correct view of the case first, because it iscertain that trembling occurs when the sympathetic is highly excited; secondly, because thecerebro-spinal system cannot, as far as we know,cause such a movement, and cannot control it


131/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. II;jwhen caused ; and thirdly, because of its peculiarrhythmical character, which allies it to other movements originating in the sympathetic.With regard to the sweating of great fear Ihave no explanation to give. I will simply remarkthat when, by division of sympathetic trunks,a part of the surface is to a great extent deprivedof its connection" with the sympathetic centres,that part of the surface is bathed in sweat.

I have quoted very few experiments upon thesympathetic in this essay, for the reason that I putvery little confidence in the deductions drawnfrom them. To divide large sympathetic trunks,or to remove large sympathetic ganglia, mustcause a disturbance of the general system whichwould necessarily mask to a great extent the peculiar effects flowing from the lesion of the nervesoperated on ; and any one who has paid attention to the literature of this subject cannot havefailed to notice how contradictory are the positions supposed to be established by these means.Without denying that experiments may in the future throw light on this branch of physiology, Ithink it is safe to say that they have thrown verylittle upon it yet.If there is one fact in relation to the functionsof the great sympathetic better established thanany other, it is that this nervous system controlsthe process of nutrition. Now, let us consider


132/222

MAN S MORAL NATURE.for a moment what a curious relationship existsbetween the process of nutrition and the habitualstate of the moral nature. The best observerof man that ever lived on this planet makes Ccesarsay to Antony :

" Let me have men about me that are fat.Yond Cassius hath a lean and hungry look.He thinks too much. Such men are dangerous."*

Shakespeare says, what we all know, that men inwhom dwell a preponderance of evil passions,such as hate, envy, jealousy, are, as a rule, illnourished. The converse of this is as notorious, so that fat and jolly go together as naturally as do any two terms in the language.Not only does this general law hold, though liable to many exceptions from the operation ofother laws interfering with it, but we find itequally true that any long-continued, inordinatepassion, be it sexual love, hate, envy, or grief, iscapable of influencing nutrition in a marked manner. Long-continued thought does not produceany such effect. If it seems to do so sometimes,it is because the student deprives himself of air,exercise, and sleep, in his ardent devotion toknowledge. Newton was as fat when he finishedthe Principia as when he began it. The writing of the Novum Organum did not reduceBacon s weight a pound. Shakespeare, in whose


133/222


134/222


135/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL MATURE. 117any depressing or inordinate passion. The alterations of circulation are alterations of excess,defect, and perversion. Alterations of excessare seen in the excessive action of the heart inrage, fear, or sudden joy, in the flushing of joyor love, the reddening of rage, or the blushing ofshame. Alterations of defect are seen in thepausing of the heart in sudden terror, the depression of the heart s action in continuous grief, andin the pallor of fear. Alteration of the circulation by perversion is seen in intermittent cardiacaction from excessive fear or rage.The second class of alteration of functions thatis, alteration of functions presided over by thecerebro-spinal nervous system may be dividedroughly into alteration of functions presided overby the cord, and alteration of functions presidedover by the brain. In the first class are a largenumber of quite meaningless acts, such as laughter, sobbing and sighing, clapping the hands in joy,wringing them in grief, stamping the feet in rage,swaying the head and body in despair. The twochief things to notice about these acts are thatthey are rhythmical, and that they are without intention. Now, if the cord was prompted to excite the muscles to these acts by the brain, thatbeing the seat of the emotion, the probabilityseems to be that the acts would have some intention underlying them, and I see no reason why


136/222

u8 MAN S MORAL NATURE.they should be rhythmical. But if the great sympathetic is the seat of the emotion, and if itprompts the cord to excite the muscles to theseactions, then we can see both why the acts shouldbe meaningless and why they should be rhythmical. Lastly, alteration of functions presided overby the brain are acts, as I think, equally promptedby the great sympathetic, but by the great sympathetic acting through the higher centres of thecerebro-spinal nervous system that is to say,through consciousness. In this class of actionsthe intellect intervenes between the emotion andthe act. These acts, performed by many generations in succession, and under changing circumstances, are apt to become meaningless, thoughthey must have all had a meaning at one time ;they also, by constant repetition, become involuntary and automatic. Such an act is the sneer ofscorn or anger, in which the canines are partiallyuncovered an act which originated when thecanines were used by our ancestors under the influence of such passions. The involuntary setting of the teeth and clenching of the hands inrage, when there is no intention to enter into aphysical contest when, perhaps, the object ofthe passion is miles away is a similar act. Butthough the acts of the class now under consideration may become meaningless, as shown above,as a class they are not meaningless acts, for this


137/222

PHYSICAL BASIS OF THE MORAL NATURE. 119class comprises most of the acts of every-day life,the majority of which are prompted more or lessremotely by some passion or emotion. Now,these acts as a class are remote from the moralstate which excites to their performance, whilethe actions of the cord, and still more of thesympathetic, are instant upon the occurrence ofthe passion or emotion, showing that alteration offunctions presided over by the great sympatheticis, so to speak, closest to the emotion ; that alteration of function presided over by the spinal cordis next closest to the emotion ; and that alteration of function presided over by the brain ismost remote from the emotion. All these considerations tend to prove that the seat of theemotions is the ganglia of the great sympatheticand not the convolutions of the brain.

For, consider if the brain was the organ of themoral nature, as it is of the intellectual nature,would not conscious intentional acts and ideation-al changes be the most instant and fundamentaleffects consequent upon the occurrence of a givenemotional state ? Would not meaningless actions,having their immediate source in the spinal cord

such as laughing, sobbing, stamping comeafter these in degree of directness ? And wouldnot actions or alteration of functions having theirimmediate source in the ganglia of the greatsympathetic such as contraction and relaxation


138/222

120 MAN S MORAL NATURE.of unstriped muscle and alterations of secretionwould not these be less instant and direct thanthe other two classes of actions instead of beingmarkedly more so?

In conclusion, .were I to attempt to draw acomparison in a few words between the functionsof the cerebro-spinal nervous system and those ofthe great sympathetic, I should say that whereasthe cerebro-spinal nervous system is an enormousand complex sensory motor apparatus, with animmense ganglion, the cerebrum, whose functionis ideation, superimposed upon its sensory tract,and another, the cerebellum, whose function isthe coordination of motion, superimposed uponits motor tract, so the great sympathetic is also asensory motor system without any superimposedganglia, and its sensory and motor functions donot differ from the corresponding functions of thecerebro-spinal system more than its cells and fibresdiffer from those of this latter system, its efferentor motor function being expended upon unstripedmuscle, and its afferent or sensory function beingthat peculiar kind of sensation which we callemotion. And as there is no such thing as coordination of emotion, as there is coordination ofmotion and sensation, so in the realm of themoral nature there is no such thing as learning,though there is development. And the moralnature of the ignorant

Man's moral nature by R. M. Bucke

Documents