It is as impossible to
teach virtue as it is to teach genius. It would be as foolish to
expect our moral systems to produce virtuous characters and saints
as to expect the science of aesthetics to bring forth poets,
sculptors and musicians." To this view Paulsen replies:
"I do not believe that ethics need be so faint-hearted. Its first
object, it is true, is to understand human strivings and modes of
conduct, conditions and institutions, as well as their effects upon
individual and social life. But if knowledge is capable of
influencing conduct--which Schopenhauer himself would not deny--it
is hard to understand why the knowledge of ethics alone should be
fruitless in this respect.... Moral instruction, however, can have
no practical effect unless there be some agreement concerning the
nature of the final goal--not a mere verbal agreement, to be sure,
but one based upon actual feeling.... It will be the business of
ethics to invite the doubter and the inquirer to assist in the
common effort to discover fixed principles which shall help the
judgment to understand the aims and problems of life.
Pages:
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36