A perfectly just society should be part of an ideal that rational human
beings could desire more than anything else once they had full knowledge
and experience of what it was.
14
The content of the principles of justice,
the way in which they are derived, and the stages of moral development
show how in justice as fairness such an interpretation is possible.
It would seem, then, that the doctrine of the purely conscientious act is
irrational. This doctrine holds, first, that the highest moral motive is the
desire to do what is right and just simply because it is right and just, no
other
description being appropriate; and second, that while other mo-
tives certainly have moral value, for example the desire to do what is right
because doing this increases human happiness, or because it tends to
promote equality, these desires are less morally worthy than that to do
what is right solely in virtue of its being right. Ross holds that the sense
of right is a desire for a distinct (and unanalyzable) object, since a spe-
cific (and unanalyzable) property characterizes actions that are our duty.
The other morally worthy desires, while indeed desires for things neces-
sarily connected with what is right, are not desires for the right as such.
15
But on this interpretation the sense of right
lacks any apparent reason;
it resembles a preference for tea rather than coffee. Although such a
preference might exist, to make it regulative of the basic structure of
society is utterly capricious; and no less so because it is masked by a
fortunate necessary connection with reasonable grounds for judgments
of right.
But for one who understands and accepts the contract doctrine, the
sentiment of justice is not a different desire from that to act on principles
that rational individuals would consent to in an initial situation which
gives everyone equal representation as a moral person. Nor is it different
from wanting to act in accordance with principles that express men’s
nature as free and equal rational beings. The principles of justice answer
to these descriptions and this fact allows us to give an acceptable interpre-
tation to the sense of justice. In the light of the theory of justice we
understand how the moral sentiments can be
regulative in our life and
have the role attributed to them by the formal conditions on moral princi-
ples. Being governed by these principles means that we want to live with
14. On this point, see G. C. Field,
Moral Theory,
2nd ed. (London, Methuen, 1932), pp. 135f, 141f.
15. For the notion of the purely conscientious act, see W. D. Ross,
The Right and the Good
(Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1930), pp. 157–160, and
The Foundations of Ethics
(Oxford, The
Clarendon Press, 1939), pp. 205f. That this notion makes the right an arbitrary preference, I borrow
from J. N. Findlay,
Values and Intentions
(London,
George Allen and Unwin, 1961), pp. 213f.
418
The Sense of Justice
others on terms that everyone would recognize as fair from a perspective
that all would accept as reasonable. The ideal of persons cooperating on
this basis exercises a natural attraction upon our affections.
Finally, we may observe that the morality of principles takes two
forms, one corresponding to the sense of right and justice, the other to the
love of mankind and to self-command. As we have noted, the latter is
supererogatory, while the former is not. In its normal form of right and
justice the morality of principles includes the virtues of the moralities of
authority and association. It defines the last stage at which all the subordi-
nate ideals are finally understood and organized
into a coherent system by
suitably general principles. The virtues of the other moralities receive
their explanation and justification within the larger scheme; and their
respective claims are adjusted by the priorities assigned by the more
comprehensive conception. The morality of supererogation has two as-
pects depending upon the direction in which the requirements of the
morality of principles are willingly surpassed. On the one hand, the love
of mankind shows itself in advancing the common good in ways that go
well beyond our natural duties and obligations. This morality is not one
for ordinary persons, and its peculiar virtues are those of benevolence, a
heightened sensitivity to the
feelings and wants of others, and a proper
humility and unconcern with self. The morality of self-command, on the
other hand, in its simplest form is manifest in fulfilling with complete
ease and grace the requirements of right and justice. It becomes truly
supererogatory when the individual displays its characteristic virtues of
courage, magnanimity, and self-control in actions presupposing great dis-
cipline and training. And this he may do either by freely assuming offices
and positions which call upon these virtues if their duties are to be well
performed; or else by seeking superior ends in a manner consistent with
justice but surpassing the demands of duty and obligation. Thus the
moralities of supererogation, those
of the saint and the hero, do not
contradict the norms of right and justice; they are marked by the willing
adoption by the self of aims continuous with these principles but extend-
ing beyond what they enjoin.
16
16. In this account of the aspects of the morality of supererogation I have drawn upon J. O.
Urmson, “Saints and Heroes,” in
Essays in Moral Philosophy,
ed. A. I. Melden (Seattle, University of
Washington Press, 1958). The notion of self-command is taken from Adam Smith,
The Theory of
the Moral Sentiments,
pt. VI, sec. III, which may be found in
Adam Smith’s Moral and Political
Philosophy,
ed. H. W. Schneider (New York, Hafner, 1948), pp. 251–277.
419
72. The Morality of Principles
73. FEATURES OF THE MORAL SENTIMENTS
73. The Moral Sentiments
In the next sections I discuss several aspects of the three stages of moral-
ity in more detail. The concept of a moral sentiment, the nature of the
three psychological laws, and the process whereby they take hold call for
further comment. Turning to the first of these matters, I should explain
that I shall use the older term “sentiment” for permanent ordered fami-
lies of governing dispositions, such as the sense of justice and the love
of mankind (§30), and for lasting attachments
to particular individuals
or associations that have a central place in a person’s life. Thus there
are both moral and natural sentiments. The term “attitude” I use more
broadly. Like sentiments, attitudes are ordered families of dispositions
either moral or natural, but in their case the tendencies need not be so
regulative or enduring. Finally, I shall use the phrases “moral feeling” and
“moral emotion” for the feelings and emotions that we experience on
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