HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

are to be explained from him as a starting-point. In so far the natu
ralistic metaphysics of the seventeenth century thought here more
after the analogy of atomism, there more after that of the Monad-
ology forms the background for the morals of the eighteenth.
The constantly progressing process in which these presuppositions
became more clear and distinct brought with it the result, that the
principles of ethics found a valuable clearing up in the discussions
of this period. For inasmuch as the ethical life was regarded
as something added to the natural essence of the individual, as some
thing that must first be explained, it was necessary, on the one hand,
to establish by an exact discrimination what the thing to be ex
plained really is, and on the other hand, to investigate on what the
worth and validity of the ethical life rests : and the more morality
appeared to be something foreign to the natural essence of the indi
vidual, the more the question as to the motives which induce man
to follow ethical commands asserted itself, side by side with the
question as to the ground of the validity of those commands. And
so three main questions appeared, at the beginning much involved,
and then becoming complicated anew : what is the content of
morality ? on what rests the validity of the moral laws ? what
brings man to moral action ? The principles of morals are set forth
according to the three points of view of the criterion, the sanction,
and the motive. This analysis and explanation, however, showed
that the various answers to these separate questions were capable of
being combined with each other in the most various ways : so the
clearing and separating process above named results precisely from
the motley variety and changing hues exhibited by the doctrines of
moral philosophy in the eighteenth century. Shaflesbury stands in
the centre of the movement as the mind that stimulates in all direc
tions and controls in many lines ; while, on the other hand, the move
ment reaches no definite conclusion in this period, on account of the
differences in the statements of the question (cf. 39) .
A typical feature of the fundamental individualistic tendency of
this ethics was the repeatedly renewed consideration of the relation
of virtue and happiness : the final outcome, expressed more or less
sharply, was that the satisfaction of the individual s impulses was
raised to be the standard of value for the ethical functions. The
system of practical philosophy built up upon this principle is
Utilitarianism, the varied development of which forms the centre in
the complicated courses of these reflections.
But out of this arose the much more burning question, as regards
the political and social order, the question, namely, as to the value