GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

119 ETHICS AND POLITICS: THE GREEKS
none ignoble. Now these good actions of mine must, it
is said, have some cause. Whence, then, do they spring?
Obviously from the nobility of my character. But how
was this noble character of mine formed? Clearly not
arbitrarily, not out of nothing. Being good is not as easy
as all that. How then? By training and discipline and the
habit of leading a good life. But a good life is nothing
apart from the good actions in which it finds expression.
By a good life we mean simply a life that expresses itself
in good acts. Hence a good character is the result of the
continuous performance of good acts. But whence do these
good acts spring? Obviously from the possession of a noble
character, for a good character as we have seen is one
that naturally expresses itself in good acts. Hence at every
stage of our career our actions are the determined results
of our characters, which in their turn were formed by our
preceding actions, which in their turn sprang from the
good character which expressed themselves in them, and
so on adinfimtum. At every stage, in fact, we act in such and
such a way because we are that sort of person. Travelling
backwards on these lines we come to the first actions we
performed which sprang out of the initial character, or
disposition for a character, with which we were born
interacting with the environment in which we found
ourselves placed.
Now, unless we believe in reincarnation, it seems difficult
to hold that we are responsible for the initial character
or disposition for a character with which we were
born; more difficult still, to hold ourselves responsible
for the environment in which at birth we were placed.
We may conclude, therefore, that we are responsible
neither for our initial character, or disposition to form
a character, nor for our initial environment, from which
it follows, if the argument which I have outlined is correct,
that we are not responsible for our actions or our char-
acters at any stage of our subsequent careers.
Now, it is to this doctrine, a doctrine known as Self-
Determinism, that in the opinion of many philosophers