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

aa ETHICS AND POLITICS: TR1 OR1KKI
thing but moral ? Remove the fear of these consequences, as,
for example, by endowing a man with the power to become
invisible at will, and he would at once lapse into the natural,
lawless state of his pr^-society days, satisfying his desires as
and when he pleased, without reference to so-called moral
considerations. Man, then, is by nature not just, but unjust;
not moral, but non-moral.
That Society Rewards the Virtuous. Plato hext introduces
Adeimantus to reinforce the argument of Glaucon.
Adcimantus does not deny that almost everybody does
for the most part behave morally. Not only do men behave
as if they valued morality; they do, he admits, in fact
value it. But why do they value it? Because of the care
which society has taken to cause it to appear valuable;
because, in short, of the rewards which society has assigned
as inducements to its pursuit. Thus the second part of the
case is devoted to showing that man's apparent regard for
morality is not really disinterested, is not, that is to say,
a regard for morality in itself, but is generated by and
proceeds from a consideration of the respective consequences
of so-called moral and so-called immoral actions.
Human society, to commit an anachronism and adapt
a metaphor of Schopenhauer's, is like a collection of
hedgehogs driven together for the sake of warmth. Spikes
in close proximity would prick, unless they were well
felted. Hence those kinds of behaviour are encouraged by
society which felt the spikes and so render social intercourse
possible. Society's encouragement takes, in the
first place, the form of moral approval; it defines as virtuous
those actions which benefit society. Thus courage is
regarded as morally good because the soldier's willingness
to face the enemy is more advantageous to an army than
the coward's practice of giving way to his natural reaction
to belching cannon and running away; meekness and
contentment, because those who are satisfied with their
stations in life make good citizens and give no trouble to
the Government; truth-telling, because if we all told lies,