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

'294
ETHICS
utilitarian ethics, says "the Utilitarian will praise die
Dispositions or permanent qualities of character of which
felicific conduct is conceived to be the result, and the
motives that are conceived to prompt it, when it would
be a clear gain to the general happiness that these should
become more '.
frequent
When the intuitionist insists that motive cannot be
judged apart from the consequences which the action
proceeding from the motive is intended to produce, the
ultimate or final consequences of the action are those which
are meant. These must be distinguished from the immediate
consequences, although these are in an equal degree
intended and expected. Thus, if a dentist uses a drill to
stop a tooth, the immediate expected consequences are
painful and unpleasant, although the ultimate expected
consequences are beneficial. When the moral sense approves
the motive of the dentist's action as taking its colour from
the aim the dentist sets before himself, it is the expected
ultimate consequences which constitute the reasons for
its approval, not the immediate painful ones. Yet the
immediate painful consequences are equally expected and
equally intended. In order to T^a^t^ this distinction,
some writers distinguish between motive and intention,
defining a motive as that for the sake of which an action
is done, whereas, an intention includes both that for the
sake of which and that in spite of which an action is done.
Intention is therefore wider than motive, and of the total
amount of the intended consequences, only those for the
sake of which the action is done form the subject of
moral approval or disapproval.
If it is important to distinguish between immediate and
ultimate consequences, it is no less important to distinguish
between intended and actual consequences. 1 The conse-
quences which the motive school of Intuitionism is prepared
to take into account are the intended, not the
actual consequences. If the intended consequences are
1 See Chapter IX, pp. 314-316 for an account of the significance of
this distinction.