[Transcriber's Note: Accented characters with macrons are marked in thisfile as [=x], while those with inferior dots are marked as [x. ]. ] THE BASIS OF MORALITY BY ANNIE BESANT AUTHOR OF _Mysticism, The Immediate Future, Initiation: The Perfecting of Man, Superhuman Men, etc. Etc. _ THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE ADYAR, MADRAS, INDIA 1915 * * * * * CONTENTS I. REVELATION II. INTUITION III. UTILITY IV. EVOLUTION V. MYSTICISM * * * * * I REVELATION Must religion and morals go together? Can one be taught without theother? It is a practical question for educationists, and France triedto answer it in the dreariest little cut and dry kind of catechism evergiven to boys to make them long to be wicked. But apart from education, the question of the bedrock on which morals rest, the foundation onwhich a moral edifice can be built that will stand secure against thestorms of life--that is a question of perennial interest, and it mustbe answered by each of us, if we would have a test of Right and Wrong, would know why Right is Right, why Wrong is Wrong. Religions based on Revelation find in Revelation their basis formorality, and for them that is Right which the Giver of the Revelationcommands, and that is Wrong which He forbids. Right is Right becauseGod, or a [R. ][s. ]hi or a Prophet, commands it, and Right rests on theWill of a Lawgiver, authoritatively revealed in a Scripture. Now all Revelation has two great disadvantages as a basis for morality. It is fixed, and therefore unprogressive; while man evolves, and at alater stage of his growth, the morality taught in the Revelation becomesarchaic and unsuitable. A written book cannot change, and many things inthe Bibles of Religion come to be out of date, inappropriate to newcircumstances, and even shocking to an age in which conscience hasbecome more enlightened than it was of old. The fact that in the same Revelation as that in which palpably immoralcommands appear, there occur also jewels of fairest radiance, gems ofpoetry, pearls of truth, helps us not at all. If moral teachings worthyonly of savages occur in Scriptures containing also rare and preciousprecepts of purest sweetness, the juxtaposition of light and darknessonly produces moral chaos. We cannot here appeal to reason or judgmentfor both must be silent before authority; both rest on the same ground. "Thus saith the Lord" precludes all argument. Let us take two widely accepted Scriptures, both regarded asauthoritative by the respective religions which accept them as comingfrom a Divine Preceptor or through a human but illuminated being, Mosesin the one case, Manu in the other. I am, of course, well aware thatin both cases we have to do with books which may contain traditions oftheir great authors, even sentences transmitted down the centuries. The unravelling of the tangled threads woven into such books is a workneeding the highest scholarship and an infinite patience; few of usare equipped for such labour. But let us ignore the work of the HigherCriticism, and take the books as they stand, and the objection raisedto them as a basis for morality will at once appear. Thus we read in the same book: "Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear anygrudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thyneighbour as thyself. " "The stranger that dwelleth with you shall beunto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself, forye were strangers in the land of Egypt. " "Sanctify yourselves thereforeand be ye holy. " Scores of noble passages, inculcating high morality, might be quoted. But we have also: "If thy brother, the son of thymother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thyfriend which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly saying, let usgo and serve other Gods . .. Thou shalt not consent unto him nor hearkenunto him; neither shalt thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him, but thou shalt surely kill him; thinehand shall be first upon him to put him to death. " "Thou shalt notsuffer a witch to live. " A man is told, that he may seize a fair womanin war, and "be her husband and she shall be thy wife. And it shall bethat if thou hast no delight in her, then thou shalt let her go whithershe will. " These teachings and many others like them have drenchedEurope with blood and scorched it with fire. Men have grown out ofthem; they no longer heed nor obey them, for man's reason performs itseclectic work on Revelation, chooses the good, rejects the evil. Thisis very good, but it destroys Revelation as a basis. Christians haveoutgrown the lower part of their Revelation, and do not realise thatin striving to explain it away they put the axe to the root of itsauthority. So also is it with the Institutes of Manu, to take but one examplefrom the great sacred literature of India. There are precepts ofthe noblest order, and the essence and relative nature of morality isphilosophically set out; "the sacred law is thus grounded on the ruleof conduct, " and He declares that good conduct is the root of furthergrowth in spirituality. Apart from questions of general morality, towhich we shall need to refer hereafter, let us take the varying viewsof women as laid down in the present Sm[r. ][t. ]i as accepted. On manypoints there is no wiser guide than parts of this Sm[r. ][t. ]i, as willbe seen in Chapter IV. With regard to the marriage law, Manu says:"Let mutual fidelity continue unto death. " Of a father He declares:"No father who knows must take even the smallest gratuity for hisdaughter; for a man, who through avarice takes a gratuity, is a sellerof his offspring. " Of the home, He says: "Women must be honoured andadorned by their fathers, husbands, brothers and brothers-in-law whodesire happiness. Where women are honoured, there the [D. ]evas arepleased; but where they are not honoured, any sacred rite is fruitless. ""In that family where the husband is pleased with his wife and thewife with her husband [note the equality], happiness will assuredly belasting. " Food is to be given first in a house to "newly-married women, to infants, to the sick, and to pregnant women". Yet the same Manu issupposed to have taken the lowest and coarsest view of women: "It isthe nature of women to seduce men; for that reason the wise are neverunguarded with females . .. One should not sit in a lonely place withone's mother, sister or daughter; for the senses are powerful, andmaster even a learned man. " A woman must never act "independently, evenin her own house, " she must be subject to father, husband or (on herhusband's death) sons. Women have allotted to them as qualities, "impuredesires, wrath, dishonesty, malice and bad conduct". The Sh[=u][d. ]raservant is to be "regarded as a younger son"; a slave is to be lookedon "as one's shadow, " and if a man is offended by him he "must bear itwithout resentment"; yet the most ghastly punishments are ordered to beinflicted on Sh[=u][d. ]ras for intruding on certain sacred rites. The net result is that ancient Revelations, being given for a certainage and certain social conditions, often cannot and ought not to becarried out in the present state of Society; that ancient documents aredifficult to verify--often impossible--as coming from those whose namesthey bear; that there is no guarantee against forgeries, interpolations, glosses, becoming part of the text, with a score of other imperfections;that they contain contradictions, and often absurdities, to say nothingof immoralities. Ultimately every Revelation must be brought to the barof reason, and as a matter of fact, is so brought in practice, even themost "orthodox" Br[=a]hma[n. ]a in Hin[d. ][=u]ism, disregarding all theSh[=a]s[t. ]raic injunctions which he finds to be impracticable or eveninconvenient, while he uses those which suit him to condemn his"unorthodox" neighbours. No Revelation is accepted as fully binding in any ancient religion, butby common consent the inconvenient parts are quietly dropped, and theevil parts repudiated. Revelation as a basis for morality is impossible. But all sacred books contain much that is pure, lofty, inspiring, belonging to the highest morality, the true utterances of the Sages andSaints of mankind. These precepts will be regarded with reverence by thewise, and should be used as authoritative teaching for the young and theuninstructed as moral textbooks, like--textbooks in other sciences--andas containing moral truths, some of which can be verified by all morallyadvanced persons, and others verifiable only by those who reach thelevel of the original teachers. * * * * * II INTUITION When scholarship, reason and conscience have made impossible theacceptance of Revelation as the bedrock of morality, thestudent--especially in the West--is apt next to test "Intuition" as aprobable basis for ethics. In the East, this idea has not appealed tothe thinker in the sense in which the word Intuition is used in theWest. The moralist in the East has based ethics on Revelation, or onEvolution, or on Illumination--the last being the basis of the Mystic. Intuition--which by moralists like Theodore Parker, Frances Power Cobb, and many Theists, is spoken of as the "Voice of God" in the humansoul--is identified by these with "conscience, " so that to base moralityon Intuition is equivalent to basing it on conscience, and making thedictate of conscience the categorical imperative, the inner voice whichdeclares authoritatively "Thou shalt, " or "Thou shalt not". Now it is true that for each individual there is no better, no safer, guide than his own conscience and that when the moralist says to theinquirer: "Obey your conscience" he is giving him sound ethical advice. None the less is the thinker faced with an apparently insuperabledifficulty in the way of accepting conscience as an ethical basis; forhe finds the voice of conscience varying with civilisation, education, race, religion, traditions, customs, and if it be, indeed, the voiceof God in man, he cannot but see--in a sense quite different from thatintended by the writer--that God "in divers manners spoke in pasttimes". Moreover he observes, as an historical fact, that some of theworst crimes which have disgraced humanity have been done in obedienceto the voice of conscience. It is quite clear that Cromwell at Droghedawas obeying conscience, was doing that which he conscientiously believedto be the Will of God; and there is no reason to doubt that a man likeTorquemada was also carrying out what he conscientiously believed to bethe Divine Will in the war which he waged against heresy through theInquisition. In this moral chaos, with such a clash of discordant "Divine Voices, "where shall sure guidance be found? One recalls the bitter gibe of Laudto the Puritan, who urged that he must follow his conscience: "Yea, verily; but take heed that thy conscience be not the conscience of afool. " Conscience speaks with authority, whenever it speaks at all. Its voiceis imperial, strong and clear. None the less is it often uninformed, mistaken, in its dictate. There _is_ an Intuition which is verilythe voice of the Spirit in man, in the God-illuminated man, which isdealt with in the fifth chapter. But the Intuition recognised in theWest, and identified with conscience, is something far other. For the sake of clarity, we must define what conscience is since we havesaid what it is not: that it is not the voice of the Spirit in man, thatit is not the voice of God. Conscience is the result of the accumulated experience gained by eachman in his previous lives. Each of us is an Immortal Spirit, a Divinefragment, a Self: "A fragment of mine own Self, transformed in theworld of life into an immortal Spirit, draweth round itself the senses, of which the mind is the sixth, veiled in Matter. " Such is each man. Heevolves into manifested powers all the potentialities unfolded in him byvirtue of his divine parentage, and this is effected by repeated birthsinto this world, wherein he gathers experience, repeated deaths out ofthis world into the other twain--the wheel of births and deaths turnsin the [T. ]riloka, the three worlds--wherein he reaps in pain theresults of experiences gathered by disregard of law, and assimilates, transforming into faculty, moral and mental, the results of experiencegathered in harmony with law. Having transmuted experience into faculty, he returns to earth for the gathering of new experience, dealt withas before after physical death. Thus the Spirit unfolds, or the manevolves--whichever expression is preferred to indicate this growth. Very similarly doth the physical body grow; a man eats food; digests it, assimilates it, transmutes it into the materials of his body; ill foodcauses pain, even disease; good food strengthens, and makes for growth. The outer is a reflection of the inner. Now conscience is the sum total of the experiences in past lives whichhave borne sweet and bitter fruit, according as they were in accord ordisaccord with surrounding natural law. This sum total of _physical_experiences, which result in increased or diminished life, we callinstinct, and it is life-preserving. The sum total of our interwoven_mental and moral_ experiences, in our relations with others, ismoral instinct, or conscience, and it is harmonising, impels to"good"--a word which we shall define in our fourth chapter. Hence conscience depends on the experiences through which we have passedin previous lives, and is necessarily an individual possession. Itdiffers where the past experience is different, as in the savage and thecivilised man, the dolt and the talented, the fool and the genius, thecriminal and the saint. The voice of God would speak alike in all; theexperience of the past speaks differently in each. Hence also theconsciences of men at a similar evolutionary level speak alike on broadquestions of right and wrong, good and evil. On these the "voice" isclear. But there are many questions whereon past experience fails us, and then conscience fails to speak. We are in doubt; two apparent dutiesconflict; two ways seem equally right or equally wrong. "I do not knowwhat I _ought_ to do, " says the perplexed moralist, hearing noinner voice. In such cases, we must seek to form the best judgment wecan, and then act boldly. If unknowingly we disregard some hidden law weshall suffer, and _that_ experience will be added to our sum total, and in similar circumstances in the future, conscience, through the aidof this added experience, will have found a voice. Hence we may ever, having judged as best we can, act boldly, and learnincreased wisdom from the result. Much moral cowardice, paralysing action, has resulted from the Christianidea of "sin, " as something that incurs the "wrath of God, " and thatneeds to be "forgiven, " in order to escape an artificial--not anatural--penalty. We gain knowledge by experience, and disregard of alaw, where it is not known, should cause us no distress, no remorse, no"repentance, " only a quiet mental note that we must in future rememberthe law which we disregarded and make our conduct harmonise therewith. Where conscience does not speak, how shall we act? The way is well knownto all thoughtful people: we first try to eliminate all personal desirefrom the consideration of the subject on which decision is needed, sothat the mental atmosphere may not be rendered a distorting medium bythe mists of personal pleasure or pain; next, we place before us all thecircumstances, giving each its due weight; then, we decide; the nextstep depends on whether we believe in Higher Powers or not; if we do, wesit down quietly and alone; we place our decision before us; we suspend_all_ thought, but remain mentally alert--all mental ear, as itwere; we ask for help from God, from our Teacher, from our own HigherSelf; into that silence comes the decision. We obey it, without furtherconsideration, and then we watch the result, and judge by that of thevalue of the decision, for it may have come from the higher or fromthe lower Self. But, as we did our very best, we feel no trouble, evenif the decision should be wrong and bring us pain. We have gained anexperience, and will do better next time. The trouble, the pain, we havebrought on ourselves by our ignorance, we note, as showing that we havedisregarded a law, and we profit by the additional knowledge in thefuture. Thus understanding conscience, we shall not take it as a basis ofmorality, but as our best available individual light. We shall judgeour conscience, educate it, evolve it by mental effort, by carefulobservation. As we learn more, our conscience will develop; as we actup to the highest we can see, our vision will become ever clearer, andour ear more sensitive. As muscles develop by exercise, so consciencedevelops by activity, and as we use our lamp it burns the more brightly. But let it ever be remembered that it is a man's own experience thatmust guide him, and his own conscience that must decide. To overrule theconscience of another is to induce in him moral paralysis, and to seekto dominate the will of another is a crime. * * * * * III UTILITY To those whose intelligence and conscience had revolted against thecrude and immoral maxims mixed up with noble precepts in Revelation; tothose who recognised the impossibility of accepting the varying voicesof Intuition as a moral guide; to all those the theory that Morality wasbased on Utility, came as a welcome and rational relief. It promised ascientific certitude to moral precepts; it left the intellect free toinquire and to challenge; it threw man back on grounds which were foundin this world alone, and could be tested by reason and experience; itderived no authority from antiquity, no sanction from religion; it stoodentirely on its own feet, independently of the many conflicting elementswhich were found in the religions of the past and present. The basis for morality, according to Utility, is the greatest happinessof the greatest number; that which conduces to the greatest happiness ofthe greatest number is Right; that which does not is Wrong. This general maxim being laid down, it remains for the student to studyhistory, to analyse experience, and by a close and careful investigationinto human nature and human relations to elaborate a moral code whichwould bring about general happiness and well-being. This, so far, hasnot been done. Utility has been a "hand-to-mouth" moral basis, andcertain rough rules of conduct have grown up by experience and thenecessities of life, without any definite investigation into, orcodifying of, experience. Man's moral basis as a rule is a compound ofpartially accepted revelations and partially admitted consciences, witha practical application of the principle of "that which works best". Themajority are not philosophers, and care little for a logical basis. Theyare unconscious empirics, and their morality is empirical. Mr. Charles Bradlaugh, considering that the maxim did not sufficientlyguard the interests of the minority, and that, so far as was possible, these also should be considered and guarded, added another phrase; hisbasis ran: "The greatest happiness of the greatest number, with theleast injury to any. " The rule was certainly improved by the addition, but it did not remove many of the objections raised. It was urged by the Utilitarian that morality had developed out of thesocial side of human beings; that men, as social animals, desired tolive in permanent relations with each other, and that this resultedin the formation of families; men could not be happy in solitude; thepersistence of these groups, amid the conflicting interests of theindividuals who composed them, could only be secured by recognising thatthe interests of the majority must prevail, and form the rule of conductfor the whole family. Morality, it was pointed out, thus began in familyrelations, and conduct which disrupted the family was wrong, while thatwhich strengthened and consolidated it was right. Thus family moralitywas established. As families congregated together for mutual protectionand support, their separate interests as families were found to beconflicting, and so a _modus vivendi_ was sought in the sameprinciple which governed relations within the family: the commoninterests of the grouped families, the tribe, must prevail over theseparate and conflicting interests of the separate families; that whichdisrupted the tribe was wrong, while that which strengthened andconsolidated it was right. Thus tribal morality was established. Thenext step was taken as tribes grouped themselves together and becamea nation, and morality extended so as to include all who were withinthe nation; that which disrupted the nation was wrong, and that whichconsolidated and strengthened it was right. Thus national morality wasestablished. Further than that, utilitarian morality has not progressed, and international relations have not yet been moralised; they remainin the savage state, and recognise no moral law. Germany has boldlyaccepted this position, and declares formally that, for the State, Might is Right, and that all which the State can do for its ownaggrandisement, for the increase of its power, it may and ought to do, for there is no rule of conduct to which it owes obedience; it is a lawunto itself. Other nations have not formularised the statement in theirliterature as Germany has done, but the strong nations have acted uponit in their dealings with the weaker nations, although the dawningsense of an international morality in the better of them has led tothe defence of international wrong by "the tyrant's plea, necessity". The most flagrant instance of the utter disregard of right and wrong asbetween nations, is, perhaps, the action of the allied European nationsagainst China--in which the Hun theory of "frightfulness" was enunciatedby the German Kaiser--but the history of nations so far is a history ofcontinual tramplings on the weak by the strong, and with the coming tothe front of the Christian white nations, and their growth in scientificknowledge and thereby in power, the coloured nations and tribes, whethercivilised or savage, have been continually exploited and oppressed. International morality, at present, does not exist. Murder within thefamily, the tribe, and the nation is marked as a crime, save thatjudicial murder, capital punishment, is permitted--on the principle of(supposed) Utility. But multiple murder outside the nation--War--is notregarded as criminal, nor is theft "wrong, " when committed by a strongnation on a weak one. It may be that out of the widespread misery causedby the present War, some international morality may be developed. We may admit that, as a matter of historical and present fact, Utilityhas been everywhere tacitly accepted as the basis of morality, defectiveas it is as a theory. Utility is used as the test of Revelation, as thetest of Intuition, and precepts of Manu, Zarathushtra, Moses, Christ, Muhammad, are acted on, or disregarded, according as they are consideredto be useful, or harmful, or impracticable, to be suitable or unsuitableto the times. Inconsistencies in these matters do not trouble the"practical" ordinary man. The chief attack on the theory of Utility as a basis for morality hascome from Christians, and has been effected by challenging the word"happiness" as the equivalent of "pleasure, " the "greatest number" asequivalent to "individual, " and then denouncing the maxim as "a moralityfor swine". "Virtue" is placed in antagonism to happiness, and virtue, not happiness, is said to be the right aim for man. This really begs thequestion, for what is "virtue"? The crux of the whole matter lies there. Is "virtue" opposed to "happiness, " or is it a means to happiness? Whyis the word "pleasure" substituted for "happiness" when utility isattacked? We may take the second question first. "Pleasure, " in ordinary parlance, means an immediate and transitoryform of happiness and usually a happiness of the body rather thanof the emotions and the mind. Hence the "swine". A sensual enjoymentis a "pleasure"; union with God would not be called a pleasure, buthappiness. An old definition of man's true object is: "To know God, andto enjoy Him for ever. " There happiness is clearly made the true endof man. The assailant changes the "greatest happiness of the greatestnumber" into the "pleasure of the individual, " and having created thisman of straw, he triumphantly knocks it down. Does not virtue lead to happiness? Is it not a condition of happiness?How does the Christian define virtue? It is obedience to the Will ofGod. But he only obeys that Will as "revealed" so far as it agrees withUtility. He no longer slays the heretic, and he suffers the witch tolive. He does not give his cloak to the thief who has stolen his coat, but he hands over the thief to the policeman. Moreover, as HerbertSpencer pointed out, he follows virtue as leading to heaven; if rightconduct led him to everlasting torture, would he still pursue it? Orwould he revise his idea of right conduct? The martyr dies for the truthhe sees, because it is easier _to him_ to die than to betray truth. He could not live on happily as a conscious liar. The nobility of aman's character is tested by the things which give him pleasure. Thejoy in following truth, in striving after the noblest he can see--thatis the greatest happiness; to sacrifice present enjoyment for theservice of others is not self-denial, but self-expression, to the Spiritwho is man. Where Utility fails is that it does not inspire, save where thespiritual life is already seen to be the highest happiness of theindividual, because it conduces to the good of all, not only of the"greatest number". Men who thus feel have inspiration from withinthemselves and need no outside moral code, no compelling external law. Ordinary men, the huge majority at the present stage of evolution, needeither compulsion or inspiration, otherwise they will not control theiranimal nature, they will not sacrifice an immediate pleasure to apermanent increase of happiness, they will not sacrifice personal gainto the common good. The least developed of these are almost entirelyinfluenced by fear of personal pain and wish for personal pleasure; theywill not put their hand into the fire, because they know that fireburns, and no one accuses them of a "low motive" because they do notburn themselves; religion shows them that the results of the disregardof moral and mental law work out in suffering after death as well asbefore it, and that the results of obedience to such laws similarly workout in post-mortem pleasure. It thus supplies a useful element in theearly stages of moral development. At a higher stage, love of God and the wish to "please Him" by leadingan exemplary life is a motive offered by religion, and this inspires topurity and to self-sacrifice; again, this is no more ignoble than thewish to please the father, the mother, the friend. Many a lad keeps pureto please his mother, because he loves her. So religious men try to livenobly to please God, because they love Him. At a higher stage yet, thegood of the people, the good of the race, of humanity in the future, acts as a potent inspiration. But this does not touch the selfish lowertypes. Hence Utility fails as a compelling power with the majority, andis insufficient as motive. Add to this the radical fault that it doesnot place morality on a universal basis, the happiness of _all_, that it disregards the happiness of the minority, and its unsatisfactorynature is seen. It has much of truth in it; it enters as a determiningfactor into all systems of ethics, even where nominally ignored ordirectly rejected; it is a better basis in theory, though a worse one inpractice, than either Revelation or Intuition, but it is incomplete. We must seek further for a solid basis of morality. * * * * * IV EVOLUTION We come now to the sure basis of morality, the bedrock of Nature, whereon Morality may be built beyond all shaking and change, built as aScience with recognised laws, and in a form intelligible and capable ofindefinite expansion. Evolution is recognised as the method of Nature, her method in all her realms, and according to the ascertained lawsof Nature, so far as they are known, all wise and thoughtful peopleendeavour to guide themselves. In making Morality a Science, we giveit a binding force, and render it of universal application; moreover, we incorporate into it all the fragments of truth which exist in othersystems, and which have lent to them their authority, their appeal tothe intellect and the heart. Let us first define Morality. It is the science of human relations, theScience of Conduct, and its laws, as inviolable, as sure, as changeless, as all other laws of Nature, can be discovered and formulated. Harmonywith these laws, like harmony with all other natural laws, is thecondition of happiness, for in a realm of law none can move withoutpain while disregarding law. A law of Nature is the statement of aninviolable and constant sequence external to ourselves and unchangeableby our will, and amid the conditions of these inviolable sequences welive, from these we cannot escape. One choice alone is ours: to live inharmony with them or to disregard them; violate them we cannot, but wecan dash ourselves against them; then the law asserts itself in thesuffering that results from our flinging ourselves against it, or fromour disregarding its existence; its existence is proved as well bythe pain that results from our disregard of it, as by the pleasurethat results from our harmony with it. Only a fool deliberately andgratuitously disregards a natural law when he knows of its existence;a man shapes his conduct so as to avoid the pain which results fromclashing with it, unless he deliberately disregards the pain in view ofa result to be brought about, which he considers to be worth more thanthe purchase price of pain. The Science of Morality, of Right Conduct, "lays down the conditions of harmonious relations between individuals, and their several environments small or large, families, societies, nations, humanity as a whole. Only by the knowledge and observance ofthese laws can men be either permanently healthy or permanently happy, can they live in peace and prosperity. Where morality is unknown ordisregarded, friction inevitably arises, disharmony and pain result; forNature is a settled Order in the mental and moral worlds as much as inthe physical, and only by knowledge of that Order and by obedience toit can harmony, health and happiness be secured. " The religious man sees in the laws of Nature the manifestation of theDivine Nature, and in obedience to and co-operation with them, he seesobedience to and co-operation with the Will of God. The non-religiousman sees them as sequences he cannot alter, on harmony with which hishappiness, his comfort, depends. In either case they have a bindingforce. The man belonging to any exoteric religion will modify by themthe precepts of his Scriptures, realising that morality rises asEvolution proceeds. He does thus modify scriptural precepts by practicalobedience or disregard, whether he do it by theory or not. But it isbetter that theory and practice should correspond. The intuitionistwill understand that conscience, accumulated experience, has developedby experience within these laws. The utilitarian will see that thehappiness of all, not only of the greatest number, must be ensured by atrue morality, and will understand why Happiness is the result thereof. Manu indicates the various bases very significantly: "The whole Ve[d. ]ais the source of the Sacred Law [Revelation], next the tradition[Conscience] and the virtuous conduct of those who know [Utility], also the customs of holy men [Evolution] and self-satisfaction[Mysticism]" (ii, 6. ). It is true that happiness can result only byharmony with law, harmony with the Divine Will which is embodied inlaw--we need not quarrel over names--and the Science of Right Conduct, "by establishing righteousness brings about Happiness". It may thereforebe truly said that the object of Morality is Universal Happiness. Whythe doing of a right action causes a flow of happiness in the doer, evenin the midst of a keen temporary pain entailed by it, we shall see under"Mysticism". The moment we base Morality on Evolution, we see that it must changewith the stage of evolution reached, and that the duty--that which oughtto be done--of the civilised and highly advanced man is not the same asthe duty of the savage. "One set of duties for men in the K[r. ][t. ]aage, different ones in the Tre[t. ][=a] and in the Dv[=a]para, andanother in the Kali. " (_Manusm[r. ][t. ]i_, i, 85. ) Different agesbring new duties. But if Morality be based on Evolution we can at oncedefine what is "Right" and what is "Wrong". That is Right whichsubserves Evolution; that is Wrong which antagonises it. Or in otherwords, for those of us who believe that God's method for this world isthe evolutionary: that is Right which co-operates with His Will; that iswrong which works against it. "Revelation" is an attempt to state thisat any given time; "Intuition" is the result of successful attemptsto do this; "Utility" is the application of observed results ofhappiness and misery which flow from obedience to this, or disregardthereof. Evolution is the unfolding and manifestation of life-energies, theunfolding of the capacities of consciousness, the manifestation of theseever-increasing capacities in ever-improving and more plastic forms. The primary truth of Morality, as of Religion and of Science, is theUnity of Life. One Life ever unfolding in endless varieties of forms; theessence of all beings is the same, the inequalities are the marks of thestage of its unfoldment. When we base Morality on Evolution, we cannot have, it is obvious, onecut and dry rule for all. Those who want cut and dry rules must go totheir Scriptures for them, and even then, as the rules in the Scripturesare contradictory--both as between Scriptures and within any givenScripture--they must call in the help of Intuition and Utility in themaking of their code, in their selective process. This selective processwill be largely moulded by the public opinion of their country and age, emphasising some precepts and ignoring others, and the code will be theexpression of the average morality of the time. If this clumsy anduncertain fashion of finding a rule of conduct does not suit us, wemust be willing to exert our intelligence, to take a large view of theevolutionary process, and to deduce our moral precepts at any givenstage by applying our reason to the scrutiny of this process at thatstage. This scrutiny is a laborious one; but Truth is the prize ofeffort in the search therefor, it is not an unearned gift to theslothful and the careless. This large view of the evolutionary process shows us that it is beststudied in two great divisions: the first from the savage to the highlycivilised man who is still working primarily for himself and his family, still working for private ends predominantly; and the second, at presentbut sparsely followed, in which the man, realising the supreme claim ofthe whole upon its part, seeks the public good predominantly, renouncesindividual advantages and private gains, and consecrates himself to theservice of God and of man. The Hindu calls the first section ofevolution the Prav[r. ][t. ][t. ]i M[=a]rga, the Path of Forthgoing; thesecond the Niv[r. ][t. ][t. ]i M[=a]rga, the Path of Return. In the first, the man evolves by taking; in the second, by giving. In the first, heincurs debts; in the second, he pays them. In the first, he acquires; inthe second, he renounces. In the first, he lives for the profit of thesmaller self; in the second, for the service of the One Self. In thefirst, he claims Rights; in the second, he discharges Duties. Thus Morality is seen from two view-points, and the virtues itcomprises fall into two groups. Men are surrounded on every side byobjects of desire, and the use of these is to evoke the desire topossess them, to stimulate exertion, to inspire efforts, and thus tomake faculty, capacity--strength, intelligence, alertness, judgment, perseverance, patience, fortitude. Those who regard the worldas God-emanated and God-guided, must inevitably realise that therelation of man--susceptible to pleasure and pain by contact with hisenvironment--to his environment--filled with pleasure and pain-givingobjects--must be intended to provoke in man the desire to possess thepleasure-giving, to avoid the pain-giving. In fact, God's lures toexertion are pleasures; His warnings are pains and the interplay betweenman and environment causes evolution. The man who does not believe inGod has only to substitute the word "Nature" for "God" and to leave outthe idea of design, and the argument remains the same: man's relation tohis environment provokes exertion, and thus evolution. A man on the Pathof Forthgoing will, at first, seize everything he desires, careless ofothers, and will gradually learn, from the attacks of the despoiled, some respect for the rights of others; the lesson will be learnt morequickly by the teaching of more advanced men--[R. ][s. ]his, Foundersof Religions, Sages, and the like--who tell him that if he kills, robs, tramples on others, he will suffer. He does all these things;he suffers; he learns--his post-mortem lives helping him much in thelearning. Later on, he lives a more controlled and regulated life, andhe may blamelessly enjoy the objects of desire, provided he injure nonein the taking. Hin[d. ][=u]ism lays down, as the proper pursuits for thehousehold life, the gaining of wealth, the performance of the duties ofthe position held, the gratification of desire. The desires will becomesubtler and more refined as intelligence fashions them and as emotionsreplace passions; but throughout the treading of the Path of Forthgoing, the "desire for fruit" is the necessary and blameless motive forexertion. Without this, the man at this stage of evolution becomeslethargic and does not evolve. Desire subserves Evolution, and it isRight. The gratification of Desire may lead a man to do injury toothers, and as soon as he has developed enough to understand this, thenthe gratification becomes wrong, because, forgetting the Unity, he hasinflicted harm on one who shares life with him, and has thus hamperedevolution. The sense of Unity is the root-Love, the Uniter, and Love isthe expression of the attraction of the separated towards union; out ofLove, controlled by reason and by the desire for the happiness of all, grow all Virtues, which are but permanent, universal, specialised_forms_ of love. So also is the sense of Separateness theroot-Hate, the Divider, the expression of the repulsion of the separatedfrom each other. Out of this grow all Vices, the permanent, universal, specialised _forms_ of Hate. That which Love does for the Beloved, that Virtue does for all who need its aid, so far as its power extends. That which Hate wreaks on the Abhorred, that Vice does to all whoobstruct its path, so far as its power extends. "Virtues and Vices are fixed emotional states. The Virtues are fixedLove-emotions, regulated and controlled by enlightened intelligenceseeing the Unity; the Vices are fixed Hate-emotions, strengthened andintensified by the unenlightened intelligence, seeing the separateness. "(_Universal Text Book_, ii, 32. ) It is obvious that virtues areconstructive and vices destructive, for Love holds together, while Hatedisintegrates. Yet the modified form of Hate--antagonism, competition--had its part to play in the earlier stages of humanevolution, developing strength, courage, and endurance, and while Lovebuilt up Nations within themselves, Hate made each strong against itscompetitor. And within Nations, there has been conflict of classes, class and caste war, and all this modified and softened by a growingsense of a common good, until Competition, the characteristic of thePath of Forthgoing tends to change into Co-operation, the characteristicof the Path of Return. The Path of Forthgoing must still be trodden bymany, but the number is decreasing; more and more are turning towardsthe Path of Return. Ideals are formulated by the leaders of Humanity, and the Ideals held up to-day are increasingly those of Love and ofService. "During the first stage, man grasps at everything he desiresand develops a strong individuality by conflict; in the second, he shares all he has, and yokes that individuality to service;ever-increasing separation is the key-note of the one; ever-increasingunity is the key-note of the other. Hence we need not brand as evil therough aggression and the fierce struggles of barbarous times; they werea necessary stage of growth and were at that stage Right, and in thedivine plan. But now those days are over, strength has been won; thetime has come when the separated selves must gradually draw together, and to co-operate with the divine Will which is working for union isthe Right. The Right which is the outcome of Love, directed by reason, at the present stage of evolution, then, seeks an ever-increasingrealisation of Unity, a drawing together of the separated selves. Thatwhich by establishing harmonious relations makes for Unity is Right;that which divides and disintegrates, which makes for separation, isWrong. " (_ibid. _, 10, 11. ) Hin[d. ][=u]ism, on which the whole of this is based, has added to thisbroad criterion the division of a life into four stages, to each ofwhich appropriate virtues are assigned: the Student Period, with itsvirtues of perfect continence, industry, frugality, exertion; theHousehold Period, with its virtue of duties appropriate to the position, the earning and enjoying of wealth, the gratification of desires; theRetirement Period, with the virtues of the renouncing of worldlygain and of sacrifice; the Ascetic Period, of complete renunciation, meditation and preparation for post-mortem life. These indicationsmake more easy the decisions as to Right and Wrong. The more we think upon and work out into detail this view of Morality asbased on Evolution, the more we realise its soundness, and the more wefind that the moral law is as discoverable by observation, by reason, and by experiment, as any other law of Nature. If a man disregards it, either ignorantly or wilfully, he suffers. A man may disregard physicalhygienic and sanitary laws because of his ignorance; none the less willhe suffer from physical disease. A man may disregard moral laws becauseof ignorance; none the less will he suffer from moral disease. The signof disease in both cases is pain and unhappiness; experts in both caseswarn us, and if we disregard the warning, we learn its truth later byexperience. There is no hurry; but the law is sure. Working with thelaw, man evolves swiftly with happiness; working against it, he evolvesslowly with pain. In either case, he evolves, advancing joyously as afree man, or scourged onwards as a slave. The most obstinate fool inlife's class, refusing to learn, fortunately dies and cannot quiteescape after death the knowledge of his folly. Let the reader try for himself the solution of moral problems, accepting, as a hypothesis, the facts of evolution and of the two halvesof its huge spiral, and see for himself if this view does not offer arational, intelligible, practical meaning to the much-vexed words, Rightand Wrong. Let him see how it embraces all that is true in the otherbases suggested, is their summation, and rationalises their precepts. He will find that Morality is no longer dependent on the maxims of greatTeachers--though indeed they proclaimed its changeless laws--nor on theimperfect resultant of individual experiences, nor on the happiness ofsome only of the great human family, but that it inheres in the verynature of things, an essential law of happy life and ordered progress. Then indeed is Morality founded on a basis that cannot be moved; thenindeed can it speak with an imperial authority the "ought" that mustbe obeyed; then it unfolds its beauty as humanity evolves to itsperfecting, and leads to Bliss Eternal, the Brahman Bliss, where thehuman will, in fullest freedom, accords itself in harmony with thedivine. * * * * * V MYSTICISM Mysticism cannot be spoken of as a basis of morality in the sense inwhich Revelation, Intuition, Utility and Evolution are bases, for it isvalid only for the individual, not for everybody, for the true Mystic, the dictates of the Outer or Inner God are imperial, compelling, but toany one else they are entirely unauthoritative. None the less, as theinfluence of the Mystic is wide-reaching, and his dicta are accepted bymany as a trustworthy revelation--are not all revelations communicatedby Mystics?--or as the intuition of an illuminated conscience, or asshowing the highest utility, or as the result of an evolution higherthan the normal, it is worth while to consider their value. Mysticism is the realisation of God, of the Universal Self. It isattained either as a realisation of God outside the Mystic, or withinhimself. In the first case, it is usually reached from within areligion, by exceptionally intense love and devotion, accompanied bypurity of life, for only "the pure in heart shall see God". The externalmeans are prayer to and meditation on the Object of devotion--Shr[=i]R[=a]ma, Shr[=i] K[r. ][s. ]h[n. ]a, the Lord Jesus--long continued andpersevering, and the devotee realises his Divinity by ecstacy attainingUnion thereby. Such Mystics are, for the most part, valuable to theworld as creating an atmosphere of spirituality, which raises thegeneral level of religious feeling in those who come within its area;India has especially profited by the considerable number of such Mysticsfound within its borders in past times, and to a lesser extent to-day;every one who practises, for instance, meditation, knows that it iseasier here than elsewhere, and all sensitive persons feel the Indian"atmosphere". Outside this, such Mystics occasionally write valuablebooks, containing high ideals of the spiritual life. As a rule, they donot concern themselves with the affairs of the outer world, which theyregard as unimportant. Their cry continually is that the world is evil, and they call on men to leave it, not to improve it. To them God and theworld are in opposition, "the world, the flesh, and the devil" are thethree great enemies of the spiritual life. In the West, this is almostuniversal, for in the Roman Catholic Church seclusion is the mark ofthe religious life, and "the religious" are the monk and the nun, the"religious" and the "secular" being in opposition. In truth, where therealisation of God outside himself is sought by the devotee, seclusionis a necessity for success, if only for the time which is required formeditation, the essential preliminary of ecstacy. In the very rareMystics of non-Catholic communions, full ecstacy is scarcely, if at all, known or even recognised; an overpowering sense of the divine Presenceis experienced, but it is a Presence outside the worshipper; it isaccompanied with a deliberate surrender of the will to God, and afeeling on the part of the man that he becomes an instrument of thedivine Will; this he carries with him into outer life, and, undirectedby love and the illuminated reason, it often lands the half-developedMystic into fanaticism and cruelty; no one who has read OliverCromwell's letters can deny that he was a Mystic, half-developed, and itis on him that Lord Rosebery founded his dictum of the formidable natureof the "practical Mystic"; the ever present sense of a divine Powerbehind himself gives such a man a power that ordinary men cannotsuccessfully oppose; but this sense affords no moral basis, as, witnessthe massacre of Drogheda. Such a Mystic, belonging to a particularreligion, as he always does, takes the revelation of his religion as hismoral code, and Cromwell felt himself as the avenging sword of his God, as did the Hebrews fighting with the Amalekites. No man who accepts arevelation as his guide can be regarded as more than partially a Mystic. He has the Mystic temperament only, and that undoubtedly gives hima strength far beyond the strength of those who have it not. The true Mystic, realising God, has no need of any Scriptures, for hehas touched the source whence all Scriptures flow. An "enlightened"Br[=a]hma[n. ]a, says Shr[=i] K[r. ][s. ]h[n. ]a, has no more need of theVe[d. ]as, than a man needs a tank in a place which is overflowing withwater. The value of cisterns, of reservoirs, is past, when a man isseated beside an ever-flowing spring. As Dean Inge has pointed out, Mysticism is the most scientific form of religion, for it bases itself, as does all science, on experience and experiment--experiment being onlya specialised form of experience, devised either to discover or toverify. We have seen the Mystic who realises God outside himself and seeksUnion with Him. There remains the most interesting, the most effectiveform of Mysticism, the realisation by a man of God within himself. Heremeditation is also a necessity, and the man who is born with a highcapacity for concentration is merely a man who has practised it inprevious lives. A life or lives of study and seclusion often precedea life of tremendous and sustained activity in the physical world. Therealisation is preceded by control of the body, control of the emotionsand control of the mind, for the power to hold these in completestillness is necessary, if a man is to penetrate into those depths ofhis own nature in which alone is to be found the shrine of the innerGod. The subtle music of that sphere is drowned by the clatter of thelower bodies as the most exquisite notes of the V[=i][n. ][=a] are lostin the crude harsh sound of the harmonium. The Voice of the Silence canonly be heard in the silence, and all the desires of the heart must beparalysed ere can arise in the tranquillity of senses and mind, theglorious majesty of the Self. Only in the desert of loneliness risesthat Sun in all His glory, for all objects that might cloud His dawningmust vanish; only "when half-Gods go, " does God arise. Even the outerGod must hide, ere the Inner God can manifest; the cry of agony of theCrucified must be wrung from the tortured lips; "My God, my God, whyhast _Thou_ forsaken me?" precedes the realisation of the Godwithin. Through this all Mystics pass who are needed for great service in theworld, those whom Mr. Bagshot so acutely calls "materialised Mystics". The Mystics who find God outside themselves are the "unmaterialised"Mystics, and they serve the world in the ways above mentioned; but theother, as Mr. Bagshot points out, transmute their mystic thought into"practical energy, " and these become the most formidable powers known inthe physical world. All that is based on injustice, fraud and wrong maywell tremble when one of these arises, for the Hidden God has becomemanifest, and who may bar His way? Such Mystics wear none of the outer signs of the "religious"--theirrenunciation is within, not without, there is no parade of outerholiness, no outer separation from the world; Janaka the King, K[r. ][s. ]h[n. ]a the Warrior-Statesman, are of these; clothed in cottoncloth or cloth of gold, it matters not; poor or rich, it boots not;failing or succeeding, it is naught, for each apparent failure is theroad to fuller success, and both are their servants, not their masters;victory ever attends them, to-day or a century hence is equal, forthey live in Eternity, and with them it is ever To-day. Possessingnothing, all is theirs; holding everything, nothing belongs to them. Misconception, misrepresentation, they meet with a smile, half-amused, all-forgiving; the frowns, the taunts, the slanders of the men they liveto serve are only the proofs of how much these foolish ones need theirhelp, and how should these foolish ones hurt those on whom the Peace ofthe Eternal abides? These Mystics are a law unto themselves, for the inner law has replacedthe external compulsion. More rigid, for it is the law of their ownnature; more compelling, for it is the Voice of the divine Will; moreexacting, for no pity, no pardon, is known to it; more all-embracing, for it sees the part only in the whole. But it has, it ought to have, no authority outside the Mystic himself. It may persuade, it may win, it may inspire, but it may not claimobedience as of right. For the Voice of the God within only becomesauthoritative for another when the God within that other self answersthe Mystic's appeal, and he recognises an ideal that he could not haveformulated, unaided, for himself. The Mystic may shine as a Light, buta man must see with his own eyes, and there lies the world's safety;the materialised Mystic, strong as he is, cannot, by virtue of the Godwithin him, enslave his fellow-men. * * * * * THE VASANTA PRESS, ADYAR, MADRAS