The Origin of the Natural Virtues and Vices

Actions Themselves Are Not The Basis Of Morality

We now examine natural virtues and vices which are independent of men’s artifice.

• This examination will conclude this system of morals.

The chief actuating principle of the human mind is pleasure or pain. When these sensations are removed from our thought and feeling, we are incapable of:

• passion or action
• desire or volition.

The most immediate effects of pleasure and pain are the propense and averse motions of the mind.

These are diversified into:

• volition
• desire and aversion
• grief and joy
• hope and fear, according as the pleasure or pain changes its situation and becomes:
  • probable or improbable,
  • certain or uncertain, or
  • out of our power for the present moment.

But when the objects that cause pleasure or pain acquire a relation to ourselves or others, they still continue to excite desire and aversion, grief and joy.

But they simultaneously cause the indirect passions of:

• pride or humility
• love or hatred

In this case, they have a double relation of impressions and ideas to the pain or pleasure.

Moral distinctions depend entirely on peculiar sentiments of pain and pleasure.

Whatever mental quality in ourselves or others that gives us a satisfaction is virtuous, by its survey or reflection. Everything that gives uneasiness is vicious. Every quality which gives pleasure in ourselves or others, always causes pride or love. Every quality that produces uneasiness, excites humility or hatred. It follows that, with regard to our mental qualities: virtue is equal to the power of producing love or pride, and vice is equal to the power of producing humility or hatred. Therefore, we must judge of the one by the other in every case. Any quality of the mind: which causes love or pride can be called virtuous, and that which causes hatred or humility can be called vicious.

If any action is virtuous or vicious, it is only as a sign of some quality or character. It must depend on durable principles of the mind which: extend over the whole conduct, and enter into the personal character. Actions themselves do not proceed from any constant principle. They have no influence on: love or hatred, pride or humility. Consequently, actions are never considered in morality.

This reflection is obvious and is the most important in the present subject. We should never consider any single action in our enquiries on the origin of morals. We should only consider the quality or character from which the action proceeded. These alone are durable enough to affect our sentiments concerning the person. Actions are, indeed, better indications of a character than: words, or even wishes and sentiments. They are attended with love or hatred, praise or blame only when they are indications.

Sympathy As The Basis Of Morals And Beauty

To discover the true origin of morals and love or hatred arising from mental qualities, we must:
    take the matter pretty deep, and
    compare some principles already explained.

We begin with considering the nature and force of sympathy anew.
    The minds of all men are similar in their feelings and operations.
    No one can be actuated by any affection which others are not susceptible to, in some degree.
In wound-up strings, the motion of one string communicates itself to the rest.
    In the same way, all affections:
        readily pass from one person to another, and
        beget correspondent movements in every human creature.
When I see the effects of passion in a person's voice and gesture, my mind:
    immediately passes from these effects to their causes, and
    forms a lively idea of the passion converted into the passion itself.
Similarly, when I perceive the causes of any emotion, my mind is:
    conveyed to the effects, and
    actuated with a like emotion.
If I were at a terribly surgery, the following would have a great effect on my mind and excite the strongest pity and terror even before they began:
    the preparation of the instruments,
    the laying of the bandages,
    the heating of the irons, and
    the signs of anxiety and concern in the patient and assistants.
Another person's passion is not immediately discovered by the mind.
    We only sense its causes or effects.
    From these we infer the passion.
    Consequently, these cause our sympathy.

Our sense of beauty depends very much on this principle.
    An object is:
        beautiful if it produces pleasure in its possessor, and
        disagreeable and deformed if it produces pain.
    Thus, the convenience of a house, the fertility of a field, the strength of a horse, the capacity, security, and swift-sailing of a vessel, form the principal beauty of those objects.
    Here, the beautiful object pleases only by its tendency to produce a pleasure or advantage of some other person.
        The stranger's pleasure pleases us only by sympathy.
The beauty in everything we find useful is owing to this principle.
    Upon reflection, we can easily see how considerable a part of this usefulness is beauty.
An object which causes pleasure to its possessor is sure to please the spectator by a delicate sympathy with the possessor.
    Most of the works of art are esteemed beautiful, in proportion to their fitness for man's use.
    Even many of nature's productions derive their beauty from their usefulness.
On most occasions, handsome and beautiful is a relative quality, not an absolute one.
    It pleases us only by its tendency to produce an agreeable end.25

Footnote 25:

Quinct. lib. 8.
"A horse with narrow flanks looks more comely and moves faster.
An athlete whose muscles have been developed by training presents a handsome appearance.
    He is also better prepared for the contest.
Attractivenes is invariably associated with efficient functioning.
    It takes no outstanding powers of judgment to wake this distinction."