Часть первая. Добро в человеческой природе

Chapter one. Primary data of morality Any moral teaching, no matter what its internal persuasiveness or external authority, would remain powerless and fruitless if it did not find firm support for itself in the very moral nature of man. Despite all the diversity of degrees of spiritual development in the past and present of mankind, despite all individual deviations and the ever wider influences of race, climate and historical conditions, there is still an indivisible basis of universal morality, and on it every significant construction in the field of ethics must be based. The recognition of this truth does not in the least depend on one or another metaphysical or scientific view of the origin of man. Whether the product of a long series of modifications of animal organizations or the direct product of a higher creative act, human nature in any case exists with all its distinctive features, among which moral features occupy the most important place. The distinctive character of human mental nature is not at all denied by the famous representative of natural science transformism. “The difference in this respect,” says Charles Darwin (between man and all other animals), “is undoubtedly enormous, even if we compare, on the one hand, the soul of the lowest savage, who cannot count more than four and does not use abstract designations even for simple objects and affects; and on the other hand, the soul of the most highly organized monkey. The difference, undoubtedly, would still remain enormous even if one of the higher ape species could be brought into the same ennobled and civilized state in which the dog is in comparison with its root form - the wolf or jackal. The natives of Tierra del Fuego belong to the lowest races; however, I had to constantly be surprised by three of these savages who were with me on the Beagle ship: how, after living for several years in England and learning a little English, they became like us in all their mental makeup and most of their spiritual abilities.” 12 Darwin further declares that he fully subscribes to the judgment of writers who claim that of all the differences between man and other animals, the most significant is the moral sense, 13 which he (from his point of view) considers not acquired, but innate to man. 14 But, carried away by his (to certain limits, legitimate) desire to fill the “huge,” in his words, distance with intermediate links, Darwin falls into one basic mistake. He ascribes an exclusively social character to all the original morality of man, thus bringing it closer to the social instincts of animals. Personal, or individual, morality, according to Darwin, has only a derivative meaning, as a later result of historical development. For savages, he argues, there are only those virtues that are required by the interests of their social group. 15 Meanwhile, one simple and well-known fact is enough to refute such a view. There is one feeling that serves no social benefit, is completely absent in the highest animals, and yet is clearly manifested in the lowest human races. Because of this feeling, the most savage and undeveloped person is ashamed, that is, he recognizes as undue and hides a physiological act that not only satisfies his own desires and needs, but is also useful and necessary for the maintenance of the race. In direct connection with this is the reluctance to remain in natural nudity, which encourages the invention of clothing even among savages who, due to the climate and simplicity of life, do not need it at all. This moral fact most sharply distinguishes man from all other animals, in whom we do not find the slightest hint of anything similar. Darwin himself, when discussing the religiosity of dogs, etc., did not try to look for any rudiments of modesty in any animal. And indeed, not to mention lower creatures, highly gifted and well-bred domestic animals are no exception. The otherwise noble horse provided the biblical prophet with a suitable image to characterize the shameless youths of the depraved Jerusalem nobility; the valiant dog has long been and rightly revered as a typical representative of complete shamelessness; and (among wild animals) in a creature even more developed in certain respects - in the monkey, precisely because of its external resemblance to man, as well as its extremely lively mind and passionate character, unrestricted cynicism appears with particular brightness. Having no way to affirm modesty in animals, naturalists of a certain school are forced to deny it in humans. Not finding shameful animals, Darwin speaks of the shamelessness of savage peoples. 16 One could expect positive and definite eyewitness testimony from the author of the trip around the world on the Beagle. But instead he confines himself to brief and unfounded remarks that are not convincing to anyone. Not only some savages, but also civilized peoples of biblical and Homeric times may seem shameless to us, but only in the sense that the feeling of shame, which they undoubtedly had, did not always have the same expressions and did not extend to all those everyday details with which it is associated with us. But in this regard, there is no need to turn to distant places and times, because people living next to us from other segments of the population in many cases consider it permissible to do what we are ashamed of, although no one would argue that the feeling of shame itself is unfamiliar to them. It is even less possible to draw any general conclusions from those cases of complete moral stupidity that are known from judicial chronicles. Sometimes headless monsters are born between people, but the human head still remains an essential part of our body. In support of his thesis about the original shamelessness of man, Darwin refers in a few words to the religious customs of the ancients, that is, to the phallic cult. But this important fact speaks rather against him. Intentional, intense, shamelessness elevated to a religious principle obviously presupposes the existence of shame. Likewise, the sacrifice of their children by parents to the gods does not in any way prove the absence of pity or parental love, but, on the contrary, presupposes this feeling; after all, the main meaning of these victims was precisely that beloved children were killed; if what was sacrificed was not dear to the sacrificer, then the sacrifice itself would not have any value, i.e. it would not be a sacrifice. (Only later, with the weakening of religious feeling, did they begin to bypass this basic condition of any sacrifice through various symbolic substitutions.) On the simple absence of shame, as well as pity, no religion, even the most savage, can be founded. If true religion presupposes the moral nature of man, then false religion, for its part, presupposes it precisely because it requires its perversion. This real perversion, this positive immorality, fed and lived on those demonic forces that were revered in the bloody and depraved cults of ancient paganism. Did these religions only demand the simple, natural performance of a certain physiological act? Oh no! The point here was potentiated depravity, a violation of all limits set by nature, society and conscience. The religious character of these furies proves the extreme importance of this point, and if everything were limited to natural shamelessness, then where did this tension, and this perversity, and this mysticism come from? Obviously, Darwin would have no need to resort to such unsuccessful indirect evidence of his view on the connection between human morality and animals, if he could refer to some reliable facts showing at least the rudimentary presence of modesty in animals. There are no such facts at all, and shame undoubtedly remains a distinctive feature of a person even from an external, empirical point of view. The feeling of shame (in its fundamental sense) is in fact an unconditional difference between man and lower nature, since no other animals have this feeling to any degree, but in man it appears from time immemorial and then is subject to further development. But this fact, by its very content, has another, much deeper meaning. The feeling of shame is not only a distinctive feature that distinguishes a person (for external observation) from the rest of the animal world: here the person himself really distinguishes himself from all material nature, and not only external, but also his own. By being ashamed of his natural inclinations and the functions of his own body, a person thereby shows that he is not only this natural material being, but also something else and higher. That which is ashamed, in the very psychic act of shame, separates itself from that of which it is ashamed; but material nature cannot be different or external to itself, therefore, if I am ashamed of my material nature, then by this I actually show that I am not the same as it. And it is precisely at that moment when a person falls under the material process of nature, mixes with it, that suddenly his distinctive feature and his inner independence appear, precisely in the feeling of shame in which he treats material life as something else, alien and should not belong to him. Therefore, even if isolated cases of sexual modesty in animals were presented, this would be only a rudimentary preliminary to human nature, for in any case it is clear that a creature that is ashamed of its animal nature thereby shows that it is not only an animal. None of the believers in Balaam’s talking donkey denied on this basis that the gift of intelligent speech is a distinctive feature of man from other animals. But even more fundamental significance in this sense belongs to sexual modesty in humans. This basic fact of anthropology and history, unnoticed or deliberately omitted in the book of the modern luminary of science, was noted with inspired features in a more authoritative book three thousand years before him. “And the eyes of both of them were opened (at the moment of the Fall) and they knew that they were naked; And they plucked the leaves of the fig tree and made aprons for themselves. And they heard the voice of the Eternal God... and the man and his wife hid from the face of the Eternal God among the trees of the garden. And the Eternal God called to the man and said to him: where are you? - And the man said: I heard your voice in the garden and was afraid, for I was naked, and I hid myself. “And (God) said: Who told you that you were naked?” At the moment of the Fall, a higher voice is heard in the depths of the human soul, asking: where are you? where is your moral dignity? Man, ruler of nature and image of God, do you still exist? - And the answer is immediately given: I heard the divine voice, I was afraid of the excitement and discovery of my lower nature: I am ashamed, therefore, I exist, not only physically I exist, but also morally - I am ashamed of my animality, therefore, I still exist as a person. Through his own action and testing of his being, a person achieves moral self-awareness. Materialistic science would try in vain to give, from its point of view, a satisfactory answer to the question posed to man so long ago: who told you that you were naked? The independent and original significance of the feeling of shame would be eliminated if it were possible to connect this moral fact with some material benefit for the individual or for the race in the struggle for existence. In this case, shame could be explained as one of the manifestations of the instinct of animal self-preservation - individual or social. But it is precisely such a connection that is impossible to find. A shy attitude towards sexual intercourse may seem beneficial for the individual and the species, as it protects against abuse of this important function of the body. In animals, obedient to instincts, there are no excesses harmful to self-preservation, but man, due to the greater strength of individual consciousness and will, receives the opportunity for such abuses, and against the most harmful of them - sexual - he develops, on the general basis of natural selection, a useful counterbalance - a feeling of shame. This reasoning seems thorough, but it only seems so. Firstly, there is an internal contradiction here. When a person’s most basic and powerful instinct of self-preservation turns out to be powerless against harmful excesses, then where will the new, derivative instinct of shame come from? And if (as it actually is) the instinctive suggestions of this feeling do not have sufficient power over a person, then it means that shame does not have any special utility, and it remains inexplicable from a utilitarian-materialistic point of view. Instead of being a counterbalance to human abuses or violations of natural norms, it is only an unnecessary object of such violation, that is, a completely unnecessary complication. Related to this is another consideration that undermines the utilitarian view of shame. The fact is that this feeling manifests itself most strongly before the onset of sexual relations: shame speaks most clearly and loudly to the virginibus puerisque (maidens and boys (lat.)) so that if its voice had a direct practical effect, it would make impossible the very fact against the abuse of which it is supposedly directed - therefore, if shame had a practical meaning, then it would not only be unhelpful, but would be harmful both for the individual and for kind. But if in fact shame has no practical application even when it speaks loudest, then what further action can be expected from it? When shame appears, there can be no talk of abuse, and when abuse appears, then there is nothing to talk about shame. A normal person is already sufficiently protected from harmful excesses by a simple feeling of satisfied need, but an abnormal person or with perverted instincts is least of all distinguished by modesty. So, in general, from a utilitarian point of view, where shame could be useful, it is not there, and where it is, it is not needed at all. In fact, the feeling of shame is aroused not by the abuse of a certain organic function, but by the simple discovery of this function: the very fact of nature is felt as shameful. If the instinct of self-preservation is manifested here, then in a very special sense. Here it is not the material well-being of the subject that is protected, but his highest human dignity, or, more precisely, it is not protected, but testifies to itself that it is still preserved in the depths of the being. The strongest manifestation of material organic life evokes a reaction of the spiritual principle, which reminds the personal consciousness that man is not only a fact of nature and should not serve as a passive instrument of its life goals. This is only a reminder, and it depends on personal reasonable will whether to use it or not. This moral feeling, as has been said, has no direct, real effect, and if its suggestions remain in vain, then shame itself gradually weakens and is finally completely lost. It is clear, therefore, that all indications of the absence of shame among individuals or entire tribes, even if these indications were completely accurate, do not at all have the meaning that is attributed to them. The undoubted shamelessness of individual individuals, as well as the dubious shamelessness of entire nations, can only mean that in these particular cases the spiritual principle of a person, by which he stands out from material nature, has either not yet been revealed, or has already been lost, that this person or this group of people has not yet actually risen above the bestial state or has returned to it again. But can this hereditary or acquired bestiality of certain people abolish or weaken the significance of moral human dignity, which clearly manifests itself in the vast majority of people in the feeling of shame - a feeling completely unknown to any animal? Does the fact that infants or mutes are dumb, like animals, in any way weaken the significance of language as a manifestation of a special, purely human intelligence, unusual for other animals? Regardless of any considerations about the empirical origin of the feeling of shame in humanity, this feeling has the fundamental significance that it determines a person’s ethical attitude towards material nature. A person is ashamed of her dominance in himself or his subordination to her (especially in her main manifestation) and thereby recognizes, in relation to her, his inner independence and highest dignity, due to which he should possess, and not be possessed by, her. Next to this basic moral feeling there is another in human nature, which constitutes the root of the ethical attitude no longer towards the lower, material principle of life in every person, but towards other human beings and generally living beings similar to him - namely, the feeling of pity. 17 It generally consists in the fact that a given subject feels someone else’s suffering or need in a corresponding way, that is, he responds to them more or less painfully, thus showing, to a greater or lesser extent, his solidarity with others. The primary, innate character of this moral feeling is not denied by any serious thinker or natural scientist for the simple reason that the feeling of pity or compassion - as opposed to shame - is characteristic (to a rudimentary degree) of many animals 18 and, therefore, from any point of view cannot be considered as a later product of human progress. Thus, if a shameless person represents a return to a bestial state, then a ruthless person falls below the animal level. The close connection of the feeling of pity with social instincts in animals and humans is beyond doubt by the very essence of this feeling; however, at its root, it is still an individual moral state, not entirely covered by social relations, even in animals, not only in humans. If the only basis for sympathy were the needs of the social organism, then each being could experience this feeling only in relation to those who belong to the same social whole. This is how it usually happens, but not always, at least in higher animals. Numerous facts of the most tender love of 19 different animals (not only domestic, but also wild) for individuals of other, sometimes very distant zoological groups are well known. Therefore, Darwin's unfounded assertion that among savage peoples sympathetic feelings is limited to members of the same close society is very strange. Of course, even among cultured peoples, the majority of people show real sympathy mainly for their family and their closest circle, but the individual moral feeling in all peoples can - and indeed has been crossing since ancient times - not only these narrow, but also all other empirical limits. To accept Darwin's statement as unconditional, even if only for wild tribes, means to admit that the moral height that dogs, monkeys and even lions sometimes reach is inaccessible to a wild man. 20 The sympathetic feeling is capable of indefinite expansion and development, but its fundamental principle is the same in all areas of living beings. The first step and fundamental form of all solidarity is in the animal world and remains in the human world, parental (especially maternal) love. And it is precisely in this simple root, from which all the complexity of internal and external social connections grows, that it is revealed with complete clarity that the individual psychological essence of a moral connection is nothing more than pity. For in what other mental state can the mother’s initial solidarity with her powerless, helpless, entirely dependent on her—in a word, pitiful offspring—be expressed? Our inherent feelings of shame and pity mainly determine our moral attitude, firstly, towards our own material nature and, secondly, towards all other living beings. Since a person is shy and compassionate, he has a moral attitude “towards himself and his neighbor” (using ancient terminology); shamelessness and ruthlessness, on the contrary, fundamentally undermine his moral character. In addition to these two basic feelings, there is in us one more, a third, irreducible to them, just as primary as they are, and determining the moral attitude of a person not to the lower side of his own nature, and also not to the world of creatures similar to him, but to something special that he recognizes as the highest, which he cannot be ashamed of or regret, but before which he must bow. This feeling of reverence (piety, pietas) or admiration for the highest (reverentia) constitutes in man the moral basis of religion and the religious order of life; being abstracted by philosophical thinking from its historical manifestations, it forms the so-called “natural religion.” The primary or innate character of this feeling cannot be denied for the same reason that the innate nature of pity or sympathy for us is not seriously denied; both this latter and the feeling of reverence in rudimentary degrees and forms are already found in animals. It is absurd to look for religion in them in our sense, but that common elementary feeling on which religion initially rests in the soul of every person - namely, the feeling of reverent admiration for something higher - arises unconsciously in other creatures besides man. In this sense, we can recognize the validity of the following instructions. “The feeling of religious devotion is extremely complex, since it consists of love, of complete submission to something higher and mysterious, of a strong feeling of dependence, fear, reverence, gratitude for the past and hope for future benefits, and perhaps other elements. No being could experience such complex emotional excitement until his mental and moral faculties had reached a comparatively high level. Nevertheless, we see something like an approach to this spiritual state in the heartfelt love of a dog for its master, which is combined with complete submission, some fear and, perhaps, with other feelings. All the techniques of a dog when it returns to its master after some absence, and, I may add, also of a monkey returning to its beloved guardian, differ widely from what these animals exhibit in relation to their own kind. In the latter case, expressions of joy are weaker, and a feeling of equality is expressed in every movement.” 21 Thus, the representative of natural science transformism recognizes that in the quasi-religious relationship of a dog or monkey to a higher (for them) being, in addition to fear and self-interest, there is also a moral element, moreover, completely different from the sympathetic feelings that these animals show in relation to their own kind. This specific feeling for the highest is precisely what I call reverence, and while recognizing it in dogs and monkeys, it would be strange to deny it in humans and derive human religion from fear and self-interest alone. It is impossible not to see the participation of these lower feelings in the formation and development of religion, but its deepest foundation remains the distinctive religious and moral feeling of a person’s reverent love for that which is superior to himself. The basic feelings of shame, pity and reverence exhaust the range of possible moral relations of a person to what is below him, what is equal to him and what is above him. Dominion over material sensuality, solidarity with living beings and internal voluntary submission to the superhuman principle - these are the eternal, unshakable foundations of the moral life of mankind. The degree of this domination, the depth and volume of this solidarity, the completeness of this internal subordination change in the historical process, moving from the least to the greatest perfection, but the principle in each of the three spheres of relations remains the same. All other phenomena of moral life, all the so-called virtues, can be shown as modifications of these three principles or as the result of interaction between them and the mental side of man. Courage or bravery, for example, undoubtedly is only in a more external, superficial form of manifestation the same principle of elevation and domination over the lower, material side of our nature - a principle of which we find a deeper and more significant expression in shame. Shame (in its main manifestation) elevates a person above the animal instinct of tribal self-preservation, courage elevates him above another animal instinct - personal self-preservation. But besides this difference in subject or field of application, these two types of the same moral principle differ from each other in another, deeper respect. The feeling of shame, by its very essence, contains a negative judgment about what it is opposed to: what I am ashamed of, the very fact of shame declares me bad or undue. On the contrary, a courageous feeling or action may simply manifest the nature of a given being and in itself does not at all contain a condemnation of its opposite. Therefore, courage is also characteristic of animals, without having any moral significance for them. The complicated and developed function of feeding and obtaining food becomes in some animals a predatory instinct of destruction, which can sometimes outweigh the instinct of self-preservation. This preponderance of one natural instinct over another is animal courage. Its presence or absence is nothing more than a natural fact, not internally connected with any self-esteem. It would not occur to anyone to say that the hare and hen are ashamed of their timidity, and brave animals are not ashamed of it when they sometimes happen to be cowardly, just as they are not proud of their exploits. Directly and in humans, the quality of courage has no other character. But due to our higher nature and incidental reflection, this quality takes on a new meaning that connects it with the root of human morality itself - shame. Courage is recognized by a person not as the predominance of only the predatory instinct, but as the ability of the spirit to rise above the instinct of personal self-preservation, and the presence of this strength of spirit is a virtue, and its absence is condemned as shameful. Thus, the essential affinity between modesty and courage is revealed in the fact that the lack of the second virtue is condemned according to the norm of the first: the lack of courage becomes a subject of shame, which cannot be said with the same force about other virtues (mercy, justice, humility, piety, etc.), the absence of which is usually condemned in other forms. And when assessing sensitive feelings and actions, malice, injustice, arrogance, wickedness are more hateful and outrageous to us than shameful; This last definition is specifically adopted only by cowardice and carnal knowledge, 22 i.e. such vices that violate the own dignity of the human person as such, and not his duties to his neighbor and God. So, courage receives its moral significance or becomes a virtue only insofar as it is associated with the first basis of human morality - modesty - in one general principle: defending the individual from the lower nature, or carnal instincts. The internal dependence of other human virtues on the three primary foundations of morality that we have found will be shown in their place. Of the three primary principles of moral life, one, as we have seen, belongs exclusively to man (shame), the other (pity) is largely characteristic of many animals, and the third (reverence, or admiration for the highest) is only noticeable to a weak degree in some animals. But although the rudiments of moral feelings (of the second and third categories) are observed in animals, there is, however, a formal difference between them and the corresponding feelings in humans. Animals can be good and evil, but the difference between good and evil, as such, does not exist in their minds. In man, this knowledge of good and evil is not only given directly in his characteristic sense of shame, but from this fundamental principle, gradually expanding and refining its concrete sensory form, it passes in the form of conscience to the entire area of ​​human ethics. We have seen that within the moral relation of a person to himself or to his own nature, the feeling of shame (originally having a strictly sexual character) retains its formal identity regardless of whether it is opposed to the instinct of animal self-preservation, individual or generic: a cowardly attachment to mortal life is just as shameful as surrendering oneself to sexual desire. Moving into another area of ​​relationships - not with oneself, as an individual and as one of the specimens of the genus, but with neighbors and with God - relationships that are incomparably more complex, objectively diverse and changeable, moral self-esteem cannot remain in the simple form of a concrete sensation, it inevitably passes through the environment of abstract consciousness, from where it emerges in a new form of conscience. But the inner essence of both phenomena is undoubtedly the same. 23 Shame and conscience speak in different languages ​​and for different reasons, but the meaning of what they say is the same: it is not good, it is not proper, it is unworthy. This meaning already lies in shame; conscience adds an analytical explanation: having done this prohibited or improper thing, you are guilty of evil, sin, crime. Only the voice of conscience, which determines our relationship to our neighbors and to God as good or evil, gives them a moral significance that they would not otherwise have, and since conscience itself is only the development of shame, then the entire moral life of a person, in all its three spheres, grows, as it were, from one root, and, moreover, a purely human root, essentially alien to the animal world. If the primary basis of conscience is a feeling of shame, then, obviously, in animals deprived of this elementary feeling, it would be in vain to look for its more complex phenomenon - in conscience. When the presence of conscience in them is deduced from the embarrassed appearance of guilty animals, this conclusion is undoubtedly based on a misunderstanding, namely on the confusion of two phenomena, the essential difference of which we know, however, from our own experience. The moral state of an excited conscience or repentance is similar in the mental sphere to the consciousness of a mistake or blunder made, that is, an act that is practically, utilitarianly inexpedient - unprofitable, and the resulting dissatisfaction with oneself. These two phenomena have common formal characteristics and are externally equally expressed in embarrassment (physiologically - in a rush of blood to the face). However, their essence is so different that although in some cases they coincide, in others they not only appear separately, but also directly exclude each other. So, for example, when the mayor (in The Government Inspector) is cruelly indignant at himself for the fact that it was not he who tricked Khlestakov, but him, or when some embarrassed sharper curses himself for not cleverly cheating at cards, then, obviously, such self-condemnation not only has nothing to do with the impulse of conscience, but also directly shows inveterate lack of conscience. Mental self-condemnation is undoubtedly characteristic of higher animals, and if a well-bred dog is so conscious of its mistakes that sometimes it even tries to skillfully hide them, then this, of course, speaks in favor of its intelligence, but has nothing to do with conscience. The highest moral teaching can only be a complete and correct development of the indicated primary data of human morality, for the general requirements embedded in them cover the entire sphere of possible human life relations. But it is precisely the commonality of these requirements that does not allow us to dwell on their simple existence as data in our nature and makes further development and justification necessary. Primary, natural morality, which we have considered, is nothing more than the reaction of spiritual nature against the suppression and absorption that threatens it by lower forces - carnal lust, selfishness and wild passions. The ability for such a reaction in a person makes him a moral being; but, remaining uncertain in its actual strength and scope, it cannot by itself justify the moral order in humanity. All actual manifestations of our moral nature, as such, have only a private, accidental character. A person can be more or less bashful, compassionate, religious: the universal norm is not given here as a fact, and the very voice of conscience, speaking more or less loudly and persistently, obviously can (as a fact) oblige only to the extent that it is heard in each given case. Meanwhile, the human mind, just as innate to it as moral feelings, initially makes its demand for universality and necessity in the moral sphere. Rational consciousness cannot be satisfied with the random existence of relatively good qualities, from which no general rule follows: the very initial distinction between good and evil already contains the idea of ​​good or good, without any restrictions, containing the unconditional norm of life and activity. Formally, as a postulate, this idea of ​​goodness is inherent in the human mind, but only the complex work of thought determines and develops the actual content of this idea. From the primary data of morality, a transition is inevitable to the principles that reason deduces from them and which alternately came to the fore in various ethical teachings. Chapter two. Ascetic principle in morality The basic moral feeling of shame actually embodies a person’s negative attitude towards the animal nature that takes possession of him. The human spirit, even at very low levels of development, opposes the most vivid and powerful manifestation of this nature with the consciousness of its dignity: I am ashamed to submit to carnal desire, I am ashamed to be like an animal, the lower side of my being should not predominate in me - such predominance is something shameful, sinful. This self-affirmation of moral dignity - a semi-conscious and unstable feeling of shame - is elevated by the action of reason to the principle of asceticism. The subject of a negative attitude in asceticism is not material nature at all. It is impossible to find a point of view from which one could reasonably assert that this nature, objectively contemplated - either in its essence or in phenomena - is evil. It is usually accepted that the so-called “Eastern” teachings, distinguished by extreme asceticism, in this regard also represent the characteristic feature that the beginning of evil is identified in them with the matter of the physical world (in contrast to true Christianity, which posits the source of evil in the moral sphere). But, strictly speaking, in none of the religious and philosophical systems of the East can one find such an identification of evil with material nature. Thus, in the classical country of asceticism, India, it is enough for us to recall the three most typical systems: the orthodox Brahminical Vedanta, the 24 independent Sankya and, finally, Buddhism. According to Vedanta, evil comes down to the deception of consciousness, which accepts objects as entities separate from each other and from the soul, and the soul as an entity separate from a single absolute being. The guilt of this deception lies in the very unified primordial spirit (Paramatman), which, in an incomprehensible moment of darkness or ignorance (avidya), suddenly imagined the possibility of something else, wanted this other and thus fell into a ghostly split, from where the whole world originated. This world does not exist separately (like another outside the one), but is only mistakenly accepted as existing separately, which is what deception and evil consist of. When a traveler in the forest mistakes a severed branch of a tree for a snake or, conversely, a snake and a tree branch, then neither in the image of the snake nor in the image of the branch in themselves is there anything false or bad: the only bad thing is that one is mistaken for the other and both are mistaken for something external. The whole world’s deception is similar to this, which in fact does not violate absolute unity at all. The ignorant think that their evil deeds are something special outside the one truth. But the evil deed, like the evildoer himself and the most false thought about their reality, are all the same one absolute first-spirit, precisely in the state of its ignorance, in which it resides partially. 25 His self-identity is restored in the thoughts of wise ascetics, who, by mortification of the flesh, have overcome the deception of a special being and learned that everything is one. In this system, evil obviously cannot be part of material nature for the reason that such nature is recognized as not existing at all. – Its reality is accepted in another of the main teachings of India - and the independent (or atheistic) Sankya. Here, pure spirit (Purusha), existing only in a multitude of individual individuals, is opposed to primary matter, or nature (Prakriti). But it is not in itself the beginning of evil or what is improper: evil (and then only in a relative sense) is the abiding connection of the spirit with it. These two principles must be connected with each other, but only in a transitory way: nature must be a temporary means, and not the goal of the spirit. The sighted paralytic (spirit) must take advantage of the blind strong man (nature) in order to reach the goal of his journey on his shoulders; when it is achieved, they should separate. The goal of the spirit is self-knowledge, that is, knowledge of oneself as different from nature. But if he must find out that he is not she, then he must first know her - only this determines their proper connection. Nature is a dancer, spirit is a spectator. She showed herself, he saw her, and they can part. An ascetic who resists the impulses of nature is only a prudent person who refrains from using unnecessary means when the goal has already been achieved. If Brahminical orthodoxy asserts that there is only one and there is no other (the principle of advaiti - non-duality or inseparability), then the Sankya philosophy, although it recognizes the existence of this other, i.e. nature, but as something alien and - after it is cognized - unnecessary for the spirit. – Buddhism resolves this duality in general indifference: both spirit and nature - both the one and the other - equally lose their essentiality here: “everything is empty,” there is no object to want; the desire to plunge the spirit into the absolute is as meaningless as the attraction to natural pleasures. Asceticism here comes down to a simple state of unwillingness. Turning from Indian views to a worldview of another type - the Egyptian one, we will find in the last, bright and original expression of this worldview - in the Gnosticism of the Valentinian school - an idea of ​​​​the mixed, heterogeneous composition of the natural world. He is: firstly, the creation of the evil principle (Satan), secondly, the creation of the average unkind and non-evil (moreover, unconscious), Dimiurge, and, thirdly, finally, in the same material nature, these thinker-poets recognized the manifestations of heavenly Wisdom, falling from the higher spheres: thus, the visible light of our world was for them the smile of Sophia, remembering the unearthly radiance of the abandoned Pleroma (fullness of absolute being). Thus, here too, materiality is not evil at all (for light is material, but it is a manifestation of a good principle); The matter created by Satan is his creation not because it in itself is evil, but, on the contrary, it is evil only because it is created by Satan, i.e. since it manifests or expresses in an external way the internal property of evil, since it is darkness, disorder, destruction, death - in a word, chaos. In a system of the Iranian type with a sharper dualism - in Manichaeism - material nature is just as little identified with evil as in the Egyptian gnosis. The natural world contains within itself a light element, originating from the kingdom of the all-good deity; this light element manifests itself not only in light phenomena, but is also hidden in plant and animal life. The highest deity itself is represented by the Manichaeans as nothing other than in the form of light. So, all these “eastern” systems do not allow the identification of evil with material nature - in itself; If, instead of this meaningless identification, we put the statement that there is evil in the material nature of the world and man, then all profound teachings, both Eastern and Western, will be on the side of this truth. This truth does not depend on any metaphysical concept of matter and nature: since we ourselves participate in material nature, we can know from inner experience what is and what is not in it in relation to the requirements of our spirit. Despite the well-known statement of Plotinus, a normal person of the highest spiritual development is not at all ashamed of the fact that he is a corporeal or material being in general; no one is ashamed to have an extended body, of a certain shape, with a certain weight and color, that is, we are not ashamed of everything that we have in common with a stone, a tree, a piece of metal; Only in relation to that in which we are similar to the creatures closest to us from the kingdom of nature adjacent to us - the higher animals - is our feeling of shame and internal confrontation, showing that it is here, where we essentially come into contact with the material life of the world, where we can really merge with it - here we must break away from it and rise above it. The feeling of shame is not aroused either by that side of our bodily existence, which has no direct relation to the spirit at all (such as the above-mentioned material properties that we share with inanimate objects), or by that part of the living organism, which serves primarily as an expression and instrument of human rational life itself, like the head, face, hands. The subject of shame is only that area of ​​our material existence, which, although it has a direct relationship to the spirit, because it can internally excite (affect) it, but at the same time not only does not serve as an expression and instrument of spiritual life, but, on the contrary, through it the process of purely animal life strives to capture the human spirit into its sphere, to subjugate or absorb it. It is this seizure by material life, which strives to make the rational being of man a suffering instrument or a useless appendage of a physical process, that causes opposition from the spiritual principle, directly expressed in a feeling of shame. Here, a reasonable affirmation of a known moral norm is psychologically clothed in the affect of fear of its violation or grief over the violation that has occurred. This norm, logically presupposed by the fact of shame, states in its most general expression: the animal life in man must be subordinated to the spiritual. This position has obligatory (apodictic) reliability, for it is a correct conclusion from a fact based on the logical law of identity. By being ashamed of being only an animal, a person thereby shows that he is not only an animal, but also something else, and, moreover, a higher one (for on the part of an inferior or equal, shame would have no meaning). Limiting oneself to even one formal relationship, one cannot doubt that clear consciousness is higher than dark sensation, that rational principle is more worthy than blind instinct, that spiritual self-control is better than self-forgetfulness in the physical process. If a person combines in himself two different elements that are related to each other in relation to the higher and lower, then the requirement for the subordination of the latter to the first lies in the concept itself. Since the fact of shame does not depend on individual, tribal and other characteristics, and the demand contained in it is of a universal nature, which, combined with the logical necessity of this demand, gives it the full meaning of a moral principle. Man, like animals, lives the common life of the universe. The essential difference lies only in the way in which both participate in this life. And the animal, as an animated being, internally, mentally participates in the processes of nature that captivate it; it knows what is pleasant and what is unpleasant for it in these processes, instinctively senses what is harmful in them and what is useful for its (own and generic) self-preservation, but all this relates exclusively to the external environment directly acting on the animal and the given circle of time, and the world process as a whole does not exist at all for the animal soul - it cannot know anything about its foundations and goals, and its participation in it is purely passive, or instrumental. A person himself evaluates his participation in the world process not only in relation to these phenomena acting on him as psychological impulses, but also in relation to the general principle of all activity - to the idea of ​​worthy and unworthy existence, or good and evil, which itself becomes the determining basis or motive of human activity. This higher consciousness, or inner self-esteem, places a person in a certain relationship to the whole world process, as an active participant in its goal; for, determining all his actions by the idea of ​​good, a person positively participates in common life only insofar as its goal is good. But since this higher consciousness actually grows on the soil of material nature and is formed, so to speak, at its expense, this naturally evokes in man the opposition of this lower nature, or animal soul. Thus, we get two opposing currents in our lives - spiritual and carnal. 26 The spiritual principle in the form in which it directly appears to our present consciousness is only a special flow or process in our life, aimed at realizing the rational idea of ​​good in our entire existence. In the same way, the carnal principle with which we deal in our inner experience is neither a physical organism, nor even an animal soul in itself, but only a current excited in this soul, opposite to the higher consciousness, striving to capture and drown in the material process the beginnings of spiritual life. Here material nature really appears as evil, for it strives to destroy that which is worthy of being, as having within itself the possibility of a different, better content than material life. Not in itself, but only in this bad relationship to the spirit, the material nature of man is what, in biblical terminology, is called flesh. The concept of the carnal should not be confused with the concept of the bodily. The body, from an ascetic point of view, is a “church of the spirit,” bodies can be “spiritual,” “glorified,” “heavenly,” while “flesh and blood will not inherit the kingdom of God.” 27 – The flesh is excited animality, going beyond its limits, ceasing to serve as matter or the hidden (potential) basis of spiritual life, which in its essence should be animal life, both from its physical and mental sides. At the initial stages of his development, man is a spiritual being more in possibility than in reality, but it is precisely this possibility of a higher being, expressed in self-consciousness and self-control, in contrast to the blind and self-possessed nature - it is precisely this self-conscious and self-controlling spiritual potency that is endangered by carnal lust. The flesh, that is, matter emerging from its suffering position, mentally striving for independence and immensity, thereby tries to attract spiritual force to itself, to involve it in its process in order to resolve it into itself and strengthen itself on its account. This is possible because although in its ideal essence spiritual existence is not homogeneous with material existence, but in its actual, manifested existence in a real person, as an embodied force, spirit or, more precisely, the life of the spirit, there is only a modification (transformation) of material existence, i.e., most immediately, the animal soul. From this real point of view, these are two types of energy, converting one into the other, just as mechanical motion is converted into heat and back. The flesh (i.e., the animal soul as an independent soul) is strong only through the weakness of the spirit, lives only by its death. And therefore, the spirit, for its preservation and strengthening, requires the weakening of the flesh, its transfer from an active state to a potential one. This is the real meaning of the moral standard or principle we have set forth above, which states that the flesh must be subject to the spirit. Here is the basis of any practice of true moral asceticism. The moral demand for the subordination of the flesh to the spirit meets the opposite actual desire of the flesh to subjugate the spirit, as a result of which the ascetic principle is twofold: it is required, firstly, to protect spiritual life from the grips of the carnal principle and, secondly, to conquer the realm of the flesh, to make animal life only the potency or matter of the spirit. Due to the inextricable internal connection and continuous interaction between the spiritual and carnal sides of human existence, as a single process, these two requirements - self-preservation of the spirit from the flesh and the realization of the spirit in the flesh - cannot be fulfilled in complete isolation - they inevitably turn into one another: the spirit can actually be protected from the grasp of the flesh only at its own expense, therefore, being partially realized in it, and at the same time, the realization of the spirit is possible only with continuous acts his self-preservation from ongoing carnal attacks on his independence. This whole process is presented in three main points: 1) the internal self-difference of spirit from flesh, 2) the spirit’s real defense of its independence, and 3) the achieved dominance of the spirit over nature, or the abolition of the evil carnal principle as such. The first point that defines man as opposed to animals is something given, namely in the feeling of shame; the third, as a consequence of spiritual perfection, when it has already been achieved, cannot be a direct subject of a moral requirement or prescription in the present: it cannot be presented, even to a morally minded and improving, but still imperfect person, in the form of a categorical imperative: be immediately immortal, or incorruptible! – In the field of ethics, therefore, only the second point remains; and our moral principle receives the following immediate definition: Subordinate the flesh to the spirit, so far as is necessary for its dignity and independence. Having the final, hoped-for goal of being a complete master of your physical forces and general nature, set your immediate, obligatory goal: at least not to be an enslaved servant of rebellious matter, or chaos. The flesh is a being that does not control itself, completely turned outward - emptiness, hunger and gluttony - a being that diffuses in appearance and ends in real disintegration; in contrast to this, spirit is being according to internal determinations, entered into itself, self-possessed and acting outward by its own power, without passing into appearance, without getting lost or resolved in it. Consequently, the self-preservation of the spirit is, first of all, the preservation of its self-control. This is the main thing in any true asceticism. Since the human body (in its anatomical structure and physiological functions) does not have independent moral significance, but can serve as an expression and instrument for both the flesh and the spirit, the moral struggle between these two sides of our being also occurs in the field of bodily or organic life - the struggle for power over the body. In the area of ​​bodily life, our moral task consists, in fact, in not being passively determined by carnal desires, especially in the two most important functions of our body - nutrition and reproduction. But as a preliminary exercise, which, however, does not have an independent moral character, it is important that the spirit acquires power over such functions of our animal body that are not directly related to the “lusts of the flesh,” such as breathing and sleep. 28 – Breathing is the basic condition of life and a constant way of communication between our body and the environment. For the power of the spirit over the body it can only be desirable that this basic function should be under the direction or “control” of the human will. Since ancient times and everywhere, the consciousness of this has led to various ascetic practices regarding breathing. We find the practice and theory of such exercises among Indian hermits, and among ancient and recent magicians, and among the monks of Athos and other monasteries of the same type, and with Swedenborg, and in our days - with Thomas Lack-Harris and Lawrence Oliphant. The mystical details of this matter do not belong to moral philosophy. I will therefore limit myself to only general comments. Some control of the will over breathing is required by simple good manners. Ascetic goals only encourage one to go further along this path. By gradual exercise it is easy to achieve not breathing through the mouth either while awake or in sleep, and then the next step will be the ability to hold every breath for a more or less long time. 29 The acquired power over this organic function undoubtedly strengthens the strength of the spirit and gives it a firm foothold for further ascetic success. Sleep, as a temporary stop in the activity of the brain and nerves, that is, the direct physiological tools of the spirit, is a weakening of the connection between spiritual and bodily life, and it is important for the spirit that in this case it does not appear in an exclusively passive role; if sleep is caused by physical reasons, then the spirit must be able, for its own reasons, to prevent sleep from occurring or to interrupt sleep that has already occurred. The very difficulty of such an action, undoubtedly possible, shows its significance. The ability to overcome sleep and cause awakening at will is an indispensable requirement of spiritual hygiene. However, sleep has another side that distinguishes it from breathing and other indifferent (in a moral sense) functions of the body and brings it closer to nutrition and reproduction: sleep, like these two functions, can be abused for the benefit of carnal life and to the detriment of spiritual life. The very tendency to excessive sleep already shows a predominance of the material, passive principle; yielding to this inclination and actually abusing sleep undoubtedly weakens the spirit and strengthens carnal lusts. Therefore, in historical manifestations of asceticism, for example in Christian monasticism, the fight against sleep plays a significant role. Of course, the weakening of the connection between spiritual and bodily life (more precisely: between the conscious and instinctive areas of life), expressed in a dream, can occur in both directions: sleepers should be distinguished from dreamers; but as a general rule, we can accept that a special ability for significant and prophetic dreams shows the strength of the spirit, already achieved through ascetic practice (hence, by the way, the fight against the pleasure of carnal sleep). In animals, the predominance of matter over form occurs from an excess of nutrition, as can be clearly seen in the example of caterpillars among lower animals and fattened pigs among higher animals. 30 In humans, the same reason (excess nutrition) determines the preponderance of animal life, or flesh, over the spirit. That is why abstinence in food and drink - fasting - has always and everywhere been one of the basic requirements of morality. This abstinence concerns, firstly, quantity - and here there can be no general rule - and, secondly, quality. In this last respect, the rule has always and everywhere been abstinence from animal food, and especially the so-called meat (that is, the meat of warm-blooded animals). The reason for this is that meat, which is more easily and more completely transformed into blood, increases the energy of carnal life more quickly and strongly. 31 Abstinence from meat food can, without a doubt, be affirmed as a universal requirement. All objections to this rule do not stand up to criticism and have long been refuted not only by moralists, but also by natural scientists. There was a time when eating raw or fire-treated human meat was considered normal. 32 From an ascetic point of view, abstinence from meat (and animal food in general) is doubly useful: firstly, since this weakens the energy of carnal life, and secondly, since the hereditary habit has developed a natural need for this food, then abstinence from it, exercising willpower regarding material attraction, thereby increases spiritual energy. As for drinking, the simplest prudence prohibits the use of strong drinks, which lead to loss of reason. The ascetic principle requires, of course, more. In general, wine increases the energy of the nervous system and, through it, mental life; at the lower stages of spiritual development, where the predominant force in the soul still belongs to carnal motives, everything that excites and raises the nervous energy serving the soul benefits this dominant carnal element and, therefore, is extremely harmful to the spirit; Therefore, complete abstinence “from wine and strong drink” is necessary here. But at higher levels of moral life, which were achieved in the pagan world, for example by Socrates (see Plato’s “Symposium”), the energy of the body serves more spiritual than carnal purposes, and an increase in nervous activity (of course, within limits that do not affect bodily health) enhances the action of the spirit and, therefore, can to a certain extent not only be harmless, but even directly useful. One universal and unconditional rule remains here: to maintain spiritual sobriety and clarity of consciousness. 33 The most important and decisive role in the struggle between the spirit and the flesh in the physiological area is sexual function. The morally bad (carnal sin) should be seen, of course, not in the physical fact of procreation (and conception), which, on the contrary, is some atonement for sin, but only in the immeasurable and blind attraction (lust of the flesh, concupiscensia) for an external, animal-material union with another person (in fact or in the imagination), which is set as a goal in itself, as an independent object of pleasure. The predominance of the flesh over the spirit is expressed most strongly, brightly and lastingly in the carnal union of two persons. It is not without reason that a direct feeling of shame is associated with this. To suppress or distort this evidence after many millennia of external and internal development, from the height of a refined mind to declare good what the simple feeling of a savage has already recognized as bad - this is the greatest disgrace for humanity and a clear proof of our depravity. The actual or perceived necessity of a certain act for extraneous purposes cannot be a sufficient basis for assessing its own permanent quality. Taking poison may be necessary against some disease, but this necessity itself is already an anomaly from a hygienic point of view. The moral question regarding sexual function is, first of all, a question of internal attitude towards it or assessment on its merits. How should we, within ourselves, treat this fact, according to the final norm, from the point of view of what is absolutely necessary - to approve or condemn it? What path should we take and continue to follow in relation to this fact: should we take the path of its affirmation and dissemination, or the path of its denial, limitation and final abolition? The feeling of shame and the voice of conscience in each specific case definitely and decisively give the second answer, and moral philosophy can only give it the form of a general reasonable rule. The carnal condition of reproduction for man is evil; it expresses the predominance of a meaningless material process over the self-control of the spirit, this is a matter contrary to the dignity of man, the death of human love and life; our moral attitude towards this fact must be decisively negative: we must take the path of limiting and abolishing it; and when and how this abolition will be accomplished in all of humanity, or at least in ourselves, is a question that does not at all belong to the moral realm. The complete transformation of our carnal life into spiritual life, as an event, is not in our power, being associated with the general conditions of the historical and cosmic process, and therefore cannot be the subject of a moral obligation, rule or prescription. Our internal attitude towards this fundamental manifestation of carnal life is obligatory for us and has moral significance, namely, the recognition of it as evil, the decision not to succumb to this evil and the conscientious execution of this decision, to the extent that it depends on us. From this point of view, we can, of course, judge our external actions, but only because their connection with internal moral conditions is known to us; We should not judge other people’s actions in this area, but only other people’s rules. As a rule, the affirmation of the carnal relationship of the sexes is in any case evil for a person. The final reconciliation of man with the kingdom of death, which is supported and perpetuated by carnal reproduction, deserves unconditional condemnation. This is the positively Christian point of view, from which this most important question is resolved in spirit, and not in letter, therefore, without any external exclusivity. “He who is able to contain, let him contain.” Marriage is approved and sanctified, childbearing is blessed, and celibacy is extolled as “the life of an angel.” But this very designation of it as angelic seems to hint at the third, highest path - the divine. For man, by purpose, is greater than an angel (see “The Meaning of Love”, as well as “Plato’s Life Drama”). If the highest Wisdom, in its everlasting habit of extracting greater good from evil, uses our carnal sins to improve humanity through new generations, then this, of course, serves for Her glory, and ours for consolation, but not justification. After all, She acts in the same way with all other evils, by which, however, neither the difference between good and evil, nor the obligation of the former for us is in any way abolished. To believe that the preaching of sexual abstinence, even the most energetic and successful, can prematurely stop the physical reproduction of human nature and lead to its destruction, is an opinion so absurd that one should rightly doubt its sincerity. Hardly anyone can seriously fear danger to humanity from this side. As long as a change of generations is necessary to renew the human race, the desire to bring about this change will probably not become scarce in people. In any case, that moment, even if it - per impossibile (due to impossibility (lat.) - came tomorrow, when all people will finally conquer carnal lust within themselves and become completely chaste - this very moment will be the end of the historical process and the beginning of the “future life” of all humanity, and, therefore, the very concept of the “premature” cessation of childbearing due to the preaching of chastity is pure nonsense, invented by hypocrites: well, who Have you ever, given yourself over to carnal desire, thought to ensure the future of humanity? The rules of ascetic morality in the field of bodily life: acquire power over breathing and sleep, limit your diet and abstain from carnal lust, although by their own nature, as rules for the will, they still have an internal moral and psychological character, but in their subject matter they are not in the same connection with the psychological side of carnal life. The first rule and partly the second (regarding breathing and sleep) are purely physiological, which in themselves are not hostile to the spirit and do not pose a direct danger to it; his interest here is only in managing these functions to strengthen his own forces in view of a further, more significant struggle. Nutrition and especially reproduction, and through them the ascetic rules related to them, have a different property. The positive feelings of pleasure associated with these functions can become a goal for the will, bind spiritual forces and draw them into the stream of carnal life. In particular, the last of these functions is completely incompatible (under ordinary conditions) with maintaining spiritual self-control. On the other hand, if breathing and sleep are only processes in our own body, then nutrition and reproduction are associated with external objects, which, in addition to their actual existence and relationship to us, can, as subjective ideas, take possession of the imagination and desire and capture the realm of the spirit. Hence the need for an ascetic struggle with internal carnal sins, even more shameful than external ones: for a gastronome who drools at the mere imagination of refined dishes, without a doubt, deviates more from human dignity than a person who actually allows excess food without any special thoughts about it. From this side, the ascetic attitude towards nutritional and sexual functions belongs not to the physiological, but to the psychological area of ​​​​the struggle of the spirit with the flesh. The direct subject of the struggle here is not the functions of the body, but mental states - voluptuousness, intoxication, voluptuousness. These sinful affects, which can turn into passions and vices, become a number of other bad emotions, such as anger, envy, greed, etc. These other passions - evil, and not just shameful - in their subject matter (relations to neighbors) are subject to the judgment not of ascetic, but of altruistic morality. But there are some general rules for the internal moral and psychological struggle against sinful inclinations as such, regardless of whether they relate to other people or to one’s own material nature. The internal process by which evil desire takes possession of our ego represents three main degrees. First, the idea of ​​some object or action arises in the mind, corresponding to one of the bad inclinations of our nature. This idea evokes the spirit to think about it. In this first moment, a simple act of will is sufficient to reject this thought; the spirit must only reveal its hardness and impenetrability to foreign elements. 35 If this is not done, then the thought develops into a whole dreamy picture of one or another character - voluptuous, or maliciously vindictive, or vain, etc. 36 This picture forces the mind to occupy itself with it, and it can no longer be gotten rid of by one negative act of will, but requires distraction of the mind by thinking in the opposite direction (for example, thinking about death). But if in this second moment the mind, instead of being distracted from the pictures of sin, stops at them and, so to speak, unites with them, then the third moment inevitably comes, when not only the mind, secretly prompted by an evil inclination, but the whole spirit surrenders to the sinful thought and enjoys it. The rule for getting rid of this captivity can no longer be limited to either a rejecting act of will or distracting reflection of the mind - a practical moral deed is required that restores internal balance in the whole person. Otherwise, the victory of sinful excitement over the spirit turns into passion and vice. Immediately a person loses his rational freedom, and moral precepts lose their power over him. Ethics is hygiene, not therapy for spiritual life. The predominance of the spirit over the flesh is necessary to preserve the moral dignity of a person. The principle of true asceticism is the principle of spiritual self-preservation. But the internal self-preservation of an individual person, a being, although a spiritual one (i.e., possessing reason and will), but individually limited or relative, cannot be an unconditional good, or the highest and final goal of life. – Slavery of a person to carnal desires (in a broad sense, that is, to everything that is counterintuitive, senseless), turning him into the worst kind of animal, is, without a doubt, evil. In this sense, no one can conscientiously object to asceticism, that is, elevated to the principle of abstinence. Everyone agrees that the inability to resist animal instincts is impotence of the spirit - something shameful for a person, and therefore bad. This means that the ability to such resistance, or abstinence, is good and should be accepted as a norm from which certain rules of life can follow. At this point (as at others), moral philosophy only clarifies and develops what is affirmed by simple human consciousness. In addition to any principles, gluttony, drunkenness, debauchery directly evoke disgust and contempt, and abstinence from these vices enjoys involuntary respect, that is, it is recognized as good. However, this good is not unconditional in its individuality. For the power of the spirit over the flesh, or willpower, acquired through correct abstinence, can be used for immoral purposes. A strong will can be evil. A person can suppress the lower nature in order to be vain or proud of his higher power; such a victory of the spirit is not good. It is even worse if self-control of spirit and concentration of will are used to cause harm to others, even without the goals of base self-interest. There have been and continue to be successful ascetics, not only people devoted to spiritual pride, hypocrisy and vanity, but also downright evil, insidious and cruel egoists. Admittedly, such an ascetic is much worse in a moral sense than a simple-minded drunkard and glutton or a compassionate libertine. So, asceticism in itself is not yet good and, therefore, cannot be the highest or unconditional principle of morality. A true (moral) ascetic acquires power over the flesh not to strengthen the formal powers of the spirit, but to better promote good. Asceticism, which frees the spirit from shameful (carnal) passions only in order to bind it all the more tightly with evil (spiritual) passions, is obviously false or immoral asceticism; 37 its prototype, according to Christian concepts, should be recognized as the devil, who does not eat, does not drink, does not sleep and remains celibate. If an evil or ruthless ascetic cannot be morally approved, then the very principle of asceticism has moral significance only conditionally, precisely under the condition of its connection with the principle of altruism, rooted in pity. Let us consider this second moral principle. Chapter three. Pity and altruism For a long time they thought, and many are again beginning to think, that the highest virtue, or holiness, consists in asceticism, in “mortification of the flesh,” in the suppression of natural inclinations and attachments, in abstinence and dispassion. We have seen that there is undoubtedly truth in this ideal, since it is clear that the higher, or spiritual, side in a person must prevail over the lower, or material, and the efforts of the will in this direction, as acts of spiritual self-preservation, are the first condition of all morality; however, the first condition cannot be turned into the last goal. A person must strengthen the spirit and subordinate the flesh to it, not because this is the purpose of his life, but because only by freeing himself from slavery to blind and evil material desires can a person properly serve truth and goodness and achieve his positive perfection. The rules of abstinence strengthen the strength of spirit in the person who follows them, but in order for this strong spirit to have moral significance, that is, to be not evil, but good, it is necessary that power over his own flesh be combined in him with a positive, benevolent attitude towards other beings. Without this condition, the dominance of the ascetic principle, even on the basis of true religion, leads to terrifying consequences, as history has shown. The ministers of the medieval church, who tortured and burned heretics, Jews, sorcerers and witches, were for the most part impeccable people in the ascetic sense, but one-sided strength of spirit, in the absence of pity, made them devils incarnate. Such bitter fruits of medieval asceticism sufficiently justify the reaction against it, which in the field of philosophical ethics led to the dominance of the altruistic principle of morality. This principle has its deep root in our nature, precisely in the form of a feeling of pity, common to man with other living beings. If the feeling of shame sets man apart from the rest of nature and contrasts him with other animals, then the feeling of pity, on the contrary, connects him with the whole world of living things, and moreover in a double sense: firstly, because it belongs to man along with all other living beings, and secondly, because all living beings can and should become objects of this feeling for man. That the natural root of our moral attitude towards others lies not in participation, or a feeling of solidarity in general, but precisely in pity or compassion - this is a truth that is not at all connected with any metaphysical system (for example, with the Buddhist faith or with Schopenhauer’s “philosophy of the will”) and in no way dependent on a pessimistic view of the world and life. As is known, Schopenhauer claims that the essence of the world is will, and will is essentially a state of dissatisfaction (since with satisfaction there is nothing to want); therefore, displeasure or suffering is the basic and positive definition of all being (within itself), and consequently, the internal moral connection (or solidarity) of beings with each other is compassion. But, leaving aside this dubious metaphysics (and the equally dubious calculations of Hartmann, who is trying to prove that the amount of suffering in humanity is immeasurably greater than the amount of pleasure), we essentially find that the basis of a moral attitude towards other beings can in principle only be pity or compassion, and not co-joy or co-enjoyment. Human pleasures, pleasures and joys are, of course, innocent and downright good, and then sympathy for them has a positive moral character; But next to this, human pleasures can and very often have an immoral character. An angry and vindictive person takes pleasure in insulting and tormenting his neighbors, he enjoys their humiliation, he rejoices in the harm caused to them; a voluptuous person believes the main joy of life is in debauchery, a cruel person - in killing, if not people, then animals, a drunkard is happy when he drives himself into a stupor, etc. In all these cases, the feeling of pleasure cannot be separated from the bad actions that cause it, and sometimes this pleasure imparts an immoral character to actions that in themselves would be indifferent. Thus, when a soldier in a war kills the enemy on command, prompted only by “duty of service,” then no matter how we, in principle, treat war in general, we, of course, will not accuse this soldier of immoral cruelty; it’s another matter if he finds pleasure in killing and takes pleasure in piercing a person with a bayonet. In simpler cases this is even clearer: so, undoubtedly, the immoral character of drunkenness does not consist at all in the external action of swallowing certain drinks, but only in the internal pleasure that a person finds in artificially stupefying himself. But if a certain pleasure in itself is immoral, then sympathy for it on the part of another person (co-joy, co-pleasure) takes on the same immoral character. The fact is that positive sympathy for some pleasure includes approval of this pleasure - thus, rejoicing with a drunkard in his favorite pleasure, I thereby approve of drunkenness; By sharing with someone the pleasure of successful revenge, I thereby approve of vindictiveness; and since pleasure is something bad, the person who sympathizes with it approves of the bad and, consequently, falls into immorality. Just as complicity in a crime is itself recognized as a crime, so sympathy in vicious pleasure or joy must itself be recognized as vicious. And indeed, sympathy for some bad pleasure, in addition to its approval, also presupposes in the sympathizer himself the same bad inclination; only a drunkard rejoices at someone else's drunkenness, only an evil person enjoys someone else's revenge. This means that participation in someone else’s pleasure or joy can be good or bad, depending on the subject, and, therefore, it in itself is in no way the basis of moral relations, since it can also be immoral. The same cannot be said about suffering and compassion. By its very concept, suffering is a state in which the will of the sufferer does not take direct and positive part. When we speak of “voluntary suffering,” it goes without saying that the object of the will is not the suffering itself, but that which makes it necessary, or the good that is achieved through suffering. The martyr agrees to torture not for its own sake, but as a necessary consequence of his faith under given conditions and as a path leading to the highest glory and the kingdom of heaven. On the other hand, suffering can be deserved, that is, it can be caused by bad deeds, but suffering itself is separated from its cause and does not contain moral guilt, but, on the contrary, is recognized as its conviction and atonement. Although drunkenness is a sin, no rigorist would see a headache from a hangover as a sin. And therefore, participation in someone else’s suffering (even if deserved) - compassion or pity - can never represent anything immoral. While I sympathize with the sufferer, I do not at all approve of the bad cause of his suffering. 38 Regret over the suffering of a criminal, of course, is not an approval or justification for crimes. On the contrary, the more pity the regrettable consequences of someone’s sins arouse in me, the stronger my condemnation of these sins. Participation in another's pleasure can always be self-serving; even, for example, in the case of an old man who shares the joy of a child, the altruistic nature of such a feeling remains doubtful; In any case, this old man is pleased to revive the memory of his own carefree childhood. On the contrary, any serious feeling of regret for someone else’s suffering, moral or physical, is difficult for the person experiencing this feeling and, therefore, is contrary to his egoism, which is clear from the fact that sincere sorrow for others confuses our personal joy, darkens our joy, i.e., it turns out to be incompatible with the state of egoistic satisfaction. So, real compassion, or pity, cannot have selfish motives, and is a purely altruistic feeling, as opposed to co-joy, or co-pleasure, which is a feeling of a mixed and indefinite (in the moral sense) character. There is another reason why participation in other people’s joys or pleasures cannot in itself have the same basic meaning for ethics that belongs to the feeling of pity or compassion. The basis of morality, at the request of reason, can only be those feelings that each time contain incentives for a certain action, from the generalization of which a certain moral rule or principle is then formed. But pleasure or joy is the end of action, in it the goal of the activity is achieved, and participation in someone else’s pleasure, like the feeling of one’s own, does not contain any incentive or reason for further action. On the contrary, pity directly motivates us to act with the goal of saving another being from suffering or helping him. Such an action may be purely internal, for example, when pity for an enemy keeps me from causing offense or harm to him, but in any case this is an action, and not a passive state, like joy or pleasure. Of course, I can find inner satisfaction in the fact that I have not offended my neighbor, but only after the act of will has been completed. In the same way, when it comes to positive help to a suffering or needy neighbor, the pleasure or joy (delivered by this both to him and to the helper himself) is only the final consequence and completion of the altruistic act, and not the basis from which it follows. In fact, if I see a suffering creature in need of my help, or learn about it, then one of two things: either this other person’s suffering also responds to me as more or less intense suffering, I feel pity, and in this case this feeling is a direct and sufficient reason prompting me to actively help; or, otherwise, if the suffering of others does not arouse pity in me or arouses in a degree insufficient to motivate me to action, the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe pleasure that would arise from my action will be even more insufficient. It is clear that an abstract and conditional thought about a future mental state cannot in any way act more powerfully than direct contemplation or a concrete representation of present physical and mental states that require direct influence. Consequently, in any altruistic act, its actual basis, or producing cause (causa efficiens), is the perception or representation of someone else's suffering existing in the present, and not the thought of the pleasure that could occur in the future as a result of the benefit rendered. Of course, when someone, out of pity, decided to help a suffering creature, then he can (if he has time) imagine, especially from the memory of previous experiences, the joy that this will bring both to that creature and to himself, but to accept this accompanying or incidental thought as the actual basis of the decision would be contrary to both logic and psychological experience. So, if, on the one hand, participation in the present pleasures and joys of other beings, as in states of achieved satisfaction, by its very concept cannot contain the grounds and rules of action, and on the other hand, the conditional presentation of future pleasures as the supposed consequences of eliminated suffering can only be an indirect and secondary addition to the real feeling of compassion or pity, impelling to active good, then, consequently, the meaning of the present remains with this feeling alone grounds for altruistic actions. He who regrets the suffering of others, of course, takes part in other people’s joys and pleasures when they are innocent and harmless. But this natural consequence of a moral attitude towards others cannot be taken as the basis of morality. Only that which is good in itself and therefore retains its good character in all cases, never becoming evil, can be recognized as truly good; therefore, the true basis of morality (as goodness) in one or another area of ​​relations can only be such a given, from which a general and unconditional rule for these relations is derived. Such is precisely the pity towards our kind; for to feel sorry for all suffering beings is an approving property unconditionally and in all cases, so that it can be elevated to a rule that does not require any restrictions, while participation in other people's joys and pleasures can be approved only conditionally and with restrictions, and even in those cases when it is approved, it does not, as we have seen, contain any rule of action. The fact that an individual being can feel, as it were, beyond the boundaries of his individuality, painfully responding to someone else’s suffering, that is, feeling it as his own - this undoubted and so widespread fact may seem to another view as something mysterious and mysterious. This is precisely how the philosopher recognizes it, who posits compassion as the only basis of all morality. “How is it possible,” he asks, “that suffering, which is not mine, does not affect me, nevertheless becomes, just as directly, as in other cases only my own, a motive for me and prompts me to action?” “This presupposes,” he says further, “that I have to some extent identified with the other and that, consequently, the boundary between I and not-I is this time removed: only then the position of the other, his need, his need, his suffering directly (?) become mine; then I no longer see it as it is still given to me in empirical representation - as something alien to me, indifferent to me (?), completely (?) separate from me; but here, on the contrary (i.e., with compassion), in him (this alien being) I also suffer, despite the fact that his skin does not cover my nerves. Only through such identification can his suffering, his need, become a motive for me, which, in addition to this, can only be my own suffering. This phenomenon is extremely mysterious - this is a real mystery of ethics, for it is something about which reason cannot give a direct account (?!), and the foundations of this phenomenon cannot be found through experience. And yet this is something everyday. Everyone has experienced it themselves and seen it in others. This sacrament is performed every day before our eyes in private cases - every time when, out of immediate attraction, without further considerations, a person helps another and protects him, sometimes exposing his life to obvious danger for the sake of a person whom he saw for the first time, and without thinking anything except that he sees the great need and danger of another; This sacrament is also revealed on a large scale, when an entire people sacrifices its property and blood to protect or liberate another oppressed people. And always a necessary condition for such actions to deserve unconditional moral approval is precisely the presence of this mysterious act of compassion, or inner identification of oneself with another without any other motives. 39 This discussion about the mysterious nature of compassion is distinguished by more literary eloquence than philosophical truthfulness. The mystery here does not lie in the fact itself, but comes from its incorrect description, in which extreme terms are presented with an excessively exaggerated brightness and sharpness, and the actual transitions and relationships between them are completely concealed, as if they did not exist at all. In his field, Schopenhauer abuses the rhetorical device of contrast or antithesis just as much as Victor Hugo does in his. It appears as if a given being, unconditionally separate from another, suddenly becomes directly identified with it in a feeling of compassion. This would, of course, be mysterious in the highest degree. But in reality, neither that perfect separateness nor that immediate identification that Schopenhauer speaks of exists at all. To understand any relationship, you must first take it in its simplest and primary manifestation. This is the maternal instinct in animals. When a dog protects its puppies or suffers when they die - where is all this mystery that Schopenhauer talks about? Do these cubs represent “something alien, indifferent, completely separate” to their mother? After all, between her and them there was from the beginning a direct, real connection, physical and organic, independent of any metaphysics, clear and undoubted for the simplest empirical view. These creatures were for a certain time only a real part of her own body, her and their nerves were actually covered by one common skin, and the very beginning of their existence was only a change in her own body, which was immediately painfully reflected in her sensations. 40 This real, organic connection at birth is weakened, so to speak, stretched, but is not completely broken and is not replaced by “perfect separateness.” Therefore, the participation of a mother in the suffering of her young is in essence the same natural fact as the fact that we painfully feel our cut finger or sprained leg - in a certain sense, and this, of course, is mysterious, but not in the one that the philosopher of compassion has in mind. Meanwhile, all other, more complex manifestations of this feeling have the same basis. Everything that exists in general, and especially all living beings, are interconnected by the commonality of being and the unity of origin, all are parts and products of one common mother - nature, nowhere and in nothing is there that “perfect separateness” that the philosopher speaks of. The natural, organic connection of all beings, as parts of one whole, is a given of experience, and not just a speculative idea, and therefore the psychological expression of this connection - the internal participation of one being in the suffering of others, compassion, or pity - is something understandable from an empirical point of view, as an expression of the natural and obvious solidarity of all that exists. This participation of beings in each other is consistent with the manifest meaning of the universe, completely in accordance with reason or completely rational. What is meaningless or irrational, on the contrary, is the mutual alienation of beings, their subjective separateness, which contradicts objective inseparability. This fact of internal egoism, and not mutual participation between parts of a single nature, is truly something mysterious and enigmatic to the highest degree - something about which reason cannot give a direct account, and the foundations of this phenomenon cannot be found through experience. But if there is not and cannot be perfect separation between beings (which is only affirmed, but not realized by egoism), then, on the other hand, their mutual connection, psychologically expressed in compassion or pity, is not at all that “direct identification” that the philosopher of “Will and Idea” speaks of. When I feel sorry for my friend who has a headache, then usually this feeling of compassion does not turn into a headache; Not only am I not directly identified with him, but our states remain not identical, and I clearly distinguish my healthy head from his sick one. In the same way, as far as I know, there has never been such a case in which a compassionate person, throwing himself into the water to save a drowning man, mistook him for himself or himself for him. Even a hen - a creature undoubtedly more child-loving than sensible - still clearly understands the difference between herself and her chickens, and therefore observes a certain course of action regarding them, which would be impossible if in her maternal compassion the boundaries between I and not-I were removed. If it were so, then the chicken, sometimes feeling hungry and, due to not distinguishing itself from its chickens, attributing this feeling to them, would begin to feed them, although well-fed, dying of hunger itself, and at other times, attributing their hunger to itself, it would be satisfied at their expense. In fact, in all real cases of pity, the boundaries between the being who pities and the beings whom it pities are not removed at all, but only turn out to be not as unconditional and impenetrable as the abstract reflection of school philosophers imagines them to be. The removal of boundaries between self and non-self, or direct identification, is only a rhetorical figure, and not an expression of actual fact. Just as the identical vibration of consonant strings, so the sympathetic connection of living beings is not a simple identity, but an agreement of the homogeneous. And from this side, the basic moral fact of compassion, or pity, completely corresponds to the actual nature of things, or the meaning of the world, the inextricable connection of which is not the unity of emptiness, but embraces the fullness of certain differences. The feeling of pity, as it should be for a moral basis, has no external limits to its application. From the close circle of maternal love, so strong already in the higher animals, it can (in humans), expanding more and more, from the family to the clan and tribe, to the civil community, to an entire nation, to all humanity, finally embracing the volume of everything living in the universe. That in some cases, at the sight of a specific suffering or need, we can actively feel sorry not only for every person - be he a foreigner or a member of a different faith - but also for every animal - this is beyond doubt and is an ordinary thing. Less common, but still encountered is such a breadth of compassionate heart that, without any apparent reason, immediately embraces with an intense feeling of pity the entire multitude of living beings of the whole world. It is difficult to suspect the following naive description of universal pity as a real state, very little similar to the so-called “worldly sorrow” (Weltschmerz), as artificial rhetoric or feigned pathos: “And he was asked, what is a merciful heart? And he answered: a person’s heart burns about all creation, about people, about birds, about animals, about demons and about every creature. When remembering them and looking at them, a person’s eyes shed tears. From the great and strong pity that envelops the heart, and from the great suffering, its heart contracts, and it cannot bear, or hear, or see any harm or small sadness endured by the creature. And therefore, for the dumb, and for the enemies of the truth, and for those who harm him, every hour he offers prayer with tears that they may be preserved and have mercy, and also for the nature of reptiles he prays with great pity, which is immeasurably aroused in his heart until he becomes like God in this.” 41 In this description of the basic altruistic impulse at its highest level there is neither “immediate identification” nor “the removal of boundaries between self and not-self”; it differs from Schopenhauer’s reasoning as living truth from literary eloquence. These words of a Christian writer also show that we do not need, as Schopenhauer mistakenly thought, to turn to Buddhism or to Indian dramas in order to learn the prayer: “May all living beings be free from suffering." The general consciousness of humanity resolutely recognizes that pity is good; a person who shows this feeling is called good; the more remotely he experiences it and the more widely he applies it, the more kind he is recognized; a ruthless person, on the contrary, is called evil par excellence. From this, however, it does not follow that all morality, or the essence of all good, can be reduced to compassion or “sympathetic feelings,” as is now very often done. “Unlimited compassion for all living beings,” notes Schopenhauer, “is the firmest and surest guarantee for a moral course of action and does not require any casuistry. The one who is filled with this feeling will probably not offend anyone, will not cause suffering to anyone, but all his actions will inevitably bear the stamp of truth and mercy. Let them try, on the contrary, to say: “This person is virtuous, but he does not know compassion,” or: “This is an unrighteous and evil person, but he is very compassionate” - and the contradiction will immediately be sensitive.” 42 These words are true only under significant restrictions. There is no doubt that pity, or compassion, is the real basis of morality, but Schopenhauer’s obvious mistake is that he recognizes this feeling as the only basis of all morality. 43 In fact, it is only one of the three foundations of morality, which has a specific scope, namely, determining our proper attitude towards other beings of our world. Pity is the only true basis of altruism, but altruism and morality are not the same thing: it is only a part of morality. It is true that “boundless compassion for all living beings is the firmest and surest guarantee,” but not for a moral course of action in general, as our philosopher mistakenly asserts, but only for a moral course of action in relation to other beings who constitute the object of compassion; and this relationship, despite all its importance, still does not exhaust the whole of morality. In addition to the relationship to other similar creatures, a person also has a relationship to his own material nature, as well as to the highest principles of all being, and these relationships tactically require a moral definition to distinguish between good and evil in them. Someone who is filled with a feeling of pity, of course, will not offend anyone, will not cause suffering to anyone, i.e. will not offend anyone else, but he can very much offend himself by indulging in carnal passions that degrade his human dignity; because with the most compassionate heart one can have a tendency towards debauchery and other base vices, which, while not at all contradicting compassion, nevertheless contradict morality, from which it is clear that these two concepts do not cover each other. Schopenhauer is right that one cannot say: “This is an unjust and evil man, but he is very compassionate,” but strangely this writer forgot that one can say and often has to say: “This is a sensual and dissolute man - a libertine, a glutton, a drunkard - but he is very compassionate,” and also everyone has heard the following speech: “Although this man leads an exemplary ascetic life, he is merciless towards his neighbors.” This means that the virtue of abstinence is possible without pity, and on the other hand, the strong development of sympathetic feelings - pity, mercy - excludes the possibility of evil actions only in the narrow sense, i.e. cruel, directly harmful to others, but it does not in the least interfere with shameful acts, which cannot, however, be considered morally indifferent even from an altruistic point of view, for a good drunkard or libertine, although he pities his loved ones and never directly intends to hurt them, but with his dissipation he, of course, harms not only himself, but also his family, which he can bring to death without any intention of harming her. And if pity does not prevent such behavior, then there must be another basis for internal counteraction to it in our moral nature, which we find in the feeling of shame, from which the rules of asceticism develop, 44 just as the rules of altruism flow from pity. The true essence of pity, or compassion, is not at all the direct identification of oneself with another, but the recognition of another’s own (belonging to) value - the right to existence and possible well-being. When I feel sorry for another person or animal, I do not confuse myself with him at all, I do not take him for myself and myself for him, but I only see in him a being akin or homogeneous with me, a being similar to me, animated, like me, wanting, like me, to live and enjoy the blessings of life. Recognizing for myself the right to fulfill such a desire, I recognize it for others; responding painfully to any violation of this right regarding me, to any insult inflicted on me, I respond in the same way to the violation of someone else’s right, to someone else’s insult - while feeling sorry for myself, I feel sorry for the other. Seeing a suffering creature, I do not at all identify, do not confuse him with myself, but only take his place in my imagination and, recognizing his homogeneity with myself, equate his states with my own, as they say, “I enter his position.” This equation (and not identification) between another and oneself, immediately and unconsciously carried out in a feeling of pity, is raised by the mind to the level of clear and separate thought. Thus, the conceivable content (idea) of pity or compassion, taken in its universality and independently of the subjective mental states in which it manifests itself (i.e., taken logically and not psychologically), is truth and justice. It is true that other beings are like me, and it is fair that I should treat them as I treat myself. This position, clear in itself, becomes even clearer with a negative check. When I treat other beings ruthlessly or indifferently, when I consider it permissible to offend them and not obligatory to help them, when I look at them only as means to my own ends, then for me they are not what they really are. A being is only a thing, a living being is dead, an animate is soulless, akin to me is a stranger, like me is certainly different. Such an attitude, in which a known object is taken not for what it really is, is a direct denial of the truth; the actions resulting from this will be unjust, and therefore the opposite attitude, which is subjectively manifested in the inner feeling of participation, pity, or compassion, objectively speaking, expresses the truth, and the actions resulting from it will be fair. Measuring with different measures is recognized by everyone as an elementary expression of injustice, but when I am merciless towards others, that is, I treat others as soulless and powerless things, and, on the contrary, I affirm myself as an animated and full-fledged person, then I obviously measure with different measures and grossly contradict truth and justice; and vice versa, when I feel sorry for others, as well as for myself, I measure with one standard and, therefore, act in accordance with truth and justice. As a permanent property and practical principle, ruthlessness is called egoism. In a pure, unalloyed form, consistent egoism does not exist, at least between people, but in order to understand the general essence of all egoism, it is necessary to characterize it as a pure, unconditional principle. This is what it is. An unconditional opposition, an impenetrable abyss, is established here between one’s self and other beings. I am everything for myself and must be everything for others, but others in themselves are nothing and become something only as a means for me; my life and well-being are an absolute goal, the life and well-being of others are allowed only as an instrument for realizing my goal, as a necessary environment for my self-affirmation. I am a single focus, and the whole world is just a circle. – Although such a point of view is rarely expressed, there is no doubt, however, that it, with certain limitations, lies at the basis of our natural life. There are no unconditional egoists on earth: everyone seems to feel sorry for someone, in someone they see something similar to themselves; but egoism, limited in a certain sphere (usually a very narrow one), manifests itself with all its force in other, broader ones. Anyone who does not adhere to this point of view in relation to his family, that is, includes his family in his Self, the more mercilessly he opposes this expanded Self to everything that is alien; whoever extends (usually very superficially) his Self to his entire people, with all the greater bitterness both for himself and for this people, takes the point of view of egoism in relation to foreigners and foreigners, etc. Expanding the circle of internal solidarity, or transferring selfishness from the individual to the family, to the people and to the state, undoubtedly has great moral significance in the life of mankind, since within this circle selfishness is limited, outweighed, and even completely replaced by relationships of a philanthropic, moral nature. However, all this does not abolish in humanity the very principle of egoism, which consists in the unconditional internal opposition of oneself and one’s own to another’s, in the establishment of an abyss between them. This principle is essentially true, because in reality there is no such unconditional opposition, no such abyss and there cannot be. Here it is clear that exclusivity, selfishness, and ruthlessness are essentially the same thing as untruth. Egoism is, first of all, unrealistic, fantastic, it affirms the non-existent and impossible. To consider oneself (in a narrow or broad sense) the exclusive center of the universe is essentially as absurd as considering oneself to be a glass bench or the constellation Ursa Major. 45 If, therefore, egoism is condemned by reason as a meaningless assertion of the non-existent and impossible, then the opposite principle of altruism, psychologically based on a feeling of pity, is fully justified by reason, as well as by conscience. By virtue of this principle, an individual person recognizes that other beings are the same relative centers of being and living forces as himself. Here the truth is affirmed, what exists is recognized. From this truth, which is evidenced internally in everyone’s soul by the feeling of pity aroused by other beings, as related and similar to him, reason derives the principle or rule of attitude towards all other beings: do with others as you want them to do with you. The general rule or principle of altruism 46 is naturally divided into two particular ones. The beginning of this dismemberment can already be seen in the basic altruistic feeling of pity. If I really feel sorry for someone, then, firstly, I myself will not cause him suffering or harm, I will not offend him, and, secondly, when he is subjected to suffering or offense independently of me, I will help him. Hence the two rules of altruism - negative and positive: 1) do not do to others anything that you do not want from others, and 2) do to others everything that you yourself would like from others. In short and simply: these two rules, usually combined together, are expressed as follows: do not offend anyone and help everyone as much as you can (Neminem laede, imo omnes, quantum potes, juva). The first, negative, rule is called, in particular, the rule of justice, the second - mercy. But this distinction is not entirely accurate. And the basis of the second rule is also justice: if I want others to help me in need, then it is fair that I help them too. On the other hand, if I do not want to offend anyone, then this is because I recognize in others the same living and suffering beings as myself; but in this case, of course, I will try, if possible, to save these creatures from suffering: I do not offend them, because I feel sorry for them, but if I feel sorry for them, then I will also help them. Mercy presupposes justice, and justice requires mercy; these are just different sides, different ways of manifesting the same thing. 47 There is a real difference between these two sides or degrees of altruism, but there is not and cannot be an opposition or contradiction. Not helping others means already offending them; a consistently just person will certainly fulfill the duties of mercy, and a truly merciful person cannot be unjust at the same time. This inseparability of two altruistic rules (with all their differences) is very important as the basis for the internal connection of law and morality, politics and the spiritual life of society. The general rule of altruism: do unto others as you would have them do unto you, does not at all imply material or qualitative equality of all subjects. Such equality does not exist in nature, and it would be pointless to demand it. This is not about equality, but only about the equal right to the existence and development of one’s positive forces. The wild Papuan has the same right to exist and improve in his own sphere as Francis of Assisi or Goethe had in theirs. We must respect this right equally in all cases - the murder of a savage is the same sin as the murder of a genius or a saint, but it does not follow that they are equal in other respects and that we should treat them equally outside the limits of this universal human right. There is no material equality, and therefore real equality (in the sense of equal legal capacity and legal capacity) not only between different beings, but also in the same being - when ages and states change, certain or special rights and obligations do not remain the same: in childhood they are not the same as in adulthood, in mental illness they are not the same as in a healthy state; however, his fundamental or universal human rights, his moral self-worth as a person remains unchanged, and in the same way it is not abolished by the endless diversity and inequality of individuals, tribes and classes. In all these differences, something unconditional and identical must be preserved, the meaning of each as an end in itself, that is, as something that cannot only be a means for other people’s goals. The logical requirements of altruism are comprehensive; reason knows no biases or barriers; and in this it coincides with the feeling on which altruism is psychologically based. Pity, as we have seen, is also universal and impartial, and in it a person reaches the point of “becoming like God,” because he embraces with equal participation everyone without distinction: the good, and the “enemies of the truth,” and people, and demons, and even “the nature of reptiles.” 48 Chapter Four. Religious principle in morality The moral rules of justice and mercy, psychologically based on the feeling of pity, although they include in their scope the entire area of ​​living beings, the content of these rules does not cover all moral relations, even between human persons. First of all: what should be the normal attitude of minors, but already capable of understanding the moral requirements of children towards their parents? Undoubtedly, there is something special, specific, irreducible to justice and humanity and irreducible from pity. The child directly recognizes the superiority of his parents over himself, his dependence on them, he feels reverence for them, and from this follows the practical duty of obedience. All this goes beyond the limits of simple altruism, the logical essence of which is that I recognize another as similar and equal to myself, I affirm for him the same meaning that I attribute to myself. The moral attitude of children towards their parents, on the contrary, is not only not determined by equality, but even has the opposite meaning - it is based on the recognition of the ways in which these beings are unequal to each other. And the psychological basis of the moral attitude here initially cannot be participation in someone else’s suffering (pity), since the parents directly appear to the child not from their need for someone else’s help, but from their own helping power in his needs. This attitude does not, of course, contradict justice, but beyond it it contains something special. The general principle of justice requires that we treat others as we would like them to treat ourselves. The moral attitude of children towards their parents can also be logically summed up under this: loving his mother or father, the child, of course, wants them to love him too. But these two forms of love - the one that a child experiences for his parents, and the one that he wishes for himself from them - have a natural difference between themselves, not arising from a common principle: in the first respect, the feeling of admiration for the higher and the duty of obedience to him dominates, and it is not at all assumed that the child demands the same respect and obedience from his parents. One can, of course, go further along the path of formal considerations and argue that children (of course, at a conscious age), honoring and obeying their parents, desire the same attitude towards themselves from their future children. But this only establishes an abstract connection between the general concept of justice and filial love, and does not in any way provide the basis for this love in its particularity. Apart from any problematic thought about future children, the moral feeling of a real child towards his parents has a completely sufficient basis in the actual relationship between this child and his parents, namely in his complete dependence on them as on his Providence - with this the recognition of their essential superiority is inevitably associated, and from here the duty of obedience logically follows; Thus, filial love receives its very special character of reverence or reverence (pietas erga parentes), which takes it beyond the general limits of simple altruism. It can be noted that parental (especially maternal) love, or pity, which represents the first fundamental manifestation of altruistic relationships, also presupposes inequality, only in the opposite direction. But here this inequality is not significant. Parents, pitying their helpless children and caring for them, themselves know from their own experience the suffering of hunger, cold, etc., which causes their pity, so here in essence there is a comparison or equation between the states of another and the same ones of their own; on the contrary, the child has not at all experienced, as his own, those advantages of mature age that evoke in him a feeling of respect or reverence for his parents, forcing him to see in them higher beings. Parents pity their children in their likeness to themselves, as homogeneous, although in fact unequal to themselves - this inequality is only incidental here; while the specific feeling of children towards their parents is essentially determined by the superiority of the latter, and is therefore directly based on inequality. If you carefully observe a child trying to protect his mother from a real or imaginary insult, it is easy to notice that his feelings are dominated by anger and indignation at the insulter of the sacred. He does not so much feel sorry for the offended woman as he is angry with the offender. The feelings of this child are essentially similar to those that animate the crowd defending their idol. “Great is Artemis of Ephesus! Death to the wicked! All manifestations of pity and the altruism that follows from it are essentially conditioned by equality, and inequality in them is only an accidental and transitory moment. By feeling sorry for another, I in any case become like him, mentally put myself in his place, enter, so to speak, into his skin; This already presupposes my equality with him as homogeneous. Recognizing another as his equal, the compassionate person compares his condition with his own and from their similarity deduces the moral obligation of participation and help. Non ignara mali miseris succurere discor. 49 To feel sorry for another, you need to equate him with yourself or yourself with him, while the supposed significant inequality, or otherness, excluding the thought of identical states, fundamentally undermines pity and any altruistic attitude. The “twice-born” Hindu is merciless towards Sudras and pariahs; basing his attitude towards them on inequality, that is, precisely on the impossibility of equating himself with them, he cannot put himself in their place, liken their conditions to his own - he cannot, therefore, take part in them. In this case, just as in the views of white planters on blacks or our ancient serf owners on “boorish spawn,” the actual cruelty of relations that had arisen sought justification for itself in the idea of ​​significant inequality, or heterogeneity. Here the recognition of inequality is purely negative, breaking the connection of beings, giving rise to or justifying all sorts of immoral relations. The positive inequality by which filial love or piety is determined has a different character. The inequality of a Brahmin with a pariah, or a planter with a Negro, abolishes the solidarity of feelings and interests between them; The advantage of parents over children determines, on the contrary, their solidarity and serves as the basis for a special kind of moral relations. Here is the natural root of religious morality, which represents a special, important area in the spiritual nature of man, regardless of positive religions and metaphysical systems. Since the last century, when De Brosse’s book about “fetish gods” appeared, an opinion began to spread, which gained great popularity especially in recent times under the influence of the positive philosophy of Auguste Comte. The original form of religion, according to this opinion, is fetishism, that is, the deification of material objects that accidentally attract attention or are arbitrarily chosen, some natural (stones, trees), some even artificial. The beginnings or remnants of such a material cult, undoubtedly, are always noticeable in all religions, but the recognition of this fetishism (which, however, may have a deeper meaning, which the founder of positivism himself began to guess about in the second era of his activity) as the main and original religion of mankind, in addition to disagreement with historical evidence and indicators about the beliefs of savages, also contains a logical inconsistency. In order to recognize a stone, a piece of wood or a shell as a god, that is, as a being of the highest significance and power, it is necessary to already have in your consciousness the concept of a higher being. I could not mistake the rope for a snake unless I had a prior idea of ​​a snake. Where does the concept of deity come from? Those material objects that are made into fetishes and idols, in themselves - in their present, sensory reality - do not have the signs of a higher being. This means that this concept was not taken from them. To say that it is innate does not answer the question. Everything that happens in a person is innate to him in a certain sense, and there is no doubt that a person by nature is capable of having the concept of a higher being, since otherwise he would not have had it; but the question is not about this ability, but about its initial use, which must have its immediate sufficient basis. Every concept, even if potentially inherent in the human mind and in this sense innate, for its transition into actual consciousness requires certain sensory impressions or perceptions that cause this potential concept to manifest and give it its living, concrete form, which then undergoes a further mental process of expansion and deepening, complication and purification. But actual impressions from a piece of wood or a crudely made block do not provide a sufficient basis for first calling into mind the concept of a higher being or serving for its initial formation. More suitable in this regard are impressions of the sun and moon, starry sky, thunderstorms, sea, rivers, etc. But even before consciousness is able to dwell on these phenomena and appreciate their significance, it has already been given, for the emergence in it of the concept of a higher being, impressions of a different kind, closer and more powerful. When it comes to the initial formation of some basic concept in human consciousness, we need to keep in mind not an adult, but a child. But there is absolutely no doubt that for a child his dependence on his mother (and then his father) who nourishes and protects him is much more tangible than on the sun, thunderstorm or river irrigating the fields of his homeland. The impressions he initially received from his parents contain sufficient basis to evoke in him the concept of a higher being and those feelings of reverent love, as well as fear of an incommensurable power, which are associated with this concept and form the basis of a religious attitude. In fact, it is undoubtedly and completely understandable that children up to a certain age do not pay any attention to the largest phenomena of nature: the sun is no more remarkable for them than a simple lamp, and heavenly thunder makes no more impression on them than the sound of household dishes. In my memories, the first surviving impression of the starry sky dates back to the age of six, and even then it was caused by a special reason (the comet of 1859), while a number of clear and coherent family memories began at the age of four. Neither in life nor in literature have I come across any indication of a reverse course of development in children; and I think that if before our eyes some three-year-old baby showed special interest in celestial phenomena, then we would feel downright creepy. Not in the form of random fetishes and handmade idols, but in tactics and not in the form of majestic or formidable natural phenomena, but in the living image of parents, the idea of ​​the Divine is first embodied for the infant person. Therefore, contrary to the prevailing opinion, from the very beginning in religion the moral element is, although not exclusively, very important. In its original idea the deity has the predominant character of Providence. First, Providence is embodied in the mother. With the disorder of marriage relations at lower levels of social development, the importance of the mother and the cult of motherhood remain predominant; various peoples, like an individual person, experienced a matriarchal, or gynecocratic era, traces of which are preserved to this day in historical evidence, in surviving customs, as well as in the modern life of some savages. 50 But with the establishment of patriarchal clan life, the role of Providence is retained for the mother only during the period of the children’s material dependence on her as their nurse and first teacher. Here, for the child, the mother is the only supreme being; but, reaching a conscious age, he sees that the mother herself is dependent on another higher being - his father, the feeder and protector of the whole family; he is the real providence, and religious veneration is naturally transferred to him. The religious attitude of children towards their parents as their living Providence, which naturally arises in primitive humanity, manifests itself with complete clarity and strength when children become adults and parents die. The veneration of deceased fathers and ancestors undoubtedly occupies a primary place in the development of religious, moral and social relations of mankind. The huge Chinese nation still lives by this religion of its ancestors, on which the entire social, state and family system of the Middle Kingdom is based; of the other peoples of the globe - wild, barbarian and educated, up to and including modern Parisians - there is not a single one who does not preserve the veneration of the dead in one form or another. The attitude towards living parents, although the first basis of religion, cannot, however, retain a purely religious character: everyday closeness and interaction interfere with this. In addition, when a child grows up, he learns from his living father about the deceased ancestor and ancestors as an object of already established religious veneration, and thus the religion of the present parents is naturally absorbed by the cult of the departed parents, elevated above everything around them, clothed in mysterious greatness. During his lifetime, the father becomes only a candidate for god, but for now only an intermediary and priest of the actual god - the deceased ancestor. It is not fear, but death that gives humanity the first gods. Just as the feeling of dependence and the concept of Providence are transferred from the mother to the father, so they are then associated with the idea of ​​ancestors when the child learns that these parents themselves, on whom he depends, are much more completely dependent on the dead, whose power is not bound by the conditions of material-corporeal existence. Thus, the concept of Providence and the moral responsibilities arising from it for a person - veneration, service, obedience - are transferred to them. To obey the will of those who have departed, you need to know it. Sometimes they communicate it directly, appearing in a vision - in a dream or in reality, in other cases it is recognized through fortune telling. At first, living fathers or elders of the clan serve as intermediaries between this highest divine power and ordinary people, then, with the complication of social relations, a special class of priests, fortune-tellers, sorcerers and prophets arises. Only a subjective, misanthropic mood can reduce filial feelings, even in primitive humanity, to fear alone, excluding from them gratitude and selfless recognition of superiority. If these moral elements are undoubtedly noticeable already in the dog’s relationship with its master, in whom it sees its living Providence, then all the more should they be present in a person’s feelings towards his Providence, originally embodied for him in his parents. And when this meaning is transferred to deceased ancestors, then, of course, the moral elements of filial love are associated with their cult, which here is already clearly distinguished from simple altruism, receiving a predominant religious character. A well-known theory, the main representative of which is Herbert Spencer, derives all religion from the veneration of dead ancestors; Although this theory does not represent the complete truth, it is much more correct and meaningful than both the theory of original fetishism and those that reduce everything to the deification of the sun, thunderstorms or other natural phenomena. The subject of religion has always been active humanoid beings, or spirits. There can hardly be any doubt that the prototype of spirits were the souls of deceased ancestors (in Lithuania and Poland the common name for all spirits is grandfathers - dziady; we have elemental spirits - the water grandfather, the goblin grandfather, also the owner of the brownie; Ovid's "Metamorphoses", mostly borrowed from the folk beliefs of the Greeks and Romans, are full of examples of the transition of dead or dying people into elemental, zoomorphic and phytomorphic (plant) deities and spirits). The most common form of fetishism - the worship of stones - is undoubtedly dependent on the cult of the dead. The Lapps, Buryats and other peoples sometimes preserve the proper names of those grandfathers or sorcerers who, after death, turned into sacred stones. 51 This transformation cannot be understood in the sense that the spirit of the deceased became a stone, that is, a soulless thing; on the contrary, he retains, and even to an enhanced degree, the power that he had during life - thus, among the Lapps, petrified sorcerers predict and send storms and bad weather to the entire area. Here the stone is only the visible seat of the spirit or the instrument of its action. Among the Semites, sacred stones were called bet-els or bet-ils, that is, houses of God. The same should be said about sacred trees. It is known that the sorcerers of African and other peoples are attributed, as their main difference, with power over atmospheric phenomena, the ability to produce bad and good weather. Such power, according to the ideas of these peoples, belongs to an even greater extent and in a more direct manner to the spirits of the dead sorcerers, for whom their living successors serve only as exorcists and intermediaries. But how does such a powerful spirit of a deceased sorcerer, producing thunderstorms and storms at will, differ from the thunder god? And where is the reasonable need to look for a different origin for the father - Zeus or grandfather - Perkunas? Without intending to present and explain the history of religious development here, I will not decide the extent to which a genetic connection can be established between the cult of the dead and solar, lunar and stellar mythology. Let me remind you just to clarify some facts. In Egypt, the solar deity Osiris reigned over the invisible world of the dead. In classical mythology, the moon - Hecate belonged to the gods of the underworld. According to the ancient belief, preserved in Manichaeism, the moon is a way station for the souls of the dead. I will note at the same time that the end of this theogonic process does not change its beginning, that the highest degree of religious consciousness represents only a deepening and expansion of the content that we find at the initial stages. The religion of the primitive human family is determined by the idea of ​​the father, or nearest ancestor, first living, then deceased. This private parent is the highest principle for the family, the source of its life and well-being, the subject of veneration, gratitude and obedience, in a word, its Providence. Through natural historical growth, communal, tribal, and folk gods are formed, until, finally, the religious consciousness of humanity, united in thought, if not in deed, has reached the idea of ​​a universal Heavenly Father with His all-encompassing Providence. Процесс развития религиозной идеи касается ее объема, а также свойства тех умственных представлений и практических предписаний, которые с нею связаны, а не нравственного ее содержания, т. е. основного отношения человека к тому, что он признает как высшее над собою, в чем он видит свое Провидение. Это отношение остается неизменным во всех формах и на всех степенях религиозного развития. Представление ребенка о своих родителях, членов рода о духе предка-родоначальника, представление целых народов о богах национальных, наконец, общечеловеческое понятие о едином и всеблагом Отце всего существующего весьма различны между собою; the forms of cult also differ. Реальная связь отца с детьми не нуждается ни в каких особых установлениях и посредствах; но связь с невидимым духом предка должна быть поддерживаема чрезвычайными способами: так как он не может разделять обыкновенного стола человеческого, а питается испарениями крови, то его нужно кормить жертвами. Жертвы домашние родовому духу, естественно, отличаются от жертв всенародных богам национальным, «бог браней» требует другого и большего, нежели дух-покровитель очага, а всеобъемлющий и вездесущий Отец вселенной вовсе не требует никаких вещественных жертв, а только поклонения в духе и истине. Но при всем том сыновнее отношение к высшему существу на всех этих различных степенях остается в сущности одно и то же. Самый грубый каннибал, как и самый совершенный праведник, поскольку оба они религиозны, сходятся в том, что и тот, и другой одинаково хотят творить не свою волю, а волю отца. Это одинаковое и всегда себе равное сыновнее отношение к высшему (в чем бы это высшее ни полагалось) и составляет тот принцип истинного пиэтизма, который связывает религию с нравственностью и может безразлично называться как религиозным началом в нравственности, так и нравственным началом в религии. 52 Is it possible, however, to affirm this principle as a generally binding moral rule along with the principles of asceticism and altruism? Apparently, a filial attitude towards a higher will depends on faith in this will, and this faith cannot be demanded from someone who does not have it: there is no judgment. But there is a misunderstanding here. Recognition of what is higher than oneself does not depend on any specific ideas of the mind and, therefore, on any positive beliefs, and in its generality it is undoubtedly obligatory for every rational-moral being. For every such being, striving for its life goal, must be convinced that its achievement, or the final satisfaction of the will, is not in human power, that is, every rational being comes to recognize its dependence on something invisible and unknown. Отрицать такую зависимость невозможно. Спрашивается только: то, от чего я завишу, имеет смысл или нет? In the same way, if, in the absence of a meaningful moral order in the world, our activities for the benefit of our neighbors can only bring harm to our neighbors instead of the desired benefit, then the moral principle of altruism is abolished by internal contradiction; assuming, for example, together with Schopenhauer, that the essence of the world is a blind and senseless will and that all existence is essentially suffering, why on earth would I try to help my neighbors in maintaining their existence, that is, in perpetuating their suffering - with such an assumption, it would be more logical, out of a feeling of pity, to make every effort to kill the greatest possible number of living beings. I can do good consciously and intelligently only when I believe in goodness, in its objective, independent meaning in the world, that is, in other words, I believe in the moral order, in Providence, in God. This faith is logically superior to all positive religious views and institutions, as well as to metaphysical teachings, and in this sense it constitutes what is called natural religion. All demands of morality receive their reasonable sanction from natural religion. Let us suppose that reason directly tells us that it is good to subordinate the flesh to the spirit, it is good to help our neighbors, to recognize the rights of others as our own; but in order to obey these suggestions of reason, you need to believe in it, believe that the good that it demands from us is not a subjective illusion, that it has valid foundations, or expresses the truth, and that this “truth is great and prevails.” Not to have this faith means not to believe in the meaning of one’s own life, it means to abandon the dignity of a rational being. The absence of natural religion is often imaginary. A negative attitude towards one or another dominant form or degree of religious consciousness at a given time and place is easily mistaken for a complete denial. Thus, the pagans of the Roman Empire recognized Christians as godless (αθεοι), and from their point of view they were right, since all their gods were really rejected by Christianity. But besides this, there are, of course, real cases of atheism, or unbelief, that is, the fundamental denial of anything higher than oneself - goodness, reason, truth. But the fact of such a negation, which coincides with the negation of morality in general, cannot serve as an objection to the universally binding religious and moral principle, just as the existence of shameless people devoted to the flesh or ruthless and cruel people says nothing against the moral obligation of abstinence and mercy. Religious morality, like morality in general, is not a confirmation of everything that happens, but a prescription of one thing, something that should happen. Regardless of any positive beliefs and any kind of unbelief, every person, as a rational being, must recognize that the life of the world in general and his own in particular has meaning, that, therefore, everything depends on a higher rational principle, by the power of which this meaning is held and realized, and recognizing this, he must put himself in a filial position relative to the highest principle of life, that is, gratefully surrender to his providence and subordinate all his actions to the “will of the father”, speaking through reason and conscience. Just as mental ideas about parents and external, practical attitudes towards them change according to the age of the children, but filial love must remain unchanged, so theological ideas and ways of honoring the Heavenly Father change in a variety of ways as humanity grows spiritually, but the religious and moral attitude - the free subordination of one’s will to the demands of a higher principle - must always and everywhere remain unconditionally the same. In morality in general, higher requirements do not cancel lower ones, but presuppose them and include them. It would seem that this goes without saying; Meanwhile, many did not understand and do not understand this simple and clear truth. Thus, according to the teachings of some Christian sects, ancient and modern, the highest rule of celibacy abolishes the seventh commandment as the lowest, as a result of which these sectarians, denying marriage, willingly allow all types of fornication. Apparently they got lost. In a similar way, many people think that the highest rule of pitying all living beings frees them from the lower duty of pitying their relatives and household, although it would seem undoubted that these latter also belong to living beings. This kind of misconception is even more common in the field of religious morality. The highest levels of religious consciousness, having been achieved, subjugate and thereby modify, but in no way abolish, those demands that were valid at the lower levels. Of course, a person who has a concept of the Heavenly Father cannot relate to his earthly father in the same way as an infant, for whom this latter is the only higher being; it does not follow from this, however, that the first and second commandments abolish the fifth. We cannot now show our deceased ancestors the religious veneration with which they were surrounded during tribal life, but this does not mean that we have no responsibilities towards the dead. Let us be aware of our dependence on the one Father of the universe, but this dependence is not direct; our existence is undoubtedly determined primarily by heredity and the environment. Heredity is the ancestors, and the environment is created by them. The Higher Will determined our existence through our ancestors, and while bowing before its action, we cannot be indifferent to the instruments of this action. I know that if I had been born among cannibals, I would have been a cannibal myself, and I cannot help but feel gratitude and reverence for those people who, through their labors and exploits, brought my people out of a savage state and brought them to the level of culture at which they now find themselves. This is done by Providence through called men who cannot be separated from their providential work. If it is important and dear to me that my homeland, with which my existence is so closely connected, was given the opportunity to be a Christian and European country, then I cannot deny the pious memory of either the Kyiv prince who christened Rus', or that northern giant who broke the Muscovite-Mongol isolation with mighty blows and introduced Russia into the circle of educated peoples, or all those who in different areas of life and spirit moved us along the path opened by these two historical founders of Russia. It is sometimes argued that personality in itself means nothing in history, that what these people did would have been done by others anyway. Abstractly speaking, of course, we could have been born by other parents besides our real father and mother, but this idle thought about possible parents does not abolish our duties to actual ones. The providential men who introduced us to the highest religion and human enlightenment were not the original creators of these goods. What they gave us, they themselves received from former world-historical geniuses, heroes and ascetics, to whom we should extend our grateful memory. We must restore with the greatest completeness the entire chain of our spiritual ancestors, people through whom Providence moved humanity along the path to perfection. The pious memory of our ancestors obliges us to actively serve them. The essence of this service, conditioned by the essence of universal existence in general, presupposes both theoretical philosophy and aesthetics for its understanding. And here it was only possible to indicate the moral basis and principle of this matter - pious and grateful veneration of ancestors. Such a cult of human ancestors in spirit and truth does not detract from the religion of the one Heavenly Father, but, on the contrary, gives it certainty and reality. In these “chosen vessels” what He put into them is also honored; in these visible images of the invisible Divinity, it itself is known and glorified. In whom certain images of providential action embodied in history do not evoke gratitude, reverence and admiration, he will be even less responsive to the pure thought of Providence. A real religious attitude towards the highest is impossible for one who has never experienced the feelings expressed by the poet: When from the hops of crime And the evil genius is happy to drag himself in the mud In the shadow of a mysterious church I study through the waves of incense Listen to the words of your mentors Trusting the noble thought, Breathe with their mighty sigh. Chapter five. About virtues Each of the moral principles I have established - shame, pity and religious feeling - can be considered from three sides: as a virtue, as a rule of action and as a condition for a certain good. Thus, in relation to shame, we first of all distinguish between people who are bashful and shameless by nature, and the first are approved, and the second are condemned; hence modesty is recognized as a good natural quality or virtue. But in this way, it is abstracted from particular cases and elevated to a norm or a general rule of action (and through this, a basis for evaluating actions), regardless of the presence or absence of this virtue in one person or another. If modesty is not something good in one case and bad in another (as, for example, a loud voice is good in a public meeting and bad in the room of a sleeping sick person), if modesty in itself is good, then reason requires us in any case to act in accordance with it, namely, to refrain from all actions that are shameful, that is, expressing the predominance of a lower nature over a higher one, and to practice actions of the opposite nature. Behavior consistent with this rule results in constant self-control, freedom of the spirit and its power over material existence, i.e. to a state that gives us some higher satisfaction, or represents a moral good. In the same way, the capacity for pity, or compassion (as opposed to selfishness, cruelty and anger), is, firstly, a good personal quality or virtue; insofar as it is recognized as such or encouraged, it provides a norm for altruistic activity according to the rules of justice and mercy, and such activity leads to the moral good of true community or solidarity with others, ultimately with all living beings. In the same way, a grateful feeling for that highest thing on which we depend, being the natural basis of the virtue called piety, thereby provides a reasonable rule of religious behavior; it also leads to the moral benefit of solidarity with the primary causes and bearers of being: with ancestors, with the dead in general, and with the entire invisible world that determines our life from this point of view. Given the inextricable internal connection between a given virtue, the rules of action corresponding to it, and the moral good that arises from this, we do not need to take all these points of view each time in a more specific consideration of ethical content; it will be enough to limit ourselves to one - the point of view of virtue, since it logically includes the other two, as a result of which a strict distinction is made between them. In fact, it is impossible to refuse as a virtuous person someone who invariably acts according to the rules of virtue, even if he only possessed the corresponding natural property to a weak degree or was even distinguished by the opposite. On the other hand, what I, in contrast to virtue, call moral good, is also virtue, but not in the original, given, but in an acquired state - a norm of activity that has turned into second nature. A virtuous person is the person he should be. In other words, virtue is a person’s normal or proper attitude towards everything (for it is impossible to think of qualities or properties that are not relative). The proper attitude is not the same attitude. Distinguishing ourselves from another, we necessarily posit or define this other in three ways: either as lower (essentially), or as similar to us (homogeneous), or as higher than us. There obviously cannot be a fourth here. From here logically follows the threefold nature of the due, or moral, attitude, for it is clear that treating the lower (say, the drive of material nature) as if it were higher (say, the prescription of the divine will) will in no way be a proper attitude; in the same way, it will be contrary to what should be done if we treat a being similar to ourselves (say, a human one) either as inferior (looking at it as a soulless thing) or as superior (seeing it as a deity). So, we have not one, but three due, or moral, relations, or three types of virtues, corresponding to three areas into which the entire totality of objects related to us is necessarily divided - necessary because man does not find himself either an unconditionally dominant or superior being, or an unconditionally subordinate or inferior being, or, finally, the only one of his kind: he recognizes himself as an average being, and, moreover, one of many averages; from which, as a direct logical consequence, the trinity of his moral relations is derived. Because of this, one and the same quality or manifestation can have completely different and even opposite meanings, depending on the subject area it relates to. Thus, belittling oneself, or recognizing one’s insignificance, when it relates to objects of higher dignity, is called humility and is a virtue, but in relation to unworthy objects it is called baseness and is an immoral matter. In the same way, enthusiasm, when it is caused by high principles and ideals, is undoubtedly a virtue, but in relation to indifferent objects it is a ridiculous weakness, and when associated with objects of a lower order, it becomes a shameful mania. So, from virtues in the proper sense, which are always and in all such, because in essence they express a quality that is properly defined, or corresponds to the very meaning of one or another of the three possible areas of life relationship, - from these definite and defining virtues one should distinguish the qualities of the will and modes of action, which do not have in themselves their own moral definition, or constant correspondence with a certain sphere of what is proper, and therefore can be either virtues, or indifferent states, or even vices, and, however, a change in moral meaning is not always accompanied by a corresponding change in the name for a given psychological property. It is clear, therefore, that even if we did not find in mental experience the three basic moral feelings: shame, pity and reverence, on logical grounds alone it would be necessary to divide the entirety of moral relations into three spheres, or to accept three main types of virtues as expressing a person’s proper attitude towards what is lower than him, to what is similar to him or similar to him, and to what is above him. If, in addition to the moral foundations we recognize: shame, pity and reverence for the highest, we go through all the other qualities that were considered virtues in ancient and modern times, then there will not be a single one among them that in itself would deserve this name. Each of these various qualities is only rightfully recognized as a virtue when it agrees with those objective norms of proper attitude, which are expressed in the three basic moral data we have indicated. Thus, abstinence or moderation has the dignity of virtue only when it relates to shameful states and actions, limiting or removing them. Virtue does not require that we be abstinent or moderate in general or in everything, but only that we abstain from what is below our human dignity and which we would be ashamed to allow unhindered. But if someone is moderate in his search for truth or refrains from benevolence towards his neighbors, no one will consider or call him virtuous for this, but, on the contrary, will condemn him for the lack of magnanimous aspirations; From here it is clear that moderation is not in itself or at its root a virtue, but it becomes or does not become such, depending on its proper or improper application to certain objects. In the same way, courage, or courage, is a virtue only insofar as it expresses the proper - namely, dominant and imperious - attitude of the rational human being to the lower material nature, the elevation of the spirit above the animal instinct of self-preservation. 53 Valiant courage is shown by one who does not tremble in the face of random disasters, who maintains self-control in the face of external dangers and boldly risks life and material goods for the sake of higher and more worthy goods. But the most courageous commission of atrocities, the most daring infliction of insults and the most fearless trampling of sacred things are not praised as virtues, just as the fear of sin or the fear of God is not imputed to shameful cowardice. And here, it means, the property of being virtuous or vicious depends on the appropriate attitude towards the subject, and not on the psychologically significant quality of sensitive and volitional states. The third of the so-called cardinal (cornerstone) virtues 54 - wisdom, i.e. understanding the best ways and means to achieve set goals and the ability to properly apply these means - receives its meaning as a virtue not simply as this formal ability to act most appropriately, but in its indispensable dependence on the dignity of the goals themselves. Wisdom as a virtue is the ability to best achieve the best goals, or the ability to most expediently apply one's mental powers to the most worthy objects. Without this last condition one can be wise, but such wisdom will not be a virtue. The biblical “serpent”, of course, justified its name as the wisest of the earthly animals by its understanding of the spiritual nature of man and the skill with which he used this understanding to achieve his goal; but since the goal itself was not good, then all this excellent wisdom of the serpent was not recognized as virtue, but was cursed as a source of evil, and the wisest animal remained a symbol of the immoral, creeping mind, philosophizing only the base and unworthy. – And in everyday life, that worldly wisdom that goes no further than understanding human weaknesses and the ability to arrange personal affairs in accordance with the goals of selfishness is not recognized as a virtue. The concept of justice (the fourth cornerstone virtue) is taken in four different senses. In the broadest sense, fair is a synonym for what is due, correct, normal, true in general - not only in the moral area (relative to will and action), but also in the mental area (relative to cognition and thinking); for example: “You are reasoning fairly or cette solution (d'un problème mathèmatique ou métaphysique) est juste” (This solution (of a mathematical or metaphysical problem) is just (French)) In this sense, the concept of justice, approaching the concept of certainty, is broader than the concept of virtue and belongs more to theoretical than to moral philosophy. In the second, more specific sense, justice (aequitas (equality (Latin)) corresponds to the basic principle of altruism, which requires recognizing equally for all others the right to life and well-being that everyone recognizes for themselves. And in this sense, justice is not some special virtue, but only a logical objective expression of that very moral principle, which is subjectively, or psychologically, expressed in the basic feeling of pity (compassion, sympathy). In the sense, the concept of justice is accepted when a distinction is made between the degrees of altruism (or moral attitude towards creatures similar to us) and the first, negative degree (“not to offend anyone”) is left with the name of justice proper (justitia), and the second, positive, requiring “to help everyone,” is designated as mercy (caritas, charité). This distinction, as stated above (in the third chapter), has only a conditional meaning, insufficient in any case to highlight justice as a special virtue, for no one will see such in a person who, without causing direct offense to his neighbors through violent actions, resolutely refuses to help anyone or alleviate anyone’s suffering. Since the moral motive for both, i.e. for abstaining from insults and for delivering help, one and the same, namely the recognition of sensitive rights to life and well-being, and since no moral motive can be found that would force someone to stop right here, halfway and limit themselves to one negative side of this moral requirement, it is clear that such a stop or such a limitation cannot in any way correspond to any special virtue, but express only a lesser degree of general altruistic virtue (sympathetic feeling), and no There is no generally binding and permanent measure for less and more, and each time the assessment depends on specific conditions. With a certain development of moral consciousness in the social environment, refusal to help, even a completely stranger or even a hostile person, is condemned by conscience as a direct insult, which is quite logical, because if I should help my neighbor at all, then by not helping him, I thereby offend him. And even at the lower levels of moral consciousness, within certain limits, refusal to help is tantamount to offense and crime, for example. within a family, clan, military squad. Among barbarian peoples, where everything is allowed regarding enemies, so that the very concept of offense has no application here, a peaceful wanderer or guest has the right to the most active help and generous gifts. But if justice prescribes beneficence or demands to be merciful (among barbarians - in relation to some, and with the progress of morality - in relation to all), then it is clear that such justice is not a special virtue separate from mercy, but only a direct expression of the general moral principle of altruism, which has various degrees and forms of its application, but always contains the idea of ​​justice. Finally, there is a fourth sense in which this word is taken. Assuming that laws (state, church) serve as an objective expression of truth, strict adherence to laws is considered an unconditional moral obligation and a corresponding disposition towards strict regularity or legality is recognized as a virtue, identifying it with justice. This view is applicable only within the limits of its assumption, that is, entirely - to the laws emanating from Divine perfection and thereby expressing the highest truth, to all others - only under the condition of their agreement with this truth; for it is fitting to obey God more than men. Thus, justice in this sense, that is, the desire for legality, is not a virtue in itself, and may not be such, depending on the nature and origin of the laws that require obedience. For the source of human laws is a vague source. A transparent stream of moral truth is barely visible in it under the overlay of other, purely historical elements, expressing only the actual relationship of forces and interests at one time or another. Therefore, justice, as a virtue, does not always coincide with legality, or legal truth, and sometimes is in direct contradiction with it, as the jurists themselves recognize: summus jus - summa in juria (highest law - highest injustice (lat.)). But fully recognizing the difference and possible conflict between internal truth and the law, many believe that such a conflict should always be resolved in favor of legality, that is, that justice in any case requires obeying the law, even if it is unjust, and in support of this opinion they refer to the authority and example of the ancient righteous man, Socrates, who considered it impermissible to flee by flight from the legal, albeit unjust, verdict against him of the Athenian judges. But in fact, this famous example does not quite say that. In his decision, Socrates - as far as we know from Xenophon and Plato - was guided mainly by motives of two kinds. Firstly, he found that fleeing that small remainder of his life, which he, as a 70-year-old old man, could count on, would be shameful cowardice, especially for him, who believed in the immortality of the soul and taught that true wisdom is constant dying (for the material world); secondly, Socrates found that a citizen must sacrifice his personal well-being to domestic laws, even if unjust, for the sake of filial piety. Thus, Socrates was guided by the moral impulses of asceticism and piety, and not by the unconditional meaning of legality, which he never recognized. Moreover, in the case of Socrates, there was no clash of two duties, but only a clash of personal right with civil duty, and it can be accepted in principle that the right must yield. No one is obliged to protect his material life: it is only a right, which is always permissible, and sometimes commendable, to sacrifice. It is another matter when the civil duty of obedience to the laws collides not with personal right, but with a moral obligation, as in the famous classic example of Antigone, who had to choose between the religious and moral obligation to give an honest burial to her brother and the civil duty of obedience to the ungodly and inhuman, but legally fair (as coming from the legitimate authority of the native city) prohibition to give such a burial. Here the rule comes into force: it is proper to obey God more than men, and it clearly turns out that justice - in the sense of legality, or the formal legal regularity of actions - is not a virtue in itself, but may or may not become such, depending on the situation. Therefore, the heroism of Socrates, who yielded to an unjust law, and the heroism of Antigone, who violated such a law, are equally approved - and not only because in both cases there was a sacrifice of life, but because of the very essence of the matter: Socrates gave up his material right for the sake of the highest ideas of human dignity and patriotic duty, and Antigone asserted someone else's right and thereby fulfilled her duty, for the burial of her brother was his right, and for her it was duty, whereas Socrates was not at all obliged to escape from his prison. – In general, pietas erga patriam, just like pietas erga parentes, (love for the homeland (lat.); love for parents (lat.)) can only oblige us to sacrifice our own, but not someone else’s right. Suppose, for example, that filial piety, carried to the point of heroism, induces someone not to resist his father, who intends to kill him. One can argue about the moral merit of such heroism, but no one would even think of justifying or finding heroic the same person if he considers himself obliged to kill his brother or sister out of obedience to his father. – Exactly the same applies to unjust and inhumane laws, from which it is clear that justice in the sense of obedience to the laws as such, according to the motto: fiat justitia, pereat mundus (let justice be done, let the world perish (lat.)) is not in itself a virtue. The three so-called theological virtues accepted in patristic (ecclesiastical) and scholastic ethics: faith, hope and love 55 also represent moral dignity not by themselves unconditionally, but only depending on other data. Not every faith is a virtue for theologians. Faith that has for itself an object that does not exist or an object that is unworthy, or that relates unworthily to something worthy is not recognized as such. So, in the first case, if someone firmly believes in the philosopher's stone, that is, in a powder, liquid or gas that turns all metals into gold, then such faith, relating to an object that does not exist in the nature of things, is considered not a virtue, but self-delusion. In the second case, if someone, not limiting himself to a thorough recognition of the existence of an evil force as a fact, makes this force an object of faith in the sense of trust and devotion, so that he enters into an agreement with it, sells his soul to the unclean, etc., then such faith, as relating to an object, although existing, but unworthy and harmful, is rightly considered to be an extreme moral failure. Finally, in the third case, the faith of the demons themselves, about whom the apostle says that they believe (in God) and tremble, 56 is not recognized as virtue, because although it relates to an existing and absolutely worthy object, it relates to it in an unworthy manner (instead of joy - with horror, instead of attraction - with disgust). So, only that faith in a Supreme Being that treats him in a worthy manner, namely with free filial piety, can be considered a virtue. And such faith completely coincides with the religious feeling that we found as one of the three primary foundations of morality. Moreover, the second theological virtue, hope, essentially boils down to this. There is no talk about it when someone relies on his own strength or wisdom, or “on princes and sons of mankind,” or even on God, but only in expectation of material benefits from him. Only hope that relates to God as the source of true future good is considered virtue; and this is the same basic religious attitude, modified by an idea of ​​the future and a sense of expectation. Finally, the third and greatest theological virtue - love - receives this moral meaning only depending on the given substantive definitions. Love in itself, or love in general, is not a virtue, otherwise all beings would be virtuous, indifferently, since they all certainly love something and live by their love. But egoistic love for oneself and one’s own, as well as passionate love for natural and unnatural pleasures, love for drinks, for hound hunting and horse riding, are not considered a virtue. Il faut en ce bas monde aimer beaucoup de choses (In this sinful world you need to love many things (French)) - inspires the New Pagan poet. Such “love” was rejected in advance by the apostle of love: Do not love the world or everything in the world. 57 This is the first, negative member in the commandment of love, which should not be forgotten, as is usually done. It is nothing more than an expression of the basic principle of asceticism: to protect oneself from the lower nature and to resist its grasp. For by the world that we should not love, the apostle means, as is clear from the context, not the assembly of our neighbors and not the totality of creation proclaiming the glory of God, but only the dark, meaningless basis of material nature, emerging from its proper, passive and potential position and lawlessly invading the realm of the human spirit: it is immediately said that everything in the world is the lust of the flesh, that is, the desire of the immeasurable sensuality, lust of the eyes, i.e. greed, or lust for money, and worldly pride, i.e. vanity and lust for power. To the negative injunction: do not love the world, biblical ethics adds two positive ones: love God with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself. These two loves are correctly distinguished from each other, for the peculiarity of objects certainly determines the peculiarity of the proper, moral attitude towards them. Love for neighbors is determined by pity, love for God - by reverence. To love your neighbor as yourself really means to pity him as yourself, and loving God with all your heart means complete devotion to Him, the complete union of your will with His will, that is, the perfection of filial, or religious feeling and attitude. Thus, the commandment of love is not associated with any particular virtue, but is the final expression of all the basic requirements of morality in three necessary spheres of relations: to the lower, higher and homogeneous being. Having shown that the four “cardinal”, as well as the three “theological” virtues, are reduced in one way or another to the three primary foundations of morality indicated to us, and do not represent independent sources of moral actions, I can leave to the good will and intelligence of the readers to continue such an analysis in application to other so-called virtues. There is no generally accepted list of them, and through scholastic distinctions one can multiply their number indefinitely. Only in the form of some “overdue” addition to the previous one, I want to say a few words about five virtues that are of certain interest in one respect or another, namely generosity, unselfishness, generosity, patience and truthfulness. We call a man generous who finds it beneath his dignity or shameful to insist on his material rights to the detriment of others or to connect his will with lower worldly interests (for example, vanity), which he therefore easily sacrifices for the sake of higher considerations. We also call generous a person who calmly endures everyday troubles and misfortunes because, again, he considers it shameful to make the peace of his spirit dependent on material accidents. The words already underlined show that this virtue is only a special expression or form of manifestation of our first moral foundation - the self-affirmation of the human spirit against the lower, material side of our existence. The whole point here is a sense of human dignity, the same one that is initially expressed in simple shame. Selflessness is freedom of the spirit from attachment to a special kind of material wealth, namely property. Clearly, this means that this is a special expression of the same feeling of human dignity; accordingly, the vices opposite to this virtue: stinginess and greed are recognized as shameful. Generosity in its external manifestations coincides with generosity and selflessness, but has a different internal basis - altruistic. A virtuous-generous person is one who, out of justice or love of humanity, shares his property with others (for since he does this out of vanity or arrogance, there is no virtue here). But at the same time, such a person can even be tied to the stinginess of the property that he gives away, and in this case he cannot, strictly speaking, be called disinterested; it should only be said that in him the altruistic virtue of generosity overcomes the vice of self-interest. Patience (as a virtue) is only the passive side of that spiritual quality, which in its active manifestation is called generosity, or spiritual courage. Here almost all the difference is limited to subjective shades that do not allow firm distinctions. Looking at the same person calmly enduring adversity or torment, one will call him generous, another – patient, a third – courageous, a fourth will see here an example of a special virtue - equanimity (αταραζία), etc. The debate about the relative merits of these definitions can only be of lexical, not ethical, interest. On the other hand, the unity of external signs can here (as in the previous case of generosity) cover up a significant difference in ethical content. One can patiently endure physical and mental suffering or due to low sensitivity of the nerves, dullness of mind and apathy of temperament - and then this is not a virtue at all; or due to the inner strength of the spirit, which is not inferior to external influences - and then this is an ascetic virtue (reduced to our first moral basis); or due to meekness and love for one’s neighbor (caritas), not wanting to repay evil for evil and insult for insult - and in this case this is an altruistic virtue (reduced to the second basis: pity, extended here even to the enemy and the offender); or, finally, patience comes from submission to the higher will, on which everything that happens depends - and then this is a pietistic or religious virtue (reduced to the third basis). A special type of patience is a quality that is given the grammatically incorrect name of tolerance in Russian (passivum pro activo (receptivity to action (Latin)). This is the name for allowing someone else’s freedom, even if it was assumed that it leads to theoretical and practical errors. And this property and attitude is not in itself either a virtue or a vice, but can be one or the other in different cases, depending on the subject (for example, the triumphant atrocity of the strong over the weak should not be tolerated, and therefore “tolerance” towards it is not virtuous, but immoral), mainly depending on internal motives, which can be generosity, cowardice, respect for the rights of others, and disregard for their welfare, and deep confidence in the victorious power of the highest truth, and indifference to this truth 58. Among the derivative, or secondary, virtues, truthfulness should be recognized as the most important, both in its specially human character (for, in a precise sense, it is possible only for a verbal being), 59 and in its significance for public morality. At the same time, this virtue has served and still serves as a reason for special disputes between moralists of various directions. The word is an instrument of reason for expressing what is, what can and what should be, that is, real, formal and ideal truth. The possession of such an instrument belongs to the highest nature of man, and therefore when he abuses it, expressing lies for the sake of lower, material goals, then he commits something contrary to human dignity, something shameful. At the same time, the word is an expression of human solidarity, the most important means of communication between people; only a truthful word can be like that; therefore, when an individual person uses a word to express untruth for the sake of his own egoistic (not individual-egoistic only, but also collectively-egoistic, for example, family, class, party, etc.) goals, then he violates the rights of others (since the word is a common property) and harms common life. If a lie, thus, being shameful for the liar himself, is at the same time offensive and harmful for those being deceived, then it means that the requirement of truthfulness has a twofold moral basis: firstly, in the human dignity of the subject himself and, secondly, in justice, that is, in recognizing the right of others not to be deceived by me, since I myself cannot want to be deceived. All this follows directly from reason and does not contain anything doubtful. But school philosophy, distracting the requirement of truthfulness from its moral foundations and turning it into a special virtue, which in its own right has unconditional significance, creates contradictions and bewilderments that do not follow from the essence of the matter. If, giving unconditional significance to the rule do not lie, as not allowing any exceptions in any case, by a lie we meant a contradiction of truth in the full sense of the word, i.e., not only real and formal truth, but also primarily ideal, or purely moral truth (that which should), then this would be completely true and indisputable, for it is clear that truth ceases to be truth if there can be at least one case in which it is permissible to deviate from it. No questions could arise here, at least between people who understand that A = A and 2×2 = 4. But the fact is that those philosophers who especially insist on the rule “don’t lie,” as if it cannot have any exception, themselves fall into falsity, arbitrarily limiting the meaning of truth (in each given case) to one of its real or, more precisely, factual side, taken separately. Taking this point of view, they come to such an absurd dilemma (I give a commonly used example as the simplest and clearest): when someone, having no other means to prevent a murderer pursuing his innocent victim, hides the person being pursued in his house and, when asked by the murderer if so-and-so is here, answers in the negative, and for greater persuasiveness “averts his eyes”, pointing to a completely different place, then one of two things: having lied to such Thus, he acted either in accordance with his moral duty or contrary to it. In the first case, it turns out to be permissible to violate the moral commandment do not lie, which deprives morality of its unconditional significance and opens the door for the justification of all evil; and in the second case, if this person sinned with his fiction, then it turns out that the moral duty of truthfulness obliged him in fact to become a decisive accomplice of the murderer in his crime, which is equally disgusting to both reason and moral feeling. With such a formulation of the matter, there cannot be a middle ground, for it goes without saying that this person’s refusal to answer or an evasive answer would only confirm the murderer’s assumption and would finally betray the victim to him. As is known, moralists of such magnitude as Kant and Fichte, who stand for the unconditional and formal nature of moral precepts, believe that even in such circumstances a lie would be impermissible, that, therefore, the person asked was obliged to fulfill the duty of truthfulness, without thinking about the consequences that (as if) were not his responsibility. Other moralists, who reduce all morality to a feeling of sympathy, or the principle of altruism, believe that lying is permissible and even obligatory in general for the salvation and good of others - the principle is too broad and vague, opening the door to all sorts of abuses. How, however, can we resolve the question: should that unfortunate man have lied or should he not? When both terms of a dilemma equally lead to absurdities, then there is something wrong in the very formulation of the dilemma. In the present question, this problem depends on the ambiguity of the word “lie (false, lie),” which, meanwhile, is accepted here as if it had only one meaning or as if one sense necessarily contained another, which in fact is not the case. Thus, this main word is accepted falsely at the very basis of the reasoning, and therefore no conclusions other than false ones can come from here. Let us analyze this in detail, and let the reader not complain about some pedantry in our analysis: after all, the question itself arose only due to the school pedantry of abstract moralists. By formal definition, a lie is a contradiction between someone's statement 60 about some fact and the actual existence or mode of existence of this fact. But this formal concept of lying is not directly related to morality. A statement that contradicts reality can sometimes only be erroneous, and in this case its actual falsity is limited only to the objective (or, more precisely, manifested) area, without in any way affecting the moral side of the subject, that is, there is no lie at all in the moral sense: an error is not considered false. Starting from the extreme case, there is no violation of truthfulness in the fact that a person tells a fable absent-mindedly, or, as in the famous joke, a German, confusing English words with German ones, claimed that he had become a cup of tea (I became a cap of tea). But in addition to errors of language, the same must be said about errors of thought, or delusions. Many people have asserted verbally and in writing (and now affirm) things as false (in the objective sense) as turning a person into a cup of tea, but they did and do this consciously - with the intention of saying exactly what they say, and if they sincerely accept a lie as the truth, then no one will recognize them as liars and will not see anything immoral in their delusion. So, neither the contradiction between words and reality, nor the contradiction between thoughts and reality constitutes a lie in the moral sense. Doesn't it consist in the contradiction of the will with reality as such, that is, in the simple intention to lie? But such a simple intention does not happen at all. People (at least those who are subject to moral responsibility) lie for something or because of something: some - to satisfy their vanity, in order to express themselves in some way, to attract attention, to distinguish themselves, others - for the sake of material calculations, in order to deceive someone for their own benefit. Both of these types of lies, of which the first is called boasting, and the second - deception, are subject to moral judgment and condemnation, as shameful for the liar himself and as offensive and harmful for others. But besides vain lies, or boasting, and selfish lies, or deception, there is a more subtle type of lie, which does not have directly low goals and, however, is subject to moral condemnation as offensive to one’s neighbor: namely, lies out of contempt for humanity, starting from the everyday “I’m not at home” and ending with complex political, religious and literary hoaxes. There is, in fact, nothing shameful in this lie, in the strict sense of the word (of course, in those cases where the hoax has no material goals), but it is immoral from the point of view of altruism, as it violates the rights of those being deceived. The hoaxer himself, obviously, would not want to be deceived and would consider the hoax directed against him to be an offensive violation of his human rights. Therefore, he must respect the same right in others. The example of a person averting the eyes of a murderer in order to prevent the murder obviously does not fit into the first types of immoral lies (i.e., neither boasting nor selfish deception); is it not possible to classify it as the latter, i.e., an immoral mystification in the sense of insulting one’s neighbor? Isn’t humanity being despised here in the person of a murderer, who is still a man and should not lose any of his human rights? But these human rights cannot in any way include the right of a murderer to my assistance in committing a murder, and it is precisely such assistance and only this that is meant when he asks about the whereabouts of his victim. Is it permissible for a moralist to create deliberate fictions, especially when it comes to human life? And what else, if not a deliberate fiction, would be the assumption that the murderer, when asking his question, thinks at all about the truth, is interested in knowing the truth, and that, therefore, he, like any other person, has the right to an accurate answer from those who know this truth. After all, in reality there is none of this. After all, the killer’s request does not exist at all as a separate and independent act expressing his curiosity about the actual whereabouts of his victim: this request is only an inseparable moment in a whole series of actions that together constitute an attempted murder, and an affirmative answer would not at all be a fulfillment of the general obligation to tell the truth, but only criminal complicity, thanks to which the attempt would turn into the commission of murder. If we talk about truthfulness, then truthfulness first of all requires taking every matter as it is, in its actual integrity and its own, internal meaning. But the words and actions of the murderer in our example are united and receive their real meaning only from his design to kill this person; therefore, only in connection with this plan can one truthfully evaluate both these very words and actions, and the attitude of another person towards them. Since the criminal plan is known to us, we have neither the theoretical basis nor the moral right to separate this person’s question (and, consequently, our answer to it) from the subject to which it actually relates. From this only truthful point of view, the killer’s question only means: help me commit murder, and in fact, an exact answer to it, distracting from the real meaning of the question and giving it, despite the evidence, some relation to the truth, would be downright false - from the theoretical side, but in practice would only mean the fulfillment of this criminal demand; whereas “averting one’s eyes” would be the only possible way of refusing this requirement - a refusal that is morally obligatory not only in relation to the victim, whose life it saves, but also in relation to the villain, whom this gives time to come to his senses and abandon his criminal intention. Nevertheless, we can talk here about a violation of the law; to confuse the demand for criminal complicity with the right to hear the truth from someone who knows would be too gross a mistake. It would also be a mistake to insist that a person, who, due to a moral obligation, prevented the murder in the only possible way, nevertheless lied and, therefore, acted badly - this would mean confusing the two meanings of the word “lie” - formal and moral, the essential difference of which was indicated above. For supporters of false moral rigorism, there is still an imaginary refuge on religious grounds: although no human right is violated by leading a murderer on a false trail, is this not a violation of divine right? If there is a commandment given from above “do not lie,” then we are certainly obliged to fulfill it, placing the consequences on the will of God. But the fact is that such an abstract commandment prohibiting lying in general or in a formal sense does not exist at all in the word of God, 61 while the commandment to sacrifice one’s very soul for one’s neighbors, and not just the formal correctness of one’s words, undoubtedly exists and requires fulfillment. Is it not possible, however (from a mystical point of view), to find a way to fulfill here the main commandment of love, avoiding, however, formal lies? Is it not possible, having given the murderer his victim, then turn to God with a prayer that He would somehow miraculously prevent the murder? Although there are known cases of prayer that produced the desired effect contrary to all human probabilities, this was only in hopeless extremes, when no natural means remained. But to demand a miracle from God, when you yourself can prevent trouble in a simple and harmless way, would be extremely wicked. It would be a different matter if the last human remedy were immoral, but to refer here to the immorality of a formal lie as such would mean to assume exactly what needs to be proven and what cannot be logically proven, for this assumption is again based on the confusion of two completely different concepts: false and deceitful. In our example, the answer to the killer’s question is undoubtedly false, but it is condemned as false, because the formal falsity of someone’s words in itself does not relate to morality and cannot be subject to condemnation. And falsity is subject to such condemnation as the expression of an intention that is immoral in any sense, for in what other way could it be different from simple falsity? Meanwhile, it is precisely no immoral intention, in any sense, and therefore no falsity in the present case that can be found. In a condensed conclusion, our long argument can be expressed as follows. A formally false statement, that is, one that contradicts the fact to which it refers, is not always a lie in the moral sense, or manifest falsity, but becomes such only when it comes from bad will, deliberately abusing the word for its own purposes; the bad property of the will consists in its contradiction not to some fact, but to what should be; what is due, necessary and completely definable in three respects - to what is below us, what is similar to us and what is above us, comes down to three requirements: subordination of the lower nature to the spirit, respect for the rights of creatures like us and complete devotion to the Highest principle of the world. Any manifestation of our will can be bad or immoral only if one of these three duties is violated, that is, when the will affirms or accepts something shameful (in the first respect), or something offensive (in the second), or something wicked (in the third). But the will of a person who takes the murderer's eyes away from his victim does not violate any of the three duties - there is nothing shameful, nothing offensive, nothing wicked in this will. So, here there is no lie at all in the moral sense, there is no deviation from any commandment at all, and by allowing this method of preventing evil, we do not at all allow any exception to the moral rule: on the indicated grounds, we deny that this case fits the moral rule to which, contrary to the evidence, they want to subordinate it. One of the disputing parties argues: since there is a lie here, one should not have used this evil means, even if only to save one’s neighbor. The other side answers: although there was a lie here, since the duty to save a sensitive life is more important than the duty to tell the truth, it was permissible to use this, albeit a bad, means to save a neighbor. Both of these false decisions are equally eliminated by the third, true one: since there was no lie here (in the moral sense), the use of this innocent means, as necessary to prevent murder, was completely obligatory in this case. 62 So, the selection of truthfulness as a special formal virtue contains an internal contradiction and is not allowed by reason. Truthfulness, like all other “virtues,” does not contain its moral quality in itself, but receives it from its agreement with the basic norms of morality. Imaginary truthfulness separated from them can be a source of lies, that is, false assessments. It may stop at the demand that our words be only an accurate reflection of the external reality of individual facts, which leads to obvious absurdities; from this point of view, a priest who conveys with complete accuracy what was said to him in confession would satisfy the requirement of truthfulness. But true truthfulness requires that our words correspond to the inner truth or meaning of a given situation to which our will applies moral standards. An analysis of the so-called virtues has shown us that they all have moral significance only insofar as they are determined by those three norms of what is proper. And these norms themselves, although they are based on the corresponding primary feelings (shame, pity and awe) as their psychological root, however, do not have their final basis in them as facts, but develop logically from the concept of what should be, or truth (in the broad sense). Truth demands that we treat the lower nature as inferior, that is, subordinate it to rational purposes; if, on the contrary, we submit to it, then we recognize it not for what it really is, but as something higher, which means we pervert the true order of things, violate the truth, treat this lower sphere in an inappropriate, or immoral, way. In exactly the same way, truth requires that we treat others like ourselves as such, recognize their equality with ourselves, and put ourselves in their place; if we, recognizing ourselves as a full-fledged person, see in others only empty masks, then, obviously, we are retreating from what is in truth, and our attitude is not due. Finally, if we recognize the highest universal principle above us, then the truth demands that we treat it as the highest, that is, with religious devotion: any other attitude will contradict the true state of affairs and, therefore, will be inappropriate. Such moral consciousness about the truth, or about what should be, could not, of course, arise if feelings of shame, pity and reverence were not already inherent in human nature, which directly determine his correct attitude towards the three basic conditions of his life. But after reason has derived from these natural data their internal ethical content and approved it as a given, it becomes an independent principle of moral activity, regardless of its psychological foundations. 63 One can imagine a person who by nature has only a very poorly developed sense of modesty, but who is reasonably convinced of his duty to resist the grips of the lower nature and conscientiously fulfills this duty; such a person will actually turn out to be more moral in this area than a person who is bashful by nature, but whose mind is unarmed against sensual temptations that overcome his modesty. The same is true of natural pity (which Kant dwells on) and of natural religious feeling. Without a sense of duty, all these natural impulses to moral action are not strong and do not have decisive significance in the clash of opposing motives. But does the consciousness of what is proper, or of truth, have such decisive power? If righteousness according to natural inclinations is a fragile phenomenon, then righteousness according to the understanding of duty is an extremely rare phenomenon. Thus, the concept of what should be is deprived in the actual sense of signs of universality and necessity. The vital interest of moral philosophy, as well as the formal requirement of reason, cannot come to terms with this fact, and from here a new task arises for reason: to find such a practical principle, which, representing something not only proper, but also highly desirable in itself and for everyone, would have in its very essence the power to necessarily determine human behavior, regardless of the natural inclinations of the soul, as well as from the degrees of spiritual development - a principle equally characteristic, understandable and valid for all people. When reason dwells exclusively or predominantly on this side of the matter, then good is understood in the sense of the highest good (summum bonum), and the question takes the following form: does there exist and what is the highest good, or that one thing to which all other goods must necessarily be subordinated as an unconditional measure (criterion) of desirability in general? Chapter six. Imaginary principles of practical philosophy (Criticism of abstract eudaimonism in its various modifications) Moral goodness is defined by reason as truth (in a broad sense), or as a proper attitude towards everything. This idea of ​​good, internally comprehensive and logically necessary, turns out to be in a real sense, or in fact, devoid of universality and necessity. Good, as an ideal norm of will, does not actually coincide with good, as an object of actual desire. Good is what should be, but 1) not everyone desires what should be; 2) among those who desire good, not everyone turns out to be able to overcome the bad aspirations of their nature for the sake of it, and, finally, 3) the few people who have achieved the victory of good over evil in themselves - virtuous people, righteous people or saints - are powerless to defeat with their good the evil in which the whole world lies. But since good is not at all desired by anyone, it is not good for him; since, although it is affirmed as desirable by rational consciousness, it does not act on the will, it is only a mental good, and not a real one; since, finally, although it acts on the will of a given person, making him internally better, it does not give him the power to realize what he should do in the whole world, it is not a sufficient good. This threefold discrepancy between (moral) good and (real) good apparently puts the idea of ​​good into internal contradiction. In the very definition of good as a ought, in addition to the ideal content, there is also a real requirement - namely, the requirement that the moral content does not remain only theoretical, but that it is practically realized: what is due by the very concept must be realized. The impotence of good is not good, and it is in no way possible to recognize as due the fact that only a part of humanity desires what should be, that very few live as they should, and that no one can bring the world into the proper state. According to the general concept, good and good should cover each other - the second should be a direct, universal and necessary consequence of the first - represent the unconditional desirability and reality of good. But in fact, they do not cover each other; good is separated from good and in this separation is understood as well-being. The real insufficiency of the idea of ​​good prompts us to turn to this principle of well-being, which, apparently, possesses, as an incentive to action, that factual universality and necessity that purely moral requirements lack. For every goal of action that someone sets for himself certainly contains, directly or indirectly, the sign that the achievement of this goal satisfies the actor or serves his well-being, while not every goal of activity directly or at least only indirectly contains a sign of moral goodness. Any desire, as such, is, apparently, only a desire for its own satisfaction, that is, well-being; wishing for misfortune or dissatisfaction would mean the same as wishing for something that is obviously undesirable, i.e., outright nonsense. And if the moral good itself in order to be realized in reality must become desirable, then the ethical principle turns out to be dependent on the practical (in the narrow sense) idea of ​​real good, or well-being, which is set as the supreme principle of human actions. This eudaimonistic principle (from the Greek ευδαιμονία - blissful state, well-being) has the visible advantage that it does not raise the question why? One can ask why I should strive for moral goodness when this desire contradicts my natural inclinations and only causes me suffering, but one cannot ask why I should desire my well-being, for I already desire it by necessity of nature - this desire is inseparably connected with my existence and is its direct expression: I exist as a desirer and desire, of course, only what satisfies me or what is pleasant to me. Everyone believes his well-being either in what directly causes him pleasure, or in what leads to this, that is, serves as a means for delivering pleasant states. Thus, well-being is determined most closely through the concept of pleasure (Greek ηδονή, whence the teaching of Idonism, or hedonism). When the desirable is put in place of what should be, then the goal of life or the highest good is reduced to pleasure. This concept, despite its apparent clarity, simplicity and reality, encounters insurmountable difficulties precisely on the path of its real application. From the general fact that everyone wants what pleases him, no general principle or rule of action can be derived. The fact is that in the concept of pleasure, its universality is only formal-logical, or abstract, not expressing any real unity. The statement that the final goal of all actions is (directly or indirectly) pleasure, that is, the satisfaction of the actor, is just as indisputable, but also as meaningless as, for example, the statement that all actions end in something, or that all actions are directed towards something. In this reality, it is absolutely impossible to find one universal pleasure, but there is only an indefinite set of all kinds of pleasures that have nothing in common with each other. One person finds the greatest pleasure in drinking vodka, while another seeks “bliss that has no name and no measure”; but even this one, when he experiences extreme hunger or thirst, forgets about all transcendental blessings and most of all desires food and drink. On the other hand, under certain conditions, everything that previously gave pleasure or seemed pleasant ceases to be attractive, and even life itself loses all value. In fact, the idea of ​​pleasure refers to the immense chaos of random drives, varied in individual characters and tastes, degrees of development of people, their ages, external positions and momentary states. What definite expression can be given to pleasure as a general practical principle? Is it really that “let everyone act in such a way that, if possible, he can achieve for himself what is pleasant to him in the present”? Such a rule, generally speaking, firmly established and more or less successfully applied in the animal kingdom, is inconvenient for human practice due to two circumstances: 1) the presence in man of unnatural aspirations, the implementation of which, although it brings desirable pleasure, at the same time leads to obvious and undoubted death, i.e., to something that is highly undesirable for everyone, and 2) the presence of the human mind, comparing various (natural) attractions and pleasures with each other. with a friend and evaluating them in relation to their further consequences. In its rudimentary form, such an assessment is already found, however, in animals that act or abstain from action not only on impulses of immediate pleasure or displeasure, but also on consideration of further pleasant or unpleasant consequences arising from this or that behavior. But in animals this consideration does not go beyond simple combinations, for example. ideas about an unauthorized piece of beef with the idea of ​​blows with a whip, etc. The more abstract nature of the human mind allows it, in addition to such simple considerations, to make general comparisons of the immediate motives of pleasure with their distant consequences, and on this path the most courageous representative of pure Idonism in ancient philosophy, Igesius of Cyrene, came to the conviction that from the point of view of pleasure, life is not worth living at all, because the desire for pleasure is either unsuccessful and in this case painful, or, having achieved the goal, turns out to be deceptive, since an instant feeling of satisfaction is inevitably followed by boredom and a new painful pursuit of deception. If it is impossible to achieve real pleasure, one should try to rid oneself of displeasure, and for this the surest means is to die. This is what Igesius concluded, for which he was nicknamed the instiller of death (πεισιθάνατος). But even regardless of such extreme conclusions, the inconsistency of “pleasure” as a principle is clear from the analysis of the concept itself. The simple desire for pleasure cannot be a principle of activity, because in itself it is vague and meaningless, and has its real, but completely unstable content only in the random objects that cause it. – In the infinite variety of all kinds of pleasant states, the only thing common and necessary is that the moment of achieving any goal or desired object is certainly felt and presented in advance as pleasure, that is, as a satisfied or calmed desire. But this extremely elementary psychological truth does not contain the slightest indication of either the property of what is desired or the means of achieving it - both remain in all their empirical diversity and contingency, and the point of view of pleasure does not in itself give us any real definition of that highest good to which all others must be subordinated, and therefore no principle or rule for activity. The matter will be even clearer if we take pleasure not in its general concept, as a satisfied desire, but in its specific states, that is, in certain sensations of pleasantness. Being only a consequence of an aspiration that has achieved its goal, and not a goal, such states are not desirable in themselves. What is desired are known, definite realities, and not the pleasant sensations that come from them. For the hungry and thirsty, bread and water are directly desired objects, and not a means for obtaining taste pleasures. Of course, we know from experience that eating when hungry is very pleasant, but the baby strives to suck before any experience; and then, upon reaching a certain age, he develops very strong desires for such objects, the real pleasantness of which he has not yet experienced at all. In this case, resorting to “heredity” is completely useless, because then, by ascending degrees of kinship, one would have to get to chemical molecules, about which hardly anyone would dare to say that they tend to enter into certain compounds solely due to the memory of the pleasantness of previous similar compounds. – Let us also recall a circumstance that does not allow us to identify good with the fact of pleasure. Everyone knows from experience that the degree of desirability of any objects or states does not always correspond to the degree of real pleasantness of the sensations they deliver. Thus, with a strong erotic attraction to a certain person of the other sex, the fact of owning this particular person is desired as the greatest bliss, before which the desirability of owning any other person disappears, meanwhile, the real pleasantness delivered by this infinitely desirable fact probably has nothing to do with infinity and is approximately equal to the pleasantness of any other satisfaction of these instincts. – In general, the desirability of certain objects, or their significance as goods, is determined not by subsequent subjective states of pleasure, but by the objective relationships of these objects with our bodily or mental nature, and the sources and properties of these relationships are for the most part not recognized by us with sufficient clarity, but only reveal their effect in the form of blind attraction. But if pleasure is not the essence of the good, or of what is desired as such, then it is in any case its constant sign. Whatever the main reasons for the desirability of given objects and states that appear to us as goods, in any case it is certain that the achieved good or the fulfilled desire is always accompanied by a feeling of pleasure, which, thus, being inextricably linked with the actual good in general, as its necessary consequence, can also serve to determine the highest good, at least in the sense of a practical principle. The highest good, from this point of view, is the state that provides the greatest amount of satisfaction. This amount is determined not only directly - through the addition of pleasant states, but also indirectly - through the subtraction of unpleasant states. In other words, the highest well-being consists in the possession of such goods, which in the aggregate, or in the final result, provide maximum pleasure and minimum pain. 64 The active principle here is not a simple desire for immediate pleasure, but prudence, evaluating various pleasures and choosing between them those that are more durable and secure from suffering. Prosperous or happy is considered here not to be the one who is experiencing the strongest pleasure at the moment, but the one whose life in general represents a constant preponderance of pleasant states over painful ones - who ultimately enjoys more than suffers. “The prudent,” says Aristotle, “pursues a carefree state, and not a pleasant one” (Ὁ φρόνιμος τò άλυπον διώκει, ου τò ηδύ). This is the point of view of eudaimonism in the proper sense, or prudent eudaimonism. The follower of this teaching will not “wallow in the mire of sensual pleasures” that destroy the soul and body - he finds his well-being mainly in those highest pleasures, mental and aesthetic, which, with the greatest strength, are associated with the least suffering. Despite its comparative plausibility, the eudaimonism of prudence shares the common fate of all eudaimonism: and it turns out to be only an imaginary principle. When good is defined as well-being, then it is all about its achievement and lasting possession; but neither one nor the other can be secured by any prudence. Our life and destiny depend on causes and agents that are not subject to the decisions and measures of our worldly wisdom; and for the most part, a prudent egoist only loses cases of real, albeit fleeting pleasures, without at all gaining lasting well-being through this. The fragility of all goods is all the more fatal here because man, unlike animals, knows about it in advance: the inevitable collapse of all happiness in the future casts its shadow on moments of present pleasure. But even in those rare cases when the prudent use of life actually provides a quantitative superiority of carefree states over difficult and painful ones, the triumph of eudaimonism is only apparent, for it is based on the arbitrary exclusion from the calculation of the qualitative moment of our mental states (I mean quality not even in the moral sense, which can still be controversial, but only in the psychological, or, more precisely, psychophysical, namely the degree of intensity of pleasant sensations). There is no doubt that the most powerful, exciting pleasures are not those recommended by prudence, but those associated with wild passions - even here, in many cases, the pleasantness of satisfaction is disproportionate to the strength of desire, but still it is incomparably more intense than all those sensations that are given by the moderate and careful use of life. When prudence inspires us that passions lead to destruction, then, without disputing this truth at all, we can only remind another: Everything, everything that threatens death, Hides for the mortal heart Inexplicable pleasures... Nothing can be said about this from a eudaimonic point of view. On what basis will I refuse “inexplicable pleasures” in favor of some boring prosperity? Passions lead to destruction, but does prudence save you from destruction? Where is the man who, through one prudent behavior, has won victory over death? The voice of passions can only turn out to be wrong in the face of something higher. He becomes silent before the heavenly thunders, but the sluggish speeches of prudence cannot drown him out. The satisfaction of passions that lead to destruction cannot, of course, be the highest good; but it may, from the general point of view of eudaimonism, have a decisive advantage over the innocent pleasures of good behavior, which does not save one from destruction. Let us suppose that mental and aesthetic pleasures are not only innocent, but also sublime; However, this dignity of theirs is associated with such restrictions that do not allow them to recognize the significance of the highest good behind these benefits. 1. These “spiritual” pleasures are essentially accessible only to people with subtle aesthetic and mental development, that is, at least for a few, while the highest good must necessarily be universal. No progress in democratic institutions will give the donkey the ability to find pleasure in the symphonies of Beethoven, or make the pig, who has no taste even for oranges, enjoy the sonnets of Dante and Petrarch or the poems of Shelley. 2. And for those who have access to mental and aesthetic pleasures, they are not enough. Relating only to certain mental abilities and powers and not touching others, they cannot fill the whole life. Only the theoretical, contemplative side of man turns out to be more or less satisfied here, and active, practical life is deprived of any firm guidance. Mental and aesthetic goods, as objects of pure contemplation, do not affect the will of life. We don't want heavenly stars, - And therefore, among people who, from an eudaimonistic point of view, place science and art above all else (that is, the enjoyment of them), the practical will remains without a dominant definition, and blind passions unhindered take possession of it, showing the inconsistency of prudent eudaimonism as the ruling principle of life. 3. This inconsistency is also reflected in his powerlessness against theoretical skepticism, which undermines the value of the very objects of mental and artistic activity. Suppose I find real pleasure in the contemplation of beauty and in the study of truth, but my reason - the highest authority for the “prudent” eudaimonist - tells me that beauty is a subjective ghost, and truth is inaccessible to human knowledge - my pleasure is poisoned by this, and for a consistent mind it becomes completely impossible. But even without such a sequence it is clear that the pleasure of deliberate deception cannot be rationally affirmed as the highest good. 4. But let us suppose that our Epicurean is alien to such skepticism and unconsciously indulges in the pleasures of thought and creativity, without asking about the final meaning of their objects. For him, these “spiritual benefits” may seem eternal; but his own ability to enjoy them is in any case far from this property; it only slightly outlasts the ability to experience sensual pleasures. Meanwhile, it is precisely the strength or durability of pleasures that is the main claim of prudent eudaimonism, its main supposed advantage over the simple desire for the directly pleasant. Of course, if our pleasures were permanent realities that could be accumulated as property, then a prudent eudaimonist, having become decrepit, could still consider himself richer than some dissolute waster of life who died prematurely. But since, in fact, past pleasures are only memories, then our wise Epicurean, if only he remains faithful to death to the eudaimonic point of view, will probably regret that for the sake of a weak memory of the innocent joys of the mind and aesthetic taste, he sacrificed cases of pleasures, much more intense, which, as unexperienced, arouse at this moment his desire - unfulfillable and painful. – The imaginary superiority of prudent eudaimonism over simple wasting of life rests only on a logically impermissible confusion of two points of view. One of two things: either we mean the present moment of pleasure, and in this case we need to abandon the prudence characteristic even of animals; or we consider the consequences of our actions in the future, and in this case the question is: what exact moment of the future should we consider as the basis for our calculation? It would be clearly pointless to take any other moment than the last one, which expresses the result of all life, but in this last dying moment the entire eudaimonic calculation is reduced to zero, and any possible advantage of prudent pleasures over insane ones (from the eudaimonic point of view) completely disappears. Since all pleasures, having become past, cease to be pleasures, and this is known in advance, the concept of “sum of pleasures” is devoid of real meaning: the sum of zeros is in no way greater than simple zero. If the possession of external goods - both in the form of pleasure of the present moment, and in the form of more lasting happiness, supposedly ensured by prudence - turns out to be deceptive and untenable, then does not true well-being, or the highest good, consist in freedom from those external aspirations and attachments that, deceiving and enslaving a person, make him unhappy? All external goods either turn out to be not worth desire, or even before their essential unsatisfactoryness is discovered, these imaginary goods, depending on external reasons that are not in the power of a person, are taken away from him, making him doubly unhappy. No one can be freed from misfortune, therefore, no one can be happy while his will is connected with such objects, the possession of which is accidental for him. If true well-being is a state of lasting satisfaction, then only a person who finds satisfaction in what cannot be taken away from him, that is, in himself, can be truly prosperous. Let only a person be internally free from attachment to external and random objects, and he will invariably be satisfied and prosperous. Not subject to anything extraneous, completely possessing himself, he possesses everything, and even more than everything. If I am free from the circulation of a certain thing, then I am more its master than the one who possesses it with desire; if I am indifferent to power, I am more than a ruler attached to it; if I am indifferent to the whole world, I am above the world ruler. This principle of self-sufficiency (αυτάρκεια), expressing an unconditional requirement, actually has only negative and conditional force. Firstly, his action is determined by the very external goods that he denies. While a person is attached to them, liberation from this attachment is desirable for his higher consciousness and gives the content of his activity. In the same way, as long as a person is sensitive to the random sufferings of external life, triumph over them, steadfastness in adversity can give him the highest satisfaction. But when he has risen above attachment to external goods and above the fear of external misfortune, then what will be the positive content of his life? Is it really only in the feeling of pleasure from this victory? But then the principle of self-sufficiency turns into empty complacency, and instead of being grandiose, it takes on a comic character. Given this unsatisfactory final result, there is no need to insist that the strength of spirit necessary to achieve it is not given to everyone, and even in the one to whom it is given, it is not always preserved to the end, so that the principle of self-sufficiency does not have in itself sufficient strength for its implementation, and from this side it turns out to be only an imaginary principle. Liberation from slavery to lower, random goods can only be a condition for obtaining the highest good, and not this good itself; a church from which the idols that filled it are thrown out does not yet become a shrine of God through this alone - in itself it remains only an empty place. 65 The human personality does not find final satisfaction or well-being either in external worldly goods or in itself (i.e., the empty form of self-consciousness). The only way out for it seems to be the consideration that a person is not only an individual, but also a part of a collective whole, and that he finds his real well-being, the positive interest of his life in serving the common good or the common benefit. This is the principle of utilitarianism, which is in obvious accordance with the moral principle of altruism, which requires living for others, helping everyone if possible and serving the good of others as one’s own. According to the representatives of utilitarianism themselves, their teaching should, in practical application, coincide with altruistic morality, or with the commandments of justice and mercy. “I must,” writes, for example, Mill, “repeat again what the opponents of utilitarianism rarely have justice in admitting to it, namely, that happiness, which forms the utilitarian measure of right behavior, is not the own happiness of the actor (taken separately), but the happiness of all those to whom his activity relates. Between his own happiness and the happiness of others, he must, according to the requirement of utilitarianism, be as impartial as if he were a disinterested and benevolent spectator. The ethics of utility finds its full expression in the golden rule of Jesus of Nazareth. To do as you would have them do to you, and to love your neighbor as yourself, is the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality" (J. S. Mill, Utilitarianism, 5 ed. Lond., 1874, pp. 24 - 25). The difference between these two principles - utilitarian and altruistic - not appreciated by Mill is that the rule of living for others is prescribed by altruism as the proper attitude of a person towards those like him, or as a moral duty due to the pure idea of ​​good, while according to the teachings of utilitarianism, although a person must serve the common good and impartially judge between his own and other people's interests, but on the latter basis only because such an attitude is (as if) most useful or profitable to himself, so that moral activity does not need any special, independent principle opposed to egoism, but is a consequence of the same egoism, correctly understood; and since everyone has selfishness, utilitarian morality is suitable for everyone without exception and, thus, has in the eyes of its followers an advantage over the morality of direct altruism, whether this latter is affirmed by virtue of a simple sympathetic feeling or in the name of pure duty. Connected with this is another advantage of utilitarianism, according to its supporters, namely: they assert that this principle is completely consistent with the actual historical origin of moral feelings and ideas, which all were only the result of successively expanded and developed considerations of their own benefit, so that the highest system of morality is only the most complex transformation of the original motives of self-love. Even if this statement were true, the resulting advantage for utilitarianism would still be only apparent. Since the oak tree comes from an acorn, and acorns are used to feed pigs, it does not follow that oak trees themselves can serve as food for pigs. In the same way, assuming that the highest moral teaching has a genetic connection with egoism, that is, it arose from it through successive modifications in the past, we have no right to conclude that this highest morality in its present, perfect form can rely on self-interest, or be suitable for egoists. Obvious experience contradicts this: most people - now, as in all times - have found it more useful for themselves to separate their own benefit from the common benefit. On the other hand, the very assumption about the original meaning of self-love, the only basis for all activity, contradicts the truth. The view of the origin of morality from individual egoism is sufficiently refuted by the simple fact that it was initially the dominant significance in the life of creatures that belongs not to individual, but to generic self-affirmation, which for individual individuals is self-denial. What benefit to itself or what satisfaction to its individual egoism can a bird who lays down its life for its chicks, or a worker bee dying for its common queen, find? 66 The decisive predominance of individual motives over generic ones and at the same time the possibility of principled and consistent self-interest appear only in humanity at a certain stage of development of personal consciousness, and therefore utilitarianism, since it requires self-restraint and self-sacrifice from the individual not in the name of any principles stronger than herself, but only in the name of her own correctly understood self-love - such utilitarianism can only make sense as a practical a teaching addressed to individuals in a given state of humanity. It is only from this side that we should consider it here, especially since questions about the empirical origin of certain feelings and concepts do not directly relate to the subject of moral philosophy. “Everyone desires his own benefit; but the benefit of everyone is to serve the common good; therefore, everyone must serve the common good.” In this formula of pure utilitarianism, only the conclusion is true, but its real foundations are not at all contained in the two premises from which it is derived here: these two premises are false in themselves and, moreover, are placed in a false relationship with each other. It is not true that everyone desires his own benefit, for very many desire only what gives them immediate pleasure, and they find this pleasure in objects that are completely useless and even harmful - in drunkenness, card games, pornography, etc. Of course, such people can be approached with a message of the common good, but this must be based on something else, and not on their own desires. Further, those people who recognize the superiority of benefit or lasting satisfaction over momentary pleasures do not place their benefit at all where utilitarianism indicates. The miser understands very well that all fleeting pleasures are dust and decay before real lasting goods, which he encloses in a strong fireproof chest, and utilitarians have no arguments at their disposal that would force him to empty this chest for philanthropic purposes. Will they tell him that his own benefit requires reconciling his own benefits with the benefits of his neighbors? But he fulfilled this requirement. Let us suppose, in fact, that he acquired his wealth by lending money on interest; this means that he provided services to his neighbors, helped them in need, lending money. He risked his capital and received a certain profit for this, and they lost this profit, but they used other people's capital at a time when they did not have their own. The whole matter took place for mutual benefit, and both parties impartially judged between their own and others' interests. Why, however, will neither Mill nor any of his like-minded people agree to recognize the behavior of this prudent moneylender as a true example of utilitarian morality? Is it because, while accumulating money, he did not use it? This is not true: he used them to the greatest extent, finding the highest satisfaction in the feeling of possessing his treasures and in the consciousness of his power (see Pushkin’s “The Miserly Knight”), moreover, the greater the accumulated wealth, the more benefits it can subsequently bring to other people; so that on this side, one’s own and others’ benefits turn out to be balanced. If utilitarians do not agree to recognize the activity of a prudent usurer as normal human activity, this can only be explained by the fact that their demands essentially go much further than a simple agreement between one’s own benefit and someone else’s: they demand that a person sacrifice his personal benefit for the benefit of the common good and in this find his true benefit. But such a requirement, which directly contradicts the concept of “one’s own benefit,” is determined by metaphysical assumptions that are completely alien to the doctrine of pure utilitarianism, and besides them it is completely arbitrary. Real cases of self-sacrifice occur either 1) due to the immediate movement of sympathetic feelings, when, for example, someone without any reflection, at the risk of his own life, saves a dying person; or 2) due to compassion, which is a constantly dominant character trait, as, for example, among people who, out of personal inclination, devote their lives to serving the suffering; or 3) due to a highly developed consciousness of moral duty; or, finally, 4) due to religious inspiration by some idea. All these motives do not depend at all on considerations of benefit. People over whose will these impulses, individually or in combination, have sufficient strength, will sacrifice themselves for the good of others, without at all needing reasons of a different kind. 67 But there are many people without natural kindness, without the capacity for moral and religious passions, without a clear sense of duty and without sensitivity to the voice of conscience. It is precisely on such people that utilitarianism should have shown its strength, convincing them that their true benefit lies in serving the common good, even to the point of self-sacrifice. But this is clearly impossible, because these people are distinguished precisely by the fact that they believe their benefit not in the good of others, but exclusively in their own egoistic well-being. By benefit, in contrast to pleasure, we mean lasting or assured satisfaction, and it would be completely absurd to prove to a practical materialist that by laying down his life for his neighbors or for an idea, he thereby ensures himself lasting satisfaction of his own, that is, material, interests. It is clear that the connection affirmed by utilitarianism between the benefit that everyone desires for himself and that which this teaching considers real or true is only a crude sophism based on the double meaning of the word “benefit.” First, the axiom is taken that everyone wants what satisfies him, then the entire actual variety of objects and methods of satisfaction is denoted by the general term “benefit”, then a completely new concept of the common good is substituted under this term, which is also given the name benefit, and on this identity of the term, with the differences and even opposition of the concepts themselves, the conclusion is built that since everyone wants benefit for himself, and benefit consists in the common good or the greatest well-being of all, then everyone should desire this common good and serve it. But in fact, the benefit that everyone desires for himself does not have a necessary relation to the general well-being, and the benefit that consists in the general well-being is not the one that everyone desires, and mere manipulation of concepts is not enough to make someone want something other than what he really wants, or to find his benefit in something other than what he really finds it in. Various modifications of the utilitarian formula do not make it more convincing. Thus, based on the concept of benefit as lasting satisfaction, it can be argued that personal happiness does not provide lasting satisfaction, since it is associated with random and transitory objects, while the general good of humanity, since it applies to all future generations, is an immutably abiding object, and therefore serving it can satisfy in a lasting way. If this argument is addressed to “everyone,” then anyone can object to it as follows. “Even if the arrangement of my personal happiness does not give me lasting satisfaction, but concern for the happiness of the future of humanity does not give me any satisfaction at all, for I cannot possibly be satisfied with such a good that, if it ever exists, then in any case not as my good, since I will probably not be there; Therefore, if there is no benefit for me in personal well-being, then in the general well-being and even more so: how can I seek benefit for myself in something that I know I will never use? The true thought to which utilitarianism in its best representatives gravitates is the idea of ​​solidarity of all mankind, as a result of which the private well-being of each person is connected with the general well-being. But this idea does not have its roots in the soil of utilitarianism and does not fit, as a practical principle, within the confines of the utilitarian and generally eudaimonic way of thinking. One can even fully recognize the truth of universal solidarity and the consequences that flow from it in the natural order of things, without, however, deriving from this any moral rule for one’s behavior. So, for example, a dissolute rich man who lives exclusively for his own pleasure and never puts the good of his neighbors as the goal of his actions, can, however, not without reason point out that, due to the natural connection of things, his exquisite luxury contributes to the development of industry and trade, sciences and arts and provides income to many poor people. General solidarity, as a natural law, exists and acts through individuals regardless of their will and behavior, and if I, caring only about my personal benefit, unwittingly contribute to the common benefit, then what else can be demanded of me from the point of view of utilitarianism? On the other hand, universal solidarity is far from the same thing as general well-being. From the fact that humanity is united in itself, it does not at all follow that it must necessarily be happy: it can be united in disasters and death. Therefore, if I have made the idea of ​​universal solidarity a practical rule of my own behavior and, because of this, sacrifice my personal benefits for the common good, and meanwhile humanity is condemned to destruction and its “good” turns out to be a deception, then what benefit will my self-sacrifice bring to both me and humanity itself? Thus, even if it were possible to connect the idea of ​​universal solidarity, in the sense of a practical rule, internally with the principle of utilitarianism, it would be completely useless for it. Utilitarianism is the highest form of eudaimonic views, and the inconsistency of this doctrine is a condemnation of all that practical philosophy, which puts good in the sense of well-being or selfish satisfaction as its highest principle. The apparent real universality and necessity of this principle, which consists in the fact that everyone certainly desires their own well-being, turns out to be completely imaginary, for 1) the general name of good or well-being refers in reality to an infinite variety of different objects that cannot be reduced to any internal unity, and 2) the universal desire for one’s own well-being (in whatever sense this word is understood) in no case contains guarantees and conditions to achieve this goal. Thus, the principle of well-being remains only a requirement and, therefore, has no advantage over the principle of due, or moral, good, the only drawback of which is precisely that it can remain only a requirement, without having its own power of necessary implementation. On the contrary, with this general deficiency, the moral principle has over the eudaimonic one the enormous advantage of internal dignity, ideal universality and necessity, for moral goodness, determined not by personal arbitrariness, but by universal reason and conscience, is necessarily the same for everyone, while by well-being everyone has the right to understand whatever he pleases. So, we have only two requirements so far - the rational requirement of duty and the natural requirement of well-being - 1) all people must be virtuous and 2) all people want to be happy. Both of these demands have natural support in the being of man, but both do not contain sufficient grounds or conditions for their implementation, while they are actually not connected with each other, quite usually contradict each other, and the attempt to fundamentally agree on them (in utilitarianism) does not stand up to criticism. These demands are of unequal dignity, and if, as a principle of practical philosophy, one had to choose between the insufficiently strong, but clear, definite and sublime idea of ​​moral good and the equally powerless, but, moreover, unclear, indefinite and base idea of ​​well-being, then, of course, all reasonable grounds would be in favor of the first. But before affirming the sad necessity of such a choice, let us delve deeper into the general moral basis of human nature, which we have so far considered mainly only in the special development of its three particular manifestations. Origin people and floors. sub., beginning Chapter 2 (according to German translation by Victor Carus). Ibid., objection to Mill. There, about social virtues. Right there. When it comes to savages, even serious scientists sometimes display an incomprehensible frivolity. I recently came across a curious example from the anthropologist Brock, who claims that the natives of the Andaman Islands do not wear clothing: for, he explains, a thin belt with a piece of leather tied to it cannot be considered as such. I think that one can blame the essential importance of clothing in the European tailcoat. I use the simplest word, but usually in the literature on this subject the term “sympathy” or “compassion” is used. Facts related to this are found in abundance in various works on descriptive zoology (see especially Bram, “The Life of Animals”), as well as in the literature on animal psychology that has been significantly developing in recent times. Love in a purely psychological sense (outside of material-sexual and aesthetic relations) is rooted pity or compassion (sympathy) that has become permanent. Much earlier than Schopenhauer, the Russian people identified these two concepts in their language: “to regret” and “to love” mean the same thing to them. One may not go so far, but that the main subjective manifestation of love as a moral feeling is pity is not subject to serious dispute. It goes without saying that such cases regarding wild animals can only be thoroughly observed when they are in captivity. It is very likely, however, that these cases of awakening sympathetic feelings occur mainly in captivity. Darwin, ibid., end of Chapter II. Darwin had previously spoken of the mental side of religion—the recognition of an invisible cause or causes for extraordinary phenomena. He finds this in animals too. Such a complex crime as, for example, treason is recognized not only as outrageous, but also shameful on the same basis, precisely because treason also includes cowardice, which prefers secret betrayal to open hostility. In our country, the very words are often used as synonyms: shameful - ashamed. In general, it is impossible to draw an actually exact boundary here, by the very essence of the matter. Although it was developed in its present form only around the time of the disappearance of Buddhism from India (VIII - XIII centuries AD), its main ideas are already found in the ancient Upanishads. In some Indian books this part of ignorance is determined arithmetically: it is 1 4 (according to others, 1 3) absolute. Probably, in order for the attitude to remain unchanged, the birth of the ignorant is balanced by the enlightenment of the sages. This is a fact of our inner experience, which neither in its psychological reality nor in its ethical meaning depends on these or other metaphysical concepts about the essence of spirit and matter. Sometimes in St. In Scripture, the word “flesh” is used in a broad sense, as material being in general, for example: “and the Word became flesh,” that is, it became a material phenomenon, which did not prevent this incarnate Word from being a purely spiritual, sinless God-man. But usually the terms “flesh” and “carnal” are used in Scripture in the bad sense of material nature, violating its proper relationship to the spirit, opposing it and excluding it from its sphere - such usage is usually not only in the New, but also in the Old Testament, for example: “My Spirit will not abide in these men, for they are flesh.” I mean normal sleep, about abnormal sleep, see below. The so-called “nostril breathing,” as well as complete retention of the breath, was diligently practiced, and in some places is still practiced by Orthodox ascetics as one of the conditions for the so-called “smart doing.” See “Beauty in Nature” (1 book. “Questions of Phil. and Psychology”, 1889). There is another motive for abstaining from meat and animal food in general - a motive that is also moral, but not of an ascetic, but of an altruistic nature - namely, the extension of the commandment of mercy or pity to animals. This point prevails in Buddhist ethics, while the ascetic one is accepted in Christian church ethics. According to biblical teaching, the food of a normal (paradise) person consisted of only fruits and herbs in their natural form. This still constitutes the rule of the strictest monastic fast both in the East and in the West (Trappists). Between this extreme limit and the light Catholic fast for the laity, there are many degrees that have their natural basis (for example, the difference between warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals, as a result of which fish is considered one of the types of lean food), but do not represent a fundamental and generally binding significance. However, since at the actual moral level of humanity the dominance of carnal desires is the rule, and the predominance of spiritual impulses is only the exception, and, moreover, quite unstable, then the preaching of sobriety and the fight against artificial stupor can, without any practical inconvenience, make as its rule complete abstinence from strong drinks and all other stimulants. But this already has pedagogical and preventive significance, and not a fundamentally moral one. Here we are not talking about the marriage union in its highest, spiritual sense, which is not associated with either carnal sin or childbirth, but is the prototype of the most perfect union of beings - “this mystery is great, and I speak in Christ and in the Church.” For this mystical meaning of marriage, see “The Meaning of Love” (“Questions”, books 14, 15, 16, 17 and 21). This rule is designated by church writers as the requirement to “break the Babylonian babies against a stone” according to the allegorical meaning of the psalm verse: Accursed daughters of Babylon! Blessed is the one who takes and dashes your babies against the stone” (Babylon - the kingdom of sin; Babylonian baby - sin born in thought and not yet developed; stone - firmness of faith). With a vivid imagination and little spiritual experience - in young years - this development of an evil thought occurs very quickly and, reaching the extreme absurdity, causes a strong moral reaction. So, for example, you had a thought about a person who is hostile to you, accompanied by at least a weak feeling of resentment, indignation or anger. If you do not immediately smash this Babylonian baby against a stone, then the imagination, submissive to evil passion, will immediately create a living picture. Now you have already met an unpleasant person and put him in an awkward position. All his worthlessness has been exposed. You have a velleitas (thirst, desire (Latin) for generosity, but the already inflamed passion overcomes. However, you still keep within the boundaries of good manners. Sloppy and caustic speeches are composed, but soon they become more caustic than subtle; “insults in word” are heard, then “insults in action.” With a devilishly strong fist you strike victorious blows. Villain knocked over, the villain is killed, and you dance cannibalically on his corpse... There is nowhere to go further, and you just have to cross yourself and spit. If the suppression of the flesh is accepted not as a means for good or for evil, but as an end in itself, then a special kind of false asceticism arises, in which the flesh is identified with the body and any bodily torment is considered a virtue. However, this false asceticism of self-torture, although it does not initially have an evil goal, in further development easily becomes evil: either turning into slow suicide, or turning into a special type of voluptuousness. It would, however, be imprudent to condemn in this way all cases of self-torture. The fact is that natures whose material life is especially strong may need heroic means to curb it. Therefore, one should not indiscriminately condemn pillarism, chains and other similar measures of struggle against the flesh, used in the heroic era of asceticism. A seeming example of the opposite is provided by those cases in which someone sympathizes with another who grieves over the failure of his crime. In fact, here too, since participation occurs only out of pity, it does not at all relate to the bad cause of grief, does not in the least imply its approval and, therefore, remains innocent and good. If, regretting the murderer who missed, I also mourn the mistake itself, then what is immoral here is not my pity for the villain, but, on the contrary, my ruthlessness towards his victim. In general, when several persons find themselves in solidarity with each other in some kind of crime, then moral condemnation does not relate to the fact of their solidarity, but only to its bad object. Schopenhauer. Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik, 2nd ed. Leipzig, 1860. Pp. 230. In addition to human mothers, some animals also experience nausea a conceptu (aversion to pregnancy (lat.)) - The feeling of motherhood established on the basis of a physical connection can then, like all feelings, be subject to deception, transferred to other people's, planted cubs. “Like in the saints of our Father, Abba Isaac the Syrian, ascetic and hermit, who was the bishop of the Christ-loving city of Nineveh, Words of the Ascetic.” Moscow, 1858. P. 299. Die beid [e] Grundprobl [eme] der Ethik, 2nd ed. Page 23. I must all the more point out this important mistake of the fashionable philosopher, since I myself fell into it in the past, when I wrote my dissertation “Critique of Abstract Principles.” It is curious that Schopenhauer himself recognized and even extremely exaggerated the importance of all asceticism, but for some reason completely isolated it from moral teaching. This is one of many examples of the famous writer’s incoherent thinking (See, for example: A. Schopenhauer. The World as Will and Representation. M., 1900. T. 1. P. 394 - 413). The reality of the external world and the internal animation of creatures is proven theoretically in metaphysics. Here, in moral philosophy, what is meant is only the general consciousness of this truth, to which even the most extreme egoist involuntarily submits. When he needs the assistance of strangers (independent of him) for his selfish purposes, he, contrary to his basic principle, treats them as real, independent and full-fledged beings, tries to persuade them to his side, and takes into account their own interests. Thus, egoism contradicts itself and is, in any case, a false point of view. This term, introduced by the founder of positivism, Auguste Comte, is the exact expression of the logical antithesis of egoism and therefore meets the real need of philosophical language (altruism is from alter another, like egoism is from ego, I). Our ardent opponents of foreign words should be consistent and, rebelling against altruism, also expel egoism from their speech. Instead of these words, they can say friendship and friendship. This last term seems to have been used by someone already. If we were talking about only psychological definitions, then it would be possible to accept the words self-love and friendliness, but to designate ethical principles, these words, as including the concept of love, are not suitable, because the point here is not in feelings, but in the rule of action. You can love yourself much more than others, and yet, according to the principle, serve the good of others as your own. Such a person will undoubtedly be an altruist, but how to call him in other terminology: selfish or friendly? Both are equally absurd. In Hebrew, tzedek means “fair,” and the noun hence tzedakah means “charity.” The question of our moral duties towards animals, in addition to individual instructions in the second and third parts of this book, will be considered in its entirety in a special appendix at the end of it. Having experienced troubles myself, I learn to help those who suffer (the words of Dido in Virgil’s Aeneid). There is a special literature on this subject, which arose first in the field of classical archeology (Bahofen. Das Mutterrecht), and then moved into the field of comparative ethnography and sociology. See, by the way, in Kharuzin’s book on the Lapps and in my article “Remains of primitive paganism” (Russian Review, 1890). I speak here of pietism in the direct and general sense of the word, as denoting the feeling of piety (pietas) raised to a principle. Pietism (in a special, historical sense) is usually called a special direction in the religious life of Protestants. See about this virtue above, in chapter one, pp. 64 – 66. From the first times of scholasticism, the name of the cardinal or philosophical virtues (as opposed to the three theological ones: faith, hope and love) was adopted by the four virtues that Plato defines in his Polity, namely temperance, courage, wisdom and justice. However, I take the names of these four virtues in their general meaning, regardless of the special meaning they may have in Plato’s teaching. Based on the well-known text of St. Paul, in which, however, there is no term “virtue”. For more on this, see the beginning of my article “The Controversy over Justice” (West [nick] of Europe, March 1894). Animals can be naive or cunning, but only man is truthful or deceitful. This general definition must obviously apply to both affirmations and negations, and therefore I had to resort to the little-used word expression, which embraces both. The words judgment and proposal have connotations that are inconvenient in the present case. The commandment: do not listen to your friend with false testimony, that is, not slander, does not relate to our question, since it does not prohibit lies in general, but only a very specific and always immoral type of lie. Although Kant stands on the side of the rigorists on the issue under consideration, this, in essence, disagrees with his own principle, which requires that in order to recognize the moral dignity of a certain action, this action can be elevated to the level of a universal rule. It is clear that, by averting the murderer’s eyes from the location of his victim, I can, by reason and conscience, affirm my method of action as a universal rule: everyone must always hide his victim from the murderer in this way, and, putting myself in the place of the murderer, I, as a moral being, can only wish that I would be prevented from committing murder by the same means. See “Criticism abstract. beginning", page 70. Regardless of any fundamental pessimism, freedom from pain has, from a eudaimonic point of view, more significance than the positive fact of pleasure. The suffering from dissatisfaction of highly individualized sexual passion, which often leads to suicide, is without comparison more significant than the pleasure of satisfaction, which can be recognized as a great good only insofar as it relieves those great sufferings. The principle of self-sufficiency in practical application partially coincides with the moral principle of asceticism; but the essential difference between them lies in the starting point or original motive, which in asceticism is the desire for the predominance of the spirit over the flesh in the sense of the proper relationship of man to that which is below him, while the demand for self-sufficiency comes from the desire for well-being, so that this principle of autarky can properly be designated as eudaimonic asceticism. On the original character of self-denial, or “struggle for the life of others,” see especially Henry Drummond, Ascent of Man. – From the fact that the self-denial of an individual in favor of the clan is based on real clan solidarity, it does not in any way follow that it is the same as egoism. There is also a fifth possible motive - afterlife interest, the desire to acquire eternal heavenly bliss. This impulse, although utilitarian in the broad sense, is again associated with assumptions of a different order, fundamentally rejected by the modern doctrine of utility.