" IDIOPSYCHOLOGICAL ETHICS." 43 certainly conceive, for the most part, as falling short of com- plete exclusion of the lower motive. I may illustrate by reference to the passion of resentment of which I before spoke. The view of reflective common sense is, I think, that the malevolent impulse so designated, as long as it is strictly limited to resentment against wrong and operates in aid of justice, has a legitimate sphere of action in the social life of human beings as actually consti- tuted : that, indeed, its suppression would be gravely mis- chievous, unless we could at the same time so intensify the ordinary man's regard for justice or for social well-being that the total strength of motives prompting to the punishment of crime should not be diminished. But, however much it were " to be wished," as Butler says, that men would repress wrong from these higher motives rather than from passionate resentment, we cannot hope to effect this change in human beings generally except by a slow and gradual process of elevation of character : therefore to come to the point on which Dr. Martineau appears to me to be at issue with common sense supposing a conflict between " Compassion," which is highest but one in Dr. Martineau's scale, and " Kesentment," which he places about the middle, it is by no means to be laid down as a general rule that com- passion ought to prevail. We ought rather with Butler to regard resentment as a salutary " balance to the weakness of pity," which would be liable to prevent the execution of justice if resentment were excluded. Or we might similarly take the impulse which comes lowest (among those not condemned altogether) in Dr. Martineau's scale the "Love of Ease and Sensual Pleasure". No doubt this impulse, or group of impulses, is continually leading men to shirk or scamp their strict duty, or to fall in some less definite way below their own ideal of conduct ; hence the attitude habitually maintained towards it by preachers and practical moralists is that of repression. Still, common sense surely recognises that there are cases in which even this impulse ought to prevail over impulses ranked much above it in Dr. Martineau's scale ; we often find men prompted say by " love of gain " or " love of cul- ture " to shorten unduly their hours of recreation ; and in the case of a conflict of motives under such circumstances we should judge it best that victory should remain on the side of the "love of ease and pleasure," and that the un- seasonable intrusion of the higher motive should be repelled. Perhaps it may be said that in neither of these instances would the conflict of motives remain such as I have described : that though the struggle might begin, so to say,
