the prompting to act but not of the result; we are pushed from behind, not pulled from in front. Some impulses of course develop into intelligent desires. But impulse is primary; it rather than rational desire is the source of human conduct and the social order. Morality itself springs from an impulse, the impulse to blame. The human individual feels this impulse—then sets his reason to work to find good grounds for the censure he wishes to inflict. In historical Ethics, moral sense theories glorify the impulse to blame, under the name of conscience. In protest hedonistic theories have too often glorified the impulse to sensual gratification. Now in order that the human being shall live as rich and varied a life as possible his impulses must be given full scope for expansion and development. Thus we reach the principle which Mr. Joad, if I understand him, regards as fundamental to Ethics that value attaches only to those actions and objects which afford expression to vital impulses. The importance and rightfulness of the claims of impulse are witnessed in his opinion by the facts which psycho-analysis has brought to light regarding the evil effects of thwarting or suppressing these vital tendencies. Historically, morality has to a great extent signified the control of the impulses of the young by the impulses of their elders, i.e., the control of our positive creative impulses by those of fear and blame. Thus in the matter of sex-relations, morality has taken the form of prudery, "the old woman's caricature of morality."
Mr. Joad would doubtless deny that 'impulse' as he uses it is a term deserving of those very epithets with which he belabors metaphysics; he would hold it to be a fact of psychological science. In answer it will be sufficient to point to the uncritical and unscientific character of the conception as he applies it. Impulse, we are told, is unconscious desire (p. 108). There is apparently an impulse "to gratify bodily appetites" (p. 116). There is also an impulse to blame (p. 113). "Most important of all perhaps is the thwarting under modern conditions of what may be called the social or political impulse. All men have a strong desire to meddle with, and if possible to control, the lives of other individuals living in the same community" (p. 129). The most of the native tendencies to action thus included under impulse would be treated by modern psychology as instincts—yet psychology certainly knows nothing of an instinct to gratify bodily appetite, or to censor the conduct of others, or a political instinct in the sense intended.
Up to this point Mr. Joad's Common-Sense Ethics promises to afford us very little assistance in the organization of our lives and the direction of our conduct. To give expression to the life-force in the gratification of impulses particularly when these retain their youthful fire and vigor seems the burden of his teaching. Yet he is at pains to deny that his theory justifies any indiscriminate indulgence of impulses. He contrives in fact
