CHAPTER VII.
THE ORGANIZATION OF LIFE.
- Die wahre Freiheit ist als Sittlichkeit dies, dass der Wille nicht subjektive, d. i. eigensüchtige, sondern allgemeinen Inhalt zu seinen Zwecken hat. — Hegel, Encyclopädie.
Unexpectedly we have been saved from our
ethical skepticism even in and through the very act of
thinking it out. Here, as elsewhere in philosophy,
the truth is to be reached, neither by dreading nor by
discountenancing the doubt, but by accepting,
experiencing, and absorbing the doubt, until, as an
element in our thought, it becomes also an element in
an higher truth. We do not say, therefore, to
commend our moral principle, as it has just been
propounded, that it is immediately acceptable to all
healthy consciences, or that it is a pious, or a
respectable, or a popularly recognized principle. We say
only this: Doubt rationally about moral doctrines,
and your doubt itself, if real, thorough-going, all-embracing,
merciless, will involve this very principle of
ours. We find the principle by means of the universal
doubt, and it is this method of procedure that
distinguishes the foregoing discussion of the basis of
morals from many of those that have previously been
concerned with this problem. To point out that the
average man, or the reputed saint, or the inspired
