him. The agent is responsible, the actions are imputable.

Human actions, we have said, are sometimes good, sometimes bad. These two qualifications have degrees in proportion to the importance or the difficulty of the action. It is thus we call an action suitable, estimable, beautiful, admirable, sublime, etc. On the other hand, a bad action is sometimes but a simple mistake, and sometimes a crime. It is culpable, base, abominable, execrable, etc.

If we observe in an agent the habit of good actions, a constant tendency to conform to the law of duty, this habit or constant tendency is called virtue, and the contrary tendency is called vice.

Whilst man feels himself bound by his conscience to seek the right, he is impelled by his nature to seek pleasure. When he enjoys pleasure without any admixture of pain, he is happy; and the highest degree of possible pleasure with the least degree of possible pain is happiness. Now, experience shows that happiness is not always in harmony with virtue, and that pleasure does not necessarily accompany right doing.

And yet we find such a separation unjust; and we believe in a natural and legitimate connection between pleasure and right, pain and wrong. Pleasure, considered as the consequence of well-doing, is called recompense; and pain, considered as the legitimate consequence of evil, is called punishment.

When a man has done well he thinks, and all other men think, that he has a right to a recompense. When he has done ill they think the contrary, and he himself thinks also that he must atone for his wrong-doing by a chastisement. This principle, by virtue of which we declare a moral agent deserving of happiness or unhappiness according to his good or bad actions, is called the principle of merit and demerit.

The sum total of the rewards and punishments attached to the execution or violation of a law is called sanction; the sanction of the moral law will then be called moral sanction.

All law presupposes a legislator. The moral law will presuppose, then, a moral legislator, and morality consequently raises us to God. All human or earthly sanction being shown by observation to be insufficient, the moral law calls for a religious sanction. It is thus that morality conducts us to the immortality of the soul.

If we go back upon the whole of the ideas we have just briefly expressed, we shall see that at each of the steps we have taken there are always two contraries opposed the one to the other: good and evil, command and prohibition, virtue and vice, merit and demerit, pleasure and pain, reward and punishment.

Human life presents itself, then, under two aspects. Man can choose between the two. This power is liberty. This choice is difficult and laborious; it exacts from us incessant efforts. It is for this reason that life is said to be a trial, and is often represented as a combat. It should therefore not be represented as a play, but rather as a manly and valiant effort. Struggle is its condition, peace its prize.

Such are the fundamental ideas morality has for its object, and of which it seeks, at the same time, both the principles and the applications.

2. What is morality? the object of morality.—Morality may be considered as a science or as an art.

By science we understand a totality of truths connected with each other concerning one and the same object. Science has for its object proper, knowledge.

By art we understand a totality of rules or precepts for directing activity towards a definite end; art has for its object proper, action.

Science is theoretical or speculative; art is practical.

Morality is a science inasmuch as it seeks to know and demonstrate the principles and conditions of morality; it is an art inasmuch as it shows and prescribes to us its applications.

As science, morality may be defined: science of good or science of duty.

As art, morality may be defined: the art of right living or the art of right acting.

3. Division of morality.—Morality is divided into two parts: in one it studies principles, in the other, applications; in the one, duty; in the other, duties.

Hence a theoretical morality and a practical morality. The first may also be called general morality, and the second particular morality, because the first has for its object the study of the common and general character of all our duties, and the other especially that of the particular duties, which vary according to objects and circumstances. It is in the first that morality has especially the character of science, and in the second, the character of art.

4. Utility of morality.—The utility of moral science has been disputed. The ancients questioned whether virtue could be taught. It may also be asked whether it should be taught. Morality, it is said, depends much more upon the heart than upon the reasoning faculties. It is rather by education, example, habit, religion, sentiment, than through theories, that men become habituated to virtue. If this were so, moral science would be of no use.

However, though it may be true that for happiness nothing can take the place of practice, it does not follow that reflection and study may not very efficaciously contribute toward it, and for the following reasons:

1. It often happens that evil has its origin in the sophisms of the mind, sophisms ever at the service of the passions. It is therefore necessary to ward off or prevent these sophisms by a thorough discussion of principles.

2. A careful study of the principles of morality causes them to penetrate deeper into the soul and gives them there greater fixity.

3. Morality consists not only in the actions themselves, but especially in the motives of our actions. An outward morality, wholly of habit and imitation, is not yet the true morality. Morality must needs be accompanied by conscience and reflection. So viewed, moral science is a necessary element of a sound education, and the higher its principles the more the conscience is raised and refined.

4. Life often presents moral problems for our solution. If the mind is not prepared for them it will lack certainty of decision; what above all is to be feared is that it will mostly prefer the easier and the more convenient solution. It should be fortified in advance against its own weakness by acquiring the habit of judging of general questions before events put it to the proof.

Such is the utility of morality. It is of the same service to man as geometry is to the workman; it does not take the place of tact and common sense, but it guides and perfects them.

It is well understood, moreover, that such a study in nowise excludes, it even exacts, the co-operation of all the practical means we have indicated above, which constitute what is called education. Doctrinal teaching is but the complement and confirmation of teaching by practice and by example.

5. Short résumé of theoretical morality.—Theoretical morality should, in fact, precede practical morality, and that is what usually takes place; but as it presents more difficulties and less immediate applications than practical morality, we shall defer the developments it may give rise to, to a subsequent year.[2] The