Volume 1

The origin and development of the moral ideas / by Edward Westermarck.

  • Edvard Westermarck
Date:
1906-1908
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The origin and development of the moral ideas / by Edward Westermarck. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    30/750 page 2
    INTRO. moral concepts. There will then be a discussion of the phenomena to which such concepts are applied—the subjects of moral judgments. The general character of these phenomena will be scrutinised, and an answer sought to the question why facts of a certain type are matters of moral concern, while other facts are not. Finally, the most important of these phenomena will be classified, and the moral ideas relating to each class will be stated, and, so far as possible, explained. An investigation of this kind cannot be confined to feelings and ideas prevalent in any particular society or at any particular stage of civilisation. Its subject- matter is the moral consciousness of mankind at large. It consequently involves the survey of an unusually rich and varied field of research—psychological, ethnogra¬ phical, historical, juridical, theological. In the present state of our knowledge, when monographs on most of the subjects involved are wanting, I presume that such an undertaking is, strictly speaking, too big for any man ; at any rate it is so for the writer of this book. Nothing like completeness can be aimed at. Hypotheses of varying degrees of probability must only too often be resorted to. Even the certainty of the statements on which conclusions are based is not always beyond a doubt. But though fullv conscious of the many defects of his attempt, the author nevertheless ventures to think himself justified in placing it before the public. It seems to him that one of the most important objects of human speculation cannot be left in its present state of obscurity ; that at least a glimpse of light must be thrown upon it by researches which have extended over some fifteen years ; and that the main principles underlying the various customs of mankind may be arrived at even without subjecting these customs to such a full and minute treatment as would be required of an anthropological monograph. Possibly this essay, in spite of its theoretical char¬ acter, may even be of some practical use. Though rooted in the emotional side of our nature, our moral
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