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.

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    determinant. Both of them are of supreme importance for the preservation of the species, and may consequently be regarded as elements in the animal’s mental constitution which have been acquired by means of natural selection in the struggle for existence. We have already noted that, originally, the impulse of attacking the enemy could hardly have been guided by a representation of the enemy as suffering. But, as a successful attack is necessarily accom¬ panied by such suffering, the desire to produce it natur¬ ally, with the increase of intelligence, entered as an important element in resentment. The need for protec¬ tion thus lies at the foundation of resentment in all its forms. This view is not new. More than one hundred and fifty years before Darwin, Shaftesbury wrote of resentment in these words :—u Notwithstanding its immediate aim be indeed the ill or punishment of another, yet it is plainly of the sort of those [affections] which tend to the advantage and interest of the self-system, the animal himself; and is withal in other respects contributing to the good and interest of the species.” 1 A similar opinion is expressed by Butler, according to whom the reason and end for which man was made liable to anger is, that he might be better qualified to prevent and resist vio¬ lence and opposition, while deliberate resentment a is to be considered as a weapon, put into our hands by nature, against injury, injustice, and cruelty.”2 Adam Smith, also, believes that resentment has u been given us by nature for defence, and for defence only,” as being a the safeguard of justice and the security of innocence.” 3 Exactly the same view is taken by several modern evolutionists as regards the “end” of resent¬ ment, though they, of course, do not rest contented with saying that this feeling has been given us by nature, but try to explain in what way it has developed. cc Among members of the same species,” says Mr. Herbert Spencer, “ those individuals which have not, in any considerable degree, resented aggressions, must have ever tended to disappear, and to have left behind those which have with some effect made counter-aggressions.” 4 Mr. 1 Shaftesbury, ‘ Inquiry concerning •3 Adam Smith, Theory of Moral Virtue or Merit,’ ii. 2. 2, in Character- Sentiments, p. 113. isticks, ii. 145. 4 Spencer, Principles of Ethics, i. 2 Butler, ‘Sermon VIII.—Upon Re- 361. sentment,’ op. cit. p. 457.
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