II. Development of the Autonomy of Ethics

1. The Roman Catholic Theory

divine indwelling. The great process of amalgamation resulted in the Catholic objectification of Christianity, with the Church conceived as a supernatural institution of grace. Various elements were taken up in the process of combination. Participation in the divine was secured through neo-Platonic theories, by which the interval between the natural and supernatural was bridged. As each of these two spheres had its legitimate existence, a place was made for an ethical system resting largely upon the traditional law of nature as found in the philosophy of the Stoics, while the Aristotelian conception of the State was also wrought into the scheme. The esthetic ethics of antiquity completely disappeared. The law of nature was made identical with the decalogue, hence the sphere of a real political and civil ethics was very limited. Ecclesiastical ethics had the predominance. A different value to the morality of the layman from that of the clergy. As time went on, the weak points of this system were criticized and the secular element accentuated, and at the same time direct protests were heard against the prevailing conception of ethics as a system of laws and regulations enforced by the objectively divine institution of the Church.

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The Protestant Position.

The Protestant movement accomplished much in minimizing the dualism between natural and supernatural factors. But the distinction between natural powers weakened by original sin and the supernatural morality of grace still remained. It is true that from the Protestant standpoint religious perfection could be attained in the world. Normal man, not the ascetic, is the object of saving grace. The State with its various functions is allowed to be free of ecclesiastical prescriptions; although it represents fallen human nature, it can be inspired by a real Christianity. So the Christian as a citizen can live as a Christian without performing some specially divine works at the bidding of his ecclesiastical superiors. Calvin took an optimistic view of the possibility of living a Christian life according to Christian rules in the State. The primary authority was founded on the identity of the law of nature with the decalogue, of which the first table contained the demands of a spiritual character and the second controlled the natural forms of life in a civilized state. The object of Christianity is to restore the law of nature in this form, for heathendom was supposed to have been forgetful of the natural law in both directions. Protestants avoided adding to this scripturally con tained law of nature by the so-called Evangelical Counsels (see Consilia Evangelica). But the idea of secular law was to be accepted as a guide only for the unregenerate. The Christian could not accept it as a standard of conduct; it stood only for a natural form of life. Its prescriptions and indeed all of the forms and activities of the State were regarded as a species of discipline prepared and ordained by God as a part of that earthly system through which the Christian had to go as a pilgrim in his journey to heaven. As to the right of resistance to the prescriptions of the State, Lutheranism and Calvinism differed. Both united, however, in denying any proper ethical aim to the State and to civilized society per se. All its rights in this sphere came through the divine ordinance as laid down in the second table of the decalogue. (On this cf. H. Wiskemann, Daratel lung der in Deutschland zur Zeit der Reformation herrschenden nadionalokonomischen Ansichten, Leipsic, 1861; P. Lobstein, Ethik Calvins, Strasburg, 1877; E. Troeltseh, Vernunft and Ofenbarung bei . Gerhard and Melanehthon, Göttingen, 1891; C. Thieme, Sittliche Triebkraft des Glaubens, Leip sic, 1895; E. Brandenburg, Luthers Anachauung von Staat und der Gesellschaft, Halle, 1901; M. Schulze, Meditatio futurie vitce in System Calvins, Leipsic, 1901; G. Honnicke, Studien zur altprote stantiechen Ethik, Berlin, 1902.)

What had been repressed by Roman Catholicism, viz., the free sphere and subjectivity of the Christian idea of ethics, was more fully developed, but in neither aspect can the development be called com plete. The existence of the State and the value of the State's activity as a religious entity, not in opposition to spiritual concerns, was acknowledged. What was omitted was the recognition that the State and social institutions were derivations from the Christian idea. A necessarily ethical aim was not allowed to the State.

The State and the Law of Nature.

The State was permitted as a part of a natural order, with the duty laid upon it of providing for the supremacy of Biblical truth and Biblical moral law. On this ground its special forms of activity were acknowledged as legitimate. Secular ends alone, such as the laying-down of systems of law, and the provisions for economic prosperity, were assigned to it. A further stage in the emancipation of the State came from the conception of the law of nature that had been made a part of the religious system by both Roman Catholics and Reformers. This conception of natural law can take on a thoroughly conservative color if it is made a mere abstraction from existing political ordinances and from commonly acknowledged legal and ethical principles. These are assumed to be a natural divinely created system, the postulates of all social life. This Was the point of view taken in the ethics of the Reformers, and on it was built the, political system and the theoretical ethical system of the Reformation. But the law of nature is capable of being handled as an instrument of criticism of the actual and the existent. In this fashion it is used by Grotius, who gives it a free sphere, apart from the decalogue or any other theological sanction. Its power would come from reason even if there were no God, and it is to be referred to God only because he is the source of human activity in which the ideas of reason work themselves out. In this way a path is made for the ethical idea of the State and of law. Grotius wished to preserve this idea on a sound basis, independent of confessional contests and unmoved by theological subtleties. Indeed his law of nations is the opponent of confessionalism and religious warfare. The idea as developed by Grotius strengthened the unity and sovereignty of the State, gave ethical and legal in dependence to the individual, and aimed at a rational derivation of political .and social conditions in the State, making legitimate its care for the welfare of the citizens, and also constituting its ideal aim, the realization of the idea of law. Yet even here the profounder ethical tasks of State life are left out of consideration. Non-ecclesiastical morality still has limitations, but the system performed good service as being the kernel of ethical independence from which modern civilization is derived. The emancipation of the State through the discussion and supporters of the theory of natural law became complete. Along with the full recognition of the sovereignty of the State as an end in itself comes also the recognition of the right of the individual citizen in the State to share in the aims of the State's life. The result of the English political movements of the seventeenth century was a definite separation between political freedom and theology. On this ground, England became a model, furnishing practical ideas and political theories to the Conti nent. (Cf. C. Kaltenborn, Vorlduferdes Hugo Grotius, Leipsic, 1848; O. Gierke, Johann Althusius, Breslau, 1880; G. Jellinek, Das Recht des modernenStaates, i. 288-301, 399-424, Berlin, 1900.)

Less important to the question under consideration is the influence of the Renaissance. It is true

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it proclaimed the independence of secular morality from the traditional transcendent ethical theories of the Middle Ages, and produced a sharp-cut expression of individualism.

4. Influence of the Renaissance.

But the leaders in the Renaissance lacked system; they were inclined to skepticism and anarchy and represented an exclusive and aristocratic type of thought. Through its great representative Machiavelli, the Renaissance exercised strong influence over Hobbes and his critics. The ethical analysis of the Renaissance with its dependence on a psychological treatment of ethics is of importance, but on the whole the ethical ideas of the Renaissance had slight impelling power and were too esthetic in character to admit of wide application. In this way the influence of the Renaissance remained in direct and of minor importance. Of really decisive importance was Protestant ethics in the particular form assumed by it in the Reformed Church in Geneva, France, Holland, and England, where the supremacy of the Calvinistic system of predestination worked out a complete civil order.

5. Importance of Reformed Protestant Ethics.

It recognized political, economic, and social elements, but its science was theology, while it left art altogether out of account. The law of nature was made identical with the revealed law; the State was to aid the Church to advance pure teaching and establish a civil life corresponding to Christian ideals. On the one hand, there was the external discipline keeping citizens in subjection to those ideals and, on the other hand, the so-called "guardianship of both tables" by which civil discipline and the purity of church teaching were maintained, a combination of the law of nature and the proclamation of salvation. Calvin's position on this point was much more thoroughgoing than Luther's, who left to the State a large sphere of activity for its natural functions and assigned to it considerable control in Church administration (see Polity, IV., 2). Calvin provided for a theocracy by which the demands and forms of civil life should be brought into barmony with the exact standards of Christian ethics, proclaimed by an independently organized Church acting as the interpreter of the Bible. The various elements of Calvinistic theology, its theory of predestination and grace, were brought into practical application in the life of the individual and the State. But the political conception of Calvinism was aristocratic. It thought of the Church as the fellowship of the predestinated who were to bear sway over the whole sphere of life; the Bible in all its details was the standard of ethical conduct, not simply a source of grace and guide to penitence. Calvinism was not content with the small sphere of Lutheranism in directing the moral conduct and ethical aspirations of the individual citizen, it attacked also directly the control of important ecclesiastical functions by the State authorities. The State indeed was bound to maintain order and execute law, and also by divine and natural right it had to maintain Biblical truth and Scriptural ordinances within its territory. If it failed to do this the society of the elect had the right of revolt, and this right was exercised in the wars of the Huguenots and of the Netherland Reformers. The Christian people were sovereign, and the Christian democracy was the supreme court of appeal. This was a very different principle from the Lutheran conservatism with its principles of practical passive obedience and its inconsistent distinction between the Church with its guidance of the individual and the State with its right to carry out measures of general utility. With Calvin Church and State worked together to establish the Scriptural social order. So one of the crucial stages in the spiritual development of modern times is reformed teaching and practise in ethics and politics and in the construction of state and society. (Cf. M. Schneckenburger, Vergleichende Darstellung des lutherischen and reformierten Lehrbegrifes, Stuttgart, 1855; Elster, Calvin als Staatsmann, Gesetzgeber and National6konom, in Jahrbücher für National6konomie and Statistik, 1878; W. Walker, John Calvin, chap. x., New York, 1906.)

6. English Ethics Under Puritanism.

This system found realization in England on a different ground from that in any other country, for there was a monarchy struggling for absolutism, a church catholicizing in tendency, both set over against a parliamentaiy system standing for the rights of the peoplc and a popular demand for a purely spiritual ecclesiastical system. As a result there came about a dissolution of the old historical constitution. Cromwell and his army did away with that compromise with historical institutions which prevailed on the continent, and proceeded to the erection of a real Christian state on a revolutionary basis. Scotch and French Huguenot influences combined with the theory of the rights of the people and natural law to make up Puritanism. The most radical religious ideas, the desire for autonomy, the claim for toleration, the separation of the Church from the State, found a home in Cromwell's army. Some of these ideas are due to continental influences, to the Anabaptists, and others. A considerable mystical element was also present among the armed supporters of the Commonwealth. They were desirous of a certain amount of freedom in dogma and worship, but their moral idea was meant to be strictly and absolutely maintained. So far as Christian society went Church and State had a common aim, the erection of a Christian commonwealth where the pious minority would be in control. The new system was to be built on the basis of specific English traditions, and it held to the old English idea of the rights and duties of a Christian state. Its special marks are religious and ecclesiastical autonomy, sovereignty of the people, puritanical strict morality, a continental policy based on uniting the Protestants and opposing Roman Catholics, popularizing and Christianizing law and justice. The experiment lasted only a short time and failed because of its impracticability, since it not only destroyed the existing church organization but also conflicted with the rights and interests of individuals. The gains made by the Commonwealth could he maintained in succeeding periods only by treating the

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idea of church autonomy as entirely distinct from the idea of political freedom. The two spheres, the ecclesiastical and political, had to be isolated from one another. As to the moral ideal of Puritanism, it had massed together State and law, war and polities, property and trade, trying to control them and the individual in his private life through the conception of a God-serving and God-fearing peoplc. But the leaders of Puritanism soon realized that these various elements could not be developed in such a combination. Cromwell became an opportunist and gave up his idealistic religious international policy for a realistic commercial policy. Milton allowed that true Christian morality could be practised only by the select few, not by the whole people. Among the masses the problem was solved in quite a different way. There. the various religious convictions led to the foundation of numerous sects, some with extravagant political ideals like those of the Fifth Monarchy Men (q.v.), or like those of the Quakers and Ranters, who were indifferent to political forms and secular ordinances. In this confusion there came a severe crisis to a purely Christian ethics. Traditional elements had to be sacrificed, ethical problems in their practical shape were econsidered, and, in the Restoration, the ethical consciousness was investigated objectively and scientifically, Christian and secular aims were surveyed under new relations, and the opposition, combination, or compromise between the two was treated from the scientific point of view. (Cf. on this section the literature under Cromwell, Oliver; and Puritanism.)

7. The New Psychological Basis.

This scientific reconstruction of ethics depends first of all on a psychological analysis which leaves aside all metaphysical assumptions of the essence of the soul and the action of God upon it, and devotes itself to discovering the laws of its own action and nature from a study and peculiar processes. This marks a distinct separation from the old theologizing ethics. Psychological analysis of a sort entirely different from its form in the scholastic theological system assumes the chief role, different, too, from the old psychology, which was a compromise between the religious language of the Bible and the scientific psychology of Greek philosophy. The old system insisted on the eternal worth, the unity, and the isolation of the soul from things of sense; transcendent causes were introduced as its influences-God, angels, and demons--just as all extraordinary natural processes were referred to the immediate activity of divine or diabolic power. This naive psychological supernaturalism had been transmitted as a part of the traditional system of revelation, which worked upon the soul in a miracu lous way through its association with the means of revelation in the sacraments and ecclesiastical ordinances. Ancient psychology was brought in as its support, and place was made for immanent psychological explanation, which, however, played a very subordinate role. The chief concern of both Roman and Protestant ethics was with the processes of salvation, and revelation and the power of grace. The opposition to this as far as the thirteenth century. It had two sours, the Stoic study of the emotions and temperament and the free poetical and artistic analysis of man as found in the literature and art of the Renaissance. It ended in the principle of universal psychological analysis, based on historic induction and supported by the achievements in the study of nature. Especially original in this respect is Machiavelli, with his psychological analysis, his historical comparison, and his empirical generalization. Men like Descartes, Gassendi, Malebranche, and Bayle contributed also by their study of the emotions and passions. But the chief impulse came from Hobbes, the founder of a purely psychological analysis, intended to build up an original conception of morality. Along with Hobbes must be placed Spinoza, the creator of the mechanical method of treating the emotions and passions. These were the tendencies that were popularized by English thinkers. One of the effects of this method was a change in the view of history. The matter of history had been studied only in relation to conceptions about the character and purpose of a world derived from the revelation of the Church and the Bible. A causal determination of facts in themselves had not been attempted; but with this new view of psychology there came a causal explanation of history, with its study of historical characters on the basis of psychological analysis. Nothing consistent could be achieved here, however, unless there were a' new foundation of ethical rules inductively derived from social and historical facts. This was really an extension of the principle of the consensus of mankind acknowledged to be valid by theological ethics. So there came from this psychological foundation a so-called natural system of intellectual sciences, in which the eighteenth century produced the most original work, just as the seventeenth century holds the first place in scientific analysis of the natural sciences. Even when a distinction was made between natural and supernaturally caused processes, the fixed point of departure was the results of psychological analysis founded on the assumption of regularity and normality in the phenomena under review. Morality was no longer regarded as a miracle of grace, the moral law was no longer identified with the revealed law. All of the old dogmatic scholastic problems either disappeared or became of subordinate interest, and an entirely new set of fundamental problems were treated as of primary importance.

8. Problems Presented.

First in older came psychogenetic problems. In these are discussed the sources of moral phenomena, whether they have grounds outside of their own sphere, as utilitarianism declares; or whether their source is exclusive and independent, according to the stand point of idealistic intuitionism. This is a crucial question for Christian morality as a whole; all others, such as the connection of morality with grace and its dependence on revelation, are concerned ultimately with this. Another primary classification arises from the question of determinism; not determinism in the old sense of divine predestination, but that scheme which brings morality within a fixed causal nexus of psychological laws.

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Determinism seems to destroy the value of ethics altogether, while indeterminism may be made to harmonize with the recognition of grace. There is bound to come up also the principle of autonomy, that is, whether conduct is necessarily subordinated to the principles of rational insight or to the effects of psychological motives. From this point of view, all individuals stand alike. It is really an application of the convictions of political equality and ecclesiastical toleration, as they were developed in the course of the seventeenth century. The next problem is concerned with the relation of morality and religion. Under the older system they were identical; no true morality was possible without faith. The new point of view was to treat religion as a kind of by-product, a special modification of a common natural morality. Religion itself became the subject of psychological analysis. The question arose as to the necessary relation between divine sanction or the fate of man in the next world and man's striving and willing in this. Finally, it became necessary to establish a formulation of the content of the moral law as a psychological principle in such a way that its obligations could be established as ultimate derivatives from the principles above classified and analyzed. If the Biblical standards were abandoned as necessarily authoritative, in what way could Christian ethics be brought into relation with this general analysis outlined above? The problem was finally solved by turning over the discussion of Christian ethics to theology, although at first the general formulation of moral ideas was certainly influenced by Christian types of thought. But these attempts were unsatisfactory, old scholastic conceptions were seen to lack clearness, and in proportion to the degree of removal of extraneous elements from the moral idea, the more its autonomy became plain and independent by right. These were the problems which the political and social condition of England in the seventeenth century forced into the atmosphere of thought and discussion, as they are represented in the speculations of Hobbes, the ideas of the Levellers (q.v.), and the the Erastians (see Erastus, Thomas, Erastianism).