Principle of Ethics

Chapter 1

The First Moral Law

1. The moral law is a notion of the mind(1) used for making a judgment about the morality of human actions, which must be guided by it.

2. Three conditions are necessary for using this notion to judge human actions:

If therefore we are to judge the morality of actions, the law must exist in us, that is, be known, promulgated and applied. The application completes the judgment. 

Notes

(1) When I say that law is only 'a notion with which the mind judges', the definition of law, in my opinion, is, reduced to its simplest philosophical form. However, it may not be altogether clear how law is a notion, and an example may help to clarify my thought. The moral law 'no one must harm his fellow human being' prohibits actions which ha" my neighbour. Thus every time 1 am involved in a harmful act, the law requires me to judge it as forbidden. But how do I judge that an act is harmful to my neighbour?
Clearly, 1 use the notion of harm, because otherwise I could never distinguish between useful and harmful actions, just as, if I do not have the notion of colour, I cannot differentiate green from yellow or purple from red.
By comparing harmful actions with the notion of harmfulness as their type, I come to know which actions are harmful. A notion, therefore, is always the principle or rule of judgment.

But, it may be objected, the law that 'it is illicit to harm your fellow human being' is itself a judgment; what notion, then, am I using as a rule to make this judgment and formulate the law? I am using the notion of what is 'Illicit. When we know what constitutes the illicitness of actions, we also know that harmful actions are illicit. Thus the notion of the illicitness of actions is itself the law. According to this law, I judge about the morality or probity of actions, noting them as licit or illicit.

This analysis of law clearly shows that laws have, so to speak, a hierarchical order, some being higher, some lower. The higher laws are more general, while the lower are more specific. Specific laws state the same as general laws but more distinctly and explicitly. Thus the moral law 'You must not harm your fellow human being' is lower and less general than 'You must not do what is illicit'. In both these laws, expressed as propositions, there is a notion which the mind uses for judging whether actions are good or evil. It is, therefore, essentially law because 'law' simply means a rule with which to distinguish right from wrong.

This observation agrees with the common definition of law, Lex est recta agendorum ratio [law is the right reason of actions], because a reason and a notion are really the same thing. Notion, however, expresses a different relationship from reason, just as idea expresses the same thing as notion and reason, but in a different respect. This will be understood more clearly if we bear in mind the following definitions of reason and notion:

It is clear then that any idea can be simultaneously a notion and a reason, because every idea is a species making individuals known and an essence on which reasonings are founded. (2)
It may seem at first sight that there is no difference between the existence or knowledge of a law in the subject and its promulgation. But after serious consideration we see the difference and its relevancy. In the case of positive law, it is easy to understand that a law could legally promulgated yet remain unknown to some people. Conversely t the lawgiver could be known before any law or, obligation promulgated by him. However, in the case of natural law-, the between its existence in the subject and its promulgation is not so evident; there seems to be no third element between knowledge and ignorance of this law. If we know it, it must already exist and be promulgated; if we do not know it, it is neither promulgated nor existent in us. But we have defined law as simply a notion or idea used as an exemplar for comparing and judging our actions. An idea is one thing, use of it is another. To have an idea and not know its use is not contradictory, for we certainly do not know all the uses, developments and consequences of our ideas. We often have principles in our minds which remain unproductive precisely because we are ignorant of their use. Indeed the accepted difference between a thinker and a non-thinker is that the, former draws many more consequences than the latter from the first principles of reasoning common to both.

There is no contradiction, therefore, between our having an idea and at the same tinie being totally ignorant of its use in some particular relationship. And even if both the idea and the knowledge of its use existed together, they would not be the same thing. Our mind would still have to separate them by analysis.

Let us take the first idea we use for judging about the morality of actions, and let us suppose we are totally ignorant of its use as a rule for such judgments. In this case the law would exist in us because the idea itself is the law and has all the force of law. But the law itself would not be promulgated, because we would not feel the obligatory force of the idea to be used as a rule for judging moral actions good or had. I would go even further: the force that an idea possesses to produce consequences of its own normally remains completely hidden from us if we do not have the experience of seeing and feeling this force in reality.

This truth is clarified in the moral system I propose, where I demonstrate that the first moral law is the notion of being. However, although all people have this notion, only a few have reflected on its ability to serve as the rule for judging about the morality of actions. It is indeed possible to reflect upon a notion without reflecting upon its use! What takes place in the order of reflection takes place also in the order of direct knowledge. We all have the direct notion if being but if we make no direct use of it, we cannot feel its force as moral law.

We can therefore accept, without any contradiction, that in the first moments of human existence the idea of being is present unaccompanied by awareness of its aptitude to serve as law. The human being begins to be aware of this aptitude only when he begins to use it, that is, with experience. The existence of this idea, anterior to its use, has been demonstrated in The Origin oy Thought [Leominster, 1987, cf. 398-470]

The idea then is. the law (as we discover afterwards by its use), known of itself to every intelligence, although its use remains unknown until the occasion to apply it presents itself. As long as this application is not actually made (the length of time is irrelevant), the law is neither promulgated nor suggested to us. Hence, the necessity of the distinction I make between the existence of the law in us (the natural law) and its promulgation.