The Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson
By Subject
MORAL PRINCIPLES / TRUTH AND VIRTUE
Of all the theories on this question, the most whimsical seems to
have been that of Wollaston, who considers
truth as the foundation of morality. The thief who steals your
guinea does wrong only inasmuch as he acts a lie in using your guinea
as if it were his own. Truth is certainly a branch of morality, and a
very important one to society. But presented as its foundation, it is
as if a tree taken up by the roots had its stem reversed in the air,
and one of its branches planted in the ground. Some have made the love
of God the foundation of morality. This, too, is but a branch of
our moral duties, which are generally divided into duties to God and
duties to man. If we did a good act merely from the love of God and a
belief that it is pleasing to Him, whence arises the morality of the
atheist? It is idle to say, as some do, that no such being exists. We
have the same evidence of the fact as of most of those we act on, to
wit: their own affirmations, and their reasonings in support of them.
I have observed, indeed, generally, that while in Protestant countries
the defections from the Platonic Christianity of the priests is to
Deism, in Catholic countries they are to Atheism. Diderot, D'Alembert,
D'Holbach, Condorcet, are known to have been among the most virtuous
of men. Their virtue, then, must have had some other foundation than
the love of God.
Self-interest, or rather self-love, or egoism, has been
more plausibly substituted as the basis of morality. But I consider
our relations with others as constituting the boundaries of morality.
With ourselves we stand on the ground of identity, not of relation,
which last, requiring two subjects, excludes self-love confined to a
single one. To ourselves, in strict language, we can owe no duties,
obligation requiring also two parties. Self-love, therefore, is no
part of morality. Indeed it is exactly its counterpart. It is the sole
antagonist of virtue, leading us constantly by our propensities to
self-gratification in violation of our moral duties to others.
Accordingly, it is against this enemy that are erected the batteries
of moralists and religionists, as the only obstacle to the practice of
morality. Take from man his selfish propensities, and he can have
nothing to seduce him from the practice of virtue. Or subdue those
propensities by education, instruction or restraint, and virtue
remains without a competitor. Egoism, in a broader sense, has been
thus presented as the source of moral action. It has been said that we
feed the hungry, clothe the naked, bind up the wounds of the man
beaten by thieves, pour oil and wine into them, set him on our own
beast and bring him to the inn, because we receive ourselves pleasure
from these acts. So Helvetius, one of the best men on earth, and the
most ingenious advocate of this principle, after defining "interest"
to mean not merely that which is pecuniary, but whatever may procure
us pleasure or withdraw us from pain, [De l'esprit 2, 1,]
says, [ib. 2, 2,] " the humane man is he to whom the sight of
misfortune is insupportable, and who to rescue himself from this
spectacle, is forced to succor the unfortunate object." This
indeed is true. But it is one step short of the ultimate question.
These good acts give us pleasure, but how happens it that they give us
pleasure? Because nature hath implanted in our breasts a love of
others, a sense of duty to them, a moral instinct, in short, which
prompts us irresistibly to feel and to succor their distresses, and
protests against the language of Helvetius, [ib. 2, 5,] "what
other motive than self-interest could determine a man to generous
actions? It is as impossible for him to love what is good for the sake
of good, as to love evil for the sake of evil." The Creator would
indeed have been a bungling artist, had he intended man for a social
animal, without planting in him social dispositions. It is true they
are not planted in every man, because there is no rule without
exceptions; but it is false reasoning which converts exceptions into
the general rule. Some men are born without the organs of sight, or of
hearing, or without hands. Yet it would be wrong to say that man is
born without these faculties, and sight, hearing, and hands may with
truth enter into the general definition of man.
to Thomas Law, 13 June 1814
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