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Thoughts on Man, His Nature, Productions and Discoveries

William Godwin

Section 14 of 27 - Table of Contents
ESSAY XI.
OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE.

NO question has more memorably exercised the ingenuity of men who
have speculated upon the structure of the human mind, than that
of the motives by which we are actuated in our intercourse with
our fellow-creatures.  The dictates of a plain and
unsophisticated understanding on the subject are manifest; and
they have been asserted in the broadest way by the authors of
religion, the reformers of mankind, and all persons who have been
penetrated with zeal and enthusiasm for the true interests of the
race to which they belong.

"The end of the commandment," say the authors of the New
Testament, "is love."  "This is the great commandment of the law,
Thou shalt love thy maker with all thy heart; and the second is
like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself."  "Though
I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and give my body to be
burned, and have not love, it profiteth me nothing."  "For none
of us liveth to himself; and no man dieth to himself."

The sentiments of the ancient Greeks and Romans, for so many
centuries as their institutions retained their original purity,
were cast in a mould of a similar nature.  A Spartan was seldom
alone; they were always in society with each other.  The love of
their country and of the public good was their predominant
passion, they did not imagine that they belonged to themselves,
but to the state.  After the battle of Leuctra, in which the
Spartans were defeated by the Thebans, the mothers of those who
were slain congratulated one another, and went to the temples to
thank the Gods, that their children had done their duty; while
the relations of those who survived the defeat were inconsolable.

The Romans were not less distinguished by their self-denying
patriotism.  It was in this spirit that Brutus put his two sons
to death for conspiring against their country.  It was in this
spirit that the Fabii perished at their fort on the Cremera, and
the Decii devoted themselves for the public.  The rigour of
self-denial in a true Roman approached to a temper which moderns
are inclined to denominate savage.

In the times of the ancient republics the impulse of the citizens
was to merge their own individuality in the interests of the
state.  They held it their duty to live but for their country.
In this spirit they were educated; and the lessons of their early
youth regulated the conduct of their riper years.

In a more recent period we have learned to model our characters
by a different standard.  We seldom recollect the society of
which we are politically members, as a whole, but are broken into
detached parties, thinking only for the most part of ourselves
and our immediate connections and attachments.

This change in the sentiments and manners of modern times has
among its other consequences given birth to a new species of
philosophy.  We have been taught to affirm, that we can have no
express and pure regard for our fellow-creatures, but that all
our benevolence and affection come to us through the strainers of
a gross or a refined self-love.  The coarser adherents of this
doctrine maintain, that mankind are in all cases guided by views
of the narrowest self-interest, and that those who advance the
highest claims to philanthropy, patriotism, generosity and
self-sacrifice, are all the time deceiving others, or deceiving
themselves, and use a plausible and high-sounding language
merely, that serves no other purpose than to veil from
observation "that hideous sight, a naked human heart."

The more delicate and fastidious supporters of the doctrine of
universal self-love, take a different ground.  They affirm that
"such persons as talk to us of disinterestedness and pure
benevolence, have not considered with sufficient accuracy the
nature of mind, feeling and will.  To understand," they say, "is
one thing, and to choose another.  The clearest proposition that
ever was stated, has, in itself, no tendency to produce voluntary
action on the part of the percipient.  It can be only something
apprehended as agreeable or disagreeable to us, that can operate
so as to determine the will.  Such is the law of universal
nature.  We act from the impulse of our own desires and
aversions; and we seek to effect or avert a thing, merely because
it is viewed by us as an object of gratification or the contrary.

The virtuous man and the vicious are alike governed by the same
principle; and it is therefore the proper business of a wise
instructor of youth, and of a man who would bring his own
sentiments and feelings into the most praise-worthy frame, to
teach us to find our interest and gratification in that which
shall be most beneficial to others."

When we proceed to examine the truth of these statements, it
certainly is not strictly an argument to say, that the advocate
of self-love on either of these hypotheses cannot consistently be
a believer in Christianity, or even a theist, as theism is
ordinarily understood.  The commandments of the author of the
Christian religion are, as we have seen, purely disinterested:
and, especially if we admit the latter of the two explanations of
self-love, we shall be obliged to confess, on the hypothesis of
this new philosophy, that the almighty author of the universe
never acts in any of his designs either of creation or
providence, but from a principle of self-love.  In the mean time,
if this is not strictly an argument, it is however but fair to
warn the adherents of the doctrine I oppose, of the consequences
to which their theory leads.  It is my purpose to subvert that
doctrine by means of the severest demonstration; but I am not
unwilling, before I begin, to conciliate, as far as may be, the
good-will of my readers to the propositions I proceed to
establish.

I will therefore further venture to add, that, upon the
hypothesis of self-love, there can be no such thing as virtue.
There are two circumstances required, to entitle an action to be
denominated virtuous.  It must have a tendency to produce good
rather than evil to the race of man, and it must have been
generated by an intention to produce such good.  The most
beneficent action that ever was performed, if it did not spring
from the intention of good to others, is not of the nature of
virtue.  Virtue, where it exists in any eminence, is a species of
conduct, modelled upon a true estimate of the good intended to be
produced.  He that makes a false estimate, and prefers a trivial
and partial good to an important and comprehensive one, is
vicious[20].

[20] Political Justice, Book 11, Chap. IV.


It is admitted on all hands, that it is possible for a man to
sacrifice his own existence to that of twenty others.  But the
advocates of the doctrine of self-love must say, that he does
this that he may escape from uneasiness, and because he could not
bear to encounter the inward upbraiding with which he would be
visited, if he acted otherwise.  This in reality would change his
action from an act of virtue to an act of vice.  So far as
belongs to the real merits of the case, his own advantage or
pleasure is a very insignificant consideration, and the benefit
to be produced, suppose to a world, is inestimable.  Yet he
falsely and unjustly prefers the first, and views the latter as
trivial; nay, separately taken, as not entitled to the smallest
regard.  If the dictates of impartial justice be taken into the
account, then, according to the system of self-love, the best
action that ever was performed, may, for any thing we know, have
been the action, in the whole world, of the most exquisite and
deliberate injustice.  Nay, it could not have been otherwise,
since it produced the greatest good, and therefore was the
individual instance, in which the greatest good was most directly
postponed to personal gratification[21].  Such is the spirit of
the doctrine I undertake to refute.

[21] Political Justice, Book IV, Chap. X.


But man is not in truth so poor and pusillanimous a creature as
this system would represent.

It is time however to proceed to the real merits of the question,
to examine what in fact is the motive which induces a good man to
elect a generous mode of proceeding.

Locke is the philosopher, who, in writing on Human Understanding,
has specially delivered the doctrine, that uneasiness is the
cause which determines the will, and urges us to act.  He
says[22], "The motive we have for continuing in the same state,
is only the present satisfaction we feel in it; the motive to
change is always some uneasiness:  nothing setting us upon the
change of state, or upon any new action, but some uneasiness.
This is the great motive that works on the mind."

[22] Book II, Chap. XXI, Sect. 29.


It is not my concern to enquire, whether Locke by this statement
meant to assert that self-love is the only principle of human
action.  It has at any rate been taken to express the doctrine
which I here propose to refute.

And, in the first place, I say, that, if our business is to
discover the consideration entertained by the mind which induces
us to act, this tells us nothing.  It is like the case of the
Indian philosopher[23], who, being asked what it was that kept
the earth in its place, answered, that it was supported by an
elephant, and that elephant again rested on a tortoise.  He must
be endowed with a slender portion of curiosity, who, being told
that uneasiness is that which spurs on the mind to act, shall
rest satisfied with this explanation, and does not proceed to
enquire, what makes us uneasy?

[23] Locke on Understanding, Book 11, Chap. XIII, Sect. 19.


An explanation like this is no more instructive, than it would
be, if, when we saw a man walking, or grasping a sword or a
bludgeon, and we enquired into the cause of this phenomenon, any
one should inform us that he walks, because he has feet, and he
grasps, because he has hands.

I could not commodiously give to my thoughts their present form,
unless I had been previously furnished with pens and paper.  But
it would be absurd to say, that my being furnished with pens and
paper, is the cause of my writing this Essay on Self-love and
Benevolence.

The advocates of self-love have, very inartificially and
unjustly, substituted the abstract definition of a voluntary
agent, and made that stand for the motive by which he is prompted
to act.  It is true, that we cannot act without the impulse of
desire or uneasiness; but we do not think of that desire and
uneasiness; and it is the thing upon which the mind is fixed that
constitutes our motive.  In the boundless variety of the acts,
passions and pursuits of human beings, it is absurd on the face
of it to say that we are all governed by one motive, and that,
however dissimilar are the ends we pursue, all this dissimilarity
is the fruit of a single cause.

One man chooses travelling, another ambition, a third study, a
fourth voluptuousness and a mistress.  Why do these men take so
different courses?

Because one is partial to new scenes, new buildings, new manners,
and the study of character.  Because a second is attracted by the
contemplation of wealth and power.  Because a third feels a
decided preference for the works of Homer, or Shakespear, or
Bacon, or Euclid.  Because a fourth finds nothing calculated to
stir his mind in comparison with female beauty, female
allurements, or expensive living.

Each of these finds the qualities he likes, intrinsically in the
thing he chooses.  One man feels himself strongly moved, and
raised to extacy, by the beauties of nature, or the magnificence
of architecture.  Another is ravished with the divine
excellencies of Homer, or of some other of the heroes of
literature.  A third finds nothing delights him so much as the
happiness of others, the beholding that happiness increased, and
seeing pain and oppression and sorrow put to flight.  The cause
of these differences is, that each man has an individual internal
structure, directing his partialities, one man to one thing, and
another to another.

Few things can exceed the characters of human beings in variety.
There must be something abstractedly in the nature of mind, which
renders it accessible to these varieties.  For the present we
will call it taste.  One man feels his spirits regaled  with the
sight of those things which constitute wealth, another in
meditating the triumphs of Alexander or Caesar, and a third in
viewing the galleries of the Louvre.  Not one of these thinks in
the outset of appropriating these objects to himself; not one of
them begins with aspiring to be the possessor of vast opulence,
or emulating the triumphs of Caesar, or obtaining in property the
pictures and statues the sight of which affords him so exquisite
delight.  Even the admirer of female beauty, does not at first
think of converting this attractive object into a mistress, but
on the contrary desires, like Pygmalion, that the figure he
beholds might become his solace and companion, because he had
previously admired it for itself.

Just so the benevolent man is an individual who finds a peculiar
delight in contemplating the contentment, the peace and heart's
ease of other men, and sympathises in no ordinary degree with
their sufferings.  He rejoices in the existence and diffusion of
human happiness, though he should not have had the smallest share
in giving birth to the thing he loves.  It is because such are
his tastes, and what above all things he prefers, that he
afterwards becomes distinguished by the benevolence of his
conduct.

The reflex act of the mind, which these new philosophers put
forward as the solution of all human pursuits, rarely presents
itself but to the speculative enquirer in his closet.  The savage
never dreams of it.  The active man, engaged in the busy scenes
of life, thinks little, and on rare occasions of himself, but
much, and in a manner for ever, of the objects of his pursuit.

Some men are uniform in their character, and from the cradle to
the grave prefer the same objects that first awakened their
partialities.  Other men are inconsistent and given to change,
are "every thing by starts, and nothing long."  Still it is
probable that, in most cases, he who performs an act of
benevolence, feels for the time that he has a peculiar delight in
contemplating the good of his fellow-man.

The doctrine of the modern philosophers on this point, is in many
ways imbecil and unsound.  It is inauspicious to their creed,
that the reflex act of the mind is purely the affair of
experience.  Why did the liberal-minded man perform his first act
of benevolence?  The answer of these persons ought to be, because
the recollection of a generous deed is a source of the truest
delight.  But there is an absurdity on the face of this solution.

We do not experimentally know the delight which attends the
recollection of a generous deed, till a generous deed has been
performed by us.  We do not learn these things from books.  And
least of all is this solution to the purpose, when the business
is to find a solution that suits the human mind universally, the
unlearned as well as the learned, the savage as well as the sage.

And surely it is inconsistent with all sound reasoning, to
represent that as the sole spring of our benevolent actions,
which by the very terms will not fit the first benevolent act in
which any man engaged.

The advocates of the doctrine of "self-love the source of all our
actions," are still more puzzled, when the case set before them
is that of the man, who flies, at an instant's warning, to save
the life of the child who has fallen into the river, or the
unfortunate whom he beholds in the upper story of a house in
flames.  This man, as might be illustrated in a thousand
instances, treats his own existence as unworthy of notice, and
exposes it to multiplied risks to effect the object to which he
devotes himself.

They are obliged to say, that this man anticipates the joy he
will feel in the recollection of a noble act, and the cutting and
intolerable pain he will experience in the consciousness that a
human being has perished, whom it was in his power to save.  It
is in vain that we tell them that, without a moment's
consideration, he tore off his clothes, or plunged into the
stream with his clothes on, or rushed up a flaming stair-case.
Still they tell us, that he recollected what compunctious
visitings would be his lot if he remained supine--he felt the
sharpest uneasiness at sight of the accident before him, and it
was to get rid of that uneasiness, and not for the smallest
regard to the unhappy being he has been the means to save, that
he entered on the hazardous undertaking.

Uneasiness, the knowledge of what inwardly passes in the mind, is
a thing not in the slightest degree adverted to but in an
interval of leisure.  No; the man here spoken of thinks of
nothing but the object immediately before his eyes; he adverts
not at all to himself; he acts only with an undeveloped, confused
and hurried consciousness that he may be of some use, and may
avert the instantly impending calamity.  He has scarcely even so
much reflection as amounts to this.

The history of man, whether national or individual, and
consequently the acts of human creatures which it describes, are
cast in another mould than that which the philosophy of self-love
sets before us.  A topic that from the earliest accounts
perpetually presents itself in the records of mankind, is
self-sacrifice, parents sacrificing themselves for their
children, and children for their parents.  Cimon, the Athenian,
yet in the flower of his youth, voluntarily became the inmate of
a prison, that the body of his father might receive the honours
of sepulture.  Various and unquestionable are the examples of
persons who have exposed themselves to destruction, and even
petitioned to die, that so they might save the lives of those,
whose lives they held dearer than their own.  Life is indeed a
thing, that is notoriously set at nothing by generous souls, who
have fervently devoted themselves to an overwhelming purpose.
There have been instances of persons, exposed to all the horrors
of famine, where one has determined to perish by that slowest and
most humiliating of all the modes of animal destruction, that
another, dearer to him than life itself, might, if possible, be
preserved.

What is the true explanation of these determinations of the human
will?  Is it, that the person, thus consigning himself to death,
loved nothing but himself, regarded only the pleasure he might
reap, or the uneasiness he was eager to avoid?  Or, is it, that
he had arrived at the exalted point of self-oblivion, and that
his whole soul was penetrated and ingrossed with the love of
those for whom he conceived so exalted a partiality?

This sentiment so truly forms a part of our nature, that a
multitude of absurd practices, and a multitude of heart-rending
fables, have been founded upon the consciousness of man in
different ages and nations, that these modes of thinking form a
constituent part of our common existence.  In India there was
found a woman, whose love to the deceased partner of her soul was
so overwhelming, that she resolved voluntarily to perish on his
funeral pile.  And this example became so fascinating and
admirable, that, by insensible degrees, it grew into a national
custom with the Hindoos, that, by a sort of voluntary constraint,
the widows of all men of a certain caste, should consign
themselves to the flames with the dead bodies of their husbands.
The story of Zopyrus cutting off his nose and ears, and of
Curtius leaping into the gulph, may be fictitious:  but it was
the consciousness of those by whom these narratives were written
that they drew their materials from the mighty store-house of the
heart of man, that prompted them to record them.  The
institutions of clientship and clans, so extensively diffused in
different ages of the world, rests upon this characteristic of
our nature, that multitudes of men may be trained and educated
so, as to hold their existence at no price, when the life of the
individual they were taught unlimitedly to reverence might be
preserved, or might be defended at the risk of their destruction.

The principal circumstance that divides our feelings for others
from our feelings for ourselves, and that gives, to satirical
observers, and superficial thinkers, an air of exclusive
selfishness to the human mind, lies in this, that we can fly from
others, but cannot fly from ourselves.  While I am sitting by the
bed-side of the sufferer, while I am listening to the tale of his
woes, there is comparatively but a slight line of demarcation,
whether they are his sorrows or my own.  My sympathy is
vehemently excited towards him, and I feel his twinges and
anguish in a most painful degree.  But I can quit his apartment
and the house in which he dwells, can go out in the fields, and
feel the fresh air of heaven fanning my hair, and playing upon my
cheeks.  This is at first but a very imperfect relief.  His image
follows me; I cannot forget what I have heard and seen; I even
reproach myself for the mitigation I involuntarily experience.
But man is the creature of his senses.  I am every moment further
removed, both in time and place, from the object that distressed
me.  There he still lies upon the bed of agony:  but the sound of
his complaint, and the sight of all that expresses his suffering,
are no longer before me.  A short experience of human life
convinces us that we have this remedy always at hand ["I am
unhappy, only while I please"[24]; and we soon come therefore to
anticipate the cure, and so, even while we are in the presence of
the sufferer, to feel that he and ourselves are not perfectly
one.

[24] Douglas.


But with our own distempers and adversities it is altogether
different.  It is this that barbs the arrow.  We may change the
place of our local existence; but we cannot go away from
ourselves.  With chariots, and embarking ourselves on board of
ships, we may seek to escape from the enemy.  But grief and
apprehension enter the vessel along with us; and, when we mount
on horseback, the discontent that specially annoyed us, gets up
behind, and clings to our sides with a hold never to be
loosened[25].

[25] Horace.


Is it then indeed a proof of selfishness, that we are in a
greater or less degree relieved from the anguish we endured for
our friend, when other objects occupy us, and we are no longer
the witnesses of his sufferings?  If this were true, the same
argument would irresistibly prove, that we are the most generous
of imaginable beings, the most disregardful of whatever relates
to ourselves.  Is it not the first ejaculation of the miserable,
"Oh, that I could fly from myself?  Oh, for a thick, substantial
sleep!" What the desperate man hates is his own identity.  But he
knows that, if for a few moments he loses himself in
forgetfulness, he will presently awake to all that distracted
him.  He knows that he must act his part to the end, and drink
the bitter cup to the dregs.  He can do none of these things by
proxy.  It is the consciousness of the indubitable future, from
which we can never be divorced, that gives to our present
calamity its most fearful empire.  Were it not for this great
line of distinction, there are many that would feel not less for
their friend than for themselves.  But they are aware, that his
ruin will not make them beggars, his mortal disease will not
bring them to the tomb, and that, when he is dead, they may yet
be reserved for many years of health, of consciousness and
vigour.

The language of the hypothesis of self-love was well adapted to
the courtiers of the reign of Louis the Fourteenth.  The language
of disinterestedness was adapted to the ancient republicans in
the purest times of Sparta and Rome.

But these ancients were not always disinterested; and the moderns
are not always narrow, self-centred and cold.  The ancients paid,
though with comparative infrequency, the tax imposed upon
mortals, and thought of their own gratification and ease; and the
moderns are not utterly disqualified for acts of heroic
affection.

It is of great consequence that men should come to think
correctly on this subject.  The most snail-blooded man that
exists, is not so selfish as he pretends to be.  In spite of all
the indifference he professes towards the good of others, he will
sometimes be detected in a very heretical state of sensibility
towards his wife, his child or his friend; he will shed tears at
a tale of distress, and make considerable sacrifices of his own
gratification for the relief of others.

But his creed is a pernicious one.  He who for ever thinks, that
his "charity must begin at home," is in great danger of becoming
an indifferent citizen, and of withering those feelings of
philanthropy, which in all sound estimation constitute the
crowning glory of man.  He will perhaps have a reasonable
affection towards what he calls his own flesh and blood, and may
assist even a stranger in a case of urgent distress.--But it is
dangerous to trifle with the first principles and sentiments of
morality.  And this man will scarcely in any case have his mind
prepared to hail the first dawnings of human improvement, and to
regard all that belongs to the welfare of his kind as parcel of
his own particular estate.

The creed of self-love will always have a tendency to make us
Frenchmen in the frivolous part of that character, and Dutchmen
in the plodding and shopkeeping spirit of barter and sale.  There
is no need that we should beat down the impulse of heroism in the
human character, and be upon our guard against the effervescences
and excess of a generous sentiment.  One of the instructors of my
youth was accustomed to say to his pupils, "Do not be afraid to
commit your thoughts to paper in all the fervour and glow of your
first conception:  when you come to look at them the next day,
you will find this gone off to a surprising degree."  As this was
no ill precept for literary composition, even so in our actions
and moral conduct we shall be in small danger of being too
warm-hearted and too generous.

Modern improvements in education are earnest in recommending to
us the study of facts, and that we should not waste the time of
young persons upon the flights of imagination.  But it is to
imagination that we are indebted for our highest enjoyments; it
tames the ruggedness of uncivilised nature, and is the
never-failing associate of all the considerable advances of
social man, whether in throwing down the strong fences of
intellectual slavery, or in giving firmness and duration to the
edifice of political freedom.

And who does not feel that every thing depends upon the creed we
embrace, and the discipline we exercise over our own souls?

The disciple of the theory of self-love, if of a liberal
disposition, will perpetually whip himself forward "with loose
reins," upon a spiritless Pegasus, and say, "I will do generous
things; I will not bring into contempt the master I serve--though
I am conscious all the while that this is but a delusion, and
that, however I brag of generosity, I do not set a step forward,
but singly for my own ends, and my own gratification."
Meanwhile, this is all a forced condition of thought; and the man
who cherishes it, will be perpetually falling back into the cold,
heartless convictions he inwardly retains.  Self-love is the
unwholesome, infectious atmosphere in which he dwells; and,
however he may seek to rise, the wings of his soul will eternally
be drawn downwards, and he cannot be pervaded, as he might have
been, with the free spirit of genuine philanthropy.  To be
consistent, he ought continually to grow colder and colder; and
the romance, which fired his youth, and made him forget the
venomous potion he had swallowed, will fade away in age,
rendering him careless of all but himself, and indifferent to the
adversity and sufferings of all of whom he hears, and all with
whom he is connected.

On the other hand, the man who has embraced the creed of
disinterested benevolence, will know that it is not his fitting
element to "live for himself, or to die for himself."  Whether he
is under the dominion of family-affection, friendship,
patriotism, or a zeal for his brethren of mankind, he will feel
that he is at home.  The generous man therefore looks forward to
the time when the chilling and wretched philosophy of the reign
of Louis the Fourteenth shall be forgotten, and a fervent desire
for the happiness and improvement of the human species shall
reign in all hearts.

I am not especially desirous of sheltering my opinions under the
authority of great names:  but, in a question of such vital
importance to the true welfare of men in society, no fair
advantage should be neglected.  The author of the system of
"self-love the source of all our actions" was La Rochefoucault;
and the whole herd of the French philosophers have not been
ashamed to follow in the train of their vaunted master.  I am
grieved to say, that, as I think, the majority of my refining and
subtilising countrymen of the present day have enlisted under his
banner.  But the more noble and generous view of the subject has
been powerfully supported by Shaftesbury, Butler, Hutcheson and
Hume.  On the last of these I particularly pique myself; inasmuch
as, though he became naturalised as a Frenchman in a vast variety
of topics, the greatness of his intellectual powers exempted him
from degradation in this.

That however which I would chiefly urge in the way of authority,
is the thing mentioned in the beginning of this Essay, I mean,
the sentiments that have animated the authors of religion, that
characterise the best ages of Greece and Rome, and that in all
cases display themselves when the loftiest and most generous
sentiments of the heart are called into action.  The opposite
creed could only have been engendered in the dregs of a corrupt
and emasculated court; and human nature will never shew itself
what it is capable of being, till the last remains of a doctrine,
invented in the latter part of the seventeenth century, shall
have been consigned to the execration they deserve.
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