#moral sentiments

“When our passive feelings are almost always so sordid and so selfish, how comes it that our active principles should often be so generous and so noble? When we are always so much more deeply affected by whatever concerns ourselves, than by whatever concerns other men; what is it which prompts the generous, upon all occasions, and the mean upon many, to sacrifice their own interests to the greater interests of others? It is not the soft power of humanity, it is not that feeble spark of benevolence which Nature has lighted up in the human heart, that is thus capable of counteracting the strongest impulses of self-love. It is a stronger power, a more forcible motive, which exerts itself upon such occasions. It is reason, principle, conscience, the inhabitant of the breast, the man within, the great judge and arbiter of our conduct.”

“The great source of both the misery and disorders of human life, seems to arise from over-rating the difference between one permanent situation and another. Avarice over-rates the difference between poverty and riches: ambition, that between a private and a public station: vain-glory, that between obscurity and extensive reputation. The person under the influence of any of those extravagant passions, is not only miserable in his actual situation, but is often disposed to disturb the peace of society, in order to arrive at that which he so foolishly admires. The slightest observation, however, might satisfy him, that, in all the ordinary situations of human life, a well-disposed mind may be equally calm, equally cheerful, and equally contented. Some of those situations may, no doubt, deserve to be preferred to others: but none of them can deserve to be pursued with that passionate ardour which drives us to violate the rules either of prudence or of justice; or to corrupt the future tranquillity of our minds, either by shame from the remembrance of our own folly, or by remorse from the horror of our own injustice.”

The fable of intelligible freedom -- The history of the sentiments by means of which we make a person responsible consists of the following principal phases. First, all single actions are called good or bad without any regard to their motives, but only on account of the useful or injurious consequences which result for the community. But soon the origin of these distinctions is forgotten, and it is deemed that the qualities 'good' or 'bad' are contained in the action itself without regard to its consequences, by the same error according to which language describes the stone as hard, the tree as green -- with which, in short, the result is regarded as the cause. Then the goodness or badness is implanted in the motive, and the action in itself is looked upon as morally ambiguous. Mankind even goes further, and applies the predicate good or bad no longer to single motives, but to the whole nature of an individual, out of whom the motive grows as the plant grows out of the earth. Thus, in turn, man is made responsible for his operations, then for his actions, then for his motives, and finally for his nature. Eventually it is discovered that even this nature cannot be responsible, inasmuch as it is an absolutely necessary consequence concreted out of the elements and influences of past and present things -- that man, therefore, cannot be made responsible for anything, neither for his nature, nor his motives, nor his actions, nor his effects. It has therewith come to be recognized that the history of moral valuations is at the same time the history of an error, the error of responsibility, which is based upon the error of the freedom of the will. Schopenhauer thus decided against it: because certain actions bring ill human ('consciousness of guilt') in their train, there must be a responsibility; for there would be no reason for this ill humour if not only all human actions were not done of necessity -- which is actually the case and also the belief of this philosopher -- but man himself from the same necessity is precisely the being that he is -- which Schopenhauer denies. From the fact of that ill humour Schopenhauer thinks he can prove the liberty which man must somehow have had, not with regard to actions, but with regard to nature; liberty, therefore, to be thus or otherwise, not to act thus or otherwise. From the esse, the sphere of freedom and responsibility, there results, in his opinion, the operari, the sphere of strict causality, necessity, and irresponsibility. This ill humour is apparently directed to the operari -- in so far as it is erroneous -- but in reality it is directed to the esse, which is the deed of a free will, the fundamental cause of the existence of an individual, man becomes that which he wishes

“…[T]o Smith [beneficence] arises out of sympathy, the capacity to imagine oneself in the circumstances of another, which generates sentiments of benevolence: ‘it is, that to feel much for others and little for ourselves, that to restrain our selfish, and to indulge our benevolent affections, constitutes the perfection of human nature; and can alone produce the harmony of sentiments and passions in which consists their whole grace and propriety’ (TMS, I.i.5.5).”

Their [moral sentiments] existence in Kantian philosophy suggest that Kant himself saw a need for some motivational supplement to the moral law. Kant’s (perhaps strategic?) refusal to address more directly the ethical potential of somatic moods and sentiments, however, compels him to engage in conceptual acrobatics. It also prevents him from exploring deeply enough how such affective elements might be orchestrated into an ethical sensibility designed to shore up and support the law.

Το ότι πολύ συχνά αισθανόμαστε λύπη με τη λύπη των άλλων είναι γεγονός τόσο αυταπόδεικτο που δεν χρειάζεται αποδείξεις, μιας και αυτό το συναίσθημα, όπως και πολλά άλλα πρωτογενή στην ανθρώπινη φύση συναισθήματα, δεν περιορίζεται με κανέναν τρόπο στους ενάρετους και τους φιλεύσπλαχνους, αν και ίσως αυτοί είναι εκείνοι που το νιώθουν με την πιο έντονη ευαισθησία. Ακόμη και ο μεγαλύτερος παλιάνθρωπος και ο πιο πωρωμένος παραβάτης των νόμων της κοινωνίας δεν στερείται εντελώς αυτού του συναισθήματος.