The Meaning of Good-A Dialogue Part 8

But upon one thing we seem to be agreed--that whatever may be the value of current standards of Good in a.s.sisting our judgment, we cannot permit them simply to supersede it by an act of authority. And so once more we are thrown back each upon his own opinions."

"To which, according to you," interposed Parry, "we are bound to attach some validity."

"And yet which we are aware," added Ellis, "cannot possibly have any."

I was about to protest against this remark when I saw, coming round from the garden, Bartlett and Dennis, the two remaining members of our party. They had just returned from a mountaineering expedition; and now, having had their bath, had come out to join us in our usual place of a.s.sembly. Bartlett had in his hand the _Times_ and the _Daily Chronicle_. He was a keen business man, and a Radical politician of some note; and though not naturally inclined to speculative thought, would sometimes take part in our discussions if ever they seemed to touch on any practical issue. On these occasions his remarks were often very much to the point; but his manner being somewhat aggressive and polemic, his interposition did not always tend to make smooth the course of debate. It was therefore with mingled feelings of satisfaction and anxiety that I greeted his return. After some talk about their expedition, he turned to me and said, "We ought to apologise, I suppose, for interrupting a discussion?"

"Not at all!" I replied; "but, as you are here, perhaps you will be willing to help us?"

"Oh," he said, "I leave that to Dennis. This kind of thing isn't much in my line."

"What kind of thing?" Leslie interjected. "I don't believe you even know what we're talking about!"

"Talking about. Why, philosophy, of course! What else should it be when you get together?"

"This time," I said, "it's not exactly philosophy, but something more like ethics."

"What is the question?" asked Dennis.

Dennis was always ready for a discussion, and the more abstract the theme, the better he was pleased. He had been trained for the profession of medicine, but coming into possession of a fortune, had not found it necessary to practise, and had been devoting his time for some years past to Art and Metaphysics. I always enjoyed talking to him, though the position he had come to hold was one which I found it very difficult to understand, and I am not sure that I have been able to represent it fairly.

"We have been discussing," I said, in answer to his question, "our judgments about what is good, and trying without much success to get over the difficulty, that whereas, on the one hand, we seem to be practically obliged to trust these judgments, on the other we find it hard to say which of them, if any, are true, and how far and in what sense."

"Oh," he replied, "then Bartlett ought really to be able to help you.

At any rate he's very positive himself about what's good and what's bad. Curiously enough, he and I have been touching upon the same point as you, and I find, among other things, that he is a convinced Utilitarian."

"I never said so," said Bartlett, "but I have no objection to the word. It savours of healthy homes and pure beer!"

"And is that your idea of Good?" asked Leslie, irritated, as I could see, by this obtrusion of the concrete.

"Yes," he replied, "why not? It's as good an idea as most."

"I suppose," I said, "all of us here should agree that the things you speak of are good. But somebody might very well deny it."

"Of course somebody can deny anything, if only for the sake of argument."

"You mean that no one could be serious in such a denial?"

"I mean that everybody really knows perfectly well what is good and what is bad; the difficulty is, not to know it, but to do it!"

"But surely you will admit that opinions do differ?"

"They don't differ nearly so much as people pretend, on important points; or, if they do, the difference is not about what ought to be done, but about how to do it."

"What ought to be done, then?" asked Leslie defiantly.

"Well, for example we ought to make our cities decent and healthy."

"Why?"

"Because we ought; or, if you like, because it will make people happy."

"But I don't like at all! I don't see that it's necessarily good to make people happy."

"Oh well, if you deny that--"

"Well, if I deny that?"

"I don't believe you to be serious, that's all. Good simply means, what makes people happy; and you must know that as well as I do."

"You see!" interposed Dennis; "I told you he was a Utilitarian."

"I daresay I am; at any rate, that's what I think; and so, I believe, does everybody else."

"'The Universe,'" murmured Ellis, "'so far as sane conjecture can go, is an immeasurable swine's trough, consisting of solid and liquid, and of other contrasts and kinds; especially consisting of attainable and unattainable, the latter in immensely greater quant.i.ties for most pigs.'"

"That's very unfair," Parry protested, "as an account of Hedonism."

"I don't see that it is at all," cried Leslie.

"I think," I said, "that it represents Bentham's position well enough, though probably not Bartlett's."

"Oh well," said Parry, "Bentham was only an egoistic Hedonist."

"A what?" said Bartlett.

"An egoistic Hedonist."

"And what may that be?"

"An egoistic Hedonist," Parry was beginning, but Ellis cut him short.

"It's best explained," he said, "by an example. Here, for example, is Bentham's definition of the pleasures of friends.h.i.+p; they are, he says, 'those which accompany the persuasion of possessing the goodwill of such and such individuals, and the right of expecting from them, in consequence, spontaneous and gratuitous services.'"

We all laughed, though Parry, who loved fair play, could not help protesting. "You really can't judge," he said, "by a single example."

"Can't you?" cried Ellis; "well then, here's another. 'The pleasures of piety' are 'those which accompany the persuasion of acquiring or possessing the favour of G.o.d; and the power, in consequence, of expecting particular favours from him, either in this life or in another.'"

We laughed again; and Parry said, "Well, I resign myself to your levity. And after all, it doesn't much matter, for no one now is an egoistic Hedonist."

"What are we then," asked Bartlett, "you and I?"

"Why, of course, altruistic Hedonists," said Parry.

"And what's the difference?"

"The difference is," Parry began to explain, but Ellis interrupted him again.

"The difference is," he cried, "that one is a brute and the other a prig."