even been represented as essential to, or as a condition of, gratitude; but it is not implied in what I here understand by gratitude. It is one thing to be grateful, and another thing to feel that it is one's duty to be grateful. A depression of the "self-feeling," a feeling of humiliation, also frequently accompanies gratitude as a motive for requiting the benefit; but it is certainly not an element in gratitude itself. Retributive kindly emotion is a much less frequent phenomenon in the animal kingdom than is the emotion. of resentment. In many animal species not even the germ of it is found, and where it occurs it is generally restricted within narrow limits. Anybody may provoke an animal's anger, but only towards certain individuals it is apt to feel retributive kindliness. The limits for this emotion are marked off by the conditions under which altruistic sentiments in general tend to arise-a subject which will be discussed in another connection. Indeed, social affection is itself essentially retributive. Gregarious animals take pleasure in each other's company, and with this pleasure is intimately associated kindly feeling towards its cause, the companion himself. Social affection presupposes reciprocity; it is not only a friendly sentiment towards another individual, but towards an individual who is conceived of as a friend. The intrinsic object of retributive kindliness being to retain a cause of pleasure, we may assume that the definite desire to produce pleasure in return for pleasure received is due to the fact that such a desire materially promotes the object in question exactly in the same way as the definite desire to inflict pain in return for pain inflicted has become an element in resentment because such a desire promotes the intrinsic object of resentment, the removal of the cause of pain. And as natural selection accounts for the origin of resentment, so it also accounts for the 1 Horwicz, Psychologische Analysen, ii. 333: "Ohne dieses Gefühl des Verbundenseins . . . . kann keine Dank barkeit aufkommen." Cf. Milton, Paradise Lost, iv. 52 sqq. origin of retributive kindly emotion. Both of these emotions are useful states of mind; by resentment evils are averted, by retributive kindliness benefits are secured. That there is such a wide difference in their prevalence is explicable from the simple facts that gregariousness— which is the root of social affection, and, largely at least, a condition of the rise of retributive kindly emotions-is an advantage only to some species, not to all, and that even gregarious animals have many enemies, but few friends. In some cases the friendly reaction in retributive kindliness is directed towards individuals who have in no way been the cause of the pleasure which gave rise to the emotion. So intimate is the connection between the stimulus and the reaction, that he who is made happy often feels a general desire to make others happy.' But such an indiscriminate reaction is only an offset of the emotion with which we are here concerned. Moreover, retributive kindly emotion often confers benefits upon somebody nearly related to the benefactor, if he himself be out of reach, or in addition to benefits conferred on him. But in such cases the gratitude towards the benefactor is the real motive. That moral approval by which I understand that emotion of which moral praise or reward is the outward manifestation-is a kind of retributive kindly emotion, and as such allied to gratitude, will probably be admitted without much hesitation. Its friendly character is not, like the hostile character of moral disapproval, disguised by any apparently contradictory facts. To confer a benefit upon a person is not generally regarded as wrong, unless, indeed, it involves an encroachment on somebody's rights or is contrary to the feeling of justice. And that moral approval sometimes bestows its favours upon undeserving 1 That a happy man wants to see glad faces around him, is also due to another cause, which has been pointed out by Dr. Hirn (Origins of Art, p. 83): from their expression he wants to derive further nourishment and increase for his own feeling. 2 The relationship between gratitude and moral approval has been recognised by Hartley (Observations on Man, i. 520) and Adam Smith (Theory of Moral Sentiments, passim). individuals for the merits of others, can no more invalidate the fact that it is essentially directed towards the cause of pleasure, than the occasional infliction of punishments upon innocent individuals invalidates the fact that moral disapproval is essentially directed against the cause of pain. Unmerited rewards are explicable on grounds analogous to those to which we have traced unmerited punishments. The doctrine of family solidarity leads, not only to common responsibility for crimes, but to common enjoyment of merits. In Madagascar, exemption from punishment was claimed by the descendants of persons who had rendered any particular service to the sovereign or the State, as also by other branches of the family, on the same plea.1 According to Chinese ideas, the virtuous conduct of any individual will result, not only in prosperity to himself, but in a certain quantity of happiness to his posterity, unless indeed the personal wickedness of some of the descendants neutralise the benefits which would otherwise accrue from the virtue of the ancestor ; and, conversely, the Chinese government confers titles of nobility upon the dead parents of a distinguished son.3 The idea that the dead share in punya or papa, that is, the merit or demerit of the living, and that the happiness of a man in the next life depends on the good works of his descendants, was early familiar to the civilised natives of India; almost all legal deeds of gift contain the formula that the gift is made "for the increase of the punya of the donor and that of his father and mother." 4 But the vicarious efficacy of good deeds is not necessarily restricted to the members of the same family. In a hymn of the Rig-Veda we find the idea that the merits of the pious may benefit their neighbours. According to one of the Pahlavi texts, persons who are wholly unable to perform good works are supposed to be entitled to a share of any supererogatory good works performed by others. The Chinese believe that 1 Ellis, History of Madagascar, i. 376. 2 Giles, Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, i. 426, n. 3; ii. 384, n. 63. Doolittle, Social Life of the Chinese, ii. 398. Wells 3 Giles, op. cit. i. 305, n. 6. Williams, Middle Kingdom, i. 422. 4 Barth, Religions of India, p. 52, n. 4. 5 Rig-Veda, vii. 35. 4. 6 Dina-i Mainôg- Khirad, xv. 3. whole kingdoms are blessed by benevolent spirits for the virtuous conduct of their rulers. Yahveh promised not to destroy Sodom for the sake of ten righteous, provided that so many righteous could be found in the town. The doctrine of vicarious reward or satisfaction through good works is, in fact, more prevalent than the doctrine of vicarious punishment. Jewish theology has a great deal more to say about the acceptance of the merits of the righteous on behalf of the wicked, than about atonement through sacrifice. The Muhammedans, who know nothing of vicarious suffering as a means of expiation, confer merits upon their dead by reciting chapters of the Koran and almsgiving, and some of them allow the pilgrimage to Mecca to be done by proxy. Christian theology itself-maintains that salvation depends on the merit of the passion of Christ; and from early times the merits of martyrs and saints were believed to benefit other members of the Church.5 For the explanation of these and similar facts various circumstances have to be considered. Good deeds may be so pleasing to a god as to induce him to forgive the sins of the wicked, in accordance with the rule that anger yields to joy. There is solidarity not only between members of the same family, but between members of the same social unit; hence the virtues of individuals may benefit the whole community to which they belong. The Catholic theologian argues that, since we are all regenerated unto Christ by being washed in the same baptism, made partakers of the same sacraments, and, especially, of the, same meat and drink, the body and blood of Christ, we are all members of the same body. "As, then, the foot does not perform its functions solely for itself, but also for the benefit of the eyes; and as the eyes exercise their sight, not for their own, but for the common benefit of all the members; so should works of satisfaction be deemed common to all the members of the de Groot, Religious System of China (vol. iv. book ii.) 435. 2 Genesis, xviii. 32. 3 Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, p. 424, n. I. Lane, Modern Egyptians, pp. 247, 248, 532. Sell, op. cit. pp. 242, 278, 287, 288, 298. Cf. Wallin, Första Resa fran Cairo till Arabiska öknen, p. 103. 5 Harnack, History of Dogma, ii. 133, n. 3. H 1 Church." Moreover, virtues, like sins, are believed to be in a material way transferable. In Upper Bavaria, when a dead person is laid out, a cake of flour is placed on his breast in order to absorb the virtues of the deceased, whereupon the cake is eaten by the nearest relatives. And we are told that, in a certain district in the north of England, if a child is brought to the font at the same time as a body is committed to the ground, whatever was "good" in the deceased person is supposed to be transferred to the little child, since God does not allow any goodness" to be buried and lost to the world, and such "goodness" is most likely to enter a little child coming to the sacrament of Baptism. A blessing, also, no less than a curse, is looked upon in the light of material energy; goodness is not required for the acquisition of it, mere contact will do. Blessings are hereditary :—" The just man walketh in his integrity: his children are blessed after him."4 It is no doubt more becoming for a god to pardon the sinner on account of the merits of the virtuous, than to punish the innocent for the sins of the wicked. It shows that his compassion overcomes his wrath; and the mercy of the deity is, among all divine attributes, that on which the higher monotheistic religions lay most stress. Allah said, "Whoso doth one good act, for him are ten rewards, and I also give more to whomsoever I will; and whoso doth ill, its retaliation is equal to it, or else I forgive him." Nevertheless, the moral consciousness of a higher type can hardly approve that the wicked should be pardoned for the sake of the virtuous, or that the reward for an act should be bestowed upon anybody else than the agent. The doctrine of vicarious merit or recompense is not just; it involves that badness is unduly ignored; it is based on crude ideas of goodness and merit. The theory of opera supererogativa, as we have seen, attaches badness. 1 Catechism of the Council of Trent, ii. 5. 72. Am Urquell, ii. 101. 3 Peacock, Executed Criminals and Folk-Medicine,' in Folk-Lore, vii. 280. 5 Lane-Poole, Speeches and TableTalk of Mohammad, p. 147. |