morality is a derivative good, and therefore a matter of inference and calculation, he has to set himself to a most careful reflection in order to discriminate nicely the various shades of moral worth and to decide between opposite lines of conduct. All rightness being relative to the effects produced, and so to the concurring circumstances of the time, there presents itself in every new individual life a fresh moral problem. It has been urged again and again by opponents of the theory (most recently by Mr. Leckey and the late Professor Grote) that it requires too much of the individual; and although this objection may be due to a misapprehension, it seems to show plainly enough that the theory in question makes extraordinary demands on habits of moral observation and reflection.

Just as the empirical theory of morality presents to the sincere striver after good the most difficult intellectual problem, so it throws him most completely on his own unaided efforts in the solution of the problem. The theologian is able to offer not only a definite standard of teaching-whether in an original revelation or in its interpretation by the church-but also the possibility of direct spiritual guidance by a supernatural illumination of the soul. The intuitivist, too, in a lesser degree, by teaching the latent existence in the soul of the regulative moral idea, leaves open a door to a sudden, accidental, and semi-miraculous discovery of the path of duty. In contrast with these, the utilitarian moralist teaches that nothing but a man's own patient search will reveal to him the golden thread of his life-duty. No secret admonition, no deterring influence of Socratic daóvov, no sudden outshining of transcendental idea presents itself to a disciple of this morality, and, consequently, he, more than any other, must realise the risks of sudden and impulsive conduct, and the need of making every new endeavour clear and distinct in the light of a calm prevision.

Once more, it may be said that, even in respect to the development of a refined sentiment of veneration and love, the new doctrine of moral worth stands on an equal footing with, if it is not superior to, the older ones. No doubt, as I have already hinted, the nature of the sentiment towards such a moral attribute as holiness will lose some of its mystic character and force in the mind of a utilitarian. There is a kind of sentiment attaching itself to the invisible, and to the eternal and absolute verity, which finds no point d'appui in a relative interpretation of the moral reality. The object of reverence and of ardent aspiration to a utilitarian is something tangible and susceptible of quiet examination. Yet it does not follow that this

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object is unfitted to attract a sentiment quite as intense and deep as that in which awe before the vague and mysterious is the most conspicuous element. If the conception of human happiness be a definite one in respect to the quality of its contents, it is an indefinite one in respect to their quantity. The far-reaching effects of worthy individual conduct, including its subtle influences on unknown contemporaries, and its beatific action on remote descendants, may, perhaps, be said, without extravagance, to contribute an object of inspiring thought not less subduing than that of a divine and eternal decree. Given, argues the utilitarian, a nature capable of conceiving, and of sympathising with, the happiness and misery of its fellows, and one may be certain that the frequent contemplation of so sublime an expanse of conscious life, with all its possibilities of exalted bliss and of overwhelming woe, will develope an ardour of emotion fully adequate to the most lofty human service. For even if there be a certain emotional loss, through the suppression of the idea of the mysterious and impenetrable, this is more than made up by the addition of a basis of sentiment, as vast and stable as that which is afforded by an intelligent conception of the highest human welfare. Further, he may urge that this idea, as the correlative of a reality existing beyond the consciousness of the individual-the sum of all worthy achievement present, past and conceivable is fitted to attract a proper sentiment of reverence, and to call forth a daily aspiration. I may add, moreover, that the acceptance of this conception of morality will not preclude the growth of distinct shades of moral sentiment; for even though all parts of the moral end are seen to repose on the needs of human life, the unequal quantities of these varieties of good, as estimated by the amounts of happiness which they respectively secure, may still serve to sustain in relation to them feelings qualitatively unlike one another. Thus, for example, even though holiness be regarded no longer as a dreadful mystery, but as the clearly recognised condition of daily duty, and as the costly and slowly-wrought equipment, the possession of which is a necessary antecedent to chivalrous and beneficent service, it may still attract an intensity of reverential regard which will assume the shape of a specifically

It is curious that adverse critics of the doctrine assume the necessity of proving that collective human happiness has a desirable worth to the individual. The fact of this desirability is really a datum for the moralist, unless indeed the disclaimers of Mr. Fitzjames Stephen must be looked on as having rendered the fact doubtful.

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distinct emotion. Not only so, but the pcetic ideas which form accretions about moral ends, and help to give them their distinctive characters, may continue to do so in the mind of a utilitarian. beautiful attributes of purity, of harmonious social order, and of illustrious virtue, are not connected with any peculiar basis of morality and will not disappear with it; but they will continue to minister their refined ingredients to the moral feelings even though men adopt a purely relative and human conception of morality.

Finally, it may be said that the value of emotional culture is quite as evident on the empirical theory of morality as it is on the other theories. No doubt both Christian theology and intuitive ethics have taught the necessity of continual meditation in order to see the full majesty and beauty of virtue. Plato and St. John approach each other at times in their modes of inculcating this habit. Yet there is something indistinct in their conceptions of the process by which moral growth advances; for they appear to attribute this to the gradual development of an occult spiritual faculty or of a special mode of spiritual activity.* The empirical doctrine, however, supplies us with a perfectly natural and intelligible method by which this moral growth is secured. Postulating simply a capacity for sympathy and ordinary conceptive powers, it can trace out in distinct outlines the course by which the requisite emotional forces may be developed. And by offering an object of contemplation so vast and so full of suggestion, it makes urgent demand on that habitual consecration of thought and cultivation of feeling, the nature of which we have just been examining.

In seeking to indicate the meaning and value of what is usually styled religious self-culture, I have purposely refrained from any attempt to determine its precise form. By the use of such terms as private meditation and periodic retirement I have been able to enumerate with sufficient clearness the essential characters of these exercises. It may be said that perfect retirement and protracted concentration of thought are necessary to the genuineness and thoroughness of the reflection; and that frequency, if not an unbroken regularity, is a condition of its practical efficacy, that is, the preservation of a constant relation between thought and action. For the rest, it may well be left an open question how such reflection

* With Plato this faculty is the reminiscence of prenatal cognition (áváμvnois); with Plotinus, ecstatic vision (KOTAσis or á‡ý); with St. Paul, the spiritual as opposed to the natural mind (TÒ TVEνμATIKÓV).

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is best conducted. Some persons require a clear direction from without, not only to supply them with inspiring thoughts, but even to control the due sequence of their ideas. To such minds an earnest biography, an inspiring poem, or a thoughtful essay may be a valuable incentive and source of illumination. Stronger and more fertile minds often grow by their own unaided efforts, and pass to lofty attainments from the spontaneous impulse of an active imagination. To these, retirement and meditation in perfect independence of external suggestion, or quiet contemplation of nature's harmonious activities with their many suggestions of the possibilities and limitations of human endeavour, may prove the best preliminary to arduous action. Whatever may be the precise mode of selfimprovement resorted to, the process may be described as the patient endeavour of a sincerely aspiring moral nature, in an hour of external repose, to recruit the energies of thought and emotion which serve to sustain the outer life-achievement.

THE BASIS OF MUSICAL SENSATION.

IF, having selected at random an uneducated lad, a student just fresh from the Conservatoire, and a man of general culture, we introduce them to a concert-room, and compare the impressions they severally receive from a symphony of Beethoven, we shall find these mental effects to be curiously unlike. To the untutored boy the various sequences of melody and harmony are little more than a variety of sensations, delightful or painful in different degrees, the grounds of which he is wholly unable to give us. In the mind of the ardent musician, again, these effects of single sensations appear to be lost in the intellectual gratification of comparing and relating their several distinguishable aspects, and of discovering the formative elements which make them an artistic product. Finally, the consciousness of the man of impartial culture passes from the single organic effects in which the lad's mind remains confined, not, however, to the fine perceptions of musical form in which the trained connoisseur delights, but to an indefinite number of vague ideas and feelings, which appear to throng as groups of images about the sequent sensations. In the first case we have simple emotional effects, which tell the mind of nothing beyond themselves, and which seem to spring immediately from the peculiarities of our organism. In the second instance, there is presented to us a highly objective form of consciousness, actively employed in noting the external aspects of the art. In the last case, we find an intensely subjective mode of consciousness, the mind being comparatively indifferent to the immediate sensation and its external references, and gratifying itself spontaneously in the varying play of memory and fancy.

These three imaginary hearers represent, in a rough fashion, three classes of musical effect, each of which a complete psychology of the subject would have to consider. They all constitute normal mental results of musical impression, though we see that in different minds, and in different stages and moods of the same mind, there is a tendency in some one of them to become prominent and to overshadow the others. Each of them, too, presents a large field for