The subject of the mechanism of the human mind, is the obvious counterpart of that which we are now to examine. Under the former of these topics we have entered, with considerable minuteness, into the nature of our involuntary actions; the decision of the latter will, in a great degree, depend upon an accurate conception of such as are voluntary. The question of self-love and benevolence, is a question relative to the feelings and ideas by which we ought to be governed, in our intercourse with our fellow men, or, in other words, in our moral conduct. But it is universally admitted, that there can be no moral conduct, that we can be neither virtuous nor vicious, except in instances where our actions flow from intention, and are directed by foresight, or where they might have been so directed; and this is the definition of voluntary actions. The question therefore of self-love and benevolence, is a question of voluntary action.
The enquiry here proposed, is the same in effect, as the question, whether we are capable of being influenced by disinterested considerations. Once admit that we are, and it will not be disputed that it is by such considerations we ought to be influenced, in cases where our neighbour or the public is to be eminently benefited.
This question has been long and eagerly contested, and the majority of persons who are accustomed to give some attention to speculations of this sort, have ranged themselves on the side of self-love. Among the French, not a single writer upon that nature of the human mind, is to be found, who does not, with more or less explicitness, declare for this hypothesis.
Among ourselves, several authors of eminence, have undertaken to support the practicability of disinterested action.
One of the writers who first contributed to render this enquiry a subject of general attention, was the duke de la Rouchefoucault. He asserted the system of self-love in its grossest form; and his exposition of it amounts to little less, than "that, in every action of our lives, we are directed by a calculation of personal interest." This notion has been gradually softened down by his successors; and the hypothesis of self-love is now frequently explained to mean only, "that, as every state of a percipient being has in it a mixture of pleasure or pain, the immediate sensation in either of these kinds is to be regarded as the sole, proper, and necessary cause of the subsequent action." This fluctuation among the adherents of self-love, has had the effect, of making some of the arguments with which their principle has been attacked, apparently inapplicable to the newest state of the question. Let us see whether the point may not be put upon a simpler issue than has usually been attempted.
An unanswerable argument for the system of disinterestedness, is contained in a proposition so obvious, as for its very plainness to be exposed to the risque of contempt, viz. that the motive of every voluntary action, consists in the view present to the mind of the agent at the time of his determination. This is an inference which immediately results from the nature of volition. Volition is an affair of foresight. "No motion is voluntary, any further than it is accompanied with intention and design, and has for its proper antecedent the apprehension of an end to be accomplished.
So far as it flows in any degree from another source, it is involuntary."
But if this be a just description of voluntary action, then the converse of this assertion must also be true; that whatever is proposed by the mind as an end to be accomplished, whether it be life or death, pleasure or pain, and relate to myself or my neighbour, has in it the true essence of a motive. -- To illustrate this in relation to the subject in hand.
Voluntary action cannot exist but as the result of experience. Neither desire nor aversion can have place, till we have had a consciousness of agreeable and disagreeable sensations. Voluntary action implies desire, and the idea of certain means to be employed for the attainment of the thing desired.
The things first desired by every thinking being, will be agreeable sensation, and the means of agreeable sensation. If he forsee any thing that is not apprehended to be pleasure or pain, or the means of pleasure or pain, this will excite no desire, and lead to no voluntary action.
A disposition to promote the benefit of another, my child, my friend, my relation, or my fellow being, is one of the passions; understanding by the term passion, a permanent and habitual tendency towards a certain course of action. It is of the same general nature, as avarice, or the love of fame. The good of my neighbour could not, in the first instance, have been chosen, but as the means of agreeable sensation. His cries, or the spectacle of his distress importune me, and I am irresistibly impelled to adopt means to remove this importunity. The child perceives, in his own case, that menaces or soothing tend to stop his cries, and he is induced to employ, in a similar instance, that mode of the two which seems most within his reach. He thinks little of the sufferings endured, and is only uneasy at the impression made upon his organs. To this motive, he speedily adds the idea of esteem and gratitude, which are to be purchased by this beneficence. Thus the good of our neigbour, like the possession of money, is originally pursued for the sake of its advantage to ourselves.