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102 MANNEKS AOTD MORALS ;
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
- - And Prompt Me " , Hence Plain And , ...
reach ; being limited , for obvious reasons , to that minor class of morals which is left by law to its ; own adjustment .
• Whileon the one handcivilizationfrom its earliest outset , , , > tends , by division of labour , to separate a community into different
classes , * on the other hand , its effect is to make the individuals . of each class , and , in certain points , the whole community , much alike .
same Associ l ation aws are under manifestl the y same probable circumstances agents in and orig subjection inating this to simi the
larity . As civilization advances , men become more and more alike ; Public opinion rules them in all their words , . and actions , and
tyrannizes over their thoughts . Conventional standards are set up fcy which each man squares his conduct . Each acts as his neighbour
acts , and looks to him only for justification . "Le sauvage vit en lui-meme ; _Thomme sociable toujours hors de lui , ne sait vivre que dans
Vopinion des autres , et c ' est , pour ainsi dire , de leur jugement qu'il tire le sentiment de sa propre existence . _" Like sheep , where one goes all
go * , and often the leader , if there be one , rushes at hedge and ditch . as blindly as his followers . Conventionalismat times , proceeds
, to the absurdest extremes . Men become mere machines . One , might suppose -that nature , tired of her labours in scientific
advancement , made amends to herself by casting a batch of men all in the same mould , instead of fashioning each separately . :
Leaving out of the question , however , the wild vagaries into which conventionalism sometimes runs , its general course is to
prescribe a stricter morality in each succeeding age . The code of manners becomes more and more punctilious . The fashionable
vices of one generation are discarded by the next . So long as this code of manners honestly represents the current
. morality , its effect is wholly good . When it adds to itself a statute that drunkenness shall cease in polite society , that
gentlemen shall not gamble away their fortunes , that ladies shall not . starve or otherwise murder their mantua-makers—and this statute is
really enforced and obeyed—the effect of this : code of manners is excellent . But the progress of manners is swiftand the progress
, of morals is slow ; and there is always a danger lest the swift progress of manners should outstrip the slow progress of morals , and
the code of manners thus come to represent a strictness of morality which is totally unreal .
In certain states of , socalled , supercivilization , the . code of manners becomes , as far as morality is concerned , a dead letter : —
Stand like " the The forfeits strong in statutes a barber ' s shop . '
The precise rules of form and ceremony are more strictly obeyed
than ever ; the surface of society is immaculate , its conversation d purity elicatel itself sensi , its tive sentiments but the most moral virtuous lawsenfo , its rced organization in ruder most
y ; , a age ,
102 Manneks Aotd Morals ;
102 _MANNEKS _AOTD MORALS ;
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Oct. 1, 1862, page 102, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01101862/page/30/
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