Prolegomena To Ethics (Hardcover)

EDITORS PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION THE works by which Professor Green has hitherto been chiefly known to the general public are his Introduction to Messrs. Longmans edition of Humes Philosophical Works, and his articles in the Contemporary Review on some doctrines of Mr. Spencer and Mr. Lewes. When in the year 1 877 Mr. Green became Whytes Pro fessor of Moral Philosophy, his main desire was, both in his teaching and writing, to develope more fully and in a more constructive way the ideas which underlay his previous critical writings and appeared in them. The present trea tise is the first outcome of that desire and doubtless it would have been only the first but for the premature and unexpected death of the author in March, 1882. Even the Prolegomena to Ethics the title is the authors own was left unfinished. The greater part of the book had been used, some of it twice over, in the Professorial lectures and about a quarter of it the first 116 pages was printed in the numbers of Mind for January, April, and July, 1882. But, according to a letter of the author written not long before his death, some twenty or thirty pages remained to be added, and, though with this ex ception the whole was written out nearly ready for print ing no part of it can be considered to have undergone the final revision. At his death Mr. Green left the charge of the manuscript to me and I have now only to explain the course I have followed in preparing it for publication. The manuscript was written in paragraphs, but other wise was continuous and I may add that it was com posed without regard to arrangement in Books and EDITORS PREFACE IX Chapters. For that arrangement I am responsible, and also for thenumbering and occasional re-division of the sections, and for the frequent division of a section into two or more paragraphs. I have also made the few cor rections in expression which seemed to be necessary, and in one case I have ventured, for the sake of clearness, to transfer a passage from one place to another. References have been verified and supplied translations of Greek quotations have been given, where their meaning was not obvious from the text and a few notes have been added by way of explanation or qualification, for the most part only where a mark in the authors manuscript showed that he intended to reconsider the passage. The Editors notes, except where they give merely a reference or translation, are enclosed in square brackets. My desire throughout has been to make no changes except in passages which I felt sure Mr. Green would have altered had his attention been called to them. With the further object of rendering the work as intelligible as possible to the general reader I have ventured to print an analysis. Mr. Green would probably have followed the plan he adopted in the Introduction to Hume, and have placed a short abstract on the margins of the pages. I have thought it better to print my analysis as a Table of Contents, as that arrangement clearly separates my work from the authors, and will also probably be the most useful to those who care to read an analysis at all. Perhaps I may further suggest to any reader who is unaccustomed to metaphysical and psychological discussions that much of the authors ethical views, though not their scientific basis, may be gathered from the Third and Fourth Books alone. It has been already explained that the book was leftunfinished. But on the whole I thought it best to make no attempt to add anything, especially as the comparison x EDITORS PREFACE which occupies the last chapter seems to have reached a natural conclusion. The reader will also find in the text indications of subjects which were to have been dis cussed. In particular the author at any rate at one time intended to introduce a criticism of Kants ethical views see page 177. But I think this intention must have been abandoned during the composition of the book, and, as it is hoped that before long Mr...