The philosophy of loyalty
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| The philosophy of loyalty |
In1906 and 1907 I gave, as a part of my regular work at the Summer School of Har vard University, an " Introduction to Ethics, with Special Reference to the Interests of Teachers."
A few lectures, summing up the main principles that lay at the basis of this ethical course as it had been given in the summer of 1906, were delivered in January and February, 1907, before a general academic audience, during a brief visit of mine at the University of Illinois.
In several other places, both in the West and in the East, I have also presented portions of my views upon ethics; and in the summer of 1907 four general lectures on the topic were repeated before the Summer School of Theology at Harvard. In November and December of 1907 the lectures that constitute the present book were delivered for the first time before the Lowell Institute in Boston.
In preparing this new statement of my case for the Lowell Institute course, I thus had the opportunity to use the experience and the criticisms that had resulted from several previous efforts of mine to set forth my views about the topics treated in this " Philosophy of Loyalty." The Lowell Institute lectures were, in fact, substantially a fresh presenta tion of the material, only Lecture V, on " American Problems," retaining any large portion of the text of any of my former lec tures. But, as the reader may see from the foregoing statement, the general doctrine con tained in " The Philosophy of Loyalty " here worked out has been discussed, in various forms, and with a good many friends, pupils, and critics.
I hope, therefore, that this book bears marks of the aid that I have gained from such contact with many sorts of minds, in widely different places. During the present academic year, 1907- 1908, the doctrine here presented has also been put into the form of a regular college course, which I have been permitted, as visiting lecturer, to give to undergraduate students at Yale University in weekly class- meetings. The present book, although in this way related to present and past academic tasks, is, nevertheless, not a text-book, and does not mean to be an elaborately technical philo sophical research.
It is simply an appeal to any reader who may be fond of ideals, and who may also be willing to review his own ideals in a somewhat new light and in a philosophical spirit. Loyalty is indeed an old word, and to my mind a precious one; and the general idea of loyalty is still far older than the word, and is immeasurably more precious. But this idea has nearly always been confused in men s minds by its chance social and traditional associations.
Everybody has heard of loyalty; most prize it; but few perceive it to be what, in its in most spirit, it really is, the heart of all the virtues, the central duty amongst all duties. In order to be able to see that this is the true meaning of the idea of loyalty, one has to free this idea from its unessential if somewhat settled associations with this or that special social habit or circumstance. And in order to accomplish this latter end, one has indeed to give to the term a more exact meaning than popular usage defines. It is this freeing of the idea of loyalty from its chance and misleading associations; it is this vindication of the spirit of loyalty as the central spirit of the moral and reasonable life of man, it is this that I believe to be some what new about my " Philosophy of Loyalty."
The conception of " Loyalty to Loyalty," as set forth in my third lecture, constitutes the most significant part of this ethical task. For the rest, if my philosophy is, as a theory, more or less new, I am still only trying to make articulate what I believe to be the true spirit and meaning of all the loyal, whoever they may be, and however they define their fidelity.
Contents:
I. NATURE AND NEED OF LOYALTY . . 1
II. INDIVIDUALISM ...... 49
III. LOYALTY TO LOYALTY .... 99
IV. CONSCIENCE 147
V. SOME AMERICAN PROBLEMS IN THEIR RELATION TO LOYALTY 197
VI. TRAINING FOR LOYALTY .... 249
VII. LOYALTY, TRUTH, AND REALITY . . . 299
VIII. LOYALTY AND RELIGION 349
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