Lucien Saumur asks, "Why should anyone be bothered to act ethically?" He seems to regard the moral order as something plastered on top of human reality rather than one of its essential aspects, and this is symptomatic of the general loss of meaning characteristic of our times. If meaning is percieved relationship, the missing connections are those between knowledge, morality and freedom.
Truth is itself a moral value. Knowledge which derives from love of truth is social in character and depends on trust, which is, in turn, a function of moral integrity. The historian, for example, depends on a synthesis of findings in many other disciplines and necessarily relies on the honesty of the scholors concerned.
The Greeks had a saying that freedom is a function of "obedience to the unenforceable." They meant that to the degree that we practice self-discipline (i.e. act ethically), external compulsion will not be required, and vice versa. On the positive side, they regarded freedom as derivative from the pursuit of justice, which is in turn dependent on the integrity of the judgement and a belief in the value of other human beings.
The will to defend this integity was, for the Stoics, the hallmark of the human: to abandon it was to become a living corpse. It was also to undermine freedom, which ultimately derives from what is naturally free: the moral judgement. Our contemporary freedom owes much to these principals.
Ultimately, it seems that the urge to live and grow - a centeral dynamic in every healthy organism - is foundational. The person who prefers life to death, truth to lies and freedom to tyranny - and understands what is involved - will feel an obligation to act ethically.
John R. MacCormack, Director Institute of Human Values
Saint Mary's University
Halifax
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