ABSTRACT
All concrete morality, which really grapples with practical life and does not remain suspended in theory and idealistic dreams, has therefore a necessary strain of utilitarianism in it: it must be a morality of means. Eudæmonism has no doubt been repeatedly and satisfactorily controverted—not only by means of philosophical theory, but also through the developments of living morality itself. The historically instructive feature of Epicureanism and Stoicism is this: Happiness in their schemes is in truth something dependent and derivative. Eudæmonism is too old and honourable a form of the moral consciousness to allow us, in criticizing it, to forget the really valuable element in it. The eudæmonistic point of view rightly plays a part in man's moral consciousness, but it has no right to play the leading role. Happiness is an eternal requirement of the human heart; but "eudæmonism", is a tendency which destroys itself, in that it systematically leads to an incapacity for happiness.
