at "for most men, actions stand in no necessary
connection with any theoretical convictions of theirs, but are, on the
contrary, independent of the same, and are dominated by inherited and
acquired motives."[1655] Why is this not true? Also, "the antagonism
between the principles of our religion and our actual behavior, even of
the faithful, as well as the great difference in the ethical views of
different peoples who profess the same religion, sufficiently proves
that the motives of our acts, and our judgments on the acts of others,
proceed primarily from practical life [i.e. from the current mores], and
that what we believe has comparatively little influence on our acts and
judgments."[1656] Religion and philosophy are components of the mores,
but not by any means sources or regulators of them.

+506. Rudeck's conclusions.+ A recent German writer on the history of
public morality[1657] says of the moral development of the German people
that one cannot bear to contemplate it, because the people face the
facts with absolute indifference. There is not a trace of moral
initiative or of moral consciousness. Existing morality presents itself
to us as a purely accidental product of forces which act without sense
or intelligence. We can find all kinds of forces in history except
ethical forces. Those are entirely wanting. There is no development, for
development means the unfolding and growth of a germ according to the
elements which it contains. The people allow all kinds of mores to be
forced on them by the work of their own hands, that is, by the economic
and political arrangements which they have adopted. The German people
has no subjective notion of public morality and no ethical ideal for
public morality. They distinguish only between good and bad mores
(_Sitten und Unsitten_), without regard to their origin.

+507.+ Rudeck's book is really a chapter in the history of the mores.
The above are the conclusions which seem to be forced upon him, but he
recoils from them in dismay. The conclusions are unquestionably correct.
They are exactly what the history teaches. They ought to be accepted and
used for profit. The fact that people are indifferent to the history of
their own mores is a primary fact. We can only accept it and learn from
it. It shows us the immense error of that current social discussion
which consists in bringing "ethical" notions to the criticism of facts.
The ethical notions are figments of speculation. C