on the question are as
follows: "If then the reconciliation of duty and self-interest is to
be regarded as a hypothesis logically necessary to avoid a fundamental
contradiction in one chief department of our thought, it remains
to ask how far this necessity constitutes a sufficient reason for
accepting this hypothesis.... Those who hold that the edifice of
physical science is really constructed of conclusions logically
inferred from self-evident premises, may reasonably demand that any
practical judgments claiming philosophic certainty should be based on
an equally firm foundation. If, on the other hand, we find that in our
supposed knowledge of the world of nature propositions are commonly
taken to be universally true, which yet seem to rest on no other
grounds than that we have a strong disposition to accept them, and
that they are indispensable to the systematic coherence of our
beliefs,--it will be more difficult to reject a similarly supported
assumption in ethics, without opening the door to universal
scepticism" ('Methods of Ethics,' 6th ed., pp. 506, 507).]

But while this question of egoism and altruism has thus been
recognised as a possible source of perplexity, affecting the ethical
standard itself, both egoists and orthodox utilitarians have commonly
agreed--though for different reasons--to insist that morality means
the same for them both, and to hold with Epicurus that "we cannot lead
a life of pleasure which is not also a life of prudence, honour, and
justice." It is only in quite recent days that a thoroughgoing attempt
has been made to revalue all the old standards of morality. And
the attempt is made from a point of view which is certainly not
altruistic. The Utilitarian writers of last generation, if they
admitted the conflict of egoism and altruism, weighted every
consideration on the side of altruism. They emphasised therefore the
agreement between their own utilitarian doctrine and the Christian
morality in which altruism is fundamental. On the other hand, the more
recent tendency to which I refer emphasises and exalts the egoistic
side, and thus accentuates the difference between the new moral
code--if we may call it moral--and the Christian morality.

The boldest and most brilliant exponent of this tendency is Friedrich
Nietzsche[1], already the object of a cult in Germany, and an author
to be reckoned with as one of the new forces in European thought. It
is true that some of the most character