Moral Philosophy

No one, Joseph Rickaby argues, chooses evil for evil’s sake: even a wrong act is pursued under some promise of good. But what if the habits we follow for happiness begin to lead us away from it?

In this early-20th-century treatise, Rickaby turns moral philosophy toward two questions bound up in every deliberate act: what makes life happy, and what makes an action our duty? Like a traveller whose steps all serve a destination, he says, we pursue many immediate ends while seeking, in the last resort, to have things go well for ourselves. Yet people mistake wealth, pleasure, power or habit for happiness—and may find themselves far from the good they meant to reach. Rickaby divides the inquiry into ethics, deontology and natural law. How can we tell whether our chosen ends truly lead us toward a happy human life?

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