Question

A thought-provoking book titled ‘The Morality of Law’ by Lon L. Fuller on moral philosophy insists on a distinction between ‘morality of aspiration’ and ‘morality of duty’. From the view of the morality of aspiration, the human conduct does not bear on mandatory rules but on conceptions of the ‘Good Life’, of ‘what beseems a human being functioning at his best to human capacities’. Because no law can compel a man to live up to the excellence of which he is capable. But for workable standards of judgment, the morality of duty lays down the basic rules without which an ordered society directed towards certain specific goals must fail of its mark. Because the duty ties it very closely to what is ‘rationally discoverable’ and ‘objective’, as contrasted with the morality of aspiration based on subjectivism. However, moralists may differ as to what range of conduct should fall within the respective spheres of duty and the morality of aspirations. “ When we are passing a judgment of moral duty, it seems absurd to say that such a duty can in some way flow directly from knowledge of a situation of fact.” As due to the fact that before we conclude ‘that a duty ought to exist’, however well we may understand the facts, by the close connection between understanding a person’s ideals, approval and disapproval. Does this mean that duties are rationally discoverable, and a matter of choice, even if not of ‘ineffable preference’? Presumably not, since when we pass a moral judgment of duty ‘ought’ to exist. It is necessary to distinguish between the accepted morality of a social group and the personal morality of individuals. ‘Duty’ may appear in all of these, but the satisfaction is very often a matter of degree varying from situation to situation. The rule of a morality of duty is necessary for social living. The morality of aspiration provides a general idea of the perfection we ought to acquire it. If we consider the whole range of moral issues, we may imagine a yardstick which begins at the bottom with the most obvious demands of social living and extends upward to the highest reaches of human aspirations. Somewhere along this scale an invisible pointer marks the dividing line where the pressure of duty leaves off and the challenge of excellence begins. The whole field of moral argument is an undeclared war over the location of this pointer. Whom we regard as being moralistic are always trying to inch the pointer upward so as to expand the area of duty and they bludgeon us into a belief that we are duty bound to embrace this pattern of human conduct, instead of making us realize a pattern of life they consider worthy of human nature