.. is an end in which the effort of a moral agent can really
find rest."[1] In this statement two points seem to be involved which
the use of the rather metaphorical term 'finding rest' tends to
confuse. If we are looking for the distinction simply of a good action
or motive from a bad one we may point to the approval of conscience in
the former case: this has a permanence--or rather an independence of
time--which distinguishes it from the satisfaction of some temporary
desire. But I do not think that this is what Green means. He wished
to avoid falling back upon mere disconnected judgments of conscience
after the manner of the intuitional moralists. The 'true good' for him
seems to mean the attainment, the complete realisation, of the moral
ideal. Were this reached we should indeed 'find rest,' for moral
activity as we know it would be at an end. But the moral ideal
is never thus attained; its realisation, as Green holds, is only
progressive and never completed. Consequently 'rest' is never 'found.'
It is of the nature of the moral life to press onward constantly
towards a goal which it cannot attain; each achievement leads to a
further effort and a higher reach.
[Footnote 1: Ibid., sec. 171, p. 179.]
By itself, therefore, the assertion that the moral agent 'finds rest'
in the 'true good' does not enable us to distinguish the moral agent
or the moral action from the immoral.
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