close as possible to the actual experience of the student and the
language of everyday life. Far more attention is given than in most
books on ethics to concrete contemporary problems. After all, an
insight into the fallacies of the reasoning of the various ethical
schools, an ability to know what they are talking about and glibly
refute them, is of less importance than an acquaintance with, and a
firm, intelligent attitude toward, the vital moral problems and
movements of the day. I have prayed to be saved from academic
abstractness and remoteness, and to go as straight as I could to the
real perplexities from which men suffer in deciding upon their conduct.
The purpose of a study of ethics is, primarily, to get light for the
guidance of life. And so, while referring to authors who differ from
the views here expressed, I have sought to impart a definite conception
of relative values, to offer a thread for guidance through the
labyrinth of moral problems, and to effect a heightened realization
of the importance and the possibilities of right living.

It is necessary, indeed, in order to justify and clarify our concrete
moral judgments, that we should reach clear and firmly grounded
conclusions upon the underlying abstract questions. And the habit of
laying aside upon occasion one's instinctive or habitual moral
preferences and discussing with open mind their justification and
rationality is of great value to the individual and to society. Hence
the first two Parts of this volume take up, as simply as is consonant
with the really intricate questions involved, the history of the
development of human morality and the psychological foundation of moral
obligations and ideals. The exposition of the meaning of right and
wrong there unfolded serves as a basis for the sound solution of the
confused concrete issues, private and then public, which are discussed
in the remainder of the volume.