that if a man errs invincibly, the evil that he takes for good is not
_formally_ evil, or evil as he wills it, and the good that he takes
for evil is _formally_ evil to him. (c. iii., s. ii., n. 7, p. 33.) So
there is variation and possible Evolution in bare _formal_ good and
bare _formal_ evil, as ignorance gradually changes into knowledge; and
likewise Reversion, as knowledge declines into ignorance. Even this
Evolution and Reversion have their limits: they cannot occur in the
primary principles of morality, as we saw in the last section. But
morality _material_ and objective,--complete morality, where the
formal and material elements agree, where real wrong is seen to be
wrong, and real right is known for right--in this morality there is no
Evolution. If Hannibal offered human sacrifices to his grandfather
because he knew no better, and could not have known better, than to
think himself bound so to do, he is to be excused, and even praised
for his piety: still it was a mistaken piety; and the act, apart from
the light in which the doer viewed it, was a hideous crime. An
incorrupt teacher of morals would have taught the Carthaginian, not
that he was doing something perfectly right for his age and country,
which, however, would be wrong in Germany some centuries later, but
that he was doing an act there and then evil and forbidden of God,
from which he was bound, upon admonition, instantly to desist.
[Footnote 15]

[Footnote 15: The author has seen reason somewhat to modify this view,
as appears by the Appendix. (Note to Third Edition.)]

5. There are Evolution and Reversion in architecture, but not in the
laws of stability of structure, nor in the principles of beauty as
realized in building. A combination, ugly now, was not beautiful in
the days of Darius. Tastes differ, but not right tastes; and moral