more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
To keep faith and perform covenants is that which natural justice obligeth to absolutely.
Gist of Idea
Keeping promises and contracts is an obligation of natural justice
Source
Ralph Cudworth (On Eternal and Immutable Morality [1688], Ch.II.4)
Book Ref
'British Moralists 1650-1800 Vol. 1', ed/tr. Raphael,D.D. [Hackett 1991], p.109
A Reaction
A nice example of an absolute moral intuition, but one which can clearly be challenged. Covenants (contracts) wouldn't work unless everyone showed intense commitment to keeping them, even beyond the grave, and we all benefit from good contracts.
| 6227 | Keeping promises and contracts is an obligation of natural justice [Cudworth] |
| 24085 | For absolute morality a goal for mankind is needed [Nietzsche] |
| 18676 | We should ask what we would judge to be good if it existed in absolute isolation [Moore,GE] |
| 5918 | The thing is intrinsically good if it would be good when nothing else existed [Ross] |
| 5930 | All things being equal, we all prefer the virtuous to be happy, not the vicious [Ross] |
| 2942 | The sense of the world must lie outside the world [Wittgenstein] |
| 22447 | Saying something 'just is' right or wrong creates an illusion of fact and objectivity [Foot] |
| 3257 | Total objectivity can't see value, but it sees many people with values [Nagel] |
| 18672 | Values from reasons has the 'wrong kind of reason' problem - admiration arising from fear [Orsi] |