There remains the question whether the feelings of approval and disapproval, which supervene on our moral judgments, admit of any explanation, or whether they are to be regarded as ultimate facts of our mental constitution.  It seems to me that, on a little reflexion, we are led to adopt the former alternative.  What are the classes of acts, under their most general aspect, which elicit the feelings of moral approbation and disapprobation?  They are such as promote, or tend to promote, the good either of ourselves or of others.  Now the feelings of which these classes of acts are the direct object are respectively the self-regarding and the sympathetic feelings, or, as they have been somewhat uncouthly called, the egoistic and altruistic feelings.  We have a variety of appetites and desires, which centre in ourselves, including what has been called rational self-love, or a desire for what, on cool reflexion, we conceive to be our own highest good on the whole, as well as self-respect, or a regard for our own dignity and character, and for our own opinion of ourselves.  When any of these various appetites or desires are gratified, we feel satisfaction, and, on the other hand, when they are thwarted, we feel dissatisfaction.  Similarly, we have a number of affections, of which others are the object, some of them of a malevolent or resentful, but most of them of a benevolent character, including a general desire to confer all the happiness that we can.  Here, again, we feel satisfaction, when our affections are gratified, and dissatisfaction, when they are thwarted.  Now these feelings of satisfaction and dissatisfaction, which are called reflex feelings, because they are reflected, as it were, from the objects of our desires, include, though they are by no means coextensive with, the feelings of moral approbation and disapprobation.  When, for instance, we gratify the appetites of hunger or thirst, or our love of curiosity or power, we feel satisfaction, but we can hardly be said to regard the gratification of these appetites or feelings with moral approval or disapproval.  We perform thousands of acts, and see thousands of acts performed, every day, which never excite any moral feeling whatever.  But there are few men in whom an undoubted act of kindness or generosity or resistance to temptation would not at once elicit admiration or respect, or, if they reflected on such acts in their own case, of self-approval.  Now, what are the circumstances which distinguish these acts which merely cause us satisfaction from those which elicit the moral feeling of approbation?  This question is one by no means easy to answer, and the solution of it must obviously depend to some extent on the moral surroundings and prepossessions of the person who undertakes to answer it.  But, attempting to take as wide a survey as possible of those acts which, in different persons, elicit moral approbation or disapprobation, I will endeavour to discriminate the characteristics which they have in common.