(1) To this we may reply that the estimation of the relative worth of different kinds of experience is, indeed, often very difficult.  But on any theory the decision as to the right is equally complicated and puzzling.  The fact that the criterion is difficult to use is no evidence that it is not the right criterion.  Which set of consequences will be of most intrinsic worth, it is sometimes impossible to know.  But one set is, nevertheless, of more intrinsic worth, and the act that secures them is the best act, even though we do not recognize it as such.  There will continue to be, many differences of judgment as to which of alternative possible experiences is the more desirable.  But that uncertainty does not alter the fundamental fact that some experiences are intrinsically more desirable than others and more deserving of pursuit.

“A debtor who cannot pay me offers to compound for his debt by making over one of sundry things he possesses- a diamond ornament, a silver vase, a picture, a carriage.  Other questions being set aside, I assert it to be my pecuniary interest to choose the most valuable of these, but I cannot say which is the most valuable.  Does the proposition that it is my pecuniary interest to choose the most valuable, therefore, become doubtful?  Must I not choose as well as I can, and if I choose wrongly, must I give up my ground of choice?  Must I infer that in matters of business I may not act on the principle that, other things equal, the more profitable transaction is to be preferred, because, in many cases, I cannot say which is the more profitable and have often chosen the less profitable?  Because I believe that of many dangerous courses I ought to take the least dangerous, do I make ’the fundamental assumption’ that courses can be arranged according to a scale of dangerousness, and must I abandon my belief if I cannot so arrange them?” [Footnote:  H. Spencer, Data of Ethics, chap.  IX.]

(2) If it is practically impossible to calculate the relative worth of consequences in many cases, it is yet easy enough to do so in the great majority of moral situations.  In most cases the preponderance of value is clear.  That selfishness and self-indulgence are not worth while; that abstinence from pleasure-giving drugs and intoxicating liquors is worth the sacrifice; that truth and honesty, the law-abiding spirit, the spirit of service, friendliness and courtesy, sanitary measures, incorruptible courts, and a thousand other things are worth the effort and cost of acquiring them, is indisputable.  It is only in some peculiarly balanced situations that we find practical difficulty in deciding.  If morality were limited to the cases where we can be sure on which side the greater good or lesser evil lies, we should not be shorn of much of our present code.