William De Witt Hyde

William De Witt Hyde (1858–1917) was president of Bowdoin College and also the chair of mental and moral philosophy there. His first of several books was Practical Ethics (1892). It is remarkable, among other things, for the methodical way in which he attempts to categorize the virtues:

Object	Duty	Virtue	Reward	Temptation	Vice of Defect	Vice of Excess	Penalty
food & drink	vigor	temperance	health	appetite	asceticism	intemperance	disease
dress	comeliness	neatness	respectability	vanity	slovenliness	fastidiousness	contempt
exercise	recreation	cheerfulness	energy	excitement	morbidness	frivolity	debility
work	self-support	industry	wealth	ease	laziness	overwork	poverty
property	provision	economy	prosperity	indulgence	wastefulness	miserliness	want
exchange	equivalence	honesty	self-respect	gain	dishonesty	compliance	degradation
sex	reproduction	purity	sweetness	lust	prudery	sensuality	bitterness
knowledge	truth	veracity	confidence	ignorance	falsehood	gossip	distrust
time	coordination	prudence	harmony	dissipation	procrastination	anxiety	discord
space	system	orderliness	efficiency	disorder	carelessness	red tape	obstruction
fortune	superiority	courage	honor	risk	cowardice	gambling	shame
nature	appreciation	sensitiveness	inspiration	utility	obtuseness	affectation	stagnation
art	beauty	simplicity	refinement	luxury	ugliness	ostentation	vulgarity
animals	consideration	kindness	tenderness	neglect	cruelty	subjection	brutality
fellow-men	fellowship	love	unity	indifference	selfishness	sentimentality	strife
the poor	help	benevolence	sympathy	alienation	niggardliness	indulgence	antipathy
wrong-doers	justice	forgiveness	reformation	vengeance	severity	lenity	perversity
friends	devotion	fidelity	affection	betrayal	exclusiveness	effusiveness	isolation
family	membership	loyalty	home	independence	self-sufficiency	self-obliteration	loneliness
state	organization	patriotism	civilization	spoils	treason	ambition	anarchy
society	cooperation	public spirit	freedom	self-interest	meanness	officiousness	constraint
self	realization	conscientiousness	character	pleasure	unscrupulousness	formalism	corruption
god	obedience	holiness	life	self-will	sin	hypocrisy	death

In his scheme, objects are the countless things which are external to us but that are the materials we use to build our lives: “materials to work with, stuff to build character out of, resistance to overcome, objects to confront.” Toward each object we have a single, particular “relation… which at the same time best promotes the development of ourselves and best preserves the object’s proper use and worth.” It is our duty to maintain that relation, and his book is designed to assist in the art of discerning that duty.

“If we do our duty repeatedly and perseveringly in any direction, we form the habit of doing it, learn to enjoy it, and acquire a preference for it. This habitual preference for a duty is the virtue corresponding to it.” This is in his words, but the idea is right out of Aristotle.

Virtues are not, in this scheme, their own reward, but they each have a particular reward, which correspond to the object on which they are practiced.

As was mentioned, between us and the various objects we encounter is one single correct relation; any other relation we might fall into instead is a temptation. The habitual yielding to temptation is vice. One might err on the side of neglect for the object, in which case this is a vice of defect, or one might err on the side of giving the object a disproportionate place in our life, in which case this is a vice of excess (this too, comes from Aristotle’s “golden mean” theory). Just as virtues have their rewards, each vice has its associated penalty by which it interferes with “that realization of ourselves through the object, or in the higher relations, that realization of the object through us, on which the harmony and completeness of our life depends.”