If morality were a library, John Stuart Mill constructed the first two floors and Søren Kierkegaard attached a third with a large skylight. Mill, whose vision involves only a two-story library, takes great issue with the extra floor and even more with the skylight. He complains that the skylight offers no benefit to the rest of the library; in fact, when the skylight is opened, falling rain makes all the books on the top floor damp and unreadable for days. In particularly drafty months, the books on this floor are even knocked haphazardly to the ground, disturbing the tranquility of the floors below. The lone reader who roams Kierkegaard’s floor is aware of this fact, having opened the skylight himself, and is often distressed by the damage incurred by some of his favorite books. Yet he refuses to close the skylight and remains on this floor regardless, even as the other inhabitants of the library—who enjoy their clean, dry books in cushy armchairs grouped around coffee tables for their weekly book club meetings—implore him to come back to the second floor. This lone reader will occasionally long for the company of others and the warmth of the floor below, but the skylight beckons and he always chooses, rather absurdly, to stay on this floor.

The building’s first floor is the children’s library. On this floor, defaced books, broken crayons, and candy wrappers litter the wooden tables and floor tiles. Herein resides Mill’s individual selfish hedonists and Kierkegaard’s aesthetic stage. On this matter, the two librarians can agree—by human nature, we begin at this floor.1 Self-interest dominates and the children frolic, unburdened by morality.2 Kierkegaard assures us that as long as the children don’t despair in their situation—as long as it doesn’t occur to them that no one will come by to repair their books or fix the window they’ve shattered by playing catch with an encyclopedia—they are content to abide by these natural instincts.3 This is who we are, Mill says, and the first floor is where we will stay unless we prove ourselves capable of acting appropriately in the library.4

How will the children attain this morality? In the beginning, Mill asserts that it will be enforced by outward sources, what he refers to as the external sanction;5 this may take the shape of a threat that their library access be revoked if any more damage occurs, or perhaps a child’s fear of their parent’s wrath in response to their actions. These external sanctions will maintain a facade of morality, prompting moral actions from the children only while the threat exists.6 Without the outer pressures, the child remains an individual selfish hedonist at heart—morality is only truly achieved when it supersedes the children’s instincts to serve only their self-interests.7 For instance, a child might notice one day that a book he has just finished tearing to shreds was once his friend’s favorite. When he notices this friend crying, something foreign will stir inside him, an emotion he will later recognize as guilt. The association between this dreadful weight on his soul and his friend’s unhappiness will be forged in his mind; he will find that he is quite unhappy in having caused his friend’s unhappiness.8 From now on, he strives to avoid inflicting such pain on others.9 The child’s moral transformation is complete. Mill commends the boy for being properly socialized and having successfully developed his internal sanction,10 whereupon the boy is ushered into the second floor of the library. Access to this floor, Mill assures him, is all the boy should have ever hoped to achieve.

Though their views eventually diverge, Kierkegaard’s version of this story will begin in the same fashion. The boy might have spent days carelessly upending bookshelves before realizing he felt some gaping despair inside of him, a yearning for something more sustained to commit himself to.11 He will reflect on his internal emptiness and allow morality to fill this space, choosing the values of the group over his own selfish, shallow desires.12 This new commitment, like the development of the internal sanction, represents the boy’s crossing over into the group.13 But while Mill celebrates this as the final achievement, Kierkegaard privately hopes for something more.

The aforementioned group, of course, is composed of Mill-sponsored universal ethical hedonists who inhabit the second floor of the library, which Kierkegaard refers to as ‘The Ethical Stage.’14 To be on the second floor of the library is to be the moral people Mill says we should be.15 In Mill’s view, the universal ethical hedonists maintain the instincts for self-indulgence, but with a corollary: a sense of humanity which urges us to maximize not only our own pleasure, but that of the group.16 Like the child who gains his internal sanction from the guilt of causing his friend’s pain, our behavior within the group is determined by this desire to act morally for the mutual benefit of everyone involved.17 A woman on the second floor may find that the book she intends to read has already been picked up by someone else a few tables away. Morality dictates that she will not march over and seize the book from the other person’s hands; even if the woman isn’t thrilled about the situation, she recognizes that the ethical thing to do—the course of action that causes the least pain for everyone18—is to wait for the other person to finish reading. Under these circumstances, Kierkegaard’s view of the ethical stage does not differ much from Mill’s. He would concur with Mill’s reasoning for why the woman would behave the way she did (he might say, for instance, that she has committed herself to these ethical values to reinforce her sense of belonging to the group).19

For these first two floors of the library, Mill and Kierkegaard agree on who belongs where and why they should be there. Beyond these points however, the architects’ views begin to diverge. When Mill gives guests a tour of the library, he stops at the second floor and asks the group to make themselves at home. This is the extent of the library the readers will see; as far as Mill is concerned, the third floor is no part of the library at all. Unlike Kierkegaard, he chooses to focus only on the transition from the first to the second. As long as every person in the children’s library eventually receives a proper moral education,20 everyone can make it to the second floor. And once everyone does reside on this second floor, Mill will proudly declare it the perfect utopia.21 Everyone returns books to their proper places, everyone engages in discussions where they are all allowed an equal opportunity to speak, and the human race has achieved utilitarian perfection.22 There is no reason to seek something higher than this ethical stage, Mill scoffs, because nothing higher or better than it exists.23

As the creator of the third floor of the library, Kierkegaard disagrees. When Kierkegaard leads the tour, he certainly doesn’t bring readers up to the third floor himself, but he implies its existence. Most readers will never look for it, a mark of their devotion to the group.24 Only a lone reader on the second floor will notice the rickety staircase winding upward in the corner of the library, boarded up with ‘Keep Out’ signs tacked on its banisters by one or the other architect, though no one is quite certain as to which. Slivers of natural light filter through the boarded front of the stairs. The staircase, which the lone reader realizes must surely lead to a third floor, doesn’t appear to catch the attention of the library’s other inhabitants. It is as if the third floor’s existence occurs only to him, as though some unique, personal connection is formed between this reader and whatever awaits him on the floor above. Yet from an external perspective, nothing about going to the third floor makes any rational sense at all—not the decrepit condition of the staircase, the blatant warning signs, or the fact that the lone reader is quite content in his comfortable armchair on the second floor (which he has gained after much self-reflection and active effort to be moral). For the lone reader however, the mere presence of the staircase implies the existence of something more, something beyond the placating comforts of the second floor. Content as he is in his armchair, he is unable to resist the lure of the staircase and the possibilities above. The reader’s decision to abandon known comforts for the fearful unknown is therefore based not on logic of any kind; it is a ‘leap of faith,’ crossing the chasm between ethics and religion/individuality.25 To relate this to Kierkegaard’s own example, the reader’s ascension of the staircase may be compared to Abraham’s journey with Isaac to Mt. Moriah, where Abe’s decision defied all logic and was a product of his unwavering faith in God.26

Once the lone reader reaches the third floor (walking resolutely past messages like “Certain Anguish Awaits You” scrawled on the walls of the staircase), nothing but real faith—faith as Kierkegaard defines it—can sustain his stay on this floor, the highest stage possible.27 As soon as the reader encounters and opens the skylight on this floor, he becomes aware that the sunshine and fresh air cascading through is accompanied by all the aspects of the third floor that Mill despises, like the way rain, wind, and bird droppings come straight through the open skylight, the distraction that these cause the occupants of the floors below, the amount of organization it takes to reorganize the fallen books, and the fact that the damage these books incur is a wholly unnecessary sacrifice, one which could be remedied by simply pulling the latch shut on the skylight. But something deep within the reader compels him to remain on the third floor and to keep the skylight open. He resigns himself to the uncomfortable conditions on this floor and the expenses of keeping the skylight open, such as the anguish of seeing his beloved books ruined, giving up the possibility of his circumstances improving. Had he stopped here at resignation, he would be nothing more than the ‘tragic hero’ Kierkegaard describes, who commits himself to a bleak fate.28 The lone reader however, on the “strength of the absurd,” has faith that the conditions will ameliorate despite no evidence, rational or otherwise, to indicate anything of the sort.29 Keeping the skylight open guarantees the continued destruction of books and distraction of the library occupants, but as the reader watches the sunlight stream through, his faith in himself and the decision prevails. This “resignation followed by faith,” Kierkegaard says, makes all the difference between the tragic heroes and the “knights of faith.”30 The reader’s willingness to give up everything (Abe’s resignation to sacrifice Isaac) and his blind belief that everything will be restored (Isaac will be brought back) are what distinguish him as a true knight of faith.31

Following the reader’s ascension to the third floor, a few inhabitants of the second, clustered around their table, begin to whisper amongst themselves. Is the lone reader trying to purposely destroy order in the library? Overhearing this conversation one morning, Kierkegaard proposes an alternative in the group’s discussion: what if the reader’s disruption of order is actually a sacrifice? The lone reader, like his peers on the second floor, is a lover of the library and would be making a sacrifice by keeping the skylight open and watching his books destroyed. Someone seeking chaos would sacrifice nothing of value to him and gain everything by doing the same. Perhaps, Kierkegaard suggests, the reader is making an individual choice outside the boundaries of ethics.32 This “teleological suspension of the ethical” is required for anyone who makes such a choice for the individual, not the group.33

At this point, Mill, eavesdropping from the next table and bursting to respond to Kierkegaard’s claims, interjects. Dismissing Kierkegaard’s protests, Mill bluntly declares that there is no such thing as suspending ethics.34 “Suspending” ethics is to go below ethics; it is to succumb to our selfish, baser instincts (our human nature).35 If this human nature is not restrained by a sense of morality, the individual is below the universal.36 In fact, Mill argues, people making individual choices are nothing more than the individual selfish hedonists like those in the children’s library. Citing the lone reader’s lack of ethical means of understanding not to damage books, Mill suggests the reader return to the children’s library instead, as a person capable of acting in such a way that harms the group has obviously never developed his internal sanction properly.37 As such, the reader’s actions reflect a lack of morality, not a suspension. Hearing murmurs of assent from the group, Mill continues with fervor: how can the reader justify his sole occupation of an entire floor? Who else benefits? Everyone foots the electricity bills, pays the membership fees, and keeps the lights on for a floor no one else benefits from except one individual. The distractions caused by the open skylight are also prices paid by the second-floor occupants, serving as further evidence of the reader’s glaring immorality.

In response, Kierkegaard counters that while the reader’s actions are certainly unethical, they go above ethics, not below them.38 He argues that Mill cannot condone the reader’s behavior because the reader is ‘unintelligible’ to him (the occupational hazard of being an individual) and the reader’s irrationality flies in the face of all of Mill’s beloved universal values.39 Kierkegaard notes that human nature is not just pure selfishness, either—it is passion, which transcends human history and cannot be constrained because some form of it exists at every floor of the library.40 Lowering his voice and bending closer to the group’s table, Kierkegaard entertains Mill’s scenario: one day, all the second floor occupants may indeed realize that all the lone reader does is stay on his floor under the open skylight surrounded by bookshelves of wet books. They will cry for the skylight to be closed and for the lone reader to cease his meaningless meditations, for how, they wonder, can a reader watch his books suffer such damage without lifting a finger to stop it? He will appear utterly incomprehensible in his act,41 and like a true knight of faith, he cannot explain that he must leave the skylight open for he knows, deep down, that all the books will be restored to their original state. The reader is not unaware of his own immorality, and he has not chosen to be unethical out of childish hedonism—he has made a commitment to what Kierkegaard calls the “absolute relation” to faith and his individuality.42 This absolute relation (placing oneself directly in front of faith) succeeds the ethical and is a necessary act for the true ‘individual’.43 In keeping the skylight open, Kierkegaard explains, the reader must temporarily overstep ethics to achieve faith, an act that is unethical and unintelligible to everyone within the group.44 These are the costs of the ultimate expression of the self, but Kierkegaard proclaims them as worthwhile ones, reiterating that “the individual is higher than the universal.”45

A few of the group members soon raise a pertinent question: why haven’t any others made it to the third floor as well? Why is this reader alone in his absurd fate? But Kierkegaard maintains that his isolation is precisely what makes it the ‘individual’ stage.46 If everyone was willing and able to enter the third floor, there would be an impossible “society of Abrahams.”47 Individuals cannot collaborate to find their own subjective truths, they cannot understand each other any more than the group can comprehend the individuals.48 If another reader on the second floor felt a divine, inner compulsion to begin throwing books out the window on the faith that they would somehow be returned to her, the lone reader would find her as nonsensical as she finds him. For the third floor to become like the second (an easily accessible, widely inhabited space) is to create a new system of ethics—a remodeling of the second floor—not a group of individuals.49

So Kierkegaard ends by saying that while the third floor is available for entrance to all, few will make it to “faith…the highest passion in a human being.”50 This is at least partially due to the utilitarian fixation on the outcome of our actions;51 Kierkegaard points out that if everyone ran through every scenario to find which produced the most ethical/utilitarian outcome before taking action, no one would ever act.52 Most ethical people do not end up in the individual stage for this reason, but if everyone went through the same thought process, there would be no ethical heroes either.53 Not allowing a suspension of the ethical also eliminates all possibility of any passion higher than ethics or the group—namely, the existence of individuals.54

But even though faith is the highest passion, Kierkegaard reminds the group that it in no way invalidates or detracts from the importance of other ones.55 The lives of all readers who remain on the second floor (who attain morality and remain there, as Mill says we should do) are no less worthy than those of the individuals. In fact, they will avoid all the anguish that comes from pursuing the individual’s journey56 and will lead pleasurable, ethical lives. Finishing with a flourish, Kierkegaard declares that those who do reach the third floor, who are able to suspend ethics (while remaining ethical people) to enter into this absolute relation with themselves, will experience “the greatest wonder in the world:” real faith and their individual, subjective truth.57 Following this stunning, long-winded declaration, Mill, along with the group members at the table, stare bemusedly at Kierkegaard. They cannot understand him anymore than they can the lone reader. It’s exactly as Kierkegaard anticipated.

If morality were a library, the hotly contested topic of whether the third floor exists remains a conflict for Mill and Kierkegaard to this day. At one week’s book club meeting, Mill tells a cautionary tale of the lone reader, a fictional story to warn of the unethical delusions58 of those who have never attained true morality. That same meeting, Kierkegaard refuses to explicitly address the lone reader’s existence and instead recommends all readers on the second floor to reexamine the biblical story of Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac. Meanwhile on floor one, a child pulls a fire alarm on purpose. A girl next to him starts sobbing out of fear; the child feels a foreign emotion stir inside of him. Occupants on floor two begin a rational discussion of who should check on the children. The man sitting closest to the entrance of the stairwell volunteers to go, sacrificing his own speaking time at the club meeting so that his fellow readers can continue their discussions without interruption. His neighbors pat him on the back as he leaves. And on floor three, vaguely aware of the shrill noises of the fire alarm two floors below, the lone reader watches a light drizzle begin to fall through the open skylight. If the drizzle becomes a storm, he knows all the books on this floor will soon become drenched. If the wind blows the books to the ground, it will disrupt the calm of the floor below. If people realize what he has done, they will condemn his actions, question his absurdity, and deplore his selfishness. The lone reader makes no effort to close the skylight.

Bibliography

Notes

1. Robert Wexelblatt, Mill Lecture, HU202: History of 20th Century Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics (class lecture, Boston University, MA, January 25, 2021).

2. Robert Wexelbatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill & Utilitarianism,” HU202: History of 20th Century Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics (Boston University, MA, January 25, 2021), 2.

3. Soren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling (New York: Penguin Group, 2006), 30.

4. Wexelblatt, Mill Lecture.

5. Wexelblatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill & Utilitarianism,” 2.

6. Wexelblatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill & Utilitarianism,” 2.

7. Wexelblatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill & Utilitarianism,” 3.

8. Wexelblatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill & Utilitarianism,” 2.

9. John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism, (England: Longmans, Green and Co, 1879), 8.

10. Wexelblatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill & Utilitarianism,” 2.

11. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” HU202: History of 20th Century Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics (Boston University, MA, February 16, 2021), 3.

12. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 3.

13. Kierkegaard, 34.

14. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 3.

15. Wexelblatt, Mill Lecture.

16. Mill, Utilitarianism, 8.

17. Mill, 8.

18. Mill, 8.

19. Kierkegaard, 34.

20. Wexelblatt, Mill Lecture.

21. Wexelblatt, Second Kierkegaard Lecture, HU202: History of 20th Century Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics (class lecture, Boston University, MA, February 22, 2021).

22. Wexelblatt, Second Kierkegaard Lecture.

23. Mill, Utilitarianism, 8.

24. Kierkegaard, 34.

25. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 3.

26. Kierkegaard, 37.

27. Kierkegaard, 37.

28. Wexelblatt, “Notes on ‘The Speech of Abraham’ and ‘Preamble of the Heart’ Sections of Kierkegaard’s Fear & Trembling,” HU202: History of 20th Century Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics (Boston University, MA, February 19, 2021), 1.

29. Kierkegaard, 24.

30. Wexelblatt, “Notes on ‘The Speech of Abraham’ and ‘Preamble of the Heart’ Sections of Kierkegaard’s Fear & Trembling,” 4.

31. Wexelblatt, “Notes on ‘The Speech of Abraham’ and ‘Preamble of the Heart’ Sections of Kierkegaard’s Fear & Trembling,” 3.

32. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 3.

33. Kierkegaard, 34.

34. Wexelblatt, Kierkegaard Discussion, HU202: History of 20th Century Ethical Philosophy and Applied Ethics (class discussion, Boston University, MA, February 17, 2021).

35. Wexelblatt, Kierkegaard Discussion.

36. Wexelblatt, Kierkegaard Discussion.

37. Wexelblatt, “Notes on J.S. Mill and Utilitarianism,” 2.

38. Kierkegaard, 34.

39. Kierkegaard, 67.

40. Kierkegaard, 71.

41. Kierkegaard, 67.

42. Kierkegaard, 35.

43. Kierkegaard, 35.

44. Kierkegaard, 35.

45. Kierkegaard, 34.

46. Kierkegaard, 44.

47. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 2.

48. Kierkegaard, 44.

49. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 2.

50. Kierkegaard, 71.

51. Wexelblatt, Mill Lecture.

52. Wexelblatt, Second Kierkegaard Lecture.

53. Wexelblatt, Second Kierkegaard Lecture.

54. Wexelblatt, Second Kierkegaard Lecture.

55. Kierkegaard, 72.

56. Wexelblatt, “Notes to Accompany First Kierkegaard Lecture,” 3.

57. Wexelblatt, “Notes on ‘The Speech of Abraham’ and ‘Preamble of the Heart’ Sections of Kierkegaard’s Fear & Trembling,” 4.

58. Wexelblatt, Kierkegaard Discussion.