Morality In Copleston's A History Of Philosophy

Copleston in one of his books, A History of Philosophy opines that, it is really difficult for one to totally reject all the old values or binding force of what is customarily called morality. This is because, one who attempts this, may degenerate himself as to destroy himself morally, since the traditional morality has put into cognizance, the values that enhance the dignity of the human person, morally and likewise. Then it becomes questionable, as to why Nietzsche calls the old morality the slave morality, even when he retains some of the values in his master morality.

Nietzsche’s outright condemnation and rejection of conventional morality in favour of subjective morality, is for me not a true response to the reality of the human society. Owing to the fact that man lives in the society presupposes or demands

If Nietzsche’s acclamation of subjective morality is accepted, how then do we get the standard for assessing men’s actions? Presumably he is oblivious of the fact that proposing or positing different moralities for different set of individuals in the society can hardly work. It does not even augur well for communal existence. It is like a reversal to the state of nature in which individuals lived according to their diverse selfish interests irrespective of their consequences to other men. For example, in our Nigerian context, if this aspect of Nietzsche’s master morality should be applied I don’t think there would be anything called Nigeria today. Christian values such as love, patience, meekness, gentleness, to mention a few, have been what has been sustaining the mutual