In general, this question will be determined by considering the
degree of danger attending the act or conduct under the known
circumstances. If there is danger that harm to another will
follow, the act is generally wrong in the sense of the law.
But in some cases the defendant's conduct may not have been
morally wrong, and yet he may have chosen to inflict the harm, as
where he has acted in fear of his life. In such cases he will be
liable, or not, according as the law makes moral blameworthiness,
within the limits explained above, the ground of liability, or
deems it sufficient if the defendant has had reasonable warning
of danger before acting. This distinction, however, is generally
unimportant, and the known tendency of the act under the known
circumstances to do harm may be accepted as the general test of
conduct.
The tendency of a given act to cause harm under given
circumstances must be determined by experience. And experience
either at first hand or through the voice of the jury is
continually working out concrete rules, which in form are still
more external and still more remote from a reference to the moral
condition of the defendant, than even the test of the prudent man
which makes the first stage of the division between law and
morals.
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