Conflicting duties › Fidelity, reparation, and gratitude

Ross groups duties according to the circumstances on which they rest. Some arise from the agent's own previous conduct. Fidelity concerns explicit or implicit undertakings. Reparation concerns a previous wrong. These are distinct: failing to perform a newly accepted promise and failing to repair an injury do not have exactly the same ground.

Suppose you damage a borrowed tool. Buying the owner a replacement can be called beneficial, but that description leaves out why you have a special reason to do it. The owner does not have the same claim on every stranger who could afford the purchase. Your own conduct helps explain the obligation.

Gratitude has a different direction. It concerns benefits received through another person's previous actions. A person who has helped you can have a claim on your response that is not fully described by saying that helping anyone is good.

These grounds can overlap in a single relationship. Someone might have helped you in the past, accepted a promise from you, and suffered a wrong at your hands. The distinctions enable a fuller description of what you owe. They do not imply that one ground always defeats the others or that gratitude requires granting every request made by a benefactor.