Utilitarianism
{"WorkMasterId":6375,"WpPageId":281658,"ParentWpPageId":193819,"Slug":"utilitarianism","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/john-stuart-mill/utilitarianism/","RelativeUrl":"theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/john-stuart-mill/utilitarianism/","HasFullText":true,"RawHtmlLength":240770,"CleanHtmlLength":184660,"Kicker":"Philosophy Work","Title":"Utilitarianism","Deck":"Mill refines utilitarianism through higher pleasures, happiness, justice, moral proof, sanction, character, and impartial concern for well-being.","BackLink":{"Text":"Back to John Stuart Mill","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/john-stuart-mill/"},"AuthorCard":{"Label":"Author","Title":"John Stuart Mill","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/john-stuart-mill/","MediaHref":"","ImageSrc":"https://chrisdeasy.com/wp-content/uploads/john-stuart-mill-01-london-stereoscopic-c1870-portrait-1.jpg","ImageAlt":"John Stuart Mill by the London Stereoscopic Company, c. 1870","FilterTerra":"Western Europe","ClickText":"John Stuart Mill","ClickHref":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/john-stuart-mill/","Copies":["1806 CE – 1873 CE","Pentonville, London","English liberal utilitarian philosopher of liberty, individuality, higher pleasures, inductive logic, political economy, representative government, women\u0027s equality, religious skepticism, and empiricist method."]},"ContextCards":[{"Label":"Period","Key":"Period:4","Title":"Modern History","DateText":"1800 CE – 1944 CE","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/eras-of-thought/philosophers-of-modern-history/"},{"Label":"Era","Key":"Era:11","Title":"Long 19th Century","DateText":"1870 CE – 1913 CE","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/eras-of-thought/philosophers-of-modern-history/philosophers-of-the-long-19th-century/"},{"Label":"Composition","Title":"1861 CE","Url":"","DateText":""}],"DateNote":"Displayed as 1861 CE for serial publication; book publication in 1863 is documented in evidence notes.","GeoCards":[{"Label":"Region","Key":"Region:1"},{"Label":"Terra Avita","Key":"TerraAvita:1"},{"Label":"Terra Avita Region","Key":"TerraAvitaRegion:2"},{"Label":"Modern Country","Key":"Country:GBR:1"}],"OriginalTitle":"Utilitarianism","Language":"English","DisciplineCards":[{"Label":"Primary Discipline","Key":"Discipline:ethics"},{"Label":"Secondary Discipline","Key":"Discipline:philosophy-of-mind"}],"Tradition":"British empiricism; liberal utilitarianism; associationism; political economy; social reform","FullText":{"Title":"Full Text","Copy":"Public-domain full text from Project Gutenberg eBook #11224 .","Url":"","Label":"","Kicker":"","Cards":[]},"CoreThesis":["Mill refines utilitarianism through higher pleasures, happiness, justice, moral proof, sanction, character, and impartial concern for well-being."],"Classification":{"AlternateTitles":"Utilitarianism essay","KeyConcepts":"utilitarianism; happiness; higher pleasures; justice; sanctions; proof; well-being","Methodology":"Direct Mill work-cluster record based on SEP, IEP, Britannica, OLL Collected Works, Gutenberg/Wikisource surfaces, catalog records, and scholarship. 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Modify or delete as required. –\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#CONTENTS\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eCONTENTS.\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n \u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#CHAPTER_I\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eCHAPTER I. GENERAL REMARKS\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n \u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#CHAPTER_II\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eCHAPTER II. WHAT UTILITARIANISM IS\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n \u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#CHAPTER_III\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eCHAPTER III. OF THE ULTIMATE SANCTION OF THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n \u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#CHAPTER_IV\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eCHAPTER IV. OF WHAT SORT OF PROOF THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY IS SUSCEPTIBLE\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n \u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#CHAPTER_V\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eCHAPTER V. OF THE CONNEXION BETWEEN JUSTICE AND UTILITY\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 65%;\"\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"UTILITARIANISM\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003ch2\u003eUTILITARIANISM.\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 65%;\"\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"CHAPTER_I\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003ch2\u003eCHAPTER I.\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"xhtml_center\"\u003eGENERAL REMARKS.\u003c/div\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThere are few circumstances among those which make up the present\r\ncondition of human knowledge, more unlike what might have been expected,\r\nor more significant of the backward state in which speculation on the\r\nmost important subjects still lingers, than the little progress which\r\nhas been made in the decision of the controversy respecting the\r\ncriterion of right and wrong. From the dawn of philosophy, the question\r\nconcerning the \u003ci\u003esummum bonum\u003c/i\u003e, or, what is the same thing, concerning\r\nthe foundation of morality, has been accounted the main problem in\r\nspeculative thought, has occupied the most gifted intellects, and\r\ndivided them into sects and schools, carrying on a vigorous warfare\r\nagainst one another. And after more than two thousand years the same\r\ndiscussions continue, philosophers are still ranged under the same\r\ncontending banners, and neither thinkers nor mankind at large seem\r\nnearer to being unanimous on the subject, than when the youth Socrates\r\nlistened to the old Protagoras, and asserted (if Plato\u0027s dialogue be\r\ngrounded on a real conversation) the theory of utilitarianism against\r\nthe popular morality of the so-called sophist.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt is true that similar confusion and uncertainty, and in some cases\r\nsimilar discordance, exist respecting the first principles of all the\r\nsciences, not excepting that which is deemed the most certain of them,\r\nmathematics; without much impairing, generally indeed without impairing\r\nat all, the trustworthiness of the conclusions of those sciences. An\r\napparent anomaly, the explanation of which is, that the detailed\r\ndoctrines of a science are not usually deduced from, nor depend for\r\ntheir evidence upon, what are called its first principles. Were it not\r\nso, there would be no science more precarious, or whose conclusions were\r\nmore insufficiently made out, than algebra; which derives none of its\r\ncertainty from what are commonly taught to learners as its elements,\r\nsince these, as laid down by some of its most eminent teachers, are as\r\nfull of fictions as English law, and of mysteries as theology. The\r\ntruths which are ultimately accepted as the first principles of a\r\nscience, are really the last results of metaphysical analysis, practised\r\non the elementary notions with which the science is conversant; and\r\ntheir relation to the science is not that of foundations to an edifice,\r\nbut of roots to a tree, which may perform their office equally well\r\nthough they be never dug down to and exposed to light. But though in\r\nscience the particular truths precede the general theory, the contrary\r\nmight be expected to be the case with a practical art, such as morals or\r\nlegislation. All action is for the sake of some end, and rules of\r\naction, it seems natural to suppose, must take their whole character\r\nand colour from the end to which they are subservient. When we engage in\r\na pursuit, a clear and precise conception of what we are pursuing would\r\nseem to be the first thing we need, instead of the last we are to look\r\nforward to. A test of right and wrong must be the means, one would\r\nthink, of ascertaining what is right or wrong, and not a consequence of\r\nhaving already ascertained it.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe difficulty is not avoided by having recourse to the popular theory\r\nof a natural faculty, a sense or instinct, informing us of right and\r\nwrong. For—besides that the existence of such a moral instinct is\r\nitself one of the matters in dispute—those believers in it who have any\r\npretensions to philosophy, have been obliged to abandon the idea that it\r\ndiscerns what is right or wrong in the particular case in hand, as our\r\nother senses discern the sight or sound actually present. Our moral\r\nfaculty, according to all those of its interpreters who are entitled to\r\nthe name of thinkers, supplies us only with the general principles of\r\nmoral judgments; it is a branch of our reason, not of our sensitive\r\nfaculty; and must be looked to for the abstract doctrines of morality,\r\nnot for perception of it in the concrete. The intuitive, no less than\r\nwhat may be termed the inductive, school of ethics, insists on the\r\nnecessity of general laws. They both agree that the morality of an\r\nindividual action is not a question of direct perception, but of the\r\napplication of a law to an individual case. They recognise also, to a\r\ngreat extent, the same moral laws; but differ as to their evidence, and\r\nthe source from which they derive their authority. According to the one\r\nopinion, the principles of morals are evident \u003ci\u003eà priori\u003c/i\u003e, requiring\r\nnothing to command assent, except that the meaning of the terms be\r\nunderstood. According to the other doctrine, right and wrong, as well as\r\ntruth and falsehood, are questions of observation and experience. But\r\nboth hold equally that morality must be deduced from principles; and the\r\nintuitive school affirm as strongly as the inductive, that there is a\r\nscience of morals. Yet they seldom attempt to make out a list of the \u003ci\u003eà\r\npriori\u003c/i\u003e principles which are to serve as the premises of the science;\r\nstill more rarely do they make any effort to reduce those various\r\nprinciples to one first principle, or common ground of obligation. They\r\neither assume the ordinary precepts of morals as of \u003ci\u003eà priori\u003c/i\u003e\r\nauthority, or they lay down as the common groundwork of those maxims,\r\nsome generality much less obviously authoritative than the maxims\r\nthemselves, and which has never succeeded in gaining popular acceptance.\r\nYet to support their pretensions there ought either to be some one\r\nfundamental principle or law, at the root of all morality, or if there\r\nbe several, there should be a determinate order of precedence among\r\nthem; and the one principle, or the rule for deciding between the\r\nvarious principles when they conflict, ought to be self-evident.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo inquire how far the bad effects of this deficiency have been\r\nmitigated in practice, or to what extent the moral beliefs of mankind\r\nhave been vitiated or made uncertain by the absence of any distinct\r\nrecognition of an ultimate standard, would imply a complete survey and\r\ncriticism of past and present ethical doctrine. It would, however, be\r\neasy to show that whatever steadiness or consistency these moral beliefs\r\nhave attained, has been mainly due to the tacit influence of a standard\r\nnot recognised. Although the non-existence of an acknowledged first\r\nprinciple has made ethics not so much a guide as a consecration of men\u0027s\r\nactual sentiments, still, as men\u0027s sentiments, both of favour and of\r\naversion, are greatly influenced by what they suppose to be the effects\r\nof things upon their happiness, the principle of utility, or as Bentham\r\nlatterly called it, the greatest happiness principle, has had a large\r\nshare in forming the moral doctrines even of those who most scornfully\r\nreject its authority. Nor is there any school of thought which refuses\r\nto admit that the influence of actions on happiness is a most material\r\nand even predominant consideration in many of the details of morals,\r\nhowever unwilling to acknowledge it as the fundamental principle of\r\nmorality, and the source of moral obligation. I might go much further,\r\nand say that to all those \u003ci\u003eà priori\u003c/i\u003e moralists who deem it necessary to\r\nargue at all, utilitarian arguments are indispensable. It is not my\r\npresent purpose to criticise these thinkers; but I cannot help\r\nreferring, for illustration, to a systematic treatise by one of the most\r\nillustrious of them, the \u003ci\u003eMetaphysics of Ethics\u003c/i\u003e, by Kant. This\r\nremarkable man, whose system of thought will long remain one of the\r\nlandmarks in the history of philosophical speculation, does, in the\r\ntreatise in question, lay down an universal first principle as the\r\norigin and ground of moral obligation; it is this:—\u0027So act, that the\r\nrule on which thou actest would admit of being adopted as a law by all\r\nrational beings.\u0027 But when he begins to deduce from this precept any of\r\nthe actual duties of morality, he fails, almost grotesquely, to show\r\nthat there would be any contradiction, any logical (not to say\r\nphysical) impossibility, in the adoption by all rational beings of the\r\nmost outrageously immoral rules of conduct. All he shows is that the\r\n\u003ci\u003econsequences\u003c/i\u003e of their universal adoption would be such as no one would\r\nchoose to incur.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eOn the present occasion, I shall, without further discussion of the\r\nother theories, attempt to contribute something towards the\r\nunderstanding and appreciation of the Utilitarian or Happiness theory,\r\nand towards such proof as it is susceptible of. It is evident that this\r\ncannot be proof in the ordinary and popular meaning of the term.\r\nQuestions of ultimate ends are not amenable to direct proof. Whatever\r\ncan be proved to be good, must be so by being shown to be a means to\r\nsomething admitted to be good without proof. The medical art is proved\r\nto be good, by its conducing to health; but how is it possible to prove\r\nthat health is good? The art of music is good, for the reason, among\r\nothers, that it produces pleasure; but what proof is it possible to give\r\nthat pleasure is good? If, then, it is asserted that there is a\r\ncomprehensive formula, including all things which are in themselves\r\ngood, and that whatever else is good, is not so as an end, but as a\r\nmean, the formula may be accepted or rejected, but is not a subject of\r\nwhat is commonly understood by proof. We are not, however, to infer that\r\nits acceptance or rejection must depend on blind impulse, or arbitrary\r\nchoice. There is a larger meaning of the word proof, in which this\r\nquestion is as amenable to it as any other of the disputed questions of\r\nphilosophy. The subject is within the cognizance of the rational\r\nfaculty; and neither does that faculty deal with it solely in the way\r\nof intuition. Considerations may be presented capable of determining the\r\nintellect either to give or withhold its assent to the doctrine; and\r\nthis is equivalent to proof.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eWe shall examine presently of what nature are these considerations; in\r\nwhat manner they apply to the case, and what rational grounds,\r\ntherefore, can be given for accepting or rejecting the utilitarian\r\nformula. But it is a preliminary condition of rational acceptance or\r\nrejection, that the formula should be correctly understood. I believe\r\nthat the very imperfect notion ordinarily formed of its meaning, is the\r\nchief obstacle which impedes its reception; and that could it be\r\ncleared, even from only the grosser misconceptions, the question would\r\nbe greatly simplified, and a large proportion of its difficulties\r\nremoved. Before, therefore, I attempt to enter into the philosophical\r\ngrounds which can be given for assenting to the utilitarian standard, I\r\nshall offer some illustrations of the doctrine itself; with the view of\r\nshowing more clearly what it is, distinguishing it from what it is not,\r\nand disposing of such of the practical objections to it as either\r\noriginate in, or are closely connected with, mistaken interpretations of\r\nits meaning. Having thus prepared the ground, I shall afterwards\r\nendeavour to throw such light as I can upon the question, considered as\r\none of philosophical theory.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 65%;\"\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"CHAPTER_II\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003ch2\u003eCHAPTER II.\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"xhtml_center\"\u003eWHAT UTILITARIANISM IS.\u003c/div\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eA passing remark is all that needs be given to the ignorant blunder of\r\nsupposing that those who stand up for utility as the test of right and\r\nwrong, use the term in that restricted and merely colloquial sense in\r\nwhich utility is opposed to pleasure. An apology is due to the\r\nphilosophical opponents of utilitarianism, for even the momentary\r\nappearance of confounding them with any one capable of so absurd a\r\nmisconception; which is the more extraordinary, inasmuch as the contrary\r\naccusation, of referring everything to pleasure, and that too in its\r\ngrossest form, is another of the common charges against utilitarianism:\r\nand, as has been pointedly remarked by an able writer, the same sort of\r\npersons, and often the very same persons, denounce the theory \"as\r\nimpracticably dry when the word utility precedes the word pleasure, and\r\nas too practicably voluptuous when the word pleasure precedes the word\r\nutility.\" Those who know anything about the matter are aware that every\r\nwriter, from Epicurus to Bentham, who maintained the theory of utility,\r\nmeant by it, not something to be contradistinguished from pleasure, but\r\npleasure itself, together with exemption from pain; and instead of\r\nopposing the useful to the agreeable or the ornamental, have always\r\ndeclared that the useful means these, among other things. Yet the\r\ncommon herd, including the herd of writers, not only in newspapers and\r\nperiodicals, but in books of weight and pretension, are perpetually\r\nfalling into this shallow mistake. Having caught up the word\r\nutilitarian, while knowing nothing whatever about it but its sound, they\r\nhabitually express by it the rejection, or the neglect, of pleasure in\r\nsome of its forms; of beauty, of ornament, or of amusement. Nor is the\r\nterm thus ignorantly misapplied solely in disparagement, but\r\noccasionally in compliment; as though it implied superiority to\r\nfrivolity and the mere pleasures of the moment. And this perverted use\r\nis the only one in which the word is popularly known, and the one from\r\nwhich the new generation are acquiring their sole notion of its meaning.\r\nThose who introduced the word, but who had for many years discontinued\r\nit as a distinctive appellation, may well feel themselves called upon to\r\nresume it, if by doing so they can hope to contribute anything towards\r\nrescuing it from this utter degradation.\u003ca id=\"FNanchorA\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003ca href=\"#Footnote_A\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003csup\u003e[A]\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe creed which accepts as the foundation of morals, Utility, or the\r\nGreatest Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in proportion\r\nas they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the\r\nreverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure, and the\r\nabsence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure. To\r\ngive a clear view of the moral standard set up by the theory, much more\r\nrequires to be said; in particular, what things it includes in the ideas\r\nof pain and pleasure; and to what extent this is left an open question.\r\nBut these supplementary explanations do not affect the theory of life on\r\nwhich this theory of morality is grounded—namely, that pleasure, and\r\nfreedom from pain, are the only things desirable as ends; and that all\r\ndesirable things (which are as numerous in the utilitarian as in any\r\nother scheme) are desirable either for the pleasure inherent in\r\nthemselves, or as means to the promotion of pleasure and the prevention\r\nof pain.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eNow, such a theory of life excites in many minds, and among them in some\r\nof the most estimable in feeling and purpose, inveterate dislike. To\r\nsuppose that life has (as they express it) no higher end than\r\npleasure—no better and nobler object of desire and pursuit—they\r\ndesignate as utterly mean and grovelling; as a doctrine worthy only of\r\nswine, to whom the followers of Epicurus were, at a very early period,\r\ncontemptuously likened; and modern holders of the doctrine are\r\noccasionally made the subject of equally polite comparisons by its\r\nGerman, French, and English assailants.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eWhen thus attacked, the Epicureans have always answered, that it is not\r\nthey, but their accusers, who represent human nature in a degrading\r\nlight; since the accusation supposes human beings to be capable of no\r\npleasures except those of which swine are capable. If this supposition\r\nwere true, the charge could not be gainsaid, but would then be no\r\nlonger an imputation; for if the sources of pleasure were precisely the\r\nsame to human beings and to swine, the rule of life which is good enough\r\nfor the one would be good enough for the other. The comparison of the\r\nEpicurean life to that of beasts is felt as degrading, precisely because\r\na beast\u0027s pleasures do not satisfy a human being\u0027s conceptions of\r\nhappiness. Human beings have faculties more elevated than the animal\r\nappetites, and when once made conscious of them, do not regard anything\r\nas happiness which does not include their gratification. I do not,\r\nindeed, consider the Epicureans to have been by any means faultless in\r\ndrawing out their scheme of consequences from the utilitarian principle.\r\nTo do this in any sufficient manner, many Stoic, as well as Christian\r\nelements require to be included. But there is no known Epicurean theory\r\nof life which does not assign to the pleasures of the intellect; of the\r\nfeelings and imagination, and of the moral sentiments, a much higher\r\nvalue as pleasures than to those of mere sensation. It must be admitted,\r\nhowever, that utilitarian writers in general have placed the superiority\r\nof mental over bodily pleasures chiefly in the greater permanency,\r\nsafety, uncostliness, \u0026amp;c., of the former—that is, in their\r\ncircumstantial advantages rather than in their intrinsic nature. And on\r\nall these points utilitarians have fully proved their case; but they\r\nmight have taken the other, and, as it may be called, higher ground,\r\nwith entire consistency. It is quite compatible with the principle of\r\nutility to recognise the fact, that some \u003ci\u003ekinds\u003c/i\u003e of pleasure are more\r\ndesirable and more valuable than others. It would be absurd that while,\r\nin estimating all other things, quality is considered as well as\r\nquantity, the estimation of pleasures should be supposed to depend on\r\nquantity alone.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIf I am asked, what I mean by difference of quality in pleasures, or\r\nwhat makes one pleasure more valuable than another, merely as a\r\npleasure, except its being greater in amount, there is but one possible\r\nanswer. Of two pleasures, if there be one to which all or almost all who\r\nhave experience of both give a decided preference, irrespective of any\r\nfeeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is the more desirable\r\npleasure. If one of the two is, by those who are competently acquainted\r\nwith both, placed so far above the other that they prefer it, even\r\nthough knowing it to be attended with a greater amount of discontent,\r\nand would not resign it for any quantity of the other pleasure which\r\ntheir nature is capable of, we are justified in ascribing to the\r\npreferred enjoyment a superiority in quality, so far outweighing\r\nquantity as to render it, in comparison, of small account.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eNow it is an unquestionable fact that those who are equally acquainted\r\nwith, and equally capable of appreciating and enjoying, both, do give a\r\nmost marked preference to the manner of existence which employs their\r\nhigher faculties. Few human creatures would consent to be changed into\r\nany of the lower animals, for a promise of the fullest allowance of a\r\nbeast\u0027s pleasures; no intelligent human being would consent to be a\r\nfool, no instructed person would be an ignoramus, no person of feeling\r\nand conscience would be selfish and base, even though they should be\r\npersuaded that the fool, the dunce, or the rascal is better satisfied\r\nwith his lot than they are with theirs. They would not resign what they\r\npossess more than he, for the most complete satisfaction of all the\r\ndesires which they have in common with him. If they ever fancy they\r\nwould, it is only in cases of unhappiness so extreme, that to escape\r\nfrom it they would exchange their lot for almost any other, however\r\nundesirable in their own eyes. A being of higher faculties requires more\r\nto make him happy, is capable probably of more acute suffering, and is\r\ncertainly accessible to it at more points, than one of an inferior type;\r\nbut in spite of these liabilities, he can never really wish to sink into\r\nwhat he feels to be a lower grade of existence. We may give what\r\nexplanation we please of this unwillingness; we may attribute it to\r\npride, a name which is given indiscriminately to some of the most and to\r\nsome of the least estimable feelings of which mankind are capable; we\r\nmay refer it to the love of liberty and personal independence, an appeal\r\nto which was with the Stoics one of the most effective means for the\r\ninculcation of it; to the love of power, or to the love of excitement,\r\nboth of which do really enter into and contribute to it: but its most\r\nappropriate appellation is a sense of dignity, which all human beings\r\npossess in one form or other, and in some, though by no means in exact,\r\nproportion to their higher faculties, and which is so essential a part\r\nof the happiness of those in whom it is strong, that nothing which\r\nconflicts with it could be, otherwise than momentarily, an object of\r\ndesire to them. Whoever supposes that this preference takes place at a\r\nsacrifice of happiness-that the superior being, in anything like equal\r\ncircumstances, is not happier than the inferior-confounds the two very\r\ndifferent ideas, of happiness, and content. It is indisputable that the\r\nbeing whose capacities of enjoyment are low, has the greatest chance of\r\nhaving them fully satisfied; and a highly-endowed being will always feel\r\nthat any happiness which he can look for, as the world is constituted,\r\nis imperfect. But he can learn to bear its imperfections, if they are at\r\nall bearable; and they will not make him envy the being who is indeed\r\nunconscious of the imperfections, but only because he feels not at all\r\nthe good which those imperfections qualify. It is better to be a human\r\nbeing dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates\r\ndissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, is of a\r\ndifferent opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the\r\nquestion. The other party to the comparison knows both sides.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt may be objected, that many who are capable of the higher pleasures,\r\noccasionally, under the influence of temptation, postpone them to the\r\nlower. But this is quite compatible with a full appreciation of the\r\nintrinsic superiority of the higher. Men often, from infirmity of\r\ncharacter, make their election for the nearer good, though they know it\r\nto be the less valuable; and this no less when the choice is between two\r\nbodily pleasures, than when it is between bodily and mental. They pursue\r\nsensual indulgences to the injury of health, though perfectly aware that\r\nhealth is the greater good. It may be further objected, that many who\r\nbegin with youthful enthusiasm for everything noble, as they advance in\r\nyears sink into indolence and selfishness. But I do not believe that\r\nthose who undergo this very common change, voluntarily choose the lower\r\ndescription of pleasures in preference to the higher. I believe that\r\nbefore they devote themselves exclusively to the one, they have already\r\nbecome incapable of the other. Capacity for the nobler feelings is in\r\nmost natures a very tender plant, easily killed, not only by hostile\r\ninfluences, but by mere want of sustenance; and in the majority of young\r\npersons it speedily dies away if the occupations to which their position\r\nin life has devoted them, and the society into which it has thrown them,\r\nare not favourable to keeping that higher capacity in exercise. Men lose\r\ntheir high aspirations as they lose their intellectual tastes, because\r\nthey have not time or opportunity for indulging them; and they addict\r\nthemselves to inferior pleasures, not because they deliberately prefer\r\nthem, but because they are either the only ones to which they have\r\naccess, or the only ones which they are any longer capable of enjoying.\r\nIt may be questioned whether any one who has remained equally\r\nsusceptible to both classes of pleasures, ever knowingly and calmly\r\npreferred the lower; though many, in all ages, have broken down in an\r\nineffectual attempt to combine both.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eFrom this verdict of the only competent judges, I apprehend there can be\r\nno appeal. On a question which is the best worth having of two\r\npleasures, or which of two modes of existence is the most grateful to\r\nthe feelings, apart from its moral attributes and from its consequences,\r\nthe judgment of those who are qualified by knowledge of both, or, if\r\nthey differ, that of the majority among them, must be admitted as final.\r\nAnd there needs be the less hesitation to accept this judgment\r\nrespecting the quality of pleasures, since there is no other tribunal to\r\nbe referred to even on the question of quantity. What means are there of\r\ndetermining which is the acutest of two pains, or the intensest of two\r\npleasurable sensations, except the general suffrage of those who are\r\nfamiliar with both? Neither pains nor pleasures are homogeneous, and\r\npain is always heterogeneous with pleasure. What is there to decide\r\nwhether a particular pleasure is worth purchasing at the cost of a\r\nparticular pain, except the feelings and judgment of the experienced?\r\nWhen, therefore, those feelings and judgment declare the pleasures\r\nderived from the higher faculties to be preferable \u003ci\u003ein kind\u003c/i\u003e, apart from\r\nthe question of intensity, to those of which the animal nature,\r\ndisjoined from the higher faculties, is susceptible, they are entitled\r\non this subject to the same regard.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eI have dwelt on this point, as being a necessary part of a perfectly\r\njust conception of Utility or Happiness, considered as the directive\r\nrule of human conduct. But it is by no means an indispensable condition\r\nto the acceptance of the utilitarian standard; for that standard is not\r\nthe agent\u0027s own greatest happiness, but the greatest amount of happiness\r\naltogether; and if it may possibly be doubted whether a noble character\r\nis always the happier for its nobleness, there can be no doubt that it\r\nmakes other people happier, and that the world in general is immensely a\r\ngainer by it. Utilitarianism, therefore, could only attain its end by\r\nthe general cultivation of nobleness of character, even if each\r\nindividual were only benefited by the nobleness of others, and his own,\r\nso far as happiness is concerned, were a sheer deduction from the\r\nbenefit. But the bare enunciation of such an absurdity as this last,\r\nrenders refutation superfluous.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAccording to the Greatest Happiness Principle, as above explained, the\r\nultimate end, with reference to and for the sake of which all other\r\nthings are desirable (whether we are considering our own good or that of\r\nother people), is an existence exempt as far as possible from pain, and\r\nas rich as possible in enjoyments, both in point of quantity and\r\nquality; the test of quality, and the rule for measuring it against\r\nquantity, being the preference felt by those who, in their opportunities\r\nof experience, to which must be added their habits of self-consciousness\r\nand self-observation, are best furnished with the means of comparison.\r\nThis, being, according to the utilitarian opinion, the end of human\r\naction, is necessarily also the standard of morality; which may\r\naccordingly be defined, the rules and precepts for human conduct, by the\r\nobservance of which an existence such as has been described might be, to\r\nthe greatest extent possible, secured to all mankind; and not to them\r\nonly, but, so far as the nature of things admits, to the whole sentient\r\ncreation.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAgainst this doctrine, however, arises another class of objectors, who\r\nsay that happiness, in any form, cannot be the rational purpose of human\r\nlife and action; because, in the first place, it is unattainable: and\r\nthey contemptuously ask, What right hast thou to be happy? a question\r\nwhich Mr. Carlyle clenches by the addition, What right, a short time\r\nago, hadst thou even \u003ci\u003eto be\u003c/i\u003e? Next, they say, that men can do \u003ci\u003ewithout\u003c/i\u003e\r\nhappiness; that all noble human beings have felt this, and could not\r\nhave become noble but by learning the lesson of Entsagen, or\r\nrenunciation; which lesson, thoroughly learnt and submitted to, they\r\naffirm to be the beginning and necessary condition of all virtue.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe first of these objections would go to the root of the matter were it\r\nwell founded; for if no happiness is to be had at all by human beings,\r\nthe attainment of it cannot be the end of morality, or of any rational\r\nconduct. Though, even in that case, something might still be said for\r\nthe utilitarian theory; since utility includes not solely the pursuit of\r\nhappiness, but the prevention or mitigation of unhappiness; and if the\r\nformer aim be chimerical, there will be all the greater scope and more\r\nimperative need for the latter, so long at least as mankind think fit to\r\nlive, and do not take refuge in the simultaneous act of suicide\r\nrecommended under certain conditions by Novalis. When, however, it is\r\nthus positively asserted to be impossible that human life should be\r\nhappy, the assertion, if not something like a verbal quibble, is at\r\nleast an exaggeration. If by happiness be meant a continuity of highly\r\npleasurable excitement, it is evident enough that this is impossible. A\r\nstate of exalted pleasure lasts only moments, or in some cases, and with\r\nsome intermissions, hours or days, and is the occasional brilliant flash\r\nof enjoyment, not its permanent and steady flame. Of this the\r\nphilosophers who have taught that happiness is the end of life were as\r\nfully aware as those who taunt them. The happiness which they meant was\r\nnot a life of rapture, but moments of such, in an existence made up of\r\nfew and transitory pains, many and various pleasures, with a decided\r\npredominance of the active over the passive, and having as the\r\nfoundation of the whole, not to expect more from life than it is capable\r\nof bestowing. A life thus composed, to those who have been fortunate\r\nenough to obtain it, has always appeared worthy of the name of\r\nhappiness. And such an existence is even now the lot of many, during\r\nsome considerable portion of their lives. The present wretched\r\neducation, and wretched social arrangements, are the only real hindrance\r\nto its being attainable by almost all.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe objectors perhaps may doubt whether human beings, if taught to\r\nconsider happiness as the end of life, would be satisfied with such a\r\nmoderate share of it. But great numbers of mankind have been satisfied\r\nwith much less. The main constituents of a satisfied life appear to be\r\ntwo, either of which by itself is often found sufficient for the\r\npurpose: tranquillity, and excitement. With much tranquillity, many find\r\nthat they can be content with very little pleasure: with much\r\nexcitement, many can reconcile themselves to a considerable quantity of\r\npain. There is assuredly no inherent impossibility in enabling even the\r\nmass of mankind to unite both; since the two are so far from being\r\nincompatible that they are in natural alliance, the prolongation of\r\neither being a preparation for, and exciting a wish for, the other. It\r\nis only those in whom indolence amounts to a vice, that do not desire\r\nexcitement after an interval of repose; it is only those in whom the\r\nneed of excitement is a disease, that feel the tranquillity which\r\nfollows excitement dull and insipid, instead of pleasurable in direct\r\nproportion to the excitement which preceded it. When people who are\r\ntolerably fortunate in their outward lot do not find in life sufficient\r\nenjoyment to make it valuable to them, the cause generally is, caring\r\nfor nobody but themselves. To those who have neither public nor private\r\naffections, the excitements of life are much curtailed, and in any case\r\ndwindle in value as the time approaches when all selfish interests must\r\nbe terminated by death: while those who leave after them objects of\r\npersonal affection, and especially those who have also cultivated a\r\nfellow-feeling with the collective interests of mankind, retain as\r\nlively an interest in life on the eve of death as in the vigour of youth\r\nand health. Next to selfishness, the principal cause which makes life\r\nunsatisfactory, is want of mental cultivation. A cultivated mind—I do\r\nnot mean that of a philosopher, but any mind to which the fountains of\r\nknowledge have been opened, and which has been taught, in any tolerable\r\ndegree, to exercise its faculties—finds sources of inexhaustible\r\ninterest in all that surrounds it; in the objects of nature, the\r\nachievements of art, the imaginations of poetry, the incidents of\r\nhistory, the ways of mankind past and present, and their prospects in\r\nthe future. It is possible, indeed, to become indifferent to all this,\r\nand that too without having exhausted a thousandth part of it; but only\r\nwhen one has had from the beginning no moral or human interest in these\r\nthings, and has sought in them only the gratification of curiosity.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eNow there is absolutely no reason in the nature of things why an amount\r\nof mental culture sufficient to give an intelligent interest in these\r\nobjects of contemplation, should not be the inheritance of every one\r\nborn in a civilized country. As little is there an inherent necessity\r\nthat any human being should be a selfish egotist, devoid of every\r\nfeeling or care but those which centre in his own miserable\r\nindividuality. Something far superior to this is sufficiently common\r\neven now, to give ample earnest of what the human species may be made.\r\nGenuine private affections, and a sincere interest in the public good,\r\nare possible, though in unequal degrees, to every rightly brought-up\r\nhuman being. In a world in which there is so much to interest, so much\r\nto enjoy, and so much also to correct and improve, every one who has\r\nthis moderate amount of moral and intellectual requisites is capable of\r\nan existence which may be called enviable; and unless such a person,\r\nthrough bad laws, or subjection to the will of others, is denied the\r\nliberty to use the sources of happiness within his reach, he will not\r\nfail to find this enviable existence, if he escape the positive evils of\r\nlife, the great sources of physical and mental suffering—such as\r\nindigence, disease, and the unkindness, worthlessness, or premature loss\r\nof objects of affection. The main stress of the problem lies, therefore,\r\nin the contest with these calamities, from which it is a rare good\r\nfortune entirely to escape; which, as things now are, cannot be\r\nobviated, and often cannot be in any material degree mitigated. Yet no\r\none whose opinion deserves a moment\u0027s consideration can doubt that most\r\nof the great positive evils of the world are in themselves removable,\r\nand will, if human affairs continue to improve, be in the end reduced\r\nwithin narrow limits. Poverty, in any sense implying suffering, may be\r\ncompletely extinguished by the wisdom of society, combined with the good\r\nsense and providence of individuals. Even that most intractable of\r\nenemies, disease, may be indefinitely reduced in dimensions by good\r\nphysical and moral education, and proper control of noxious influences;\r\nwhile the progress of science holds out a promise for the future of\r\nstill more direct conquests over this detestable foe. And every advance\r\nin that direction relieves us from some, not only of the chances which\r\ncut short our own lives, but, what concerns us still more, which deprive\r\nus of those in whom our happiness is wrapt up. As for vicissitudes of\r\nfortune, and other disappointments connected with worldly circumstances,\r\nthese are principally the effect either of gross imprudence, of\r\nill-regulated desires, or of bad or imperfect social institutions. All\r\nthe grand sources, in short, of human suffering are in a great degree,\r\nmany of them almost entirely, conquerable by human care and effort; and\r\nthough their removal is grievously slow—though a long succession of\r\ngenerations will perish in the breach before the conquest is completed,\r\nand this world becomes all that, if will and knowledge were not wanting,\r\nit might easily be made—yet every mind sufficiently intelligent and\r\ngenerous to bear a part, however small and unconspicuous, in the\r\nendeavour, will draw a noble enjoyment from the contest itself, which he\r\nwould not for any bribe in the form of selfish indulgence consent to be\r\nwithout.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAnd this leads to the true estimation of what is said by the objectors\r\nconcerning the possibility, and the obligation, of learning to do\r\nwithout happiness. Unquestionably it is possible to do without\r\nhappiness; it is done involuntarily by nineteen-twentieths of mankind,\r\neven in those parts of our present world which are least deep in\r\nbarbarism; and it often has to be done voluntarily by the hero or the\r\nmartyr, for the sake of something which he prizes more than his\r\nindividual happiness. But this something, what is it, unless the\r\nhappiness of others, or some of the requisites of happiness? It is noble\r\nto be capable of resigning entirely one\u0027s own portion of happiness, or\r\nchances of it: but, after all, this self-sacrifice must be for some end;\r\nit is not its own end; and if we are told that its end is not happiness,\r\nbut virtue, which is better than happiness, I ask, would the sacrifice\r\nbe made if the hero or martyr did not believe that it would earn for\r\nothers immunity from similar sacrifices? Would it be made, if he thought\r\nthat his renunciation of happiness for himself would produce no fruit\r\nfor any of his fellow creatures, but to make their lot like his, and\r\nplace them also in the condition of persons who have renounced\r\nhappiness? All honour to those who can abnegate for themselves the\r\npersonal enjoyment of life, when by such renunciation they contribute\r\nworthily to increase the amount of happiness in the world; but he who\r\ndoes it, or professes to do it, for any other purpose, is no more\r\ndeserving of admiration than the ascetic mounted on his pillar. He may\r\nbe an inspiriting proof of what men \u003ci\u003ecan\u003c/i\u003e do, but assuredly not an\r\nexample of what they \u003ci\u003eshould\u003c/i\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThough it is only in a very imperfect state of the world\u0027s arrangements\r\nthat any one can best serve the happiness of others by the absolute\r\nsacrifice of his own, yet so long as the world is in that imperfect\r\nstate, I fully acknowledge that the readiness to make such a sacrifice\r\nis the highest virtue which can be found in man. I will add, that in\r\nthis condition of the world, paradoxical as the assertion may be, the\r\nconscious ability to do without happiness gives the best prospect of\r\nrealizing such happiness as is attainable. For nothing except that\r\nconsciousness can raise a person above the chances of life, by making\r\nhim feel that, let fate and fortune do their worst, they have not power\r\nto subdue him: which, once felt, frees him from excess of anxiety\r\nconcerning the evils of life, and enables him, like many a Stoic in the\r\nworst times of the Roman Empire, to cultivate in tranquillity the\r\nsources of satisfaction accessible to him, without concerning himself\r\nabout the uncertainty of their duration, any more than about their\r\ninevitable end.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eMeanwhile, let utilitarians never cease to claim the morality of\r\nself-devotion as a possession which belongs by as good a right to them,\r\nas either to the Stoic or to the Transcendentalist. The utilitarian\r\nmorality does recognise in human beings the power of sacrificing their\r\nown greatest good for the good of others. It only refuses to admit that\r\nthe sacrifice is itself a good. A sacrifice which does not increase, or\r\ntend to increase, the sum total of happiness, it considers as wasted.\r\nThe only self-renunciation which it applauds, is devotion to the\r\nhappiness, or to some of the means of happiness, of others; either of\r\nmankind collectively, or of individuals within the limits imposed by the\r\ncollective interests of mankind.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eI must again repeat, what the assailants of utilitarianism seldom have\r\nthe justice to acknowledge, that the happiness which forms the\r\nutilitarian standard of what is right in conduct, is not the agent\u0027s own\r\nhappiness, but that of all concerned. As between his own happiness and\r\nthat of others, utilitarianism requires him to be as strictly impartial\r\nas a disinterested and benevolent spectator. In the golden rule of Jesus\r\nof Nazareth, we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility. To\r\ndo as one would be done by, and to love one\u0027s neighbour as oneself,\r\nconstitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality. As the means of\r\nmaking the nearest approach to this ideal, utility would enjoin, first,\r\nthat laws and social arrangements should place the happiness, or (as\r\nspeaking practically it may be called) the interest, of every\r\nindividual, as nearly as possible in harmony with the interest of the\r\nwhole; and secondly, that education and opinion, which have so vast a\r\npower over human character, should so use that power as to establish in\r\nthe mind of every individual an indissoluble association between his own\r\nhappiness and the good of the whole; especially between his own\r\nhappiness and the practice of such modes of conduct, negative and\r\npositive, as regard for the universal happiness prescribes: so that not\r\nonly he may be unable to conceive the possibility of happiness to\r\nhimself, consistently with conduct opposed to the general good, but also\r\nthat a direct impulse to promote the general good may be in every\r\nindividual one of the habitual motives of action, and the sentiments\r\nconnected therewith may fill a large and prominent place in every human\r\nbeing\u0027s sentient existence. If the impugners of the utilitarian morality\r\nrepresented it to their own minds in this its true character, I know not\r\nwhat recommendation possessed by any other morality they could possibly\r\naffirm to be wanting to it: what more beautiful or more exalted\r\ndevelopments of human nature any other ethical system can be supposed to\r\nfoster, or what springs of action, not accessible to the utilitarian,\r\nsuch systems rely on for giving effect to their mandates.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe objectors to utilitarianism cannot always be charged with\r\nrepresenting it in a discreditable light. On the contrary, those among\r\nthem who entertain anything like a just idea of its disinterested\r\ncharacter, sometimes find fault with its standard as being too high for\r\nhumanity. They say it is exacting too much to require that people shall\r\nalways act from the inducement of promoting the general interests of\r\nsociety. But this is to mistake the very meaning of a standard of\r\nmorals, and to confound the rule of action with the motive of it. It is\r\nthe business of ethics to tell us what are our duties, or by what test\r\nwe may know them; but no system of ethics requires that the sole motive\r\nof all we do shall be a feeling of duty; on the contrary, ninety-nine\r\nhundredths of all our actions are done from other motives, and rightly\r\nso done, if the rule of duty does not condemn them. It is the more\r\nunjust to utilitarianism that this particular misapprehension should be\r\nmade a ground of objection to it, inasmuch as utilitarian moralists have\r\ngone beyond almost all others in affirming that the motive has nothing\r\nto do with the morality of the action, though much with the worth of the\r\nagent. He who saves a fellow creature from drowning does what is morally\r\nright, whether his motive be duty, or the hope of being paid for his\r\ntrouble: he who betrays the friend that trusts him, is guilty of a\r\ncrime, even if his object be to serve another friend to whom he is under\r\ngreater obligations.\u003ca id=\"FNanchorB\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003ca href=\"#Footnote_B\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003csup\u003e[B]\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/a\u003e But to speak only of actions done from the\r\nmotive of duty, and in direct obedience to principle: it is a\r\nmisapprehension of the utilitarian mode of thought, to conceive it as\r\nimplying that people should fix their minds upon so wide a generality as\r\nthe world, or society at large. The great majority of good actions are\r\nintended, not for the benefit of the world, but for that of individuals,\r\nof which the good of the world is made up; and the thoughts of the most\r\nvirtuous man need not on these occasions travel beyond the particular\r\npersons concerned, except so far as is necessary to assure himself that\r\nin benefiting them he is not violating the rights—that is, the\r\nlegitimate and authorized expectations—of any one else. The\r\nmultiplication of happiness is, according to the utilitarian ethics, the\r\nobject of virtue: the occasions on which any person (except one in a\r\nthousand) has it in his power to do this on an extended scale, in other\r\nwords, to be a public benefactor, are but exceptional; and on these\r\noccasions alone is he called on to consider public utility; in every\r\nother case, private utility, the interest or happiness of some few\r\npersons, is all he has to attend to. Those alone the influence of whose\r\nactions extends to society in general, need concern themselves\r\nhabitually about so large an object. In the case of abstinences\r\nindeed—of things which people forbear to do, from moral considerations,\r\nthough the consequences in the particular case might be beneficial—it\r\nwould be unworthy of an intelligent agent not to be consciously aware\r\nthat the action is of a class which, if practised generally, would be\r\ngenerally injurious, and that this is the ground of the obligation to\r\nabstain from it. The amount of regard for the public interest implied in\r\nthis recognition, is no greater than is demanded by every system of\r\nmorals; for they all enjoin to abstain from whatever is manifestly\r\npernicious to society.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe same considerations dispose of another reproach against the doctrine\r\nof utility, founded on a still grosser misconception of the purpose of a\r\nstandard of morality, and of the very meaning of the words right and\r\nwrong. It is often affirmed that utilitarianism renders men cold and\r\nunsympathizing; that it chills their moral feelings towards\r\nindividuals; that it makes them regard only the dry and hard\r\nconsideration of the consequences of actions, not taking into their\r\nmoral estimate the qualities from which those actions emanate. If the\r\nassertion means that they do not allow their judgment respecting the\r\nrightness or wrongness of an action to be influenced by their opinion of\r\nthe qualities of the person who does it, this is a complaint not against\r\nutilitarianism, but against having any standard of morality at all; for\r\ncertainly no known ethical standard decides an action to be good or bad\r\nbecause it is done by a good or a bad man, still less because done by an\r\namiable, a brave, or a benevolent man or the contrary. These\r\nconsiderations are relevant, not to the estimation of actions, but of\r\npersons; and there is nothing in the utilitarian theory inconsistent\r\nwith the fact that there are other things which interest us in persons\r\nbesides the rightness and wrongness of their actions. The Stoics,\r\nindeed, with the paradoxical misuse of language which was part of their\r\nsystem, and by which they strove to raise themselves above all concern\r\nabout anything but virtue, were fond of saying that he who has that has\r\neverything; that he, and only he, is rich, is beautiful, is a king. But\r\nno claim of this description is made for the virtuous man by the\r\nutilitarian doctrine. Utilitarians are quite aware that there are other\r\ndesirable possessions and qualities besides virtue, and are perfectly\r\nwilling to allow to all of them their full worth. They are also aware\r\nthat a right action does not necessarily indicate a virtuous character,\r\nand that actions which are blameable often proceed from qualities\r\nentitled to praise. When this is apparent in any particular case, it\r\nmodifies their estimation, not certainly of the act, but of the agent.\r\nI grant that they are, notwithstanding, of opinion, that in the long run\r\nthe best proof of a good character is good actions; and resolutely\r\nrefuse to consider any mental disposition as good, of which the\r\npredominant tendency is to produce bad conduct. This makes them\r\nunpopular with many people; but it is an unpopularity which they must\r\nshare with every one who regards the distinction between right and wrong\r\nin a serious light; and the reproach is not one which a conscientious\r\nutilitarian need be anxious to repel.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIf no more be meant by the objection than that many utilitarians look on\r\nthe morality of actions, as measured by the utilitarian standard, with\r\ntoo exclusive a regard, and do not lay sufficient stress upon the other\r\nbeauties of character which go towards making a human being loveable or\r\nadmirable, this may be admitted. Utilitarians who have cultivated their\r\nmoral feelings, but not their sympathies nor their artistic perceptions,\r\ndo fall into this mistake; and so do all other moralists under the same\r\nconditions. What can be said in excuse for other moralists is equally\r\navailable for them, namely, that if there is to be any error, it is\r\nbetter that it should be on that side. As a matter of fact, we may\r\naffirm that among utilitarians as among adherents of other systems,\r\nthere is every imaginable degree of rigidity and of laxity in the\r\napplication of their standard: some are even puritanically rigorous,\r\nwhile others are as indulgent as can possibly be desired by sinner or by\r\nsentimentalist. But on the whole, a doctrine which brings prominently\r\nforward the interest that mankind have in the repression and prevention\r\nof conduct which violates the moral law, is likely to be inferior to no\r\nother in turning the sanctions of opinion against such violations. It is\r\ntrue, the question, What does violate the moral law? is one on which\r\nthose who recognise different standards of morality are likely now and\r\nthen to differ. But difference of opinion on moral questions was not\r\nfirst introduced into the world by utilitarianism, while that doctrine\r\ndoes supply, if not always an easy, at all events a tangible and\r\nintelligible mode of deciding such differences.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 45%;\"\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt may not be superfluous to notice a few more of the common\r\nmisapprehensions of utilitarian ethics, even those which are so obvious\r\nand gross that it might appear impossible for any person of candour and\r\nintelligence to fall into them: since persons, even of considerable\r\nmental endowments, often give themselves so little trouble to understand\r\nthe bearings of any opinion against which they entertain a prejudice,\r\nand men are in general so little conscious of this voluntary ignorance\r\nas a defect, that the vulgarest misunderstandings of ethical doctrines\r\nare continually met with in the deliberate writings of persons of the\r\ngreatest pretensions both to high principle and to philosophy. We not\r\nuncommonly hear the doctrine of utility inveighed against as a \u003ci\u003egodless\u003c/i\u003e\r\ndoctrine. If it be necessary to say anything at all against so mere an\r\nassumption, we may say that the question depends upon what idea we have\r\nformed of the moral character of the Deity. If it be a true belief that\r\nGod desires, above all things, the happiness of his creatures, and that\r\nthis was his purpose in their creation, utility is not only not a\r\ngodless doctrine, but more profoundly religious than any other. If it be\r\nmeant that utilitarianism does not recognise the revealed will of God as\r\nthe supreme law of morals, I answer, that an utilitarian who believes in\r\nthe perfect goodness and wisdom of God, necessarily believes that\r\nwhatever God has thought fit to reveal on the subject of morals, must\r\nfulfil the requirements of utility in a supreme degree. But others\r\nbesides utilitarians have been of opinion that the Christian revelation\r\nwas intended, and is fitted, to inform the hearts and minds of mankind\r\nwith a spirit which should enable them to find for themselves what is\r\nright, and incline them to do it when found, rather than to tell them,\r\nexcept in a very general way, what it is: and that we need a doctrine of\r\nethics, carefully followed out, to \u003ci\u003einterpret\u003c/i\u003e to us the will of God.\r\nWhether this opinion is correct or not, it is superfluous here to\r\ndiscuss; since whatever aid religion, either natural or revealed, can\r\nafford to ethical investigation, is as open to the utilitarian moralist\r\nas to any other. He can use it as the testimony of God to the usefulness\r\nor hurtfulness of any given course of action, by as good a right as\r\nothers can use it for the indication of a transcendental law, having no\r\nconnexion with usefulness or with happiness.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAgain, Utility is often summarily stigmatized as an immoral doctrine by\r\ngiving it the name of Expediency, and taking advantage of the popular\r\nuse of that term to contrast it with Principle. But the Expedient, in\r\nthe sense in which it is opposed to the Right, generally means that\r\nwhich is expedient for the particular interest of the agent himself: as\r\nwhen a minister sacrifices the interest of his country to keep himself\r\nin place. When it means anything better than this, it means that which\r\nis expedient for some immediate object, some temporary purpose, but\r\nwhich violates a rule whose observance is expedient in a much higher\r\ndegree. The Expedient, in this sense, instead of being the same thing\r\nwith the useful, is a branch of the hurtful. Thus, it would often be\r\nexpedient, for the purpose of getting over some momentary embarrassment,\r\nor attaining some object immediately useful to ourselves or others, to\r\ntell a lie. But inasmuch as the cultivation in ourselves of a sensitive\r\nfeeling on the subject of veracity, is one of the most useful, and the\r\nenfeeblement of that feeling one of the most hurtful, things to which\r\nour conduct can be instrumental; and inasmuch as any, even\r\nunintentional, deviation from truth, does that much towards weakening\r\nthe trustworthiness of human assertion, which is not only the principal\r\nsupport of all present social well-being, but the insufficiency of which\r\ndoes more than any one thing that can be named to keep back\r\ncivilisation, virtue, everything on which human happiness on the largest\r\nscale depends; we feel that the violation, for a present advantage, of a\r\nrule of such transcendent expediency, is not expedient, and that he who,\r\nfor the sake of a convenience to himself or to some other individual,\r\ndoes what depends on him to deprive mankind of the good, and inflict\r\nupon them the evil, involved in the greater or less reliance which they\r\ncan place in each other\u0027s word, acts the part of one of their worst\r\nenemies. Yet that even this rule, sacred as it is, admits of possible\r\nexceptions, is acknowledged by all moralists; the chief of which is when\r\nthe withholding of some fact (as of information from a male-factor, or\r\nof bad news from a person dangerously ill) would preserve some one\r\n(especially a person other than oneself) from great and unmerited evil,\r\nand when the withholding can only be effected by denial. But in order\r\nthat the exception may not extend itself beyond the need, and may have\r\nthe least possible effect in weakening reliance on veracity, it ought to\r\nbe recognized, and, if possible, its limits defined; and if the\r\nprinciple of utility is good for anything, it must be good for weighing\r\nthese conflicting utilities against one another, and marking out the\r\nregion within which one or the other preponderates.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAgain, defenders of utility often find themselves called upon to reply\r\nto such objections as this—that there is not time, previous to action,\r\nfor calculating and weighing the effects of any line of conduct on the\r\ngeneral happiness. This is exactly as if any one were to say that it is\r\nimpossible to guide our conduct by Christianity, because there is not\r\ntime, on every occasion on which anything has to be done, to read\r\nthrough the Old and New Testaments. The answer to the objection is, that\r\nthere has been ample time, namely, the whole past duration of the human\r\nspecies. During all that time mankind have been learning by experience\r\nthe tendencies of actions; on which experience all the prudence, as well\r\nas all the morality of life, is dependent. People talk as if the\r\ncommencement of this course of experience had hitherto been put off, and\r\nas if, at the moment when some man feels tempted to meddle with the\r\nproperty or life of another, he had to begin considering for the first\r\ntime whether murder and theft are injurious to human happiness. Even\r\nthen I do not think that he would find the question very puzzling; but,\r\nat all events, the matter is now done to his hand. It is truly a\r\nwhimsical supposition, that if mankind were agreed in considering\r\nutility to be the test of morality, they would remain without any\r\nagreement as to what is useful, and would take no measures for having\r\ntheir notions on the subject taught to the young, and enforced by law\r\nand opinion. There is no difficulty in proving any ethical standard\r\nwhatever to work ill, if we suppose universal idiocy to be conjoined\r\nwith it, but on any hypothesis short of that, mankind must by this time\r\nhave acquired positive beliefs as to the effects of some actions on\r\ntheir happiness; and the beliefs which have thus come down are the rules\r\nof morality for the multitude, and for the philosopher until he has\r\nsucceeded in finding better. That philosophers might easily do this,\r\neven now, on many subjects; that the received code of ethics is by no\r\nmeans of divine right; and that mankind have still much to learn as to\r\nthe effects of actions on the general happiness, I admit, or rather,\r\nearnestly maintain. The corollaries from the principle of utility, like\r\nthe precepts of every practical art, admit of indefinite improvement,\r\nand, in a progressive state of the human mind, their improvement is\r\nperpetually going on. But to consider the rules of morality as\r\nimprovable, is one thing; to pass over the intermediate generalizations\r\nentirely, and endeavour to test each individual action directly by the\r\nfirst principle, is another. It is a strange notion that the\r\nacknowledgment of a first principle is inconsistent with the admission\r\nof secondary ones. To inform a traveller respecting the place of his\r\nultimate destination, is not to forbid the use of landmarks and\r\ndirection-posts on the way. The proposition that happiness is the end\r\nand aim of morality, does not mean that no road ought to be laid down to\r\nthat goal, or that persons going thither should not be advised to take\r\none direction rather than another. Men really ought to leave off talking\r\na kind of nonsense on this subject, which they would neither talk nor\r\nlisten to on other matters of practical concernment. Nobody argues that\r\nthe art of navigation is not founded on astronomy, because sailors\r\ncannot wait to calculate the Nautical Almanack. Being rational\r\ncreatures, they go to sea with it ready calculated; and all rational\r\ncreatures go out upon the sea of life with their minds made up on the\r\ncommon questions of right and wrong, as well as on many of the far more\r\ndifficult questions of wise and foolish. And this, as long as foresight\r\nis a human quality, it is to be presumed they will continue to do.\r\nWhatever we adopt as the fundamental principle of morality, we require\r\nsubordinate principles to apply it by: the impossibility of doing\r\nwithout them, being common to all systems, can afford no argument\r\nagainst any one in particular: but gravely to argue as if no such\r\nsecondary principles could be had, and as if mankind had remained till\r\nnow, and always must remain, without drawing any general conclusions\r\nfrom the experience of human life, is as high a pitch, I think, as\r\nabsurdity has ever reached in philosophical controversy.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe remainder of the stock arguments against utilitarianism mostly\r\nconsist in laying to its charge the common infirmities of human nature,\r\nand the general difficulties which embarrass conscientious persons in\r\nshaping their course through life. We are told that an utilitarian will\r\nbe apt to make his own particular case an exception to moral rules, and,\r\nwhen under temptation, will see an utility in the breach of a rule,\r\ngreater than he will see in its observance. But is utility the only\r\ncreed which is able to furnish us with excuses for evil doing, and means\r\nof cheating our own conscience? They are afforded in abundance by all\r\ndoctrines which recognise as a fact in morals the existence of\r\nconflicting considerations; which all doctrines do, that have been\r\nbelieved by sane persons. It is not the fault of any creed, but of the\r\ncomplicated nature of human affairs, that rules of conduct cannot be so\r\nframed as to require no exceptions, and that hardly any kind of action\r\ncan safely be laid down as either always obligatory or always\r\ncondemnable. There is no ethical creed which does not temper the\r\nrigidity of its laws, by giving a certain latitude, under the moral\r\nresponsibility of the agent, for accommodation to peculiarities of\r\ncircumstances; and under every creed, at the opening thus made,\r\nself-deception and dishonest casuistry get in. There exists no moral\r\nsystem under which there do not arise unequivocal cases of conflicting\r\nobligation. These are the real difficulties, the knotty points both in\r\nthe theory of ethics, and in the conscientious guidance of personal\r\nconduct. They are overcome practically with greater or with less success\r\naccording to the intellect and virtue of the individual; but it can\r\nhardly be pretended that any one will be the less qualified for dealing\r\nwith them, from possessing an ultimate standard to which conflicting\r\nrights and duties can be referred. If utility is the ultimate source of\r\nmoral obligations, utility may be invoked to decide between them when\r\ntheir demands are incompatible. Though the application of the standard\r\nmay be difficult, it is better than none at all: while in other systems,\r\nthe moral laws all claiming independent authority, there is no common\r\numpire entitled to interfere between them; their claims to precedence\r\none over another rest on little better than sophistry, and unless\r\ndetermined, as they generally are, by the unacknowledged influence of\r\nconsiderations of utility, afford a free scope for the action of\r\npersonal desires and partialities. We must remember that only in these\r\ncases of conflict between secondary principles is it requisite that\r\nfirst principles should be appealed to. There is no case of moral\r\nobligation in which some secondary principle is not involved; and if\r\nonly one, there can seldom be any real doubt which one it is, in the\r\nmind of any person by whom the principle itself is recognized.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eFOOTNOTES:\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"Footnote_A\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#FNanchorA\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e[A]\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"note\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e The author of this essay has reason for believing himself\r\nto be the first person who brought the word utilitarian into use. He did\r\nnot invent it, but adopted it from a passing expression in Mr. Galt\u0027s\r\n\u003ci\u003eAnnals of the Parish\u003c/i\u003e. After using it as a designation for several\r\nyears, he and others abandoned it from a growing dislike to anything\r\nresembling a badge or watchword of sectarian distinction. But as a name\r\nfor one single opinion, not a set of opinions—to denote the recognition\r\nof utility as a standard, not any particular way of applying it—the\r\nterm supplies a want in the language, and offers, in many cases, a\r\nconvenient mode of avoiding tiresome circumlocution.\u003c/p\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"Footnote_B\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#FNanchorB\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e[B]\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"note\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e An opponent, whose intellectual and moral fairness it is a\r\npleasure to acknowledge (the Rev. J. Llewellyn Davis), has objected to\r\nthis passage, saying, \"Surely the rightness or wrongness of saving a man\r\nfrom drowning does depend very much upon the motive with which it is\r\ndone. Suppose that a tyrant, when his enemy jumped into the sea to\r\nescape from him, saved him from drowning simply in order that he might\r\ninflict upon him more exquisite tortures, would it tend to clearness to\r\nspeak of that rescue as \u0027a morally right action?\u0027 Or suppose again,\r\naccording to one of the stock illustrations of ethical inquiries, that a\r\nman betrayed a trust received from a friend, because the discharge of it\r\nwould fatally injure that friend himself or some one belonging to him,\r\nwould utilitarianism compel one to call the betrayal \u0027a crime\u0027 as much\r\nas if it had been done from the meanest motive?\"\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\r\nI submit, that he who saves another from drowning in order to kill him\r\nby torture afterwards, does not differ only in motive from him who does\r\nthe same thing from duty or benevolence; the act itself is different.\r\nThe rescue of the man is, in the case supposed, only the necessary first\r\nstep of an act far more atrocious than leaving him to drown would have\r\nbeen. Had Mr. Davis said, \"The rightness or wrongness of saving a man\r\nfrom drowning does depend very much\"—not upon the motive, but—\"upon\r\nthe \u003ci\u003eintention\u003c/i\u003e\" no utilitarian would have differed from him. Mr. Davis,\r\nby an oversight too common not to be quite venial, has in this case\r\nconfounded the very different ideas of Motive and Intention. There is no\r\npoint which utilitarian thinkers (and Bentham pre-eminently) have taken\r\nmore pains to illustrate than this. The morality of the action depends\r\nentirely upon the intention—that is, upon what the agent \u003ci\u003ewills to do\u003c/i\u003e.\r\nBut the motive, that is, the feeling which makes him will so to do, when\r\nit makes no difference in the act, makes none in the morality: though it\r\nmakes a great difference in our moral estimation of the agent,\r\nespecially if it indicates a good or a bad habitual \u003ci\u003edisposition\u003c/i\u003e—a\r\nbent of character from which useful, or from which hurtful actions are\r\nlikely to arise.\u003c/p\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 65%;\"\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"CHAPTER_III\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003ch2\u003eCHAPTER III.\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"xhtml_center\"\u003eOF THE ULTIMATE SANCTION OF THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY.\u003c/div\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe question is often asked, and properly so, in regard to any supposed\r\nmoral standard—What is its sanction? what are the motives to obey it?\r\nor more specifically, what is the source of its obligation? whence does\r\nit derive its binding force? It is a necessary part of moral philosophy\r\nto provide the answer to this question; which, though frequently\r\nassuming the shape of an objection to the utilitarian morality, as if it\r\nhad some special applicability to that above others, really arises in\r\nregard to all standards. It arises, in fact, whenever a person is called\r\non to adopt a standard or refer morality to any basis on which he has\r\nnot been accustomed to rest it. For the customary morality, that which\r\neducation and opinion have consecrated, is the only one which presents\r\nitself to the mind with the feeling of being \u003ci\u003ein itself\u003c/i\u003e obligatory; and\r\nwhen a person is asked to believe that this morality \u003ci\u003ederives\u003c/i\u003e its\r\nobligation from some general principle round which custom has not thrown\r\nthe same halo, the assertion is to him a paradox; the supposed\r\ncorollaries seem to have a more binding force than the original theorem;\r\nthe superstructure seems to stand better without, than with, what is\r\nrepresented as its foundation. He says to himself, I feel that I am\r\nbound not to rob or murder, betray or deceive; but why am I bound to\r\npromote the general happiness? If my own happiness lies in something\r\nelse, why may I not give that the preference?\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIf the view adopted by the utilitarian philosophy of the nature of the\r\nmoral sense be correct, this difficulty will always present itself,\r\nuntil the influences which form moral character have taken the same hold\r\nof the principle which they have taken of some of the\r\nconsequences—until, by the improvement of education, the feeling of\r\nunity with our fellow creatures shall be (what it cannot be doubted that\r\nChrist intended it to be) as deeply rooted in our character, and to our\r\nown consciousness as completely a part of our nature, as the horror of\r\ncrime is in an ordinarily well-brought-up young person. In the mean\r\ntime, however, the difficulty has no peculiar application to the\r\ndoctrine of utility, but is inherent in every attempt to analyse\r\nmorality and reduce it to principles; which, unless the principle is\r\nalready in men\u0027s minds invested with as much sacredness as any of its\r\napplications, always seems to divest them of a part of their sanctity.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe principle of utility either has, or there is no reason why it might\r\nnot have, all the sanctions which belong to any other system of morals.\r\nThose sanctions are either external or internal. Of the external\r\nsanctions it is not necessary to speak at any length. They are, the hope\r\nof favour and the fear of displeasure from our fellow creatures or from\r\nthe Ruler of the Universe, along with whatever we may have of sympathy\r\nor affection for them or of love and awe of Him, inclining us to do His\r\nwill independently of selfish consequences. There is evidently no\r\nreason why all these motives for observance should not attach themselves\r\nto the utilitarian morality, as completely and as powerfully as to any\r\nother. Indeed, those of them which refer to our fellow creatures are\r\nsure to do so, in proportion to the amount of general intelligence; for\r\nwhether there be any other ground of moral obligation than the general\r\nhappiness or not, men do desire happiness; and however imperfect may be\r\ntheir own practice, they desire and commend all conduct in others\r\ntowards themselves, by which they think their happiness is promoted.\r\nWith regard to the religious motive, if men believe, as most profess to\r\ndo, in the goodness of God, those who think that conduciveness to the\r\ngeneral happiness is the essence, or even only the criterion, of good,\r\nmust necessarily believe that it is also that which God approves. The\r\nwhole force therefore of external reward and punishment, whether\r\nphysical or moral, and whether proceeding from God or from our fellow\r\nmen, together with all that the capacities of human nature admit, of\r\ndisinterested devotion to either, become available to enforce the\r\nutilitarian morality, in proportion as that morality is recognized; and\r\nthe more powerfully, the more the appliances of education and general\r\ncultivation are bent to the purpose.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eSo far as to external sanctions. The internal sanction of duty, whatever\r\nour standard of duty may be, is one and the same—a feeling in our own\r\nmind; a pain, more or less intense, attendant on violation of duty,\r\nwhich in properly cultivated moral natures rises, in the more serious\r\ncases, into shrinking from it as an impossibility. This feeling, when\r\ndisinterested, and connecting itself with the pure idea of duty, and\r\nnot with some particular form of it, or with any of the merely accessory\r\ncircumstances, is the essence of Conscience; though in that complex\r\nphenomenon as it actually exists, the simple fact is in general all\r\nencrusted over with collateral associations, derived from sympathy, from\r\nlove, and still more from fear; from all the forms of religious feeling;\r\nfrom the recollections of childhood and of all our past life; from\r\nself-esteem, desire of the esteem of others, and occasionally even\r\nself-abasement. This extreme complication is, I apprehend, the origin of\r\nthe sort of mystical character which, by a tendency of the human mind of\r\nwhich there are many other examples, is apt to be attributed to the idea\r\nof moral obligation, and which leads people to believe that the idea\r\ncannot possibly attach itself to any other objects than those which, by\r\na supposed mysterious law, are found in our present experience to excite\r\nit. Its binding force, however, consists in the existence of a mass of\r\nfeeling which must be broken through in order to do what violates our\r\nstandard of right, and which, if we do nevertheless violate that\r\nstandard, will probably have to be encountered afterwards in the form of\r\nremorse. Whatever theory we have of the nature or origin of conscience,\r\nthis is what essentially constitutes it.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe ultimate sanction, therefore, of all morality (external motives\r\napart) being a subjective feeling in our own minds, I see nothing\r\nembarrassing to those whose standard is utility, in the question, what\r\nis the sanction of that particular standard? We may answer, the same as\r\nof all other moral standards—the conscientious feelings of mankind.\r\nUndoubtedly this sanction has no binding efficacy on those who do not\r\npossess the feelings it appeals to; but neither will these persons be\r\nmore obedient to any other moral principle than to the utilitarian one.\r\nOn them morality of any kind has no hold but through the external\r\nsanctions. Meanwhile the feelings exist, a feet in human nature, the\r\nreality of which, and the great power with which they are capable of\r\nacting on those in whom they have been duly cultivated, are proved by\r\nexperience. No reason has ever been shown why they may not be cultivated\r\nto as great intensity in connection with the utilitarian, as with any\r\nother rule of morals.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThere is, I am aware, a disposition to believe that a person who sees in\r\nmoral obligation a transcendental fact, an objective reality belonging\r\nto the province of \"Things in themselves,\" is likely to be more obedient\r\nto it than one who believes it to be entirely subjective, having its\r\nseat in human consciousness only. But whatever a person\u0027s opinion may be\r\non this point of Ontology, the force he is really urged by is his own\r\nsubjective feeling, and is exactly measured by its strength. No one\u0027s\r\nbelief that Duty is an objective reality is stronger than the belief\r\nthat God is so; yet the belief in God, apart from the expectation of\r\nactual reward and punishment, only operates on conduct through, and in\r\nproportion to, the subjective religious feeling. The sanction, so far as\r\nit is disinterested, is always in the mind itself; and the notion,\r\ntherefore, of the transcendental moralists must be, that this sanction\r\nwill not exist \u003ci\u003ein\u003c/i\u003e the mind unless it is believed to have its root out\r\nof the mind; and that if a person is able to say to himself, That which\r\nis restraining me, and which is called my conscience, is only a feeling\r\nin my own mind, he may possibly draw the conclusion that when the\r\nfeeling ceases the obligation ceases, and that if he find the feeling\r\ninconvenient, he may disregard it, and endeavour to get rid of it. But\r\nis this danger confined to the utilitarian morality? Does the belief\r\nthat moral obligation has its seat outside the mind make the feeling of\r\nit too strong to be got rid of? The fact is so far otherwise, that all\r\nmoralists admit and lament the ease with which, in the generality of\r\nminds, conscience can be silenced or stifled. The question, Need I obey\r\nmy conscience? is quite as often put to themselves by persons who never\r\nheard of the principle of utility, as by its adherents. Those whose\r\nconscientious feelings are so weak as to allow of their asking this\r\nquestion, if they answer it affirmatively, will not do so because they\r\nbelieve in the transcendental theory, but because of the external\r\nsanctions.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt is not necessary, for the present purpose, to decide whether the\r\nfeeling of duty is innate or implanted. Assuming it to be innate, it is\r\nan open question to what objects it naturally attaches itself; for the\r\nphilosophic supporters of that theory are now agreed that the intuitive\r\nperception is of principles of morality, and not of the details. If\r\nthere be anything innate in the matter, I see no reason why the feeling\r\nwhich is innate should not be that of regard to the pleasures and pains\r\nof others. If there is any principle of morals which is intuitively\r\nobligatory, I should say it must be that. If so, the intuitive ethics\r\nwould coincide with the utilitarian, and there would be no further\r\nquarrel between them. Even as it is, the intuitive moralists, though\r\nthey believe that there are other intuitive moral obligations, do\r\nalready believe this to be one; for they unanimously hold that a large\r\nportion of morality turns upon the consideration due to the interests of\r\nour fellow creatures. Therefore, if the belief in the transcendental\r\norigin of moral obligation gives any additional efficacy to the internal\r\nsanction, it appears to me that the utilitarian principle has already\r\nthe benefit of it.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eOn the other hand, if, as is my own belief, the moral feelings are not\r\ninnate, but acquired, they are not for that reason the less natural. It\r\nis natural to man to speak, to reason, to build cities, to cultivate the\r\nground, though these are acquired faculties. The moral feelings are not\r\nindeed a part of our nature, in the sense of being in any perceptible\r\ndegree present in all of us; but this, unhappily, is a fact admitted by\r\nthose who believe the most strenuously in their transcendental origin.\r\nLike the other acquired capacities above referred to, the moral faculty,\r\nif not a part of our nature, is a natural outgrowth from it; capable,\r\nlike them, in a certain small degree, of springing up spontaneously; and\r\nsusceptible of being brought by cultivation to a high degree of\r\ndevelopment. Unhappily it is also susceptible, by a sufficient use of\r\nthe external sanctions and of the force of early impressions, of being\r\ncultivated in almost any direction: so that there is hardly anything so\r\nabsurd or so mischievous that it may not, by means of these influences,\r\nbe made to act on the human mind with all the authority of conscience.\r\nTo doubt that the same potency might be given by the same means to the\r\nprinciple of utility, even if it had no foundation in human nature,\r\nwould be flying in the face of all experience.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eBut moral associations which are wholly of artificial creation, when\r\nintellectual culture goes on, yield by degrees to the dissolving force\r\nof analysis: and if the feeling of duty, when associated with utility,\r\nwould appear equally arbitrary; if there were no leading department of\r\nour nature, no powerful class of sentiments, with which that association\r\nwould harmonize, which would make us feel it congenial, and incline us\r\nnot only to foster it in others (for which we have abundant interested\r\nmotives), but also to cherish it in ourselves; if there were not, in\r\nshort, a natural basis of sentiment for utilitarian morality, it might\r\nwell happen that this association also, even after it had been implanted\r\nby education, might be analysed away.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eBut there is this basis of powerful natural sentiment; and this it is\r\nwhich, when once the general happiness is recognized as the ethical\r\nstandard, will constitute the strength of the utilitarian morality. This\r\nfirm foundation is that of the social feelings of mankind; the desire to\r\nbe in unity with our fellow creatures, which is already a powerful\r\nprinciple in human nature, and happily one of those which tend to become\r\nstronger, even without express inculcation, from the influences of\r\nadvancing civilization. The social state is at once so natural, so\r\nnecessary, and so habitual to man, that, except in some unusual\r\ncircumstances or by an effort of voluntary abstraction, he never\r\nconceives himself otherwise than as a member of a body; and this\r\nassociation is riveted more and more, as mankind are further removed\r\nfrom the state of savage independence. Any condition, therefore, which\r\nis essential to a state of society, becomes more and more an inseparable\r\npart of every person\u0027s conception of the state of things which he is\r\nborn into, and which is the destiny of a human being. Now, society\r\nbetween human beings, except in the relation of master and slave, is\r\nmanifestly impossible on any other footing than that the interests of\r\nall are to be consulted. Society between equals can only exist on the\r\nunderstanding that the interests of all are to be regarded equally. And\r\nsince in all states of civilization, every person, except an absolute\r\nmonarch, has equals, every one is obliged to live on these terms with\r\nsomebody; and in every age some advance is made towards a state in which\r\nit will be impossible to live permanently on other terms with anybody.\r\nIn this way people grow up unable to conceive as possible to them a\r\nstate of total disregard of other people\u0027s interests. They are under a\r\nnecessity of conceiving themselves as at least abstaining from all the\r\ngrosser injuries, and (if only for their own protection.) living in a\r\nstate of constant protest against them. They are also familiar with the\r\nfact of co-operating with others, and proposing to themselves a\r\ncollective, not an individual, interest, as the aim (at least for the\r\ntime being) of their actions. So long as they are co-operating, their\r\nends are identified with those of others; there is at least a temporary\r\nfeeling that the interests of others are their own interests. Not only\r\ndoes all strengthening of social ties, and all healthy growth of\r\nsociety, give to each individual a stronger personal interest in\r\npractically consulting the welfare of others; it also leads him to\r\nidentify his feelings more and more with their good, or at least with\r\nan ever greater degree of practical consideration for it. He comes, as\r\nthough instinctively, to be conscious of himself as a being who \u003ci\u003eof\r\ncourse\u003c/i\u003e pays regard to others. The good of others becomes to him a thing\r\nnaturally and necessarily to be attended to, like any of the physical\r\nconditions of our existence. Now, whatever amount of this feeling a\r\nperson has, he is urged by the strongest motives both of interest and of\r\nsympathy to demonstrate it, and to the utmost of his power encourage it\r\nin others; and even if he has none of it himself, he is as greatly\r\ninterested as any one else that others should have it. Consequently, the\r\nsmallest germs of the feeling are laid hold of and nourished by the\r\ncontagion of sympathy and the influences of education; and a complete\r\nweb of corroborative association is woven round it, by the powerful\r\nagency of the external sanctions. This mode of conceiving ourselves and\r\nhuman life, as civilization goes on, is felt to be more and more\r\nnatural. Every step in political improvement renders it more so, by\r\nremoving the sources of opposition of interest, and levelling those\r\ninequalities of legal privilege between individuals or classes, owing to\r\nwhich there are large portions of mankind whose happiness it is still\r\npracticable to disregard. In an improving state of the human mind, the\r\ninfluences are constantly on the increase, which tend to generate in\r\neach individual a feeling of unity with all the rest; which feeling, if\r\nperfect, would make him never think of, or desire, any beneficial\r\ncondition for himself, in the benefits of which they are not included.\r\nIf we now suppose this feeling of unity to be taught as a religion, and\r\nthe whole force of education, of institutions, and of opinion,\r\ndirected, as it once was in the case of religion, to make every person\r\ngrow up from infancy surrounded on all sides both by the profession and\r\nby the practice of it, I think that no one, who can realize this\r\nconception, will feel any misgiving about the sufficiency of the\r\nultimate sanction for the Happiness morality. To any ethical student who\r\nfinds the realization difficult, I recommend, as a means of facilitating\r\nit, the second of M. Comte\u0027s two principal works, the \u003ci\u003eSystème de\r\nPolitique Positive\u003c/i\u003e. I entertain the strongest objections to the system\r\nof politics and morals set forth in that treatise; but I think it has\r\nsuperabundantly shown the possibility of giving to the service of\r\nhumanity, even without the aid of belief in a Providence, both the\r\nphysical power and the social efficacy of a religion; making it take\r\nhold of human life, and colour all thought, feeling, and action, in a\r\nmanner of which the greatest ascendency ever exercised by any religion\r\nmay be but a type and foretaste; and of which the danger is, not that it\r\nshould be insufficient, but that it should be so excessive as to\r\ninterfere unduly with human freedom and individuality.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eNeither is it necessary to the feeling which constitutes the binding\r\nforce of the utilitarian morality on those who recognize it, to wait for\r\nthose social influences which would make its obligation felt by mankind\r\nat large. In the comparatively early state of human advancement in which\r\nwe now live, a person cannot indeed feel that entireness of sympathy\r\nwith all others, which would make any real discordance in the general\r\ndirection of their conduct in life impossible; but already a person in\r\nwhom the social feeling is at all developed, cannot bring himself to\r\nthink of the rest of his fellow creatures as struggling rivals with him\r\nfor the means of happiness, whom he must desire to see defeated in their\r\nobject in order that he may succeed in his. The deeply-rooted conception\r\nwhich every individual even now has of himself as a social being, tends\r\nto make him feel it one of his natural wants that there should be\r\nharmony between his feelings and aims and those of his fellow creatures.\r\nIf differences of opinion and of mental culture make it impossible for\r\nhim to share many of their actual feelings-perhaps make him denounce and\r\ndefy those feelings-he still needs to be conscious that his real aim and\r\ntheirs do not conflict; that he is not opposing himself to what they\r\nreally wish for, namely, their own good, but is, on the contrary,\r\npromoting it. This feeling in most individuals is much inferior in\r\nstrength to their selfish feelings, and is often wanting altogether. But\r\nto those who have it, it possesses all the characters of a natural\r\nfeeling. It does not present itself to their minds as a superstition of\r\neducation, or a law despotically imposed by the power of society, but as\r\nan attribute which it would not be well for them to be without. This\r\nconviction is the ultimate sanction of the greatest-happiness morality.\r\nThis it is which makes any mind, of well-developed feelings, work with,\r\nand not against, the outward motives to care for others, afforded by\r\nwhat I have called the external sanctions; and when those sanctions are\r\nwanting, or act in an opposite direction, constitutes in itself a\r\npowerful internal binding force, in proportion to the sensitiveness and\r\nthoughtfulness of the character; since few but those whose mind is a\r\nmoral blank, could bear to lay out their course of life on the plan of\r\npaying no regard to others except so far as their own private interest\r\ncompels.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 65%;\"\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"CHAPTER_IV\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003ch2\u003eCHAPTER IV.\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"xhtml_center\"\u003eOF WHAT SORT OF PROOF THE PRINCIPLE OF UTILITY IS SUSCEPTIBLE.\u003c/div\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt has already been remarked, that questions of ultimate ends do not\r\nadmit of proof, in the ordinary acceptation of the term. To be incapable\r\nof proof by reasoning is common to all first principles; to the first\r\npremises of our knowledge, as well as to those of our conduct. But the\r\nformer, being matters of fact, may be the subject of a direct appeal to\r\nthe faculties which judge of fact—namely, our senses, and our internal\r\nconsciousness. Can an appeal be made to the same faculties on questions\r\nof practical ends? Or by what other faculty is cognizance taken of them?\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eQuestions about ends are, in other words, questions what things are\r\ndesirable. The utilitarian doctrine is, that happiness is desirable, and\r\nthe only thing desirable, as an end; all other things being only\r\ndesirable as means to that end. What ought to be required of this\r\ndoctrine—what conditions is it requisite that the doctrine should\r\nfulfil—to make good its claim to be believed?\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe only proof capable of being given that an object is visible, is that\r\npeople actually see it. The only proof that a sound is audible, is that\r\npeople hear it: and so of the other sources of our experience. In like\r\nmanner, I apprehend, the sole evidence it is possible to produce that\r\nanything is desirable, is that people do actually desire it. If the end\r\nwhich the utilitarian doctrine proposes to itself were not, in theory\r\nand in practice, acknowledged to be an end, nothing could ever convince\r\nany person that it was so. No reason can be given why the general\r\nhappiness is desirable, except that each person, so far as he believes\r\nit to be attainable, desires his own happiness. This, however, being a\r\nfact, we have not only all the proof which the case admits of, but all\r\nwhich it is possible to require, that happiness is a good: that each\r\nperson\u0027s happiness is a good to that person, and the general happiness,\r\ntherefore, a good to the aggregate of all persons. Happiness has made\r\nout its title as \u003ci\u003eone\u003c/i\u003e of the ends of conduct, and consequently one of\r\nthe criteria of morality.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eBut it has not, by this alone, proved itself to be the sole criterion.\r\nTo do that, it would seem, by the same rule, necessary to show, not only\r\nthat people desire happiness, but that they never desire anything else.\r\nNow it is palpable that they do desire things which, in common language,\r\nare decidedly distinguished from happiness. They desire, for example,\r\nvirtue, and the absence of vice, no less really than pleasure and the\r\nabsence of pain. The desire of virtue is not as universal, but it is as\r\nauthentic a fact, as the desire of happiness. And hence the opponents of\r\nthe utilitarian standard deem that they have a right to infer that there\r\nare other ends of human action besides happiness, and that happiness is\r\nnot the standard of approbation and disapprobation.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eBut does the utilitarian doctrine deny that people desire virtue, or\r\nmaintain that virtue is not a thing to be desired? The very reverse. It\r\nmaintains not only that virtue is to be desired, but that it is to be\r\ndesired disinterestedly, for itself. Whatever may be the opinion of\r\nutilitarian moralists as to the original conditions by which virtue is\r\nmade virtue; however they may believe (as they do) that actions and\r\ndispositions are only virtuous because they promote another end than\r\nvirtue; yet this being granted, and it having been decided, from\r\nconsiderations of this description, what \u003ci\u003eis\u003c/i\u003e virtuous, they not only\r\nplace virtue at the very head of the things which are good as means to\r\nthe ultimate end, but they also recognise as a psychological fact the\r\npossibility of its being, to the individual, a good in itself, without\r\nlooking to any end beyond it; and hold, that the mind is not in a right\r\nstate, not in a state conformable to Utility, not in the state most\r\nconducive to the general happiness, unless it does love virtue in this\r\nmanner—as a thing desirable in itself, even although, in the individual\r\ninstance, it should not produce those other desirable consequences which\r\nit tends to produce, and on account of which it is held to be virtue.\r\nThis opinion is not, in the smallest degree, a departure from the\r\nHappiness principle. The ingredients of happiness are very various, and\r\neach of them is desirable in itself, and not merely when considered as\r\nswelling an aggregate. The principle of utility does not mean that any\r\ngiven pleasure, as music, for instance, or any given exemption from\r\npain, as for example health, are to be looked upon as means to a\r\ncollective something termed happiness, and to be desired on that\r\naccount. They are desired and desirable in and for themselves; besides\r\nbeing means, they are a part of the end. Virtue, according to the\r\nutilitarian doctrine, is not naturally and originally part of the end,\r\nbut it is capable of becoming so; and in those who love it\r\ndisinterestedly it has become so, and is desired and cherished, not as a\r\nmeans to happiness, but as a part of their happiness.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo illustrate this farther, we may remember that virtue is not the only\r\nthing, originally a means, and which if it were not a means to anything\r\nelse, would be and remain indifferent, but which by association with\r\nwhat it is a means to, comes to be desired for itself, and that too with\r\nthe utmost intensity. What, for example, shall we say of the love of\r\nmoney? There is nothing originally more desirable about money than about\r\nany heap of glittering pebbles. Its worth is solely that of the things\r\nwhich it will buy; the desires for other things than itself, which it is\r\na means of gratifying. Yet the love of money is not only one of the\r\nstrongest moving forces of human life, but money is, in many cases,\r\ndesired in and for itself; the desire to possess it is often stronger\r\nthan the desire to use it, and goes on increasing when all the desires\r\nwhich point to ends beyond it, to be compassed by it, are falling off.\r\nIt may be then said truly, that money is desired not for the sake of an\r\nend, but as part of the end. From being a means to happiness, it has\r\ncome to be itself a principal ingredient of the individual\u0027s conception\r\nof happiness. The same may be said of the majority of the great objects\r\nof human life—power, for example, or fame; except that to each of these\r\nthere is a certain amount of immediate pleasure annexed, which has at\r\nleast the semblance of being naturally inherent in them; a thing which\r\ncannot be said of money. Still, however, the strongest natural\r\nattraction, both of power and of fame, is the immense aid they give to\r\nthe attainment of our other wishes; and it is the strong association\r\nthus generated between them and all our objects of desire, which gives\r\nto the direct desire of them the intensity it often assumes, so as in\r\nsome characters to surpass in strength all other desires. In these cases\r\nthe means have become a part of the end, and a more important part of it\r\nthan any of the things which they are means to. What was once desired as\r\nan instrument for the attainment of happiness, has come to be desired\r\nfor its own sake. In being desired for its own sake it is, however,\r\ndesired as part of happiness. The person is made, or thinks he would be\r\nmade, happy by its mere possession; and is made unhappy by failure to\r\nobtain it. The desire of it is not a different thing from the desire of\r\nhappiness, any more than the love of music, or the desire of health.\r\nThey are included in happiness. They are some of the elements of which\r\nthe desire of happiness is made up. Happiness is not an abstract idea,\r\nbut a concrete whole; and these are some of its parts. And the\r\nutilitarian standard sanctions and approves their being so. Life would\r\nbe a poor thing, very ill provided with sources of happiness, if there\r\nwere not this provision of nature, by which things originally\r\nindifferent, but conducive to, or otherwise associated with, the\r\nsatisfaction of our primitive desires, become in themselves sources of\r\npleasure more valuable than the primitive pleasures, both in permanency,\r\nin the space of human existence that they are capable of covering, and\r\neven in intensity. Virtue, according to the utilitarian conception, is a\r\ngood of this description. There was no original desire of it, or motive\r\nto it, save its conduciveness to pleasure, and especially to protection\r\nfrom pain. But through the association thus formed, it may be felt a\r\ngood in itself, and desired as such with as great intensity as any other\r\ngood; and with this difference between it and the love of money, of\r\npower, or of fame, that all of these may, and often do, render the\r\nindividual noxious to the other members of the society to which he\r\nbelongs, whereas there is nothing which makes him so much a blessing to\r\nthem as the cultivation of the disinterested, love of virtue. And\r\nconsequently, the utilitarian standard, while it tolerates and approves\r\nthose other acquired desires, up to the point beyond which they would be\r\nmore injurious to the general happiness than promotive of it, enjoins\r\nand requires the cultivation of the love of virtue up to the greatest\r\nstrength possible, as being above all things important to the general\r\nhappiness.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt results from the preceding considerations, that there is in reality\r\nnothing desired except happiness. Whatever is desired otherwise than as\r\na means to some end beyond itself, and ultimately to happiness, is\r\ndesired as itself a part of happiness, and is not desired for itself\r\nuntil it has become so. Those who desire virtue for its own sake, desire\r\nit either because the consciousness of it is a pleasure, or because the\r\nconsciousness of being without it is a pain, or for both reasons united;\r\nas in truth the pleasure and pain seldom exist separately, but almost\r\nalways together, the same person feeling pleasure in the degree of\r\nvirtue attained, and pain in not having attained more. If one of these\r\ngave him no pleasure, and the other no pain, he would not love or desire\r\nvirtue, or would desire it only for the other benefits which it might\r\nproduce to himself or to persons whom he cared for.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eWe have now, then, an answer to the question, of what sort of proof the\r\nprinciple of utility is susceptible. If the opinion which I have now\r\nstated is psychologically true—if human nature is so constituted as to\r\ndesire nothing which is not either a part of happiness or a means of\r\nhappiness, we can have no other proof, and we require no other, that\r\nthese are the only things desirable. If so, happiness is the sole end of\r\nhuman action, and the promotion of it the test by which to judge of all\r\nhuman conduct; from whence it necessarily follows that it must be the\r\ncriterion of morality, since a part is included in the whole.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAnd now to decide whether this is really so; whether mankind do desire\r\nnothing for itself but that which is a pleasure to them, or of which the\r\nabsence is a pain; we have evidently arrived at a question of fact and\r\nexperience, dependent, like all similar questions, upon evidence. It can\r\nonly be determined by practised self-consciousness and self-observation,\r\nassisted by observation of others. I believe that these sources of\r\nevidence, impartially consulted, will declare that desiring a thing and\r\nfinding it pleasant, aversion to it and thinking of it as painful, are\r\nphenomena entirely inseparable, or rather two parts of the same\r\nphenomenon; in strictness of language, two different modes of naming the\r\nsame psychological fact: that to think of an object as desirable (unless\r\nfor the sake of its consequences), and to think of it as pleasant, are\r\none and the same thing; and that to desire anything, except in\r\nproportion as the idea of it is pleasant, is a physical and metaphysical\r\nimpossibility.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eSo obvious does this appear to me, that I expect it will hardly be\r\ndisputed: and the objection made will be, not that desire can possibly\r\nbe directed to anything ultimately except pleasure and exemption from\r\npain, but that the will is a different thing from desire; that a person\r\nof confirmed virtue, or any other person whose purposes are fixed,\r\ncarries out his purposes without any thought of the pleasure he has in\r\ncontemplating them, or expects to derive from their fulfilment; and\r\npersists in acting on them, even though these pleasures are much\r\ndiminished, by changes in his character or decay of his passive\r\nsensibilities, or are outweighed by the pains which the pursuit of the\r\npurposes may bring upon him. All this I fully admit, and have stated it\r\nelsewhere, as positively and emphatically as any one. Will, the active\r\nphenomenon, is a different thing from desire, the state of passive\r\nsensibility, and though originally an offshoot from it, may in time take\r\nroot and detach itself from the parent stock; so much so, that in the\r\ncase of an habitual purpose, instead of willing the thing because we\r\ndesire it, we often desire it only because we will it. This, however, is\r\nbut an instance of that familiar fact, the power of habit, and is nowise\r\nconfined to the case of virtuous actions. Many indifferent things, which\r\nmen originally did from a motive of some sort, they continue to do from\r\nhabit. Sometimes this is done unconsciously, the consciousness coming\r\nonly after the action: at other times with conscious volition, but\r\nvolition which has become habitual, and is put into operation by the\r\nforce of habit, in opposition perhaps to the deliberate preference, as\r\noften happens with those who have contracted habits of vicious or\r\nhurtful indulgence. Third and last comes the case in which the habitual\r\nact of will in the individual instance is not in contradiction to the\r\ngeneral intention prevailing at other times, but in fulfilment of it; as\r\nin the case of the person of confirmed virtue, and of all who pursue\r\ndeliberately and consistently any determinate end. The distinction\r\nbetween will and desire thus understood, is an authentic and highly\r\nimportant psychological fact; but the fact consists solely in this—that\r\nwill, like all other parts of our constitution, is amenable to habit,\r\nand that we may will from habit what we no longer desire for itself, or\r\ndesire only because we will it. It is not the less true that will, in\r\nthe beginning, is entirely produced by desire; including in that term\r\nthe repelling influence of pain as well as the attractive one of\r\npleasure. Let us take into consideration, no longer the person who has a\r\nconfirmed will to do right, but him in whom that virtuous will is still\r\nfeeble, conquerable by temptation, and not to be fully relied on; by\r\nwhat means can it be strengthened? How can the will to be virtuous,\r\nwhere it does not exist in sufficient force, be implanted or awakened?\r\nOnly by making the person \u003ci\u003edesire\u003c/i\u003e virtue—by making him think of it in\r\na pleasurable light, or of its absence in a painful one. It is by\r\nassociating the doing right with pleasure, or the doing wrong with pain,\r\nor by eliciting and impressing and bringing home to the person\u0027s\r\nexperience the pleasure naturally involved in the one or the pain in the\r\nother, that it is possible to call forth that will to be virtuous,\r\nwhich, when confirmed, acts without any thought of either pleasure or\r\npain. Will is the child of desire, and passes out of the dominion of its\r\nparent only to come under that of habit. That which is the result of\r\nhabit affords no presumption of being intrinsically good; and there\r\nwould be no reason for wishing that the purpose of virtue should become\r\nindependent of pleasure and pain, were it not that the influence of the\r\npleasurable and painful associations which prompt to virtue is not\r\nsufficiently to be depended on for unerring constancy of action until it\r\nhas acquired the support of habit. Both in feeling and in conduct, habit\r\nis the only thing which imparts certainty; and it is because of the\r\nimportance to others of being able to rely absolutely on one\u0027s feelings\r\nand conduct, and to oneself of being able to rely on one\u0027s own, that the\r\nwill to do right ought to be cultivated into this habitual independence.\r\nIn other words, this state of the will is a means to good, not\r\nintrinsically a good; and does not contradict the doctrine that nothing\r\nis a good to human beings but in so far as it is either itself\r\npleasurable, or a means of attaining pleasure or averting pain.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eBut if this doctrine be true, the principle of utility is proved.\r\nWhether it is so or not, must now be left to the consideration of the\r\nthoughtful reader.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 65%;\"\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"CHAPTER_V\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003ch2\u003eCHAPTER V.\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"xhtml_center\"\u003eON THE CONNEXION BETWEEN JUSTICE AND UTILITY.\u003c/div\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn all ages of speculation, one of the strongest obstacles to the\r\nreception of the doctrine that Utility or Happiness is the criterion of\r\nright and wrong, has been drawn from the idea of Justice, The powerful\r\nsentiment, and apparently clear perception, which that word recalls with\r\na rapidity and certainty resembling an instinct, have seemed to the\r\nmajority of thinkers to point to an inherent quality in things; to show\r\nthat the Just must have an existence in Nature as something\r\nabsolute-generically distinct from every variety of the Expedient, and,\r\nin idea, opposed to it, though (as is commonly acknowledged) never, in\r\nthe long run, disjoined from it in fact.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn the case of this, as of our other moral sentiments, there is no\r\nnecessary connexion between the question of its origin, and that of its\r\nbinding force. That a feeling is bestowed on us by Nature, does not\r\nnecessarily legitimate all its promptings. The feeling of justice might\r\nbe a peculiar instinct, and might yet require, like our other instincts,\r\nto be controlled and enlightened by a higher reason. If we have\r\nintellectual instincts, leading us to judge in a particular way, as well\r\nas animal instincts that prompt us to act in a particular way, there is\r\nno necessity that the former should be more infallible in their sphere\r\nthan the latter in theirs: it may as well happen that wrong judgments\r\nare occasionally suggested by those, as wrong actions by these. But\r\nthough it is one thing to believe that we have natural feelings of\r\njustice, and another to acknowledge them as an ultimate criterion of\r\nconduct, these two opinions are very closely connected in point of fact.\r\nMankind are always predisposed to believe that any subjective feeling,\r\nnot otherwise accounted for, is a revelation of some objective reality.\r\nOur present object is to determine whether the reality, to which the\r\nfeeling of justice corresponds, is one which needs any such special\r\nrevelation; whether the justice or injustice of an action is a thing\r\nintrinsically peculiar, and distinct from all its other qualities, or\r\nonly a combination of certain of those qualities, presented under a\r\npeculiar aspect. For the purpose of this inquiry, it is practically\r\nimportant to consider whether the feeling itself, of justice and\r\ninjustice, is \u003ci\u003esui generis\u003c/i\u003e like our sensations of colour and taste, or\r\na derivative feeling, formed by a combination of others. And this it is\r\nthe more essential to examine, as people are in general willing enough\r\nto allow, that objectively the dictates of justice coincide with a part\r\nof the field of General Expediency; but inasmuch as the subjective\r\nmental feeling of Justice is different from that which commonly attaches\r\nto simple expediency, and, except in extreme cases of the latter, is far\r\nmore imperative in its demands, people find it difficult to see, in\r\nJustice, only a particular kind or branch of general utility, and think\r\nthat its superior binding force requires a totally different origin.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo throw light upon this question, it is necessary to attempt to\r\nascertain what is the distinguishing character of justice, or of\r\ninjustice: what is the quality, or whether there is any quality,\r\nattributed in common to all modes of conduct designated as unjust (for\r\njustice, like many other moral attributes, is best defined by its\r\nopposite), and distinguishing them from such modes of conduct as are\r\ndisapproved, but without having that particular epithet of\r\ndisapprobation applied to them. If, in everything which men are\r\naccustomed to characterize as just or unjust, some one common attribute\r\nor collection of attributes is always present, we may judge whether this\r\nparticular attribute or combination of attributes would be capable of\r\ngathering round it a sentiment of that peculiar character and intensity\r\nby virtue of the general laws of our emotional constitution, or whether\r\nthe sentiment is inexplicable, and requires to be regarded as a special\r\nprovision of Nature. If we find the former to be the case, we shall, in\r\nresolving this question, have resolved also the main problem: if the\r\nlatter, we shall have to seek for some other mode of investigating it.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 45%;\"\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo find the common attributes of a variety of objects, it is necessary\r\nto begin, by surveying the objects themselves in the concrete. Let us\r\ntherefore advert successively to the various modes of action, and\r\narrangements of human affairs, which are classed, by universal or widely\r\nspread opinion, as Just or as Unjust. The things well known to excite\r\nthe sentiments associated with those names, are of a very multifarious\r\ncharacter. I shall pass them rapidly in review, without studying any\r\nparticular arrangement.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn the first place, it is mostly considered unjust to deprive any one\r\nof his personal liberty, his property, or any other thing which belongs\r\nto him by law. Here, therefore, is one instance of the application of\r\nthe terms just and unjust in a perfectly definite sense, namely, that it\r\nis just to respect, unjust to violate, the \u003ci\u003elegal rights\u003c/i\u003e of any one.\r\nBut this judgment admits of several exceptions, arising from the other\r\nforms in which the notions of justice and injustice present themselves.\r\nFor example, the person who suffers the deprivation may (as the phrase\r\nis) have \u003ci\u003eforfeited\u003c/i\u003e the rights which he is so deprived of: a case to\r\nwhich we shall return presently. But also,\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eSecondly; the legal rights of which he is deprived, may be rights which\r\n\u003ci\u003eought\u003c/i\u003e not to have belonged to him; in other words, the law which\r\nconfers on him these rights, may be a bad law. When it is so, or when\r\n(which is the same thing for our purpose) it is supposed to be so,\r\nopinions will differ as to the justice or injustice of infringing it.\r\nSome maintain that no law, however bad, ought to be disobeyed by an\r\nindividual citizen; that his opposition to it, if shown at all, should\r\nonly be shown in endeavouring to get it altered by competent authority.\r\nThis opinion (which condemns many of the most illustrious benefactors of\r\nmankind, and would often protect pernicious institutions against the\r\nonly weapons which, in the state of things existing at the time, have\r\nany chance of succeeding against them) is defended, by those who hold\r\nit, on grounds of expediency; principally on that of the importance, to\r\nthe common interest of mankind, of maintaining inviolate the sentiment\r\nof submission to law. Other persons, again, hold the directly contrary\r\nopinion, that any law, judged to be bad, may blamelessly be disobeyed,\r\neven though it be not judged to be unjust, but only inexpedient; while\r\nothers would confine the licence of disobedience to the case of unjust\r\nlaws: but again, some say, that all laws which are inexpedient are\r\nunjust; since every law imposes some restriction on the natural liberty\r\nof mankind, which restriction is an injustice, unless legitimated by\r\ntending to their good. Among these diversities of opinion, it seems to\r\nbe universally admitted that there may be unjust laws, and that law,\r\nconsequently, is not the ultimate criterion of justice, but may give to\r\none person a benefit, or impose on another an evil, which justice\r\ncondemns. When, however, a law is thought to be unjust, it seems always\r\nto be regarded as being so in the same way in which a breach of law is\r\nunjust, namely, by infringing somebody\u0027s right; which, as it cannot in\r\nthis case be a legal right, receives a different appellation, and is\r\ncalled a moral right. We may say, therefore, that a second case of\r\ninjustice consists in taking or withholding from any person that to\r\nwhich he has a \u003ci\u003emoral right\u003c/i\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThirdly, it is universally considered just that each person should\r\nobtain that (whether good or evil) which he \u003ci\u003edeserves\u003c/i\u003e; and unjust that\r\nhe should obtain a good, or be made to undergo an evil, which he does\r\nnot deserve. This is, perhaps, the clearest and most emphatic form in\r\nwhich the idea of justice is conceived by the general mind. As it\r\ninvolves the notion of desert, the question arises, what constitutes\r\ndesert? Speaking in a general way, a person is understood to deserve\r\ngood if he does right, evil if he does wrong; and in a more particular\r\nsense, to deserve good from those to whom he does or has done good, and\r\nevil from those to whom he does or has done evil. The precept of\r\nreturning good for evil has never been regarded as a case of the\r\nfulfilment of justice, but as one in which the claims of justice are\r\nwaived, in obedience to other considerations.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eFourthly, it is confessedly unjust to \u003ci\u003ebreak faith\u003c/i\u003e with any one: to\r\nviolate an engagement, either express or implied, or disappoint\r\nexpectations raised by our own conduct, at least if we have raised those\r\nexpectations knowingly and voluntarily. Like the other obligations of\r\njustice already spoken of, this one is not regarded as absolute, but as\r\ncapable of being overruled by a stronger obligation of justice on the\r\nother side; or by such conduct on the part of the person concerned as is\r\ndeemed to absolve us from our obligation to him, and to constitute a\r\n\u003ci\u003eforfeiture\u003c/i\u003e of the benefit which he has been led to expect.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eFifthly, it is, by universal admission, inconsistent with justice to be\r\n\u003ci\u003epartial\u003c/i\u003e; to show favour or preference to one person over another, in\r\nmatters to which favour and preference do not properly apply.\r\nImpartiality, however, does not seem to be regarded as a duty in itself,\r\nbut rather as instrumental to some other duty; for it is admitted that\r\nfavour and preference are not always censurable, and indeed the cases in\r\nwhich they are condemned are rather the exception than the rule. A\r\nperson would be more likely to be blamed than applauded for giving his\r\nfamily or friends no superiority in good offices over strangers, when he\r\ncould do so without violating any other duty; and no one thinks it\r\nunjust to seek one person in preference to another as a friend,\r\nconnexion, or companion. Impartiality where rights are concerned is of\r\ncourse obligatory, but this is involved in the more general obligation\r\nof giving to every one his right. A tribunal, for example, must be\r\nimpartial, because it is bound to award, without regard to any other\r\nconsideration, a disputed object to the one of two parties who has the\r\nright to it. There are other cases in which impartiality means, being\r\nsolely influenced by desert; as with those who, in the capacity of\r\njudges, preceptors, or parents, administer reward and punishment as\r\nsuch. There are cases, again, in which it means, being solely influenced\r\nby consideration for the public interest; as in making a selection among\r\ncandidates for a Government employment. Impartiality, in short, as an\r\nobligation of justice, may be said to mean, being exclusively influenced\r\nby the considerations which it is supposed ought to influence the\r\nparticular case in hand; and resisting the solicitation of any motives\r\nwhich prompt to conduct different from what those considerations would\r\ndictate.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eNearly allied to the idea of impartiality, is that of \u003ci\u003eequality\u003c/i\u003e; which\r\noften enters as a component part both into the conception of justice and\r\ninto the practice of it, and, in the eyes of many persons, constitutes\r\nits essence. But in this, still more than in any other case, the notion\r\nof justice varies in different persons, and always conforms in its\r\nvariations to their notion of utility. Each person maintains that\r\nequality is the dictate of justice, except where he thinks that\r\nexpediency requires inequality. The justice of giving equal protection\r\nto the rights of all, is maintained by those who support the most\r\noutrageous inequality in the rights themselves. Even in slave countries\r\nit is theoretically admitted that the rights of the slave, such as they\r\nare, ought to be as sacred as those of the master; and that a tribunal\r\nwhich fails to enforce them with equal strictness is wanting in justice;\r\nwhile, at the same time, institutions which leave to the slave scarcely\r\nany rights to enforce, are not deemed unjust, because they are not\r\ndeemed inexpedient. Those who think that utility requires distinctions\r\nof rank, do not consider it unjust that riches and social privileges\r\nshould be unequally dispensed; but those who think this inequality\r\ninexpedient, think it unjust also. Whoever thinks that government is\r\nnecessary, sees no injustice in as much inequality as is constituted by\r\ngiving to the magistrate powers not granted to other people. Even among\r\nthose who hold levelling doctrines, there are as many questions of\r\njustice as there are differences of opinion about expediency. Some\r\nCommunists consider it unjust that the produce of the labour of the\r\ncommunity should be shared on any other principle than that of exact\r\nequality; others think it just that those should receive most whose\r\nneeds are greatest; while others hold that those who work harder, or who\r\nproduce more, or whose services are more valuable to the community, may\r\njustly claim a larger quota in the division of the produce. And the\r\nsense of natural justice may be plausibly appealed to in behalf of every\r\none of these opinions.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAmong so many diverse applications of the term Justice, which yet is not\r\nregarded as ambiguous, it is a matter of some difficulty to seize the\r\nmental link which holds them together, and on which the moral sentiment\r\nadhering to the term essentially depends. Perhaps, in this\r\nembarrassment, some help may be derived from the history of the word, as\r\nindicated by its etymology.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn most, if not in all languages, the etymology of the word which\r\ncorresponds to Just, points to an origin connected either with positive\r\nlaw, or with that which was in most cases the primitive form of\r\nlaw-authoritative custom. \u003ci\u003eJustum\u003c/i\u003e is a form of \u003ci\u003ejussum\u003c/i\u003e, that which has\r\nbeen ordered. \u003ci\u003eJus\u003c/i\u003e is of the same origin. \u003ci\u003eDichanou\u003c/i\u003e comes from\r\n\u003ci\u003edichae\u003c/i\u003e, of which the principal meaning, at least in the historical\r\nages of Greece, was a suit at law. Originally, indeed, it meant only the\r\nmode or \u003ci\u003emanner\u003c/i\u003e of doing things, but it early came to mean the\r\n\u003ci\u003eprescribed\u003c/i\u003e manner; that which the recognized authorities, patriarchal,\r\njudicial, or political, would enforce. \u003ci\u003eRecht\u003c/i\u003e, from which came \u003ci\u003eright\u003c/i\u003e\r\nand \u003ci\u003erighteous\u003c/i\u003e, is synonymous with law. The original meaning, indeed,\r\nof \u003ci\u003erecht\u003c/i\u003e did not point to law, but to physical straightness; as\r\n\u003ci\u003ewrong\u003c/i\u003e and its Latin equivalents meant twisted or tortuous; and from\r\nthis it is argued that right did not originally mean law, but on the\r\ncontrary law meant right. But however this may be, the fact that \u003ci\u003erecht\u003c/i\u003e\r\nand \u003ci\u003edroit\u003c/i\u003e became restricted in their meaning to positive law, although\r\nmuch which is not required by law is equally necessary to moral\r\nstraightness or rectitude, is as significant of the original character\r\nof moral ideas as if the derivation had been the reverse way. The courts\r\nof justice, the administration of justice, are the courts and the\r\nadministration of law. \u003ci\u003eLa justice\u003c/i\u003e, in French, is the established term\r\nfor judicature. There can, I think, be no doubt that the \u003ci\u003eidée mère\u003c/i\u003e,\r\nthe primitive element, in the formation of the notion of justice, was\r\nconformity to law. It constituted the entire idea among the Hebrews, up\r\nto the birth of Christianity; as might be expected in the case of a\r\npeople whose laws attempted to embrace all subjects on which precepts\r\nwere required, and who believed those laws to be a direct emanation from\r\nthe Supreme Being. But other nations, and in particular the Greeks and\r\nRomans, who knew that their laws had been made originally, and still\r\ncontinued to be made, by men, were not afraid to admit that those men\r\nmight make bad laws; might do, by law, the same things, and from the\r\nsame motives, which, if done by individuals without the sanction of law,\r\nwould be called unjust. And hence the sentiment of injustice came to be\r\nattached, not to all violations of law, but only to violations of such\r\nlaws as \u003ci\u003eought\u003c/i\u003e to exist, including such as ought to exist but do not;\r\nand to laws themselves, if supposed to be contrary to what ought to be\r\nlaw. In this manner the idea of law and of its injunctions was still\r\npredominant in the notion of justice, even when the laws actually in\r\nforce ceased to be accepted as the standard of it.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt is true that mankind consider the idea of justice and its obligations\r\nas applicable to many things which neither are, nor is it desired that\r\nthey should be, regulated by law. Nobody desires that laws should\r\ninterfere with the whole detail of private life; yet every one allows\r\nthat in all daily conduct a person may and does show himself to be\r\neither just or unjust. But even here, the idea of the breach of what\r\nought to be law, still lingers in a modified shape. It would always give\r\nus pleasure, and chime in with our feelings of fitness, that acts which\r\nwe deem unjust should be punished, though we do not always think it\r\nexpedient that this should be done by the tribunals. We forego that\r\ngratification on account of incidental inconveniences. We should be glad\r\nto see just conduct enforced and injustice repressed, even in the\r\nminutest details, if we were not, with reason, afraid of trusting the\r\nmagistrate with so unlimited an amount of power over individuals. When\r\nwe think that a person is bound in justice to do a thing, it is an\r\nordinary form of language to say, that he ought to be compelled to do\r\nit. We should be gratified to see the obligation enforced by anybody who\r\nhad the power. If we see that its enforcement by law would be\r\ninexpedient, we lament the impossibility, we consider the impunity given\r\nto injustice as an evil, and strive to make amends for it by bringing a\r\nstrong expression of our own and the public disapprobation to bear upon\r\nthe offender. Thus the idea of legal constraint is still the generating\r\nidea of the notion of justice, though undergoing several transformations\r\nbefore that notion, as it exists in an advanced state of society,\r\nbecomes complete.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe above is, I think, a true account, as far as it goes, of the origin\r\nand progressive growth of the idea of justice. But we must observe, that\r\nit contains, as yet, nothing to distinguish that obligation from moral\r\nobligation in general. For the truth is, that the idea of penal\r\nsanction, which is the essence of law, enters not only into the\r\nconception of injustice, but into that of any kind of wrong. We do not\r\ncall anything wrong, unless we mean to imply that a person ought to be\r\npunished in some way or other for doing it; if not by law, by the\r\nopinion of his fellow creatures; if not by opinion, by the reproaches of\r\nhis own conscience. This seems the real turning point of the distinction\r\nbetween morality and simple expediency. It is a part of the notion of\r\nDuty in every one of its forms, that a person may rightfully be\r\ncompelled to fulfil it. Duty is a thing which may be \u003ci\u003eexacted\u003c/i\u003e from a\r\nperson, as one exacts a debt. Unless we think that it might be exacted\r\nfrom him, we do not call it his duty. Reasons of prudence, or the\r\ninterest of other people, may militate against actually exacting it; but\r\nthe person himself, it is clearly understood, would not be entitled to\r\ncomplain. There are other things, on the contrary, which we wish that\r\npeople should do, which we like or admire them for doing, perhaps\r\ndislike or despise them for not doing, but yet admit that they are not\r\nbound to do; it is not a case of moral obligation; we do not blame them,\r\nthat is, we do not think that they are proper objects of punishment. How\r\nwe come by these ideas of deserving and not deserving punishment, will\r\nappear, perhaps, in the sequel; but I think there is no doubt that this\r\ndistinction lies at the bottom of the notions of right and wrong; that\r\nwe call any conduct wrong, or employ instead, some other term of dislike\r\nor disparagement, according as we think that the person ought, or ought\r\nnot, to be punished for it; and we say that it would be right to do so\r\nand so, or merely that it would be desirable or laudable, according as\r\nwe would wish to see the person whom it concerns, compelled or only\r\npersuaded and exhorted, to act in that manner.\u003ca id=\"FNanchorC\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003ca href=\"#Footnote_C\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003csup\u003e[C]\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThis, therefore, being the characteristic difference which marks off,\r\nnot justice, but morality in general, from the remaining provinces of\r\nExpediency and Worthiness; the character is still to be sought which\r\ndistinguishes justice from other branches of morality. Now it is known\r\nthat ethical writers divide moral duties into two classes, denoted by\r\nthe ill-chosen expressions, duties of perfect and of imperfect\r\nobligation; the latter being those in which, though the act is\r\nobligatory, the particular occasions of performing it are left to our\r\nchoice; as in the case of charity or beneficence, which we are indeed\r\nbound to practise, but not towards any definite person, nor at any\r\nprescribed time. In the more precise language of philosophic jurists,\r\nduties of perfect obligation are those duties in virtue of which a\r\ncorrelative right resides in some person or persons; duties of imperfect\r\nobligation are those moral obligations which do not give birth to any\r\nright. I think it will be found that this distinction exactly coincides\r\nwith that which exists between justice and the other obligations of\r\nmorality. In our survey of the various popular acceptations of justice,\r\nthe term appeared generally to involve the idea of a personal right—a\r\nclaim on the part of one or more individuals, like that which the law\r\ngives when it confers a proprietary or other legal right. Whether the\r\ninjustice consists in depriving a person of a possession, or in breaking\r\nfaith with him, or in treating him worse than he deserves, or worse than\r\nother people who have no greater claims, in each case the supposition\r\nimplies two things—a wrong done, and some assignable person who is\r\nwronged. Injustice may also be done by treating a person better than\r\nothers; but the wrong in this case is to his competitors, who are also\r\nassignable persons. It seems to me that this feature in the case—a\r\nright in some person, correlative to the moral obligation—constitutes\r\nthe specific difference between justice, and generosity or beneficence.\r\nJustice implies something which it is not only right to do, and wrong\r\nnot to do, but which some individual person can claim from us as his\r\nmoral right. No one has a moral right to our generosity or beneficence,\r\nbecause we are not morally bound to practise those virtues towards any\r\ngiven individual. And it will be found, with respect to this as with\r\nrespect to every correct definition, that the instances which seem to\r\nconflict with it are those which most confirm it. For if a moralist\r\nattempts, as some have done, to make out that mankind generally, though\r\nnot any given individual, have a right to all the good we can do them,\r\nhe at once, by that thesis, includes generosity and beneficence within\r\nthe category of justice. He is obliged to say, that our utmost exertions\r\nare due to our fellow creatures, thus assimilating them to a debt; or\r\nthat nothing less can be a sufficient \u003ci\u003ereturn\u003c/i\u003e for what society does for\r\nus, thus classing the case as one of gratitude; both of which are\r\nacknowledged cases of justice. Wherever there is a right, the case is\r\none of justice, and not of the virtue of beneficence: and whoever does\r\nnot place the distinction between justice and morality in general where\r\nwe have now placed it, will be found to make no distinction between them\r\nat all, but to merge all morality in justice.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eHaving thus endeavoured to determine the distinctive elements which\r\nenter into the composition of the idea of justice, we are ready to enter\r\non the inquiry, whether the feeling, which accompanies the idea, is\r\nattached to it by a special dispensation of nature, or whether it could\r\nhave grown up, by any known laws, out of the idea itself; and in\r\nparticular, whether it can have originated in considerations of general\r\nexpediency.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eI conceive that the sentiment itself does not arise from anything which\r\nwould commonly, or correctly, be termed an idea of expediency; but that,\r\nthough the sentiment does not, whatever is moral in it does.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eWe have seen that the two essential ingredients in the sentiment of\r\njustice are, the desire to punish a person who has done harm, and the\r\nknowledge or belief that there is some definite individual or\r\nindividuals to whom harm has been done.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eNow it appears to me, that the desire to punish a person who has done\r\nharm to some individual, is a spontaneous outgrowth from two sentiments,\r\nboth in the highest degree natural, and which either are or resemble\r\ninstincts; the impulse of self-defence, and the feeling of sympathy.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt is natural to resent, and to repel or retaliate, any harm done or\r\nattempted against ourselves, or against those with whom we sympathize.\r\nThe origin of this sentiment it is not necessary here to discuss.\r\nWhether it be an instinct or a result of intelligence, it is, we know,\r\ncommon to all animal nature; for every animal tries to hurt those who\r\nhave hurt, or who it thinks are about to hurt, itself or its young.\r\nHuman beings, on this point, only differ from other animals in two\r\nparticulars. First, in being capable of sympathizing, not solely with\r\ntheir offspring, or, like some of the more noble animals, with some\r\nsuperior animal who is kind to them, but with all human, and even with\r\nall sentient beings. Secondly, in having a more developed intelligence,\r\nwhich gives a wider range to the whole of their sentiments, whether\r\nself-regarding or sympathetic. By virtue of his superior intelligence,\r\neven apart from his superior range of sympathy, a human being is capable\r\nof apprehending a community of interest between himself and the human\r\nsociety of which he forms a part, such that any conduct which threatens\r\nthe security of the society generally, is threatening to his own, and\r\ncalls forth his instinct (if instinct it be) of self-defence. The same\r\nsuperiority of intelligence, joined to the power of sympathizing with\r\nhuman beings generally, enables him to attach himself to the collective\r\nidea of his tribe, his country, or mankind, in such a manner that any\r\nact hurtful to them rouses his instinct of sympathy, and urges him to\r\nresistance.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe sentiment of justice, in that one of its elements which consists of\r\nthe desire to punish, is thus, I conceive, the natural feeling of\r\nretaliation or vengeance, rendered by intellect and sympathy applicable\r\nto those injuries, that is, to those hurts, which wound us through, or\r\nin common with, society at large. This sentiment, in itself, has nothing\r\nmoral in it; what is moral is, the exclusive subordination of it to the\r\nsocial sympathies, so as to wait on and obey their call. For the natural\r\nfeeling tends to make us resent indiscriminately whatever any one does\r\nthat is disagreeable to us; but when moralized by the social feeling, it\r\nonly acts in the directions conformable to the general good; just\r\npersons resenting a hurt to society, though not otherwise a hurt to\r\nthemselves, and not resenting a hurt to themselves, however painful,\r\nunless it be of the kind which society has a common interest with them\r\nin the repression of.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt is no objection against this doctrine to say, that when we feel our\r\nsentiment of justice outraged, we are not thinking of society at large,\r\nor of any collective interest, but only of the individual case. It is\r\ncommon enough certainly, though the reverse of commendable, to feel\r\nresentment merely because we have suffered pain; but a person whose\r\nresentment is really a moral feeling, that is, who considers whether an\r\nact is blameable before he allows himself to resent it—such a person,\r\nthough he may not say expressly to himself that he is standing up for\r\nthe interest of society, certainly does feel that he is asserting a rule\r\nwhich is for the benefit of others as well as for his own. If he is not\r\nfeeling this—if he is regarding the act solely as it affects him\r\nindividually—he is not consciously just; he is not concerning himself\r\nabout the justice of his actions. This is admitted even by\r\nanti-utilitarian moralists. When Kant (as before remarked) propounds as\r\nthe fundamental principle of morals, \u0027So act, that thy rule of conduct\r\nmight be adopted as a law by all rational beings,\u0027 he virtually\r\nacknowledges that the interest of mankind collectively, or at least of\r\nmankind indiscriminately, must be in the mind of the agent when\r\nconscientiously deciding on the morality of the act. Otherwise he uses\r\nwords without a meaning: for, that a rule even of utter selfishness\r\ncould not \u003ci\u003epossibly\u003c/i\u003e be adopted by all rational beings—that there is\r\nany insuperable obstacle in the nature of things to its adoption—cannot\r\nbe even plausibly maintained. To give any meaning to Kant\u0027s principle,\r\nthe sense put upon it must be, that we ought to shape our conduct by a\r\nrule which all rational beings might adopt \u003ci\u003ewith benefit to their\r\ncollective interest\u003c/i\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo recapitulate: the idea of justice supposes two things; a rule of\r\nconduct, and a sentiment which sanctions the rule. The first must be\r\nsupposed common to all mankind, and intended for their good. The other\r\n(the sentiment) is a desire that punishment may be suffered by those who\r\ninfringe the rule. There is involved, in addition, the conception of\r\nsome definite person who suffers by the infringement; whose rights (to\r\nuse the expression appropriated to the case) are violated by it. And the\r\nsentiment of justice appears to me to be, the animal desire to repel or\r\nretaliate a hurt or damage to oneself, or to those with whom one\r\nsympathizes, widened so as to include all persons, by the human capacity\r\nof enlarged sympathy, and the human conception of intelligent\r\nself-interest. From the latter elements, the feeling derives its\r\nmorality; from the former, its peculiar impressiveness, and energy of\r\nself-assertion.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eI have, throughout, treated the idea of a \u003ci\u003eright\u003c/i\u003e residing in the\r\ninjured person, and violated by the injury, not as a separate element in\r\nthe composition of the idea and sentiment, but as one of the forms in\r\nwhich the other two elements clothe themselves. These elements are, a\r\nhurt to some assignable person or persons on the one hand, and a demand\r\nfor punishment on the other. An examination of our own minds, I think,\r\nwill show, that these two things include all that we mean when we speak\r\nof violation of a right. When we call anything a person\u0027s right, we mean\r\nthat he has a valid claim on society to protect him in the possession\r\nof it, either by the force of law, or by that of education and opinion.\r\nIf he has what we consider a sufficient claim, on whatever account, to\r\nhave something guaranteed to him by society, we say that he has a right\r\nto it. If we desire to prove that anything does not belong to him by\r\nright, we think this done as soon as it is admitted that society ought\r\nnot to take measures for securing it to him, but should leave it to\r\nchance, or to his own exertions. Thus, a person is said to have a right\r\nto what he can earn in fair professional competition; because society\r\nought not to allow any other person to hinder him from endeavouring to\r\nearn in that manner as much as he can. But he has not a right to three\r\nhundred a-year, though he may happen to be earning it; because society\r\nis not called on to provide that he shall earn that sum. On the\r\ncontrary, if he owns ten thousand pounds three per cent. stock, he \u003ci\u003ehas\u003c/i\u003e\r\na right to three hundred a-year; because society has come under an\r\nobligation to provide him with an income of that amount.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo have a right, then, is, I conceive, to have something which society\r\nought to defend me in the possession of. If the objector goes on to ask\r\nwhy it ought, I can give him no other reason than general utility. If\r\nthat expression does not seem to convey a sufficient feeling of the\r\nstrength of the obligation, nor to account for the peculiar energy of\r\nthe feeling, it is because there goes to the composition of the\r\nsentiment, not a rational only but also an animal element, the thirst\r\nfor retaliation; and this thirst derives its intensity, as well as its\r\nmoral justification, from the extraordinarily important and impressive\r\nkind of utility which is concerned. The interest involved is that of\r\nsecurity, to every one\u0027s feelings the most vital of all interests.\r\nNearly all other earthly benefits are needed by one person, not needed\r\nby another; and many of them can, if necessary, be cheerfully foregone,\r\nor replaced by something else; but security no human being can possibly\r\ndo without; on it we depend for all our immunity from evil, and for the\r\nwhole value of all and every good, beyond the passing moment; since\r\nnothing but the gratification of the instant could be of any worth to\r\nus, if we could be deprived of everything the next instant by whoever\r\nwas momentarily stronger than ourselves. Now this most indispensable of\r\nall necessaries, after physical nutriment, cannot be had, unless the\r\nmachinery for providing it is kept unintermittedly in active play. Our\r\nnotion, therefore, of the claim we have on our fellow creatures to join\r\nin making safe for us the very groundwork of our existence, gathers\r\nfeelings round it so much more intense than those concerned in any of\r\nthe more common cases of utility, that the difference in degree (as is\r\noften the case in psychology) becomes a real difference in kind. The\r\nclaim assumes that character of absoluteness, that apparent infinity,\r\nand incommensurability with all other considerations, which constitute\r\nthe distinction between the feeling of right and wrong and that of\r\nordinary expediency and inexpediency. The feelings concerned are so\r\npowerful, and we count so positively on finding a responsive feeling in\r\nothers (all being alike interested), that \u003ci\u003eought\u003c/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eshould\u003c/i\u003e grow into\r\n\u003ci\u003emust\u003c/i\u003e, and recognized indispensability becomes a moral necessity,\r\nanalogous to physical, and often not inferior to it in binding force.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIf the preceding analysis, or something resembling it, be not the\r\ncorrect account of the notion of justice; if justice be totally\r\nindependent of utility, and be a standard \u003ci\u003eper se\u003c/i\u003e, which the mind can\r\nrecognize by simple introspection of itself; it is hard to understand\r\nwhy that internal oracle is so ambiguous, and why so many things appear\r\neither just or unjust, according to the light in which they are\r\nregarded. We are continually informed that Utility is an uncertain\r\nstandard, which every different person interprets differently, and that\r\nthere is no safety but in the immutable, ineffaceable, and unmistakeable\r\ndictates of Justice, which carry their evidence in themselves, and are\r\nindependent of the fluctuations of opinion. One would suppose from this\r\nthat on questions of justice there could be no controversy; that if we\r\ntake that for our rule, its application to any given case could leave us\r\nin as little doubt as a mathematical demonstration. So far is this from\r\nbeing the fact, that there is as much difference of opinion, and as\r\nfierce discussion, about what is just, as about what is useful to\r\nsociety. Not only have different nations and individuals different\r\nnotions of justice, but, in the mind of one and the same individual,\r\njustice is not some one rule, principle, or maxim, but many, which do\r\nnot always coincide in their dictates, and in choosing between which, he\r\nis guided either by some extraneous standard, or by his own personal\r\npredilections.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eFor instance, there are some who say, that it is unjust to punish any\r\none for the sake of example to others; that punishment is just, only\r\nwhen intended for the good of the sufferer himself. Others maintain the\r\nextreme reverse, contending that to punish persons who have attained\r\nyears of discretion, for their own benefit, is despotism and injustice,\r\nsince if the matter at issue is solely their own good, no one has a\r\nright to control their own judgment of it; but that they may justly be\r\npunished to prevent evil to others, this being an exercise of the\r\nlegitimate right of self-defence. Mr. Owen, again, affirms that it is\r\nunjust to punish at all; for the criminal did not make his own\r\ncharacter; his education, and the circumstances which surround him, have\r\nmade him a criminal, and for these he is not responsible. All these\r\nopinions are extremely plausible; and so long as the question is argued\r\nas one of justice simply, without going down to the principles which lie\r\nunder justice and are the source of its authority, I am unable to see\r\nhow any of these reasoners can be refuted. For, in truth, every one of\r\nthe three builds upon rules of justice confessedly true. The first\r\nappeals to the acknowledged injustice of singling out an individual, and\r\nmaking him a sacrifice, without his consent, for other people\u0027s benefit.\r\nThe second relies on the acknowledged justice of self-defence, and the\r\nadmitted injustice of forcing one person to conform to another\u0027s notions\r\nof what constitutes his good. The Owenite invokes the admitted\r\nprinciple, that it is unjust to punish any one for what he cannot help.\r\nEach is triumphant so long as he is not compelled to take into\r\nconsideration any other maxims of justice than the one he has selected;\r\nbut as soon as their several maxims are brought face to face, each\r\ndisputant seems to have exactly as much to say for himself as the\r\nothers. No one of them can carry out his own notion of justice without\r\ntrampling upon another equally binding. These are difficulties; they\r\nhave always been felt to be such; and many devices have been invented to\r\nturn rather than to overcome them. As a refuge from the last of the\r\nthree, men imagined what they called the freedom of the will; fancying\r\nthat they could not justify punishing a man whose will is in a\r\nthoroughly hateful state, unless it be supposed to have come into that\r\nstate through no influence of anterior circumstances. To escape from the\r\nother difficulties, a favourite contrivance has been the fiction of a\r\ncontract, whereby at some unknown period all the members of society\r\nengaged to obey the laws, and consented to be punished for any\r\ndisobedience to them; thereby giving to their legislators the right,\r\nwhich it is assumed they would not otherwise have had, of punishing\r\nthem, either for their own good or for that of society. This happy\r\nthought was considered to get rid of the whole difficulty, and to\r\nlegitimate the infliction of punishment, in virtue of another received\r\nmaxim of justice, \u003ci\u003evolenti non fit injuria\u003c/i\u003e; that is not unjust which is\r\ndone with the consent of the person who is supposed to be hurt by it. I\r\nneed hardly remark, that even if the consent were not a mere fiction,\r\nthis maxim is not superior in authority to the others which it is\r\nbrought in to supersede. It is, on the contrary, an instructive specimen\r\nof the loose and irregular manner in which supposed principles of\r\njustice grow up. This particular one evidently came into use as a help\r\nto the coarse exigencies of courts of law, which are sometimes obliged\r\nto be content with very uncertain presumptions, on account of the\r\ngreater evils which would often arise from any attempt on their part to\r\ncut finer. But even courts of law are not able to adhere consistently to\r\nthe maxim, for they allow voluntary engagements to be set aside on the\r\nground of fraud, and sometimes on that of mere mistake or\r\nmisinformation.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eAgain, when the legitimacy of inflicting punishment is admitted, how\r\nmany conflicting conceptions of justice come to light in discussing the\r\nproper apportionment of punishment to offences. No rule on this subject\r\nrecommends itself so strongly to the primitive and spontaneous sentiment\r\nof justice, as the \u003ci\u003elex talionis\u003c/i\u003e, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a\r\ntooth. Though this principle of the Jewish and of the Mahomedan law has\r\nbeen generally abandoned in Europe as a practical maxim, there is, I\r\nsuspect, in most minds, a secret hankering after it; and when\r\nretribution accidentally falls on an offender in that precise shape, the\r\ngeneral feeling of satisfaction evinced, bears witness how natural is\r\nthe sentiment to which this repayment in kind is acceptable. With many\r\nthe test of justice in penal infliction is that the punishment should be\r\nproportioned to the offence; meaning that it should be exactly measured\r\nby the moral guilt of the culprit (whatever be their standard for\r\nmeasuring moral guilt): the consideration, what amount of punishment is\r\nnecessary to deter from the offence, having nothing to do with the\r\nquestion of justice, in their estimation: while there are others to whom\r\nthat consideration is all in all; who maintain that it is not just, at\r\nleast for man, to inflict on a fellow creature, whatever may be his\r\noffences, any amount of suffering beyond the least that will suffice to\r\nprevent him from repeating, and others from imitating, his misconduct.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTo take another example from a subject already once referred to. In a\r\nco-operative industrial association, is it just or not that talent or\r\nskill should give a title to superior remuneration? On the negative side\r\nof the question it is argued, that whoever does the best he can,\r\ndeserves equally well, and ought not in justice to be put in a position\r\nof inferiority for no fault of his own; that superior abilities have\r\nalready advantages more than enough, in the admiration they excite, the\r\npersonal influence they command, and the internal sources of\r\nsatisfaction attending them, without adding to these a superior share of\r\nthe world\u0027s goods; and that society is bound in justice rather to make\r\ncompensation to the less favoured, for this unmerited inequality of\r\nadvantages, than to aggravate it. On the contrary side it is contended,\r\nthat society receives more from the more efficient labourer; that his\r\nservices being more useful, society owes him a larger return for them;\r\nthat a greater share of the joint result is actually his work, and not\r\nto allow his claim to it is a kind of robbery; that if he is only to\r\nreceive as much as others, he can only be justly required to produce as\r\nmuch, and to give a smaller amount of time and exertion, proportioned to\r\nhis superior efficiency. Who shall decide between these appeals to\r\nconflicting principles of justice? Justice has in this case two sides to\r\nit, which it is impossible to bring into harmony, and the two disputants\r\nhave chosen opposite sides; the one looks to what it is just that the\r\nindividual should receive, the other to what it is just that the\r\ncommunity should give. Each, from his own point of view, is\r\nunanswerable; and any choice between them, on grounds of justice, must\r\nbe perfectly arbitrary. Social utility alone can decide the preference.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eHow many, again, and how irreconcileable, are the standards of justice\r\nto which reference is made in discussing the repartition of taxation.\r\nOne opinion is, that payment to the State should be in numerical\r\nproportion to pecuniary means. Others think that justice dictates what\r\nthey term graduated taxation; taking a higher percentage from those who\r\nhave more to spare. In point of natural justice a strong case might be\r\nmade for disregarding means altogether, and taking the same absolute sum\r\n(whenever it could be got) from every one: as the subscribers to a mess,\r\nor to a club, all pay the same sum for the same privileges, whether they\r\ncan all equally afford it or not. Since the protection (it might be\r\nsaid) of law and government is afforded to, and is equally required by,\r\nall, there is no injustice in making all buy it at the same price. It is\r\nreckoned justice, not injustice, that a dealer should charge to all\r\ncustomers the same price for the same article, not a price varying\r\naccording to their means of payment. This doctrine, as applied to\r\ntaxation, finds no advocates, because it conflicts strongly with men\u0027s\r\nfeelings of humanity and perceptions of social expediency; but the\r\nprinciple of justice which it invokes is as true and as binding as those\r\nwhich can be appealed to against it. Accordingly, it exerts a tacit\r\ninfluence on the line of defence employed for other modes of assessing\r\ntaxation. People feel obliged to argue that the State does more for the\r\nrich than for the poor, as a justification for its taking more from\r\nthem: though this is in reality not true, for the rich would be far\r\nbetter able to protect themselves, in the absence of law or government,\r\nthan the poor, and indeed would probably be successful in converting the\r\npoor into their slaves. Others, again, so far defer to the same\r\nconception of justice, as to maintain that all should pay an equal\r\ncapitation tax for the protection of their persons (these being of equal\r\nvalue to all), and an unequal tax for the protection of their property,\r\nwhich is unequal. To this others reply, that the all of one man is as\r\nvaluable to him as the all of another. From these confusions there is no\r\nother mode of extrication than the utilitarian.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003chr style=\"width: 45%;\"\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIs, then, the difference between the Just and the Expedient a merely\r\nimaginary distinction? Have mankind been under a delusion in thinking\r\nthat justice is a more sacred thing than policy, and that the latter\r\nought only to be listened to after the former has been satisfied? By no\r\nmeans. The exposition we have given of the nature and origin of the\r\nsentiment, recognises a real distinction; and no one of those who\r\nprofess the most sublime contempt for the consequences of actions as an\r\nelement in their morality, attaches more importance to the distinction\r\nthan I do. While I dispute the pretensions of any theory which sets up\r\nan imaginary standard of justice not grounded on utility, I account the\r\njustice which is grounded on utility to be the chief part, and\r\nincomparably the most sacred and binding part, of all morality. Justice\r\nis a name for certain classes of moral rules, which concern the\r\nessentials of human well-being more nearly, and are therefore of more\r\nabsolute obligation, than any other rules for the guidance of life; and\r\nthe notion which we have found to be of the essence of the idea of\r\njustice, that of a right residing in an individual, implies and\r\ntestifies to this more binding obligation.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe moral rules which forbid mankind to hurt one another (in which we\r\nmust never forget to include wrongful interference with each other\u0027s\r\nfreedom) are more vital to human well-being than any maxims, however\r\nimportant, which only point out the best mode of managing some\r\ndepartment of human affairs. They have also the peculiarity, that they\r\nare the main element in determining the whole of the social feelings of\r\nmankind. It is their observance which alone preserves peace among human\r\nbeings: if obedience to them were not the rule, and disobedience the\r\nexception, every one would see in every one else a probable enemy,\r\nagainst whom he must be perpetually guarding himself. What is hardly\r\nless important, these are the precepts which mankind have the strongest\r\nand the most direct inducements for impressing upon one another. By\r\nmerely giving to each other prudential instruction or exhortation, they\r\nmay gain, or think they gain, nothing: in inculcating on each other the\r\nduty of positive beneficence they have an unmistakeable interest, but\r\nfar less in degree: a person may possibly not need the benefits of\r\nothers; but he always needs that they should not do him hurt. Thus the\r\nmoralities which protect every individual from being harmed by others,\r\neither directly or by being hindered in his freedom of pursuing his own\r\ngood, are at once those which he himself has most at heart, and those\r\nwhich he has the strongest interest in publishing and enforcing by word\r\nand deed. It is by a person\u0027s observance of these, that his fitness to\r\nexist as one of the fellowship of human beings, is tested and decided;\r\nfor on that depends his being a nuisance or not to those with whom he is\r\nin contact. Now it is these moralities primarily, which compose the\r\nobligations of justice. The most marked cases of injustice, and those\r\nwhich give the tone to the feeling of repugnance which characterizes the\r\nsentiment, are acts of wrongful aggression, or wrongful exercise of\r\npower over some one; the next are those which consist in wrongfully\r\nwithholding from him something which is his due; in both cases,\r\ninflicting on him a positive hurt, either in the form of direct\r\nsuffering, or of the privation of some good which he had reasonable\r\nground, either of a physical or of a social kind, for counting upon.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe same powerful motives which command the observance of these primary\r\nmoralities, enjoin the punishment of those who violate them; and as the\r\nimpulses of self-defence, of defence of others, and of vengeance, are\r\nall called forth against such persons, retribution, or evil for evil,\r\nbecomes closely connected with the sentiment of justice, and is\r\nuniversally included in the idea. Good for good is also one of the\r\ndictates of justice; and this, though its social utility is evident, and\r\nthough it carries with it a natural human feeling, has not at first\r\nsight that obvious connexion with hurt or injury, which, existing in the\r\nmost elementary cases of just and unjust, is the source of the\r\ncharacteristic intensity of the sentiment. But the connexion, though\r\nless obvious, is not less real. He who accepts benefits, and denies a\r\nreturn of them when needed, inflicts a real hurt, by disappointing one\r\nof the most natural and reasonable of expectations, and one which he\r\nmust at least tacitly have encouraged, otherwise the benefits would\r\nseldom have been conferred. The important rank, among human evils and\r\nwrongs, of the disappointment of expectation, is shown in the fact that\r\nit constitutes the principal criminality of two such highly immoral acts\r\nas a breach of friendship and a breach of promise. Few hurts which human\r\nbeings can sustain are greater, and none wound more, than when that on\r\nwhich they habitually and with full assurance relied, fails them in the\r\nhour of need; and few wrongs are greater than this mere withholding of\r\ngood; none excite more resentment, either in the person suffering, or in\r\na sympathizing spectator. The principle, therefore, of giving to each\r\nwhat they deserve, that is, good for good as well as evil for evil, is\r\nnot only included within the idea of Justice as we have defined it, but\r\nis a proper object of that intensity of sentiment, which places the\r\nJust, in human estimation, above the simply Expedient.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eMost of the maxims of justice current in the world, and commonly\r\nappealed to in its transactions, are simply instrumental to carrying\r\ninto effect the principles of justice which we have now spoken of. That\r\na person is only responsible for what he has done voluntarily, or could\r\nvoluntarily have avoided; that it is unjust to condemn any person\r\nunheard; that the punishment ought to be proportioned to the offence,\r\nand the like, are maxims intended to prevent the just principle of evil\r\nfor evil from being perverted to the infliction of evil without that\r\njustification. The greater part of these common maxims have come into\r\nuse from the practice of courts of justice, which have been naturally\r\nled to a more complete recognition and elaboration than was likely to\r\nsuggest itself to others, of the rules necessary to enable them to\r\nfulfil their double function, of inflicting punishment when due, and of\r\nawarding to each person his right.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThat first of judicial virtues, impartiality, is an obligation of\r\njustice, partly for the reason last mentioned; as being a necessary\r\ncondition of the fulfilment of the other obligations of justice. But\r\nthis is not the only source of the exalted rank, among human\r\nobligations, of those maxims of equality and impartiality, which, both\r\nin popular estimation and in that of the most enlightened, are included\r\namong the precepts of justice. In one point of view, they may be\r\nconsidered as corollaries from the principles already laid down. If it\r\nis a duty to do to each according to his deserts, returning good for\r\ngood as well as repressing evil by evil, it necessarily follows that we\r\nshould treat all equally well (when no higher duty forbids) who have\r\ndeserved equally well of us, and that society should treat all equally\r\nwell who have deserved equally well of it, that is, who have deserved\r\nequally well absolutely. This is the highest abstract standard of social\r\nand distributive justice; towards which all institutions, and the\r\nefforts of all virtuous citizens, should be made in the utmost possible\r\ndegree to converge. But this great moral duty rests upon a still deeper\r\nfoundation, being a direct emanation from the first principle of morals,\r\nand not a mere logical corollary from secondary or derivative doctrines.\r\nIt is involved in the very meaning of Utility, or the\r\nGreatest-Happiness Principle. That principle is a mere form of words\r\nwithout rational signification, unless one person\u0027s happiness, supposed\r\nequal in degree (with the proper allowance made for kind), is counted\r\nfor exactly as much as another\u0027s. Those conditions being supplied,\r\nBentham\u0027s dictum, \u0027everybody to count for one, nobody for more than\r\none,\u0027 might be written under the principle of utility as an explanatory\r\ncommentary.\u003ca id=\"FNanchorD\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003ca href=\"#Footnote_D\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e\u003csup\u003e[D]\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/a\u003e The equal claim of everybody to happiness in the\r\nestimation of the moralist and the legislator, involves an equal claim\r\nto all the means of happiness, except in so far as the inevitable\r\nconditions of human life, and the general interest, in which that of\r\nevery individual is included, set limits to the maxim; and those limits\r\nought to be strictly construed. As every other maxim of justice, so\r\nthis, is by no means applied or held applicable universally; on the\r\ncontrary, as I have already remarked, it bends to every person\u0027s ideas\r\nof social expediency. But in whatever case it is deemed applicable at\r\nall, it is held to be the dictate of justice. All persons are deemed to\r\nhave a \u003ci\u003eright\u003c/i\u003e to equality of treatment, except when some recognised\r\nsocial expediency requires the reverse. And hence all social\r\ninequalities which have ceased to be considered expedient, assume the\r\ncharacter not of simple inexpediency, but of injustice, and appear so\r\ntyrannical, that people are apt to wonder how they ever could have been\r\ntolerated; forgetful that they themselves perhaps tolerate other\r\ninequalities under an equally mistaken notion of expediency, the\r\ncorrection of which would make that which they approve seem quite as\r\nmonstrous as what they have at last learnt to condemn. The entire\r\nhistory of social improvement has been a series of transitions, by which\r\none custom or institution after another, from being a supposed primary\r\nnecessity of social existence, has passed into the rank of an\r\nuniversally stigmatized injustice and tyranny. So it has been with the\r\ndistinctions of slaves and freemen, nobles and serfs, patricians and\r\nplebeians; and so it will be, and in part already is, with the\r\naristocracies of colour, race, and sex.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIt appears from what has been said, that justice is a name for certain\r\nmoral requirements, which, regarded collectively, stand higher in the\r\nscale of social utility, and are therefore of more paramount obligation,\r\nthan any others; though particular cases may occur in which some other\r\nsocial duty is so important, as to overrule any one of the general\r\nmaxims of justice. Thus, to save a life, it may not only be allowable,\r\nbut a duty, to steal, or take by force, the necessary food or medicine,\r\nor to kidnap, and compel to officiate, the only qualified medical\r\npractitioner. In such cases, as we do not call anything justice which is\r\nnot a virtue, we usually say, not that justice must give way to some\r\nother moral principle, but that what is just in ordinary cases is, by\r\nreason of that other principle, not just in the particular case. By this\r\nuseful accommodation of language, the character of indefeasibility\r\nattributed to justice is kept up, and we are saved from the necessity of\r\nmaintaining that there can be laudable injustice.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eThe considerations which have now been adduced resolve, I conceive, the\r\nonly real difficulty in the utilitarian theory of morals. It has always\r\nbeen evident that all cases of justice are also cases of expediency: the\r\ndifference is in the peculiar sentiment which attaches to the former, as\r\ncontradistinguished from the latter. If this characteristic sentiment\r\nhas been sufficiently accounted for; if there is no necessity to assume\r\nfor it any peculiarity of origin; if it is simply the natural feeling of\r\nresentment, moralized by being made coextensive with the demands of\r\nsocial good; and if this feeling not only does but ought to exist in all\r\nthe classes of cases to which the idea of justice corresponds; that idea\r\nno longer presents itself as a stumbling-block to the utilitarian\r\nethics. Justice remains the appropriate name for certain social\r\nutilities which are vastly more important, and therefore more absolute\r\nand imperative, than any others are as a class (though not more so than\r\nothers may be in particular cases); and which, therefore, ought to be,\r\nas well as naturally are, guarded by a sentiment not only different in\r\ndegree, but also in kind; distinguished from the milder feeling which\r\nattaches to the mere idea of promoting human pleasure or convenience, at\r\nonce by the more definite nature of its commands, and by the sterner\r\ncharacter of its sanctions.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eTHE END.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003eFOOTNOTES:\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"Footnote_C\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#FNanchorC\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e[C]\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"note\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e See this point enforced and illustrated by Professor Bain,\r\nin an admirable chapter (entitled \"The Ethical Emotions, or the Moral\r\nSense\") of the second of the two treatises composing his elaborate and\r\nprofound work on the Mind.\u003c/p\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca id=\"Footnote_D\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"pg_body_wrapper\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"#FNanchorD\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003e[D]\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\u003cdiv class=\"note\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e This implication, in the first principle of the utilitarian\r\nscheme, of perfect impartiality between persons, is regarded by Mr.\r\nHerbert Spencer (in his \u003ci\u003eSocial Statics\u003c/i\u003e) as a disproof of the\r\npretentions of utility to be a sufficient guide to right; since (he\r\nsays) the principle of utility presupposes the anterior principle, that\r\neverybody has an equal right to happiness. It may be more correctly\r\ndescribed as supposing that equal amounts of happiness are equally\r\ndesirable, whether felt by the same or by different persons. This,\r\nhowever, is not a pre-supposition; not a premise needful to support the\r\nprinciple of utility, but the very principle itself; for what is the\r\nprinciple of utility, if it be not that \u0027happiness\u0027 and \u0027desirable\u0027 are\r\nsynonymous terms? If there is any anterior principle implied, it can be\r\nno other than this, that the truths of arithmetic are applicable to the\r\nvaluation of happiness, as of all other measurable quantities.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\r\n[Mr. Herbert Spencer, in a private communication on the subject of the\r\npreceding Note, objects to being considered an opponent of\r\nUtilitarianism; and states that he regards happiness as the ultimate end\r\nof morality; but deems that end only partially attainable by empirical\r\ngeneralizations from the observed results of conduct, and completely\r\nattainable only by deducing, from the laws of life and the conditions of\r\nexistence, what kinds of action necessarily tend to produce happiness,\r\nand what kinds to produce unhappiness. With the exception of the word\r\n\"necessarily,\" I have no dissent to express from this doctrine; and\r\n(omitting that word) I am not aware that any modern advocate of\r\nutilitarianism is of a different opinion. Bentham, certainly, to whom in\r\nthe \u003ci\u003eSocial Statics\u003c/i\u003e Mr. Spencer particularly referred, is, least of all\r\nwriters, chargeable with unwillingness to deduce the effect of actions\r\non happiness from the laws of human nature and the universal conditions\r\nof human life. The common charge against him is of relying too\r\nexclusively upon such deductions, and declining altogether to be bound\r\nby the generalizations from specific experience which Mr. Spencer thinks\r\nthat utilitarians generally confine themselves to. My own opinion (and,\r\nas I collect, Mr. Spencer\u0027s) is, that in ethics, as in all other\r\nbranches of scientific study, the consilience of the results of both\r\nthese processes, each corroborating and verifying the other, is\r\nrequisite to give to any general proposition the kind and degree of\r\nevidence which constitutes scientific proof.]\u003c/p\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cdiv\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\u003c/article\u003e"}],"SectionSequence":["Back Link","Work Title","Deck","Author","Period","Era","Composition","Date Note","Region","Terra Avita","Terra Avita Region","Modern Country","Original Title","Language","Primary Discipline","Secondary Discipline","Tradition","Full Versions","Core Thesis","Classification","Arguments","Influence","Significance","Evidence Note","Full Text"],"Counts":{"ContextCards":3,"GeoCards":4,"DisciplineCards":2,"Links":11,"Sections":25,"Styles":3,"Scripts":1}}