The interest of the next generation, and it may be It is scarcely necessary to discuss the effects for the remote interest of the present genera- which a general spoliation of the rich would tion, that property should be held sacred. And produce. It may indeed happen, that where a so no doubt it will be for the interest of the next legal and political system full of abuses is pacha, and even for that of the present pacha, inseparably bound up with the institution of if he should hold office long, that the inhabitants property, a nation may gain by a single conof his pachalic should be encouraged to accu-vulsion, in which both perish together. mulate wealth. Scarcely any despotic sovereign has plundered his subjects to a large extent, without having reason, before the end of his reign, to regret it. Everybody knows how bitterly Louis the Fourteenth, towards the close of his life, lamented his former extravagance. If that magnificent prince had not expended millions on Marli and Versailles, and tens of millions on the aggrandizement of his grandson, he would not have been compelled at last to pay servile court to low-born moneylenders, to humble himself before men, on whom, in the days of his pride, he would not have vouchsafed to look, for the means of supporting even his own household. Examples to the same effect might easily be multiplied. But despots, we see, do plunder their subjects, though history and experience tell them, that by prematurely exacting the means of profusion, they are in fact devouring the seed-corn, from which the future harvest of revenue is to spring. Why then should we suppose that the people will be deterred from procuring immediate relief and enjoyment by the fear of distant calamities, of calamities which, perhaps, may not be fully felt till the times of their grandchildren? price is fearful: but if, when the shock is over, a new order of things should arise, under which property may enjoy security, the industry of individuals will soon repair the devastation. Thus we entertain no doubt that the Revolution was, on the whole, a most salutary event for France. But would France have gained, if, ever since the year 1793, she had been governed by a democratic convention? If Mr. Mill's principles be sound, we say that almost her whole capital would by this time have been annihilated. As soon as the first explosion was beginning to be forgotten, as soon as wealth again began to germinate, as soon as the poor again began to compare their cottages and salads with the hotels and banquets of the rich, there would have been another scramble for property, another maximum, another general confiscation, another reign of terror. Four or five such convulsions following each other, at intervals of ten or twelve years, would reduce the most flourishing countries of Europe to the state of Barbary or the Morea. The civilized part of the world has now nothing to fear from the hostility of savage nations. Once the deluge of barbarism has These conclusions are strictly drawn from passed over it, to destroy and to fertilize; and Mr. Mill's own principles: and, unlike most of in the present state of mankind we enjoy a full the conclusions which he has himself drawn security against that calamity. That flood will from those principles, they are not, as far as no more return to cover the earth. But is it we know, contradicted by facts. The case of possible that, in the bosom of civilization itthe United States is not in point. In a country self, may be engendered the malady which shall where the necessaries of life are cheap and the destroy it? Is it possible that institutions may wages of labour high, where a man who has be established which, without the help of earthno capital but his legs and arms may expect quake, of famine, of pestilence, or of the foreign to become rich by industry and frugality, it is sword, may undo the work of so many ages not very decidedly even for the immediate of wisdom and glory, and gradually sweep advantage of the poor to plunder the rich; and away taste, literature, science, commerce, mathe punishment of doing so would very speedilynufactures, every thing but the rude arts nefollow the offence. But in countries in which the great majorities live from hand to mouth, and in which vast masses of wealth have been accumulated by a comparatively small number, the case is widely different. The immediate want is, at particular seasons, craving, imperious, irresistible. In our own time, it has steeled men to the fear of the gallows, and urged them on the point of the bayonet. And if these men had at their command that gallows, and those bayonets, which now scarcely restrain them, what is to be expected? Nor is this state of things one which can exist only under a bad government. If there be the least truth in the doctrines of the school to which Mr. Mill belongs, the increase of population will necessarily produce it everywhere. The increase of population is accelerated by good and cheap government. Therefore, the better the government, the greater is the inequality of conditions; and the greater the inequality of conditions, the stronger are the motives which impel the populace to spoliation. As for America, we appeal to the twentieth century. cessary to the support of animal life? Is it possible, that in two or three hundred years, a few lean and half-naked fishermen may divide with owls and foxes the ruins of the greatest of European cities-may wash their nets amidst the relics of her gigantic docks, and build their huts out of the capitals of her stately cathedrals? If the principles of Mr. Mill be sound, we say, without hesitation, that the form of government which he recommends will assuredly produce all this. But if these principles be unsound, if the reasonings by which we have opposed them be just, the higher and middling orders are the natural representa. tives of the human race. Their interest may be opposed, in some things, to that of their poorer contemporaries, but it is identical with that of the innumerable generations which are to follow. Mr. Mill concludes his essay, by answering an objection often made to the project of uni versal suffrage-that the people do not under stand their own interests. We shall not ge through his arguments on this subject, because 1 All he has proved, that it is for the interest of the people to respect property, he only makes matters worse, by proving that they understand neir interests. But we cannot refrain from treating our readers with a delicious bonne bouche of wisdom, which he has kept for the last moment. "The opinions of that class of the people who are below the middle rank are formed, and their minds are directed, by that intelligent, that virtuous rank, who come the most immediately in contact with them, who are in the constant habit of intimate communication with them, to whom they fly for advice and assistance in all their numerous difficulties, upon whom they feel an immediate and daily dependence in health and in sickness, in infancy and in old age, to whom their children look up as models for their imitation, whose opinions they hear daily repeated, and account it their honour to adopt. There can be no doubt that the middle rank, which gives to science, to art, and to legislation itself, their most distinguished ornaments, and is the chief source of all that has exalted and refined human natnre, is that portion of the commuuity, of which, if the basis of representation were ever so far extended, the opinion would ultimately decide. Of the people beneath them, a vast majority would be sure to be guided by their advice and example." are sick, it seems, like the children of Israel, of the objects of our old and legitimate wor ship. We pine for a new idolatry. All that is costly and all that is ornamental in our intellectual treasures must be delivered up, and cast into the furnace-and there comes out this calf! Our readers can scarcely mistake our object in writing this article. They will not suspect us of any disposition to advocate the cause of absolute monarchy, or of any narrow form of oligarchy, or to exaggerate the evils of po. pular government. Our object at present is, not so much to attack or defend any particular system of polity, as to expose the vices of a kind of reasoning utterly unfit for moral and political discussions; of a kind of reasoning which may so readily be turned to purposes of falsehood, that it ought to receive no quarter, even when by accident it may be employed on the side of truth. Our objection to the essay of Mr. Mill is fundamental. We believe that it is utterly impossible to deduce the science of govern. ment from the principles of human nature. What proposition is there respecting human nature which is absolutely and universally true? We know of only one; and that is not only true, but identical; that men always act from self-interest. This truism the Utilitarians proclaim with as much pride as if it were rew and as much zeal as if it were important. But in fact, when explained, it means only that men, if they can, will do as they choose. When we see the actions of a man, we know with certainty what he thinks his interest to be This single paragraph is sufficient to upset Mr. Mills theory. Will the people act against their own interest? Or will the middle rank act against its own interest? Or is the interest of the middle rank identical with the interest of the people? If the people act accord-But it is impossible to reason with certainty ing to the directions of the middle rank, as Mr. Mill says that they assuredly will, one of these three questions must be answered in the affirmative. But if any one of the three be answered in the affirmative, his whole system falls to the ground. If the interest of the middle rank be identical with that of the people, why should not the powers of government be intrusted to that rank? If the powers of government were intrusted to that rank, there would evidently be an aristocracy of wealth; and "to constitute an aristocracy of wealth, though it were a very numerous one, would," according to Mr. Mill, leave the community without protection, and exposed to all the "evils of unbridled power." Will not the same motives which induce the middle classes to abuse one of kind of power, induce them to abuse another? If their interest be the same with that of the people, they will govern the people well. If it be opposite to that of the people, they will advise the people ill. The system of universal suffrage, therefore, according to Mr. Mill's own account, is only a device for doing circuitously what a representative system, with a pretty high qualification, would do directly. So ends the celebrated essay. And such is this philosophy, for which the experience of three thousand years is to be discarded; this philosophy, the professors of which speak as if it had guided the world to the knowledge of navigation and alphabetical writing; as if, before its dawn, the inhabitants of Europe had lived in caverns and eaten each other! We from what we take to be his interest to his ac tions. One man goes without a dinner, that he may add a shilling to a hundred thousand pounds: another runs in debt to give balls and masquerades. One man cuts his father's throat to get possession of his old clothes: another hazards his own life to save that of an enemy. One man volunteers on a forlorn hope: another is drummed out of a regiment for cowardice. Each of these men has, no doubt, acted from self-interest. But we gain nothing by knowing this, except the pleasure, if it be one, of multiplying useless words. In fact, this principle is just as recondite, and just as important, as the great truth, that whatever is, is. If a philosopher were always to state facts in the following form-"There is a shower: but whatever is, is; therefore, there is a shower," his reasoning would be perfectly sound; but we do not apprehend that it would materially enlarge the circle of human knowledge. Ard it is equally idle to attribute any importance to a proposition, which, when interpreted, means only that a man had rather do what he had rather do. If the doctrine that men always act from self-interest be laid down in any other sense than this-if the meaning of the word selfinterest be narrowed so as to exclude any one of the motives which may by possibility act on any human being, the proposition ceases to be identical; but at the same time it ceases to be true. What we have said of the word "self-inte rest" applies to all the synonymes and circum- | about the whole species, the impossibility of locutions which are employed to convey the answering is still more evident. Man differs same meaning; pain and pleasure, happiness from man; generation from generation; na. and misery, objects of desire, and so forth. tion from nation. Education, station, sex, age, accidental associations, produce infinite shades of variety. The whole art of Mr. Mill's essay consists in one simple trick of legerdemain. It consists in using words of the sort which we have been describing, first in one sense and then in another. Men will take the objects of their desire if they can. Unquestionably :-but this is an identical proposition: for an object of desire means merely a thing which a man will procure if he can. Nothing can possibly be inferred from a maxim of this kind. When we see a man take something, we shall know that it was an object of his desire. But till then, we have no means of judging with certainty what he desires, or what he will take. The general proposition, however, having been admitted, Mr. Mill proceeds to reason as if men had no desires but those which can be gratified only by spoiliation and oppression. It then becomes easy to deduce doctrines of vast importance from the original axiom. The only misfortune is, that by thus narrowing the meaning of the word desire, the axiom becomes false, and all the doctrines consequent upon it are false likewise. When we pass beyond those maxims which it is impossible to deny without a contradiction in terms, and which, therefore, do not enable us to advance a single step in practical knowledge, we do not believe that it is possible to lay down a single general rule respecting the motives which influence human actions. There is nothing which may not, by association or by comparison, become an object either of desire or of aversion. The fear of death is generally considered as one of the strongest of our feelings. It is the most formidable sanction which legislators have been able to devise. Yet it is notorious that, as Lord Bacon has observed, there is no passion by which that fear has not been often overcome. Physical pain is indisputably an evil; yet it has been often endured, and even welcomed. Innumerable martyrs have exulted in torments which made the spectators shudder; and, to use a more homely illustration, there are few wives who do not long to be mothers. Is the love of approbation a stronger motive than the love of wealth? It is impossible to answer this question generally, even in the case of an individual with whom we are very intimate. We often say, indeed, that a man loves fame more than money, or money more than fame. But this is said in a loose and popular sense; for there is scarcely a man who would not endure a few sneers for a great sum of money, if he were in pecuniary distress; and scarcely a man, on the other hand, who, if he were in flourishing circumstances, would expose himself to the hatred and contempt of the public for a trifle. In order, therefore, to return a precise answer, even about a single human being, we must know what is the amount of the sacrifice of reputation demanded, and of the pecuniary advantage offered, and in what situation the person to whom the temptation is proposed stands at the time. But when the question is propounded generally Now, the only mode in which we can, conceive it possible to deduce a theory of govern ment from the principles of human nature, is this. We must find out what are the motives which, in a particular form of government, impel rulers to bad measures, and what are those which impel them to good measures. We must then compare the effect of the two classes of motives; and according as we find the one or the other to prevail, we must pronounce the form of government in question good or bad. Now let it be supposed that, in aristocrat.cal and monarchical states, the desire of wealth, and other desires of the same class, always tend to produce misgovernment, and that the love of approbation, and other kindred feelings, always tend to produce good government. Then, if it be impossible, as we have shown that it is, to pronounce generally which of the two classes of motives is the more influential, it is impossible to find out, a priori, whether a monarchical or aristocratical form of government be good or bad. Mr. Mill has avoided the difficulty of making the comparison, by very coolly putting all the weights into one of the scales,-by reasoning as if no human being had ever sympathized with the feelings, been gratified by the thanks, or been galled by the execrations, of another. The case, as we have put it, is decisive against Mr. Mill; and yet we have put it in a manner far too favourable to him. For in fact, it is impossible to lay it down as a general rule, that the love of wealth in a sovereign always produces misgovernment, or the love of approbation good government. A patient and far-sighted ruler, for example, who is less desirous of raising a great sum immediately, than of securing an unencumbered and pro gressive revenue, will, by taking off restraints from trade, and giving perfect security to property, encourage accumulation, and entice capital from foreign countries. The commercial policy of Prussia, which is perhaps superior to that of any government in the world, and which puts to shame the absurdities of our republican brethren on the other side of the Atlantic, has probably sprung from the desire of an absolute ruler to enrich himself. On the other hand, when the popular estimate of virtues and vices is erroneous, which is too often the case, the love of approbation leads sovereigns to spend the wealth of the nation on useless shows, or to engage in wanton and destructive wars. If, then, we can neither compare the strength of two motives, nor determine with certainty to what description of actions either motive will lead, how can we possibly deduce a theory of government from the nature of man? How, then, are we to arrive at just conclu sions on a subject so important to the happi ness of mankind? Surely by that method which, in every experimental science to which it has been applied, has signally increased the | of nations,-which, of all sciences, most tends power and knowledge of our species,-by that to expand and invigorate the mind,-which method for which our new philosophers would draws nutriment and ornament from every parl substitute quibbles scarcely worthy of barba- of philosophy and literature, and dispenses, in rous respondents and opponents of the middle return, nutriment and ornament to all. We are ages, by the method of induction;-by observ-sorry and surprised when we see men of good ing the present state of the world, by as- intentions and good natural abilities abandon siduously studying the history of past ages, this healthful and generous study, to pore over by sifting the evidence of facts,-by carefully speculations like those which we have been combining and contrasting those which are examining. And we should heartily rejoice to authentic,-by generalizing with judgment and find that our remarks had induced any person diffidence, by perpetually bringing the theory of this description, to employ, in researches of which we have constructed to the test of new real utility, the talents and industry which are facts, by correcting, or altogether abandoning now wasted on verbal sophisms, wretched of it, according as those new facts prove it to be their wretched kind. partially or fundamentally unsound. Proceeding thus, patiently, diligently, candidly, we may hope to form a system as far inferior in pretensions to that which we have been examining, and as far superior to it in real utility, as the prescriptions of a great physician, varying with every stage of every malady, and with the constitution of every patient, to the pill of the advertising quack, which is to cure all human beings, in all climates, of all diseases. As to the greater part of the sect, it is, we apprehend, of little consequence, what they study, or under whom. It would be more amusing, to be sure, and more reputable, if they would take up the old republican cant, and declaim about Brutus and Timoleon, the duty of killing tyrants, and the blessedness of dying for liberty. But, on the whole, they might have chosen worse. They may as well be Utilitarians as jockeys or dandies. And though quibbling about self-interest and motives, and This is that noble science of politics, which objects of desire, and the greatest happiness is equally removed from the barren theories of of the greatest number, is but a poor employthe Utilitarian sophists, and from the petty ment for a grown man, it certainly hurts the craft, so often mistaken for statesmanship by health less than hard drinking, and the fortune minds grown narrow in habits of intrigue, job- less than high play: it is not much more bing, and official etiquette;-which, of all laughable than phrenology, and is imx.com. sciences, is the most important to the welfare | rably more humane than cock-fighting. BENTHAM'S DEFENCE OF MILL.' [EDINBURGH REVIEW, JUNE, 1829.] We have had great reason, we think, to be gratified by the success of our late attack on the Utilitarians. We could publish a long list of the cures which it has wrought, in cases previously considered as hopeless. Delicacy forbids us to divulge names; but we cannot refrain from alluding to two remarkable instances. A respectable lady writes to inform us, that her son, who was plucked at Cambridge last January, has not been heard to call Sir James Mackintosh a poor ignorant fool more than twice since the appearance of our article. A distinguished political writer in the Westminster and Parliamentary Reviews has borrowed Hume's History, and has actually got as far as the battle of Agincourt. He assures us that he takes great pleasure in his new study, and that he is very impatient to learn how Scotland and England became one kingdom. But the greatest compliment that we have received is, that Mr. Bentham himself should have condescended to take the field in defence of Mr. Mill. We have not been in the habit of reviewing reviews; but as Mr. Bentham is a truly great man, and as his party have thought fit to announce in puffs and placards that this article is written by him, and contains not only an answer to our attacks, but a developnent of the "greatest happiness principle," with the latest improvements of the author, we shall for once depart from our general rule. However the conflict may terminate, we shall at least not have been vanquished by an ignoble hand. Of Mr. Bentham himself, we shall endeavour, even while defending ourselves against his reproaches, to speak with the respect to which his venerable age, his genius, and his public services entitle him. If any harsh expression should escape us, we trust that he will attribute it to inadvertence, to the momentary warmth of controversy,-to any thing, in short, rather than to a design of affronting him. Though we have nothing in common with the crew of Hurds and Boswells, who, either from interested motives, or from the habit of intellectual servility and dependence, pamper and vitiate his appetite with the noxious sweetness of their undiscerning praise, we are not perhaps less competent than they to appreciate his merit, or less sincerely disposed to acknow ledge it. Though we may sometimes think his reasonings on moral and political questions feeble and sophistical-though we may sometimes smile at his extraordinary language-we can never be weary of admiring the amplitude of his comprehension, the keenness of his peneratior, the exuberant fertility with which his mind pours forth arguments and illustrations. He has utterly mistaken our object and meaning. He seems to think that we have undertaken to set up some theory of government in opposition to that of Mr. Mill. But we distinctly disclaimed any such design. From the beginning to the end of our article, there is not, as far as we remember, a single sentence which, when fairly construed, can be considered as indicating any such design. If such an expression can be found, it has been dropped by inadvertence. Our object was to prove, not that monarchy and aristocracy are good, but that Mr. Mill had not proved them to be bad; not that democracy is bad, but that Mr. Mill had not proved it to be good. The points in issue are these, Whether the famous Essay on Government be, as it has been called, a perfect solution of the great political problem, or a se ries of sophisms and blunders; and whether the sect which, while it glories in the precision of its logic, extols this Essay as a masterpiece of demonstration, be a sect deserving of the respect or of the derision of mankind. These, we say, are the issues; and on these we with full confidence put ourselves on the country. Edinburgh Review, No. XCVII., Article on Mill's Essays investigation, that we should state what our It is not necessary, for the purposes of this The Westminster Review, No. XXI., Article XVI. on Government, &c. |