to have the same qualifications as are sought in a good legal judge,-special education, experience, coolness, impartiality, and the observance of all the maxims of evidence, set up to protect the innocent.

But the chief consideration remains. The objection against the Rational theories of Morals applies with all its force to Smith's theory. Where does the impartial spectator get his standard? Where does he find the rules that he is impartially to interpret? A judge is provided by competent authority with a legal code; and the arbitrating spectator is supposed to be provided with a moral code. Now the whole point in dispute is the source or foundation of the moral code itself.

14. Next as to the principle of Utility. This is opposed to the doctrine of a Moral Sense. It sets up an outward standard in the room of an inward, being the substitution of a regard to consequences for a mere unreasoning sentiment, or feeling. Utility is also opposed to the selfish theory, for as propounded it always implies the good of society generally, and the subordination of individual interest to that general good.*

The statement of the principle by Jeremy Bentham as the greatest happiness of the greatest number,' has the merits, and some of the defects, of an epigram. There is something repulsive to the common mind in so broadly announcing the sacrifice of minorities to majorities. In our legislation this happens every day, it being enough for a statesman that one measure does more good to a larger number of people than another. Bentham aimed the principle originally at class interests, under which the greatest happiness of the smallest number was the determining motive of public policy.

In Morals, Bentham opposed to Utility, first, Asceticism, and next what he called Sympathy and Antipathy, or the decisions of mere feeling, including the theories of the Moral Sense, the Fitness of Things, Right Reason, &c. He assumed that the production of pleasure, and the avoiding of pain, were the only positive ends, never to be set aside in any instance, except in order to secure them in some greater amount. To aid the requisite calculation, he endeavoured to classify and enumerate our pleasures and pains.

I have elsewhere stated some of the difficulties attending the principle of Utility as thus expressed, but which do not effect its soundness as opposed to a Moral Sense'-(See p. 88 of the Moral Philosophy of Paley, with additional Dissertations. W. and R. Chambers, Edinburgh.)

UTILITY AS THE BASIS OF MORALS.

273

But what is the exact import of Utility as concerns morals? Some limit must be assigned to the principle, for it is obvious that we do not make everything a moral rule that we consider useful. It is useful to make experiments in Chemistry, but this is not a point of morality unless it be a part of a man's professional duty undertaken and paid for. Jeremy Bentham wrote many useful books, but not because of his being obliged to do so under a high moral sanction.

Bentham would have contributed still more to the promotion of sound ethical discussion, if he had reversed the plan of his work, and entitled it 'On Legislation and Morals.' He would thus have put forward the more tangible, and more formally and officially constructed department of obligation, to elucidate clearly the less tangible and the unofficial department. There is, as he saw, a precise parallelism between the moral legislation of society in its private action on individuals, and the public legislation through the government, and if this parallelism were closely traced, we should have a much clearer conception of moral obligation properly so called. In both cases, punishment is the instrument and the criterion of the obligatory. Where the law does not prescribe a penalty, it does not make a duty; and so where other authorities and society generally do not think proper to punish, they do not constitute a moral rule.

Then as to the origin of moral enactments, and the proper enacting authority, we ought to insist on having some positive declaration. Who is it that gives the law in this department to a community, and what is their right to do so founded upon? Is the authority a despotism, a limited monarchy, or a republic? Is public opinion appealed to, and open discussion permitted, before a moral bill becomes a moral law? Or have we received our code from a venerable antiquity, embodied in our religion, and shut up for ever from reconsideration or change? Whatever the case is, let it be stated exactly as we describe the political system under which our other laws are promulgated.

Moreover, we ought to have a written code of public morality, or of the duties imposed by society, over and above what parliament imposes, and this should not be a loosely written moral treatise, but a strict enumeration of what society requires under pain of punishment by excommunication or otherwise-the genuine offences that are not passed over. A system of morals for the guidance of the individual member of society, ought to be composed on the plan of excluding all the virtues that bring rewards, just as the articles of war omit all reference to the virtues of the soldier, and merely enumerate offences and crimes. The very interesting field of human virtue and nobleness should be treated apart, with all the aids that eloquence can bestow, a quality of composition that has no business to be present in a strict moral treatise, any more than in a criminal code, or a digest of justice-of-peace pro

cedure.

Many actions pre-eminently useful to society are performed out of the free-will and choice of individuals, and not from any fear, either of punishment, or of inward remorse. A distinction must therefore be drawn between Utility made compulsory, and what is left free.

There are very different degrees of urgency in things known to be useful. The extinction of a blazing house, the arrest of a riot or tumult, the resistance to an invading army, are actions that press before all others. Among social actions, the first degree of urgency belongs to those already alluded to as essential to the very existence of society.

Social security must be maintained as the highest necessity of men's existence in common fellowship; and whatever militates against it must be considered wrong. On this foundation we establish right, duty, or obligation-as attaching to obedience to law, fulfilment of compacts, justice, and truth; and we employ the sanction of punishment in favour of those classes of actions.

'Moreover, men desire not the lowest security compatible with civil order, but a high and increasing security; and for this end, they put an especial stress on the comprehensive virtue of integrity.

'When something more than social security is maintained. as an end carrying rightness and compulsion along with it, that something must be a clear case of the promotion of the general happiness without any material sacrifice of individual happiness. A mere increase of the sum of enjoyment is not to be put on the same footing as the common safety.'*

It is usual to distinguish between the necessary, and the optional functions of government. Defence, security, the administration of justice, &c., are necessary; but whether the government shall undertake the support of churches, schools, theatres, pauperism, or the administration of roads, railways, or the post-office, depends upon a balance of considerations in each case. So it is with morals. Society must keep men

* Edition of Paley above quoted, p. 87.

UTILITY NOT TO BE ENFORCED TO ALL LENGTHS. 275

to their word and punish the promise-breaker; but there is no absolute necessity for hereditary distinctions and castes, although it is quite open to any one to adduce arguments in their favour so strong as to justify a compulsory respect towards the favoured class, or to constitute this one of the terms of social communion.

15. It will be seen at a glance that one great objection to the enforcement of utility without exception, or qualification,' is the consideration of individual Liberty. (A still greater objection is the fallibility of the social authority.) Every public enactment is a restraint put upon the free will of individuals; and the sum total of the pain and privation thus arising must be set against the positive utility of the measure. There are cases where public authority can do much positive good, at the expense of a small and unimportant amount of individual restraint, as, for example, carrying on postal communication; and in these instances interference is justified. There are other cases of a more debateable kind, such as religious and educational establishments, and the regulation of labour. In a country where questions are settled by the general voice, after free and open discussion, it is difficult to find any other standard than the happiness of the population as calculated by themselves.

The common dislike to utility, as the standard, resolves itself into a sentimental preference, amounting to the abnegation of reason in human life. A man refuses to embrace some lucrative occupation because of family pride, and chooses a life of privation and misery instead; this is the false choice of sentiment as regards the private welfare of an individual. From a feeling of aversion founded on no reason, I refuse the professional assistance of some one specially qualified to extricate me from a situation of misery; so presenting an example of the same antithesis of sentiment and utility. But there are sentiments reckoned so lofty, dignified, and ennobling, and there are utilities reckoned so low and grovelling, that it is conceived no comparison exists between the two. Thus the principles of justice, truth, and purity, con

sidered in a certain ideal form, are supposed to predominate immeasurably over worldly prosperity. 'Let justice be done though nature should collapse,' is the highest flight of sentimentalism.*

In the case of the individual that would rather starve than abate a jot of his family pride, there is really nothing to be said; as a free man he has made his own choice. If he involves no other persons in his destitution, his friends may remonstrate with him, but no one is entitled to go any farther. And so with any number of men, each carrying out in his own case, without detriment to others, a sentimental preference. Even supposing them to be much less happy than the emancipation from their peculiar liking or dislike would make them, still, as men beyond the state of tutelage, they must decide for themselves. A philanthropic reformer would doubtless wish, by an improved education, or in other ways, to free his fellow-citizens from the incubus of a deleterious sentiment, superstition, antipathy, or the like; but so long as each one confines the operation of the feeling to himself, liberty is in favour of abstaining from anything like interference in the matter. But when one man endeavours to impose his likings or dislikes upon another, or when a mere sentimental preference entertained by the majority is made the law for every one, there is a very serious infringement of individual freedom on the one hand, with nothing legitimate to be set against it in the way of advantage. Herein lies the real opposition of the two principles, as applied to legislation and morality. If a man has a strong antipathy (like what prevails among large sections of mankind) to a pig, this is a good reason to him for not keeping pigs, or eating pork; but if a sufficient number join in the antipathy to make a ruling party in the society that they belong to, and carry the thing so far as to compel everybody whomsoever to put away this animal, they

* See an admirable criticism by Mr. James Mill, on the saying of Andrew Fletcher, that he would lose his life to serve his country; but would not do a base thing to save it.'-Fragment on Mackintosh, p. 267.