John Stuart Millexcerpted from Utilitarianism,available on Project Gutenberg

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/11224/11224-h/11224-h.htm

CHAPTER I.GENERAL REMARKS.

There are few circumstances among those which makeup the present condition of human knowledge, more un-like what might have been expected, or more significantof the backward state in which speculation on the mostimportant subjects still lingers, than the little progresswhich has been made in the decision of the controversyrespecting the criterion of right and wrong. From thedawn of philosophy, the question concerning the sum-mum bonum, or, what is the same thing, concerningthe foundation of morality, has been accounted the mainproblem in speculative thought, has occupied the mostgifted intellects, and divided them into sects and schools,carrying on a vigorous warfare against one another. Andafter more than two thousand years the same discussionscontinue, philosophers are still ranged under the samecontending banners, and neither thinkers nor mankindat large seem nearer to being unanimous on the subject,than when the youth Socrates listened to the old Pro-tagoras, and asserted (if Plato’s dialogue be grounded ona real conversation) the theory of utilitarianism againstthe popular morality of the so-called sophist.

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On the present occasion, I shall, without further discus-sion of the other theories, attempt to contribute some-thing towards the understanding and appreciation of theUtilitarian or Happiness theory, and towards such proofas it is susceptible of. It is evident that this cannot beproof in the ordinary and popular meaning of the term.Questions of ultimate ends are not amenable to directproof. Whatever can be proved to be good, must be soby being shown to be a means to something admitted tobe good without proof. The medical art is proved to begood, by its conducing to health; but how is it possible toprove that health is good? The art of music is good, forthe reason, among others, that it produces pleasure; butwhat proof is it possible to give that pleasure is good?If, then, it is asserted that there is a comprehensive for-mula, including all things which are in themselves good,and that whatever else is good, is not so as an end, but asa mean, the formula may be accepted or rejected, but isnot a subject of what is commonly understood by proof.We are not, however, to infer that its acceptance or rejec-tion must depend on blind impulse, or arbitrary choice.There is a larger meaning of the word proof, in whichthis question is as amenable to it as any other of thedisputed questions of philosophy. The subject is withinthe cognizance of the rational faculty; and neither doesthat faculty deal with it solely in the way of intuition.Considerations may be presented capable of determiningthe intellect either to give or withhold its assent to thedoctrine; and this is equivalent to proof.

We shall examine presently of what nature are these con-

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siderations; in what manner they apply to the case, andwhat rational grounds, therefore, can be given for ac-cepting or rejecting the utilitarian formula. But it is apreliminary condition of rational acceptance or rejection,that the formula should be correctly understood. I be-lieve that the very imperfect notion ordinarily formed ofits meaning, is the chief obstacle which impedes its re-ception; and that could it be cleared, even from only thegrosser misconceptions, the question would be greatlysimplified, and a large proportion of its difficulties re-moved. Before, therefore, I attempt to enter into thephilosophical grounds which can be given for assenting tothe utilitarian standard, I shall offer some illustrations ofthe doctrine itself; with the view of showing more clearlywhat it is, distinguishing it from what it is not, and dis-posing of such of the practical objections to it as eitheroriginate in, or are closely connected with, mistaken in-terpretations of its meaning. Having thus prepared theground, I shall afterwards endeavour to throw such lightas I can upon the question, considered as one of philo-sophical theory.

CHAPTER II.WHAT UTILITARIANISM IS.

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The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals,Utility, or the Greatest Happiness Principle, holds thatactions are right in proportion as they tend to promotehappiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of

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happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure, and theabsence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privationof pleasure. To give a clear view of the moral standardset up by the theory, much more requires to be said; inparticular, what things it includes in the ideas of painand pleasure; and to what extent this is left an openquestion. But these supplementary explanations do notaffect the theory of life on which this theory of moralityis grounded — namely, that pleasure, and freedom frompain, are the only things desirable as ends; and that alldesirable things (which are as numerous in the utilitar-ian as in any other scheme) are desirable either for thepleasure inherent in themselves, or as means to the pro-motion of pleasure and the prevention of pain.

Now, such a theory of life excites in many minds, andamong them in some of the most estimable in feeling andpurpose, inveterate dislike. To suppose that life has (asthey express it) no higher end than pleasure — no betterand nobler object of desire and pursuit — they designateas utterly mean and grovelling; as a doctrine worthy onlyof swine, to whom the followers of Epicurus were, at avery early period, contemptuously likened; and modernholders of the doctrine are occasionally made the subjectof equally polite comparisons by its German, French, andEnglish assailants.

When thus attacked, the Epicureans have always an-swered, that it is not they, but their accusers, who repre-sent human nature in a degrading light; since the accusa-tion supposes human beings to be capable of no pleasuresexcept those of which swine are capable. If this suppo-

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sition were true, the charge could not be gainsaid, butwould then be no longer an imputation; for if the sourcesof pleasure were precisely the same to human beings andto swine, the rule of life which is good enough for the onewould be good enough for the other. The comparison ofthe Epicurean life to that of beasts is felt as degrading,precisely because a beast’s pleasures do not satisfy a hu-man being’s conceptions of happiness. Human beingshave faculties more elevated than the animal appetites,and when once made conscious of them, do not regardanything as happiness which does not include their grat-ification. I do not, indeed, consider the Epicureans tohave been by any means faultless in drawing out theirscheme of consequences from the utilitarian principle. Todo this in any sufficient manner, many Stoic, as well asChristian elements require to be included. But there isno known Epicurean theory of life which does not assignto the pleasures of the intellect; of the feelings and imagi-nation, and of the moral sentiments, a much higher valueas pleasures than to those of mere sensation. It mustbe admitted, however, that utilitarian writers in generalhave placed the superiority of mental over bodily plea-sures chiefly in the greater permanency, safety, uncostli-ness, c., of the former — that is, in their circumstantialadvantages rather than in their intrinsic nature. And onall these points utilitarians have fully proved their case;but they might have taken the other, and, as it maybe called, higher ground, with entire consistency. It isquite compatible with the principle of utility to recognisethe fact, that some kinds of pleasure are more desirableand more valuable than others. It would be absurd that

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while, in estimating all other things, quality is consideredas well as quantity, the estimation of pleasures should besupposed to depend on quantity alone.

If I am asked, what I mean by difference of quality inpleasures, or what makes one pleasure more valuablethan another, merely as a pleasure, except its being greaterin amount, there is but one possible answer. Of two plea-sures, if there be one to which all or almost all who haveexperience of both give a decided preference, irrespectiveof any feeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is themore desirable pleasure. If one of the two is, by thosewho are competently acquainted with both, placed so farabove the other that they prefer it, even though knowingit to be attended with a greater amount of discontent,and would not resign it for any quantity of the otherpleasure which their nature is capable of, we are justi-fied in ascribing to the preferred enjoyment a superiorityin quality, so far outweighing quantity as to render it, incomparison, of small account.

Now it is an unquestionable fact that those who areequally acquainted with, and equally capable of appre-ciating and enjoying, both, do give a most marked pref-erence to the manner of existence which employs theirhigher faculties. Few human creatures would consent tobe changed into any of the lower animals, for a promise ofthe fullest allowance of a beast’s pleasures; no intelligenthuman being would consent to be a fool, no instructedperson would be an ignoramus, no person of feeling andconscience would be selfish and base, even though theyshould be persuaded that the fool, the dunce, or the ras-

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cal is better satisfied with his lot than they are withtheirs. They would not resign what they possess morethan he, for the most complete satisfaction of all thedesires which they have in common with him. If theyever fancy they would, it is only in cases of unhappinessso extreme, that to escape from it they would exchangetheir lot for almost any other, however undesirable intheir own eyes. A being of higher faculties requires moreto make him happy, is capable probably of more acutesuffering, and is certainly accessible to it at more points,than one of an inferior type; but in spite of these liabili-ties, he can never really wish to sink into what he feels tobe a lower grade of existence. We may give what expla-nation we please of this unwillingness; we may attributeit to pride, a name which is given indiscriminately tosome of the most and to some of the least estimable feel-ings of which mankind are capable; we may refer it tothe love of liberty and personal independence, an appealto which was with the Stoics one of the most effectivemeans for the inculcation of it; to the love of power, orto the love of excitement, both of which do really enterinto and contribute to it: but its most appropriate ap-pellation is a sense of dignity, which all human beingspossess in one form or other, and in some, though byno means in exact, proportion to their higher faculties,and which is so essential a part of the happiness of thosein whom it is strong, that nothing which conflicts withit could be, otherwise than momentarily, an object ofdesire to them. Whoever supposes that this preferencetakes place at a sacrifice of happiness-that the superiorbeing, in anything like equal circumstances, is not hap-

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pier than the inferior-confounds the two very differentideas, of happiness, and content. It is indisputable thatthe being whose capacities of enjoyment are low, hasthe greatest chance of having them fully satisfied; anda highly-endowed being will always feel that any happi-ness which he can look for, as the world is constituted, isimperfect. But he can learn to bear its imperfections, ifthey are at all bearable; and they will not make him envythe being who is indeed unconscious of the imperfections,but only because he feels not at all the good which thoseimperfections qualify. It is better to be a human beingdissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socratesdissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or thepig, is of a different opinion, it is because they only knowtheir own side of the question. The other party to thecomparison knows both sides.

It may be objected, that many who are capable of thehigher pleasures, occasionally, under the influence of temp-tation, postpone them to the lower. But this is quitecompatible with a full appreciation of the intrinsic supe-riority of the higher. Men often, from infirmity of char-acter, make their election for the nearer good, thoughthey know it to be the less valuable; and this no lesswhen the choice is between two bodily pleasures, thanwhen it is between bodily and mental. They pursue sen-sual indulgences to the injury of health, though perfectlyaware that health is the greater good. It may be furtherobjected, that many who begin with youthful enthusi-asm for everything noble, as they advance in years sinkinto indolence and selfishness. But I do not believe that

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those who undergo this very common change, voluntarilychoose the lower description of pleasures in preference tothe higher. I believe that before they devote themselvesexclusively to the one, they have already become inca-pable of the other. Capacity for the nobler feelings isin most natures a very tender plant, easily killed, notonly by hostile influences, but by mere want of suste-nance; and in the majority of young persons it speedilydies away if the occupations to which their position inlife has devoted them, and the society into which it hasthrown them, are not favourable to keeping that highercapacity in exercise. Men lose their high aspirations asthey lose their intellectual tastes, because they have nottime or opportunity for indulging them; and they ad-dict themselves to inferior pleasures, not because theydeliberately prefer them, but because they are either theonly ones to which they have access, or the only oneswhich they are any longer capable of enjoying. It maybe questioned whether any one who has remained equallysusceptible to both classes of pleasures, ever knowinglyand calmly preferred the lower; though many, in all ages,have broken down in an ineffectual attempt to combineboth.

From this verdict of the only competent judges, I ap-prehend there can be no appeal. On a question whichis the best worth having of two pleasures, or which oftwo modes of existence is the most grateful to the feel-ings, apart from its moral attributes and from its con-sequences, the judgment of those who are qualified byknowledge of both, or, if they differ, that of the majority

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among them, must be admitted as final. And there needsbe the less hesitation to accept this judgment respectingthe quality of pleasures, since there is no other tribunalto be referred to even on the question of quantity. Whatmeans are there of determining which is the acutest oftwo pains, or the intensest of two pleasurable sensations,except the general suffrage of those who are familiar withboth? Neither pains nor pleasures are homogeneous, andpain is always heterogeneous with pleasure. What isthere to decide whether a particular pleasure is worthpurchasing at the cost of a particular pain, except thefeelings and judgment of the experienced? When, there-fore, those feelings and judgment declare the pleasuresderived from the higher faculties to be preferable in kind,apart from the question of intensity, to those of whichthe animal nature, disjoined from the higher faculties, issusceptible, they are entitled on this subject to the sameregard.

I have dwelt on this point, as being a necessary part ofa perfectly just conception of Utility or Happiness, con-sidered as the directive rule of human conduct. But itis by no means an indispensable condition to the accep-tance of the utilitarian standard; for that standard isnot the agent’s own greatest happiness, but the greatestamount of happiness altogether; and if it may possiblybe doubted whether a noble character is always the hap-pier for its nobleness, there can be no doubt that it makesother people happier, and that the world in general is im-mensely a gainer by it. Utilitarianism, therefore, couldonly attain its end by the general cultivation of noble-

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ness of character, even if each individual were only ben-efited by the nobleness of others, and his own, so far ashappiness is concerned, were a sheer deduction from thebenefit. But the bare enunciation of such an absurdityas this last, renders refutation superfluous.

According to the Greatest Happiness Principle, as aboveexplained, the ultimate end, with reference to and forthe sake of which all other things are desirable (whetherwe are considering our own good or that of other peo-ple), is an existence exempt as far as possible from pain,and as rich as possible in enjoyments, both in point ofquantity and quality; the test of quality, and the rulefor measuring it against quantity, being the preferencefelt by those who, in their opportunities of experience,to which must be added their habits of self-consciousnessand self-observation, are best furnished with the meansof comparison. This, being, according to the utilitarianopinion, the end of human action, is necessarily also thestandard of morality; which may accordingly be defined,the rules and precepts for human conduct, by the obser-vance of which an existence such as has been describedmight be, to the greatest extent possible, secured to allmankind; and not to them only, but, so far as the natureof things admits, to the whole sentient creation.

Against this doctrine, however, arises another class of ob-jectors, who say that happiness, in any form, cannot bethe rational purpose of human life and action; because,in the first place, it is unattainable: and they contemptu-ously ask, What right hast thou to be happy? a questionwhich Mr. Carlyle clenches by the addition, What right,

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a short time ago, hadst thou even to be? Next, theysay, that men can do without happiness; that all noblehuman beings have felt this, and could not have becomenoble but by learning the lesson of Entsagen, or renunci-ation; which lesson, thoroughly learnt and submitted to,they affirm to be the beginning and necessary conditionof all virtue.

The first of these objections would go to the root of thematter were it well founded; for if no happiness is to behad at all by human beings, the attainment of it can-not be the end of morality, or of any rational conduct.Though, even in that case, something might still be saidfor the utilitarian theory; since utility includes not solelythe pursuit of happiness, but the prevention or mitiga-tion of unhappiness; and if the former aim be chimerical,there will be all the greater scope and more imperativeneed for the latter, so long at least as mankind think fitto live, and do not take refuge in the simultaneous actof suicide recommended under certain conditions by No-valis. When, however, it is thus positively asserted to beimpossible that human life should be happy, the asser-tion, if not something like a verbal quibble, is at leastan exaggeration. If by happiness be meant a continu-ity of highly pleasurable excitement, it is evident enoughthat this is impossible. A state of exalted pleasure lastsonly moments, or in some cases, and with some inter-missions, hours or days, and is the occasional brilliantflash of enjoyment, not its permanent and steady flame.Of this the philosophers who have taught that happinessis the end of life were as fully aware as those who taunt

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them. The happiness which they meant was not a lifeof rapture, but moments of such, in an existence madeup of few and transitory pains, many and various plea-sures, with a decided predominance of the active overthe passive, and having as the foundation of the whole,not to expect more from life than it is capable of be-stowing. A life thus composed, to those who have beenfortunate enough to obtain it, has always appeared wor-thy of the name of happiness. And such an existenceis even now the lot of many, during some considerableportion of their lives. The present wretched education,and wretched social arrangements, are the only real hin-drance to its being attainable by almost all.

The objectors perhaps may doubt whether human be-ings, if taught to consider happiness as the end of life,would be satisfied with such a moderate share of it. Butgreat numbers of mankind have been satisfied with muchless. The main constituents of a satisfied life appear to betwo, either of which by itself is often found sufficient forthe purpose: tranquillity, and excitement. With muchtranquillity, many find that they can be content withvery little pleasure: with much excitement, many canreconcile themselves to a considerable quantity of pain.There is assuredly no inherent impossibility in enablingeven the mass of mankind to unite both; since the two areso far from being incompatible that they are in naturalalliance, the prolongation of either being a preparationfor, and exciting a wish for, the other. It is only thosein whom indolence amounts to a vice, that do not desireexcitement after an interval of repose; it is only those in

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whom the need of excitement is a disease, that feel thetranquillity which follows excitement dull and insipid,instead of pleasurable in direct proportion to the excite-ment which preceded it. When people who are tolerablyfortunate in their outward lot do not find in life suffi-cient enjoyment to make it valuable to them, the causegenerally is, caring for nobody but themselves. To thosewho have neither public nor private affections, the excite-ments of life are much curtailed, and in any case dwindlein value as the time approaches when all selfish inter-ests must be terminated by death: while those who leaveafter them objects of personal affection, and especiallythose who have also cultivated a fellow-feeling with thecollective interests of mankind, retain as lively an inter-est in life on the eve of death as in the vigour of youthand health. Next to selfishness, the principal cause whichmakes life unsatisfactory, is want of mental cultivation.A cultivated mind — I do not mean that of a philoso-pher, but any mind to which the fountains of knowledgehave been opened, and which has been taught, in any tol-erable degree, to exercise its faculties — finds sources ofinexhaustible interest in all that surrounds it; in the ob-jects of nature, the achievements of art, the imaginationsof poetry, the incidents of history, the ways of mankindpast and present, and their prospects in the future. Itis possible, indeed, to become indifferent to all this, andthat too without having exhausted a thousandth part ofit; but only when one has had from the beginning nomoral or human interest in these things, and has soughtin them only the gratification of curiosity.

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Now there is absolutely no reason in the nature of thingswhy an amount of mental culture sufficient to give an in-telligent interest in these objects of contemplation, shouldnot be the inheritance of every one born in a civilizedcountry. As little is there an inherent necessity that anyhuman being should be a selfish egotist, devoid of ev-ery feeling or care but those which centre in his ownmiserable individuality. Something far superior to thisis sufficiently common even now, to give ample earnestof what the human species may be made. Genuine pri-vate affections, and a sincere interest in the public good,are possible, though in unequal degrees, to every rightlybrought-up human being. In a world in which there is somuch to interest, so much to enjoy, and so much also tocorrect and improve, every one who has this moderateamount of moral and intellectual requisites is capable ofan existence which may be called enviable; and unlesssuch a person, through bad laws, or subjection to thewill of others, is denied the liberty to use the sources ofhappiness within his reach, he will not fail to find thisenviable existence, if he escape the positive evils of life,the great sources of physical and mental suffering — suchas indigence, disease, and the unkindness, worthlessness,or premature loss of objects of affection. The main stressof the problem lies, therefore, in the contest with thesecalamities, from which it is a rare good fortune entirelyto escape; which, as things now are, cannot be obviated,and often cannot be in any material degree mitigated.Yet no one whose opinion deserves a moment’s consider-ation can doubt that most of the great positive evils ofthe world are in themselves removable, and will, if hu-

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man affairs continue to improve, be in the end reducedwithin narrow limits. Poverty, in any sense implying suf-fering, may be completely extinguished by the wisdomof society, combined with the good sense and providenceof individuals. Even that most intractable of enemies,disease, may be indefinitely reduced in dimensions bygood physical and moral education, and proper controlof noxious influences; while the progress of science holdsout a promise for the future of still more direct conquestsover this detestable foe. And every advance in that di-rection relieves us from some, not only of the chanceswhich cut short our own lives, but, what concerns usstill more, which deprive us of those in whom our hap-piness is wrapt up. As for vicissitudes of fortune, andother disappointments connected with worldly circum-stances, these are principally the effect either of grossimprudence, of ill-regulated desires, or of bad or imper-fect social institutions. All the grand sources, in short,of human suffering are in a great degree, many of themalmost entirely, conquerable by human care and effort;and though their removal is grievously slow — though along succession of generations will perish in the breachbefore the conquest is completed, and this world becomesall that, if will and knowledge were not wanting, it mighteasily be made — yet every mind sufficiently intelligentand generous to bear a part, however small and uncon-spicuous, in the endeavour, will draw a noble enjoymentfrom the contest itself, which he would not for any bribein the form of selfish indulgence consent to be without.

And this leads to the true estimation of what is said by

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the objectors concerning the possibility, and the obliga-tion, of learning to do without happiness. Unquestion-ably it is possible to do without happiness; it is doneinvoluntarily by nineteen-twentieths of mankind, even inthose parts of our present world which are least deep inbarbarism; and it often has to be done voluntarily bythe hero or the martyr, for the sake of something whichhe prizes more than his individual happiness. But thissomething, what is it, unless the happiness of others, orsome of the requisites of happiness? It is noble to becapable of resigning entirely one’s own portion of hap-piness, or chances of it: but, after all, this self-sacrificemust be for some end; it is not its own end; and if we aretold that its end is not happiness, but virtue, which isbetter than happiness, I ask, would the sacrifice be madeif the hero or martyr did not believe that it would earnfor others immunity from similar sacrifices? Would it bemade, if he thought that his renunciation of happinessfor himself would produce no fruit for any of his fellowcreatures, but to make their lot like his, and place themalso in the condition of persons who have renounced hap-piness? All honour to those who can abnegate for them-selves the personal enjoyment of life, when by such renun-ciation they contribute worthily to increase the amountof happiness in the world; but he who does it, or professesto do it, for any other purpose, is no more deserving ofadmiration than the ascetic mounted on his pillar. Hemay be an inspiriting proof of what men can do, butassuredly not an example of what they should.

Though it is only in a very imperfect state of the world’s

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arrangements that any one can best serve the happinessof others by the absolute sacrifice of his own, yet so longas the world is in that imperfect state, I fully acknowl-edge that the readiness to make such a sacrifice is thehighest virtue which can be found in man. I will add,that in this condition of the world, paradoxical as the as-sertion may be, the conscious ability to do without hap-piness gives the best prospect of realizing such happinessas is attainable. For nothing except that consciousnesscan raise a person above the chances of life, by makinghim feel that, let fate and fortune do their worst, theyhave not power to subdue him: which, once felt, freeshim from excess of anxiety concerning the evils of life,and enables him, like many a Stoic in the worst timesof the Roman Empire, to cultivate in tranquillity thesources of satisfaction accessible to him, without con-cerning himself about the uncertainty of their duration,any more than about their inevitable end.

Meanwhile, let utilitarians never cease to claim the moral-ity of self-devotion as a possession which belongs by asgood a right to them, as either to the Stoic or to the Tran-scendentalist. The utilitarian morality does recognise inhuman beings the power of sacrificing their own greatestgood for the good of others. It only refuses to admit thatthe sacrifice is itself a good. A sacrifice which does notincrease, or tend to increase, the sum total of happiness,it considers as wasted. The only self-renunciation whichit applauds, is devotion to the happiness, or to some ofthe means of happiness, of others; either of mankind col-lectively, or of individuals within the limits imposed by

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the collective interests of mankind.

I must again repeat, what the assailants of utilitarianismseldom have the justice to acknowledge, that the happi-ness which forms the utilitarian standard of what is rightin conduct, is not the agent’s own happiness, but that ofall concerned. As between his own happiness and that ofothers, utilitarianism requires him to be as strictly im-partial as a disinterested and benevolent spectator. Inthe golden rule of Jesus of Nazareth, we read the com-plete spirit of the ethics of utility. To do as one would bedone by, and to love one’s neighbour as oneself, consti-tute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality. As themeans of making the nearest approach to this ideal, util-ity would enjoin, first, that laws and social arrangementsshould place the happiness, or (as speaking practically itmay be called) the interest, of every individual, as nearlyas possible in harmony with the interest of the whole;and secondly, that education and opinion, which have sovast a power over human character, should so use thatpower as to establish in the mind of every individual anindissoluble association between his own happiness andthe good of the whole; especially between his own happi-ness and the practice of such modes of conduct, negativeand positive, as regard for the universal happiness pre-scribes: so that not only he may be unable to conceivethe possibility of happiness to himself, consistently withconduct opposed to the general good, but also that adirect impulse to promote the general good may be inevery individual one of the habitual motives of action,and the sentiments connected therewith may fill a large

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and prominent place in every human being’s sentient ex-istence. If the impugners of the utilitarian morality rep-resented it to their own minds in this its true character, Iknow not what recommendation possessed by any othermorality they could possibly affirm to be wanting to it:what more beautiful or more exalted developments ofhuman nature any other ethical system can be supposedto foster, or what springs of action, not accessible to theutilitarian, such systems rely on for giving effect to theirmandates.

The objectors to utilitarianism cannot always be chargedwith representing it in a discreditable light. On the con-trary, those among them who entertain anything like ajust idea of its disinterested character, sometimes findfault with its standard as being too high for humanity.They say it is exacting too much to require that peo-ple shall always act from the inducement of promotingthe general interests of society. But this is to mistakethe very meaning of a standard of morals, and to con-found the rule of action with the motive of it. It is thebusiness of ethics to tell us what are our duties, or bywhat test we may know them; but no system of ethicsrequires that the sole motive of all we do shall be a feel-ing of duty; on the contrary, ninety-nine hundredths ofall our actions are done from other motives, and rightlyso done, if the rule of duty does not condemn them. Itis the more unjust to utilitarianism that this particularmisapprehension should be made a ground of objectionto it, inasmuch as utilitarian moralists have gone beyondalmost all others in affirming that the motive has nothing

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to do with the morality of the action, though much withthe worth of the agent. He who saves a fellow creaturefrom drowning does what is morally right, whether hismotive be duty, or the hope of being paid for his trouble:he who betrays the friend that trusts him, is guilty ofa crime, even if his object be to serve another friend towhom he is under greater obligations. But to speak onlyof actions done from the motive of duty, and in directobedience to principle: it is a misapprehension of theutilitarian mode of thought, to conceive it as implyingthat people should fix their minds upon so wide a gener-ality as the world, or society at large. The great majorityof good actions are intended, not for the benefit of theworld, but for that of individuals, of which the good ofthe world is made up; and the thoughts of the most vir-tuous man need not on these occasions travel beyond theparticular persons concerned, except so far as is neces-sary to assure himself that in benefiting them he is notviolating the rights — that is, the legitimate and autho-rized expectations — of any one else. The multiplicationof happiness is, according to the utilitarian ethics, theobject of virtue: the occasions on which any person (ex-cept one in a thousand) has it in his power to do this onan extended scale, in other words, to be a public bene-factor, are but exceptional; and on these occasions aloneis he called on to consider public utility; in every othercase, private utility, the interest or happiness of some fewpersons, is all he has to attend to. Those alone the influ-ence of whose actions extends to society in general, needconcern themselves habitually about so large an object.In the case of abstinences indeed — of things which peo-

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ple forbear to do, from moral considerations, though theconsequences in the particular case might be beneficial— it would be unworthy of an intelligent agent not tobe consciously aware that the action is of a class which,if practised generally, would be generally injurious, andthat this is the ground of the obligation to abstain fromit. The amount of regard for the public interest impliedin this recognition, is no greater than is demanded by ev-ery system of morals; for they all enjoin to abstain fromwhatever is manifestly pernicious to society.

The same considerations dispose of another reproach againstthe doctrine of utility, founded on a still grosser miscon-ception of the purpose of a standard of morality, and ofthe very meaning of the words right and wrong. It is of-ten affirmed that utilitarianism renders men cold and un-sympathizing; that it chills their moral feelings towardsindividuals; that it makes them regard only the dry andhard consideration of the consequences of actions, nottaking into their moral estimate the qualities from whichthose actions emanate. If the assertion means that theydo not allow their judgment respecting the rightness orwrongness of an action to be influenced by their opinionof the qualities of the person who does it, this is a com-plaint not against utilitarianism, but against having anystandard of morality at all; for certainly no known ethicalstandard decides an action to be good or bad because itis done by a good or a bad man, still less because done byan amiable, a brave, or a benevolent man or the contrary.These considerations are relevant, not to the estimationof actions, but of persons; and there is nothing in the

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utilitarian theory inconsistent with the fact that thereare other things which interest us in persons besides therightness and wrongness of their actions. The Stoics, in-deed, with the paradoxical misuse of language which waspart of their system, and by which they strove to raisethemselves above all concern about anything but virtue,were fond of saying that he who has that has everything;that he, and only he, is rich, is beautiful, is a king. Butno claim of this description is made for the virtuous manby the utilitarian doctrine. Utilitarians are quite awarethat there are other desirable possessions and qualitiesbesides virtue, and are perfectly willing to allow to all ofthem their full worth. They are also aware that a rightaction does not necessarily indicate a virtuous charac-ter, and that actions which are blameable often proceedfrom qualities entitled to praise. When this is apparentin any particular case, it modifies their estimation, notcertainly of the act, but of the agent. I grant that theyare, notwithstanding, of opinion, that in the long runthe best proof of a good character is good actions; andresolutely refuse to consider any mental disposition asgood, of which the predominant tendency is to producebad conduct. This makes them unpopular with manypeople; but it is an unpopularity which they must sharewith every one who regards the distinction between rightand wrong in a serious light; and the reproach is not onewhich a conscientious utilitarian need be anxious to re-pel.

If no more be meant by the objection than that manyutilitarians look on the morality of actions, as measured

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by the utilitarian standard, with too exclusive a regard,and do not lay sufficient stress upon the other beautiesof character which go towards making a human beingloveable or admirable, this may be admitted. Utilitar-ians who have cultivated their moral feelings, but nottheir sympathies nor their artistic perceptions, do fallinto this mistake; and so do all other moralists under thesame conditions. What can be said in excuse for othermoralists is equally available for them, namely, that ifthere is to be any error, it is better that it should beon that side. As a matter of fact, we may affirm thatamong utilitarians as among adherents of other systems,there is every imaginable degree of rigidity and of lax-ity in the application of their standard: some are evenpuritanically rigorous, while others are as indulgent ascan possibly be desired by sinner or by sentimentalist.But on the whole, a doctrine which brings prominentlyforward the interest that mankind have in the repressionand prevention of conduct which violates the moral law,is likely to be inferior to no other in turning the sanctionsof opinion against such violations. It is true, the ques-tion, What does violate the moral law? is one on whichthose who recognise different standards of morality arelikely now and then to differ. But difference of opinion onmoral questions was not first introduced into the worldby utilitarianism, while that doctrine does supply, if notalways an easy, at all events a tangible and intelligiblemode of deciding such differences.

It may not be superfluous to notice a few more of thecommon misapprehensions of utilitarian ethics, even those

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which are so obvious and gross that it might appear im-possible for any person of candour and intelligence tofall into them: since persons, even of considerable men-tal endowments, often give themselves so little troubleto understand the bearings of any opinion against whichthey entertain a prejudice, and men are in general so lit-tle conscious of this voluntary ignorance as a defect, thatthe vulgarest misunderstandings of ethical doctrines arecontinually met with in the deliberate writings of per-sons of the greatest pretensions both to high principleand to philosophy. We not uncommonly hear the doc-trine of utility inveighed against as a godless doctrine.If it be necessary to say anything at all against so merean assumption, we may say that the question dependsupon what idea we have formed of the moral characterof the Deity. If it be a true belief that God desires, aboveall things, the happiness of his creatures, and that thiswas his purpose in their creation, utility is not only nota godless doctrine, but more profoundly religious thanany other. If it be meant that utilitarianism does notrecognise the revealed will of God as the supreme lawof morals, I answer, that an utilitarian who believes inthe perfect goodness and wisdom of God, necessarily be-lieves that whatever God has thought fit to reveal on thesubject of morals, must fulfil the requirements of util-ity in a supreme degree. But others besides utilitarianshave been of opinion that the Christian revelation wasintended, and is fitted, to inform the hearts and mindsof mankind with a spirit which should enable them tofind for themselves what is right, and incline them to doit when found, rather than to tell them, except in a very

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general way, what it is: and that we need a doctrine ofethics, carefully followed out, to interpret to us the will ofGod. Whether this opinion is correct or not, it is super-fluous here to discuss; since whatever aid religion, eithernatural or revealed, can afford to ethical investigation, isas open to the utilitarian moralist as to any other. Hecan use it as the testimony of God to the usefulness orhurtfulness of any given course of action, by as good aright as others can use it for the indication of a transcen-dental law, having no connexion with usefulness or withhappiness.

Again, Utility is often summarily stigmatized as an im-moral doctrine by giving it the name of Expediency, andtaking advantage of the popular use of that term to con-trast it with Principle. But the Expedient, in the sensein which it is opposed to the Right, generally means thatwhich is expedient for the particular interest of the agenthimself: as when a minister sacrifices the interest of hiscountry to keep himself in place. When it means any-thing better than this, it means that which is expedientfor some immediate object, some temporary purpose, butwhich violates a rule whose observance is expedient ina much higher degree. The Expedient, in this sense, in-stead of being the same thing with the useful, is a branchof the hurtful. Thus, it would often be expedient, for thepurpose of getting over some momentary embarrassment,or attaining some object immediately useful to ourselvesor others, to tell a lie. But inasmuch as the cultivationin ourselves of a sensitive feeling on the subject of ve-racity, is one of the most useful, and the enfeeblement of

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that feeling one of the most hurtful, things to which ourconduct can be instrumental; and inasmuch as any, evenunintentional, deviation from truth, does that much to-wards weakening the trustworthiness of human assertion,which is not only the principal support of all present so-cial well-being, but the insufficiency of which does morethan any one thing that can be named to keep back civil-isation, virtue, everything on which human happiness onthe largest scale depends; we feel that the violation, for apresent advantage, of a rule of such transcendent expedi-ency, is not expedient, and that he who, for the sake of aconvenience to himself or to some other individual, doeswhat depends on him to deprive mankind of the good,and inflict upon them the evil, involved in the greater orless reliance which they can place in each other’s word,acts the part of one of their worst enemies. Yet that eventhis rule, sacred as it is, admits of possible exceptions, isacknowledged by all moralists; the chief of which is whenthe withholding of some fact (as of information from amale-factor, or of bad news from a person dangerouslyill) would preserve some one (especially a person otherthan oneself) from great and unmerited evil, and whenthe withholding can only be effected by denial. But inorder that the exception may not extend itself beyondthe need, and may have the least possible effect in weak-ening reliance on veracity, it ought to be recognized, and,if possible, its limits defined; and if the principle of utilityis good for anything, it must be good for weighing theseconflicting utilities against one another, and marking outthe region within which one or the other preponderates.

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Again, defenders of utility often find themselves calledupon to reply to such objections as this — that there isnot time, previous to action, for calculating and weighingthe effects of any line of conduct on the general happi-ness. This is exactly as if any one were to say that itis impossible to guide our conduct by Christianity, be-cause there is not time, on every occasion on which any-thing has to be done, to read through the Old and NewTestaments. The answer to the objection is, that therehas been ample time, namely, the whole past durationof the human species. During all that time mankindhave been learning by experience the tendencies of ac-tions; on which experience all the prudence, as well asall the morality of life, is dependent. People talk as ifthe commencement of this course of experience had hith-erto been put off, and as if, at the moment when someman feels tempted to meddle with the property or lifeof another, he had to begin considering for the first timewhether murder and theft are injurious to human hap-piness. Even then I do not think that he would find thequestion very puzzling; but, at all events, the matter isnow done to his hand. It is truly a whimsical supposi-tion, that if mankind were agreed in considering utilityto be the test of morality, they would remain withoutany agreement as to what is useful, and would take nomeasures for having their notions on the subject taughtto the young, and enforced by law and opinion. There isno difficulty in proving any ethical standard whatever towork ill, if we suppose universal idiocy to be conjoinedwith it, but on any hypothesis short of that, mankindmust by this time have acquired positive beliefs as to the

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effects of some actions on their happiness; and the be-liefs which have thus come down are the rules of moralityfor the multitude, and for the philosopher until he hassucceeded in finding better. That philosophers mighteasily do this, even now, on many subjects; that the re-ceived code of ethics is by no means of divine right; andthat mankind have still much to learn as to the effectsof actions on the general happiness, I admit, or rather,earnestly maintain. The corollaries from the principle ofutility, like the precepts of every practical art, admit ofindefinite improvement, and, in a progressive state of thehuman mind, their improvement is perpetually going on.But to consider the rules of morality as improvable, isone thing; to pass over the intermediate generalizationsentirely, and endeavour to test each individual action di-rectly by the first principle, is another. It is a strangenotion that the acknowledgment of a first principle isinconsistent with the admission of secondary ones. Toinform a traveller respecting the place of his ultimatedestination, is not to forbid the use of landmarks anddirection-posts on the way. The proposition that hap-piness is the end and aim of morality, does not meanthat no road ought to be laid down to that goal, or thatpersons going thither should not be advised to take onedirection rather than another. Men really ought to leaveoff talking a kind of nonsense on this subject, which theywould neither talk nor listen to on other matters of prac-tical concernment. Nobody argues that the art of naviga-tion is not founded on astronomy, because sailors cannotwait to calculate the Nautical Almanack. Being rationalcreatures, they go to sea with it ready calculated; and all

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rational creatures go out upon the sea of life with theirminds made up on the common questions of right andwrong, as well as on many of the far more difficult ques-tions of wise and foolish. And this, as long as foresight isa human quality, it is to be presumed they will continueto do. Whatever we adopt as the fundamental principleof morality, we require subordinate principles to applyit by: the impossibility of doing without them, beingcommon to all systems, can afford no argument againstany one in particular: but gravely to argue as if no suchsecondary principles could be had, and as if mankindhad remained till now, and always must remain, withoutdrawing any general conclusions from the experience ofhuman life, is as high a pitch, I think, as absurdity hasever reached in philosophical controversy.

The remainder of the stock arguments against utilitari-anism mostly consist in laying to its charge the commoninfirmities of human nature, and the general difficultieswhich embarrass conscientious persons in shaping theircourse through life. We are told that an utilitarian willbe apt to make his own particular case an exception tomoral rules, and, when under temptation, will see anutility in the breach of a rule, greater than he will seein its observance. But is utility the only creed which isable to furnish us with excuses for evil doing, and meansof cheating our own conscience? They are afforded inabundance by all doctrines which recognise as a fact inmorals the existence of conflicting considerations; whichall doctrines do, that have been believed by sane per-sons. It is not the fault of any creed, but of the com-

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plicated nature of human affairs, that rules of conductcannot be so framed as to require no exceptions, andthat hardly any kind of action can safely be laid down aseither always obligatory or always condemnable. Thereis no ethical creed which does not temper the rigidity ofits laws, by giving a certain latitude, under the moralresponsibility of the agent, for accommodation to pecu-liarities of circumstances; and under every creed, at theopening thus made, self-deception and dishonest casu-istry get in. There exists no moral system under whichthere do not arise unequivocal cases of conflicting obli-gation. These are the real difficulties, the knotty pointsboth in the theory of ethics, and in the conscientiousguidance of personal conduct. They are overcome prac-tically with greater or with less success according to theintellect and virtue of the individual; but it can hardlybe pretended that any one will be the less qualified fordealing with them, from possessing an ultimate standardto which conflicting rights and duties can be referred. Ifutility is the ultimate source of moral obligations, util-ity may be invoked to decide between them when theirdemands are incompatible. Though the application ofthe standard may be difficult, it is better than none atall: while in other systems, the moral laws all claimingindependent authority, there is no common umpire enti-tled to interfere between them; their claims to precedenceone over another rest on little better than sophistry, andunless determined, as they generally are, by the unac-knowledged influence of considerations of utility, afforda free scope for the action of personal desires and par-tialities. We must remember that only in these cases of

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conflict between secondary principles is it requisite thatfirst principles should be appealed to. There is no caseof moral obligation in which some secondary principle isnot involved; and if only one, there can seldom be anyreal doubt which one it is, in the mind of any person bywhom the principle itself is recognized.

[...]

CHAPTER IV.OF WHAT SORT OF PROOF THE PRINCIPLE OF

UTILITY IS SUSCEPTIBLE.

It has already been remarked, that questions of ultimateends do not admit of proof, in the ordinary acceptationof the term. To be incapable of proof by reasoning iscommon to all first principles; to the first premises ofour knowledge, as well as to those of our conduct. Butthe former, being matters of fact, may be the subject ofa direct appeal to the faculties which judge of fact —namely, our senses, and our internal consciousness. Canan appeal be made to the same faculties on questions ofpractical ends? Or by what other faculty is cognizancetaken of them?

Questions about ends are, in other words, questions whatthings are desirable. The utilitarian doctrine is, thathappiness is desirable, and the only thing desirable, asan end; all other things being only desirable as means tothat end. What ought to be required of this doctrine —what conditions is it requisite that the doctrine shouldfulfil — to make good its claim to be believed?

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The only proof capable of being given that an object isvisible, is that people actually see it. The only proof thata sound is audible, is that people hear it: and so of theother sources of our experience. In like manner, I ap-prehend, the sole evidence it is possible to produce thatanything is desirable, is that people do actually desireit. If the end which the utilitarian doctrine proposes toitself were not, in theory and in practice, acknowledgedto be an end, nothing could ever convince any personthat it was so. No reason can be given why the generalhappiness is desirable, except that each person, so faras he believes it to be attainable, desires his own happi-ness. This, however, being a fact, we have not only allthe proof which the case admits of, but all which it ispossible to require, that happiness is a good: that eachperson’s happiness is a good to that person, and the gen-eral happiness, therefore, a good to the aggregate of allpersons. Happiness has made out its title as one of theends of conduct, and consequently one of the criteria ofmorality.

But it has not, by this alone, proved itself to be thesole criterion. To do that, it would seem, by the samerule, necessary to show, not only that people desire hap-piness, but that they never desire anything else. Nowit is palpable that they do desire things which, in com-mon language, are decidedly distinguished from happi-ness. They desire, for example, virtue, and the absenceof vice, no less really than pleasure and the absence ofpain. The desire of virtue is not as universal, but it is asauthentic a fact, as the desire of happiness. And hence

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the opponents of the utilitarian standard deem that theyhave a right to infer that there are other ends of humanaction besides happiness, and that happiness is not thestandard of approbation and disapprobation.

But does the utilitarian doctrine deny that people de-sire virtue, or maintain that virtue is not a thing to bedesired? The very reverse. It maintains not only thatvirtue is to be desired, but that it is to be desired dis-interestedly, for itself. Whatever may be the opinionof utilitarian moralists as to the original conditions bywhich virtue is made virtue; however they may believe(as they do) that actions and dispositions are only virtu-ous because they promote another end than virtue; yetthis being granted, and it having been decided, from con-siderations of this description, what is virtuous, they notonly place virtue at the very head of the things which aregood as means to the ultimate end, but they also recog-nise as a psychological fact the possibility of its being, tothe individual, a good in itself, without looking to anyend beyond it; and hold, that the mind is not in a rightstate, not in a state conformable to Utility, not in thestate most conducive to the general happiness, unless itdoes love virtue in this manner — as a thing desirable initself, even although, in the individual instance, it shouldnot produce those other desirable consequences which ittends to produce, and on account of which it is held to bevirtue. This opinion is not, in the smallest degree, a de-parture from the Happiness principle. The ingredients ofhappiness are very various, and each of them is desirablein itself, and not merely when considered as swelling an

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aggregate. The principle of utility does not mean thatany given pleasure, as music, for instance, or any givenexemption from pain, as for example health, are to belooked upon as means to a collective something termedhappiness, and to be desired on that account. They aredesired and desirable in and for themselves; besides be-ing means, they are a part of the end. Virtue, accordingto the utilitarian doctrine, is not naturally and originallypart of the end, but it is capable of becoming so; and inthose who love it disinterestedly it has become so, and isdesired and cherished, not as a means to happiness, butas a part of their happiness.

To illustrate this farther, we may remember that virtueis not the only thing, originally a means, and which ifit were not a means to anything else, would be and re-main indifferent, but which by association with what itis a means to, comes to be desired for itself, and thattoo with the utmost intensity. What, for example, shallwe say of the love of money? There is nothing origi-nally more desirable about money than about any heapof glittering pebbles. Its worth is solely that of the thingswhich it will buy; the desires for other things than itself,which it is a means of gratifying. Yet the love of moneyis not only one of the strongest moving forces of humanlife, but money is, in many cases, desired in and for it-self; the desire to possess it is often stronger than thedesire to use it, and goes on increasing when all the de-sires which point to ends beyond it, to be compassed byit, are falling off. It may be then said truly, that moneyis desired not for the sake of an end, but as part of the

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end. From being a means to happiness, it has come to beitself a principal ingredient of the individual’s conceptionof happiness. The same may be said of the majority ofthe great objects of human life — power, for example,or fame; except that to each of these there is a certainamount of immediate pleasure annexed, which has atleast the semblance of being naturally inherent in them;a thing which cannot be said of money. Still, however,the strongest natural attraction, both of power and offame, is the immense aid they give to the attainment ofour other wishes; and it is the strong association thusgenerated between them and all our objects of desire,which gives to the direct desire of them the intensity itoften assumes, so as in some characters to surpass instrength all other desires. In these cases the means havebecome a part of the end, and a more important partof it than any of the things which they are means to.What was once desired as an instrument for the attain-ment of happiness, has come to be desired for its ownsake. In being desired for its own sake it is, however,desired as part of happiness. The person is made, orthinks he would be made, happy by its mere possession;and is made unhappy by failure to obtain it. The desireof it is not a different thing from the desire of happi-ness, any more than the love of music, or the desire ofhealth. They are included in happiness. They are someof the elements of which the desire of happiness is madeup. Happiness is not an abstract idea, but a concretewhole; and these are some of its parts. And the utilitar-ian standard sanctions and approves their being so. Lifewould be a poor thing, very ill provided with sources of

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happiness, if there were not this provision of nature, bywhich things originally indifferent, but conducive to, orotherwise associated with, the satisfaction of our prim-itive desires, become in themselves sources of pleasuremore valuable than the primitive pleasures, both in per-manency, in the space of human existence that they arecapable of covering, and even in intensity. Virtue, ac-cording to the utilitarian conception, is a good of thisdescription. There was no original desire of it, or motiveto it, save its conduciveness to pleasure, and especiallyto protection from pain. But through the associationthus formed, it may be felt a good in itself, and desiredas such with as great intensity as any other good; andwith this difference between it and the love of money, ofpower, or of fame, that all of these may, and often do,render the individual noxious to the other members ofthe society to which he belongs, whereas there is noth-ing which makes him so much a blessing to them as thecultivation of the disinterested, love of virtue. And con-sequently, the utilitarian standard, while it tolerates andapproves those other acquired desires, up to the pointbeyond which they would be more injurious to the gen-eral happiness than promotive of it, enjoins and requiresthe cultivation of the love of virtue up to the greateststrength possible, as being above all things important tothe general happiness.

It results from the preceding considerations, that thereis in reality nothing desired except happiness. Whateveris desired otherwise than as a means to some end beyonditself, and ultimately to happiness, is desired as itself a

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part of happiness, and is not desired for itself until ithas become so. Those who desire virtue for its own sake,desire it either because the consciousness of it is a plea-sure, or because the consciousness of being without it isa pain, or for both reasons united; as in truth the plea-sure and pain seldom exist separately, but almost alwaystogether, the same person feeling pleasure in the degreeof virtue attained, and pain in not having attained more.If one of these gave him no pleasure, and the other nopain, he would not love or desire virtue, or would desireit only for the other benefits which it might produce tohimself or to persons whom he cared for.

We have now, then, an answer to the question, of whatsort of proof the principle of utility is susceptible. If theopinion which I have now stated is psychologically true— if human nature is so constituted as to desire nothingwhich is not either a part of happiness or a means ofhappiness, we can have no other proof, and we requireno other, that these are the only things desirable. Ifso, happiness is the sole end of human action, and thepromotion of it the test by which to judge of all humanconduct; from whence it necessarily follows that it mustbe the criterion of morality, since a part is included inthe whole.

And now to decide whether this is really so; whethermankind do desire nothing for itself but that which is apleasure to them, or of which the absence is a pain; wehave evidently arrived at a question of fact and expe-rience, dependent, like all similar questions, upon ev-idence. It can only be determined by practised self-

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consciousness and self-observation, assisted by observa-tion of others. I believe that these sources of evidence,impartially consulted, will declare that desiring a thingand finding it pleasant, aversion to it and thinking of itas painful, are phenomena entirely inseparable, or rathertwo parts of the same phenomenon; in strictness of lan-guage, two different modes of naming the same psycho-logical fact: that to think of an object as desirable (un-less for the sake of its consequences), and to think of itas pleasant, are one and the same thing; and that to de-sire anything, except in proportion as the idea of it ispleasant, is a physical and metaphysical impossibility.

So obvious does this appear to me, that I expect it willhardly be disputed: and the objection made will be, notthat desire can possibly be directed to anything ulti-mately except pleasure and exemption from pain, butthat the will is a different thing from desire; that a personof confirmed virtue, or any other person whose purposesare fixed, carries out his purposes without any thoughtof the pleasure he has in contemplating them, or expectsto derive from their fulfilment; and persists in acting onthem, even though these pleasures are much diminished,by changes in his character or decay of his passive sen-sibilities, or are outweighed by the pains which the pur-suit of the purposes may bring upon him. All this I fullyadmit, and have stated it elsewhere, as positively andemphatically as any one. Will, the active phenomenon,is a different thing from desire, the state of passive sensi-bility, and though originally an offshoot from it, may intime take root and detach itself from the parent stock;

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so much so, that in the case of an habitual purpose, in-stead of willing the thing because we desire it, we of-ten desire it only because we will it. This, however, isbut an instance of that familiar fact, the power of habit,and is nowise confined to the case of virtuous actions.Many indifferent things, which men originally did froma motive of some sort, they continue to do from habit.Sometimes this is done unconsciously, the consciousnesscoming only after the action: at other times with con-scious volition, but volition which has become habitual,and is put into operation by the force of habit, in oppo-sition perhaps to the deliberate preference, as often hap-pens with those who have contracted habits of viciousor hurtful indulgence. Third and last comes the case inwhich the habitual act of will in the individual instanceis not in contradiction to the general intention prevailingat other times, but in fulfilment of it; as in the case ofthe person of confirmed virtue, and of all who pursuedeliberately and consistently any determinate end. Thedistinction between will and desire thus understood, isan authentic and highly important psychological fact;but the fact consists solely in this — that will, like allother parts of our constitution, is amenable to habit, andthat we may will from habit what we no longer desire foritself, or desire only because we will it. It is not the lesstrue that will, in the beginning, is entirely produced bydesire; including in that term the repelling influence ofpain as well as the attractive one of pleasure. Let us takeinto consideration, no longer the person who has a con-firmed will to do right, but him in whom that virtuouswill is still feeble, conquerable by temptation, and not

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to be fully relied on; by what means can it be strength-ened? How can the will to be virtuous, where it doesnot exist in sufficient force, be implanted or awakened?Only by making the person desire virtue — by makinghim think of it in a pleasurable light, or of its absence ina painful one. It is by associating the doing right withpleasure, or the doing wrong with pain, or by elicitingand impressing and bringing home to the person’s expe-rience the pleasure naturally involved in the one or thepain in the other, that it is possible to call forth thatwill to be virtuous, which, when confirmed, acts withoutany thought of either pleasure or pain. Will is the childof desire, and passes out of the dominion of its parentonly to come under that of habit. That which is the re-sult of habit affords no presumption of being intrinsicallygood; and there would be no reason for wishing that thepurpose of virtue should become independent of pleasureand pain, were it not that the influence of the pleasurableand painful associations which prompt to virtue is notsufficiently to be depended on for unerring constancy ofaction until it has acquired the support of habit. Bothin feeling and in conduct, habit is the only thing whichimparts certainty; and it is because of the importance toothers of being able to rely absolutely on one’s feelingsand conduct, and to oneself of being able to rely on one’sown, that the will to do right ought to be cultivated intothis habitual independence. In other words, this stateof the will is a means to good, not intrinsically a good;and does not contradict the doctrine that nothing is agood to human beings but in so far as it is either itselfpleasurable, or a means of attaining pleasure or averting

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pain.

But if this doctrine be true, the principle of utility isproved. Whether it is so or not, must now be left to theconsideration of the thoughtful reader.

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