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SOCIAL STATICS. 
 
LONDON : 
 GEORGE WOODFALL AND SON, 
 
 ANGEL COURT, SKINXER STHEET- 
 
SOCIAL STATICS 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE CONDITIONS 
 
 ESSENTIAL TO 
 
 HUMAN HAPPINESS 
 
 SPECIFIED, 
 
 AND THE FIKST OF THEM DEVELOPED. 
 
 HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 LONDON: 
 JOHN CHAPMAN, 142, STRAND. 
 
 MDCCCLI. 
 
 M ,; ;i ■ ■ 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Being somewhat at variance with precedent, the tone and 
 mode of treatment occasionally adopted in the following pages 
 vnh, perhaps, provoke criticism. Whether, in thus innovating 
 upon estabhshed usage, the writer has acted judiciously or 
 otherwise, the event must determine. He has not, however, 
 transgressed without adequate motive; having done so under 
 the belief that, as it is the purpose of a book to influence con- 
 duct, the best way of writing a book must be the way best 
 fitted to effect this purpose. 
 
 Should exception be taken to the manifestations of feeling 
 now and then met with, as out of place in a treatise having so 
 scientific a title; it is replied that, in their present phase of 
 progress, men are but little swayed by purely intellectual con- 
 siderations — that to be operative, these must be enforced by 
 direct or imphed appeals to the sentiments — and that, pro- 
 vided such appeals are not in 2}lccce of, but merely supple- 
 mentary to, the deductions of logic, no well-grounded objection 
 can be made to them. The reader will find that the several 
 conclusions submitted to him are primarily based on entirely 
 impersonal reasoning, by which alone they may be judged; 
 and if, for the sake of commending these conclusions to the 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 many, the sympathies have been indirectly addressed, the 
 general argument cannot have been thereby weakened, if it 
 has not been strengthened. 
 
 Possibly the relaxations of style in some cases used, will be 
 censured, as beneath the gravity of the subject. In defence 
 of them it may be urged, that the measured movement which 
 custom prescribes for philosophical works, is productive of a 
 monotony extremely repulsive to the generahty of readers. 
 That no counterbalancing advantages are obtained, the writer 
 does not assert. But, for his own part, he has preferred to 
 sacrifice somewhat of conventional dignity, in the hope of 
 rendering his theme interesting to a larger number. 
 
 London, December, 1850. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Doctrine of Expediency . 1 
 
 The Doctrine of the Moral Sense 16 
 
 Lemma I. 31 
 
 Lemma IL 38 
 
 PART I. 
 
 Chap. I. Definition of Morality 55 
 
 II. The Evanescence of Evil 59 
 
 III. The Divine Idea ; and the Conditions of its Realization . 66 
 
 PART II. 
 
 IV. Derivation of a First Principle 
 V. Secondary Derivation of a First Principle 
 
 VI. First Principle 
 
 VII. Application of this First Principle . 
 VIII. The Rights of Life and Personal Liberty . 
 IX The Right to the Use of the Earth . 
 
 75 
 90 
 103 
 110 
 112 
 114 
 
Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 I'AOE 
 
 Chap. X. The Right of Property 126 
 
 XI. The Right of Property in Ideas 136 
 
 XII. The Right of Property in Character . . . .143 
 
 XIII. The Right of Exchange 146 
 
 XIV. The Right of Free Speech 148 
 
 XV. Further Rights . 154 
 
 ^.XVI. The Rights of Women 155 
 
 XVII. The Rights of Children 172 
 
 PAET III. 
 
 XVIII. Political Rights 195 
 
 XIX. The Right to Ignore the State 206 
 
 XX. The Constitution of the State 217 
 
 XXI. The Duty of the State 250 
 
 XXII. The Limit of State-Duty 274 
 
 XXIII. The Regulation of Commerce 296 
 
 XXIV. "Religious Establishments 305 
 
 XXV. Poor-Laws 311 
 
 XXVI. National Education 330 
 
 " XXVII. Government Colonization 357 
 
 XXVIII. Sanitary Supervision 372 
 
 XXIX. Currency, Postal Arrangements, &c 396 
 
 PAET IV. 
 
 XXX. General Considerations 409 
 
 XXXI. Summary ... , 457 
 
 XXXII. Conclusion 463 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF EXPEDIENCY. 
 § 1- 
 
 " Give us a guide," cry men to the philosopher. " We 
 would escape from these miseries in which we are entangled. 
 A hetter state is ever present to our imaginations, and we 
 yearn after it ; hut all our efforts to realize it ai'e fruitless. 
 We are weary of perpetual failures ; tell us hy what rule we 
 may attain our desire." 
 
 "Whatever is expedient is right;" is one of the last of the 
 many replies to this appeal. 
 
 "True," rejoiQ some of the appHcants. "With the Deity 
 right ^n^ expedient are doubtless convertible terms. For us, 
 however, there remains the question — which is the antecedent, 
 and which is the consequent ? Granting your assiunption 
 that right is the unknown quantity and expediency the known 
 one, your formula may be serviceable. But we deny your 
 premises; a painful experience has proved the two to be 
 equally indeterminate. Nay, we begin to suspect that the 
 right is the more easUy ascertained of the two ; and that your 
 maxim would be better if transposed into — whatever is right 
 is expedient." 
 
 "Let your rule be, the greatest happiness to the great- 
 est number," interposes another authority. 
 
 " That, like the other, is no rule at all," it is rephed ; " but 
 
 B 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 rather an enunciation of the problem to be solved. It is your 
 'greatest happiness' of which we have been so long and so 
 fruitlessly in search ; albeit we never gave it a name. You 
 tell us nothing new; you merely give words to our want. 
 What you call an answer, is simply our own question turned 
 the right side up. If this is your philosophy it is surely 
 empty, for it merely echoes the interrogation." 
 
 " Have a little patience," returns the moralist, " and I will 
 give you my opinion as to the mode of securing this greatest 
 happiness to the greatest number." 
 
 "There again," exclaim the objectors, "you mistake our 
 requirement. We want something else than opinions. We 
 have had enough of them. Every futile scheme for the 
 general good has been based on opinion; and we have no 
 guarantee that your plan will not add one to the list of failures. 
 Have you discovered a means of forming an infallible judg- 
 ment ? If not, you are, for aught we can perceive, as much 
 in the dark as ourselves. True, you have obtained a clearer 
 view of the end to be arrived at ; but concerning the route 
 leading to it, your ofifer of an opinion proves that you know 
 nothing more certain than we do. We demur to your maxim 
 because it is not what we wanted — a guide ; because it dictates 
 no sure mode of securing the desideratum ; because it puts no 
 veto upon a mistaken policy ; because it permits all actions — ■ 
 bad, as readily as good^-provided only the actors believe them 
 conducive to the prescribed end_. Your doctrines of ' expe- 
 diency ' or ' utility ' or ' general good ' or ' greatest happiness 
 to the greatest number' afford not a solitaiy command of a 
 practical chai-acter. - Let but rulers think, or profess to think, 
 that their measures will benefit the community, and your 
 philosopby stands mute in the presence of the most egregious 
 folly, or tl^e blackest misconduct. This will not do for us. 
 We seek a system that can return a definite answer when we 
 ask^-' Is this act good ? ' and not hke yours, reply—' Yes, 
 if it will benefit you.' If you can show us such an one— if you 
 pan give; us ^ axiom froiji wbich we may develope successive 
 
INTRODUCTION. 6 
 
 propositions until we have with mathematical certainty solved 
 all our difficulties — we will thank you. If not, we must go 
 elsewhere." 
 
 In his defence, our philosopher submits that such expecta- 
 tions are unreasonable. He doubts the possibility of a 
 strictly scientific morality. Moreover he maintains that his 
 system is sufficient for all practical purposes. He has de- 
 finitely pointed out the goal to be attained. He has surveyed 
 the. tract lying between us and it. He believes he has dis- 
 covered the best route. And finally he has volunteered as 
 pioneer. Having done this, he claims to have performed aU 
 that can be expected of him, and deprecates the opposition of 
 these critics as factious, and their objections as frivolous. 
 Let us examine this position somewhat more closely. 
 
 §2. 
 
 Assuming it to be in other respects satisfactory, a rule, 
 principle, or axiom, is valuable only in so far as the words 
 in which it is expressed have a definite meaning. The 
 terms used must be universally accepted in the same sense, 
 otherwise the proposition will be liable to such various con- 
 structions, as to lose all claim to the title — a rule. We must 
 therefore take it for granted that when he announced " the 
 greatest happiness to the greatest number" as the canon of 
 social morality, its originator supposed mankind to be 
 unanimous in their defirdtion of " greatest happiness.". 
 
 This was a most unfortunate assumption, for no fact is 
 more palpable than that the standard of happiness is in- 
 finitely variable. In all ages — amongst every people — by 
 each class — do we find different notions of it entertained. To 
 the wandering gipsy a home is tu-esome; whilst a Swiss is 
 miserable without one. Progress is necessary to the well-being 
 of the Anglo-Saxons; on the other hand the Esquimaux are 
 content iu their squalid poverty, have no latent wants, and 
 are still what they were in the days of Tacitus. An Irishman 
 delights in a row ; a Chinese' in pageantry and ceremonies; and 
 
 B 2 
 
4 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the usually apathetic Javan gets vociferously enthusiastic over a 
 cock-fight. The heaven of the Hehrew is " a city of gold and 
 precious stones, with a supernatural abundance of com and 
 ■wine;" that of the Turk — a harem peopled hy houris ; that 
 of the American Indian — a " happy hunting ground ; " in 
 the Norse paradise there were to be daily battles with magical 
 heaUng of wounds ; whilst the Australian hopes that after 
 death he shall "jump up a white fellow, and have plenty of 
 sixpences." Descending to individual instances, we find Louis 
 XVI. interpreting "greatest happiness" to mean — making 
 locks ; instead of which his successor read — making empires. 
 It was seemingly the opirdon of Lycurgus that perfect phy- 
 sical development was the chief essential to human felicity ; 
 Plotinus, on the contrary, was so purely ideal in his aspirations 
 as to be ashamed of his body. Indeed the many con- 
 tradictory answers given by Grecian thinkers to the ques- 
 tion — What constitutes happiness ? have given occasion to 
 comparisons that have now become trite. Nor has greater 
 unanimity been shown amongst ourselves. To a miserly 
 Elwes the hoarding of money was the only enjoyment 
 of life; but Day, the philanthropic author of "Sand- 
 ford and Merton," could find no pleasurable employment 
 save in its distribution. Eural quietude, books, and a friend, 
 are the wants of the poet; a tuft-hunter longs rather for a 
 large circle of titled acquaintance, a box at the Opera, and 
 the freedom of Almack's. The ambitions of the tradesman 
 and the artist are anything but ahke; and could we com- 
 pare the air castles of the ploughman and the philosopher, we 
 should find them of widely-difierent orders of architecture. 
 
 Generalizing such facts, we see that the standard of " greatest 
 happiness " possesses as Httle fixity as the other exponents of 
 human nature. Between nations the difi"erences of opinion are 
 conspicuous enough. On contrasting the Hebrew patriarchs 
 with their existing descendants, we observe that even in the 
 same race the beau ideal of existence changes. The members 
 of each community disagree upon the questioQ. Neither, if 
 
INTRODUCTION. ft 
 
 we compare the wishes of the gluttonous school-boy with 
 those of the earth-scorning transcendentalist into whom he 
 may afterwards grow, do we find any constancy in the indi- 
 vidual. So we may say, not only that every epoch and every 
 people has its peculiar conceptions of happiness, but that no 
 two men have like conceptions ; and further, that in each 
 man the conception is not the same at any two periods of 
 life. 
 
 The rationale of- this is simple enough. Happiness signi- 
 fies a gratified state of all the faculties. The gratification of a 
 faculty is produced by its exercise. To be agreeable that 
 exercise must be proportionate to the power of the faculty; 
 if it is insufficient discontent arises, and its excess produces 
 weariness. Hence, to have complete felicity is to have all 
 the faculties exerted in the ratio of their several developments ; 
 and an ideal arrangement of circumstances calculated to 
 secure this constitutes the standard of " greatest happiness ; " 
 but the minds of no two individuals contain the same com- 
 bination of elements. Duphcate men are not to be found. 
 There is in each a difierent balance of desires. Therefore the 
 conditions adapted for the highest enjoyment of one, would 
 not perfectly compass the same end for any other. And con- 
 sequently the notion of happiness must vary with the dis- 
 position and character ; that is, must vary indefinitely. 
 
 Whereby we are also led to the inevitable conclusion that 
 a true conception of what human life should be, is possible 
 only to the ideal man. We may make approximate estimates, 
 but he only in whom the component feehngs exist in their 
 normal proportions is capable of a perfect aspiration. And as 
 the world yet contains none such, it follows that a specific idea 
 of " greatest happiness " is for the present unattainable. It 
 is not then to be wondered at, if Paleys and Benthams make 
 vain attempts at a definition. The question involves one of 
 those mysteries which men are ever trying to penetrate and 
 ever failing. It is the insoluble riddle which Care, Sphinx-like, 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 puts to each new comer, and in default of answer devours him. 
 And as yet there is no ffidipus, nor any sign of one. 
 
 The allegation that these are hypercritical objections, and 
 that for all practical purposes we agree sufficiently well as to 
 what "gi-eatest happiness" means, will possibly be made by 
 some. It were easy to disprove this, but it is unnecessary, for 
 there are plenty of questions practical enough to satisfy such 
 caviUers, and about which men exliibit none of tliis pretended 
 unanimity. For example : 
 
 — What is the ratio between the mental and bodily 
 enjoyments constituting this " greatest happiness " ? There 
 is a point up to which increase of mental activity pro- 
 duces increase of happiness ; but beyond which, it produces 
 in the end more pain than pleasure. Where is that point? 
 Some appear to think that intellectual culture and the 
 gratifications deriveable Irom it can hardly be carried too 
 far. Others again maintain that aheady amongst the edu- 
 cated classes mental excitements ai-e taken in excess ; and 
 that were more time given to a proper fulfilment of the animal 
 functions, a larger amount of enjoyment would he obtained. 
 If " greatest happiness " is to be the rule, it becomes needful 
 to decide which of these opinions is correct; and further to 
 determine the exact boundary between the use and abuse of 
 every faculty. 
 
 — Which is most truly an element in the desired feHcitv, 
 content or aspiration ? The generality assume, as a matter of 
 com-se, that content is. They think it the chief essential to well- 
 being. There are others, however, who hold that but for 
 discontent we should have been still savages. It is in their 
 eyes the greatest incentive to progress. Nay, they maintain 
 that were content the order of the day, society would even 
 now begin to decay. It is required to reconcile these con- 
 tradictory theories. 
 
 — And this synonyme for " greatest happiness " — this " utility " 
 — what shall be comprised under it ? The miUion would con- 
 
INTRO DUC'rroN. 7 
 
 fine it to the things which directly or indirectly minister to th6 
 bodily wants, and in the words of the adage "help to gdt 
 something to put in the pot." Others there are who think 
 mental improvement useful in itself, irrespective of so-caUed 
 practical results, and would therefore teach astronomy, com- 
 parative anatomy, ethnology, and the Hke, together with logic 
 and metaphysics. Unlike some of the Roman writers who 
 held the practice of the fine arts to be absolutely vicious, there 
 are now many, who suppose utility to comprehend poetry, 
 painting, sculpture, the decorative arts, and whatever aids 
 the refinement of the taste. Whilst an extreme party maintains 
 that music, dancing, the drama, and what are commonly 
 called amusements, are equally worthy to be incbided: In 
 place of all which discordance we ought to hav3 agreement. 
 
 — • Whether shall we adopt the theory of some that felicity 
 means the greatest possible enjoyment of this life's pleasures, 
 or that of others, that it consists in anticipating the pleasures 
 of a life to come ? And if we compromise the matter, and say 
 it should combine both, how much of each shall go to its com- 
 position ? 
 
 — Or what must we think of this wealth-seeking age of ours ? 
 Shall we consider the total absorption of time and energy in 
 business — the servitude of the mind to the needs of the body — 
 the spending of life in the accumulation of the means to live, 
 as constituting " greatest happiness," and act accordingly ? Or 
 shall we legislate upon the assumption that this is to be re- 
 garded as the voracity of a Ijirva assimilating material for the 
 development of the future psyche ? 
 
 Similar unsettled questions might be indefinitely multi- 
 pUed. Not only therefore is an agreement as to the mean- 
 ing of " greatest happiness " theoretically impossible, but it is 
 also manifest, that men are at issue upon all topics, which for 
 their determination require defined notions of it. 
 
 So that in directing us to this "greatest happiness to the 
 greatest number," as the object towards which we should steer, 
 our pilot " keeps the word of promise to our ear and breaks it 
 
8 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 to our hope." What he shows us through his telescope is a 
 fata morgana, and not the promised land. The real haven 
 of our hopes dips far down helow the horizon and has yet been 
 seen hy none. It is beyond the ken of seer be he never so far- 
 sighted. Faith not sight must be our guide. We cannot do 
 without a compass. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Even were the fundamental proposition of the expediency 
 system not thus vitiated by the indefiniteness of its terms, 
 it would still be vulnerable. Granting for the sake of ar- 
 gument, that the desideratum, "greatest happiness," is duly 
 comprehended, its identity and nature agreed upon by all, and 
 the direction in which it has satisfactorily settled, there yet 
 remains the unwarranted assumption that it is possible for the 
 self-guided human judgment to determine, with something like 
 precision, by what methods it may be achieved. Experience 
 daily proves that just the same uncertainty which exists re- 
 specting the specific ends to be obtained, exists hkewise re- 
 specting the right mode of attaining them when supposed to be 
 known. In their attempts to compass one after another the 
 several items which go to make up the grand total, " greatest 
 happiness," men have been anything but successful ; their most 
 promising measures having commonly turned out the greatest 
 failures. Let us look at a few cases. 
 
 When it was enacted in Bavaria that no marriage should be 
 allowed between parties without capital, unless certain authori- 
 ties could " see a reasonable prospect of the parties being able 
 to provide for their children," it was doubtless intended to ad- 
 vance the pubUc weal by checking improvident unions, and 
 redundant population; a purpose most pohticians will con- 
 sider praiseworthy, and a provision which many will think 
 well adapted to secure it. Nevertheless this apparently saga- 
 cious measure has by no means answered its end; the fact 
 being that in Munich, the capital ^of the kingdom, half the 
 births are illegitimate ! 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 Those too were admirable motives, and very cogent reasons, 
 ■whicli led our government to estabUsh an armed force on the 
 coast of Africa for the suppression of the slave trade. Wiat 
 could be more essential to the "greatest happiness" than the 
 annihilation of the abominable traffic ? And how could forty 
 ships of war, supported by an expenditure of ^6700,000 a year, 
 fail to whoUy or partially accomplish tliis ? The results have, 
 however, been anything but satisfactory. Wlien the aboli- 
 tionists of England advocated it, they little thought that such 
 a measure instead of preventing would only "aggravate the 
 horrors, without sensibly mitigating the extent of the traffic; " 
 that it would generate fast-saiUng slavers with decks one foot 
 six inches apart, suffocation from close packing, miserable 
 diseases, and a mortality of thirty-five per cent. They dreamed 
 not that when hard pressed a slaver might throw a whole cargo 
 of 500 negroes into the sea ; nor that on a blockaded coast 
 the disappointed chiefs would, as at Gallinas, put to death 200 
 men and women, and stick their heads on poles, along shore, 
 in sight of the squadron^. In short, they never anticipated 
 having to plead as they now do for the abandonment of coer- 
 cion. 
 
 Again, how great and how self-evident to the artisan mind, were 
 the promised advantages of that trades-union project, whereby 
 master manufacturers were to be dispensed with ! If a body of 
 workmen formed themselves into a joint-stock manufacturing 
 company, with elective directors, secretary, treasurer, superin- 
 tendents, foremen, &c., for managing the concern, and an or- 
 ganization adapted to ensure an equitable division of profits 
 amongst the members, it was clear that the enormous sums 
 previously pocketed by the employers, would be shared amongst 
 the employed to the great increase of their prosperity. Yet all 
 past attempts to act out this very plausible theory have, somehow 
 or other, ended in miserable failures. 
 
 Another illustration is afforded by the fate which befel that 
 
 ' See Anti-Slavery Society's Report for lSi7 ; and Evidence before Parliamentary 
 Committee, 1848. 
 
10 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 kindred plan recommended by Mr. Babbage in his " Economy 
 of Manufactures," as likely to be to the benefit of the workmen 
 and to the interest of the master ; that namely, in which factoij 
 hands were to " unite together, and have an agent to purchase 
 by wholesale those articles which are most in demand ; as tea, 
 sugar, bacon, &c., and to retail them at prices which will just 
 repay the wholesale cost, together with the expenses of the 
 agent who conducts their sale." After fourteen years' trial a 
 concern, established in pursuance of this idea, was " abandoned 
 with the joint consent of all parties;" Mr. Babbage confessing 
 that the opinion he had expressed " on the advantage of such 
 societies was very much modified," and illustrating by a series 
 of curves "the quick rise and gradual decline" of the experi- 
 mental association. 
 
 The Spitalfields weavers afford us another case in point. 
 No doubt the temptation which led them to obtain the Act 
 of 1773, fixing a minimum of wages, was a strong one; and 
 the anticipations of greater comfort to be secured by its en- . 
 forcement must have seemed reasonable enough to all. Un- 
 fortunately, however, the weavers did not consider the conse- 
 quences of being interdicted from working at reduced rates ; 
 and httle expected that before 1793, some 4000 looms would 
 be brought to a stand in consequence of the trade going else- 
 where. 
 
 To mitigate distress appearing needful for the production of 
 the " greatest happiness," the English people have sanctioned 
 upwards of one hundred acts in Parliament having this end in 
 view, each of them arising out of the failure or incompleteness 
 of previous legislation. Men are nevertheless still discontented 
 with the Poor Laws, and we are seemingly as far as ever from 
 their satisfactory settlement. 
 
 But why cite individual cases ? Does not the experience of 
 all nations testify to the futility of these empirical attempts at 
 the acquisition of happiness ? What is the statute-book but a 
 record of such unhappy guesses ? or history but a narrative of 
 their unsuccessful issues ? And what forwarder are we now ? 
 
INTEODOCTION. 11 
 
 Is not our goveminent as busy still as though the work of law- 
 making commenced but yesterday ? Has it made any appa- 
 rent progress toward a final settlement of social arrangements ? 
 Does it not rather each year entangle itself stiU further in the 
 web of legislation, confounding the already heterogeneous mass 
 of enactments into still greater confusion ? Nearly every par- 
 liamentary proceeding is a tacit confession of incompetency. 
 There is scarcely a bill introduced but is entitled " An Act to 
 amend an Act." The "Whereas" of almost every preamble 
 heralds an account of the miscarriage of previous legislation. 
 Alteration, explanation, and repeal, form the staple employ- 
 ment of every session. All our great agitations are for the 
 abolition of institutions purporting to be for the public good. 
 Witness those for the lemoval of the Test and Corporation 
 Acts, for Catholic Emancipation, for the repeal of the Com 
 Laws ; to which may now be added, that for the separation of 
 Church and State. The history of one scheme is the history 
 of all. First comes enactment, then probation, then failure ; 
 next an amendment and another failure ; and, after many alter- 
 nate tinkerings and abortive trials, arrives at length repeal, 
 followed by the substitution of some fresh plan, doomed to run 
 the same course, and share a hke fate. 
 
 The expediency-philosophy, however, ignores this world full 
 of facts. Though men have so constantly been balked in their 
 attempts to secure, by legislation, any desired constituent of that 
 complex whole, " greatest happiness," it nevertheless continues 
 to place confidence in the unaided judgment of the statesman. 
 It asks no guide ; it possesses no eclectic principle ; it seeks 
 no clue whereby the tangled web of social existence may be 
 unravelled and its laws discovered. But, holding up to view 
 the great desideratum, it assumes that after an inspection of 
 the aggregate phenomena of national life, governments are 
 qualified to concoct such measures as shall be " expedient." 
 It considers the philosophy of humanity so easy, the con- 
 stitution of the social organism so simple, the causes of a peo- 
 
12 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 pie's conduct so obvious, that a general examination can give 
 to "collective wisdom," the insight requisite for law-making. 
 It thinks that man's intellect is competent, first, to observe 
 accurately the facts exhibited by associated human nature ; 
 to form just estimates of general and individual charac- 
 ter, of the effects of religions, customs, superstitions, preju- 
 dices, of the mental tendencies of the age, of the probabihties 
 of future events, &c., &c.; and then, grasping at once the 
 multiplied phenomena of this ever- agitated, ever-changing sea 
 of Ufe, to derive from them that knowledge of their governing 
 principles which shall enable him to say whether such and such 
 measures wiU conduce to " the greatest happiness of the greatest 
 number." 
 
 If without any previous investigation of the properties of 
 teiTestrial matter, Newton had proceeded at once to study 
 the dynamics of the universe, and after years spent with the 
 telescope in ascertaining the distances, sizes, times of revolu- 
 tion, inclinations of axes, forms of orbits, perturbations, &c., 
 of the celestial bodies, had set himself to tabulate this accumu- 
 lated mass of observations, and to educe from them the funda- 
 mental laws of planetary and stellar equihbrium, he might have 
 cogitated to all eternity without arriving at a result. 
 
 But absurd as such a method of research would have been, 
 it would have been far less absurd, than is the attempt to find 
 out the principles of pubUc polity, by a direct examination of 
 that wonderfully intricate combination — society. It needs ex- 
 cite no surprise when legislation, based upon the theories thus 
 elaborated, fails. Rather would its success afford matter for 
 extreme astonishment. Considering that men as yet so im- 
 perfectly understand man — the instrument by which, and the 
 material on which, laws are to act — and that a complete know- 
 ledge of the unit — man, is but a first step to the comprehension 
 of the nias,'&— society, it seems obvious enough that to educe 
 fi:om the infinitely-ramified compHcadons of universal hu- 
 manity, a true philosophy of national hfe, and to found thereon 
 
INTRODUCTION. 13 
 
 a code of rules for the obtamment of "greatest happiness" is a 
 task far beyond the ability of any finite mind. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 Yet another fatal objection to the expediency-philosophy, is 
 to be found in the fact, that it implies the eternity of govern- 
 ment. It is a mistake to assume that government must neces- 
 sarily last for ever. The institution marks a certain stage of 
 civilization — is natural to a particular phase of human deve- 
 lopment. It is not essential but incidental. As amongst the 
 Bushmen we find a state antecedent to government ; so may 
 there be one in which it shall have become extinct. Already 
 has it lost something of its importance. The time was when 
 the history of a people was but the history of its government. 
 It is otherwise now. The once universal despotism was but a 
 manifestation of the extreme necessity of restraint. Feudalism, 
 serfdom, slavery — aU tyrannical institutions, are merely the 
 most vigorous kinds of rule, springing out of, and necessary to, 
 a bad state of man. The progress from these is in all cases 
 the same — less government. Constitutional forms mean this. 
 PoUtical freedom means this. Democracy means this. In 
 societies, associations, joint-stock companies, we have new 
 agencies occupjdng fields filled in less advanced times and 
 countries by the State. With us the legislature is dwarfed by 
 newer and greater powers — is no longer master but slave. 
 "Pressure from without" has come to be acknowledged as 
 ultimate ruler. The triumph of the Anti-Com-Law League 
 is simply the most marked instance yet, of the new style of 
 government — that of opinion, overcoming the old style— that 
 of force. It bids fair to become a trite remark that the law- 
 maker is but the servant of the thinker. Daily is statecraft 
 held in less repute. Even the Times can see that " the social 
 changes thickening around us estabHsh a truth sufficiently 
 humiliating to legislative bodies," and that " the great stages 
 of our progress are determined rather by the spontaneous 
 workings of society, connected as they are with the progress of 
 
14 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 art and science, the operations of nature, and other such un^ 
 poHtical causes, than hy the proposition of a bill, the passing 
 of an act, or any other event of poUtics or of state." * Thus, 
 as civilization advances, does government decay. To the bad 
 it is essential; to the good, not. It is the check which 
 national wickedness makes to itself and exists only to the same 
 degree. Its continuance is proof of still-existing barbarism. 
 What a cage is to the wild beast, law is to the selfish man. 
 Eestraint is for the savage, the rapacious, tlie violent ; not for 
 the just, the gentle, the benevolent. All necessity for external 
 force implies a morbid state. Dungeons for the felon; a 
 strait-jacket for the maniac ; crutches for the lame ; stays 
 for the weak-backed ; for the infirm of purpose a master ; for 
 the fooHsh a guide ; but for the sound mind, in a sound body, 
 none of these. Were there no thieves and murderers, prisons 
 would be unnecessary. It is only because tyranny is yet rife 
 in the world that we have armies. Barristers, judges, juries — 
 all the instruments of law — exist, simply because knavery exists. 
 Magisterial force is the sequence of social vice ; and the police- 
 man is but the complement of the criminal. Therefore it is 
 that we call government " a necessary evil." 
 
 What then must be thought of a morality which chooses 
 this probationary institution for its basis, builds a vast fabric of 
 conclusions upon its assumed permanence, selects acts of par- 
 liament for its materials, and employs the statesman for its 
 arcliitect? The expediency-philosophy does this. It takes 
 government into partnership — assigns to it entire control of its 
 affairs — enjoins all to defer to its judgment — makes it in short 
 the vital principle, the very soul of its system. When Paley 
 teaches that " the interest of the whole society is binding upon 
 every part of it," he implies the existence of some supreme 
 power by which that " interest of the whole society" is to be 
 determined. And elsewhere he more expUcitly tells us, that for 
 the attainment of a national advantage the private will of the 
 subject is to give way; and that "the proof of this advantage 
 
 = See Times of October 12, 1846. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 15 
 
 lies with the legislature." Still more decisive is Bentham, when 
 he says that " the happiness of the individuals of whom a com- 
 munity is composed, that is, their pleasures and their security, 
 is the sole end which the legislator ought to have in view ; the 
 sole standard in conformity with which each individual ought, 
 as far as depends upon the legislature, to he made to fashion 
 his behaviour." These positions, be it remembered, are not 
 voluntarily assumed; they are necessitated by the premises. 
 If, as its propounder tells us, "expediency" means the benefit 
 of the mass, not of the individual — of the future as much as of 
 the present, it presupposes some one to judge of what will most 
 conduce to that benefit. Upon the "utihty" of this or that 
 measure, the views are so various as to render an umpire 
 essential. Whether protective duties, or established religions, 
 or capital punishments, or poor laws, do or do not minister 
 to the " general good," are questions concerning which there is 
 such difference of opinion, that were nothing to be done till 
 all agreed upon them, we might stand still to the end of time. 
 If each man carried out, independently of a state power, his own 
 notions of what would best secure " the greatest happiness of 
 the greatest number," society would quickly lapse into con- 
 fusion. Clearly, therefore, a morality established upon a 
 maxim of which the practical interpretation is questionable, 
 involves the existence of some authority whose decision re- 
 specting it shall be final — that is, a legislature. And without 
 that authority, such a morality must ever remain inoperative. 
 
 See here then the predicament. A system of moral philo- 
 sophy professes to be a code of correct rules for the control of 
 human beings — fitted for the regulation of the best, as well as 
 the worst members of the race — applicable, if true, to the guid- 
 ance of humanity in its highest conceivable perfection. Govern- 
 ment, however, is an institution originating in man's imperfec- 
 tion; an institution confessedly begotten by necessity out of 
 evil ; one which might be dispensed with were the world peo- 
 pled with the unselfish, the conscientious, the philanthropic ; 
 one, in short, inconsistent with this same " highest conceivable 
 
16 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 perfection." How, then, can that be a true system of morality 
 which adopts government as one of its premises ? 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Of the expediency-philosophy it must therefore be said, in 
 the first place, that it can make no claim to a scientific charac- 
 ter, seeing that its fundamental proposition is not an axiom, but 
 simply an enunciation of the problem to be solved. 
 
 Further, that even supposing its fundamental proposition were 
 an axiom, it would still be inadmissible, because expressed in 
 • terms possessing no fixed acceptation. 
 
 Moreover, were the expediency theory otherwise satisfactory, 
 it would be still useless ; since it requires nothing less than 
 omniscience to c&rry it into practice. 
 
 And, waiving all other objections, we are yet compelled to 
 reject a system, which, at the same time that it tacitly lays 
 claim to perfection, takes imperfection for its basis. 
 
 The Doctrine of the Moral Sense. 
 
 § 1- 
 
 There is no way of coming at a true theoiy of society, but by 
 inquiring into the nature of its component mdividuals. To 
 understand humanity in its combinations, it is necessary to 
 analyze that humanity in its elementary form— for the explana- 
 tion of the compound, to refer back to the simple. We quickly 
 find that every phenomenon exhibited by an aggregation of 
 men, originates in some quality of man himseK A little con- 
 sideration shows us, for instance, that the very existence of 
 society, impUes some natural affinity in its members for such 
 
INTRODUCTION. 17 
 
 a union. It is pretty clear too, that without a certain fitness 
 in mankind for ruling, and heing ruled, government would he 
 an impossibility. The infinitely complex organizations of com- 
 merce, have grown up under the stimulus of certain desires 
 existing in each of us. And it is from our possession of a 
 sentiment to which they appeal, that rehgious institutions have 
 been called into existence. 
 
 In fact, on looking closely into the matter, we find that no 
 other arrangement is conceivable. The characteristics exhibited 
 by beings in an associated state cannot arise from the accident 
 of combination, but must be the consequences of certain in- 
 herent properties of the beings themselves. True, the gather- 
 ing together may call out these characteristics; it may make 
 manifest what was before dormant ; it may afford the oppor- 
 tunity for undeveloped peculiarities to. appear ; but it evidently 
 does not create them. No phenomenon can be presented by a 
 corporate body, but what there is a pre-existing capacity in its 
 individual members for producing. 
 
 This fact, that the properties of a mass are dependent upon 
 the attributes of its component parts, we see throughout nature. 
 In the chemical combination of one element with another, 
 Dalton has shown us that the afiinity is between atom and 
 atom. What we call the weight of a body, is the sum of the 
 gravitative tendencies of its separate particles. The strength 
 of a bar of metal, is the total effect of an indefinite number ofl 
 molecular adhesions. And the power of the magnet, is a 
 cumulative result of the polarity of its independent corpuscles. 
 After the same manner, every social phenomenon must have 
 its origin in some property of the individual. And just as 
 the attractions and affinities which are latent in separate atoms, 
 become visible when those atoms are approximated ; so the 
 forces that are dormant in the isolated man, are rendered active 
 by juxtaposition with his fellows. 
 
 This consideration, though perhaps needlessly elaborated, 
 has an important bearing on our subject. It points out the 
 path we must pursue in our search after a true social philo- 
 
 c 
 
18 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 sophy. It suggests the idea that the moral law of society, like 
 its other laws, originates in some attribute of the human being. 
 It warns us against adopting any fundamental doctrine which, 
 like that of " the greatest happiness to the greatest number," 
 cannot be expressed without presupposing a state of aggrega- 
 tion. On the other hand it hints that the first principle of a 
 code for the right ruhng of humanity in its state of multitude, 
 is to be found in humanity in its state of unitude — that the 
 moral forces upon which social equilibrium depends, are resi- 
 dent in the social atom — man; and that if we would under- 
 stand the nature of those forces, and the laws of that equili- 
 brium, we must look for them in the human constitution. 
 
 §2. 
 
 Had we no other inducement to eat than that arising from 
 the prospect of certain advantages to be thereby obtained, it is 
 scarcely probable that our bodies would be so well cared for 
 as now. One can quite imagine, that were we deprived of 
 that punctual monitor — appetite, and left to the guidance of 
 some reasoned code of rules, such rules, were they never so 
 philosophical, and the benefits of obeying them never so ob- 
 vious, would form but a very inefiicient substitute. Or, in- 
 stead of that powerful affection by which men are led to 
 nourish and protect their offspring, did there exist merely an 
 abstract opinion that it was proper or necessary to maintain 
 the population of the globe, it is questionable whether the 
 annoyance, anxiety, and expense, of providing for a posterity, 
 would not so far exceed the anticipated good, as to involve a 
 rapid extinction of the species. And if, in addition to these 
 needs of the body, and of the race, all other requirements of 
 our nature were similarly consigned to the sole cai-e of tlie 
 intellect — were knowledge, property, freedom, reputation, 
 friends, sought only at its dictation — then would our investi- 
 gations be so perpetual, our estimates so complex, our decisions 
 so difficult, that life would be wholly occupied in the collection 
 of evidence, and the balancing of probabilities. Under such 
 
INTRODUCTION. 19 
 
 an arrangement the utilitarian philosophy would indeed Lave 
 strong argument in nature ; for it would be simply applying 
 to society, that system of governance hy appeal to calculated 
 final results, which already ruled the individual. 
 
 Quite different, however, is the method of nature. Answer- 
 ing to each of the actions which it is requisite for us to per- 
 form, we find in ourselves some prompter called a desire ; and 
 the more essential the action, the more powerful is the im- 
 pulse to its performance, and the more intense the gratification 
 derived therefrom. Thus, the longings for food, for sleep, for 
 warmth, are irresistible ; and quite independent of foreseen 
 advantages. The continuance of the race is secured by others 
 equally strong, whose dictates are followed, not in obedience 
 to reason, but often in defiance of it. That men are not im- 
 pelled to accumulate the means of subsistence solely by a 
 view to consequences, is proved by the existence of misers, in 
 whom the love of acquirement is gratified to the neglect of 
 the ends meant to be subserved. We find employed a like 
 system of regulating our conduct to our fellows. That we 
 may behave in the public sight in the most agreeable manner, 
 we possess a love of praise. It is desirable that there should 
 be a segregation of those best fitted for each other's society — 
 hence the sentiment of friendship. And in the reverence felt 
 by men for superiority, we see a provision intended to secure 
 the supremacy of the best. 
 
 May we not then reasonably expect to find a like instru- 
 mentality employed in impelling us to that line of conduct, 
 in the due observance of which consists what we call morality ? 
 All must admit that we are guided to our bodily welfare by 
 instincts ; that from instincts also, spring those domestic re- 
 lationships by which other important objects are compassed — 
 and that similar agencies are in many cases used to secure 
 our indirect benefit, by regulating social behaviour. Seeing, 
 therefore, that whenever we can readily trace our actions to 
 their origin, we find them produced after this manner, it is, 
 
 c 2 
 
20 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 to say the least of it, highly probable that the same mental 
 mechanism is employed in all cases- — that as the all-important 
 requirements of our being are fulfilled at the solicitations of 
 desire, so also are the less essential ones — that upright con- 
 duct in each being necessary to the happiness of aU, there 
 exists in us an impulse towards such conduct; or, in other 
 
 ■ words, that we possess a " Moral Sense," the duty of which 
 is to dictate rectitude in our transactions with each other; 
 which receives gratification from honest and fair dealing ; and 
 which gives birth to the sentiment of justice. 
 
 In bar of this conclusion it is indeed urged, that did there 
 exist such an agency for controlling the behaviour of man to 
 man, we should see universal evidence of its influence. Men 
 would exhibit a more manifest obedience to its supposed dic- 
 tates than they do. There would be a greater uniformity of 
 opinion as to the rightness or wrongness of actions. And we 
 should not, as now, find one man, or nation, considering as a 
 virtue, what another regards as a vice — Malays glorying in the 
 piracy abhorred by civihzed races — a Thug regarding as a 
 religious act, that assassination at which a European shudders 
 — a Russian piquing himself on his successful trickery — a red 
 Indian in his undying revenge — things which with us would 
 hardly be boasted of. 
 
 Overwhelming as this objection appears, its fallacy becomes 
 conspicuous enough, if we obsei-ve the predicament into which 
 the general application of such a test betrays us. As thus : — 
 None deny the universal existence of that instinct akeady ad- 
 verted to, which ui-ges us to take the food needfiil to support 
 life ; and none deny that such instinct is highly beneficial, and 
 
 . in all Ukehhood essential to being. Nevertheless there are not 
 wanting infinite evils and incongruities, arising out of its rule. 
 AU know that appetite does not invariably guide men aright 
 in the choice of food, either as to quality or quantity. Neither 
 can any maintain that its dictates are uniform, when reminded 
 of those unnumbered differences in the opinions called " tastes " 
 
INTEODUCTION. 21 
 
 which it originates in each. The mere mention of " gluttony," 
 " drunkenness," reminds us that the promptings of appetite are 
 not always good. Carbuncled noses, cadaverous faces, fcetid 
 breaths, and plethoric bodies, meet us at every turn ; and our 
 condolences are perpetually asked for headaches, flatulence, 
 nightmare, heartburn, and endless other dyspeptic symptoms. 
 Again : — equally great irregularities may be found in the work- 
 ings of that generally recognised feehng — parental affection. 
 Amongst ourselves, its beneficial sway seems tolerably uniform. 
 In the East, however, infanticide is practised now as it ever 
 has been. During the so-called classic times, it was common 
 to expose babes to the tender mercies of wild beasts. And 
 it was the Spartan practice to cast all the newly-born who 
 were not approved by a committee of old men, into a pubUc 
 pit provided for the purpose. If, then, it be argued that the 
 want of uniformity in men's moral codes, together with the 
 weakness and partiality of their influence, prove the non- 
 existence of a feeling designed for the right regulation of our 
 deahngs with each other, it must be inferred from analogous 
 irregularities in men's conduct as to food and offspring, that 
 there are no sach feeUngs as appetite and parental aflPection. 
 As, however, we do not draw this inference in the one case, 
 we cannot do so in the other. Hence, notwithstanding all 
 the incongruities, we must admit the existence of a Moral 
 Sense to be both possible and probable. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 But that we possess such a sense, may be best proved by 
 evidence drawn from the hps of those who assert that we 
 have it not. Oddly enough Bentham unwittingly derives his 
 initial proposition from an oracle whose existence he denies, 
 and at which he sneers when it is appealed to by others. 
 " One man," he remarks, speaking of Shaftesbury, " says he 
 has a thing made on purpose to tell him what is right and 
 what is wrong ; and that it is called a moral sense : and then 
 
22 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 he goes to work at his ease, and says such and such a thing is 
 right, and such and such a thing is wrong. Why? 'because 
 my moral sense tells me it is.' " Now that Bentham should 
 have no other authority for his own maxim than this same 
 moral sense, is somewhat unfortunate for him. Yet, on putting 
 that maxim into critical hands, we shall soon discover such to 
 he the fact. Let us do this. 
 
 "And so you think," says the patrician, "that the object 
 of our rule should be ' the greatest happiness to the greatest 
 number.' " 
 
 " Such is our opinion," answers the petitioning plebeian. 
 
 " Well now, let us see what your principle involves. Sup- 
 pose men to be, as they very commonly are, at variance in 
 their desires on some given point; and suppose that those 
 forming the larger party will receive a certain amount of hap- 
 piness each, from the adoption of one course, whilst those 
 forming the smaller party •^-ill receive the same amount of hap- 
 piness each, from the adoption of the opposite course : then 
 if ' greatest happiness ' is to be oui guide, it must follow, 
 must it not, that the larger party ought to have their way ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " That is to say, if you — the people, are a hundred, whilst 
 we are ninety-nine, your happiness must be preferred, should 
 our wishes clash, and should the individual amounts of grati- 
 fication at stake on the two sides be equal." 
 
 " Exactly ; our axiom involves that." 
 
 " So then it seems, that as, in such a case, you decide be- 
 tween the two parties by numerical majority, you assume that 
 the happiness of a member of the one party, is equally im- 
 portant with that of a member of the other." 
 
 " Of course." 
 
 " Wherefore, if reduced to its simplest form, your doctrine 
 turns out to be the assertion, that all men have equal claims 
 to happiness ; or, applying it personally— that you have as 
 good a right to happiness as I have." 
 
 " No doubt I have." 
 
INTEODUCTION. 23 
 
 " And pray, sir, who told you that you have as good a right 
 to happiness as I have ? " 
 
 "Who told me? — I am sure of it; I know it; I feel it; 
 I " 
 
 " Nay, nay, that will not do. Give me your authority. 
 Tell me who told you this — how you got at it— whence you 
 derived it." 
 
 Whereupon, after some shuffling, our petitioner is forced to 
 confess, that he has no other authority but his own feeling — • 
 that he has simply an innate perception of the fact ; or, in 
 other words, that " his moral sense tells him so." 
 
 Whether it rightly teUs him so, need not now be considered. 
 All that demands present notice is the fact, that when cross- 
 examined, even the disciples of Bentham have no alternative 
 but to fall back upon an intuition of this much derided moral 
 sense, for the foundation of their own system. 
 
 § 4- 
 
 In truth, none but those committed to a preconceived theory, 
 can fail to recognise, on every hand, the workings of such a 
 faculty. From early times downward there have been con- 
 stant signs of its presence — signs which happily thicken as 
 our own day is approached. The articles of Magna Charta 
 embody its protests against oppression, and its demands for a 
 better administration of justice. Serfdom was abolished partly 
 at its suggestion. It encouraged Wickliffe, Huss, Luther, and 
 Knox, in their contests with Popery ; and by it were Hugue- 
 nots, Covenanters, Moravians, stimulated to maintain freedom 
 of judgment in the teeth of armed Ecclesiasticism. It dictated 
 Milton's "Essay on the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing." It 
 piloted the pilgrim fathers to the new world. It supported 
 the followers of George Fox under fines and imprisonment. 
 And it whispered resistance to the Presbyterian clergy of 
 1662. In latter days it emitted that tide of feeling which 
 undermined and swept away Catholic disabilities. Through 
 
24 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the mouths of anti-slavery orators, it poured out its fire, to the 
 scorching of the selfish, to the melting of the good, to our 
 national purification. It was its heat, too, which warmed our 
 sympathy for the Poles, and made hoil our indignation against 
 their oppressor. Pent-up accumulations of it, let loose upon a 
 long-standing injustice, generated the effervescence of a reform 
 agitation. Out of its gi-owing flame came those sparks hy 
 which Protectionist theories were exploded, and that light 
 which discovered to us the truths of Free-trade. By the pas- 
 sage of its suhtle current is that social electrolysis effected, 
 which classes men into parties — which separates the nation 
 into its positive and negative — its radical and conservative 
 elements. At present it puts on the garh of Anti-State- 
 Church Associations, and shows its presence in manifold 
 societies for the extension of popular power. It huilds monu- 
 ments to political martyrs, agitates for the admission of Jews 
 into Parhament, publishes books on the rights of women, 
 petitions against class-legislation, threatens to rebel against 
 mihtia conscriptions, refuses to pay church-rates, repeals op- 
 pressive debtor acts, laments over the distresses of Italy, and 
 thrills with sympathy for the Hungarians. From it, as from 
 a root, spring our aspirations after social rectitude : it blossoms 
 in such expressions as — "Do as you would he done by," 
 " Honesty is the best policy," " Justice before Generosity ; " 
 and its fruits are Equity, Freedom, Safety. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 But how, it may be asked, can a sentiment have a percep- 
 tion ? how can a desire give rise to a moral sense ? Is there 
 not here a confounding of the intellectual with the emotional ? 
 It is the office of a sense to perceive, not to induce a certain 
 kind of action ; whilst it is the office of an instinct to induce a 
 certain kind of action, and not to perceive. But in the fore- 
 going arguments, motor and percipient fiinctions are attributed 
 to the same agent. 
 
 The objection seems a serious one; and were the term sense 
 
INTRODUCTION. 25 
 
 to be understood in its strictest acceptation, would be fatal. 
 But the word is in this case, as in many others, used to express 
 that feeling with which an instinct comes to regard tlie deeds 
 and objects it is related to ; or rather that judgment which, by 
 a kind of reflex action, it causes the intellect to form of them. 
 To elucidate this we must take an example ; and perhaps the 
 love of accumulation will afford us as good a one as any. 
 
 We find, then, that conjoined with the impulse to acquire 
 property, there is what we call a sense of the value of pro- 
 perty ; and we find the vividness of this sense to vary with the 
 strength of the impulse. Contrast the miser and the spendthrift. 
 Accompanying his constant desire to heap up, the miser has 
 a quite peculiar belief in the worth of money. The most strin- 
 gent economy he thinks virtuous ; and anything like the most 
 ordinary liberahty vicious ; whilst of extravagance he has 
 an absolute horror. Whatever adds to his store seems to 
 hhnffood: whatever takes from it, bad. And should a pass- 
 ing gleam of generosity lead him on some special occasion 
 to open his purse, he is pretty sure afterwards to reproach 
 himself with having done wrong. On the other hand, whilst 
 the spendthrift is deficient in the instinct of acquisition, he 
 also fails to realize the intrinsic worth of property ; it does not 
 come home to him ; he has httle sense of it. Hence under 
 the influence of other feelings, he regards saving habits as 
 mean; and holds that there is something tiohle in profuse- 
 ness. Now it is clear that these opposite perceptions of the 
 • propriety or impropriety of certain hnes of conduct, do not 
 originate with the intellect, but with the emotional faculties. 
 The intellect, uninfluenced by desire, would show both miser 
 and spendthrift that their habits were imwise; whereas the 
 intellect, influenced by desire, makes each think the other a 
 fool, but does not enable him to see his own fooUshness. 
 
 Now this law is at work universally. Every feeling is ac- 
 companied by a sense of the rightness of those actions which 
 give it gratification — tends to generate convictions that things 
 are good or bad, according as they bring to it pleasure or pain ; 
 and would always generate such convictions, were it unopposed. 
 
26 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 As however there is a perpetual conflict amongst the feelings 
 — some of them heing in antagonism throughout life — there 
 results a proportionate incongruity in the beUefs — a similar 
 conflict amongst these also — a parallel antagonism. So that it 
 is only where a desire is very predominant, or where no adverse 
 desire exists, that this connection between the instincts and the 
 opinions they dictate, becomes distinctly visible. 
 
 Apphed to the elucidation of the case in hand, these facts 
 explain how from au impulse to behave in the way we caU 
 equitable, there will arise a perception that such behaviour is 
 proper — a conviction that it is good. This instinct or senti- 
 ment, being gratified by a just action, and distressed by an 
 unjust action, produces in us an approbation of the one, and 
 a disgust towards the other; and these readily beget beliefs 
 that the one is virtuous, and the other vicious. Or, refen-ing 
 again to the illustration, we may say that as the desire to ac- 
 cumulate property is accompanied by a sense of the value of 
 property, so is the desire to act fairly, accompanied by a sense 
 of what is fair. And thus, hmiting the word sense to the ex- 
 pression of this fact, there is nothing wrong in attributing motor 
 and percipient functions to the same agent. 
 
 It will perhaps be needful here to meet the objection, that 
 whereas according to the foregoing statement each feehng tends 
 to generate notions of the rightness or wrongness of the actions 
 towards which it is related ; and whereas moraUty should de- 
 termine what is correct in all departments of conduct, it is im- 
 proper to confine the term "moral sense" to that which can 
 afibrd directions in only one department. Tliis is quite true. 
 Nevertheless, seeing that our behaviour towards each other is 
 the most important part of our behaviour, and that in which 
 we are most prone to err ; seeing also that this same faculty is 
 so purely and immediately moral in its purpose; and seeing 
 further, as we shall shortly do, that its dictates are the only 
 ones capable of reduction to an exact form, we may with some 
 show of reason continue to employ that term, with this re- 
 stricted meaning. 
 
INTRODDCTION. 27 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Assuming the existence in man of such a faculty as this 
 for prompting him to right dealings with his fellows, and as- 
 suming that it generates certain intuitions" respecting those 
 dealings, it seems reasonable enough to seek in such intuitions 
 the elements of a moral code. Attempts to construct a code 
 so founded have from time to time been made. They have 
 resulted in systems based by Shaftesbury and Hutchinson on 
 " Moral Sense," by Eeid and Beattie on " Common Sense," 
 by Price on " Understanding," by Clarke on " Fitness of 
 Things," by Granville Sharpe on " Natural Equity," by others 
 on " Eule of Eight," " Natural Justice," " Law of Nature," 
 " Law of Eeason," " Eight Eeason," &c. Unsuccessful as 
 these writers have been in the endeavour to develope a philoso- 
 phical morahty, all of them, if the foregoing reasoning be cor- 
 rect, have consulted a trae oracle. Though they have failed to 
 systematize its utterances, they have acted wisely in trying to 
 do this. An analysis of right and wrong so made, is not in- 
 deed the profoundest and ultimate one ; but, as we shall by-and- 
 by see, it is perfectly in harmony with that in its initial princi- 
 ple, and coincident with it in its results. 
 
 Against codes thus derived, it is indeed alleged, that they 
 are necessarily worthless because unstable in their premises. 
 " If," say the objectors, " this ' moral sense,' to which all these 
 writers directly or indirectly appeal, possesses no fixity, gives 
 no uniform response, says one thing in Europe, and another in 
 Asia — originates different notions of duty in each age, each race, 
 each individual, how can it afford a safe foundation for a sys- 
 tematic morality? What can be more absurd than to seek 
 a definite rule of right, in the answers of so uncertain an au- 
 thority ? " 
 
 Even granting that there is no escape from this difficulty — 
 even supposing no method to exist, by which from this source, 
 
 ^ As here used, this word is of course to be understood in a popular, and not in 
 a metaphysical sense. 
 
28 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 a moral philosopliy can be drawn free from so fatal an imper- 
 fection, there still results merely that same dilemma, in -n-hich 
 every other proposed scheme is involved. If such a guide is 
 unfit, because its dictates are variable, then must Expe- 
 diency also be rejected for the same reason. If Bentham is 
 right in condemning Moral Sense, as an "anarchical and 
 capricious principle, founded solely upon internal and peculiar 
 feelings," then is liis own maxim doubly fallacious. Is not the 
 idea, " greatest happiness," a capricious one ? Is not that also 
 " founded solely upon internal and peculiar feelings ? " (See 
 page 3.) And even were the idea "greatest happiness" alike 
 in all, would not his principle be still " anarchical," in virtue of 
 the infinite disagreement as to the means of realizing this 
 "greatest happiness?" All utilitarian philosophies are in 
 fact liable to tliis charge of indefiniteness, for there ever 
 recurs the same unsettled question — what is utility ? — a ques- 
 tion which, as every newspaper shows us, gives rise to endless 
 disputes, both as to the goodness of each desired end, and the 
 efficiency of every proposed means. At the worst therefore, in 
 so fai^as want of scientific precision is concerned, a philosophy 
 founded on !Moral Sense, simply stands in the same category 
 with all other known systems. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 But happily there is an alternative. The force of the objec- 
 tion above set forth may be fully admitted, without in any de- 
 gree invahdating the theory. Notwithstanding appearances to 
 the contrary, it is still possible to construct upon tliis basis, a 
 purely synthetic morality proof against all such criticism. 
 
 The error pointed out is not one of doctrine, but of applica- 
 tion. Those who committed it did not start from a -wrong 
 principle, but rather missed the right way fi-om that principle 
 to the sought-for conclusions. It was not in the oracle to 
 which they appealed, but in their method of interpretation, 
 that the writere of the Shaftesbury school erred. Confound- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 29 
 
 ing the functions of feeling and reason, they required a senti- 
 ment to do that, which should have heen left to the intellect. 
 They were right in helieving that there exists some governing 
 instinct generating in us an approval of certain actions we call 
 good, and a repugnance to certain others we call had. But 
 they were not right in assuming such instinct to be capable of 
 intuitively solving every ethical problem submitted to it. To 
 suppose this, was to suppose that moral sense could supply the 
 place of logic. 
 
 For the better explanation of this point, let us take an 
 analogy from mathematics, or rather some branch of it, as geo^ 
 metry. The human mind possesses a faculty that takes cog- 
 nizance of measurable quantity, which faculty, to carry out the 
 analogy, let us term a geometric sense. By the help of this 
 we estimate the linear dimensions, surfaces, and bulks of sur- 
 rounding objects, and form ideas of their relationship to each 
 other. But in the endeavour to reduce the knowledge thus 
 obtained to a scientific form, we find that no rehance can be 
 placed on the unaided decisions of tliis geometric sense, in 
 consequence of the conflicting judgments it makes in different 
 persons. On comparing notes, however, we discover that there 
 are certain simple propositions upon which we aU think aHke, 
 such as " Things which are equal to the same thing are equal 
 to one another;" "The whole is greater than its part;" and 
 agreeing upon these axioms as we call them — these funda- 
 mental truths recognised by our geometric sense, we find it 
 becomes possible by successive deductions to settle all disputed 
 points, and to solve with certainty, problems of the most com- 
 plicated nature '. Now if, instead of adopting this method, geo- 
 metricians had persisted in determining all questions concern- 
 ing lines, angles, squares, circles, and the like, by the geometric 
 sense — if they had tried to discover whether the three angles of 
 
 * Whether we adopt the views of Locke or of Eant as to the ultimate nature 
 ef what is here, for analogy's sake, called geometric sense, does not affect the ques- 
 tion. However originated, the fundamental perceptions attaching to it form the 
 undecomposable basis of exact science. And this is all that is now assumed. 
 
30 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 a triangle were, or were not, equal to two right angles, and 
 whether the areas of similar polygons were, or were not, in the 
 duplicate ratio of their homologous sides, by an effort of simple 
 perception, they would have made just the same mistake that 
 moralists make, who try to solve all the problems of morality 
 by the moral sense. 
 
 The reader will at once perceive the conclusion towards 
 which this analogy points; namely, that the perception of 
 the primary laws of quantity bears the same relationship to 
 mathematics, that this instinct of right bears to a moral sys- 
 tem ; and that as it is the office of the geometric sense to ori- 
 ginate a geometric axiom, from which reason may deduce a 
 scientific geometry, so it is the office of the moral sense to 
 originate a moral axiom, from which reason may develope a 
 systematic moraUty. 
 
 And, varying the illustration, it may be further remarked 
 that just as erroneous notions in mechanics, — for instance, that 
 large bodies fall faster than small ones^; that water rises 
 in a pump by suction; that perpetual motion is possible, to- 
 gether with the many other mistaken opinions, formed by 
 unaided mechanical sense, — are set aside by the conclusions 
 synthetically deduced from those primary laws of matter which 
 the mechanical sense recognises ; so may we expect the mul- 
 titudes of conflicting behefs about human duty dictated by 
 unaided moral sense, to disappear before the deductions scien- 
 tifically drawn from some primary law of man which the moral 
 sense recognises. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 On reviewing the claims of the Moral Sense doctrine, it 
 appears that there is a •priori reason for expecting the first 
 principle of social morality to originate in some feeling, power, 
 or faculty of the individual. Quite in harmony with this be- 
 lief, is the inference that as desire is found to be the incentive 
 
 * A doctrine held by Aristotle and his followera. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 81 
 
 to action where motives are readily analyzable, it is protably 
 the uniyersal incentive ; and that the conduct we call moral 
 is determined by it as well as other conduct. Moreover we 
 find that even the great maxim of the expediency-philosophy 
 presupposes some tendency in man towards right relationship 
 with his fellow, and some correlative perception of what that 
 right relationship consists in. There are sundry phenomena 
 of social Ufe, both past and present, that well illustrate the in- 
 fluence of this supposed moral sense, and which are not readily 
 expUcable upon any other hypothesis. Assuming the existence 
 of such a faculty, there appears reason to think that its moni- 
 tions afford a proper basis for a systematic moraUty ; and to 
 the demurrer that their variabihty ruifits them for this purpose, 
 it is replied that, to say the least, the foundations of all other 
 systems are equally open to the same objection. Finally, how- 
 ever, we discover that this dif&culty is apparent only, and not 
 real : for that whilst the decisions of this moral sense upon 
 the complex cases referred to it are inaccurate and often con- 
 tradictory, it may still be capable of generating a true funda- 
 mental intuition, which can be logically unfolded into a scien- 
 tific moraUty. 
 
 LEMMA I. 
 
 § 1. 
 
 It seems at first sight a very rational way of testing any 
 proposed rule of conduct to ask — How will it work ? Taking 
 men as we know them, and institutions as they are, what will 
 result from carrying such a theory into practice ? This very 
 common-sense style of inquiry is that by which most opinions 
 on morals and politics are formed. People consider of any 
 system, whether it seems feasible, whether it will square with 
 this or the other social arrangement, whether it fits what they 
 see of human nature. They have got certain notions of what 
 
32 INTRODUCTION 
 
 man is, and what society must le ; and their verdict on any 
 ethical doctrine depends upon its accordance or discordance 
 ■with these. 
 
 Such a mode of settling moral questions, is clearly open to 
 aU the criticisms so fatal to the expediency-philosophy. In- 
 capacity for guiding ourselves in detail hy making estimates of 
 consequences, implies incapacity for judging of fii'st principles 
 by that method. But passing over this, there is yet another 
 reason for rejecting an iuquiry so pursued as worthless; namely, 
 that it assumes the chai-acter of manMnd to he constant. If 
 moral systems are adopted or condemned, because of their con- 
 sistency or inconsistency, with what we know of men and 
 things, then it is taken for granted that men and things will 
 ever be as they are. It would be absurd to measure with a 
 variable standard. If existing humanity is the gauge by which 
 truth must be determined, then must that gauge — existing 
 humanity — be fixed. 
 
 Now that it is not fixed, might have been thought suffi- 
 ciently obvious without any proving — so obvious indeed as to 
 make proof look ridiculous. But, unfortunately, those whose 
 prejudices make them think otherwise are too numerous to be 
 passed by. Their scepticism needs to be met by facts ; and, 
 wearisome though it may be to the philosophic reader, there is 
 no alternative but to go into these. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 And first, let us pause a moment to consider the antecedent 
 improbability of this alleged constancy in human natm-e. It 
 is a trite enough remark that change is the law of all things : 
 true equally of a single object, and of the universe. Nature in 
 its infinite complexity is ever growing to a new development. 
 Jilach successive result becomes the parent of an additional in- 
 fluence, destined in some degree to modify all future results. 
 No fresh tlu-ead enters into the texture of that endless web, 
 woven in " the roaring loom of Time" but what more or less 
 
INTRODUCTION. 33 
 
 alters tlie pattern. It has been so from tlie beginning. As 
 we turn over the leaves of the earth's primeval history — as we 
 intei-pret the hieroglyphics in which are recorded the events of 
 the unknown past, we find this same ever-beginning, never- 
 ceasing change. We see it alike in the organic and the inor- 
 ganic—in the decompositions and recombinations of matter, 
 and in the constantly-varying forms of animal and vegetable 
 life. Old formations are worn down ; new ones are deposited. 
 Forests and bogs become coal basins ; and the now igneous 
 rock was once sedimentary. With an altering atmosphere, and 
 a decreasing temperature, land and sea perpetually bring forth 
 fresh races of insects, plants, and animals. All things are 
 metamorphosed; infusorial shells into chalk and flint, sand 
 into stone, stone into gravel. Strata get contorted; seas fill 
 up ; lands are alternately upheaved and sunk. Where once 
 rolled a fathomless ocean, now tower the snow-covered peaks 
 of a wide-spread, richly-clothed country, teeming with exist- 
 ence; and where a vast continent once stretched, there re- 
 main but a few lonely coral islets to mark the graves of its 
 submerged mountains. Thus also is it with systems, as well 
 as with worlds. Orbits vary in their forms, axes in their in- 
 clinations, suns in their brightness. Fixed only in name, the 
 stars are incessantly changing their relationships to each other. 
 New ones from time to time suddenly appear, increase and 
 wane ; whilst the members of each nebula — suns, planets, and 
 their satellites, sweep for ever onwards into unexplored infinity. 
 Strange indeed would it be, if, in the midst of this universal 
 mutation, man alone were constant, unchangeable. But it is 
 not so. He also obeys the law of indefinite variation. His 
 circumstances are ever altering ; and he is ever adapting him- 
 self to them. Between the naked houseless savage, and the 
 Shakspeares and Newtons of a civilized state, lie unnumbered 
 degrees of difference. The contrasts of races in form, colour, 
 and feature, are not greater than the contrasts in their moral 
 and intellectual qualities. That superiority of sight which 
 enables a Bushman to see further with the naked eye than a 
 
31 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 European with a telescope, is fully paralleled by the European's 
 more perfect intellectual vision. The Calmuck in dehcacy of 
 smell, and the red Indian in acuteness of hearing, do not excel 
 the wliite man more than the white man excels them in moral 
 susceptihility. Every age, every nation, every climate, ex- 
 hibits a modified form of humanity ; and in all times, and 
 amongst all peoples, a greater or less amount of change is 
 going on. 
 
 There cannot indeed be a more astounding instance of the 
 tenacity with which men will cling to an opinion in spite of an 
 overwhelming mass of adverse evidence, than is shown in this 
 prevalent behef that human nature is uniform. One would 
 have thought it impossible to use .eyes or ears without learning 
 that mankind vary indefinitely, in instincts, in morals, in 
 opinions, in tastes, in rationality, in everj'thing. Even a stroll 
 through the nearest museum would show that some law of 
 modification was at work. Mark the grotesque frescos of the 
 Egyptians, or the shadowless drawings of the Chinese. Does 
 the contrast between these and the works of European artists 
 indicate no difference in the perceptive powers of the races ? 
 Compare the sculptures of Athens with those of Hindostan or 
 Mexico. Is not a greater sense of beauty imphed by the one 
 than the others ? But, passing to the more significant facts 
 suppUed by historians and travellers, what are we to tliink on 
 reading that the Greeks and Romans had a deity to sanction 
 and patronise every conceivable iniquity ? or when we hear of 
 Polynesian tribes who believe that their gods feed upon the 
 souls of the departed ? Surely the characters indicated bj' such 
 conceptions of Divinity differ somewhat from ours ! Surely too 
 we may claim some essential superiority over those Tartars who 
 leave infirm parents to die of hunger in the desert ; and over 
 those Feejee islanders, amongst whom members of the same 
 family have to keep watch against each other's treachery. It 
 is not the custom of an Englishman to dine, hke a Canib, 
 upon a roasted captive ; or even as the Abyssinian, on a quiver- 
 ing shoe from the haunch of a hve ox. Neither does he. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 36 
 
 like a red Indian, delight in the writhing of a victim at the 
 stake ; nor, like a Hindoo, burn his wife that her spirit may 
 haunt his enemy. 
 
 What one respect is there in which it can be asserted that 
 human nature is always the same ? Is it in rationality ? Why, 
 Anaxagoras had to fly his country for having blasphemously 
 asserted that the sun was not the chariot of the deity Helios : 
 whilst amongst ourselves a child often puzzles its seniors by the 
 question — Who made God ? Is it in justice ? No : badly as 
 the modems have treated slaves, they have never, hke the 
 Spartans, encouraged their young warriors to waylay and as- 
 sassinate helots for practice. Is it in honesty ? If so, how 
 come we to read that " piracy was the exercise, the trade, the 
 glory, and the virtue of the Scandinavian youth ; " whilst 
 amongst ourselves privateering, even in time of war, is disap- 
 proved ? Is it in want of mercy ? Not so : for much as 
 Austrian butcheries have lately disgraced Europe, they have 
 not paralleled the doings of Gengis Khan, who signalized his 
 first victory by casting seventy prisoners into cauldrons of 
 boiling water ; or of Timour, who massacred 100,000 Indian 
 prisoners, and erected a pyramid of 90,000 human heads on the 
 smoking ruins of Bagdad; or of Attila, who totally extirpated 
 and erased seventy cities. Is it in vindictiveness ? Why no : 
 for whilst we are told of the Begum Sumroo, that having 
 ordered one of her dancing girls to be bricked up in a vault, 
 she had her bed placed over it, that she might listen to her 
 victim's dying moans ; we find our own Queen requesting, 
 much to her credit, that the man who fired at her should not 
 be flogged. Where now is the sameness ? It is not in actions 
 as we see. Is it then in manners and opinions ? Certainly 
 not. Society in our day would hardly receive a lady or gentle- 
 man known to have poisoned an enemy: in Italy, however, 
 there was a time when disgrace did not attach to such. No 
 family would now follow the example of the Visconti, and 
 choose the viper for an armorial bearing. Nor could we in 
 the nineteenth century, find a match to that German captain of 
 
 D 2 
 
36 INTRODUCTION'. 
 
 mercenaries, who in silver letters labelled himself — " Duke 
 Werner, Lord of the great Company ; the enemy of mercy, of 
 pity, and of God." 
 
 But why go abroad for illustrations of human variability ? 
 have we not plenty at home ? In those early days -when it was 
 thought " quite sufficient for noblemen to winde their horn, and 
 carry their hawke fair, and leave study and learning to the 
 children of mean people"— in those days when men secured 
 themselves inside thick walls and behind deep moats, and when 
 women wore daggers, character was not just what we now find 
 it. Whilst all nominally held the creed professed by ourselves, 
 the Borderer was most zealous at his prayers when going on a 
 foray; saints' names were battle cries; bishops led on their 
 retainers to fight ; and the highest piety was in the slaying of 
 Saracens. Must not our natures have changed somewhat, when 
 we translate this same religion into peace, into philanthropic 
 effort of all kinds, into missionary enterprise, into advocacy of 
 temperance, into inquiries about " labour and the poor" ? 
 Does the agitation for the abolition of death punishment indi- 
 cate no revolution in men's feelings since the days when 
 Cromwell's body was exhumed, and his head stuck on Temple 
 Bar — the days when criminals .were drawn and quartered as 
 well as hung — the days when there were murmurs "because 
 Stafford was suffered to die without seeing his bowels burned 
 before his face" — the days when creaking gibbets were 
 scattered over the country — the days when church- doors were 
 covered with the skins of men who had committed sacrilege ? 
 And when we read that Sir John Hawkins, in honour of his 
 having been the first to commence the slave-trade, received the 
 addition to his coat of arms of " a demi-moor proper bound 
 with a cord," does it not seem that the national character has 
 improved between his times and ours, when, out of sympathy 
 for the negroes, 300,000 persons pledged themselves to abstain 
 from all West-India produce ? 
 
 But really it is absurd to argue the matter. The very 
 assertors of this fi.xedness of human nature tacitly disown their 
 
INTRODUCTION. 37 
 
 belief in it. They constantly stultify themselves by remarks 
 on differences of national character, on peculiarities in their 
 friends' dispositions, and on their own special tastes and feelings. 
 Admissions thus accidentally made quite invalidate their dogma. 
 Nay, not even these are needed. No comparison between the 
 habits of separate races — between man as he is and as he was 
 — between the tempers and talents of individuals — are neces- 
 sary for this. To the man of any insight, the mere fact that he 
 himself changes with circumstances, from day to day, and from 
 year to year, in sentiments, capacities, and desires, is sufficient 
 to show that humanity is indefinitely variable. 
 
 §3. 
 
 And if humanity is indefinitely variable, it cannot be used as 
 a gauge for testing moral truth. When we see that institutions 
 impracticable in one age have flourished in a subsequent one ; 
 and that what were once salutary laws and customs have 
 become repugnant ; we may shrewdly suspect that the hke 
 changes will take place in future. That incongruity with the 
 state of men and things which at present gives to certain 
 proposed principles an appearance of impracticability, may, in a 
 coming age, no longer exist; and those principles that now 
 seem so well adapted to our social condition, may then no 
 longer harmonise with it. Unless, therefore, we assume that 
 human nature, although hitherto variable, will henceforth re- 
 main fixed — a somewhat unwarrantable assumption — we must 
 not allow the disagreement between any system of ethics and 
 the present state of mankind, to be taken as evidence against 
 that system. 
 
 Nay more : not only ought we to regard such disagreement, 
 when it appears, without prejudice ; but we ought to expect it ; 
 and to consider it, if anything, rather an indication of truth 
 than of error. It is preposterous to look for consistency be- 
 tween absolute moral truth, and the defective characters and 
 usages of our existing state ! As already said. Morality pro- 
 fesses to be a code of rules proper for " the guidance of humanity 
 
38 INTRODDCTION. 
 
 in its highest conceivable perfection." A universal obedience 
 to its precepts implies an ideal society. How then can it be 
 expected to harmonise with the ideas, and actions, and institu- 
 tions of man as he now is ? When we say that mankind are 
 sinful, weak, frail, we simply mean that they do not habitually 
 fulfil the appointed law. Imperfection is merely another word 
 for disobedience. So that congruity between a true theory of 
 duty, and an untrue state of humanity, is an impossibility, a 
 contradiction in the nature of things. Whoever, by way of 
 recommending his scheme of ethics, sets forth its immediate 
 and entire practicability, thereby inevitably proves its false- 
 hood. Eight principles of action become practicable, only as 
 man becomes perfect ; or rather, to put the expressions in 
 proper sequence — man becomes perfect, just in so far as he is 
 able to obey them. 
 
 A total disagreement may therefore be ' looked for between 
 the doctrines promulgated in the following pages, and the 
 institutions amidst which we live. And the reader wiU be 
 prepared to view such disagreement not only as consistent with 
 their truth, but as adding to its probabihty. 
 
 LEMMA II. 
 
 And yet, unable as the imperfect man may be to fulfil the 
 perfect law, there is no other law for him. One right course 
 only is open ; and he must either follow that or take the con- 
 sequences. The conditions of existence will not bend before 
 his perversity; nor relax in consideration of his weakness. 
 Neither, when they are broken, may any exception from 
 penalties be hoped for. " Obey or suffer" are the ever-repeated 
 alternatives. Disobedience is sure to be convicted. And there 
 are no reprieves. 
 
 It is indeed the favourite maxim of a certain popular phi- 
 losophy, that " there is no rule without an exception," — a 
 
INTRODUCTION. 39 
 
 maxim about as respectable as the proverbs along with which 
 it commonly passes current. AppUed to conventional usages 
 — to the tenets of state policy — to social regulations — to the 
 precepts of pocket prudence — to the laws of grammar, of art, of 
 etiquette — or to those common aphorisms which roughly classify 
 the experiences of every-day hfe, it may be true enough ; but 
 if affirmed of the essential principles of tilings, of society, of 
 man, it is utterly false. 
 
 Nature's rules, on the contrary, have no exceptions. The 
 apparent ones are only apparent; not real. They are indica- 
 tions either that we have not found the true law, or that we 
 have got an imperfect expression of it. Thus, if terrestrial 
 gravitation be defined as " a tendency possessed by all free 
 bodies to descend towards the centre of the earth," you may 
 triumphantly add — " all free bodies except the balloon." But 
 your balloon is no exception. Its ascent is just as much a 
 result of gravitation as the falling of a stone. You have merely 
 proved that the definition does not adequately express the law. 
 Again, to the assertion that exercise increases strength — you 
 may answer, that although generally true, it is not true of 
 invalids, to whom exercise is often detrimental ; and that it is 
 only true of the healthy within certain limits. Just so. But 
 such qualifications would have been needless, if the law had 
 been completely stated. Had it been said that — so long as 
 the power of assimilation is sufficient to make good the waste 
 consequent upon exercise, exercise increases strength — no limi- 
 tations could have been discovered. The so-called exceptions 
 are in ourselves, not in nature. They show either that the law 
 eludes our perception, or bafiles our power of expression. 
 - Eightly understood, the progress from deepest ignorance to 
 highest erJighteimient, is a progress from entire unconscious- 
 ness of law, to the conviction that law is universal and inevit- 
 able. Accumulating knowledge and continual induction are 
 ever restricting the old ideas of special causation within 
 narrower limits. Each new discovery in science — every 
 anomaly solved — strengthens men ia the belief that phenomena 
 
40 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 result from general uniform forces. And at length, by dint of 
 constantly-repeated evidence, they begin to perceive that there 
 are no suspensions of these forces even for the avoidance of 
 the most terrific catastrophes. They see that although fleets 
 be sent to the bottom by the resulting storm, yet must atmo- 
 spheric equilibrium be restored. They see that the earth does 
 not cease its attraction, even to save a village from the impend- 
 ing avalanche. They see that, regai-dless of the consequent 
 destraction of a church, or blowing up of a vessel, the electric 
 fluid -ivill still follow " the line of least resistance." They see 
 that chemical afiinity must act, not'withstanding it ends in the 
 burning of a city to ashes — in the submergence of half a 
 country by volcanic disturbance — or in the loss of a hundred 
 tbousand lives by an epidemic. Every increment of knowledge 
 goes to show that constancy is an essential attribute of the 
 Divine rule: an unvaryingness which renders the echpse of a 
 hundred years hence predicable to a moment! And for the end 
 of these unbending ordinances of nature— we find it to be the 
 universal good. To render the world habitable; that is the 
 great object. The minor evils due to this persistency of action 
 are as nothing compared with the infinite benefits secured. 
 Whether those evils might or might not have been avoided, we 
 need not now consider. It is enough for us to know that con- 
 stancy is the law, and we have no alternative but to assume that 
 law to be the best possible one. 
 
 As with the physical, so with the etliical. A belief, as yet 
 fitful and partial, is beginning to spread amongst men, that 
 here also there is an indissoluble bond between cause and con- 
 sequence, an inexorable destiny, a " law which altereth not." 
 Confounded by the multiplied and ever-new aspects of human 
 affairs, it is not perhaps surprising that men should fail duly to 
 recognise the systematic character of the Divine rule. Yet in 
 the moral as in the material world, accumulated evidence is 
 
INTRODUCTION. 41 
 
 gradually generating the conviction, that events are not at 
 bottom fortuitous ; but that they are wrought out in a certain 
 inevitable way by unchanging forces. In all ages there has 
 been some glimmering perception of this truth ; and experience 
 is ever giving to that perception increased distinctness. Indeed 
 even now all men do, in one mode or other, testify of such a faith. 
 Every known creed is an assertion of it. What are the moral 
 codes of the Mahometan, the Brahmin, the Buddhist, but so 
 many acknowledgments of the inseparable connection between 
 conduct and its results ? Do they not all say you shall not do 
 this, and this, because they will produce evil ; and you shall do 
 that and that, because they leill produce good ? No matter that 
 their founders erred in the attempt to refer each effect to its 
 special cause, and so botched their systems of morality; not- 
 ^\ithstaiiding this, they evinced the belief that there is an 
 inevitable law of causation in human affairs, which it is for 
 man to learn and conform to. And is not this the doctrine of 
 the highest known religion ? Does not Christianity also teach 
 that such and such deeds shall surely end in such and such 
 issues — evil-doing in punishment, well-doing in reward — and 
 that these things are necessarily and indissoluhly connected ? 
 We imply such a faith, too, in our every-day conversations; in 
 our maxims and precepts, in our education of children, in our 
 advice to friends. In judging men and things we instinctively 
 refer them to some standard of ascertained principles. We 
 predict good or evil of this or the other scheme, because of 
 its accordance or discordance with certain perceived laws of 
 life. Nay, even the pettifogging red-tapist, with his hand-to- 
 mouth expediency, and professed contempt for " abstract prin- 
 ciples," has really a secret consciousness of some such in- 
 variable sequence of events — does really believe in the sway of 
 that "beneficent necessity" which to a given act attaches a 
 fixed result. For what is the true meaning of his " measures " — 
 his "projects of law" ? He does not think it a toss-up whether 
 this, or that, effect will be produced by them. If he did, he 
 would be as ready to adopt one plan as another. Evidently he 
 
42 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 sees that there are constant influences at work, which, from 
 each cii'cumstance, or set of ^circumstances, educe an unavoid- 
 able consequence ; and that under like conditions like events 
 will again follow. 
 
 Surely, then, if all believe in the persistency of these se- 
 condary laws, much more should they believe in the persistency 
 of those primary ones, which underlie human existence, and 
 out of which our every-day truths grow. We cannot deny 
 the root, if we recognise the branches. And if such is the 
 constitution of things, we aie compelled to admit this same 
 " beneficent necessity." There is no alternative. Either society 
 has laws, or it has not. If it has not, there can be no order, 
 no certainty, no system in its phenomena. If it has, then are 
 they like the other laws of the universe — sure, inflexible, ever 
 active, and having no exceptions. 
 
 §3. 
 
 How infinitely important is it, that we should ascertain what 
 these laws are ; and having ascertained, implicitly obey them ! 
 If they really exist, then only by submission to them can 
 anything permanently succeed. Just in so far as it complies 
 with the principles of moral equilibrium can it stand. Our 
 social edifice may be constructed with all possible labour and 
 ingenuity, and be strongly cramped together with cunningly- 
 devised enactments, but if there be no rectitude in its com- 
 ponent parts — if it is not built on upright principles, it will 
 assuredly tumble to pieces. As well might we seek to light a fire 
 with ice, feed cattle on stones, hang our hats on cobwebs, or 
 otherwise disregard the physical laws of the world, as go con- 
 trary to its equally imperative ethical laws. 
 
 Yes, but there are exceptions, say you. We cannot always 
 be strictly guided by abstract principles. Prudential con- 
 siderations must have some weight. It is necessary to use a 
 little policy. 
 
 Very specious, no doubt, are your reasons for advocating this 
 
INTRODUCTION. 43 
 
 or the otlier exception. But if there he any truth in the fore- 
 going argument, no infraction of the law can he made -with 
 impunity. Those cherished schemes by which you propose to 
 attain some desired good by a little politic disobedience, are all 
 delusive. Were any one to tell you that he had invented 
 a mechanical combination, which doubled power without di- 
 minishing velocity, or that he had discovered the quadrature 
 of the circle, or that he knew the receipt for the philosopher's 
 stone, or that he could sell you a child's caul which would 
 save you from drowning, you would reply, that whilst there 
 were laws of matter, such things could not be — that they were 
 proved impossibilities. Exactly so. But rest satisJied that they 
 are not more complete impossibilities than are your proposed 
 achievements, which similarly conflict with the essential laws 
 of life. 
 
 It may indeed be difficult for those who have but little faith 
 in the invisible, to follow out a principle unflinchingly, in spite 
 of every threatening evil — to give up their own power of judging 
 what seems best, from the belief that that only is best which 
 is abstractedly right — to say, " although appearances are 
 against it, yet will I obey the law." Nevertheless, this is the 
 true attitude to assume : the conduct which it has been the 
 object of all moral teaching to inculcate ; the only conduct 
 which can eventually answer *. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 Even supposing for a moment, that a solitary act of dis- 
 obedience may pass without evil results — nay, may bring bene- 
 
 / ' Coleridge clearly expresses such a belief. He says — " This is indeed the 
 
 main characteristic of the moral system taught by the Friend throughout ; that the 
 distinct foresight of consequences belongs exclusively to the Infinite Wisdom which 
 is one with the Almighty "Will, on which all consequences depend ; but that for 
 
 man to obey the simple unconditional commandment of eschewing every act that 
 
 impUes a self-contradicton, or, in other words, to produce and maintain the greatest 
 possible harmony in the component impulses and faculties of his nature, involves 
 ■ the effects of prudence." — The Fnemd. 
 
44 INTRODUCTION'. 
 
 ficial ones : even supposing this, the wisdom of the act is not 
 thereby proved. For consider the probable effects of a wrong 
 precedent. As Paley truly says, "the bad consequences of 
 actions are twofold, particular and general!' And admitting 
 even that a particular good has been secured, a far greater 
 general evil has been entailed by opening the way to future 
 disobedience. There is no security in this lax creed. One 
 breach of the law leaves a gap for numberless subsequent tres- 
 passes. If the first false step has been taken with seeming 
 impunity, it will inevitably be followed by others. School-boy 
 promises of — " only this once" are not to be believed. Make a 
 hole through a principle to admit a soUtary exception, and, on 
 one pretence or other, so many other exceptions will by and by 
 be thrust through after it, as to render the principle utterly good- 
 for-nothing. In fact, if its consequences are closely traced, 
 dns same plea for licence in special cases turns out to be the 
 source of nearly all the evils that afflict us. Almost every 
 wrong doing is excused by the doer on this ground. He con- 
 fesses his act is at variance with the moral law, which he ad- 
 mits to be, and in some sort beheves to be, the best guide. 
 He tliinks, however, that his interest requires him now and 
 then to make exceptions. All men do this ; — and see the 
 result. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 But can we ever be sure that an exceptional disobedience 
 tpill bring the anticipated benefits ? Whoso would forsake for 
 a time a confessedly-legitimate guide, should remember that he 
 is falling back upon that expediency-hypothesis of which we 
 have already seen the falsity. He is laying claim to a per- 
 fect knowledge of man, of society, of institutions, of events, of 
 all the complex, ever-varying phenomena of human existence ; 
 and to a grasp of mind that can infer from these how things 
 -will go in future. In short, he is assuming that same 
 omniscience, which, as we saw, is requisite for the successful 
 
INTRODCCTION. 4 .'» 
 
 can-ying out of such a system. Does he shrink from arrogating 
 as much ? Then ohserve his dilemma. He deserts -what 
 he admits to he on the whole a safe rule of conduct, to follow 
 one which is difficult to understand ; unsettled in its direc- 
 tions ; douhtful in its consequences. 
 
 If the foohshness of such conduct needs illustrating hy facts, 
 there are plenty at hand. The constant failure of schemes 
 devised without consulting ethical principles has been already 
 exempUfied (see page 8). Let us now, however, t&ke a few 
 cases specially applying to the present point — cases in which 
 benefit has been sought by going in palpable opposition to 
 those principles — cases in which meu, dissatisfied with the road 
 whose finger-post declares that " Honesty is the best policy," 
 have diverged into the by-ways of injustice, in the hope of 
 more readily attaining their ends. 
 
 The enslavement of the neg^'oes serves for a good example. 
 Nothing could have seemed more conclusive than the reason- 
 ing of unscrupulous colonists on tliis matter. Here were rich 
 soils, a splendid chmate, and a large market for the sale of 
 produce. Now, could but a sufiiciency of labourers be im- 
 ported and reduced to servitude, what profit they would bring 
 to their possessors ! Maintained at a cheap rate ; made to 
 work hard, and to keep long at it, what a surplus would theY 
 not create ! Here was a mine of wealth ! Well : the planters 
 acted out their thought — did that which, although it might not 
 be just, was apparently "the best policy," so far as they were 
 concerned. Their golden visions have been far from realized 
 however. Slave countries are comparatively poverty-stricken all 
 over the world. Though Jamaica at one time sent us a few 
 overgrown nabobs, yet West-Indian history has been a history 
 of distress and complainings, in spite of continual assistance 
 and artificial advantages. The southern states of America are 
 far behind their northern neighbours in prosperity — are in 
 process of abandoning slavery one after another, in consequence 
 of its ruinous results. Somehow the scheme has not answered 
 as was expected. Though worked in some cases sixteen hours 
 
46 INXnODUCTION. 
 
 out of the twenty-foui-; though supported on "a. pint of flour 
 and one salt herring per day;" though kept to his work by 
 whips, yet did not the slave bring to his owner the large profit 
 calculated upon. Indeed it has turned out that, under like cir- 
 cumstances, free labour is much cheaper. And then, besides the 
 disappointment, there came results that were never looked for. 
 Slavery brought in its train the multiplied curses of a diseased 
 social state ; a reign of mutual hatred and terror ; of universal 
 demoralization; of sin-begotten recklessness; of extravagant 
 expenditure; of bad cultivation, exhausted soils, mortgaged 
 estates, bankruptcy, beggary. After all, the moral law would 
 have been the safest guide. 
 
 When Philip of Valois swore the officers of his mint to 
 conceal the debasement of the coinage, and to endeavour to 
 make the merchants believe that the gold and silver pieces 
 were of full value, he thought that although perhaps unprin- 
 cipled, such a measure would be vastly profitable. And so no 
 doubt believed the other kings, who, in the " good old times," 
 almost universally did the like. They overreached themselves, 
 however, as all such schemers do. It is true that their debts 
 were diminished " in proportion to the reduction in the'value of 
 the currency ; but their revenues were at the same time re- 
 duced in the like ratio. Moreover, the loss of their reputation 
 for honesty made them afterwards unable to borrow money, 
 except at proportionately high rates of interest, to cover the 
 risk ran by the lender." So that they not only lost on the 
 creditor side of their accounts what they gained on the debtor 
 side, but put themselves at a great disadvantage for the future. 
 After centuries of dearly-bought experience, the practice was 
 reluctantly abandoned, and is now universally exploded as 
 essentially suicidal — -just as suicidal in fact as all other in- 
 fiingements of the rule of right. 
 
 Let us remember also, the failure of those attempts to profit 
 at the expense of our American colonies ; and the disastrous 
 results to which they led. Our governors thought it would 
 be highly beneficial to the mother country, if the colonies were 
 
INTRODUCTION. 47 
 
 constrained to become her customers ; and in pm'suance of this 
 conclusion, not only prohibited the settlers from purchasing 
 certain goods from any other counti^ than England, but ac- 
 tually denied them the right to make those goods for themselves ! 
 As usual the manoeuvre proved worse than abortive. The 
 outlay required to keep open this national truck-shop was 
 greater than the receipts. Nay, indeed, that outlay was wholly 
 thrown away, and worse than thrown away ; for it turns out 
 that artificial trades so obtained entail loss upon both parties. 
 Then too came the punishment, the resistance of the settlers, 
 the war of independence, and the hundred and odd millions 
 added to our national burdens ! 
 
 What an astounding illustration of the defeat of dishonesty 
 by the eternal laws of things we have in the history of the East 
 India Company ! Selfish, unscrupulous, worldly-wise in pohcy, 
 and with unlimited force to back it, this oligarchy, year by year, 
 perseveringly carried out its schemes of aggrandisement. It 
 subjugated province upon province ; it laid one prince after an- 
 other under tribute ; it made exorbitant demands upon adjacent 
 rulers, and construed refusal into a pretext for aggression ; it 
 became sole proprietor of the land, claiming nearly one-half the 
 produce as rent ; and it entirely monopoUzed commerce : thus 
 uniting in itself the character of conqueror, ruler, landowner, 
 and merchant. With all these resources, what could it be but 
 prosperous ? From the spoils of victorious war, the rent of 
 milhons of acres, the tribute of dependent monarchs, the profits 
 of an exclusive trade, what untold wealth must have poured in 
 upon it ! what revenues ! what a bursting exchequer ! Alas ! 
 the Company is some 50,000,000/. in debt. 
 
 Protected trades, too, have afforded many proofs of the im- 
 policy of injustice. The history of the wool business some 
 centuries ago might be quoted as one ; but let us take the 
 more recent case of silk. Under the now happily exploded 
 plea of protection to native industry, the silk manufacturers 
 were freed from aU foreign competition. Their prices were 
 thus artificially raised, and all the nation was compelled to 
 
■i^ INTRODUCTTON'. 
 
 buy of them. And so, having a large market and high profits, 
 the)' thought their prosperity ensured. They were doomed to 
 disappointment, however. Instead of a brisk and extensive 
 trade, they obtained a languishing and confined one ; and that 
 branch of manufacture, wliich was to have been a pattern of 
 commercial greatness, became a by-word for whining poverty. 
 How utterly absurd, under such a lamentable state of things, 
 must have appeared the proposal to return towards equit- 
 able dealing by lowering the duties ! What " impi'ac- 
 ticables " must those, men have been thought, who, because 
 monopoly was unjust, wished to expose the almost ruined 
 manufacturers to the additional difficulty of foreign com- 
 petition! Could anything be more contrary to common 
 sense ? Here surely was a case in which " abstract principles " 
 must give way to " policy.'' No : even here, too, obedience to 
 the moral law proved to be the best. EebeUion against it had 
 been punished by accumulated distresses : a partial submission 
 was rewarded by an increase of prosperity. Within fourteen 
 years from the date at which the duties were lowered, the trade 
 had more than doubled itself — had increased more within that 
 period than during the preceding century. And those who, 
 but a short time before, were unable to meet their French 
 compeers in the home-markets, not only began to compete 
 witli them in the marts of other nations, but to send large 
 quantities of goods to France itself. 
 
 These are but a few samples from a univei-sal experience. If 
 diligently traced, the results of abandoning the riff/it to pursue 
 the politic will uniformly be found to end thus. Men who are 
 insane enough to think that they may safely violate the fun- 
 damental laws of right conduct, may read in such defeats and 
 disasters their own fate. Let them but inquire, and they will 
 find that each petty evil, each great catastrophe, is in some 
 way or other a sequence of injustice. Monetary panics, South- 
 Sea bubbles, Eailway manias, Irish rebeUions, French revolu- 
 tions, — these, and the miseries flowing from them, are but the 
 cumulative effects of dishonesty. A bitter experiences teaches 
 
INTRODUCTION. 49 
 
 all men when it is too late, that, alike in national and individual 
 affairs, entire submission is the wisest course. Even Napoleon, 
 after his seeming success, his triumphs, his profound states- 
 manship, his far-seeing "policy," ended in the behef that 
 " There is no power without justice." 
 
 Yet this commentary on the moral code — this History as 
 we call it — men for ever read in vain ! Poring with micro- 
 scopic eye over the symbols in which it is written, they are 
 heedless of the great facts expressed by them. Instead of 
 collecting evidence bearing upon the all-important question — 
 What are the laws that determine national success or failure, 
 stability or revolution ? — they gossip about state intrigues, 
 sieges andbattles, court scandal, the crimes of nobles, the quarrels 
 of parties, the births, deaths, and marriages of kings, and other 
 hke trifles: Minutiee, pettifogging details, the vanity and 
 frippery of bygone times, the mere decorations of the web of 
 existence, they examine, analyze, and learnedly descant upon ; 
 yet are blind to those stem reahties which each age shrouds 
 in its superfiffial tissue of events — those terrible truths which 
 glare out upon us from the gloom of the past. From the 
 successive strata of our historical deposits, they diligently 
 gather all the highly-coloured fragments, pounce upon every- 
 thing that is curious and sparkUng, and chuckle like children 
 over their glittering acquisitions ; meanwhile the rich veins of 
 wisdom that ramify amidst, this worthless debris, lie utterly 
 neglected. Cumbrous volumes of rubbish are greedily accu- 
 mulated, whilst those masses of rich ore, that should have been 
 dug out, and from which golden truths might have been 
 smelted, are left unthought of and unsought. 
 
 §6. 
 
 But why all this laboured examination into the propriety, or 
 impropriety, of making exceptions to an ascertained ethical 
 law? The very question is absurd. For what does a man 
 really mean by saying of a thing that it is " theoretically just," 
 or " true in principle," or " abstractedly right " ? Simply that 
 
 E 
 
50 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 it accords with what he, in some way or other, perceives to 
 he the estahUshed arrangements of Divine rule, ^^^len he 
 admits that an act is "theoretically just," he admits it to he 
 that which, in strict duty, should be done. By " true in prin- 
 ciple," he means in harmony with the conduct decreed for us. 
 The course which he caUs " abstractedly right," he beUeves to 
 be the appointed way to human happiness. There is no 
 escape. The expressions mean this, or they mean nothing. 
 Practically, therefore, when he proposes to disobey, he does so 
 in the hope of improving on this guidance ! Though told that 
 such and such are the true roads to happiness, he opines that 
 he knows shorter ones ! To the Creator's silent command — 
 "Do this ; " he repUes that, aU things considered, he thinks he 
 can do better ! This is the real Infidehty ; the true Atheism : 
 to doubt the foresight and efficiency of the Divine arrange- 
 ments, and with infinite presumption to suppose a human 
 judgment less falhhle ! When will man " cease his frantic 
 pretension of scanning this great God's World in his small 
 fraction of a brain; and know that it has verily, though deep 
 beyond his soundings, a Just Law ; that the soul of it is good ; 
 — that his part in it is to conform to the Law of the Whole, 
 and in devout silence follow that, not questioning it, obeying 
 it as unquestionable." * 
 
 § 7. 
 
 ) Briefly reviewing the argument, we mark first, that physical 
 laws are characterized by constancy and universality, and that 
 there is every reason to beheve the like true of ethical ones. It 
 is inferred, that if so, there is no safety but in entire obedience, 
 even in spite of threatening appearances. This inference is 
 enforced by the consideration, that any departure from prin- 
 ciple to escape some anticipated evil, is a return to the proved 
 errors of expediency. It is again enforced by the fact, that 
 the innumerable attempts of a stifi'-necked worldly wisdom to 
 
 * Advice, by the way, which in these latter days the giver might properly 
 enough take home to himself. 
 
INTEODUCTION. 61 
 
 benefit by disobedience have failed. And it is yet farther 
 enforced by the reflection, that to think we can better our- 
 selves by deserting the road marked out for us, is an impious 
 assumption of more than divine omniscience. 
 
 The reasons for thus specially insisting on implicit obedience 
 ■will become apparent as the reader proceeds. Amongst the 
 conclusions inevitably foUo-wing from an admitted principle, he 
 ■will most likely find several for which he is hardly prepared. 
 Some of these will seem strange ; others impracticable ; and, 
 it may be — one or two whoUy at variance with his ideas of duty. 
 Nevertheless should he find them logically derived from a 
 fundamental truth, he ■will have no alternative but to adopt 
 them as rules of conduct, which ought to be followed without 
 exception. If there be any weight in the considerations above 
 set forth, then, no matter how seemingly inexpedient, dangerous, 
 injurious even, may be the course which morality points out 
 as " abstractedly - right," the highest ■wisdom is in perfect and 
 fearless submission. ■ 
 
 E 2 
 
PART I. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 DEFINITION OF MORALITY. 
 
 §1. 
 
 There does not seem to exist any settled idea as to what a 
 Moral Philosophy properly embraces. Moralists have either 
 omitted to prelude their inquiries hy any strict definition of 
 the work to he done, or a definition of a very loose and iadis- 
 criminating character has been framed. Instead of confining 
 themselves to the discovery and application of certain essential 
 principles of right conduct, they have attempted to give rules 
 for all possible actions, under all possible circumstances. Pro- 
 perly understood the subject matter for investigation lies withiu 
 comparatively narrow hmits ; but, overlooking these, they have 
 entered upon a multitude of questions which we shall shortly 
 find to be quite beyond their province. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 As already said (p. 15) the moral law must be the law of the ' 
 perfect man — the law ia obedience to which perfection consists. 
 There are but two propositions for us to choose between. It 
 may either be asserted that moraUty is a code of rules for the 
 behaviour of man as he is — a code which recognises existing 
 defects of character, and allows for them ; or otherwise that it 
 is a code of rules for the regulation of conduct amongst men as 
 they should be. Of the first alternative we must say, that any 
 proposed system of morals which recognises existiag defects, 
 and countenances acts made needful by them, stands self-con- 
 demned ; seeing that, by the hypothesis, acts thus excused are 
 not the best conceivable; that is^are not perfectly right — ^not 
 
56 DEFINITION OF MORALITY. 
 
 perfectly moral, and therefore a morality -which permits them, 
 is, in SO far as it does this, not a morality at all. To escape 
 from this contradiction is impossible, save by adopting the 
 Other alternative; namely, that the moral law ignoring all 
 jvicious conditions, defects, and incapacities, prescribes the con- 
 iduct of an ideal humanity. Pm-e and absolute rectitude can 
 alone be its subject matter. Its object must be to determine 
 the relationships in which men ot<ght to stand to each other— 
 to point out the principles of action in a normal society. By 
 successive propositions it must aim to give a systematic state- 
 ment of those conditions under which human beings may har- 
 moniously combine ; and to this end it requires as its postulate, 
 that those human beings be perfect. Or we may term it the 
 science of social life ; a science that, in common with all 
 other sciences, assumes perfection in the elements with which 
 it deals. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 » Treating therefore as it does on the abstract principles of 
 right conduct, and the deductions to be made from these, a 
 system of pure ethics cannot recognise evil, or any of those 
 conditions which evil generates. It entirely ignores wrong, 
 injustice, or crime, and gives no information as to what must 
 be done when they have been committed. It knows no such 
 thing as an infraction of the laws, for it is merely a statement 
 of what the laws are. It simply says, such and such are the 
 principles on which men should act ; and when these are broken 
 it can do nothing but say that they are broken. If asked what 
 ought any one to do when another has knocked him down, it 
 will not tfill ; it can only answer that an assault is a trespass 
 against the law, and gives rise to a wrong relationship. It is 
 silent as to the manner in which we should behave to a thief; 
 all the information it affords is, that theft is a disturbance of 
 social equihbrium. We may learn from it that debt impHes an 
 infraction of the moral code ; but whether the debtor should 
 or should not be imprisoned, cannot be decided by it. To all 
 
DEFINITION OF MORALITY. 57 
 
 questions which presuppose some antecedent unlawful action, 
 such as — Should a hamster defend any one whom he helieves 
 to he guilty ? Ought a man to hreak an oath which he has 
 taken to do something wrong ? Is it proper to publish the 
 misconduct of our fellows ? the perfect law can give no 
 reply, hecause it does not recognise the premises. In seeking 
 to settle such points on purely ethical principles, morahsts have 
 attempted impossibilities. As well might they have tried to 
 solve mathematically a series of problems respecting crooked 
 lines and broken-hacked curves, or to deduce from the theorems 
 of mechanics the proper method of setting to work a dislocated 
 machine. No conclusions can lay claim to absolute truth, 
 but such as depend upon truths that are themselves absolute. 
 Before there can he exactness in an inference, there must be 
 exactness in the antecedent propositions. A geometrician 
 requires that the straight lines with which he deals shall be 
 veritably straight ; and that his circles, and ellipses, and pai'a- 
 holas shall agree with precise definitions — shall perfectly and 
 invariably answer to specified equations. If you put to him a 
 question in which these conditions are not complied with, he 
 tells you that it cannot be answered. So Ukewise is it with 
 the philosophical morahst. He treats solely of the straight 
 man. He determines the properties of the straight man ; de- 
 scribes how the straight man comports himself; shows in what 
 relationship he stands to other straight men; shows how a 
 community of straight men is constituted. Any deviation from 
 strict rectitude he is obliged wholly to ignore. It cannot be 
 admitted into his premises without vitiating all his conclusions. 
 A problem in which a crooked man forms one of the elements 
 is insoluble by him. He may state what he thinks about it — 
 may give an approximate solution ; but anything more is im- 
 possible. His decision is no longer scientific and authorita- 
 tive, but is now merely an ojpinion. 
 
 Or perhaps the point may be most conveniently enforced, by 
 using the science of the anunal man, to illustrate that of the 
 moral man. Physiology is defined as a classified statement of 
 
58 DEFINITION OF MORALITY. 
 
 the phenomena of bodily life. It treats of the functions of our 
 several organs in their normal states. It explains the relation- 
 ships in which the members stand to each other — what are 
 their respective duties — how such duties are performed, and 
 why they are necessary. It exhibits the mutual dependence 
 of the vital actions ; points out how these are maintained in 
 due balance, and describes the condition of things constituting 
 perfect health. Disease it does not even recognise, and can 
 therefore solve no questions concerning it. To the inquiry — 
 What is the cause of fever ? or, what is the best remedy for a 
 cold ? it gives no answer. Such matters are out of its sphere. 
 Could it reply it would be no longer Physiology, but Pathology, 
 or Therapeutics. Just so it is with a true morality, which might 
 properly enough be called — Moral Physiology. Its office is 
 simply to expound the principles of moral health. Like its 
 analogue, it has nothing to do with morbid actions and de- 
 ranged functions. It deals only with the laws of a normal 
 humanity, and cannot recognise a wrong, a depraved, or a 
 disordered condition. 
 
 Hence it appears, that in treating of two such matters as the 
 right of property, and the impropriety of duelling, as paits of 
 the same science, moralists have confounded together subjects 
 that are essentially distinct. The question— What are the 
 right principles of human conduct ? is one thing ; the ques- 
 tion — What must be done when those principles have been 
 broken through ? is another, and widely - different thing. 
 Whether this last admits of any solution — whether it is pos- 
 sible to develope scientifically a Moral Pathology and a Moral 
 Therapeutics seems very doubtful. Be this as it may, how- 
 ever, it is very clear that a system of pure Ethics is inde- 
 pendent of these. And it will be considered so throughout 
 the ensuing investigations. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 
 § J- 
 
 All evil results from the non- adaptation of constitution to 
 conditions. Tliis is true of everydiing tliat lives. Does 
 a shrub dwindle in poor soil, or become sickly when de- 
 prived of light, or die outright if removed to a cold cUmate ? 
 it is because the harmony between its organization and its cir- 
 cumstances has been destroyed. Those experiences of the farm- 
 yard and tlie menagerie which show that pain, disease, and 
 death, are entailed upon animals by certain kinds of treatment, 
 may all be generalised under the same law. Every suiFering 
 incident to the human body, from a headache up to a fatal 
 illness — from a bum or a sprain, to accidental loss of life, is 
 similarly traceable to the having placed that body iu a situa- 
 tion for which its powers did not fit it. Nor is the expression 
 confined in its application to physical evil; it comprehends 
 moral evil also. Is the kindhearted man distressed by the 
 sight of misery ? is the bachelor unhappy because his means 
 will not permit him to marry? does the mother mourn over 
 her lost child ? does the emigrant lament leaving his father- 
 land ? are some made uncomfortable by having to pass their 
 lives in distasteful occupations, and others fr'om having no oc- 
 cupation at aU ? the explanation is stiU the same. No matter 
 what the special nature of the evil, it is invariably referable to 
 the one generic cause — want of congruity between the faculties 
 and their spheres of action. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Equally true is it that evil perpetually tends to disappear. 
 In virtue of an essential principle of Hfe, this non-adaptation of 
 
CO THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 
 
 an orgaDism to its conditions is ever being rectified ; and modi- 
 fication of one or both, continues until the adaptation is com- 
 plete. Whatever possesses vitaUty, from the elementary cell 
 up to man himself, inclusive, obeys this law. We see it illus- 
 trated in the acclimatization of plants, in the altered habits of 
 domesticated animals, in the vaiTing characteristics of our own 
 race. Accustomed to the brief arctic summer, the Siberian 
 herbs and shrubs spring up, flower, and ripen their seeds, in the 
 space of a few weeks. If exposed to the rigour of northern 
 winters, animals of the temperate zone get thicker coats, and 
 become white. The greyhound which, when first transported to 
 the high plateaus of the Andes, fails in the chase from want of 
 breath, acquires, in the course of generations, a more efficient 
 pair of lungs. Cattle which in their wild state gave milk but 
 for short periods, now give it almost continuously. Ambling 
 is a pace not natural to the horse; yet there are American 
 breeds that now take to it without training. 
 
 Man exhibits just the same adaptabOity. He alters in 
 colour according to temperature — lives here upon rice, and there 
 upon whale oU — gets larger digestive organs if he habitually 
 eats innutritions food — acquires the power of long fasting if his 
 mode of life is irregular, and loses it when the supply of food 
 is certain — becomes fleet and agile in the wilderness and inert 
 in the city — attains acute vision, hearing, and scent, when his 
 habits of life call for them, and gets these senses blunted when 
 they are less needful. That such changes are towards fitness 
 for surrounding circumstances no one can question. When he 
 sees that the dweller in marshes lives in an atmosphere which 
 is certain death to a stranger — when he sees that the Hindoo 
 can he down and sleep under a tropical sun, whilst his white 
 master with closed bhnds, and water sprinklings, and punkah, 
 can hardly get a doze — when he sees that the Greenlander and 
 the Neapolitan subsist comfortably on their respective foods — 
 blubber and macaroni, but would be made miserable by an 
 interchange of them — when he sees that in other cases there is 
 stiU this fitness to diet, to climate, and to modes of life, even 
 
THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 61 
 
 the most sceptical must admit that some law of adaptation is at 
 work. Nay, indeed, if he interprets facts aright, he will find 
 that the action of such a law, is traceahle down to the minutest 
 ramifications of individual experience. In the drunkard who 
 needs an increasing quantity of spirits to intoxicate him, and in 
 the opium eater, who has to keep taking a larger dose to 
 produce the usual effect, he may mark how the system gradu- 
 ally acquires power to resist what is noxious. Those who 
 smoke, who take snuff, or -who hahitually use medicines, can 
 furnish hke illustrations. Nor in fact, is there any permanent 
 change of hodily state or capability, which is not to be ac- 
 counted for on the same principle. 
 
 This universal law of physical modification, is the law of 
 mental modification also. The multitudinous differences of 
 capacity and disposition that have in course of time grovm up 
 between the Indian, African, Mongolian and Caucasian races, 
 and between the various subdivisions of them, must all be 
 ascribed to the acquirement in each case of fitness for surround- 
 ing circumstances. Those strong contrasts between the cha- 
 racters of nations and of times awhile since exemplified (p. 34) 
 admit of no other conceivable explanation. Why all this 
 divergence from the one common origiaal type ? If adaptation 
 of constitution to conditions is not the cause, what is the 
 cause ? 
 
 There are none, however, who can with anything Hke con- 
 sistency combat this doctiine ; for aU use arguments that pre- 
 suppose its truth. Even those to whose prejudices the theory 
 of man's indefinite adaptabihty is most opposed, are continu- 
 ally betraying their involuntary belief in it. They do this when 
 they attribute differences of national character to differences in 
 social customs and arrangements : and again when they com- 
 ment on the force of habit : and again when they discuss the 
 probable influence of a proposed measure upon pubHc mo- 
 raUty : and again when they recommend practice as a means of 
 acquiring increased aptitude: and again when they describe 
 certain pursuits as elevating and others as degrading: and 
 
02 THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 
 
 again when tbey talk of getting used to anything : and again 
 when they advocate certain systems of mental discipline — when 
 they teach that virtuous conduct eventually becomes pleasur- 
 able, and when they warn against the power of a long-en- 
 couraged vice. 
 
 In fact, if we consider the question closely, no other ar- 
 rangement of tilings can be imagined. For we must adopt one 
 of three propositions. We must either affirm that the human 
 being is wholly unaltered by the influences that are brought to 
 bear upon him — his circumstances as we call them ; or that he 
 perpetually tends to become more and more un&lted to those 
 circumstances ; or that he tends to become fitted to them. If 
 the first is trae, then all schemes of education, of government, 
 of social reform — aU instrumentalities by which it is proposed 
 to act upon man, are utterly useless, seeing that he cannot be 
 acted upon at aU. If the second is true, then the way to make 
 a man virtuous is to accustom him to vicious practices, and 
 vice versa. Both of which propositions being absurd, we are 
 compelled to admit the remaining one. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Keeping in mind then the two facts, that all evil results from 
 the non-adaptation of constitution to conditions ; and that 
 where this non-adaptation exists it is continually being dimin- 
 ished by the changing of constitution to suit conditions, we 
 shall be prepared for comprehending the present position of the 
 human race. 
 
 By the increase of population the state of existence we call 
 social has been necessitated. Men living in this state sufifer 
 imder numerous evils. By the hypothesis it follows that their 
 characters £ire not completely adapted to such a state. 
 
 In what respect are they not so adapted ? what is the special 
 qualification which the social state requires ? 
 
 It requires that each individual shall have such desires only, 
 as may be fully satisfied without trenching upon the ability of 
 
THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 03 
 
 other individuals to obtain like satisfaction. If the desires of 
 each are not thus limited, then either all must have certain of 
 their desires ungratified; or some must get gratification for 
 them at the corresponding expense of others. Both of which 
 alternatives necessitating pain, imply non-adaptation. 
 
 But why is not man adapted to the social state ? 
 
 Simply because he yet partially retains the characteristics 
 that adapted him for an antecedent state. The respects in 
 which he is not fitted to society are the respects in which he is 
 fitted for his original predatory life. EEis primitive circum- 
 stances required that he should sacrifice the welfare of other 
 beings to his own; his present circumstances require that he 
 should not do so ; and in as far as his old attribute stOl clings 
 to him, in so far is he unfit for the social state. All sins of 
 men against each other, from the cannibalism of the Carrib to 
 the crimes and venahties that we see around us ; the felonies 
 that fill our prisons, the trickeries of trade, the quarrelings of 
 nation with nation, and of class with class, the corruptness of 
 iustitutions, the jealousies of caste, and the scandal of drawing- 
 rooms, have their causes comprehended under this generaliza- 
 tion. 
 
 Concerning the present position of the human race, we must 
 therefore say, that man needed one moral constitution to fit 
 him for his original state ; that he needs another to fit him for 
 his present state ; and that he has been, is, and wiU long contiaue 
 to be, in process of adaptation. By the term civilization we 
 signify the adaptation that has akeady taken place. The 
 changes that constitaXje progress are the successive steps of the 
 transition. And the behef in human perfectibility, merely 
 amounts to the behef, that in virtue of this process, man vriU 
 eventually become completely suited to his mode of life. 
 
 §4. 
 
 If there be any conclusiveness in the foregoing arguments, 
 such a faith is well founded. As commonly supported by evi- 
 
C4 THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 
 
 dence drawn from liistory, it cannot be considered indisputable. 
 The inference that as advancement has been hitherto the rule, 
 it will be the rule henceforth, may be called a plausible specu- 
 lation. But when it is shown that this advancement is due to 
 the working of a universal law ; and that in virtue of that law 
 it must continue until the state we call perfection is reached, 
 then the advent of such a state is removed out of the region of 
 probabiUty into that of certainty. If any one demurs to this, 
 let him point out the en-or. Here are the several steps of the 
 argument. 
 
 All imperfection is unfitness to the conditions of existence. 
 
 This unfitness must consist either in having a faculty or 
 faculties in excess ; or in having a faculty or faculties deficient ; 
 or in both. 
 
 A faculty in excess, is one which the conditions of existence 
 do not afibrd full exercise to ; and a faculty that is deficient, is 
 one from which the conditions of existence demand more than 
 it can perform. 
 
 But it is an essential principle of fife that a faculty to which 
 circumstances do not allow full exercise diminishes ; and that 
 a faculty on which circumstances make excessive demands 
 increases. 
 
 And so long as this excess and this deficiency continue, there 
 must continue decrease on the one hand, and growth on the 
 other. 
 
 Finally all excess and all deficiency must disappear ; that is, 
 all unfitness must disappear ; that is, all imperfection must 
 disappear. 
 
 Thus the ultimate development of the ideal man is logically 
 certain— as certain as any conclusion in which we place the 
 most impUcit faith ; for instance, that all men will die. For 
 why do we infer that all men will die ? Simply because, in' 
 an immense number of past experiences, death has uniformly 
 occurred. Similarly tlien as the experiences of all people in 
 all times — experiences that are embodied in maxims, proverbs, 
 and moral precepts, and that are illustrated in biographies and 
 
THE EVANESCENCE OF EVIL. 05 
 
 histories, go to prove that organs, faculties, powers, capacities, 
 or whatever else we call them, grow hy use and diminish from 
 disuse, it is infen-ed that they will continue to do so. And if 
 tliis inference is unquestionable, then is the one above deduced 
 from it — that humanity must in the end become completely 
 adapted to its conditions— unquestionable also. 
 
 Progress, therefore, is not an accident, but a necessity. 
 Instead of civilization being artificial, it is a part of natm-e ; all 
 of a piece with the development of the embryo or the unfolding 
 of a flower. The modifications mankind have undergone, and 
 are still undergoing, result from a law underlying the whole or- 
 ganic creation ; and provided the human race continues, and 
 the constitution of things remains the same, those modifications 
 must end in completeness. As surely as the tree becomes 
 bulky when it stands alone, and slender if one of a group ; as 
 surely as the same creature assumes the different forms of cart- 
 horse and race-horse, according as its habits demand strength 
 or speed ; as surely as a blacksmith's arm grows large, and 
 the skin of a labourer's hand thick ; as surely as the eye tends 
 to become long-sighted in the sailor, and short-sighted in the 
 student; as surely as the blind attain a more delicate sense 
 of touch ; as surely as a clerk acquires rapidity in writing 
 and calculation; as surely as the musician learns to detect 
 an error of a semitone amidst What seems to others a very 
 babel of sounds ; as surely as a passion grows by indulgence 
 and diminishes when restrained ; as surely as a disregarded 
 conscience becomes inert, and one that is obeyed active ; as 
 surely as there is any efficacy in educational culture, or any 
 meaning in such terms as habit, custom, practice ; — so surely 
 must the human faculties be moulded into complete fitness for 
 the social state; so surely must the things we call evil and 
 immorality disappear ; so surely must man become perfect. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 THE DIVINE IDEA, AND THE CONDITIONS OF ITS REALIZATION. 
 
 § 1- 
 
 ,Tf, instead of proposing it as the rule of human conduct, 
 Bentham had simply assumed "greatest happiness" to be the 
 creative purpose, his position would have been tenable enough. 
 Almost all men do in one way or other assert the same. There 
 have indeed been times when such a faith -was far from uni- 
 versal. Had the proposition been made before Simeon StyHtes 
 on the top of his column, he would very Ukely have demurred 
 to it. Probably the Flagellants of the thirteenth century may 
 have thought otherwise. And even now it is possible that the 
 Fakeers of India hold a contrary opinion. But, whilst it may 
 be true that a savage asceticism attributes to the Deity a 
 barbarity equal to its own, and conceives him as delighting in 
 human sacrifices ; whilst it may be true that amongst our- 
 selves the same notion yet lingers, under the form of occasional 
 fasts and penances; still there are few if any amongst civi- 
 hzed people who do not agree that human well-being is in 
 accordance Tvith the Divine will. The doctiine is taught by 
 all our rehgious teachers ; it is assumed by every writer on 
 morality: we may therefore safely consider it as an admitted 
 truthH 
 
 [It is one thing, however, to hold that gi-eatest happiness is 
 the creative purpose, and a quite different thing to hold that 
 greatest happiness should be the immediate aim of man. It 
 has been the fatal error of the expediency - philosophers to 
 confound these positions. They have not observed that the 
 truth has two sides, a Divine side and a human side ; and that 
 it matters much to us which we look at. Greatest Happiness 
 and Morality, are the face and obverse of the same fact : what 
 
THE DIVINE IDF-A, ETC. G7 
 
 is written on the one surface is beyond our interpretation : 
 what is \ratten on the other we may read easily enough. 
 
 Or dropping metaphor, and speaking in philosophical lan- 
 guage, we may say thaHit is for us to ascertain the conditions 
 by conforming to which this greatest happiness may be at- 
 tained. ; Not to put tmst in guesses : not to do this or that, 
 because we think it will be beneficial : but to find out what 
 really is the line of conduct that leads to the desired end. For 
 unquestionably there must be in the nature of things some 
 definite and fixed pre-requisites to success. Man is a visible, 
 tangible entity, having properties. In the circumstances that 
 surround him there are certain unchanging necessities. Life 
 is dependent upon the fulfilment of specific functions ; and 
 happiness is a particular kind of life. Surely then if we would 
 know how, in the midst of these appointed circumstances, the 
 being Man must live, so as to achieve the result — greatest 
 happiness, we ought first to determine what the essential con- 
 ditions are. If we solve the problem, it can only be by con- 
 sulting these and submitting ourselves to them. To suppose 
 that we may, in ignorance or disregard of them, succeed by 
 some haphazard speculation, is sheer folly. Only in one way 
 can the desideratum be reached. What that one way is must 
 depend upon the fundamental necessities_ofjyjr_gositipn. And 
 if we would discover it, our first step must be to ascertain 
 those necessities. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 At the head of them stands this unalterable fact — the social 
 state. I In the pre-ordained course of things^' men have multi- 
 plied until they are constrained to live more or less in presence 
 of each other. That, as being needful for the support of the 
 greatest sum of life, such a condition is preliminaiy to the 
 production of the greatest sum of happiness, seems highly 
 probable. Be that as it may, however, we find this state 
 established ; are henceforth to continue in it ; and must there- 
 fore set it down as one of those necessities which our rales for 
 
 F 2 
 
C8 THE DIVINE IDEA, AND 
 
 the achievement of the greatest happiness must recognise and 
 conform to. 
 
 In this social state the sphere of activity of each individual 
 being limited by the spheres of activity of other individuals, it 
 follows that the men who are to realize this greatest sum of 
 /happiness, must be men of whom each can obtain complete 
 ; happiness within his own sphere of activity, without diminish- 
 i ing the spheres of activity required for the acquisition of hap- 
 ipiness by others. For manifestly, if each or any of them 
 cannot receive complete happiness without lessening the spheres 
 of activity of one or more of the rest, he must either liimself 
 come short of complete happiness, or must make one or more 
 do so ; and hence under such circumstances, the sum total of 
 happiness cannot be as great as is conceivable, or cannot be 
 greatest happiness. Here then is the first of those fixed con- 
 ditions to the obtainment of greatest happiness, necessitated by 
 the social state. It is the fulfilment of this condition which we 
 express by the vioxA justice. 
 
 To this all-essential pre-requisite there is a supplementary 
 one of kindred nature. We find that without trenching upon 
 each other's spheres of activity, men may yet behave to one 
 another in such a way as to produce painful emotions. And if 
 any have feelings that lead them to do this, it is clear that the 
 total amount of happiness is not so great as it would be were 
 they devoid of those feeUngs. Hence, to compass greatest 
 happiness, the human constitution must be such (as~ that each 
 man may [perfectly] fulfil his own nature, not only without 
 diminishing other men's spheres of activity, but without giving 
 unhappiness to other men in any direct or indirect way. This 
 condition, as we shall by-and-by see, needs to be kept quite 
 distinct from the foregoing one. The observance of it may be 
 called negative beneficence. 
 
 Yet another requirement is there by fulfilment of which the 
 happiness flowing from comphance with the foregoing ones is 
 indefinitely muMpfied: Let a race of beings be so constituted 
 as that each individual may be able to obtain full satisfaction 
 
THE CONDITIONS OF ITS REALIZATION. 69 
 
 for all liis desires, without deducting from the satisfacdouS 
 obtainable by otheiS individaalg , and we have a state of things 
 in which the amount of isolated happiness is the greatest 
 conceivable. But let these beings be so constituted as- that 
 each, in addition to the pleasurable emotions personally re- 
 ceived by him, can sympathetically participate in the pleasm-able 
 emotions of aH others, and the sum-total of happiness becomes 
 lai'gely -iaeiteasedT Hence, to the primary requisite that each 
 shall be able to get complete happiness without diminisliiug the 
 happiness of the rest, we must now add the secondary one that 
 each shall be capable of receiving happiness from the happi- 
 ness of the rest. Compliance with this requisite implies posi- 
 tive ienejicence. 
 
 Lastly there must go to the production of the greatest happi- 
 ness the further condition, that, whilst duly regardful of the 
 preceding limitations, each individual shall perform all those 
 acts required to fill up the measure of his own private happi- 
 ness. 
 
 These then are necessities. They are not matters of opinion, 
 but matters of uaalterable fact. Denial of them is impossible, 
 for nothing else can be stated but what is self-contradictory. 
 i-iVithout any alternative, heings who are to realize the Divine 
 Idea must be thus constituted. Before greatest happiness can 
 be brought about, every man must answer to these definitions; 
 and all approach to greatest happiness, presupposes an approach ' 
 towards conformity with them.^ Schemes of government and 
 culture which ignore them, cannot but be essentially absurd. 
 Everything must be good or bad, right or wrong, in virtue of 
 its accordance or discordance with them. [We have no need 
 to perplex ourselves with investigations into the expediency of 
 every measure, by trying to trace out its ultimate results in all 
 their infinite ramifications — a task which it is folly to attempt. 
 Our course is to inquire concerning such measure, whether or 
 not it fully recognises these fundamental necessities, and to be 
 sure that it must he proper or improper accordingly^ Ouj- 
 whole code of duty is comprehended in the endeavour to hvc 
 
70 THE DIVINE IIIEA, AND 
 
 up to these necessities. If we fiud pleasure in doing tliis, it is 
 well ; if not, our aim must be to acquire that pleasure. Greatest 
 happiness is obtaiiiecl only when conformity to them is spon- 
 taneous ; seeing that the restraint of desires inciting to trespass 
 implies pain, or deduction from greatest happiness. Hence it 
 is for us to habituate ourselves to fulfil these requirements as 
 fast as we can. The social state is a necessity. The conditions 
 of greatest happiness under that state are fixed. Our characters 
 are the only things not fixed. They, then, must be moulded 
 into fitness for the conditions. And all moral teaching and 
 discipline, must have for its object, to hasten this process. 
 
 I Objection may be taken to the foregoing classification of the 
 conditions needful to greatest happiness, as being in some 
 degree artificial. It will perhaps be said that the distinction 
 between justice and beneficence cannot be maintained, for that 
 the two graduate into each other imperceptibly. Some may 
 argue that it is not allowable to assume any essential difference 
 between right conduct towards others and right conduct towards 
 self, seeing that what ai-e generally considered purely private 
 actions, do eventually affect others to such a degree, as to render 
 them public actions ; as witness the collateral effects of drunk- 
 enness or suicide. Others again may contend that all morality 
 should be classed as private; because with the rightly-con- 
 stituted or moral man, con-ect conduct to others is merely 
 incidental upon the fulfilment of his own nature. 
 
 In each of these allegations there is much truth ; and it is 
 not to be denied that under a final analysis, all such distinc- 
 tions as those above made must disappear. But it should be 
 borne in mind that similar criticisms may be passed upon all 
 classifications whatever. It might after the same fashion be 
 argued that we ought not to separate the laws of heat from 
 those of mechanics, because fire when applied to water gene- 
 rates mechanical force. On like grounds Optics ought to be 
 
THE CONDITIONS OF ITS REALIZATION. 71 
 
 identified with Chemistry ; seeing that in the photographic 
 process, light becomes a chemical agent. Considering that 
 muscles contract when stimulated by a galvanic current, we 
 ought to treat of Physiology and Electricity as forming one 
 science. Nor should we even distinguish between vegetable 
 and animal life ; for these are found to have a common root, 
 and it is hardly possible to say of the lowest organisms which 
 division they belong to. So that unless such objectors are 
 prepai-ed to say that Botany and Zoology should be regarded as 
 one, and that all lines of demarcation between the physical 
 sciences should be abolished, they must in consistency tolerate 
 an analogous classification in moral science ; and must admit 
 that whilst this is in a certain sense artificial, it may be an 
 essential preliminary to anything Hke systematic investigation. 
 The same finite power of comprehension which compels us to 
 deal viith natural phenomena by separating them into groups 
 and studying each group by itself, may also compel us to 
 separate those actions wliich place a man in direct relationship 
 with his fellows, fcom others which do not so place him; although 
 it may be true that such a separation cannot be strictly mtdn- 
 tained. And even in deahng with one of these sections — in 
 developing the principles of right conduct to others, it may be 
 further necessary to distinguish, as above, the primary and most 
 imperative piinciple, from the secondary and less imperative 
 one ; notwithstanding that these have a common root. 
 
 The realization of the Divine Idea being reduced to the ful- 
 filment of certain conditions, it becomes the of&ce of a scientific 
 morality, to make a detailed statement of the mode in which 
 life must be regulated so as to conform to them. On each of 
 these axiomatic truths it must be possible to build a series of 
 theorems immediately bearing upon our daily conduct; or, 
 inverting the thought — every act stands in a certain relationship 
 to these truths, and it must be possible in some way or other 
 
72 THE DIVINE I PEA, ETC. 
 
 to solve the problem, whether that relationship is one of accord- 
 ance or discordance. When such a series of theorems has been 
 elaborated, and solutions have been given to such a series of 
 problems, the task of the morahst is accomplished. 
 
 Each of these axioms, however, may have its own set of 
 consequences separately deduced, or indeed, as already hinted, 
 must have them so deduced. Their respective developments 
 constitute independent departments of moral science, requiring 
 to be dealt with in the order of their natural sequence. For 
 the present, therefore, our attention vr\\\ be confined to the first 
 and most essential of them. Individual or private moraUty, as 
 distinguished from social or public morality, is not to be 
 entered upon in the following pages. Neither ■will there be 
 found in them any statement of that class of moral obligations 
 above comprehended under the terms positive and negative 
 beneficence^. It is with the several inferences to be drawn 
 from that primary condition to greatest happiness, the observ- 
 ance of wliich is vaguely signified by the word justice, that we 
 have now to deal. Our work will be to unfold that condition 
 into a system of equity ; to mark out those limits put to each 
 man's proper sphere of activity, by the Hke spheres of other 
 men ; to dehneate the relationships that are necessitated by a 
 recognition of those limits ; or — in other words — to develop 
 the principles of Social Statics. 
 
 * These other divisions of the subject may be taken up on a future occasion 
 should circumstances favour. 
 
PART 11. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 " DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 ^ 1. 
 
 I — 
 
 i There ■will possibly be some for whom the a j)rio?i eonsider- 
 atioiis set forth in the foregoing chapter, are too abstract for 
 distinct comprehension. It is easy, however, to reason our 
 way to that first principle of ethical science which we are about 
 to follow out to its consequences, without any appeal to these. 
 And it will be desirable now to do this. Starting afresh then, 
 from the admitted truth, that human happiness is the Divine 
 will, let us look at the means appointed for the obtainment of 
 that happiness, and observe what conditions they presuppose. 
 
 Happiness is a certain state of jjojjaeiousness. That state 
 must be produced by the action upon consciousness of certain 
 modifying influences — by certain affections of it. All affec- 
 tions of consciousness we term sensations. And amongst the 
 rest, those affections of it which constitute happiness must be 
 sensations. 
 
 But how do we receive sensations ? Through what are 
 called faculties. It is certain that a man cannot see without 
 eyes. Equally certain is it that he can experience no impres- 
 sion of any kind, unless he is endowed with some power fitted 
 to take in that impression ; that is, a faculty. All the mental 
 states which he calls feelings and ideas, are affections of his 
 consciousness received through the faculties — sensations given 
 to it by them. 
 
 There next comes the question — under what circumstances 
 do the faculties yield those sensations of which happiness con- 
 sists ? The reply is — when they are exercised. It is from the 
 activity of one or more of them that all gratification arises. 
 To the healthful perfonnanoe of each function of mind or 
 
76 DKRIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 body attaches a pleasurable feeling. And tliis pleasurable 
 feeling is obtainable only by the performance of the function ; 
 that is, by the exercise of the correlative faculty. Every 
 faculty in turn affords its special emotion; and the sura of 
 these constitutes happiness. 
 
 Or the matter may be briefly put thus. A desire is the need 
 for some species of sensation. A sensation is producible only 
 by the exercise of a faculty. Hence no desire can be satisfied 
 except thi-ough the exercise of a faculty. But happiness con- 
 sists in the due satisfaction of all the desires ; that is, happi- 
 ness consists in the due exercise of all the faculties. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Now if God wills man's happiness, and man's happiness 
 can be obtained only by the exercise of his faculties, then God 
 A\'ills that man should exercise his faculties ; that is, it is man's 
 duty to exercise his faculties ; for duty means fulfilment of 
 the Divine will. That it is man's duty to exercise his faculties 
 is further proved by the fact, that what we call punishment 
 attaches to the neglect of that exercise. Not only is the 
 normal activity of each faculty productive of pleasure, but 
 the continued suspension of that activity is productive of 
 pain. As the stomach hungers to digest food, so does every 
 bodily and mental agent hunger to perform its appointed ac- 
 tion. And as the refusal to satisfy the cravings of the diges- 
 tive faculty is productive of suffering, so is the refusal to 
 satisfy the cravings of any other faculty also productive of 
 suffering, to an extent proportionate to the importance of that 
 facult}'. But as God wills man's happiness, that line of con- 
 duct which produces unhappiness is contrary to his wiU. 
 Therefore the non-exercise of the faculties is contrary to his 
 ■wiU. Either way then, we find that the exercise of the facul- 
 ties is God's wiU and man's duty. 
 
 But the fulfilment of this duty necessarily presupposes free- 
 dom of action. Man caimot exercise his faculties without 
 
DERIVATION 01? A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 77 
 
 certain scope. He must have liberty to go and to come, to 
 see, to feel, to speak, to work; to get food, raiment, shelter, 
 and to provide for each and all of the needs of his nature. 
 He must be free to do everything -which is directly or indi- 
 rectly requisite for the due satisfaction of every mental and 
 bodily want. Without this he cannot fulfil his duty or God's 
 will. But if he cannot fulfil God's will without it, then God 
 commands him to take it. He has Divine authority, therefore, 
 for claiming this freedom of action. God intended him to have 
 it; that is, he has a right to it. 
 
 From this conclusion there seems no possibility of escape. 
 Let us repeat the steps by which we arrive at it. God wills 
 man's happiness. Man's happiness can only be produced by / 
 the exercise of his faculties. Then God wills that he should / 
 exercise Lis faculties. But to exercise his faculties he must j 
 have hberty to do all that his faculties naturally impel him to I 
 do. Then God intends he should have that Hberty. There- ! 
 fore he has a right to that liberty. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 This, however, is not the right of one but of all. All are 
 endowed with faculties. All are bound to fulfil the Divine 
 will by exercising them. All therefore must be free to do 
 those things in which the exercise of them consists. That is, 
 all must have rights to liberty of action. <: 
 
 And hence there necessarily arises a limitation. Foruf men 
 have like claims to that freedom which is needful for the exer- 
 cise of their faculties, then must the freedom of each be bounded 
 by the similar freedom>3f all. When, in the pursuit of their 
 respective ends, two individuals clash, the movements of the 
 one remain free only in so far as they do not interfere with 
 the like movements of the other. This sphere of existence 
 into which we are thrown not affording room for the unre- 
 strained activity of all, and yet all possessing in virtue of their 
 constitutions similar claims to such unrestrained activity, there 
 
78 DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 is no course but to apportion out tlie unavoidable restraint 
 equally. Wherefore we arrive at the general proposition, that 
 every man may claim the Mlest liberty to exercise his facul- 
 ties compatible with the possession of like liberty by eveiy 
 other man. 
 
 Upon a partial consideration this statement of the law will 
 perhaps seem open to criticism. It may be thought better 
 to limit the right of each to exercise his faculties, by the pro- 
 viso that he shall not hurt any one else— shall not inflict pain 
 on any one else. But although at first sight satisfactory, tliis 
 expression of the law allows of eiToneous deductions. It is 
 true that men, answering to those conditions of greatest hap- 
 piness set forth in the foregoing chapter, cannot exercise their 
 faculties to the aggrieving of one another. It is not, however, 
 that each avoids giving pain by refraining from the full exer- 
 cise of his faculties ; but it is that the faculties of each are such 
 that the full exercise of them offends no one. And herein lies 
 the difference. The giving of pain may have two causes. 
 Either the abnormally-constituted man may do something 
 displeasing to the normal feelings of his neighbours, in which 
 case he acts wrongly ; or the behaviour of the nonnally-con- 
 stituted man may irritate the abnormal feelings of his neigh- 
 bours ; in which case it is not his behaviour that is wrong, but 
 their characters that are so. Under such circumstances the 
 due exercise of his faculties is right, although it gives pain ; 
 and the remedy for the evil lies in the modification of those 
 abnormal feelings to which pain is given. 
 
 To elucidate this distinction let us take a few illustrations. 
 An honest man discovers some friend, of whom he had pre- 
 viously thought well, to be a rogue. He htis certain high 
 instincts to which roguery is repugnant; and allowing free 
 play to these, he drops the acquaintanceship of this unworthy 
 one. Now, though in doing so he gives pain, it does not 
 foUow that he transgresses the law. The evil must he as- 
 
DKRIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 79 
 
 cribed, not to au undue exercise of faculties Ijy liim, but to 
 the immorality of the man who suifers. Again, a Protestant 
 in a Roman Catholic country, refuses to uncover his head on 
 the passing of the host. In so obeying the promptings of 
 certain sentiments, he annoys the spectators ; and were the 
 above modified expression of the law correct, would be blame- 
 able. The fault, however, is not with him, but with those 
 who are offended. It is not that he is culpable in thus testi- 
 fying to Ms belief, but it is that they ought not to have so 
 tyrannical an intolerance of other opinions than their own. 
 Or again, a son, to the great displeasure of his father and 
 family, marries one who, though in all respects admirable, is 
 dowerless. In thus obeying the dictates of his nature he may 
 entail considerable distress of mind upon his relatives ; but it 
 does not follow that his conduct is bad ; it foUows rather that 
 the feelings which his conduct has wounded are bad. 
 
 Hence we see that in hourly-occurring cases like these, to 
 limit the exercise of faculties by the necessity of not giving 
 pain to others, would be to stop the proper exercise of faculties 
 in some persons, for the purpose of allowing the improper exer- 
 cise of faculties in the rest. Moreover, the observance of such 
 a rule does not, as at first sight appears, prevent pain. For 
 tliough he who is restrained by it avoids inflicting suffering 
 on his fellows, he does so at the expense of suffering to him- 
 self. The evil must be borne by some one, and the question 
 is by whom. Shall the Protestant, by showing reverence for 
 what he does not revere, tell a virtual Ue, and thus do violence 
 to his conscientious feeling that he may avoid vexing the in- 
 tolerant spirit of his Catholic neighboui's ? or shall he give tlie 
 rein to his own healthy sincerity and independence, and offend 
 their unhealthy bigotry ? Shall the honest man repress those 
 sentiments that make him honest, lest the exhibition of them 
 should give pain to a rogue ? or shall he respect Ms ovm nobler 
 feelings, and hurt the other's baser ones ? Between these al- 
 ternatives no one can well pause. And here indeed we get 
 down to the root of the matter. For be it remembered 
 
80 DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 the universal law of life is, that the exercise or gratification of 
 faculties sti-engthens them ; whilst, on the contraiy, the curbing 
 or inflicting pain upon them, entails a diminution of their power. 
 And hence it follows that when the action of a normal faculty 
 is checked, to prevent pain being given to the abnormal facul- 
 ties of others, those abnormal faculties remain as active as 
 they were, and the nonnal one becomes weaker or abnormal. 
 Whereas under converse circumstances the normal one remains 
 strong, and the abnormal ones are weakened, or made more 
 normal. In the one case the pain is detrimental, because it 
 retards the approximation to that form of human nature under 
 wliich the faculties of each may be fully exercised without dis- 
 pleasure to the like faculties of all. In the other case the pain 
 is beneficial, because it aids the approximation to that form. 
 Thus, that fij-st expression of the law which arises immediately 
 from the conditions of social existence, turns out to be the true 
 one : any such modification of it as the above, necessitating con- 
 duct that is in many cases absolutely mischievous. 
 
 And yet, on the other hand, when we seek to express the law 
 by saying that every man has full liberty to exercise his facul- 
 ties, provided always he does not trench upon the similar 
 liberty of any other, we commit ourselves to an imperfection 
 of an opposite character ; and we find that there are many 
 cases in wliich the above modified expression answers better. 
 Various ways exist in which the faculties may be exercised to 
 the aggrieving of other persons, without the law of equal free- 
 dom being overstepped. A man may behave unamiably, may 
 use harsh language, or annoy by disgusting habits ; and whoso 
 thus ofiends the normal feelings of his fellows, manifestly di- 
 minishes happiness. If we say that every one is free to exer- 
 cise his faculties so long only as he does not inflict pain 
 upon any one else, we forbid all such conduct. Whereas if we 
 simply limit the liberty of each by the like • hberty of all, we 
 do not forbid it; seeing that he who exercises his faculties in 
 this way, does not hinder others from exercising theire in the 
 same way, and to the same extent. How then are we to es- 
 
DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 81 
 
 cape from this difficulty ? Neither statement of the law quite 
 fulfils our requirement, and yet we must choose one of them. 
 Which must it he, and why ? 
 
 It must he the original one, and for a very good reason. 
 Limiting the liberty of each by the hke liberty of all, excludes 
 a wide range of improper actions, hut does not exclude certain 
 other improper ones. Limiting the hberty of each by the 
 necessitj' of not giving pain to the rest, excludes the whole 
 of these improper actions, but excludes along with them many 
 others that are proper. The one does not out off enough ; the 
 other cuts off too much. The one is negatively erroneous; 
 the other is positively so. Evidently, then, we must adopt the 
 negatively erroneous one, seeing that its shortcomings may be 
 made good by a supplementary law. And here we find the 
 need for that distinction lately drawn between justice and 
 negative lenejicence — a distinction which we habitually make 
 in the afiairs of life. Justice imposes upon the exercise of 
 faculties a primary series of limitations, which is strictly true 
 as far as it goes. Negative beneficence imposes a secondary 
 series. It is no defect in the first of these that it does not 
 include the last. The two are, in the main, distinct ; and, as we 
 have just seen, the attempt to unite them under one expression 
 leads us into fatal errors. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Yet another objection will probably be started. By full 
 liberty to exercise the faculties, is meant full liberty to do all 
 that the faculties prompt, or, in other words, to do all that the 
 individual wills ; and, it may be said, that if the individual is 
 free to do all that he wills, provided he does not trespass upon 
 certain specified claims of others, then he is free to do things 
 that are injurious to himself — is free to get drunk, or to 
 commit suicide. To this it must be in the first place replied, 
 as above, that whilst the law now laid down forbids a certain 
 class of actions as immoral, it does not recognise all kinds of 
 
 G 
 
82 DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 immorality — that the restriction it puts on the free exercise of 
 faculties, though the chief, is not the sole restriction, and must 
 he received without prejudice to further ones. Of the need 
 for such further ones, the difficulty here raised furnishes a 
 second instance. 
 
 Mark now, however, that these supplementary restrictions 
 are of quite inferior authority to the original law. Instead of 
 heing, like it, capahle of strictly scientific development, they 
 (under existing circumstances) can he unfolded only into 
 superior forms of expediency. The limit put to each man's 
 freedom, by the lite freedom of every other man, is a limit 
 almost always possible of exact ascertainment ; for let the con- 
 dition of things be what it may, the respective amounts of 
 freedom men assume can be compared, and the equality or 
 inequality of those amounts recognised. But when we set 
 about drawing practical deductions from the propositions that 
 a man is not at liberty to do things injurious to himself, and 
 that he is not at liberty (except in cases hke those lately cited) 
 to do what may give unhappiness to his neighbours, we find 
 ourselves involved in comphcated estimates of pleasures and 
 pains, to the obvious peril of our conclusions. It is very true, 
 that to trace out the consequences a given act will entail upon 
 oneself or another, is incomparably less difficult than to deter- 
 mine the ultimate effects of some public measm-e upon a whole 
 nation ; and hence the being guided by expediency in private 
 life is proportionably less dangerous. Yet it is also true, that 
 even here, trustworthy inferences are attainable in but a minority 
 of cases. In the first place we frequently cannot say whether 
 the bad results will exceed the good ones ; and in the second 
 place we frequently cannot say whether the faculties on which 
 suffering wiU be inflicted, are in normal or abnormal states. 
 For example, though it is very manifest that drunkenness is 
 an injurious exercise of faculties, as being clearly productive of 
 more pain than pleasure, it is by no means manifest how much 
 work is proper for us, and when work becomes detrimental ; it 
 is by no means manifest where lies the fine between due and 
 
DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 83 
 
 undue intellectual activity; it is by no means manifest what 
 amount of advantage will justify a man in submitting to ud- 
 suitable climate and mode of life ; and yet in each of these 
 cases happiness is at stake, and the wrong course is wrong for 
 the same reason that drunkenness is so. Even were it possible 
 to say of each private action whether the resulting gratification 
 did or did not preponderate over the resulting sufiering, there 
 would still present itself this second difficulty, that we cannot 
 with certainty distinguish suffering that is detrimental, from 
 suffering that is beneficial. Whilst we are as yet imperfectly 
 adapted to our conditions, pain must inevitably arise f rom the _ 
 repression of faculties that are too active, and from the over- 
 tasking of those Ihat are not equal to their duties; and, as 
 being needful to the development of the ultimate man, such 
 pain cannot be held damnatory of the actions causing it. Thus, 
 referring again to the instances just cited, it is self-evident that 
 the abihty to work is needful for the production of the greatest 
 happiness; yet is the acquirement of this ability by the un- 
 civilized man so distressing, that only the severest disciphne 
 will force him to it. That degree of intelligence which our 
 existing mode of life necessitates, cannot be arrived at witliout 
 ages of wearisome apphcation ; and perhaps cannot get organ- 
 ized in the race without a partial and temporary sacrifice of 
 bodily health. The realization of the Divine Idea impUes the 
 peopling of every habitable region ; and this implies the adapt- 
 ation of mankind to a variety of climates — an adaptation which 
 cannot be undergone without great sufiering. Here, then, are 
 cases in which men's liberty must not be limited by the neces- 
 sity of not injuring themselves ; seeing that it cannot be so 
 limited without a suspension of our approach to greatest happi- 
 ness. Similarly we saw awhile since (p. 79), that there are 
 cases in which for the same reason men's liberty must not.be 
 limited by the necessity of not inflicting pain upon others. 
 And the fact now to be noticed is, that we possess no certain 
 way of distinguishing the two groups of cases thus exemplified 
 from those cases in which the doing what diminishes happiness,' 
 
 G 2 
 
84 DKRIVATIOX OF A FIRST PRINCIPLK. 
 
 either in ourselves or others, is hoth immediately and ultimately 
 detrimental, and therefore wrong. Not heing able to define 
 specifically the constitution of the ideal man, but being able 
 to define it generically only — not being able to deteiTnine the 
 ratios of the several faculties composing that constitution, but 
 being able simply to lay down certain laws which their action 
 must conform to— we are quite incompetent to say of every 
 particular deed whether it is or is not accordant with that con- 
 stitution. Or, putting the difficulty in its simplest form, we 
 may say, tliat as both of these supplementarj' limitations involve 
 the term happiness, and as happiness is for the present capable 
 only of a generic and not of a specific definition (p. 5), they 
 do not admit of scientific development. Though abstractedly 
 correct limitations, and limitations which the ideal man will 
 strictly observe, they cannot be reduced to concrete forms until 
 the ideal man exists. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 And now we have arrived at the tlu-eshold of an impoitant 
 truth touching this matter; the truth namely, that only by a 
 universal exercise of this alleged Hberty of each, limited alone 
 by the like liberty of all, can there ever arise a separation of 
 those acts which, though incidentally and temporarily injurious 
 to ourselves or others, are indirectly beneficial, from those acts 
 I which are necessarily and eternally injurious. For manifestly, 
 that non-adaptation of faculties to their functions, from which 
 springs every species of evil, must consist either in excess or 
 defect. And manifestly, in the wide range of cases we are now 
 treating of, there exists no mode but a tentative one of dis- 
 tinguishing that exercise of faculties which produces sufifering 
 because it oversteps the conditions of normal existence, from 
 that other exercise of faculties wliich produces suffering be- 
 cause it falls short of those conditions. And manifestly, the. 
 due employment of this tentative mode requires that each man 
 shall have the greatest freedom compatible with the like free- 
 dom of all others. Or, turning the proposition the other side 
 
DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 85 
 
 up, we may say, that whilst these secondary conditions of 
 greatest happiness are really fixed, yet the practical intei-preta- 
 tion of them requiring a detailed knowledge of the ultimate 
 human constitution, bodily and mental, and such detailed 
 knowledge heing unattainable, our course is to regard the law 
 of equal freedom as setting up the only recognisable limit to 
 the exercise of faculties, knowing that the other limits will 
 inevitably make themselves felt, and that in virtue of the law of 
 adaptation, there must eventually arise a complete conformity 
 to them. 
 
 That, on tliis course being piu'sued, there will happen a 
 gradual cessation of the detrimentally painful actions, whilst 
 the beneficially painful ones will be continued until they have 
 ceased to be painful, may be made clear by a few illustrations. 
 Thus, the change from the impulsive nature of the savage to 
 that nature which enables the civilised man to sacrifice a 
 present gratification for a futui-e greater one, involves much 
 suffering; but the necessities of social life demanding such a 
 change, and continually visiting the lack of a self-restraining 
 power with severe punishment, ensure a constant though irk- 
 some endeavour on the part of all to acquire this power — ao 
 endeavour that must surely though slowly succeed. Conversely, 
 the prevalence amongst men of a somewhat undue desire foi 
 food, entaihng as it perpetually does much bodily, and some 
 mental, affliction, is sure to be therefore accompanied by suet 
 attempts at abstemiousness, as must, by constantly curbing it, 
 finally reduce this desire to a normal intensity ". And what so 
 manifestly happens in these simple cases, will with equal 
 certainty happen in those complex ones above exemphfied, 
 where the good and bad results are more nearly balanced : for 
 
 ^ Why the appetite for food- should now be greater than is proper, seems at first 
 difficult to understand. On calling to mind, however, the conditions of the abo- 
 riginal man, we shall find an explanation of this apparent anomaly in the fact, that 
 the irregularity in his supplies of .food necessitated an ability to eat largely' wht;n 
 food was attainable, and necessitated, therefore, a corresponding desire. Now tljat 
 the supplies of food have become regular, and no contingent periods of long fasting 
 have to be provided against, the desire is in excess and has to be abated. 
 
86 DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 although it may be impossible in such cases for the intellect to 
 estimate the respective amounts of pleasure and pain consequent 
 upon each alternative, yet will experience enable the constitu- 
 tion itself to do this ; and will further cause it instinctively to 
 shun that course which produces on the whole most suffering, 
 or, in other words — most sins against the necessities of exist- 
 ence, and to choose that wliich least sins agaiast them. Turn- 
 ing to those actions which put us in direct relationship to other 
 men, it must in the same manner happen that such of them as 
 give no necessary displeasure to any one, will be persevered in, 
 and the faculties answering to them developed ; whilst, on the 
 contrary, actions necessarily displeasing to our neighbours, 
 must, by virtue of the disagreeable reaction which they com- 
 monly entail upon ourselves, be, m the average of cases, subject 
 to a certain degree of repression — a repression that must ulti- 
 mately tell upon the desires they spring from. And now 
 observe what it is the special purpose of the present argument 
 to show, namely, that in the course of this process there must 
 be continually produced a different effect upon conduct which 
 is necessarily painful to others, from that produced upon 
 conduct that is incidentally painful only. Conduct which 
 hurts necessary feelings in others, wiU, as just explained, 
 inevitably undergo restraint and consequent diminution : con- 
 duct which hurts only their incidental feelings, as those of 
 caste, or prejudice, will not inevitably do so ; but, if it springs 
 from necessary feelings, will, on the contrary, be continued at 
 the expense of these incidental feehngs, and to the final sup- 
 pression of them. When men mutually behave in a way that 
 offends some essential element in the nature of each, and all in 
 turn have to bear the consequent suffering, there will arise a 
 tendency to curb the desire that makes them so behave. When, 
 instead of this, they keep hurting in each other those non- 
 essential elements of character pecuhar to a passing phase of 
 things, and are impelled to do this by impulses that are 
 permanently requisite, then will these non-essential elements be 
 extirpated. Thus, the existing confusion of necessary and con- 
 
DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 87 
 
 ventional feelings, necessaiy and conventional circumstances, 
 and feelings and circumstances that are partly necessary and 
 partly conventional, will eventually work itself clear. Conven- 
 tional feelings will give way before necessary circumstances, 
 and conventional circumstances before necessary feelings. And 
 when, as a result of this process, complete adaptation between 
 constitution and conditions has been anived at, a complete 
 classification of actions into essentially injurious and essentially 
 beneficial, will have been arrived at also. 
 
 If, then, we find that the one thing needful to produce 
 ultimate subordination to these secondary limits of right con- 
 duct is, that we should have the opportunity of freely coming 
 in contact with them — should be allowed freely to expand our 
 natures in all directions until the available space has been filled, 
 and the true bounds have made themselves felt — if a develop- 
 ment of these secondary Umits into practical codes of duty can 
 only thus be accomplished, then does the supreme authority 
 of our first law — the Hberty of each limited alone by the like 
 liberty of all — become still more manifest, seeing that that right 
 to exercise the faculties which it asserts, must precede the 
 unfolding of this supplementary morality. Indeed, regarding 
 it from this point of view, we may almost say that the first law 
 is the sole law ; for we find that of the several conditions to 
 greatest happiness it is the only one at present capable of a 
 systematic development; and we further find that conformity to 
 it, ensures ultimate conformity to the others. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 Nevertheless, it must still be admitted, that in cases where 
 these secondary limitations to the exercise of faculties are un- 
 doubtedly transgressed, the full assertion of this law of equal 
 freedom betrays us into an apparent dilemma. By drunken- 
 ness, or by brutality of manner, our own happiness, or the hap- 
 piness of others, is diminished ; and that not in an incidental but 
 in a necessary way. And if by affirming a man's liberty to do 
 
88 DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 all that he wills so long as he respects the like liberty of every 
 other, we imply that he is at liberty to get drunk or to behave 
 brutally, then we faU into the inconsistency of affirming that he 
 is at liberty to do sometliing essentially destructive of happiness. 
 Of this difficulty nothing can be said, save that it seems in 
 part due to the impossibility of making the perfect law recog- 
 nise an imperfect state, and in part to that defect in our powers 
 of expression elsewhere exemphfied (p. 39). As matters stand, 
 however, we must deal with it as best we may. There is clearly 
 no alternative but to declare man's freedom to exercise his 
 faculties; for without this freedom fulfilment of the Divine 
 will is impossible. There is clearly no alternative but to de- 
 clare the several hmitations of that freedom needful for the 
 achievement of greatest happiness. And there is clearly no 
 alternative but to develop the first and chief of these limita- 
 tions separately ; seeing as we have done that a development 
 of the others is at present impossible. Against the conse- 
 quence of neglecting these secondary hmitations, we must 
 therefore guard ourselves as well as we can; supplying the 
 place of scientific deductions from them, by such inferences 
 as observation and experience enable us to make. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 Finally, however, there is satisfaction in the thought, that no 
 such imperfection as this, can in the least vitiate any of the 
 conclusions we are now about to draw. Liberty of action 
 being the first essential to exercise of faculties, and therefore 
 the first essential to happiness; and the liberty of each limited 
 by the like Uberty of all, being the form which this first essen- 
 tial assumes when applied to many instead of one (§ 3), it 
 follows that this liberty of each, Umited by the hke hberty of 
 all, is the rule in conformity with which society must be organ- 
 ised. Freedom being the pre-requisite to normal life in the 
 individual, equal freedom becomes the pre-requisite to normal 
 life in society. And if this law of equal freedom is the pri- 
 
DERIVATION OF A FIRST riUNCIVLE. 89 
 
 mary law of right relationship hetween man and man, then no 
 desire to get fulfilled a secondary law can warrant us in break- 
 ing it. 
 
 Now we shall find that in the unfolding of this primary 
 limitation to the exercise of faculties into a series of practical 
 regulations, it is impossible to recognise any secondary limita- 
 tions without commilting a breach of the primarj' one. For, 
 in what must recognition of any secondary limitations consist ? 
 It must consist in the establishment in our social organization 
 of certain further restrictions on the exercise of faculties be- 
 sides those imposed by the law of equal fi'eedom. And how 
 are these further restrictions to be enforced ? Manifestly, by 
 men. Now the men who enforce them must necessarily as- 
 sume in so doing a greater amount of freedom than those on 
 whom they are enforced; — that is to say, they must transgress 
 the primary law to prevent others transgressing secondai"y ones. 
 
 Hence, in drawing from it deductions respecting the equitable 
 constitution of society, we may safely assert in full this liberty 
 of each limited alone by the hke hberty of all — must so assert 
 it. The neglect of other hmitations will in no way afiect the 
 accuracy of our conclusions, so long as we confine ourselves to 
 deducing from this fundamental law the just relationships of 
 men to each otber; whereas we cannot include these other 
 limitations in our premises without vitiating those conclusions. 
 We have no alternative therefore but, for the time being, to 
 ignore such other limitations ; leaving that partial interpretation 
 of them which is at present possible to us, for subsequent state- 
 ment. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 SECONDARY DEEIVATION OF A FIEST PRINCIPLE. 
 § 1. 
 
 Having inquired how the Divine Idea, greatest happiness, is to 
 be realized — having found that it is to be realized through the 
 exercise of faculties — and having found that, to fulfil its end, 
 such exercise of faculties must be confined "within certain 
 hmits ; let us now pursue the investigation a step further, and 
 see whether there does not exist in man himself an impulse to 
 claim that exercise, and an impulse to respect those limits. 
 Some such provisions are clearly needful for the completion of 
 the creative scheme. It would be quite at variance with the 
 general law of our structure, that there should be nothing to 
 restrain us from the undue exercise of faculties, but abstract 
 considerations like those set forth in the last chapter. As 
 elsewhere pointed out (p. 19), man is ruled by quite other in- 
 strumentalities than intellectual ones. The regulation of his 
 conduct is not left to the accident of a philosophical inquiry. 
 We may, therefore, expect to find some special agent by which 
 the distinction between riglit and wrong exercise of faculties is 
 recognised and responded to. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 From what he has already gathered, the reader will of course 
 infer that this agent is that Moral Sense, in whose existence we 
 elsewhere saw good reason to believe. And possibly he will 
 anticipate the further inference, that this first and all-essential 
 3aw, declaratory of the liberty of each limited only by the like 
 
SECONDARY DEEIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 91 
 
 liberty of all, is that fundamental truth of which the moral sense , 
 is to give an intuition, and which the intellect is to develop 
 into a scientific morality. 
 
 Of the correctness of this inference there are various proofs, 
 upon an examination of which we must now enter. And first 
 on the list stands the fact, that, out of some source or other in 
 men's minds, there keep continually coming utterances more 
 or less completely expressive of this truth. Quite independ- 
 ently of any such analytical examinations as that just con- 
 cluded, men perpetually exhibit a tendency to assert the 
 equality of human rights. In all ages, hut more especially in 
 later ones, has this tendency been visible. In our own history 
 we may detect signs of its presence as early as the time of 
 Edward I., in whose writs of summons it was said to be " a 
 most equitable rale, that what concerns all should be approved 
 of by aU." How our institutions have been influenced by it 
 may be seen in the judicial principle that " all men are equal 
 before the law." The doctrine that " all men are naturally 
 equal " (of course only in so far as their claims are concerned), 
 has not only been asserted by philanthropists like Granville 
 Sharpe, but as Sir Eobert Filmer, a once renowned champion 
 of absolute monarchy, t«lls us, " Heyward, Blackwood, Barclay, 
 and others that have bravely vindicated the rights of kings, 
 * * * yfith one consent admitted the natural hberty and 
 equality of mankind." Again, we find the declaration of 
 American independence affirming that " all men have equal 
 rights to hfe, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ; " and the 
 similar assertion that " every man has an equal right with every 
 other man to a voice in the making of the laws which all are 
 required to obey," was the maxim of the Complete Suffrage 
 movement. In his essay on Civil Government, Locke, too, 
 expresses the opinion that there is " nothing more evident than 
 that creatures of the same species and rank, promiscuously 
 bom to the same advantages of nature, and the use of the saine 
 faculties, should also be equal one amongst another without 
 subordination or sulajection." And those who wish for more 
 
92 SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 authorities who have expressed the same conviction, may add 
 the names of Judge Blackstone and " the judicious Hooker." 
 
 The sayings and doings of daily life continually imply some 
 intuitive belief of this kind. We take for granted its uni- 
 versahty, when we appeal to men's sense of justice. In moments 
 of irritation it shows itself in such expressions as — " How 
 would you like it ? " " What is tliat to you ? " "I \e as good 
 a right as you," &c. Our praises of liberty are pervaded by it ; 
 and 'it gives bitterness to the invectives with which we assail 
 the oppressors of mankind. Nay, indeed, so spontaneous is 
 this faith in the equality of human rights, that our very lan- 
 guage embodies it. Equity and e'jual are from the same root; 
 and equity hterally means equalness. 
 
 It is manifest, moreover, that some such faith is continually 
 increasing in strength. Rightly understood, the advance from 
 a savage to a cultivated state is the advance of its dominion. 
 It is by their greater harmony with it that the laws, opinions, 
 and nsages of a civilized society are chiefly distinguished from 
 those of a barbarous one. How instrumental it has been in 
 modifying the events of the past was elsewhere hinted (p. 23). 
 If we call to mind the politioal agitations that have run a 
 successful com'se witliin these few years, and consider likewise 
 those that are going on around us, we shall find them nearly 
 all strongly tinctured by it. Nor can we contemplate the late 
 European revolutions, and read the preambles to the new 
 constitutions that have sprung out of them, without perceiving 
 that a conviction of the equality of human rights is now 
 stronger and more general than ever. 
 
 Not without meaning is the continued Ufe and gi'owth of this 
 conviction. He must indeed have a strange way of interpreting 
 social phenomena, who can believe that the re-appearance of it, 
 with ever-increasing frequency, in laws, books, agitations, 
 revolutions, means nothing. If we analyze them, we shall find 
 all behefs to be in some way dependent upon mental confonna- 
 tion — temporary ones upon temporary characteristics of our 
 nature^ — permanent ones upon its pennanent characteristics. 
 
SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 93 
 
 And wlien we find that a belief like this in the equal freedom of 
 aU men, is not only permanent, but daily gaining ground, we 
 have good reason to conclude that it corresponds to some 
 essential element of our moral constitution: more especially 
 since we find that its existence is in harmony with that chief 
 pre-requisite to gi-eatest happiness lately dwelt upon ; and that 
 its growth is in harmony with that law of adaptation by which 
 this greatest happiness is being wTought out. 
 
 Such, at least, is the hypotliesis here adopted. From the 
 above accumulation of evidence it is inferred that there exists 
 in man what may be termed an instinct of jiersonal rights — a 
 feeling that leads him to claim as great a share of natural 
 privilege as is claimed by others — a feehng that leads him to 
 .repel anything like an encroachment upon what he thinks his 
 sphere of original freedom. By virtue of this impulse, indi- 
 viduals, as units of the social mass, tend to assume hke relation- 
 ships with the atoms of matter, surrounded as these are by 
 their respective atmosphei'es of repulsion as well as of attraction. 
 And perhaps social stability may ultimately be seen to depend 
 upon the due balance of these forces. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 There exists, however, a dominant sect of so-called philoso- 
 phical politicians who treat with contempt this behef that 
 men have any claims antecedent to those endorsed by go- 
 vernments. As disciples of Bentham, consistency requires 
 them to do this. Accordingly, although it does violence to 
 their secret perceptions, they boldly deny the existence of 
 " rights " entirely. They nevertheless perpetually betray a 
 belief in the doctrines which they professedly reject. They 
 inadvertently talk about justice, especially when it concerns 
 themselves, in much the same style as their opponents. They 
 draw the same distinction between law and equity that other 
 people do. They applaud _/««>««■«*, and honour, quite as if 
 they thought them something more than mere words. And 
 when robbed, or assaulted, or wrongly imprisoned, they exhibit 
 
94 SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 the same indignation, the same determination to oppose the 
 aggressor, utter the same denunciations of tyranny, and the 
 same loud demands for redress, as the sternest assertors of the 
 rights of man. By way of explaining such inconsistencies, it 
 is indeed alleged, that the feeling thus manifested is nothing 
 but the result of a gradually-acquired conviction that benefits 
 flow from some kinds of action, and evils from other kinds ; 
 and it is said that the sympatliies and antipathies respectively 
 contracted towards these, exhibit themselves, as a love of justice, 
 and a hatred of injustice. To which supposition it was by 
 implication elsewhere rephed, that it would be equally wise to 
 conclude that hunger springs from a conviction of the benefit 
 of eating ; or that love of offspring is the result of a wish to 
 maintain the species! 
 
 But it is amusing when, after all, it turns out that the 
 ground on which these philosophers have taken their stand, 
 and from which with such self-complacency they shower their 
 sarcasms, is nothing but an adversary's mine, destined to blow 
 tlie vast fabric of conclusions they have based on it into nonen- 
 tity. This so solid-looking principle of " the greatest hap- 
 piness to the greatest number," needs but to have a light 
 brought near it, and lo ! it explodes into the astounding as- 
 sertion, that all men have equal rights to happiness (p. 22) — 
 an assertion far more sweeping and revolutionary than any of 
 those which are assailed with so much scorn*. 
 
 When we see, then, that an instinct of personal rights mani- 
 fests itself unceasingly in opinions and institutions; when 
 further we find that the attempt to trace the monitions of this 
 instinct to experience, beti-ays us into an absurdity ; and when 
 lastly, the dogma of those who most sturdily deny that there 
 is such an instinct, proves to be only another emanation from 
 it — we find ourselves in possession of the strongest possible 
 evidence of its existence — the testimony of all parties. We 
 
 ^ We need not here debate the claims of this maxim. It is sufScient for present 
 purposes to remark, that were it true it would be utterly useless as a first principle ; 
 both from the impossibility of determining specifically what happiness is, and from 
 the want of a measure by which equitably to mete it out, could we define it. 
 
SECONDARY DERTVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 95 
 
 are therefore justified in considering that existence as sufficiently 
 proved. 
 
 §4. 
 
 But why, it may be asked, should there need any sentiment 
 leading men to claim the hberty of action requisite for the due 
 exercise of faculties, and prompting them to resist encroach- 
 ments upon that liberty ? Will not the several. faculties them- 
 selves do this, by virtue of their desires for activity, which can- 
 not otherwise be gratified ? Surely there is no necessity for a 
 special impulse to make a man do that which all his impulses 
 conjointly tend to make him do. 
 
 This is not so serious an objection as it appears to be. For 
 although, were there no such sentiment as this supposed one, 
 each faculty in turn might impel its possessor to oppose a dimi- 
 nution of its own sphere of action, yet, during the doinancy of 
 that faculty, there would be nothing to prevent the freedom requi- 
 site for its/iiture exercise from being infringed upon. It may, 
 perhaps, be rejoined, that the mere consciousness that there 
 must again occur occasions for the use of such freedom will 
 constitute a sufficient incentive to defend it. But plausible as 
 this supposition looks, it does not tally with facts. We do not 
 find on inquiry, that each faculty has a special foresight — takes 
 thought for its gratifications to come : we find, on the contrary^ 
 that to provide for the future gratification of the faculties at 
 large, is the office of faculties appointed solely for that pur- 
 pose. Thus, referring once more by way of illustration to the 
 acquisitive instinct, we see that, when this is wanting, the desires 
 for food, for clothing, for shelter, together with those many 
 other desires which property minsters to, do not of themselves 
 prompt that accumulation of property on which the continuance 
 of their satisfaction depends. Each of them, when active, im- 
 pels the individual to take means for its present fulfilment ; but 
 does not prompt him to lay by the means for its future fulfil- 
 ment. To so prompt him there needs a certain amount of this 
 acquisitive instinct, which, in pursuing its own gratification, inci- 
 dentally secures to other instincts the means of their gratification. 
 
96 SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 Similarlj', then, with liberty of action. It is argued, that as each 
 faculty does not look after its own particular fund of necessaries, 
 SO neither does it look after its own particular sphere of activity; 
 and that as there is a special faculty to which the providing of a 
 general fund of necessaries is consigned, so likewise is there a 
 special faculty to which the maintenance of a general sphere of 
 activity is consigned. Or perhaps we may most clearly express 
 the relationship in wliich these two faculties stand to the rest, 
 by saying, that whilst it is the function of the one to accumulate 
 the matter on which the faculties at large are to be exercised, 
 it is the function of the other to preserve the freedom of motion 
 by -which that matter is both obtained and made use of 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Seeing, however, that this instinct of personal rights is a 
 purely selfish instinct, leading each man to assert and defend 
 his own liberty of action, there remains the question — "Whence 
 comes our perception of the rights of others ? 
 
 The way to a solution of this difficulty has been opened by 
 Adam Smith in his " Theory of Moral Sentiments." It is the 
 aim of that work to show that the proper regulation of our 
 conduct to one another, is secured by means of a faculty whose 
 function it is to excite in each being the emotions displayed 
 by surrounding ones — a faculty wliich awakens a like 
 state of sentiment, or, as he terms it, " a fellow feeling with 
 the passions of others" — the faculty, in short, which we com- 
 monly call Sympathy. As illustrations of the mode in which 
 this agent acts, he quotes cases hke these : — 
 
 "Persons of dehcate fibres, and weak constitution of bodv, 
 complain that in looking on the sores and ulcers -which are ex- 
 posed by beggars in the streets, they are apt to feel an itching 
 or uneasy sensation in the coiTesponding part of their own 
 bodies." " Men of most robust make observe, that in looking 
 upon sore eyes they often fed a very sensible soreness in tlieir 
 own." " Our joy for the deliverance of those heroes of tragedv 
 
SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 97 
 
 or romance who interest us, is as sincere as our grief for their 
 distress, and our fellow-feeling for their misery, is not more 
 real than that for their happiness." " We blush for the impu- 
 dence and rudeness of another, though he himself appears to 
 have no sense of the impropriety of his behaviour." 
 
 To these facts cited by Adam Smith, may be added many 
 others of like import ; such as that people — women especially — 
 start or shriek on seeing an accident occur to others ; that un- 
 practised assistants at surgical operations often faint ; that out 
 of the soldiers drawn up to witness a flogging, usually several 
 drop down in the ranks ; that a boy has been known to die on 
 witnessing an execution. We have all experienced the uncom- 
 fortable feeling of shame produced in us by the blunders and 
 confusion of a nervous speaker ; and most likely every one has 
 some time or other been put into a horrible tremor on seeing 
 another at the edge of a precipice. The converse action of the 
 faculty is equally observable. Thus, we find ourselves unable 
 to avoid joining in the merriment of our friends, whilst unaware 
 of its cause ; and children, much to their armoyance, are often 
 forced to laugh in the midst of their tears, by witnessing the 
 laughter of those arouiid them. These and many like evidences 
 prove that, as Burke says, " sympathy must be considered as 
 a sort of substitution by which we are put into the place of 
 another man, and affected in ruany respects as he is affected." 
 
 In tracing our benevolent actions to the influence of such 
 a faculty — in concluding that we are led to relieve the miseries 
 of others from a desire to rid ourselves of the pain given by 
 the sight of miser3% and to make others happy, because we 
 participate in their happiness, Adam Smith puts forth what 
 seems to be a quite satisfactoi7 theory. But he has overlooked 
 one of its most important applications. Not recognising any 
 such impulse as that which ui-ges men to maintain their claims, 
 he did not see that their respect for the claims of others, may 
 be explained in the same way. He did not perceive that the 
 sentiment of justice is nothing but a sympathetic affection of 
 the instinct of personal rights— a sort of reflex function of it. 
 
 H 
 
98 SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 ! Such, however, must be the case, if that instinct exists, and if 
 this hypothesis of Adam Smith's be true. Here Hes the ex- 
 
 ; planation of those qualms of conscience, as we call them, felt 
 by men who have committed dishonest actions. It is through 
 
 ' this instrumentality that we receive satisfaction on paying 
 another what is due to him. And with these two faculties also, 
 originate that indignation which narratives of political oppres- 
 sion excite in us, and that gnashing of the teeth \vith which we 
 read of the slave-dealer's barbarities. 
 
 It was elsewhere hinted (p. 71), that though we must keep 
 up the distinction between them, it is nevertheless true that 
 
 justice and beneficence have a common root, and the reader 
 will now at once perceive that the common root is — Sympathy. 
 All the actions properly classified under the one, and which we 
 describe as fair, equitable, upright, spring from the sympathetic 
 excitement of the instinct of personal rights ; whilst those 
 usually grouped under the other, as mercy, charity, good-nature, 
 generosity, amiability, considerateness, are due to the action of 
 Sympathy upon one or more of the other feehngs. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 In support of the foregoing theory much detailed evidence 
 can be adduced. If it be true that men's perceptions of jus- 
 tice are generated in the way alleged, it will follow that, 
 other things equal, those who have the strongest sense of their 
 own rights, will have the strongest sense of the rights of their 
 neighbours. Aad, by observing whether this is the case or not, 
 we may put the theory to the proof. Let us do this. 
 
 The fii-st illustration that suggests itself is afforded by the 
 Society of Friends. Ever since they appeared in the days of 
 Charles I., the members of that body have been remarkable for 
 their determined assertion of personal liberty. They have 
 shown it in their continued resistance to ecclesiastical power; in 
 the obstinacy with which they successfully defied persecution ; 
 in their still-continued refusal to pay church-rates ; and even 
 
SECONDARY DERIVATrON OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 99 
 
 in their creed, which does not pei'rait a priesthood. Obsen'e, 
 now, how the sentiment which these peculiarities imply has 
 manifested itself sympathetically. Penn and his followers 
 were the only emigrants of their age who made any acknow- 
 ledgment to the aborigines for the land they colonized. Of 
 this same sect were the philanthropists who commenced the 
 agitation for abolishing the slave trade; and who were most 
 energetic in carrying it on. Amongst lunatic asylums, the 
 York Retreat was one of the first, if not tlie first, in which a 
 non-coercive treatment of the insane was adopted. They were 
 Quakers too, who years ago hegan publicly to exclaim against 
 the injustice as well as the cruelty of war. And, whilst it 
 may be true that in business they are firm in the assertion of 
 their claims, it is not less true that on the whole they are re- 
 markable for honest dealing. 
 
 The English national character, as contrasted with that of 
 other races, will supply a further illustration. We are universally 
 distinguished for our jealous love of freedom — for the firm 
 maintenance of our rights. At the same time we are not less 
 distinguished for the greater equity of our general conduct. 
 Although our hehaviour to the natives of lands on which we 
 have settled has been anything but praiseworthy, it has never 
 been so abominable as that of the Spaniards and others. Ac- 
 cording to all accounts English merchants are noted everywhere 
 for good faith and straightforwardness. Even amongst the 
 most brutal of our population — even in the prize-ring itself, 
 there is shown in that maxim which forbids the striking of a 
 man when down, a greater sense of what is fair than the people 
 of other countries show. And during these latter times, in 
 which the popular demand for equal political rights has been 
 so loud and so increasing, we have, as a nation, proved our 
 greater regard for the rights of others, by an attempt to put 
 down slavery all over the world. 
 
 Conversely, we £nd that those who have not a strong sense 
 of what is just to themselves, are likewise deficient in a sense 
 of what is just to their fellow men. This has long been a com- 
 
 H 2 
 
100 SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 men remark. As one of our living writers puts it — the tyrant 
 is nothing but a slave turned inside out. In earlier days, when 
 feudal lords were vassals to the king, they were also despots to 
 their retainers. In our own time, the Russian noble is alike a 
 serf to his autocrat, and an autocrat to his serf. It is remarked 
 even by school-boys, that the buUy is the most ready of all to 
 knock under to a bigger bully. We constantly observe that 
 those who fawn upon the great are overbearing to their inferiors. 
 That " emancipated slaves exceed all other owners (of slaves) 
 in cruelty and oppression," * is a truth established on numerous 
 authorities. And that where opportunity offers the submissive 
 nature becomes a tyrannical one, is further illustrated by the 
 fact, that the negroes are frequently caught and sold by their 
 own kings. 
 
 Thus we find the proposed theory to be supported both 
 by direct and converse evidence. One quaUfication must be 
 made, however. There is no necessary connection between a 
 sense of what is due to self, and a sense of what is due to 
 others. Sympathy and instinct of rights do not always co- 
 exist in equal strength any more than other faculties do. 
 Either of them may be present in normal amount, whUst 
 the other is almost wanting. And, if devoid of sympathy, 
 it is possible for a man who has a sufficient impulse to 
 assert his own claims, to show no corresponding respect 
 for the claims of his fellows. The instinct of rights being 
 of itself entirely selfish, merely impels its possessor to 
 maintain his own privileges. Only by the sympathetic 
 excitement of it, is a desii-e to behave equitably to others 
 awakened; and when sympathy is absent such a desii-e is 
 impossible. Nevertheless this does not affect the general 
 proposition, that where there exists the usual amount of 
 sympathy, respect for the rights of others will be great or 
 small, according as the amount of the instinct of personal 
 rights is great or small. And thus in the average of cases, 
 
 Fonr Years in Oie Pacific. By Lieut. Walpole. 
 
SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 101 
 
 we may safely conclude that a man's sense of justice to him- 
 self, and his sense of justice to his neighbours, bear a constant 
 ratio to each other. 
 
 Further proof that there exists the mental arrangement here 
 described, may be found in the fact, that some of the peculiar 
 moral notions traceable to it are perfectly in harmony with 
 certain of the abstract conclusions arrived at in the preceding 
 chapter. We find in ourselves a conviction, for which we can 
 give no satisfactory reason, that we are free, if we please, to do 
 particular things which it is yet blamable to do. Though it 
 may greatly diminish his happiness, a man feels that he has a 
 right, if he likes, to cut off a limb, or to destroy his property. 
 Whilst we condemn the want of consideration he shows towards 
 some miserable debtor, we yet admit that the hard creditor is, 
 in strict justice, entitled to the uttermost farthing. Notwith- 
 standing our disgust at thei selfishness of one who refuses to 
 afford some friendly accommodation, we cannot deny that he 
 is quite at liberty so to refuse. Now these perceptions, which, 
 if the hypothesis be true, are referable to the instinct of per- 
 sonal rights acting in the one case directly, and in the other 
 cases sympathetically, quite accord with foregoing inferences. 
 We found that the law of equal freedom was the fundamental 
 law. We found (p. 82) that no other limitations of activity 
 could be as authoritative as that which it sets up. And we 
 found further (p. 89) that in this, our state of adaptation, it 
 would be wrong to estabhsh any fixed boundary to the liberty 
 of each, save the similar Uberty of others. Such a corre- 
 spondence between our instinctive beliefs, and the conclusions 
 previously arrived at, lends additional probabihty to the hypo- 
 thesis here advanced. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 That there exists in us a mental mechanism by which the 
 essential pre-requisite to greatest happiness is recognised and 
 
102 SECONDARY DERIVATION OF A FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 enforced, seems therefore abundantly manifest. We find the 
 general principles of our structure to imply some such pro- 
 vision. In that Moral Sense, of whose existence we elsewhere 
 saw the probabihty, we have an agent apparently answering to 
 the requirement ; and in this first condition to greatest happi- 
 ness, we discover the axiom which the Moral Sense was to 
 respond to. That man does possess a feeling which responds to 
 this axiom, is evidenced by the more or less complete expres- 
 sion spontaneously given to it in poUtical dogmas, in laws, and 
 in the sayings of daily hfe : further proof of its existence being 
 found in the fact, that those who nominally repudiate the be- 
 lief it gives utterance to, themselves profess that belief in a 
 disguised and incorrect form. By an analogy drawn from the 
 impulse to accumulate, we are shown that an impulse to main- 
 tain liberty of action, is most Hkely essential to the complete- 
 ness of the human constitution. How this impulse to main- 
 tain liberty of action can generate regard for the liberty of 
 action of others, is explicable by an extension of Adam Smith's 
 doctrine of Sympathy; and that our sentiment of justice is 
 really due to a sympathetic excitement of such impulse, nume- 
 rous facts conspire to prove. Lastly, we find that the convic- 
 tions originated in us after the manner here supposed, corre- 
 spond ^vith the results of abstract reasoning, not only as to the 
 possession by each of a right to exercise his faculties, and as to 
 a consequent hmit of that right, but as to the pecuhar sacred- 
 ness of that right and this limit. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 § 1. 
 
 Thus are we brought by several routes to the same conclusion. 
 Whether we reason our way from those fixed conditions under 
 which only the Divine Idea — greatest happiness, can be re- 
 alized — whether we draw our inferences from man's consti- 
 tution, considering him as a congeries of faculties — or whether 
 we listen to the monitions of a certain mental agency, which 
 seems to have the function of guiding us in this matter, we 
 are alike taught as the law of right social relationships, that — 
 Every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he 
 infringes not the equal freedom of any other man. Though 
 further quahfications of the liberty of action thus asserted may 
 be necessary, yet we have seen (p. 89) that in the just regu- 
 lation of a community no further qualifications of it can be 
 recognised. Such further quahfications must ever remain for 
 private and individual application. We must therefore adopt 
 this law of equal freedom in its entirety, as the law on which 
 a correct system of equity is to be based. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Some wUl, perhaps, object to this first principle, that being 
 in the nature of an axiomatic truth — standing towards the 
 inferences to be drawn from it in the position of one, it ought 
 to be recognisable by all ; which it is not. 
 
 Respecting the fact thus alleged, that there have been, and 
 are, men impervious to this first principle, there can be no 
 question. Probably it would have been dissented from by 
 
J 04 FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 Aristotle, who considered it a " self-evident maxim that nature 
 intended barbarians to be slaves." Cardinal Julian, who " ab- 
 horred the impiety of keeping faith with infidels," might pos- 
 sibly have disputed it. It is a doctrine which would scarcely 
 have suited the abbot Guibert, who, in his sermons, called the 
 free cities of France " those execrable communities, where serfs, 
 against law and justice, withdraw themselves from the power 
 of their lords." And perhaps the Highlanders, who in 1748 
 were reluctant to receive their freedom on the abolition of 
 the heritable jurisdictions, would not have admitted it. But 
 the confession that the truth of this first principle is not 
 self-evident to all, by no means invalidates it. The Bushman 
 can only count as high as three ; yet arithmetic is a fact : and 
 we have got a Calculus of Functions by the aid of which we 
 find new planets. As, then, die disabiUty of the savage to 
 perceive the elementary truths of number is no argument 
 against their existence, and no obstacle to their discovery 
 and development, so, the circumstance that some do not see 
 the law of equal freedom to be an elementary truth of ethics, 
 does not prevent its being one. 
 
 So far indeed is this difference in men's moral perceptions 
 from being a difficulty in our way, that it serves to illustrate a 
 doctrine already set forth. As explained in Chapter II., man's 
 original circumstances "required that he should sacrifice the 
 welfare of other beings to his o^ti;" whereas his present cir- 
 cumstances require that " each individual shall have such desires 
 only as may be fully satisfied without trenching upon the abiUty 
 of other individuals to obtain like satisfaction." And it was 
 pointed out that, in virtue of the law of adaptation, the human 
 constitution is changing from the form that fitted it to the first 
 set of conditions to a form fitting it for the last. Now it is by 
 the growth of those two faculties which together originate 
 what we t€rm a Moral Sense, that fitness for these last condi- 
 tions is secm-ed. In proportion to the strengths of sympathy, 
 and the instinct of personal rights, will be the impulse to con- 
 form to the law of equal freedom. And in the mode elsewhere 
 
FIRST PKINCIPLE. 105 
 
 shown (p. 26), tbe impulse to conform to this lawwill generate 
 a correlative belief in it. Only, therefore, after the process of 
 adaptation has made considerable advance, can there aiise 
 either subordination to this law, or a perception of its truth. 
 And hence any general recognition of it during the earlier 
 stages of social development must not be looked for. 
 
 §3. 
 
 To the direct evidence that has been accumulated in proof 
 of our first principle, may now, however, be added abundant 
 indirect evidence furnished by the absurdities into which a 
 denial of it betrays us. He who asserts that the law of equal 
 freedom is not true, that is, he who asserts that men have 
 ■not equal rights, has two alternatives. He may either say 
 that men have no rights at all, or that they have unequal 
 rights. Let us examine these positions. 
 
 Foremost of those who deny rights altogether, stands that 
 same Sir Eobert Filmer akeady named, with his dogma, that 
 " men are not naturally free." Starting thus, he readily finds 
 his way to the conclusion, that the only proper form of govern- 
 ment is an absolute monarchy. For, if men are not naturally 
 free, that is, if men have naturally no rights, then, he only has 
 rights to whom they are specially given by God. From which 
 inference to " the divine right of kings" is an easy step. It has 
 become very manifest in later times, however, that this divine 
 right of kings, means the divine right of any one who can get 
 uppermost. For since, according to its assertors, no man can 
 be supposed to occupy the position of supreme ruler in oppo- 
 sition to the will of the Deity, it follows that whoever attains 
 to that position, whether by fair means or by foul, be he legi- 
 timate or be he usurper, has Divine authority on his side. So 
 that to say " men are not naturally free," is to say that though 
 men have no rights, yet whoever can get power to coerce the 
 rest has a right to do so ! 
 
106 FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 §4. 
 
 But this doctrine betrays its supporters into a still more 
 serious dilemma. On referring back to Chapter IV., we shall 
 find that the denial of rights amounts to a libel on the Deity. 
 For, as we there saw, that which a man has a right to, is that 
 which God intended for him. And to say that man has no 
 right to freedom of action, is to say that God did not mean 
 him to have it. Without freedom of action, however, man 
 cannot fulfil his desires. Then God willed that he should not 
 fulfil them. But the non-fulfilment of the desires produces 
 misery. Therefore, God intended that he should be miserable. 
 By which absurdity we may safely consider the position dis- 
 proved. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 For espousing the other alternative, namely, that men's rights 
 are unequal, no conceivable motive can be assigned but a 
 desire to ensure the supremacy of the best. There are not a 
 few good sort of people who commonly reply to strictures upon 
 social inequalities by quoting that couplet, which, beginning 
 with the postulate — " Order is heaven's first law," ends with 
 the inference — " Some are, and must be, greater than the rest." 
 And on this maxim, with ludicrous inconsistency, they found a 
 defence of conventional distinctions. Not daring to trust 
 "heaven's first law" to itself, they wish to help it by artificial 
 classification. They fear that the desired " order" will not be 
 maintained unless it is looked after ; and so these " greater 
 than the rest" are picked out by official divination ; ranged in 
 tiers ; and ticketed with their respective values. 
 
 These people, and others akin to them, who hold that rights 
 are unequal, belong to that large class who believe in nothing 
 but externals — who can recognise no forces but those of pre- 
 scription — votes, authority, rank, and the like — who " adore an 
 institution, and do not see that it is founded on a thought." 
 
FIRST PRINCIPLE. 107 
 
 A modicum of penetration, however, would show them that the 
 great need none of this patronage at their hands. Real supe- 
 riority will assert itself without factitious aid. Do away with 
 disturbing arrangements, and, just in proportion to the force 
 resident in each, will be the influence each exercises upon the 
 rest. Allow things to take their natural course, and if a man 
 have in him that which transcends the common, it must event- 
 ually draw to itself respect and obedience. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 But even were it admitted that, to ensure supremacy of the 
 best, Hberty of action should he apportioned out to men in the 
 ratio of their merits, the maintainers of unequal rights would 
 be none the forwarder; for there remains the question — how 
 are relative merits to be determined ? Where are the standards 
 by which we may test tlie respective values of different kinds 
 and degrees of abihty ? We cannot appeal to pubhc opinion, 
 for it is not uniform. And were it uniform, there is no reason 
 to think that it would be correct. On the contrary, if anything 
 is to be gathered from surrounding facts, very erroneous 
 estimates would be formed by it. Can confidence be placed in 
 the judgments of men who subscribe Hudson- testimonials, and 
 yet leave the original projector of railways to die in poverty ? 
 Are those fit to decide upon comparative greatness who orna- 
 ment their drawing-room tables with a copy of Burke's Peerage ; 
 who read through the lists of court presentations, and gossip 
 about tlie movements of the haut ton — people who would 
 trace back their lineage to some bandit baron — some Pront-de- 
 hoeuf, rather than to a Watt or an Arkwright? Is any depend- 
 ence to Tdc placed on the decision of an authority which has 
 erected half-a-dozen pubUc monuments to its Wellington, and 
 none to its Shakspeare, its Newton, or its Bacon ? — an authority 
 that awards to the door-keeper of its House of Commons i£74 
 a year more than to its astronomer royal ? According to 
 Johnson,, " the chief glory of every people arises from its 
 
103 FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 
 authors : " yet our literary men are less honoured than people 
 of title ; the writers of our leading journals are unknown ; and 
 we see much more respect shown to a Eothschild or a Baring 
 than to our Faradays and our Owens. 
 
 If, then, pubUc opinion is so fallible a test of relative merits, 
 where shall a trustworthy test he found ? Manifestly, if the 
 freedom to which each is entitled varies with his worth, some 
 satisfactory mode of estimating worth must be discovered 
 before any settlement of men's right relationships can become 
 possible. Who now will point out such a mode ? 
 
 § 7. 
 
 Even were a still further admission made — even were we to 
 assume that men's respective claims could be fairly rated — it 
 would still be impossible to reduce the theory of unequal rights 
 to practice. We' should yet have to find a rule by which to 
 allot these different shares of privilege. Where is the scale 
 that would enable us to mark off the portion proper for each 
 individual? What unit of measure must be used for this kind 
 of division ? Supposing a shopkeeper's rights to be sym- 
 bolized by ten and a fraction, what number will represent those 
 of a doctor ? What multiple are the hberties of a banker of 
 those of a seamstress ? Given two artists, one half as clever 
 again as the other, it is required to find the Umits within which 
 each may exercise his faculties. As the greatness of a prime 
 minister is to that of a ploughboy, so is full freedom of action 
 to — the desired answer. Here are a few out of numberless 
 like questions. When a method for their solution has been 
 found, it will be time enough to reconsider the theory of un- 
 equal rights. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 ■ Thus to the several positive reasons for aflirming that every 
 man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infi'inges 
 
FIRST PRINCIPLE. 109 
 
 not the equal freedom of any other man, we must now add the 
 foregoing negative ones. Neither of the alternatives, to which 
 the rejection of this first principle leaves us, is acceptable. The 
 doctrine that men have naturally no rights leads to the 
 awkward inferences, that might makes right, and that the Deity 
 is a malevolent being. Whilst to say that men have unequal 
 rights is to assume two impossibilities ; namely, that we are 
 able to determine the ratios of men's merits; and having done 
 this, to assign to each his due proportion of privilege. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 APPLICATION OF THIS FIRST PRINCIPLE. 
 § 1- 
 
 The process by -which we may develop this first principle into 
 a system of equity, is sufficiently obvious. We have just to 
 distinguish the actions that are included under its pennit, from 
 those which are excluded by it — to find what lies inside the 
 sphere appointed for each individual, and what outside. Our 
 aim must be to discover how far the territory of may extends, 
 and where it borders upon that of may not. We shall have 
 to consider of every deed, whether, in committing it, a man 
 does, or does not, trespass upon the ordained freedom of his 
 neighbour — whether, when placed side by side, the shares of 
 liberty the two parties respectively assume are equal. And by 
 thus separating that which can be done by each without trench- 
 ing on the privileges of others, from that which cannot be so 
 done, we may classify actions into lawful and unlawful. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Difficulties may now and then occur in the performance of 
 this process. We shall, perhaps, occasionally find ourselves 
 unable to decide whether a given action does or does not 
 trespass against the law of equal freedom. But such an 
 admission by no means implies any defect in that law. It 
 merely impUes human incapacity — an incapacity which puts a 
 limit to our discovery of physical as well as of moral truth. It 
 is for instance, quite beyond the power of any mathematician to 
 state in degrees and minutes, the angle at which a man may 
 lean without falling. Not being able to find accurately the 
 
APPLICATION OF THIS FIEST PRINCIPLE. Ill 
 
 centre of gravity of a man's body, he cannot say with certainty 
 whether, at a given inclination, the line of direction will or will 
 not fall outside the base. But we do not, therefore, take 
 exception to the first principles of mechanics. We know that, 
 in spite of our inability to follow out those first principles to 
 all their consequences, the stability or instability of a man's 
 attitude might still be accurately determined by them, were our 
 perceptions competent to take in all the conditions of such a 
 problem. Similarly, it is argued that, although there may 
 possibly arise out of the more complex social relationships, 
 questions that are apparently not soluble by comparing the 
 respective amounts of freedom the concerned parties assume, it 
 must nevertheless be granted that, whether we see it or not, 
 their claims are either equal or unequal, and the dependent 
 actions right or wrong accordingly. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 For those who have faith in the abstract, and who dare to 
 foUow wherever an acknowledged doctrine may lead, it will be 
 sufiicient to point out the several conclusions which may be 
 drawn from this first principle, and to leave those conclusions 
 to stand or fall by the logicalness of their deduction. It is to 
 be feared, however, that results arrived at by so purely philo- 
 sophical a process, will weigh but little with the majority. 
 People who " cannot understand a principle until its light falls 
 upon a fact," are not to be swayed by inferences so deduced. 
 Wedded as they are to the guidance of a superficial experience, 
 they are deaf to the enunciation of those laws, of which the 
 complex phenomena they draw their experience fi-om are the 
 workings out. We have, nevertheless, to deal with such as best 
 we may ; and, to meet their case, evidence of a so-called 
 "practical" nature must be adduced. Whenever, therefore, we 
 arrive at inferences conflicting with the general opinion, it is 
 intended to follow up the argument by showing that " ex- 
 perience," rightly interpreted, enforces these inferences. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE RIGHTS OF LIFE AND PERSONAL LIBERTY. 
 § 1- 
 
 These are such self-evident corollaries from our first principle 
 as scarcely to need a separate statement. If every man has 
 freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the 
 equal freedom of any other man, it is manifest that he has a 
 claim to his life : for without it he can do nothing that he has 
 willed; and to his personal liberty: for the withdrawal of it 
 partially, if not wholly, restrains him from the ftilfilment of his 
 will. It is just as clear, too, that each man is forbidden to 
 deprive his fellow of Kfe or Uberty : inasmuch as he cannot do 
 this without breaking the law, which, in asserting his freedom, 
 declares that he shall not infringe " the equal freedom of any 
 other." For he who is killed or enslaved is obviously no 
 longer equally free with his killer or enslaver. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 It is unnecessary to commend these conclusions by any 
 exposition of advantages. All spontaneously assent to them. 
 There are a few simple truths of which the moral sense gives 
 a sufficiently clear perception without the aid of logic ; and 
 these are of the number. The time was, indeed, when the 
 law of adaptation having as yet produced but little effect, the 
 feelings that respond to these truths were comparatively un- 
 developed, and consequently produced no spontaneous recog- 
 nition of them. And did we live in the old Assyrian days 
 when a subject was the property of his king — were it our 
 
THE RIGHTS OF LIFE AND PEESONAL LIBERTY. 1 1 3 
 
 custom to chain a porter to his cell on one side of the door, 
 opposite to the kennel of the house-dog on the other, as in 
 Athens and Rome — did we sacrifice men to the gods, or send 
 our prisoners of war to he torn to pieces in an amphitheatre, it 
 might be needfal to enforce the doctrines here enunciated, by 
 showing the expediency of acting upon them. But happily we 
 live in better times ; and may congratulate ourselves on having 
 reached a phase of civilization, in which the rights of life and 
 personal liberty no longer require inculcating. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Into such questions as the punishment of death, the per- 
 petual imprisonment of c rimin als^ and the like, we cannot here 
 enter. These implying, as they do, antecedent infractions of 
 the law, and being, as they are, remedial measures for a diseased 
 moral state, belong to what has been elsewhere termed Thera- 
 peutical Etliics, with which we have now nothing to do. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 
 § 1- 
 
 Given a race of beings having like claims to pursue the 
 objects of their desires — given a world adapted to the gratifi- 
 cation of those desires— a world into which such beings are 
 similarly bom, and it unavoidably follows that they have equal 
 rio-hts to the use of this world. For if each of them " has 
 freedom to do all that he wills provided he infringes not the 
 equal freedom of any other," then each of them is free to use 
 the earth for the satisfaction of his wants, provided he allows 
 all others the same Uherty. And conversely, it is manifest that 
 no one, or part of them, may use the earth in such a way as to 
 prevent the rest from similarly using it ; seeing that to do this 
 is to assume greater freedom than the rest, and consequently to 
 break the law. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Equity, therefore, does not permit property in land. For if 
 one portion of the earth's surface may justly become the 
 possession of an individual, and may be held by him for his 
 sole use and benefit, as a tiling to which he has an exclusive 
 right, then other portions of the earth's surface may be so held ; 
 and eventually the whole of the earth's surface may be so held ; 
 and our planet may thus lapse altogether into private hands. 
 Observe now the dilemma to which this leads. Supposing the 
 -entire habitable globe to be so enclosed, it follows that if the 
 landowners have a valid right to its surface, all who are not 
 landowners, have no right at all to its surface. Hence, such 
 can exist on the earth by sufferance only. They are all 
 
THE EIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 115 
 
 trespassers. Save by the permission of the lords of the soil, 
 they can have no room for the soles of their feet. Nay, should 
 the others think fit to deny them a resting-place, these landless 
 men might equitably be expelled from the earth altogether. 
 If, then, the assumption that land can be held as property, 
 involves that the whole globe may become the private domain 
 of a part of its inhabitants ; and if, by consequence, the rest of 
 its inhabitants can then exercise their faculties — can then exist 
 even — only by consent of the landowners ; it is manifest, that 
 an exclusive possession of the soil necessitates an infiingement 
 of the law of equal freedom. For, men who cannot " live and 
 move and have their being" without the leave of others, cannot 
 he equally free with those others. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Passing from the consideration of the possible, to that of the 
 actual, we find yet further reason to deny the rectitude of 
 property in land. It can never be pretended that the existing 
 titles to such property are legitimate. Should any one think 
 so, let him look in the chronicles. Violence, fraud, the prero- 
 gative of force, the claims of superior cunning — these are the 
 sources to which those titles may be traced. The original 
 deeds were written with the sword, rather than with the pen : 
 not lawyers, but soldiers, were the conveyancers : blows were 
 the current coin given in payment; and for seals, blood was 
 used in preference to wax. Could vahd claims be thus consti- 
 tuted ? Hardly. And if not, what becomes of the pretensions 
 of all subsequent holders of estates so obtained ? I>oes sale 
 or bequest generate a right where it did not previously exist ? 
 Would the original claimants be nonsuited at the bar of reason, 
 because the thing stolen from them had changed hands? 
 Certainly not. And if one act of transfer can give no title, can 
 many ? No : though nothing be multiplied for ever, it wiU 
 not produce one. Even the law recognises this principle. An 
 existing holder must, if called upon, substantiate the claims of 
 
 I 2 
 
116 THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 
 
 those from whom he purchased or inherited hjs property ; and 
 any flaw in the original parchment, even though the property 
 should have had a score intermediate owners, quashes his 
 right. 
 
 " But Time," say some, " is a great legaliser. Immemorial 
 possession must be taken to constitute a legitimate claim. 
 That which has been held from age to age as private property, 
 and has been bought and sold as such, must now be considered 
 as irrevocably belonging to individuals." To which proposition 
 a willing assent shall be given when its propounders can assign 
 it a definite meaning. To do this, however, they must find 
 satisfactoi-y answers to such questions as — How long does it 
 take for what was originally a wrong to grow into a rigid ? 
 At what rate per annum do invaUd claims become valid ? If a 
 title gets perfect in a thousand years, how much more than 
 perfect will it be in two thousand years ? — and so forth. For 
 the solution of which they ■will require a new calculus. 
 
 Whether it may be expedient to admit claims of a certain 
 standing, is not the point. We have here nothing to do with 
 considerations of conventional privilege or legislative conve- 
 nience. We have simply to inquire what is the verdict given 
 by pureequity in the matter. And this verdict enjoins a protest 
 against every existing pretension to the individual possession 
 of the soU ; and dictates the assertion, that the right of man- 
 kind at large to the earth's surface is still valid ; all deeds, 
 customs, and laws, notwithstanding. 
 
 § 4. . 
 
 Not only have present land tenures an indefensible origin, 
 but it is impossible to discover any mode in which land can 
 become private property. Cultivation is commonly considered 
 to give a legitimate title. He who has reclaimed a tract of 
 ground from its primitive wildness, is supposed to have thereby 
 made it his own. But if his right is disputed, by what system of 
 logic can he vindicate it? Let us hsten a moment to his 
 pleadings. 
 
THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EAKTH. 117 
 
 " Hallo, you Sir," cries the cosmopolite to some backwoods- 
 man, smoking at the door of his shanty, " by what autliority 
 do you take possession of these acres that you have cleared ; 
 round which you have put up a snake-fence, and on which 
 you liave buUt this log-house ? " 
 
 "By what authority? I squatted here because there was 
 no one to say nay — because I was as much at Uberty to do so 
 as any other man. Besides, now that I have cut down the 
 wood, and ploughed and cropped the ground, this farm is more 
 mine than yours, or anybody's ; and I mean to keep it." 
 
 " Ay, so you all say. But I do not A'et see how you have 
 substantiated your claim. When you came here you found the 
 land producing trees— sugar-maples, perhaps; or may be it 
 was covered with prairie-grass end wild strawberries. Well, 
 instead of these, you made it yield wheat, or maize, or tobacco. 
 Now I want to understand how, by exterminating one set of 
 plants, and making the soil bear another set in their place, you 
 have constituted yourself lord of this soil for all succeeding 
 time." 
 
 " Oh, those natural products which I destroyed were of little 
 or no use; whereas I caused the earth to bring forth things 
 good for food — things that help to give Ufe and happiness." 
 
 " Still you have not shown why such a process makes the 
 portion of earth you have so modified yours. What is it that 
 you have done ? You have turned over the soil to a few inches 
 in depth with a spade or a plough ; you have scattered over this 
 prepared surface a few seeds ; and you have gathered the fruits 
 which the sun, rain, and air, helped the soil to produce. Just 
 teU me, if you please, by what magic have these acts made you 
 sole owner of that vast mass of matter, having for its base the 
 6m"face of your estate, and for its apex the centre of the globe ? 
 all of which it appears you would monopohse to yourself and 
 your descendants for ever." 
 
 " Wen, if it isn't mine, whose is it? I have dispossessed no- 
 body. When I crossed the Mississippi yonder, I found nothing 
 
118 THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 
 
 but the silent woods. If some one else had settled here, aad 
 made this clearing, he would have had as good a right to the 
 location as I have. I have done nothing but what any other 
 person was at liberty to do had he come before me. Whilst 
 they were unreclaimed, these lands belonged to all men — as much 
 to one as to another — and they are now mine simply because 
 I was the first to discover and improve them." 
 
 " You say truly, when you say that ' whilst they were un- 
 reclaimed these lands belonged to all men.' And it is my duty 
 to tell you that they belong to all men still ; and that your 
 ' improvements' as you call them, cannot vitiate the claim of all 
 men. You may plough and harrow, and sow and reap ; you 
 may turn over the soil as often as you like ; but all your ma- 
 nipulations will fail to make* that soil yours, which was not 
 yours to begin with. Let me put a case. Suppose now that 
 in the course of your wanderings you come upon an empty 
 house, wliich in spite of its dilapidated state takes your fancy ; 
 suppose that with the intention of making it your abode you 
 expend much time and trouble in repairing it — that you paint 
 and paper, and whitewash, and at considerable cost bring it 
 into a habitable state. Suppose further, that on some fatal 
 day a stranger is announced, who turns out to be the heir to 
 whom this house has been bequeathed ; and that this professed 
 heir is prepared with all the necessary proofs of his identity : 
 what becomes of your improvements? Do they give you a 
 valid title to the house ? Do they quash the title of the ori- 
 ginal claimant ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 "Neither then do your pioneering operations give you a 
 valid title to this land. Neither do they quash the title of its 
 original claimants — the human race. The world is God's be- 
 quest to, mankind. All tnen are joint heirs to it; you amongst 
 the number. And because you have taken up your residence 
 on a certain part of it, and have subdued, cultivated, beautified 
 that part — improved it as you say, you are not therefore war- 
 
THE EIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 119 
 
 ranted in appropriating it as entirely private property. At least 
 if you do so, you may at any moment be justly expelled by the 
 lawful owner — Society." 
 
 " " Well, but surely you would not eject me without making 
 some recompense for the great additional value I have given to 
 this tract, by reducing what was a wilderness into fertile fields. 
 You would not turn me adrift and deprive me of all the benefit 
 of those years of toil it has cost me to bring this spot into its 
 present state." 
 
 " Of course not : just as in the case of the house, you would 
 have an ec[uitable title to compensation from the proprietor for 
 repairs and new fittings, so the community cannot justly take 
 possession of this estate, without paying for all that you have 
 done to it. This extra worth which your labour has imparted 
 to it is fairly yours ; and although you have, without leave, 
 busied yourself in bettering what belongs to the community, 
 yet no doubt the community wiU duly discharge your claim. 
 But admitting this, is quite a different thing from recognising 
 your right to the land itself. It may be true that you are en- 
 titled to compensation for the improvements this enclosure has 
 received at your hands ; and at the same time it may be equally 
 true that no act, form, proceeding, or ceremony, can make this 
 enclosure your private property." 
 
 § 5. 
 
 It does indeed at first sight seem possible for the earth to 
 become the exclusive possession of individuals by some process 
 of equitable distribution. " Why," it may be asked, " should 
 not men agree to a fair subdivision ? If all are co-heirs, why 
 may not the estate be equally apportioned, and each be after- 
 wards perfect master of his own share ? " 
 
 To this question it may iu the first place be replied, that 
 such a division is vetoed by the difficulty of fixing the values 
 of respective tracts of land. Variations in productiveness, dif- 
 ferent degrees of accessibihty, advantages of climate, proximity 
 
120 THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 
 
 to the centres of civilisation — these, and other such considera- 
 tions, remove the prohlem out of the sphere of mere mensura- 
 tion into the region "of impossibihty. 
 
 But, waiving this, let us inquire who are to be the allottees. 
 Shall adult males, and all who have reached twenty-one on a 
 specified day, be the fortunate individuals ? If so, what is to 
 be done with those who come of age on the morrow ? Is it 
 proposed that each man, woman, and child, shall have a sec- 
 tion ? If so, what becomes of all who are to be bom next year ? 
 And what wiU be the fate of those whose fathers sell their 
 estates and squander the proceeds ? These portionless ones 
 must constitute a class already described as having no right to 
 a resting-place on earth^as living by the sufferance of their 
 fellow men — as being practically serfs. And the existence of 
 such a class is wholly at variance with the law of equal freedom. 
 
 Until therefore, we can produce a valid coromission authoriz- 
 ing us to make this distribution — until it can be proved that 
 God has given one charter of privileges to one generation, and 
 another to the next — until we can demonstrate that men born 
 after a certain date aCre doomed to slavery, we must consider 
 that no such allotment is permissible. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Probably some will regard the difficulties inseparable from 
 individual ownership of the soil, as caused by pushing to ex- 
 cess a doctrine applicable only witliin rational limits. This is 
 a veiy favourite style of thinking with some. There are people 
 who hate anything in the shape of exact conclusions ; and these 
 are of them. According to such, the right is never in either 
 extreme, but always half way between the extremes. They are 
 continually trying to reconcile Yes and No. Ifs, and huts, 
 and excepts, are their delight. They have so great a faith in 
 "the judicious mean" that they would scarcely believe an 
 oracle, if it uttered a full-length principle. Were you to inquire 
 of them whether the earth turns on its axis from East to West, 
 
THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 121 
 
 or from West to East, you might almost expect the reply — " A 
 little of hoth," or " Not exactly either." It is doubtful whether 
 they ■would assent to the axiom that the whole is greater than 
 its part, ■without making some qualification. They have a 
 passion for compromises. To meet their taste, Truth must 
 always be spiced with a little Error. They cannot conceive of a 
 pure, definite, entire, and unlimited law. And hence, in dis- 
 cussions like the present, they are constantly petitioning for 
 limitations — always ■ssishing to abate, and modify, and moderate 
 — ever protesting against doctrines being pui"sued to their ulti- 
 mate consequences. 
 
 But it behoves such to recollect, that ethical truth is as 
 exact and as peremptory as physical truth ; and that in this 
 matter of land-tenure, the verdict of morahty must be distinctly 
 yea or nay. Either men have a right to make the soil private 
 property, or they have not. There is no medium. We must 
 choose one of the two positions. There can be no half-and- 
 half opinion. In the nature of things the fact must be either 
 one way or the other. 
 
 If men have not such a right, ■we are at once delivered from 
 the several predicaments alrea,dy pointed out. If they luive 
 such a right, then is that right absolute, sacred, not on any 
 pretence to be ■violated. If they have such a right, then is bis 
 Grace of Leeds justified in -waming-off tomists from Ben Mac 
 Dhui, the Duke of Atholl in closing Glen Tilt, the Duke of 
 Buccleugh in denying sites to the Free Church, and the Duke 
 of Sutherland in banishing the Highlanders to make room for 
 sTieep-walks. If they have such a right, then it would be pro- 
 per for the sole proprietor of any kingdom — a Jersey or Guern- 
 sey, for example — to impose just -what regulations he might 
 choose on its inhabitants — to teU them that they should not live 
 on his property, unless they professed a certain religion, spoke a 
 particular language, paid him a specified reverence, adopted 
 an authorized dress, and conformed to all other conditions he 
 might see fit to make. If they have such a right, then is there 
 truth in diat tenet of the ultra-Tory school, that the landowners 
 
122 THE RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 
 
 are the only legitimate rulers of a country — that the people at 
 large remain in it only hy the landowners' permission, and 
 ought consequently to submit to the landowners' rule, and re- 
 spect whatever institutions the landowners set up. There is no 
 escape from these inferences. They are necessary corollaries 
 to the theory that the earth can become individual property. 
 And they can only he repudiated by denying that theory. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 After all, nobody does impHcitly believe in landlordism. We 
 hear of estates being held under the king, that is, the State ; 
 or of their being kept in trust for the public benefit; and not 
 that they are the inalienable possessions of their nominal 
 owners. Moreover, we daily deny landlordism by our legislation. 
 Is a canal, a railway, or a turnpike road to be made ? we do 
 not scruple to seize just as many acres as may be requisite ; 
 allowing the holders compensation for the capital invested. 
 We do not wait for consent. An Act of Parhament supersedes 
 the authority of title deeds, and serves proprietors with notices 
 to quit, whether they will or not. Either this is equitable, or 
 it is not. Either the public are free to resume as much of the 
 earth's surface as they think fit, or the titles of the landowners 
 must be considered absolute, and all national works must be 
 postponed until lords and squires please to part with the re- 
 quisite slices of their estates. If we decide that the claims of 
 individual ownership must give way, then we imply that the 
 right of the nation at large to the soil is supreme — that the 
 right of private possession only exists by general consent — that 
 general consent being withdrawn it ceases — or, ia other words, 
 that it is no right at all. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 " But to what does this doctrine, that men are equally en- 
 titled to the use of the earth, lead ? Must we return to the 
 times of unincloscd wilds, and subsist on roots, berries, and 
 
TBE EIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 123 
 
 game ? Or are we to be left to the management of Messrs. 
 Fourrier, Owen, Louis Blanc, and Co.? " 
 
 Neither. Such a doctrine is consistent with the highest 
 state of civilization ; may be carried out without involving 
 a community of goods ; and need cause no very serious revolu- 
 tion in existing arrangements. The change required would 
 simply be a change of landlords. Separate ownerships would 
 merge into the joint-stock ownership of the pubUc. Instead of 
 being in the possession of individuals, the coimtry would be 
 he held by the great corporate body — Society. Instead of 
 leasing his acres from an isolated proprietor, the farmer would 
 lease them from the nation. Instead of paying his rent to the 
 agent of Sir John or his Grace, he would pay it to an agent 
 or deputy-agent of the community. Stewards would be pubUc 
 officials instead of private ones; and tenancy the only land 
 tenure. 
 
 A state of things so ordered would be in perfect harmony 
 with the moral law. Under it aU men would be equally land- 
 lords ; all men would be aUke free to become tenants. A, B, 
 C, and the rest, might compete for a vacant farm as now, and 
 one of them might take that farm, without in any way violating 
 the principles of pure equity. All would be equally free to 
 bid ; aU would be equally free to refrain. And when the farm 
 had been let to A, B, or 0, all parties would have done that 
 which they willed — the one in choosing to pay a given sum to 
 his fellow-men for the use of certain lands — the others in re- 
 fusing to pay that sum. Clearly, therefore, on such a system, 
 the earth might be inclosed, occupied, and cultivated, in entire 
 subordination to the law of equal freedom. 
 
 § 9. 
 
 No doubt great difficulties must attend the resumption, by 
 mankind at large, of their rights to the soil. The question of 
 compensation to existing proprietors is a complicated one — one 
 that perhaps cannot be settled in a strictly-equitable manner. 
 
124 THE EIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 
 
 Had we to deal with the parties who originally robbed the hu- 
 man race of its heritage, we might make short work of the 
 matter. But, unfortunately, most of our present landowners are 
 men who have, eitlier mediately or immediately — either by their 
 own acts, or by the acts of their ancestors — given for their 
 estates, equivalents of honestly-eai-ned wealth, beheving that 
 they were investing their savings in a legitimate manner. To 
 justly estimate and liquidate the claims of such, is one of the 
 most intricate problems society will one day have to solve. 
 But with this perplexity and our extrication from it, abstract 
 morahty has no concern. Men having got themselves into the 
 dilemma by disobedience to the law, must get out of it as well 
 as they can ; and with as little injury to the landed class as 
 may be. 
 
 Meanwhile, we shall do well to recollect, that there are others 
 besides the landed class to be considered. In our tender re- 
 gard for the vested interests of the few, let us not forget that 
 the rights of the many are in abeyance ; and must remain so, 
 as long as the earth is monopohsed by individuals. Let us 
 remember, too, that the injustice thus inflicted on the mass of 
 inankind, is an injustice of the gravest nature. The fact that it 
 is not so regarded, proves nothing. In early phases of civili- 
 zation even homicide is thought hghtly of. The suttees of 
 India, together with the practice elsewhere followed of sacri- 
 ficing a hecatomb of human victims at the buiial of a chief, 
 show this : and probably cannibals consider the slaughter of 
 those whom " the fortune of war " has made their prisoners, 
 perfectly justifiable. It was once also universally supposed that 
 slavery was a natural and quite legitimate iustitution — a con- 
 dition into which some were bom, and to which they ought to 
 submit as to a Divine ordination ; nay, indeed, a great proportion 
 of mankind hold this opinion still. A higher social develop- 
 ment, however, has generated in us a better faith, and we now to 
 a considerable extent recognise the claims of humanity. But 
 our civilization is only partiid. It may by-and-by be perceived, 
 that Equity utters dictates to which we have not yet hstened ; 
 
THE EIGHT TO THE USE OF THE EARTH. 125 
 
 and men may then learn, that to deprive others of their rights 
 to the use of the earth, is to commit a crime inferior only in 
 wickedness to the crime of taking away their lives or personal 
 liberties. 
 
 § 10. 
 
 Briefly reviewing the argument, we see that the right of each 
 man to the use of the earth, limited only by the hke rights of 
 liis fellow-men, is immediately deducible from the law of equal 
 freedom. We see that the maintenance of this right necessarily 
 forbids private property in land. On examination all existing 
 titles to such property turn out to be invalid ; those founded on 
 reclamation inclusive. It appears that not even an equal ap- 
 portionment of the earth amongst its inhabitants could generate 
 a legitimate proprietorship. We find that if pushed to its ulti- 
 mate consequences, a claim to exclusive possession of the soil 
 involves a landowning despotism. We further find that such a 
 claim is constantly denied by the enactments of our legislature. 
 And we find lastly, that the theory of the co-lieirship of all men 
 to the soil, is consistent with the highest civilization ; and that, 
 however difficult it may be to embody that theory in fact, Equity 
 sternly commands it to be done. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE EIGHT OF PROPERTY. 
 § 1. 
 
 The moral law, being the law of the social state, is obliged 
 whoUy to ignore the ant«-social state. Constituting, as the 
 principles of pure morality do, a code of conduct for the perfect 
 man, tliey cannot be made to adapt themselves to the actions 
 of the uncivilized man, even under the most ingenious hypo- 
 thetical conditions — cannot be made even to recognise those 
 actions so as to pass any definite sentence upon them. Over- 
 looking this fact, thinkers, in their attempts to prove some of 
 the first theorems of ethics, have commonly fallen into the 
 error of referring back to an imaginary state of savage wildness, 
 instead of referring forward to an ideal civilization, as they 
 should have done ; and have, in consequence, entangled them- 
 selves in difBculties arising out of the discordance between 
 ethical principles and the assumed premises. To this circum- 
 stance is attributable that vagueness by which the arguments 
 used to establish the right of property in a logical manner, are 
 characterized. Whilst possessed of a certain plausibility, they 
 yet cannot be considered conclusive ; inasmuch as they suggest 
 questions and objections that admit of no satisfactory answers. 
 Let us take a sample of these arguments, and examine its 
 defects. 
 
 " Though the earth and all inferior creatures," says Locke, 
 " be common to all men, yet every man has a property in his 
 own person: this nobody has a right to but himself The 
 labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say are 
 properly his. Whatever then he removes out of the state that 
 
THE EIGHT OF PROPERTY. 127 
 
 nature hath provided and left it in, he hath mixed his labour 
 with, and joined to it something that is liis own, and thereby 
 makes it his propert)'. It being bj' him removed from the 
 common state nature hath placed it in, it hath by this labour 
 something annexed to it that excludes the common right of 
 other men. For tliis labour being the unquestionable property 
 of the labourer, no man but he can have a right to what that is 
 once joined to, at least when there is enough and as good left 
 in common for others." 
 
 If inclined to cavil, one might in reply to this observe, that 
 as, according to the premises, "the earth and all inferior 
 creatures"- — all things, in fact, that the earth produces — are 
 " common to all men," the consent of aU men must be obtained 
 before any article can be equitably " removed from the common 
 state nature hath placed it in." It might be argued that the 
 real question is overlooked, when it is said, that, by gathering 
 any natural product, a man " hath mixed his labour with it, 
 and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby made 
 it his property ; " for that the point to be debated is, whether he 
 had any right to gather, or mix his labour with that, which, by 
 the hypothesis, previously belonged to mankind at large. The 
 reasoning used in the last chapter to prove that no amount of 
 labour, bestowed by an individual upon a part of the earth's 
 surface, can nullify the title of society to that part, might be 
 similarly employed to show that no one can, by the mere act of 
 appropriating to himself any wild unclaimed animal or fruit, 
 supersede the joint claims of other men to it. It may be quite 
 true that the laboui- a man expends in catching or gathering, 
 gives him a better right to the thing caught or gathered, than 
 any one other man ; but the question at issue is, whether by 
 labour so expended, he has made his right to the thing caught 
 or gathered, greater than the pre-existing rights of all other 
 men put together. And unless he can prove that he has done 
 this, his title to possession cannot be admitted as a matter of 
 right, but can be conceded only on the ground of convenience. 
 
 Further difficulties are suggested by the qualification, that 
 
128 THE RIGHT OF PEOPERTi'. 
 
 the claim to any article of property thus obtained, is valid only 
 " when there is enough and as good left in common for others." 
 A condition hke this gives birth to such a host of queries, 
 doubts, and limitations, as practically to neutralize the general 
 proposition entirely. It may be asked, for example — How is it 
 to be known that enough is " left in common for others ? " 
 Who can determine whether what remains is " as good" as 
 what is taken ? How if the remnant is less accessible ? If 
 there is not enough " left in common for otJiers," how must the 
 right of appropriation be exercised ? Why, in such case, does 
 the mixing of labour with the acquired object, cease to " ex- 
 clude the common right of other men ? " Supposing enough to 
 be attainable, but not all equally good,\i-y what rule must each 
 man choose ? Out of which inquisition it seems impossible to 
 liberate the alleged right, without such mutilations as to render 
 it, in an ethical point of view, entirely valueless. 
 
 Thus, as already hinted, we find, that the circumstances of 
 savage life, render the principles of abstract morality inap- 
 plicable ; for it is impossible, under ante-social conditions, to 
 determine the rightness or wrongness of certain actions by an 
 exact measurement of the amount of freedom assumed by the 
 parties concerned. We must not expect, therefore, that the 
 right of propeity can be satisfactorily based upon the premises 
 afforded by such a state of existence. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 But, under the system of land tenure pointed out in the last 
 chapter, as the only one that is consistent with the equal claims 
 of all men to the use of the earth, these difficulties disappear ; 
 and the right of property obtains a legitimate foundation. We 
 have seen that, without any infraction of the law of equal 
 freedom, an individual may lease from society a given surface 
 of soil, by agreeing to pay in return a stated amount of the 
 produce he obtains from that soil. We found that, in doing 
 tliis, he does no more than what every other man is equally 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY. 129 
 
 &ee with himself to do — that each has the same power with 
 himself to hecome the tenant — and that the rent he pays 
 accrues alike to all. Having thus hired a tract of land from 
 his fellow-men, for a given period, for understood purposes, 
 and on specified terms — having thus obtained, for a time, the 
 exclusive use of that land by a definite agreement with its 
 owners, it is manifest that an individual may, without any 
 infringement of the rights of others, appropriate to himself 
 that portion of produce wliich remains after he has paid to 
 mankind the promised rent. He has now, to use Locke's 
 expression, "mixed his labour with" certain products of the 
 earth ; and his claim to them is in this case valid, because he 
 obtained the consent of society before so expending his labour ; 
 and having fulfilled the condition which society imposed ia 
 giving that consent — the payment of rent, — society, to fulfil its 
 part of the agreement, must acknowledge his title to that 
 sui-plus which remains after the rent has been paid. " Provided 
 you deliver to us a stated share of the produce which by 
 cultivation you can obtain from this piece of land, we give you 
 the exclusive use of the remainder of that produce : " these are 
 the words of the contract ; and in virtue of this contract, the 
 tenant may equitably claim the supplementary share as his 
 private property : may so claim it without any disobedience to 
 the law of equal freedom; and has therefore a right so to 
 claim it. 
 
 Any doubt that may be felt as to the fact that this is a 
 logical deduction from our first principle, that every man has 
 freedom to do all that he wills provided he infringes not the 
 equal freedom of any other man, may be readily cleared up by 
 comparing the respective degrees of freedom assumed in such a 
 case by the occupier and the members of society with whom he 
 bargains. As was shown in the preceding chapter, if the pubhc 
 altogether deprive any individual of the use of the earth, they 
 allow him less liberty than they themselves claim ; and by so 
 breaking the law of equal freedom, commit a wrong. If, 
 conversely, an individual usurps a given portion of the earth, to 
 
 K 
 
130 THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY. 
 
 which, as we have seen, all other men have as good a title as 
 himself he hreaks the law, hy assuming more Uberty than the 
 rest. But when an individual holds land as a tenant of society, 
 a balance is maintained between these extremes, and the claims 
 of both parties are respected. A price is paid by the one, for a 
 certain privilege granted by the other. By the fact of the 
 agreement being made, it is shown that such price and privi- 
 lege are considered to be equivalents. The lessor and the 
 lessee have both, within the prescribed limits, done that which 
 they willed : the one in letting a certain holding for a specified 
 sum ; the other in agreeing to give that sum. And so long as 
 this contract remains intact, the law of equal freedom is duly 
 observed. If, however, any of the prescribed conditions be not 
 fulfilled, the law is necessarily broken, and the parties are 
 involved in one of the predicaments above named. If the tenant 
 refuses to pay the rent, then he tacitly lays claim to the 
 exclusive use and benefit of the land he occupies — ^practically 
 asserts that he is the sole ovraer of its produce ; and conse- 
 quently violates the law, by assuming a greater share of freedom 
 than the rest of mankind. If, on the other hand, society take 
 from the tenant that portion of the fruits obtained by the cul- 
 ture of his farm, which remains with him after the payment of 
 rent, they virtually deny him the use of the earth entirely (for 
 by the use of the earth we mean the use of its products), and 
 in so doing, claim for themselves a greater share of liberty than 
 they allow him. Clearly, therefore, this surplus produce equitably 
 remains with the tenant : society cannot take it without tres- 
 passing upon his freedom ; he can take it without trespass- 
 ing on the freedom of society. And as, according to the 
 law, he is free to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not 
 the equal freedom of any other, he is free to take possession of 
 such surplus as his property. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 The doctrine that all men have equal rights to the use of the 
 earth, does indeed at first sight, seem to countenance a species of 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY. 131 
 
 social organization, at variance with that from which the right 
 of property has just been deduced ; an organization, namely, in 
 which the public, instead of letting out the land to individual 
 members of their body, shall retain it in their own hands ; cul- 
 tivate it by joint- stock agency ; and share the produce : in fact, 
 what is usually termed Socialism or Communism. 
 
 Plausible though it may be, such a scheme is not capable of 
 realization in strict conformity with the moral law. Of the two 
 forms under which it may be presented, the one is ethically im- ' 
 perfect ; and the other, although correct in theory, is im- 
 practicable. 
 
 . -Thus, if an equal portion of the earth's produce is awarded 
 to every man, irrespective of the amount or quality of the 
 labour he has contributed towards the obtainment of that 
 produce, a breach of equity is committed. Our first principle 
 requires, not that all shall have like shares of the things 
 which minister to the gratification of the faculties, but that 
 all shall have like freedom to pursue . those things — shall 
 have Kke scope. It is one thing to give to each an op- 
 portunity of acquiring the objects he desires ; it is another, 
 and quite a different thing, to give the objects themselves, no 
 matter whether due endeavour has or has not been made to 
 obtain them. The one we have seen to be the primary law of 
 the Divine scheme ; the other, by interfering with the ordained 
 connection between desire and gratification, shows its disagree- 
 inent with that scheme. Nay more, it necessitates an absolute 
 violation of the principle of equal freedom. For when we assert 
 the entire liberty of each, bounded only by the like liberty of all, 
 we assert that each is free to do whatever his desires dictate, 
 within the prescribed limits — that each is fr-ee, therefore, to claim 
 for himself air those gratifications, and sources of gratification, 
 attainable by him within those limits — aU those gratifications, and 
 •sources of. gratification which he can procure without trespass- 
 ing upon tte'spieres of action of his neighbours. If, therefore, 
 out of many starting with like fields of activity, one obtains, 
 by his greater strength, greater ingenuity, or greater application, 
 
 K 2 
 
132 THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY. 
 
 more gratifications and sources of gratification than the rest, 
 and does this without in any way trenching upon the equal 
 freedom of the rest, the moral law assigns him an exclusive 
 right to all those extra gratifications and sources of gratifica- 
 tion ; nor can the rest take them fi-om him without claiming for 
 themselves greater hherty of action than he claims, and thereby 
 violating that law. Whence it follows, that an equal apportion- 
 ment of the fruits of the earth amongst all, is not consistent 
 with pure justice. 
 
 If, on the odier hand, each is to have allotted to him a share 
 of produce proportionate to the degree in which he has aided 
 production, the proposal, whilst it is abstractedly just, is no 
 longer practicable. Were all men cultivators of the soil, it 
 would perhaps be possible to form an approximate estimate of 
 their several claims. But to ascertain the respective amounts 
 of help given by different kinds of mental and bodily labourers, 
 towards procuring the general stock of the necessaries of life, is 
 an utter impossibility. We have no means of making such a 
 division save that afibrded by the law of supply and demand, 
 and this means, the hypothesis excludes ^. 
 
 §4. 
 
 An argument fatal to the communist theory, is suggested by 
 the fact, that a desire for property is one of the elements of our 
 nature. Repeated allusion has been made to the admitted 
 truth, that acquisitiveness is an unreasoning impulse quite dis- 
 tinct firom the desires whose gratifications property secures — an 
 impulse that is often obeyed at the expense of those desires. 
 And if a propensity to personal acquisition be really a com- 
 ponent of man's constitution, then that cannot be a right form 
 of society which affords it no scope. Socialists do indeed al- 
 lege that private appropriation is an abuse of this propensity, 
 whose normal function, they say, is to impel us to accumulate 
 
 " These inferences do not at all militate against joint-stock systems of production 
 and living, which are in all probability what Socialism prophesies. 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY. 133 
 
 for the benefit of the public at large. But in thus attempting 
 to escape from one difficulty, they do but entangle themselves in 
 another. Such an explanation overlooks the fact that the use 
 and abuse of a faculty (whatever the etymology of the words 
 may imply) differ only in degree ; whereas their assumption is, 
 that they differ in hind. Gluttony is an abuse of the desire for 
 food; timidity, an abuse of the feeling which in moderation 
 produces prudence; serviHty, an abuse of the sentiment tliat 
 generates respect ; obstinacy, of that from which firmness 
 springs : in all of which cases we find that the legitimate mani- 
 festations differ from the illegitimate ones, merely in quantity, 
 and not in quality. So also with the instinct of accumulation. 
 It may be quite true that its dictates have been, and stiU are, 
 followed to an absurd excess ; but it is also true that no change 
 in the state of society will alter its nature and its office. To 
 whatever extent moderated, it must still be a desire for per- 
 sonal acquisition. Whence it follows that a system affording 
 opportunity for its exercise must ever be retained ; which means, 
 that the system of private property must be retained; and 
 this presupposes a right of private property, for by right we 
 mean that which harmonizes with the human constitution as 
 divinely ordained. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 There is, however, a still more awkward dilemma into which 
 M. Proudhon and his party betray themselves. For if, as 
 they assert, " aU property is robbery " — if no one can equitably 
 become the exclusive possessor of any article — or as we say, 
 obtain a right to it, then, amongst other consequences, itfollows, 
 thata man can have no right to the things he consiunes for food. 
 And if these are not his before eating them, how can they become 
 his at all ? As Locke asks, " when do they begin to be his ? when 
 he digests ? or when he eats ? or when he boils ? or when he 
 brings them home ?" If no previous acts can make them his 
 property, neither can any process of assimilation do it; not 
 even their absorption into the tissues. Wherefore, pursuing the 
 
134 THE RIGHT OF PKOPERTY. 
 
 idea, we axrive at the curious conclusion, that as the whole of 
 his bones, muscles, skin, &c., have been thus built up from 
 nutriment not belonging to him, a man has no property in his 
 own flesh and blood— can have no valid title to himself— has 
 no more claim to his own limbs than he has to the limbs of 
 another— and has as good a right to his neighbour's body as 
 to his own ! Did we exist after the same fashion as those 
 compound polyps, in which a number of individuals are based 
 upon a living trunk common to them aU, such a theory would 
 be rational enough. But until Communism can be carried to 
 that extent, it will be best to stand by the old doctrine. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Further argument appears to be unnecessary. We have seen 
 that the right of property is deducible from the law of equal 
 freedom — that it is presupposed by the human constitution — 
 and that its denial involves absurdities. 
 
 Were it not that we shall frequently have to refer to the fact 
 hereafter, it would be scarcely needful to show that the taking 
 away another's property is an infringement of the law of equal 
 freedom, and is therefore wrong. If A appropriate to himself 
 something belonging to B, one of two things must take place : 
 either B does the like to A, or he does not. If A has no pro- 
 perty, or if his property is inaccessible to B, B has evidently 
 no opportunity of exercising equal freedom with A, by claiming 
 from him something of hke value ; and A has therefore assumed 
 a greater share of freedom than he allows B, and has broken the 
 law. If again, A's property is open to B, and A permits B to 
 use like freedom with himseK by taking an equivalent, there is 
 no violation of the law; and the affair practically becomes one 
 of barter. But such a transaction will never take place save in 
 theory ; for A has no motive to appropriate B's property with 
 the intention of letting B take an equivalent : seeing that if he 
 really means to let B have what B thinks an equivalent, he will 
 prefer to make the exchange by consent in the ordinary way. 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY. 135 
 
 The only case simulating this, is one in which A takes from B 
 a thing that B does not wish to part ■with ; that is, a thing for 
 which A can give B nothing that B thinks an equivalent ; and 
 as the amount of gratification which B has in the possession of 
 this thing, is the measure of its value to him, it follows that if 
 A cannot give B a thing which affords B equal gratification, or 
 in other words what he thinks an equivalent, then A has taken 
 from B what affords A satisfaction, hut does not return to B 
 what affords B satisfaction ; and has therefore broken the law 
 by assuming the greater share of freedom. Wherefore we find 
 it to be a logical deduction from the law of equal freedom, that 
 no man can rightfully take property from another against 
 his will. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS. 
 § 1. 
 
 It is tolerably self-evident that no violation of the law of equal 
 freedom is committed in the acquisition of knowledge — that 
 knowledge, at least, which is open to aU. A man may read, 
 hear, and observe, to as great an extent as he pleases, without 
 in the least diminishing the hberty of others to do the like — in 
 fact, without affecting the condition of others in any way. It is 
 clear, too, that the knowledge thus obtained may be digested, 
 re-organized, or combined afresh, and new knowledge educed 
 from it by its possessor, without the rights of Ms feUows being 
 thereby trespassed upon. And it is further manifest, that the 
 moral law permits a man who has by his intellectual labour 
 ■ obtained such new knowledge, to keep it for his own exclusive 
 use, or claim it as his private property. He who does this, in 
 no degree exceeds the prescribed limits of individual freedom. 
 He abridges no one's liberty of action. Every other person 
 retains as much scope for thought and deed as before. And 
 each is free to acquire the same facts — to elaborate from them, 
 if he can, the same new ideas — and in a similar manner employ 
 those new ideas for his private advantage. Seeing, therefore, 
 that a man may claim the exclusive use of his original ideas 
 without overstepping the boundaries of equal freedom, it follows 
 that he has a right so to claim them ; or, in other words, such 
 ideas are his property. 
 
 Of course the argument used in the last chapter to show that 
 material property cannot be taken from its possessor without a 
 breach of the law, is applicable to property of this kind also. 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS. 137 
 
 §2. 
 
 That a, man's right to the produce of his brain is equally 
 valid with his right to the produce of his hands, is a fact which 
 has yet obtained but a very imperfect recognition. It is true 
 that we have patent laws, a law of copyright, and acts for the 
 registration of designs ; but these, or at any rate two of them, 
 have been enacted not so much in obedience to the dictates of 
 justice, as in deference to the suggestions of trade policy. "A 
 patent is not a thing which can be claimed as a right," we are 
 told by legal authorities, but is intended to " act as a stimulus 
 to industry and talent" It is not because the piracy of 
 patterns would be wrong that legislators forbid it, but because 
 they wish to afford " encouragement to manufactures." Similar 
 also are the current opinions. Measm'es of this nature are 
 commonly considered by the public as giving to inventors a 
 certain " privilege," a " reward," a sort of modified " monopoly." 
 It is on the ground of commercial statesmanship that they are 
 approved ; and not as being necessary for the administration of 
 justice. 
 
 The prevalence of such a belief is by no means creditable to 
 the national conscience, and indicates a sad bluntness of moral 
 feeling. To think that the profits which a speculator makes by 
 a rise in the share-market, should be recognised as legally and 
 equitably his property, and yet that some new combination of 
 ideas, which it may have cost an ingenious man years of appli- 
 cation to complete, cannot be " claimed as a right" by that 
 man! To think that a sinecurist should be held to have 
 a " vested interest " in his ofiice, and a just title to compen- 
 sation if it is abolished, and yet that an invention .over which 
 no end of mental toil has been spent, and on which the poor 
 mechanic has laid out perhaps his last sixpence — an inven- 
 tion which he has completed entirely by his own labour and 
 with his own materials — has wrought, as it were, out of the 
 very substance of his own mind — should not be acknowledged 
 
138 THE EIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS. 
 
 as his property! To think that his title to it should be 
 admitted merely as a matter of convenience — admitted even 
 then only on payment of some £400 — and, after all, quashed 
 on the most trifling pretences ! What a thick-skinned percep- 
 tion of justice does this show ! What a want of ability to 
 appreciate matters at all removed beyond the sphere of the 
 external senses! One would think that equity afforded no 
 guidance beyond transactions in material things — weights, 
 measures, and money. Let a shop-boy take from his master's 
 till a visible, tangible, ponderable sovereign, and all can see 
 that the rights of ownership have been violated. Yet those who 
 exclaim with such indignant virtue against theft, will purchase 
 a pirated edition of a book, without any qualms of conscience 
 concerning the receipt of stolen goods. Dishonesty, when 
 shown in house-breaking or sheep-stealing, is held up to 
 eternal infamy, and those convicted of it are for ever excluded 
 from society ; but the manufacturer who steals his foreman's 
 improved plan for the spinning of cotton, or the building of 
 steam engines, continues to be held in high respect. The law 
 is active enough in apprehending the urchin v?ho may have 
 deprived some comfortable citizen of his pocket-handkerchief, 
 and wiU deal with the young scapegrace at the public expense ; 
 but there is no redress for the poverty-stricken schemer who is 
 robbed by some we-althy scamp of that which formed the sole 
 hope of his life. Strong illustrations these of the fact, that 
 the moral sense, when unguided by systematic deduction, fails to 
 find its way through the labyrinth of confused opinion, to a 
 correct code of duty. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 As already remarked, it is a common notion, and one more 
 especially pervading the operative classes, that the exclusive 
 use by its discoverer of any new or improved mode of produc- 
 tion, is a species of monopoly, in the sense in which that word 
 is conventionally used. To let a man have the entire benefit 
 accruing from the employment of some more efScient machine, 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS. 139 
 
 or better process invented by him ; and to allow no other 
 person to adopt and apply for his own advantage the same 
 plan, they hold to be an injustice. Nor are there wanting 
 philanthropic and even thinking men, who consider that the 
 valuable ideas originated by individuals — ideas which may be 
 of great national advantage — should be taken out of private 
 hands and thrown open to the public at large. 
 
 " And pray, gentlemen," an inventor might fairly reply, 
 " why may not I make the same proposal respecting yoirr goods 
 and chattels, your clothing, your houses, your railway shares,- 
 and your money in the funds ? If you are right in the interpre- 
 tation you give to the term ' monopoly,' I do not see why that 
 term should not be applied to the coats upon your backs and 
 the provisions on your dinner tables. With equal reason I 
 might argue that you unjustly ' monopoUze' your furniture, and 
 that you ought not in equity to have the ' exclusive use' of so 
 many apartments. If ' national advantage' is to be the supreme 
 rule, why should we not appropriate yom wealth, and the wealth 
 of others like you, to the liquidation of the state debt ? True, 
 as you say, you came honestly by all this property : but so did 
 I by my invention. True, as you say, this capital, on the 
 interest of which you subsist, was acquired by years of toil — is 
 the reward of persevering industry : well, I may say the like 
 of this machine. Whilst you were gathering profits, I was 
 collecting ideas ; the time you spent in conning the prices 
 current, was employed by me in studying mechanics; your 
 speculations in new articles of merchandise, answer to my 
 experiments, many of which were costly and fruitless; when 
 you were writing out your accounts, I was making drawings ; 
 and the same perseverance, patience, thought, and toil, which 
 enabled you" to make a fortune, have enabled me to complete 
 my invention. Tike your wealth, it represents so much accumu- 
 lated labour; ■ and I am liviug upon the profits it produces me, 
 just as you are living upon the interest of -your invested .savings. 
 Beware, then, how you question my claim. ; If I am a monopoUst, 
 so also are you; so also is every man. If I have no right to 
 
140 THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS. 
 
 these products of my brain, neither have you to those of your 
 hands : no one can become the sole owner of any article "what- 
 ever; and ' all property is robbery.' " 
 
 § 4. 
 
 They fall into a serious error, who suppose that the exclusive 
 right assumed by a discoverer, is something taken from the 
 public. He who in any way increases the powers of production, 
 is seen by all, save a few insane Luddites, to be a general bene- 
 factor who gives rather than takes. The successful inventor 
 makes a further conquest over nature. By him the laws of 
 matter are rendered stiU more subservient to the wants of man- 
 kind. He economises labour— helps to emancipate men from 
 their slavery to the needs of the body — harnesses a new power 
 to the car of human happiness. He cannot, if he would, 
 prevent society from largely participating in his good fortune. 
 Before he can realize any benefit from liis new process or 
 apparatus, he must first confer a benefit on his fellow men — 
 must either offer them a better article at the price usually 
 charged, or the same article at a less price. If he fails to do 
 this, his invention is a dead letter; if he does it, he makes 
 society a partner in the new mine of wealth he has opened. For 
 all the exertion he has had in subjugating a previously un- 
 known region of nature, he simply asks an extra proportion of 
 the fruits. The rest of mankind unavoidably come in for the 
 main advantage — will in a short time have the whole. Mean- 
 while, they cannot without injustice disregard his claims. 
 
 Let us remember, too, that in this, as in other cases, dis- 
 obedience to the moral law is ultimately detrimental to all 
 parties— to those who infringe the rights of the individual as 
 well as to the individual himself. It is a well-proved fact, that 
 that insecurity of material property which results from general 
 dishonesty, inevitably reacts to the punishment of all. The 
 rationale of this is obvious. Industrial energy diminishes just 
 in proportion to the uncertainty of its reward. Those who do 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS. 141 
 
 not know that they shall reap ■will not sow. Instead of em- 
 ploying it in business, capitaUsts hoard what they possess, 
 because productive investments are dangerous. Hence arises a 
 universal straitness of means. Every enterprise is crippled by 
 want of confidence. And from general distrust spring general 
 discouragement, apathy, idleness, poverty, and their attendant 
 miseries, involving ahke all grades of men. Similar in kind, 
 and less only in degree, is the curse attendant upon insecurity 
 of property in ideas. Just in so far as the benefits likely to 
 accrue to the inventor are precarious, wiU he be deterred from 
 carrying out his plans. " If," thinks he to himself, " others are 
 to enjoy the fruits of these wearisome studies and these number- 
 less experiments, why should I continue them ? If, in addi- 
 tion to aU the possibilities of failure in the scheme itself, all the 
 time, trouble, and expense of my investigations, all the chances 
 of destruction to my claim by disclosure of the plan, aU the 
 heavy costs attendant upon obtaining legal protection, I am 
 liable to be deprived of my right by any scoundrel who may 
 infringe it in the expectation that I shall not have money or 
 madness enough to institute a chancery suit against him, I had 
 better abandon the project at once." And although such re- 
 flections may often fail to extinguish the sanguine hopes of an 
 inventor — although he may still prosecute his scheme to the 
 end, regardless of all risks, yet after having once suffered the 
 losses which ten to one society wiU inflict upon him, he will 
 take good caie never again to enter upon a sinulai undertaking. 
 Whatever other ideas he may then or subsequently entertain — 
 some of them most hkely valuable ones — will remain unde- 
 veloped and probably die with him. Did mankind know the 
 many important discoveries which the ingenious are prevented 
 from giving to the world by the cost of obtaining legal protec- 
 tion, or by the distrust of that protection if obtained — were people 
 duly to appreciate the consequent check put upon the develop- 
 ment of the means of production — and could they properly 
 estimate the loss thereby entailed upon themselves, they would 
 begin to see that the recognition of the right of property in 
 
142 TH£ RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN IDEAS.- 
 
 ideas, is only less . important than the recognition of the right 
 of property in goods. 
 
 - § 5. 
 
 In consequence of the probability, or perhaps we may say 
 the certainty, that the causes leading to the evolution of a new 
 idea in our mind, wiU eventually produce a hke result in some 
 other mind, the claim above set forth must not be admitted 
 without hmitation. Many have remarked the tendency that 
 exists for an important invention or discovery to be made by 
 independent investigators nearly at the same time. There is 
 nothing really mysterious in this. A certain state of knowledge, 
 a recent advancement in science, the occurrence of some new 
 social want, — these form the conditions under which minds of 
 similar characters are stimulated to like trains of thought, 
 ending as they are prone to do in the same result. Such being 
 the fact, there arises a qualification to the right of property in 
 ideas, which it seems difficult and even impossible to specify 
 definitely. The laws of patent and copyright, express this 
 quahfication by confining the inventor's or author's privilege 
 within a certain term of years. But in what way the length of 
 that term may be found with correctness there is no saying. In 
 the mean time, as already pointed out (p. 110), such a difficulty 
 does not in the least mihtate against the right itself. 
 
CHAPTEK XII. 
 
 THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN CHARACTER. 
 § I- 
 
 Could we accurately analyze the stimulus by which men are 
 usually impelled to action — could we determine the proportions 
 of the several motives which go to make up that stimulus, we 
 should prohahly find that amongst those classes removed from 
 the absolute pressure of bodily wants, its chief component is a 
 desire for the good opinion, regard, or admiration of others. 
 Whether we observe this feeling as shown by the tattooed 
 savage in his willingness to undergo torture that he may ob- 
 tain a character for fortitude, and to risk auy amount of danger 
 that he may be called brave ; or whether, turning to civihzed 
 life, we contemplate that ambition so universally exhibited by 
 poets, orators, statesmen, artists, soldiers, and others known to 
 fame ; or whether, by taking off its disguises, we discover the 
 true nature of that insane eagerness with which people pursue 
 wealth; we are alike instructed in the fact that, after those 
 instincts immediately connected with the preservation of life, 
 love of approbation exercises the greatest influence over human 
 conduct. 
 
 Reputation therefore, as a thing which men strive so inces- 
 santly to acc[uire and preserve, may be regarded as property. 
 Earned like other property by labour, care, and perseverance — 
 similarly surrounding its owner with facihties for securing bis 
 ends, and affording him as it does a constant supply of food 
 for divers of his desires ; the esteem of others is a possession, 
 having many analogies with possessions of a more palpable 
 nature. An estate in the general good-will, appears to many 
 of more worth than one in land. By some great action to have 
 
144 THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN CHARACTER. 
 
 bought golden opinions, may be a richer source of gratification 
 than to have obtained bank stock or railway shares. There 
 are those to whom a crown of bay leaves would be a gi-eater 
 treasure than a fat legacy. Titles had once a definite pounds, 
 shillings and pence price ; and if they are now becoming depre- 
 ciated in value when compared with the honours spontaneously 
 awarded by the public voice, it is that they do not represent 
 so large an amount of genuine approbation. Men therefore 
 who cultivate character, and live on the hai-vests of praise they 
 reap — men who have invested their labour in noble deeds, and 
 receive by way of interest the best wishes and cordial greetings 
 of society, may be considered as having claims to these rewards 
 of good conduct, resembling the claims of others to the rewards 
 of their industry. Of course this is true not only of such as 
 are distinguished by unusual worth; it is true of all. To the 
 degree in which each has shown probity, kindness, truth or 
 other virtue, and has gained amongst his fellows a reputation 
 for it, we must hold liim entitled to the character he has thus 
 fairly won, as to a species of property ; a species of property too, 
 which, without quoting the hackneyed saying of lago, may be 
 described as of greater value than property of any other kind. 
 
 Those who hesitate to admit that a good name is property, 
 should remember that it has really a money value. To be ac- 
 counted honest is to be preferred as one with whom commer- 
 cial dealings may be most safely carried on. Whoso is said 
 to be pai-ticularly industrious, is likely, other tilings being equal, 
 to get better pay than his competitors. The celebrity attending 
 great intellectual capacity, introduces those possessing it to re- 
 sponsible and remunerative situations. It is quite allowable 
 therefore, to classify reputation under this head, seeing that, like 
 capital, it may bring its owner an actual revenue in hard cash. 
 
 §2. 
 
 The position that a good character is property being granted, 
 a right to the possession of it when fairly earned, is demon- 
 
THE RIGHT OF PROPERTY IN CHARACTER. 145 
 
 strable by arguments similar to those used in the two preceding 
 chapters. Such character is attainable ■without any infringe- 
 ment of the freedom of others ; is indeed a concrete result of 
 habitual regard for that freedom ; and being thus a source of 
 gratification which its owner legitimately obtains — a species of 
 property, as we say — it can no more be taken away from him 
 without a breach of equity, than property of other kinds can. 
 This conclusion manifestly serves as the foundation for a law 
 of hbel. 
 
 § S. 
 
 Possibly this reasoning wiU be thought inconclusive. The 
 position that character is property may be considered open to 
 dispute; and it must be confessed that the propriety of so 
 classifying it is not proveable with logical precision. Should 
 any urge that this admission is fatal to the argument, they 
 have the alternative of regarding slander as a breach, not of 
 that primary law which forbids us to trench upon each other's 
 spheres of activity, but of that secondary one which forbids us 
 to inflict pain on each other. If the destruction of a fellow- 
 man's deserved reputation does not amount to a trespass 
 against the law of equal freedom, then the flagitiousness of 
 such an act remains to be treated of in that supplementary 
 department of morals elsewhere generalized under the term 
 negative beneficence. Of these alternatives each must make 
 his own choice; for there seems to be no way of deciding 
 between them with certainty. And here indeed we meet with 
 an illustration of a remark previously made (p. 70), namely, 
 that the division of morality into separate sections, though 
 needful for our due comprehension of it, is yet artificial ; and 
 that the hues of demarcation are not always capable of being 
 maintained. 
 
CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 THE RIGHT OF EXCHANGE. 
 § 1- 
 
 Freedom to exchange his property for the property of others, 
 is manifestly included in a man's general freedom. In claim- 
 ing this as his right, he in no way transgresses the proper limit 
 put to his sphere of action hy the Hke spheres of action of others. 
 The two parties in a trade transaction, whilst doing all that 
 they will to do, are not assuming more liberty than they leave 
 to others. Indeed their act ends with themselves — does not 
 affect the condition of the bystanders at all — leaves these as 
 much power to pursue the objects of their desires as before. 
 Hence, exchanges may be made in complete conformity with 
 the law of equal freedom. 
 
 Possibly it will be said, that in cases where several men are 
 wishing to deal with the same man, and a bargain is ultimately 
 made between him and one of them, the rest are by this event 
 excluded from a certain prospective field for the fulfilment of 
 their wants, which was previously open to them ; and that 
 consequently they have had the liberty to exercise their facul- 
 ties diminished by the success of their competitor. This, 
 however, is a distorted view of the matter. Let us for a 
 moment turn back to first principles. What is it that we have 
 to do ? We have to divide out equally amongst all men, the 
 whole of that freedom which the conditions of social existence 
 afford. Observe, then, in respect of trade relationships, how 
 much falls to the share of each. Evidently each is free to ofier ; 
 each is free to accept; each is free to refuse; for each may 
 do these to any extent without preventing his neighbours from 
 
THE RIGHT OF EXCHANGE. 147 
 
 doing the like to the same extent, and at the same time. But 
 no one may do more ; no one may force another to part with 
 his goods ; no one may force another to take a specified price ; 
 for no one can do so without assuming more Tiherty of action 
 than the man whom he thus treats. If, tlierefore, every one is 
 entitled to offer, to accept, and to refuse, but to do nothing 
 more, it is clear that, under the circumstances above put, the 
 closing of an agreement between two of the parties impUes no 
 infringement of the claims of the disappointed ones; seeing 
 that each of them remains as free as ever, to offer, accept, and 
 refuse. 
 
 . § 2. 
 
 To say that, as a corollary from thisj all interference between 
 those who would traf&c with each other amounts to a breach of 
 equity, is hardly needful. Nor is there any occasion here to 
 assign reasons why the recognition of liberty of trade is expe- 
 dient. Harmonizing as it does with the settled convictions of 
 thinking people, the foregoing conclusion may safely be left to 
 stand unsupported. Some remarks upon the limits it puts to 
 legislation are indeed called for. But these wiU come in more 
 appropriately elsewhere. 
 
CHAPTEE XIV. 
 
 3 
 
 THE RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH. 
 § 1- 
 
 The utterance of thought being one species of action, there 
 arises from the proposition that every man is free -within 
 specified bounds to do what he wills, the self-evident corollary, 
 that, with the like qualification, he is free to say what he wills ; 
 or, in other words, as the rights of his fellow-men form the only 
 legitimate restraint upon his deeds, so Kkewise do they form 
 the only legitimate restraint upon his words. 
 
 There are two modes in which speech may exceed the or- 
 dained limits. It may be used for the propagation of slander, 
 which, as we have seen in a foregoing chapter, involves a dis- 
 regard of moral obligation ; or it may be used in inciting and 
 directing another to injure a third party. In this last case, the 
 instigator, although not personally concerned in the trespass 
 proposed by him, must be considered as having virtually com- 
 mitted it. We should not exonerate an assassin who pretended 
 that his dagger was guilty of the murder laid to his charge 
 rather than himself. We should reply, that the having moved 
 a dagger with the intention of taking away life, constituted 
 his crime. Following up the idea, we must also assert that he 
 who, by bribes or persuasion, moved the man who moved the 
 dagger, is equally guilty with his agent. He had just the same 
 intention, and similarly used means for its ftdfilment ; the only 
 diiference being that he produced death through a more com- 
 plicated mechanism. As, however, no one will argue that the 
 interposing of an additional lever between a motive force and 
 its ultimate effect, alters the relationship between the two, so 
 neither can it be said that he who gets a wrong done by proxy, 
 is less guilty than if he had done it himself. Hence, whoso 
 
THE RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH. 149 
 
 suggests or urges the infraction of another's rights, must be held 
 to have transgressed the law of equal freedom. 
 
 Liberty of speech, then, like Hberty of action, may be claimed 
 by each, to the fullest extent compatible ■with the equal rights 
 of all. Exceeding the limits thus arising, it becomes immoral. 
 Within them, no restraint of it is permissible. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 A new Areopagitica, were it possible to write one, would 
 surely be needless in our age of the world and in this country. 
 And yet there still prevails, and that too amongst !men who 
 plume themselves on their hberahty, no small amount of the 
 feeling which Milton combated in his celebrated essay. Not- 
 withstanding the abatement of intolerance, and the growth of 
 free institutions, the repressive policy of the past has occa- 
 sional advocates even now. Were it put to the vote, proba- 
 bly not a few would say ay to the proposition, that the pubhc 
 safety requires some restriction to be placed on the freedom of 
 speech. The imprisonment of a sociaUst for blasphemy some 
 few years since, called forth no indignant protest against the 
 violation of " the hberty of unlicensed " speaking, but was even 
 approved by staunch maintainers of rehgious freedom. Many 
 would like to make it a penal offence to preach discontent to. 
 the people ; and there are not wanting others who would hang 
 up a few demagogues by way of scarecrows. Let us look at 
 what may be said by the advocates of a mild censorship on 
 behalf of their opinions. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 It is an assertion often made, as of indisputable truth, that 
 government ought : to guarantee to its subjects " secuiity.and a 
 sense of seourity^." From which maxim to the inference that 
 it is the duty of the magistrate to keep an ear open to the say- 
 ings of popular orators, and to stop violent declamation, as 
 being calculated to create alarm, is an obvious step. Were the 
 
150 THE RIGHT OF FEEE SPEECH. 
 
 premises good, the deduction might pass ; but the premises are 
 more than questionable. That it is the special function of the 
 legislator to guard every man in the peaceable possession of 
 his person and property, all admit; but that the legislator is 
 called upon to quiet the fears aroused by every trifling excite- 
 ment, is a notion almost too ridiculous for serious argument. 
 Consider a moment to what it leads. Coupled as are the ideas 
 " security and a sense of security," we must suppose that as 
 governors are required to carry home " security" to every indi- 
 vidual, so also may every individual claim the " sense of security " 
 at their hands. Here is a pretty prospect for overburdened 
 premiers ! If such a doctrine be true, where shall the cares 
 of the statesman end ? Must he hsten to the apprehensions of 
 every hypochondriac, in whose morbid imagination Eeform is 
 pictured as a grim ogre of anthropophagous propensities, with 
 pikes for claws and guillotines for teeth ? If not, why not ? 
 " Sense of security" in such an one has been destroyed by the 
 violent denunciations of some hot patriot ; he wishes his trepi- 
 dations allayed by the suppression of what he thinks dangerous 
 speaking ; and, according to the hypothesis, his wishes ought 
 to be obeyed. On the same grounds all agitation should be 
 extinguished, for there are invariably some — and not a small 
 number either — who regard the discussion of every public 
 question that comes uppermost with dread, and predict all 
 kinds of disasters from its continuance. Old women of both 
 sexes working themselves into a state of great tribulation over 
 the terrible vaticinations of a Standard, or the melancholy 
 waitings of a Herald, would fain have put down the Free 
 Trade propaganda; and if their "sense of security" had been 
 duly consulted, they should have had their way. Eeligious 
 disabilities too ought, for the like reason, to have been stiU 
 maintained, for the proposal to repeal them was productive of 
 extreme consternation to multitudes of weak-minded people. 
 Prophecies were rife of the return of papal persecutions ; every 
 horror narrated in the Btiok of Martyrs was expected to be acted 
 over afresh ; and an epidemic fright invalided its thousands. 
 
THE EIGHT OF FREE SPEECH. 151 
 
 Credulous individuals listened with raised eyebrows and pendant 
 jaws to the dismal tales of some incipient Titus Gates, and 
 straightway had visions of fire and faggots ; each saw himself 
 in Smithfield with a stake at his back and a torch at his feet ; 
 or dreamed he was in the torture-chamber of an inquisition, 
 and awoke iu a cold perspiration to find that he had mistaken 
 the squeak of a mouse for the creak of a thumb-screw. Well, 
 here was a woful loss of the " sense of security ; " and therefore 
 the authorities ought to have stopped the movement for CathoUc 
 emancipation, by gagging all its advocates, fettering its press, 
 and preventing its meetings. 
 
 It is useless to say that these are exaggerations, and that the 
 alarms of nervous valetudinaiians or foolish bigots are to be 
 disregarded. If the fears of a hundred are not to be attended 
 to, why those of a thousand ? If not those of a thousand, 
 why those of ten thousand ? How shall the Hne be drawn ? 
 where is the requisite standard ? who shall teU when the sense 
 of jwsecurity has become general enough to merit respect ? Is 
 it to be when the majority participate in it ? If so, who shall 
 decide when they do this ? Perhaps it will be said that the 
 apprehensions must be reasonable ones. Good ; but who is to 
 determine whether they are so or not? "Where is the pope 
 who shall give an infallible judgment on such a matter ? To 
 all which questions those who would make the preservation of 
 a "sense of security" the limi t, to liberty of speech, must first 
 find answers. 
 
 §4. 
 
 Of those animadversions upon state affairs which constitute 
 the legal offence of bringing government into contempt, and of 
 which offence, by the way, all parties might be accused, firom a 
 chartist orator, to the leader of the opposition — fi-om the Times ^ 
 with its burlesques upon the pitiful results of an annual "great 
 talk," to its facetious contemporary who quizzes the eccen- 
 tricities of a versatile ex-chancellor — of such animadversions the 
 only needful question to be asked is — are they deserved ? Are 
 
152 THE RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH. 
 
 the allegations contained in them true ? If it can be shown 
 that they are not — that is, if it can he shown that the parties 
 referred to have been unjustly aspersed — that is, if it can he 
 shown that a violation of the law has been committed — there is 
 an end of the matter, so far as the morahst is concerned. But, 
 on the other hand, should they prove to he substantially correct, 
 on what grounds shall the suppression of them be defended ? 
 That which is really contemptible ought to be exposed to con- 
 tempt; and, if so, derogatory charges ought to have full 
 pubhcity. To argue otherwise, is to take up the MacliiaveUian 
 position, that it is right for the legislature to be an imposture, 
 an "organized hypocrisy" — that it is necessary for a nation to 
 be cheated by the semblance of virtue when there is no reahty 
 — that pubHc opinion ought to be in error rather than in truth 
 — or that it is well for the people to believe a lie ! 
 
 There may be much danger in placing an invalid under the 
 regimen proper to people in robust health. For a dyspeptic, 
 chicken-broth may be in all respects better suited than more 
 substantial fare. . And whoso is suffering under an attack of 
 influenza, will do wisely to avoid a blustering north-wester, or 
 even a gentle breeze from the south. But he would be thought 
 more than silly who inferred from such facts that sohd food 
 and fresh air are bad things. To ascribe any evil results to 
 these, rather than to the unhealthy condition of the patients, 
 would imply extremely crude ideas of causation. 
 
 Similarly crude, however, are the ideas of those who infer 
 that unhmited hberty of speech is improper, because productive 
 in certain states of society of disastrous results. It is to the 
 abnormal condition of the body politic that all evils arising from 
 an unrestrained expression of opinion must be attributed, and 
 not to the unrestrained expression itself. Under a sound social 
 regime and its accompanying contentment, nothing is to be 
 reared from the most uncontrolled utterance of thought and 
 
THE RIGHT OF FEEE SPEECH. 163 
 
 feeling. On the other hand it may happen that where disease 
 exists, exposure of the sore places of the state to the cold 
 breath of criticism, -wiU superinduce alarming symptoms. But 
 ■what then ? A Louis PhDippe, a General Oavaignac, or a Louis 
 Napoleon, may find excuse in a corrupted and disorganized 
 state of things for espionnage, censorships, and the suppres- 
 sion of public meetings. But what then ? If a nation cannot 
 be governed on principles of pure equity, so much the worse 
 for the nation. Those principles remain true notwithstanding. 
 As elsewhere pointed out (p. 37), there must necessarily exist 
 incongruity between the perfect law and the imperfect man. 
 And if e'nls are entailed upon a people by immediate and en- 
 tire recognition of the law of equal freedom, in the matter of 
 speech as well as in that of action, such evils are merely 
 significant of the incomplete adaptation of that people to the 
 social state, and not of any defect in the law. 
 
CHAPTEK XV. 
 
 FURTHEK RIGHTS. 
 
 Did circumstances demand it, sundry other chapters of the 
 same nature as the preceding ones, could be added. Were 
 this France, it might he needfiil formally to deduce from the 
 law of equal freedom, the right to move from place to place 
 ■without leave of a government official. In addressing the 
 Chinese, some proof that a man is at hherty to cut his clothes 
 after whatever fashion may best suit him, would perhaps he 
 called for. And, similarly, there might he found in different 
 times and places, many other directions in which the law of 
 equal freedom required asserting. But it is unnecessary now to 
 repeat over again the reasoning so many times used. These 
 that we call rights, are nothing but artificial divisions of the 
 general claim to exercise the faculties — applications of that 
 general claim to particular cases ; and each of them is proved 
 in the same way, by showing that the particular exercise of 
 faculties referred to, is possible without preventing the hke 
 exercise of faculties by other persons. The reader has already 
 seen the most important rights thus estabUshed ; and the 
 establishment of such minor ones as have not been touched 
 upon, may safely be left with himself 
 
CHAPTEK XVI. 
 
 THE EIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 §1- 
 
 Equity knows no difference of sex. In its vocabulary the 
 word man must be understood in a generic, and not in a spe- 
 cific sense. The law of equal freedom manifestly applies to 
 the whole race— female as well as male. The same a priori 
 reasoning which estabUshes that law for men (Chaps. III. 
 and IV.), may be used with equal cogency on behalf of 
 women. The Moral Sense, by virtue of which the masculine 
 mind responds to that law, exists in the feminine mind as well. 
 Hence the several rights deducible from that law must apper- 
 tain equally to both sexes. 
 
 This might have been thought a self-evident truth, needing 
 only to be stated to meet with universal acceptation. There 
 are many, however, who either tacitly, or in so many words, 
 express their dissent from it. For what reasons they do so, 
 does not appear. They admit the axiom, that human happi- 
 ness is the Divine will ; from which axiom, what we call rights 
 are primarily derived. And why the dififerences of bodily or- 
 ganization, and those trifling mental variations which distin- 
 guish female from male, should exclude one half of the race 
 from the benefits of this ordination, remains to be shown. 
 The onus of proof lies on those who affirm that such is the 
 fact; and it would be perfectly in order to assume that the 
 law of equal freedom comprehends both sexes, until the con- 
 trary has been demonstrated. But without taking advantage 
 of this, suppose we go at once into the controversy. 
 
 Three positions only are open to us. It may be said that 
 
156 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 women have no rights at all — that their rights are not so great 
 as those of men — or that they are equal to those of men. 
 
 Whoever maintains the first of these dogmas, that women 
 have no rights at all, must show that the Creator intended 
 women to he wholly at the mercy of men — their happiness, 
 their liherties, their lives, at men's disposal ; or, in other words, 
 that they were meant to be treated as creatures of an inferior 
 order. Few will have the hardihood to assert this. 
 
 From the second proposition, that the rights of women are 
 not so great as those of men, there immediately arise such 
 queries as — If they are not so great, hy how much are they 
 less ? What is the exact ratio between the legitimate claims 
 of the two sexes ? How shall we tell which rights are com- 
 mon to both, and where those of the male exceed those of the 
 female ? Who can show us a scale that wiU serve for the 
 apportionment? Or, putting the question practically, it is 
 required to determine by some logical method, [whether the 
 Tiu"k is justified in plunging an ofiending Circassian into the 
 Bosphorus ? whether the rights of women were violated by 
 
 that Athenian law, which allowed a citizen, under certain cir- 
 
 — I 
 
 cumstances to sell his daughter or sisterPj whether our own 
 statute, which permits a man to heat his wife in moderation, 
 and to imprison her in any room in his house, is morally de- 
 fensible ? whether it is equitable that a married vjoman should 
 be incapable of holding property ? whether a husband may 
 justly take possession of his wife's earnings against her will, 
 as our law allows him to do? — and so forth. These, and a 
 multitude of similar problems, present themselves for solution. 
 Some principle rooted in the nature of things has to be found, 
 by which they may be scientifically decided — decided, not on 
 grounds of expediency, but in some definite, philosophical way. 
 Does any one holding the doctrine that women's rights are not 
 so great as men's, think he can find such a principle ? 
 
 If not, there remains no alternative but to take up, the third 
 position — that the rights of women are equal with those of 
 men. 
 
THK RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 157 
 
 §■2. 
 
 Whoso urges the mental inferiority of women in bar of their 
 claim to equal rights ■with men, may be met in various ways. 
 
 In the first place, the alleged fact may he disputed. A 
 defender of her sex might name many whose achievements 
 in government, in science, in literature, and ia art, have ob- 
 tained no small share of renown. Powerful and sagacious 
 queens the world has seen in plenty, from Zenohia, down 
 to the empresses Catherine and Maria Theresa. In the exact 
 sciences, Mrs. Somerville, Miss Herschel, and iliss Zomhn, 
 have gained applause ; in political economy. Miss Martineau ; 
 in general philosophy, Madame de Stael ; in poUtics, Madame 
 Eoland. Poetry has its Tighes, its Hemanses, its Landons, 
 its Brownings; the drama its Joanna BaiUie; and fiction its 
 Austens, Bremers, Gores, Dudevants, &c., without end. In 
 sculpture, fame has been acquired by a princess ; a picture hke 
 "The Momentous Question" is tolerable proof of female 
 capacity for painting ; and on the stage, it is certain that 
 women are on a level with men, if they do not even bear 
 away the pahn. Joining to such facts the important consi- 
 deration, that women have always been, and are stiU, placed 
 at a disadvantage in every department of learning, thought, 
 or skiU. — seeing that they are not admissible to the academies 
 and universities in which men get their training ; that the kind 
 of life they have to look forward to, does not present so great a 
 range of ambitions ; that they are rarely exposed to that most 
 powerful of all stimuh — necessity ; that the education custom 
 dictates for them is one that leaves uncultivated many of the 
 higher faculties ; and that the prejudice against blue-stockings, 
 hitherto so prevalent amongst men, has greatly tended to deter 
 women from the pursuit of literary honours; — adding these 
 considerations to the above facts, we shall see good reason for 
 thinking that the alleged inferiority of the feminine mind, is by 
 no means self-evident. 
 
 But, waiving this point, let us contend with the proposition 
 on its own premises. Let it be granted that the intellect of 
 
ir)8 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 woman is less profound than that of man — that she is more 
 uniformly ruled by feeling, more impulsive, and less reflective, 
 than man is — let all this be granted ; and let us now see what 
 basis such an admission aflFords to the doctrine, that the rights 
 of women are not co-extensive with those of men. 
 
 1. If rights are to be meted out to the two sexes in the ratio 
 of their respective amounts of intelligence, then must the same 
 system be acted upon in the apportionment of rights between 
 man and man. Whence must proceed aU those multiplied 
 perplexities already pointed out. (See pp. 107 and 108.) 
 
 2. In Kke manner, it wiU follow, that as there are here and 
 there women of unqnestionably greater ability than the average 
 of men, some women ought to have greater rights than some 
 men. 
 
 3. Wherefore, instead of a certain fixed allotment of rights 
 to all males and another to all females, the hypothesis itself 
 involves an infinite gradation of rights, irrespective of sex en- 
 tirely, and sends us once more in search of those unattainable 
 desiderata— a standard by which to measure capacity, and 
 another by which to measure rights. 
 
 Not only, however, does the theory thus fall to pieces under 
 the mere process of inspection ; it is absurd on the very face of 
 it, when freed firom the disguise of hackneyed phraseology. 
 For what is it that we mean by rights ? Nothing else than 
 fireedom to exercise the faculties. And what is the meaning of 
 the assertion that woman is mentally inferior to man ? Simply 
 that her faculties are less powerful. What then does the dogma, 
 that because woman is mentally inferior to man she has less 
 extensive rights, amount to ? Just this,— that because woman 
 has weaker faculties than man, she ought not to have like 
 liberty with him, to exercise the faculties she has! 
 
 §3. 
 
 BeKef always bears the impress of character- is, in fact, its 
 product. Anthropomorphism sufEiciently proves this. Men's 
 wishes eventually get expressed in their faiths— their real faiths. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 159 
 
 that is ; not their nominal ones. Pull to pieces a man's Theorj' 
 of Things, and you will find it based upon facts collected at the 
 suggestion of his desires. A fiery passion consumes all evi- 
 dences opposed to its gratification, and fusing together those 
 that serve its purpose, casts them into weapons by which to 
 achieve its end. There is no deed so vicious but what the 
 actor makes for himself an excuse to justify ; and if the deed is 
 often repeated, such excuse becomes a creed. The vilest trans- 
 actions on record — Bartholomew massacres and the Uke — have 
 had defenders ; nay, have been inculcated as fulfilments of the 
 Divine will. There is wisdom in the fable which represents the 
 wolf as raising accusations against the lamb before devouring 
 it. It is always thus amongst men. No invader ever raised 
 standard, but persuaded himself that he had a just cause. 
 Sacrifices and prayers have preceded every mihtary expedition, 
 from one of Ceesar's campaigns, down to a border foray. God 
 is on our side, is the universal cry. Each of two conflicting 
 nations consecrates its flags ; and whichever conquers sings a 
 Te Deum. Attila conceived himself to have a "divine claim to 
 the dominion of the earth : " the Spaniards subdued the Indians 
 under plea of converting them to Christianity ; hanging thirteen 
 refractory ones in honour of Jesus Christ and his apostles : and 
 we EngHsh justify our colonial aggressions by saying that the 
 Creator intends the Anglo-Saxon race to people the world ! 
 An insatiate lust of conquest transmutes manslaying into a 
 virtue ; and, amongst more races than one, implacable revenge 
 has made assassination a duty. A clever theft was praiseworthy 
 amongst the Spartans ; and it is equally so amongst Christians, 
 provided it be on a sufiiciently large scale. Piracy was heroism 
 with Jason and his followers ; was so also with the Norsemen ; 
 is so stiU with the Malays ; and there is never wanting some 
 golden fleece for a pretext. Amongst money-hunting people a 
 man is commended in proportion to the number of hours he 
 spends in business ; ia our day the rage for accrunulation has 
 apotheosized work; and even the miser is not without a code 
 of morals by which to defend his parsimony. The ruling 
 
160 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 classes argue themselves into the hehef that property should 
 be represented rather than person — that the landed interest 
 should preponderate. The pauper is thoroughly persuaded that 
 he has a right to reUef. The monks held printing to be an 
 invention of the devil ; and some of our modem sectaries re- 
 gard their refractory brethren as under demoniacal possession*. 
 To the clergy nothing is more obvious than that a state-church 
 is just, and essential to the maintenance of rehgion. The sine- 
 curist thinks himself rightly indignant at any disregard of his 
 vested interests. And so on throughout society. 
 
 Perhaps the slave- owner's assertion that negroes are not 
 human beings, and the kindred dogma of the Mahometans, 
 that "women have no souls'", are the strangest samples of convic- 
 tions so formed. In these, as in the foregoing cases, selfish- 
 ness finds out a satisfactory reason why it may do what it wills 
 — collects and distorts, exaggerates and suppresses, so as ulti- 
 mately to cheat itself into the desired conclusion. Does any 
 one doubt that men can really believe things thus palpably 
 opposed to ^he plainest facts ? Does any one assert that those 
 who profess opinions so manifestly absurd must be hypocrites ? 
 Let bim beware. Let him consider whether selfishness has not 
 deluded him into absurdities almost as gross. The laws of 
 England, and the pubUc opinion of England, countenance 
 doctrines nearly as preposterous as these that look to us incon- 
 ceivable; nay, the very same doctrines somewhat softened 
 down. For what, when closely examined, is this notion that 
 the rights of women are not equal with those of men ? Simply 
 an evanescent form of the theory that women have no souls. 
 
 §4. 
 
 That a people's condition may be judged by the treatment 
 which women receive under it, is a remark that has become 
 
 " SpeecR of Mr. Garland, one of the Conference Methodists. 
 
 ^ Though Washington Irving has pointed out that the Koran does not teach this, 
 he has not shown that Mahomet's followers do not hold it. Most likely the Ma- 
 hometan faith has undergone corraptions similar to those suffered by Christianity. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 161 
 
 almost trite. The facts, of which this remark is a generaUza- 
 tion, are abundant enough. Look where we will, we find that 
 just as far as the law of the strongest regulates the relationships 
 between man and man, does it regiilate the relationships between 
 man and woman. To the same extent that the triumph of 
 might over right is seen in a nation's political institutions, it is 
 seen in its domestic ones. Despotism in the state is neces^ 
 sarUy associated with despotism in the family. The two being 
 r.like moral in their origin, cannot fail to co-exist. Turkey,- 
 Egypt, India, China, Eussia, the feudal states of Europe — it 
 needs but to name these to suggest hosts of facts illustrative of 
 such aa accordance. 
 
 Yet, strangely enough, almost all of us who let fall this obser- 
 vation, overlook its application to ourselves. Here we sit over 
 cur tea-tables, and pass criticisms upon national chaj:'a;cter, or 
 Yjhilosophize upon the development of civilized institutions, 
 quietly taking it for granted that we are ci^dlized — that the 
 state of things we live under is the right one, or thereabouts. 
 Although the people of every past age have thought the Hke 
 and have been uniformly mistaken, there are still many to 
 whom it nevef occurs that we may be mistaken too. Amidsf 
 their strictures upon the ill-treatment of women in the East, and 
 the unhealthy social arrangements impHed by it, most persons- 
 do not see that the same connection between pohtical and 
 domestic oppression exists in this England of ours at the 
 present hour, and that in as far as our' laws and customs violate 
 the rights of humanity by giving the richer classes power over 
 the poorer, in so far do they similarly violate those rights by 
 giving the stronger sex power over the weaken Yet, looking at 
 the matter apart from prejudice, and considering all institutions 
 to be, as they are, products of the popular character, we cannot 
 avoid confessing that such must be the case. To the same 
 extent that the old leaven of tyranny shows itself in the trans- 
 actions of the senate, it wiU creep out in the doings of the 
 household. If injustice sways men's public acts, it will in-' 
 evitably sway their private ones also'. The mere fact, therefore,' 
 
 M 
 
102 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 that oppression marks the relationships of out-door life, is 
 ample proof that it exists in the relationships of the fireside. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 The desire to command is essentially a barbarous desire. 
 Whether seen in tlie ukase of a Czar, or in the order of an Eton 
 bully to his fag, it is alike significant of brutality. Command 
 cannot be otherwise than savage, for it implies an appeal to 
 force, should force be needful. Behind its " You shall," there 
 lies the scarcely hidden " If you won't, I '11 make you." 
 Command is the growl of coercion crouching in ambush. Or 
 we might aptly term it — violence in a latent state. All 
 its accessories — its frown, its voice, its gestures, prove it akin 
 to the ferocity of the uncivilized man. Command is the foe of 
 peace, for it breeds war of words and feelings — sometimes of 
 deeds. It is inconsistent with the first law of morality. It is 
 radically wrong. 
 
 All the barbarisms of the past have their types in the present. 
 All the barbarisms of the past grew out of certain dispositions ; 
 those dispositions may be weakened, but they are not extinct ; 
 and so long as they exist there must be manifestations of 
 them. What we commonly understand by command and 
 obedience, are the modem forms of bygone despotism and 
 slavery. Philosophically considered, they are identical with 
 these. Despotism may be defined as the making of another's 
 will bend to the fulfilment of our own : and its counterpart — 
 slavery — as the having our own will subordinated to the will 
 of another. True, we apply the terms only when the rule of 
 one will over another is extreme — when the one wholly, 
 or almost whoUy extinguishes the other. But if the sub- 
 jection of man to man is bad when carried to its full extent, 
 it is bad in any degree. If every man has freedom to exer- 
 cise his faculties within specified Umits ; and if, as we have 
 seen (Chap. VIII.), slavery is wrong because it transgresses that 
 freedom, and makes one man use his powers, to satisfy not his 
 
THE KIGHTS OF WOMEN. 163 
 
 own wants, but the wants of another ; then, whatsoever involves 
 command, or whatsoever imphes ohedience, is wrong also ; seeiag 
 that it too, necessitates the subserviency of one man's actions to 
 the gratifications of another. " You must do not as you will, 
 but as I wUl," is the basis of every mandate, whether used by 
 a planter to his negi-o, or by a husband to his wife. Not satis- 
 fied with being sole ruler over his own doings, the petty auto- 
 crat oversteps the boundary dividing his sphere of action from 
 his neighbour's, and takes upon himself to direct his or her 
 doings also. It matters not, in point of principle, whether 
 such domination is entire or partial. To whatever extent the 
 win of the one is overborne by the will of the other, to that 
 extent the parties are tyrant and slave. 
 
 There are, without doubt, many who wiU rebel against this 
 doctrine. There are many who hold that the obedience of one 
 human being to another is proper, virtuous, praiseworthy. 
 There are many to whose moral sense command is not repug- 
 nant. There are many who think the subjection of the weaker 
 sex to the stronger legitimate and beneficial. Let them not be 
 deceived. Let them remember that a nation's institutions and 
 beUefs are determined by its character. Let them remember 
 that men's perceptions are warped by their passions. Let them 
 remember that our social state proves our superior feehngs 
 to be very imperfectly developed. And let them remember 
 that, as many customs deemed right by our ancestors, appear 
 detestable to us, so, many customs which we think proper, our 
 more civiUzed descendants may regard with aversion — even as 
 we loathe those barbarian manners wliich forbid a woman to 
 sit at table with her lord and master, so may mankind one day 
 loathe that subserviency of wife to husband, which existing laws 
 enjoin. 
 
 As elsewhere shown (page 29), moral sense becomes a trust- 
 worthy guide only when it has logic for an interpreter. Nothing 
 but its primary intuition is authoritative. From the funda- 
 mental law to which it gives utterance,-reason has to deduce 
 the consequences; and from these, when correctly drawn, there 
 
 M 2 
 
164 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 is no appeal. It proves nothing, therefore, that there are some 
 who do not feel command to be improper. It is for such to 
 inquire whether command is or is not consistent -with that first 
 principle expressive of the Divine will — that axiom to which 
 the Moral Sense responds. And they will find that, thus judged 
 by the law of equal freedom, command is at once pronounced 
 wrong ; for whoso commands, manifestly claims more freedom 
 than whoso is commanded. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 A future beUef that subordination of sex is inequitable, is 
 clearly prophesied by the change civilization is working in 
 men's sentiments. The ai-bitrary rule of one human being over 
 another, no matter in what form it may appear, is fast getting 
 recognised as essentially rude and brutal. In our day, the man 
 of refined feeling does not like to play the despot over his 
 fellow. He is disgusted if one in humble circumstances 
 cringes to him. So far from wishing to elevate himself by de- 
 pressing his poor and ignorant neighbours, he strives to put 
 them at their ease in his presence — encourages them to behave 
 in a less submissive and more self-respecting manner. He 
 feels that a fellow-man may be enslaved by imperious words 
 and manners as well as by tyrannical deeds ; and hence he avoids 
 a dictatorial style of speech to those below him. Even paid 
 domestics, to whose services he has obtained a right by contract, 
 he does not like to address in a tone of authority. He seeks 
 rather to disguise his character of master : to this end wraps up 
 his commands in the shape of requests ; and continually em- 
 ploys the phrases, " If you please," and " Thank you." 
 
 In the conduct of the modem gentleman to his friend, we 
 have additional signs of this growing respect for another's 
 dignity. Every one must have observed the carefulness with 
 which those who are on terms of affectionate intimacy, shun 
 anything in the form of supremacy on either side, or en- 
 deavour to banish from remembrance, by their behaviour to 
 each other, whatever of supremacy there may exist. Who is 
 
THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 165 
 
 there that has not witnessed the dilemma in which the wealthier 
 of two such is sometimes placed, between the wish to confer a 
 benefit on the other, and the fear that in so doing he may 
 offend by assuming the attitude of a patron ? And who is there 
 that does not feel how destructive it would be of the sentiment 
 subsisting between himself and his friend, were he to play the 
 master over his friend, or his friend to play the master over 
 him? 
 
 A further increase of this same refinement will show men 
 that there is a fatal incongruity between the matrimonial ser- 
 vitude which our law recognises, and the relationship that ought 
 to exist between husband and wife. Surely if he who possesses 
 any generosity of nature dislikes speaking to a hired domestic 
 in a tone of authority — if he cannot bear assuming towards his 
 friend the behaviour of a superior — how utterly repugnant to 
 him should it be, to make himself ruler over one on whose 
 behalf all his kindly sentiments are specially enlisted ; one to 
 whom he is bound by the strongest attachment that his nature 
 is capable of; and for whose rights and dignity he ought to 
 have the most active sympathy ! 
 
 § 7. 
 
 Command is a blight to the affections. Whatsoever of re- 
 finement — whatsoever of beauty — whatsoever of poetry, there 
 is in the passion that unites the sexes, withers up and dies 
 in the cold atmosphere of authority. Native as they are to such 
 vpidely-separated regions of our nature. Love and Coercion can- 
 not possibly flourish together. The one grows out of our best 
 feelings : the other has its root in our worst. Love is sym- 
 pathetic : Coercion is callous. Love is gentle ; Coercion is 
 harsh. Love is self-sacrificing : Coercion is selfish. How 
 then can they co-exist ? It is the property of the first to 
 attract ; whilst it is that of the last to repel : and, conflicting 
 as they thus do, it is the constant tendency of each to destroy 
 the other. Let whoever thinks the two compatible imagine 
 himself acting the master over his betrothed. Does he believe 
 
166 THE EIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 that he could do this without any injury to the subsisting 
 relationship ? Does he not know rather that a bad effect would 
 be produced upon the feehngs of both parties by the assumption 
 of such an attitude ? And confessing this, as he must, is he 
 superstitious enough to suppose that the going through a form 
 of words will render harmless that use of command which was 
 previously hurtful ? 
 
 Of all the causes which conspire to produce the disappomt- 
 ment of those glowing hopes with which mamed hfe is usually 
 entered upon, none is so potent as this supremacy of sex 
 this degradation of what should be a free and equal relation- 
 ship into one of ruler and subject — this supplanting of the 
 sway of affection by the sway of authority. Only as that con- 
 dition of slavery to which women are condemned amongst 
 barbarous nations is amehorated, does ideal love become possi- 
 ble; and only when that condition of slavery shall have 
 been wholhj abohshed, will ideal love attain fulness and per- 
 manence. The facts around us plainly indicate this. Where- 
 ever anything worth calling connubial happiness at present 
 exists, we shall find that the subjugation of wife to husband is 
 not enforced ; though perhaps still held in theory, it is practi- 
 cally repudiated. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 There are many who think that authority, and its ally com- 
 pulsion, are the sole agencies by which human beings can be 
 controlled. Anarchy or government are, with them, the only 
 conceivable alternatives. Believing in notliing but what they 
 see, they cannot realize the possibility of a condition of things 
 in which peace and order shall be maintained without force, or 
 the fear of force. By such as these, the doctrine that the reign 
 of man over woman is wrong, will no doubt be combated on the 
 ground that the domestic relationsliip can only exist by the 
 help of such supremacy. The impracticability of an equality 
 of rights between the sexes will be urged by them in disproof of 
 its rectitude. It will be argued, that were they put upon a level 
 
THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 167 
 
 husband and wife would be for ever in antagonism — that as, 
 when their wishes clashed, each would possess a hke claim to 
 have his or her way, the matrimonial bond would daily be en- 
 dangered by the jar of opposing wills, and that, involving as 
 it would a perpetual conflict, such an arrangement of married 
 life must necessarily be an erroneous one. 
 
 A very superficial conclusion this. It has been already 
 pointed out (p. 37), that there must be an inconsistency between 
 the perfect law and an imperfect state. The worse the con- 
 dition of society, the more visionary must a true code of morality 
 appeaj. The fact that any proposed principle of conduct is at 
 once fully practicable — req^uires no reformation of human nature 
 for its complete reaUzation — is not a proof of its truth : is proof 
 rather of its error. And, conversely, a certain degree of incon- 
 gruity between such a principle and humanity as we know it, 
 though no proof of the correctness of that principle, is at any rate 
 a fact in its favour. Hence the allegation that mankind are 
 not good enough to admit of the> sexes hving together har- 
 moniously under the law of equal freedom, in no way mihtates 
 against the vahdity or saoredness of that law. 
 
 But the never-ceasing process of adaptation will gradually 
 remove this obstacle to domestic rectitude. Recognition of the 
 moral law, and an impulse to act up to it, going hand in hand, 
 as we have seen that they must do (p. 26), equality of rights 
 in the manied state wiU become possible as fast as there arises 
 a perception of its justness. That selfish conflict of claims 
 which, according to the foregoing objection, would reduce a 
 union, founded on the law of equal freedom, to a condition of 
 anarchy, presupposes a deficiency in those feehngs with which 
 a belief in the law of equal freedom originates, and would de- 
 crease with the growth of those feehngs. As elsewhere shown 
 (p. 97), the same sentiment which leads us to maintain our own 
 rights, leads us, by its sympathetic excitement, to respect the 
 rights of our neighbours. Other things equal, the sense of 
 justice to ourselves, and the sense of justice to our fellow- 
 creatures, bear a constant ratio to each other. A state in 
 
168 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 which -every one is jealous of his natural claims, is not there- 
 fore a litigious state, because it is one in which there is of 
 necessity a diminished tendency to aggression. Experience 
 proves this. For, as it cannot be denied that there is now a 
 greater disposition amongst men towards the assertion of indi- 
 vidual hberty than existed during the feudal ages, so neither 
 can it be denied that there is now a less disposition amongst 
 men to trespass against each other than was then exhibited. 
 The two changes are co-ordinate, and must continue to be so. 
 Hence, whenever society shall have become civilized enough 
 to recognise the equality of rights between the sexes — when 
 women shall have attained to a clear perception of what is due 
 to them, and men to a nobihty of feeling which shall make them 
 concede to women the freedom which they themselves claim 
 — humanity will have undergone such a modification as to 
 render an equaUty of rights practicable. 
 
 Married life under this ultimate state of things will not be 
 characterised by perpetual squabbles, but by mutual concessions. 
 Instead of a desire on the part of the husband to assert his 
 claims to the uttermost, regardless of those of his wife, or on 
 the part of the wife to do the like, there will be a watchful 
 desire on both sides not to transgress. Neither will have to 
 stand on the defensive, because each wiU be solicitous for the 
 rights of the other. Not eijcroachment, but self-sacrifice, mil 
 be the rahng principle. The struggle will not be which shall 
 gain the mastery, but which shall gjve way. Committing a 
 trespass will be the thing feared, and not the being trespassed 
 against. And thus, instead of domestic discord, will come a 
 higher harmony than any we yet know. 
 
 There is nothing Utopian in this. We may already trace 
 the begionings pf it. An attitude like that described is not 
 uncommonly maintained in the deahngs of honourable men 
 with each other ; and if so, why should it not ,exjst between the 
 sexes? Here and there, indeed, may be found, even now, a 
 wedded pair who preserve such a relationship. Apd what is at 
 present the exception may one day be the rule. 
 
THE EIGHTS OF WOMEN. 169 
 
 § 9. 
 
 The extension of the law of equal freedom to both sexes 
 ■will doubtless be objected to., on the ground that the pohtical 
 privileges exercised by men must thereby be ceded to women 
 also. Of course they must ; and why not ? Is it that women 
 are ignorant of state affairs ? Why then their opinions would 
 be those of their husbands and brothers; and the practical 
 effect would be merely that of giving each male elector two 
 votes instead of one. Is it that they might by-and-by become 
 better informed, and might then begin to act independently ? 
 Why, in such case, they would be pretty much as competent 
 to use their power with intelligence as the members of our 
 present constituencies. 
 
 We are told, however, that "woman's mission" is a domestic 
 one — that her character and position do not admit of her taking 
 a part in the decision of public questions — that politics are be- 
 yond her sphere. But this raises the question — Who shall say 
 what her sphere is ? Amongst the Pawnees and Sioux it is 
 that of a beast of burden ; she has to carry the baggage, to 
 drag home fuel from the woods, and to do everything that is 
 menial and laborious. In slave-countries it is witliin woman's 
 sphere to work side by side with men, under the lash of the task- 
 master. Clerkships, cashierships, and other responsible busi- 
 ness situations, are comprised in her sphere in modem France. 
 Whilst, on the other hand, the sphere of a Turkish or Egyp- 
 tian lady extends scarcely an inch beyond the walls of the 
 harem. Who now will tell us what woman's sphere really 
 is ? As the usages of mankind vary so much, let us hear 
 how it is to be shown that the sphere we assign her is the 
 true one — that the limi ts we have set to female activity are 
 just the proper limits. Let us hear why on this one point of 
 our social poHty we are exactly right, whilst we are wrong on 
 so many others. 
 
 It is indeed said, that the exercise of pohtical power by 
 women is repugnant to our sense of propriety — conflicts with 
 
170 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 
 
 our ideas of the feminine character — is altogether condemned 
 hy our feehngs. Granted; but what then? The same plea 
 has been urged in defence of a thousand absurdities, and if 
 valid in one case is equally so in all others. Should a travel- 
 ler in the East inquire of a Turk why women in his country 
 conceal their faces, he would be told that for them to go un- 
 veiled would be considered indecent ; would offend the feelings 
 of the spectators. In Eussia female voices are never heard in 
 church : women not being thought worthy " to sing the praises 
 of God in the presence of men;" and the disregard of this 
 regulation would be censured as an outrage upon public feel- 
 ing. There was a time in Trance when men were so enamoured 
 of ignorance, that a lady who pronounced any but the com- 
 monest words correctly, was blushed for by her companions ; 
 a tolerable proof that y^o^Xq^ feelings then blamed in a woman 
 that literateness which it is now thought a disgrace for her to 
 be without. In Cliina cramped feet are essential to female 
 refinement ; and so strong is the feeling in this matter, that 
 a Chinese will not believe that an Englishwoman who walks 
 naturally, can be one of a superior class. It was once held 
 unfeminine for a lady 'to write a book ; and no doubt those 
 who thought it so, would have quoted feelings in support of 
 their opinion. Yet, with facts like these on every hand, people 
 assume that the enfranchisement of women cannot be right, 
 because it is repugnant to their feelings ! 
 
 We have some feelings that are necessary and eternal; we 
 have others that, being the results of custom, are changeable 
 and evanescent. And there is no way of distinguishing those 
 feehngs which are natural from those which are conventional, 
 except by an appeal to first principles. If a sentiment responds 
 to some necessity of our condition, its dictates must be re- 
 spected. If otherwise — if opposed to a necessity, instead of 
 in harmony with one, we must regard that sentiment as the 
 product of circumstances, of education, of habit, and conse- 
 quently without weight. However much, therefore, the giving 
 of political power to women may disagree with our notions of 
 
THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 171 
 
 propriety, we must conclude that, being required by that first 
 pre-requisite to greatest happiness — the law of equal freedom — 
 such a concession is unquestionably right and good. 
 
 § 10. 
 
 Thus it has been shown that the rights of women must stand 
 or faU with those of men ; derived as they are from the same 
 authority ; involved in the same axiom ; demonstrated by the 
 same argument. That the law of equal freedom apphes alike 
 to both sexes, has been further proved by the fact that any 
 other hypothesis involves us in inextricable difficulties. The 
 idea that the rights of women are not equal to those of men, 
 has been condemned as akin to the Eastern dogma, that 
 women have no souls. It has been argued that the position 
 at present held by the weaker sex is, of necessity a wrong one, 
 seeing that the same selfishness which vitiates our pohtical 
 institutions, must inevitably vitiate our domestic ones also. 
 Subordination of females to males has been also repudiated, 
 because it impUes the use of command, and thereby reveals its 
 descent from barbarism. Proof has been given that the atti- 
 tudes of mastery on the one side, and submission on the other, 
 are essentially at variance with that refined sentiment which 
 should subsist between husband and wife. The argument that 
 married life would be impracticable under any other arrange- 
 ment, has been met by pointing out how the relationship of 
 equality must become possible as fast as its justness is recog- 
 nised. And lastly, it has been shown that the objections 
 commonly raised against giving political power to women, are 
 founded on notions and prejudices that will not bear exami- 
 nation. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 § 1. 
 
 If we are once sure of our law — sure that it is a Diviae ordi- 
 nation — sure that it is rooted in the nature of things, then 
 whithersoever it leads we may safely follow. As elsewhere 
 pointed out (Lemma II.), a true rule has no exceptions. When 
 therefore that first principle fi"om which the rights of adults 
 are derived, turns out to he a source from which we may de- 
 rive the rights of children, and when the two processes of 
 deduction prove to he identical, we have no choice but to 
 abide by the result, and to assume that the one inference is 
 equally authoritative with the other. 
 
 That the law — Every man has freedom to do all that he 
 wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other 
 man— applies as much to the young as to the mature, becomes 
 manifest on referring back to its origin. God wills human 
 happiness ; that happiness is attainable only through the me- 
 dium of faculties ; for the production of happiness those facul- 
 ties must be exercised ; the exercise of them pre-supposes 
 hherty of action: these are the steps by which we find our 
 way from the Divine will to the law of equal freedom. But 
 the demonstration is fully as complete when used on behalf 
 of the child, as when used on behaK of the man. The child's 
 happiness, too, is willed by the Deity ; the child, too, has facul- 
 ties to be exercised ; the child, too, needs scope for the exercise 
 of those faculties ; the child therefore has claims to freedom — ■ 
 rights, as we call them — co-extensive with those of the adult. 
 We cannot avoid this conclusion, if we would. Either we must 
 reject the law altogether, or we must include under it both 
 sexes and all ages. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 173 
 
 The candid thinker will find himself obliged to concede this, 
 when he considers the many perplexities which follow in the 
 train of any other theory. Por, if it he asserted that the law 
 of equal freedom applies only to adults ; that is, if it be as- 
 serted that men have rights, hut that children have none, we 
 are immediately met by the question — When does the child 
 become a man ? at what period does the human being pass 
 out of the condition of having no rights, into the condition of 
 having rights ? None will have the folly to quote the arbi- 
 trary dictum of the statute-book as an answer. The appeal is 
 to an authority above that of legislative enactments — demands 
 on what these are to be founded — on what attribute of man- 
 hood recognition by the law of equal freedom depends. Shall 
 the youth be entitled to the rights of humanity when the pitch 
 of his voice sinks an octave ? or when he begins to shave ? or 
 when he ceases growing ? or when he can lift a hundred 
 weight? Are we to adopt the test of age, of stature, of 
 weight, of strength, of viriUty, or of intelligence ? Much may 
 no doubt be said in favour of each of these; but who can 
 select the true one ? And who can answer the objection, that 
 whichever qualification is chosen, will class many as men who 
 are not at present considered such ; whilst it will reject from 
 the list, others who are now by universal consent included 
 in it? 
 
 Nor is this all. For even supposing that, by some undis- 
 covered species of logic, it has been determined on what par- 
 ticular day of his life the human being may equitably claim 
 his freedom, it stiU remains to define the position he holds 
 previously to this period. Has the minor absolutely no rights 
 at all ? If so, there is nothing wrong in infanticide. If so, 
 robbery is justifiable, provided the party robbed be under 
 age. If so, a child may equitably be enslaved. For, as already 
 shown (pp. 112, 134), murder, theft, and the holding of others 
 in bondage are wrong, simply because they are violations 
 of human rights ; and if children have no rights, they 
 cannot become the subjects of these crimes. But if, on the 
 other hand, it be held, as it wheld, that children h&ye so?ne 
 
174 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 rights ; if it be held that the youth has an equal claim to life 
 with the adult ; if it be held that he has something hke the 
 same title to liberty ; and if it be held (though not by law, yet 
 by pubUc opinion) that he is similarly capable of owning pro- 
 perty, then it becomes needful to show why these primary 
 rights must be conceded, but no others. They who assert 
 that children are wholly without rights, and that, hke the 
 inferior animals, they exist only by permission of grown men, 
 take up a precise, unmistakable position. But they who sup- 
 pose children to occupy a place morally above that of brutes, 
 and yet maintain that whilst cliildren have certain rights, their 
 rights are not equal with those of men, are called upon to draw 
 the line, to explain, to define. They must say what rights are 
 common to children and adults, and why. They must say 
 where the rights of adults exceed those of children, and why. 
 And their answers to these queries must be drawn, not from 
 considerations of expediency, but from the original constitution 
 of things. 
 
 Should it be argued, that the relationship in which a parent 
 stands to his child, as supplying it with the necessaries of 
 life, is a different one from that subsisting between man and 
 man, and that consequently the law of equal freedom does not 
 apply, the answer is, that though by so maintaining it a parent 
 establishes a certain claim upon his child — a claim which he 
 may fairly expect to have discharged by a Hke kindness to- 
 wards himself should he ever need it, yet he estabhshes no title to 
 dominion. For if the conferring an obligation establishes a title 
 to dominion in this case, then must it do so in others ; whence 
 it will follow that if one man becomes a benefactor to an- 
 other, he thereby obtains the right to play the master over that 
 other ; a conclusion which we do not admit. Moreover, if in 
 virtue of his position a parent may ti-ench upon the hberties 
 of his child, there necessarily arises the question — To what 
 extent may he do this ? may he destroy them entirely, as by 
 committing murder? If not, it is required to ascertain the 
 hmit up to -which he may go, but which he must not exceed ; 
 a problem equally insoluble with the similar one just noticed. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 175 
 
 Unless, therefore, the reader can show that the train of 
 reasoning by which the law of equal freedom is deduced 
 from the Divine will, does not recognise children, which he 
 cannot; unless he can show exactly at what time the child 
 becomes a man, which he cannot; unless he can show why 
 a certain share of liberty naturally attaches to both childhood 
 and manhood, and another share to only one, which he cannot ; 
 he must admit that the rights of the youth and the adult are 
 co-extensive. 
 
 There is indeed one plausible-looking way of meeting these 
 arguments. It may be urged that ia the child many of the 
 faculties of the future man are undeveloped, and that as rights 
 are primarily dependent on faculties, the rights of children can- 
 not be co-extensive with those of adults, because their faculties 
 are not so. A fatal objection this, did it touch the question ; but 
 it happens to be wholly beside it. The fullest endowment of 
 rights that any being can possess, is perfect freedom to exer- 
 cise all his faculties. And if each of two beings possesses 
 perfect freedom to exercise all his faculties, each possesses 
 complete rights; that is, the rights of the two are equal; no 
 matter whether their faculties are equal or not. For, to say 
 that the rights of the one are less than those of the other, 
 because his faculties are fewer, is to say that he has no right 
 to exercise the faculties he has not got ! — a curious compound 
 of truism and absurdity. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Due warning was given (p. 51) that our first principle car- 
 ried in it the germs of sundry uulocked-for conclusions. We 
 have now met with one of these. We have just found our- 
 selves committed to a proposition at war with the convictions 
 of almost all. Truth, however, must of necessity be consistent. 
 We have therefore no alternative but to re-examine our pre- 
 conceived opinions, in the expectation of finding them en-o- 
 neous. 
 
 That we may. enter upon tliis task in a philosophical spirit, 
 
170 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 it will be well, at the risk even of something like repetition, to 
 glance at the influences by which our beliefs are in danger of 
 being warped. We need constantly reminding of these. As 
 an abstract truth, we all admit that passion distorts judgment ; 
 yet never inquire whether our passions are influencing us. We 
 all decry prejudice, yet are all prejudiced. We see how habits, 
 and interests, and likings, mould the theories of those around 
 us; yet forget that our Own theories are similarly moulded. 
 Nevertheless, the instances in which our feehngs bias us in spite 
 of ourselves are of hourly recurrence. That proprietary pas- 
 sion, which a man has for his ideas, veils their defects to him 
 as efiectually as maternal fondness blinds' a mother to the im- 
 perfections of her ofispring. An author cannot, for the Hfe of 
 him, judge correctly of what he has just written ; he has to 
 wait untU lapse of time enables him to read it as though it 
 were a stranger's, and he then discerns flaws where all had 
 seemed perfect. It is only when his enthusiasm on its behalf 
 has gi-own cold, that the artist is able to see the faults of his 
 picture. Whilst they are transpiring, we do not perceive the 
 ultimate bearing of our own acts or the acts of others towards 
 us ; only in after yeai's are we able to philosophize upon them. 
 Just so, too, is it with successive generations. Men of the past 
 quite misunderstood the institutions they Hved under; they 
 pertinaciously adhered to the most vicious principles, and were 
 bitter in their opposition to right ones, at the dictates of their 
 attachments and antipathies. So difficult is it for man to 
 emancipate himself from the invisible fetters which habit and 
 education cast over his intellect; and so palpable is the con- 
 sequent incompetency of a people to judge rightly of itself and 
 its deeds or opinions, that the fact has been embodied in the 
 current aphorism— "No age can write its own history:" an 
 aphorism sufficiently expressive of the universaUty of prejudice. 
 If we act wisely, we shall assume that the "reasonings of 
 modem society are subject to the like disturbing influences. 
 We shall conclude that, even now, as in times gone by, opinion 
 IS but the counterpart of condition— merely expresses the de- 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 177 
 
 gree of civilisation to which we have attained. We shall sus- 
 pect that many of those convictions which seem the results of 
 dispassionate thinking, have heen nurtured in us by circum- 
 stances. We shall confess that as, heretofore, fanatical opposi- 
 tion to this doctrine, and bigoted adhesion to that, have been 
 no tests of the truth or falsity of the said doctrines ; so neither 
 is the strength of attachment, or dishke which a nation now 
 exhibits towards certain principles, any proof of their correct- 
 ness or their fallacy. Nay more — we shall not only admit that 
 public opinion may be wrong, but that it must be so. With- 
 out a general eq^uUibrium between institutions and ideas society 
 cannot subsist ; and hence, if error pervades our institutions, it 
 must similarly pervade our ideas. Just as much as a people 
 falls short of perfection in its state, will it lack of truth in its 
 beliefs. 
 
 Thus much by way of bespeaking a calm hearing. As lately 
 said, the proposition about to be maintained conflicts with the 
 habits, associations, and most cherished convictions of the great 
 majority. That the law of equal freedom appUes to children as 
 much as to adults ; that consequently the rights of children are 
 co-extensive with those of adults ; that, as violating those 
 rights, the use of coercion is wrong ; and that the relationship 
 now commonly existing between parents and children is there- 
 fore a vicious one — these are assertions which perhaps few will 
 listen to with equanimity. Nevertheless, if there be any weight 
 in the foregoing considerations, we shall do well to disregard 
 all protests of feeling, and place imphcit faith in the conclu- 
 sions of abstract equity. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 We say that a man's character may be told by the company 
 he keeps. We might similarly say that the truth of a belief 
 may be judged by the morality with which it is associated. 
 Given a theory universally current amongst the most degraded 
 sections of our race— a theory received only with considerable 
 abatements by civilized nations— a theory in which men's con- 
 
 N 
 
178 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 fidence diminishes as fast as society advances — and we may 
 safely pronounce that theory to be a false one. On such, along 
 ■with other evidence, the subordination of sex was lately con- 
 demned. Those commonly-observed facts, that the enslave- 
 ment of woman is invariably associated with a low type of 
 social Hfe, and that conversely, her elevation towards an equality 
 with man uniformly accompanies progress, were cited in part 
 proof that the subjection of female to male is essentially wrong. 
 If now, instead of women we read children, similar facts may 
 be cited, and a similar deduction may be drawn. If it be 
 true that the dominion of man over woman has been oppressive 
 in proportion to the badness of the age or the people, it is also 
 true that parental authority has been stringent and unlimited in 
 a like proportion. If it be a fact that the emancipation of 
 women has kept pace with the emancipation of society, it is 
 likewise a fact that the once despotic rule of the old over the 
 young has been ameliorated at the same rate. And if in our 
 own day, we find the fast-spreading recognition of popular 
 rights accompanied by a silently-growing perception of the 
 rights of women, we also find it accompanied by a tendency 
 towards systems of non-coercive education — that is, towards a 
 practical admission of the rights of children. 
 
 Whoever wants illustrations of this alleged harmony between 
 the political, connubial, and filial relationships, may discover 
 them anywhere and everywhere. Scanning that aboriginal 
 state of existence during which the aggressive conduct of man 
 to man renders society scarcely possible, he wlU see not only 
 that wives are slaves and exist by sufierance, but that children 
 hold their Hves by the same tenure, and are sacrificed to the 
 gods when fathers so will. He may observe how during 
 classic times, the thraldom of five-sixths of the population 
 was accompanied both by a theory that the child is the pro- 
 perty and slave of its male parent, and by a legal fiction 
 which regarded wives, as children similarly owned. That 
 poUtical degradation of the present East-Indian races for whom 
 absolute monarchy seems still the only possible form of rule. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 179 
 
 he will find accompanied alike by suttees and by infanticide. 
 The same connection of facts mil be seen by him in China, 
 ■where under a government, purely autocratic, there exists a 
 public opinion which deems it an unpardonable offence for a 
 wife to accuse her husband to the magistrate, and which ranks 
 filial disobedience as a crime next in atrocity to murder. Nor 
 is our own history barren of illustrations. On reviewing those 
 times when constitutional liberty was but a name, when men 
 were denied fireedom of speech and belief, when the people's 
 representatives were openly bribed and justice was bought — 
 the times, too, with which the laws enacting the servitude of 
 women were in complete harmony — the observer cannot fail to 
 be struck with the harshness «of parental behaviour, and the 
 attitude of humble subjection which sons and daughters had to 
 assume. Between the close of the last century, when om' 
 domestic condition was marked by the use of Sir and Madam 
 in addressing parents, and by the doctrine that a child ought 
 unhesitatingly to marn' whomsoever a father appointed; and 
 when our pohtical condition was marked by aristocratic supre- 
 macy, by the occurrence of church- and-king riots, and by the 
 persecution of reformers — between that day and ours, the de- 
 chne in the rigour of paternal authority and in the severity of 
 political oppression, has been simultaneous. And, as akeady 
 remarked, the like companionship of facts is seen in the present 
 rapid growth of democratic feeling, and the equally rapid spread 
 of a milder system of juvenile training. 
 
 Thus, the biography of the race affords ample illustration of 
 the alleged law. That uniformity of moral tone, which it was 
 asserted must necessarily pervade a nation's arrangements — 
 social, marital, and parental, we see exemplified alike imder all 
 phases of civilisation. Indeed this position hardly needed 
 proof, being, as it is, a direct coroUary fi-om self-evident truths. 
 As surely as a man's character shines through all his, deeds, so 
 surely does the character of a people shine through all its laws 
 and customs. Having a common root in human nature, co- 
 temporary institutions cannot fail to be equally affected by the 
 • N 2 
 
180 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 imperfection of that nature. They must all he right or wrong 
 together. The evil which taints one must taint all. The 
 change which reforms one must at the same time reform all. 
 The progress which perfects one must eventually perfect all. 
 
 Consequently, whoever admits that injustice is still visible m 
 the dealings of class with class— whoever admits that it similarly 
 exhibits itself in the behaviour of one sex to the other, cannot 
 but admit that it necessarily exists in the conduct of the old to 
 the young. And he must further admit that being most im- 
 plicitly received amongst the most barbarous nations, and 
 waning as its influence does with the advance of civilisation, 
 the doctrine of fiUal subjection is entirely condemned by its 
 associations. 
 
 §4. 
 
 If coercive education be right, it must be productive of good, 
 and if wrong, of evil. By an analysis of its results, therefore, 
 we shall obtain so much evidence for or against the doctrine 
 that the liberties of children are co-extensive with those of 
 adults. 
 
 That coercive education is impoUtic, may be strongly sus- 
 pected from the fact lately adverted to — the evident disposition 
 towards the abandonment of it which modem systems of train- 
 ing evince. Considering what universal attention the culture 
 of the young has lately received — the books written about it, 
 the lectures dehvered on it, the experiments made to elucidate 
 it — there is reason for concluding that as the use of brute 
 force for educational purposes has greatly declined, something 
 radically wrong must be involved in it. Eut without dwelUng 
 upon this, which, like all inferences drawn from expediency, 
 is liable to have its premises called in question, let us judge of 
 coercive education not by the effects it is believed to produce, 
 but by those it must produce. 
 
 Education has for its object the formation of character. To 
 curb restive propensities, to awaken dormant sentiments, to 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 181 
 
 strengthen the perceptions, and cultivate the tastes, to en- 
 courage this feeling and repress that, so as finally to develop 
 the child into a man of well proportioned and harmonious 
 nature — this is alike the aim of parent and teacher. Those, 
 therefore, who advocate the use of authority, and if need he 
 — force in the management of children, must do so because they 
 think these the best means of compassing the desired object — 
 formation of character. Paternity has to devise some kind of 
 rule for the nursery. Impelled partly by creed, partly by cus- 
 tom, partly by inclination, paternity decides in favour of a pure 
 despotism, proclaims its word the supreme law, anathematizes 
 disobedience, and exhibits the rod as the final arbiter in all 
 disputes. And of course this system of discipline is defended 
 as the one best calculated to cui'b restive propensities, awaken 
 dormant sentiments, &c., &c., as aforesaid. Suppose, now, we 
 inquire how the plan works. An imamiable Uttle urchin is 
 pursuing his own gratification regardless of the comfort of 
 others — is perhaps annoyingly vociferous in his play ; or is 
 amusing himself by teasing a companion ; or is trying to 
 monopolize the toys intended for others in common with him- 
 self. Well ; some kind of interposition is manifestly called for. 
 Paternity with knit brows, and in a severe tone, commands 
 desistance — visits anything hke reluctant submission with a 
 sharp " Do as I bid you " — if need be, hints at a whipping or the 
 black hole — in short carries coercion, or the threat of coercion, 
 far enough to produce obedience. After sundry exhibitions of 
 perverse feeling, the child gives in ; showing, however, by its 
 sullenness the animosity it entertains. Meanwhile paternity 
 pokes the fire and complacently resumes the newspaper under 
 the impression that all is as it should be : most unfortunate 
 mistake ! 
 
 If the thing wanted had been the mere repression of noise, 
 or the mechanical transfer of a plaything, perhaps no better 
 course could have been pursued. Had it been of no conse- 
 quence under what impulse the child acted, so long as it ful- 
 filled a given mandate, nothing would remain to be said. But 
 
182 THE EIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 something else was needed. Character was the thing to be 
 changed rather than conduct. It was not the deeds, but the 
 feehng from which the deeds sprung that required dealing with. 
 Here were palpable manifestations of selfishness — an indif- 
 ference to the wishes of others, a marked desire to tyrannise, 
 an endeavour to engross benefits intended for all — in short, 
 here were exhibitions on a small scale of that unsympathetic 
 nature to which our social evils are mainly attributable. What, 
 then, was the thing wanted ? Evidently an alteration in the 
 child's disposition. What was the problem to be solved ? 
 Clearly to generate a state of mind which had it previously 
 existed would have prevented the offending actions. What 
 was the final end to be achieved ? Unquestionably the form- 
 ation of a character which should spontaneously produce 
 greater generosity of conduct. Or, speaking definitely, it was 
 necessary to strengthen that sympathy to the weakness of 
 which this ill behaviour was traceable. 
 
 But sympathy can be strengthened only by exercise. No 
 faculty whatever will grow, save by the performance of its 
 special function — a muscle by contraction ; the intellect by 
 perceiving and thinking ; a moral sentiment by feeling. Sym- 
 pathy, therefore, can be increased only by exciting sympathetic 
 emotions. A selfish child is to be rendered less selfish, only by 
 arousing in it a feUow-feeling with the desires of others. If 
 this is not done, nothing is done. 
 
 Observe, then, how the case stands. A grasping hard-natured 
 boy is to be humanized — is to have whatever germ of better 
 spirit may be in him developed ; and to this end it is proposed 
 to use frowns, threats, and the stick ! To stimulate that faculty 
 which originates our regard for the happiness of others, we 
 are told to inflict pain, or the fear of pain ! The problem is — 
 to generate in a child's mind a sympathetic feeling; and the 
 answer is — beat it, or send it supperless to bed ! 
 
 Thus we have hut to reduce the subjection -theory to a 
 definite form to render its absurdity self-evident. Contrasting 
 the means to be employed with the work to be done, we are at 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 183 
 
 once struck with their utter unfitness. Instead of creating a 
 new internal state which shall exhibit itself in better deeds, 
 coercion can manifestly do nothing but forcibly mould externals 
 into a coarse semblance of such a state. In the family, as in 
 society, it can simply restrain; it cannot educate. Just as the 
 recollection of Bridewell, and the dread of a poUceman, whUst 
 they serve to check the thiefs depredations, effect no change 
 in his morals, so, although a father's threats may produce in a 
 child a certain outside conformity with rectitude, they cannot 
 generate any real attachment to it. As some one has well said, 
 the utmost that severity can do is to make hypocrites ; it can 
 never make converts. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Let those who have no faith in any instrumentahties for the 
 rule of human beings, save the stern will and the strong hand, 
 visit the Hanwell Asylum for the insane. Let all self-styled 
 practical men, who, in the pride of their semi-savage theories, 
 shower sarcasms upon the movements for peace, for the abolition 
 of capital punishments and the like, go and witness to their 
 confusion how a thousand lunatics can be managed without 
 the use of force. Let these sneerers at " sentimentalisms " re- 
 flect on the horrors of madhouses as they used to be; where was 
 weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, where chains 
 clanked dismally, and where the silence of the night was rent 
 by shrieks that made the belated passer-by hurry on shudder- 
 ingly ; let them contrast with these hoiTors, the calmness, the 
 contentment, the tractabihty, the improved health of mind and 
 body, and the not unfrequent recoveries, that have followed the 
 abandonment of the strait-jacket regime": and then let them 
 blush for their creed. 
 
 And shall the poor maniac, with diseased feelings and a 
 warped intellect, persecuted as he constantly is by the sugges- 
 
 " See Dr. ConoUy on Lunatic Asylums. 
 
184 THE KIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 tions of a morbid imagination, shall a being with a mind so 
 
 hopelessly chaotic that even the most earnest pleader for human 
 
 rights would make his case an exception, shall he be amenable 
 
 to a non-coercive treatment, and shall a child not be amenable 
 
 to it ? WOl any one maintain that madmen can be managed 
 
 by suasion, but not children ? that moral-force methods are 
 
 best for those deprived of reason, but physical-force methods 
 
 for those possessing it? Hardly. The boldest defender of 
 
 domestic despotism will not assert so much. If by judicious 
 
 conduct the confidence even of the insane may be obtained — ^if 
 
 even to the beclouded intelUgence of a limatic, kind attentions 
 
 and a sympathetic manner will carry the conviction that he is 
 
 surrounded by friends and not by demons — and if, under that 
 
 conviction, even he, though a slave to every disordered impulse, 
 
 becomes comparatively docile, how much more under the same 
 
 influence will a child become so. Do but gain a boy's trust; 
 
 convince him by your behaviour that you have his happiness at 
 
 heart ; let him discover that you are the wiser of the two ; let 
 
 him experience the benefits of following your advice, and the 
 
 evils that arise from disregarding it; and fear not yon will 
 
 readily enough guide him. Not by authority is your sway to 
 
 be obtained ; neither by reasoning ; but by inducement. Show 
 
 in all your conduct that you are thoroughly your child's friend, 
 
 and there is nothing that you may not lead him to. The 
 
 faintest sign of your approval or dissent will be his law. You 
 
 have won from him the key of all his feelings ; and, instead of 
 
 the vindictive passions that severe treatment would have aroused, 
 
 you may by a word call forth tears, or blushes, or the thrill of 
 
 sympathy — may excite any emotion you please — may, in short, 
 
 efiect something worth calling education. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 If we wish a boy to become a good mechanic, we ensure his 
 expertness by an early apprenticeship. The young musician 
 that is to be, passes several hours a day at his instrument. 
 
THE EIGHTS OF CHILBEEN. 185 
 
 Initiatory courses of outline drawing and shading are gone 
 through by the intended artist. For the future accountant, a 
 thorough drilling in arithmetic is prescribed. The reflective 
 powers are sought to be developed by the study of mathematics. 
 Thus, all training is founded on the principle that culture must 
 precede proficiency. In such proverbs as — " Habit is second 
 nature," and "Practice makes perfect," men have expressed 
 those net products of universal observation on which every 
 educational system is ostensibly based. The maxims of a 
 village schoolmistress and the speculations of a Pestalozzi are 
 alike pervaded by the thory that the child should be ac- 
 customed to those exertions of body and mind which will in 
 future life be required of it. Education means this or nothing. 
 
 What now is the most important attribute of man as a moral 
 being ? What faculty above all othere should we be soUcitous 
 to cultivate ? May we not answer — the faculty of self-control ? 
 This it is which forms a chief distinction between the human 
 being and the brute. It is in virtue of this that man is defined 
 as a creature " looking before and after." It is in their larger 
 endowment of this that the civiUzed races are superior to the 
 savage. In supremacy of this consists one of the perfections of 
 the ideal man. Not to be impulsive — not to be spurred hither 
 and thither by each desire that in turn comes uppermost ; but 
 to be self-restrained, self-balanced, governed by the joint 
 decision of the feeHngs in council assembled, before whom every 
 action shall have been fuUy debated and calmly determined — 
 this it is which education — moral education at least — strives to 
 produce. 
 
 But the power of seK-govemment, like all other powers, can 
 be developed only by exercise. Whoso is to rule over his 
 passions in maturity, must be practised in ruling over his 
 passions during youth. Observe, then, the absurdity of the 
 coercive system. Instead of habituating a boy to be a law to 
 himself as he is required in after-life to be, it administers the 
 law for him. Instead of preparing him against the day when 
 he shall leave the paternal roof, by inducing him to fix the 
 
186 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 boundaries of his actions and voluntarily confine himself witMn 
 them, it marks out these boundaries for him, and says — " cross 
 them at your peril." Here "we have a being who, in a few 
 years, is to become his own master, and, by way of fitting him 
 for such a condition, he is allowed to be his own master as 
 httle as possible. Whilst in every other particular it is thought 
 desirable that what the man wiU have to do, the child should 
 be well drilled in doing, in this most important of all particulars 
 — the controlling of himself — it is thought that the less practice 
 he has the better. Is o wonder that those who have been brought 
 up under the severest discipline should so frequently turn out 
 the wildest of the wild. Such a result is just what might have 
 been looked for. 
 
 Indeed, not only does the physical-force system fail to fit the 
 youth for his future position ; it absolutely tends to ««fit liim. 
 Were slavery to be his lot — if his after-life had to be passed 
 under the rule of a Russian autocrat, or of an American cotton 
 planter, no better method of training could be devised than one 
 which accustomed him to that attitude of complete subordina- 
 tion he would subsequently have to assume. But just to the 
 degree in which such treatment would fit him for servitude, must 
 it unfit him for being a free man amongst free men. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 But why is education needed at all? Why does not the 
 child grow spontaneously into a nonnal human being ? Why 
 should it be requisite to curb this propensity, to stimulate the 
 other sentiment, and thus by artificial aids to mould the mind 
 into something dififerent from what it would of itself become ? 
 Is not there here an anomaly in nature ? Throughout the rest 
 of creation we find the seed and the embryo attaining to perfect 
 maturity without external aid. Drop an acorn into the ground, 
 and it will in due time become a healthy oak without either 
 pruning or training. The insect passes through its several 
 transformations unhelped, and airives at its final form possessed 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 187 
 
 of every needful capacity and instinct. No coercion is needed 
 to make the young bird or quadruped adopt the hahits proper 
 to its future life. Its character Kke its body, spontaneously 
 assumes complete fitness for the part it has to play in the 
 ■world. How happens it, then, that the human mind alone tends 
 to develop itself wrongly ? Must there not be some excep- 
 tional cause for this ? Manifestly : and if so a true theory of 
 education must recognise this cause. 
 
 It is an indisputable fact that the moral constitution ■which 
 fitted man for his original predatory state, differs itom the one 
 needed to fit him for this social state to which multiplication of 
 the race has led. In a foregoing part of our inquiry (Chap. II.), 
 it was shown that the law of adaptation is efiecting a transition 
 irom the one constitution to the other. Living then, as we do, 
 in the midst of this transition, we must expect to find sundry 
 phenomena which are expHcable only upon the hypothesis that 
 humanity is at present partially adapted to both these states, 
 and not completely to either — has only in a degree lost the 
 dispositions needed for savage life, and has but imperfectly 
 acquired those needed for social life. The anomaly just specified 
 is one of these. The tendency of each new generation to 
 develop itself wrongly, indicates the degree of modification that 
 has yet to take place. Those respects in which a child requires 
 restraint, are just the respects in which he is taking after the 
 aboriginal man. The selfish squabbles of the nursery, the 
 persecution of the play-ground, the lyings and petty thefts, the 
 rough treatment of inferior creatures, the propensity to destroy 
 — all these imply that tendency to pursue gratification at the 
 expense of other beings, which qualified man for the ■wilderness, 
 and which disqualifies him for civOized hfe. 
 
 We have seen, however, that this incongruity between man's 
 attributes and his conditions is in course of being remedied. 
 We have seen that the instincts of the savage must die of 
 inanition — that the sentiments called forth by the social state 
 must grow by exercise, and that if the laws of life remain 
 constant, this modification will continue imtil our desires are 
 
188 THE EIGHTS OF CHILDEEN. 
 
 brought into perfect conformity with our circumstances. When 
 now that ultimate state in which morality shall have become 
 organic is arrived at, this anomaly in the development of the 
 child's character will have disappeared. The young human 
 being will no longer be an exception in nature — will not as now 
 tend to grow into unfitness for the requirements of after-life ; 
 but wiU spontaneously unfold itself into that ideal manhood, 
 whose every impulse coincides with the dictates of the moral 
 law. 
 
 Education therefore, in so far as it seeks to form character, 
 serves only a temporary purpose, and, lite other institutions re- 
 sulting from the non- adaptation of man to the social state, must 
 in the end die out. Hence we see how doubly incongruous with 
 the moral law, is the system of training by coercion. Not only 
 does it necessitate direct violations of that law, but the very work 
 which it so futilely attempts to perform, will not need performing 
 when that law has attained to its final supremacy. Force in 
 the domestic circle, like magisterial force, is merely the comple- 
 ment of immorality : immorality we have found to be resolvable 
 into non-adaptation : non-adaptation must in time cease : and 
 thus the postulate with which this old theory of education 
 starts will eventually become false. Rods and ferules, equally 
 with the staffs and handcufis of the constable ; the gaoler's 
 keys; the swords, bayonets and cannon, with which nations 
 restrain each other, are the ofispring of iniquity— can exist 
 only whilst supported by it, and necessarily share in the bad- 
 ness of their parentage. Bom therefore as it is of man's im- 
 perfections—governing as it does by means of diose imper- 
 fections—and abdicating as it must when Equity begins to 
 reign, Coercion in all its forms— educational or other— is essen- 
 tially vicious. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 And here we are naturaUy led to remark once more the ne- 
 cessary incongruity between the perfect law and the imperfect 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 189 
 
 man. Whatsoever of Utopianism there may seem to \>e in the 
 foregoing doctrines, is due not to any error in them but to 
 faults in ourselves. A partial impracticability must not per- 
 plex us ; must, on tlie contrary, be expected. Just in propor- 
 tion to our distance below the purely moral state, must be our 
 difi&culty in acting up to the moral law, either in the treatment 
 of children or in anything else. It is not for us, however, to 
 magnify and ponder over this difficulty. Our course is simple. 
 We have just to fulfil the law as far as in us lies, resting satis- 
 fied that the limitations necessitated by our present condition 
 win quite soon enough assert themselves. 
 
 Meanwhile let it be remarked that the main obstacle to the right 
 conduct of education Ues rather in the parent than in the child. It 
 is not that the child is insensible to influences higher than that 
 of force, but that the parent is not virtuous enough to use them. 
 Fathei-s and mothers who enlarge upon the trouble which filial 
 misbehaviour entails upon them, strangely assume that aU the 
 blame is due to the evil propensities of their ofispring and none 
 to their own. Though on their knees they confess to being 
 miserable sinners, yet to hear their complaints of undutrful 
 sons and daughters you might suppose that they were them- 
 selves immaculate. They forget that the depravity of their 
 children is a reproduction of their own depravity. They do not 
 recognise in these much-scolded, often-beaten Httle ones so many 
 looking-glasses wherein they may see reflected their own selfish- 
 ness. It would astonish them to assert that they behave as 
 improperly to their children as their children do to them. Yet 
 a little candid self-analysis would show them that half their 
 commands are issued more for their own convenience or grati- 
 fication than for corrective purposes. "I won'thave thatnoise!" 
 exclaims a disturbed father to some group of vociferous juveniles : 
 and the noise ceasing, he claims to have done something to- 
 wards making his family orderly. Perhaps he has ; but how ? 
 By exhibiting that same evil disposition which he seeks to 
 check in his children — a determination to sacrifice to his own 
 happiness the happiness of others. Observe, too, the impulse 
 
190 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 under which a refractory child is punished. Instead of anxiety 
 for the delinquent's welfare, that severe eye and compressed Hp 
 denote rather the ire of an offended ruler — express some such 
 inward thought as " You little wretch, we '11 soon see who is to 
 he master." Uncover its roots, and the theory of parental au- 
 thority will be found to grow not out of man's love for his 
 offspring but out of his love of dominion. Let any one who 
 doubts this hsten to that common reprimand " How dare you 
 disobey me ? " and then consider what the emphasis means. 
 No no, moral-force education is widely practicable even now, 
 if parents were civilized enough to use it. 
 
 But of course the obstacle is in a measure reciprocal. Even 
 the best samples of childhood as we now know it will be occa- 
 sionally unmanageable by suasion : and when inferior natures 
 have to be dealt with, the difficulty of doing without coercion 
 must be proportionably great. Nevertheless patience, self- 
 denial, a sufficient insight into j-outhful emotions, and a due 
 sympathy with them, added to a little ingenuity in the choice 
 of means, will usually accompUsh all that can be wished. Only 
 let a parent's actions and words and manner show that his ovm 
 feeUng is a thoroughly right one, and he will rarely fail to 
 awaken a responsive feehng in the breast of his child. 
 
 § 9. 
 
 One further objection remains to be noticed. It wiU probably 
 be said that if the rights of children are co-extensive with those 
 of adults, it must follow that children axe equally entitled with 
 adults to citizenship, and ought to be similarly endowed with 
 political power. This inference looks somewhat alarming ; and 
 it is easy to imagine the triumphant air of those who draw it, 
 and the smiles with which they meditate upon the absurdities 
 it suggests. Nevertheless the answer is simple and decisive. 
 There must go two things to originate an incongruity; and, 
 before passing censure, it is needful to say which of the two 
 incongruous things is in fault. In the present case the incon- 
 
THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. ' 191 
 
 gruity is between the institution of government on the one side, 
 and a certain consequence of the law of equal freedom on the 
 other. Which of the two is to be condemned for this ? In the 
 above objection it is tacitly assumed that the blame lies with 
 this consequence of the law of equal freedom : whereas the fact 
 is just the other way. It is with the institution of government 
 that the blame lies. Were the institution of government an 
 essentially right one, there would be reason to suppose that our 
 conclusion was fallacious ; but being as it is the offspring of 
 immorality, it must be condemned for conflicting with the 
 moral law, and not the moral law for conflicting with it. Were 
 the moral law universally obeyed, government would not exist ; 
 and did government not exist, the moral law could not dictate 
 the political enfranchisement of children. Hence the alleged 
 absurdity is traceable to the present evil constitution of society, 
 and not to some defect in our conclusion. 
 
 § 10. 
 
 Concerning the extension of the law of equal freedom to 
 children, we must therefore say, that equity commands it, emd 
 that expediency recommends it. We find the rights of children 
 to be deducible from the same axiom, and by the same 
 argument as the rights of adults ; whilst denial of them involves 
 us in perplexities out of which there seems to be no escape. 
 The association between filial subservience and barbarism — the 
 evident kinship of fiUal subservience to social and marital 
 slavery — and the fact that fiUal subservience declines with the 
 advance of civUization, suggest that such subservience is bad. 
 The viciousness of a coercive treatment of children is further 
 proved by its utter failure to accomplish the chief end of moral 
 education — the culture of the sympathies ; by its tendency to 
 excite feelings of antagonism and hate ; and by the check which 
 it necessarily puts upon the development of the all-import- 
 ant faculty of self-control. Whilst, on the other hand, a non- 
 coercive treatment being favourable to, and almost necessi- 
 
192 THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN. 
 
 tating, constant appeals to the higher feelings, must, by exer- 
 cising those feelings, improve the character ; and must, at the 
 same time, accustom the child to that condition of freedom in 
 which its after-Ufe is to he passed. It turns out, too, that the 
 very need for a moral training of children is but temporary, and 
 that, consequently, a true theory of the filial relationship must 
 not presuppose Uke the command-and-obedience theory that 
 such a need is permanent. Lastly, we find reason to attribute 
 whatever of incompatibiUty there may be between these con- 
 clusions and our daily experience, not to any error in them, but 
 to the necessary incongruity between the perfect law and an 
 imperfect humanity. 
 
PART III. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 POLITICAL RIGHTS. 
 
 § 1. 
 
 Our principle is the primordial one. It is the first pre-re- 
 quisite to the realization of the Divine -will. Every mode of 
 interpreting that will points to this as the all-essential condition 
 of its fulfilment. If we start with an a priori view of creative 
 design, we are immediately led to the law of equal freedom 
 (Chap. III). Do we appeal to the general character of the 
 human constitution ? the law of equal freedom is its corollary 
 (Chap. IV). And when, pursuing the examination ftirther, we 
 observe the detailed arrangements of that constitution, we dis- 
 cover a faculty by which the law of equal freedom is recognised 
 and responded to (Chap. V.). Otherwise viewed, this law is 
 seen to be a direct deduction from the necessities of existence : 
 as thus. Life depends upon the performance of certain actions. 
 Abrogate entirely the Hberty to exercise the faculties, and we 
 have death : abrogate it partially, and we have pain or partial 
 death. This remains true of man whether he be savage or 
 civilized — isolated or social. And as there must be hfe before 
 there can be society, this first principle of hfe must take prece- 
 dence of tiie first principle of society — must fix or govern it. 
 Or, speaking definitely, as liberty to exercise the faculties is 
 the first condition of individual hfe, the hberty of each, limited 
 only by the like liberty of all, must be the first condition of 
 social life. 
 
 Derived, therefore, as it is, directly from the Divine will, and 
 underlying as-it does the right organization of society, the law 
 of equal freedom is of higher authority than all other laws. 
 The creative purpose demands that everything shall be subordi- 
 
 o 2 
 
]90 POLITICAL EIGHTS. 
 
 nated to it. Institutions and social forms must just marshal 
 themselves as it commands. It dates from the creation ; they 
 are of yesterday. It is constant; they are changeable. It 
 appertains to the perfect; they to the imperfect. It is co- 
 enduring with humanity ; they may die to-morrow. As surely 
 then as the incidental must how before the necessary, so surely 
 must all conventional arrangements be subject to the absolute 
 moral law. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Allusion has from time to time been made to a school of 
 politicians, especially claiming for themselves the title of philo- 
 sophical, who demur to this. They do not recognise any such 
 supreme authority to which all human regulations must bend. 
 Practically, if not professedly, they hold, with Archelaus, that 
 nothing is intrinsically right or wrong ; but that it becomes 
 either by the dictum of the state. If we are to credit them 
 government determines what shall be morality; and not morality 
 what shall be government. They believe in no oracular principle 
 by whose yea or nay we may be guided : their Delphi is the 
 House of Commons. By their account man lives and moves 
 and has his being by legislative permit. His freedom to do 
 this or that is not natural, but conferred. The question — Has 
 the citizen any claim to the work of bis hands ? can only be 
 decided by a parliamentary division. If " the ayes have it," he 
 has ; if " the noes," he has not. 
 
 The reader who has arrived thus far, needs not to have the 
 fallacy of this doctrine pointed out. The expediency-system, of 
 which it forms an essential part, has been repeatedly proved 
 untenable, and with it must fall its dependent propositions. 
 And having, moreover, been collaterally refuted in foregoing 
 chapters, the notion that man has no rights save those of 
 government manufacture, might safely be left where it lies. 
 There are, however, additional evidences of its untruth, which 
 it may be as well to state. And first let us inquire how it has 
 originated. 
 
POLITICAL RIGHTS. 197 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Considering society as a corporate body, we may say that 
 man, when he first enters into it, has the repulsive force 
 in excess, wliilst in the cohesive force he is deficient. His 
 passions are strong ; his sympathies weak. Those propensities 
 which fitted him for savage life necessarily tend to breed war 
 between himself and his neighbours. His condition has been 
 that of perpetual antagonism ; and his antagonistic habits must 
 of course accompany him into the social state. Aggression, 
 dispute, anger, hatred, revenge — these are the several stages of 
 the process by which the members of a primitive community 
 are continually being sundered. Hence the smaUness of the 
 first communities. Populations burst as fast as they increase. 
 Eaces spUt into tribes ; tribes into factions. Only as civilization 
 advances do larger unions become possible. And even these 
 have to pass through some such stage as that of feudalism, with 
 its small chieftainships and right of private war, showing that 
 the tendency to repel is still active. 
 
 Now, in proportion to the repulsive force subsisting between 
 atoms of matter, must be the restraint required to keep them 
 from exploding. And in proportion to the repulsive force sub- 
 sisting between the units of a society must be the strength of 
 the bonds rec[uisite to prevent that society from flying to pieces. 
 Some powerful concentrative influence there must be to pro- 
 duce even these smallest unions : and this influence must be 
 strong in proportion to die savageness of the people ; other- 
 wise the unions cannot be maintained. Such an influence 
 we have in the sentiment of veneration, reverence for power, 
 loyalty, or, as Carlyle terms it — hero-worship. By this feeliag 
 it is, that society begins to be organized ; and where the bar- 
 barism is greatest, there is this feeling strongest. Hence the 
 fact that all traditions abound in superhuman beings, in giants 
 and demigods.' The mythical accounts of Bacchus and Her- 
 cules, of Thor and Odin, and of the various divine and half- 
 divine personages who figure in the early histories of aU races. 
 
198 POLITICAL RIGHTS. 
 
 merely prove the intensity of the awe with which superiority was 
 once regarded. In that behef of some of the Polynesian 
 Islanders that only their chiefs have souls, we find a still ex- 
 tant example of the almost incredible influence which this 
 sentiment of reverence has over savage men. Through it only 
 does all authority, whether that of ruler, teacher, or priest, be- 
 come possible. It was ahke the parent of behefs in the mira- 
 culous conception of Gengis Khan, in the prophetic characters 
 of Zoroaster, Confucius, and Mahomet, and in the infallibility of 
 the Pope. Where it no longer deifies power, it associates it with 
 divine attributes. Thus it was death for the Assyrian to enter 
 unbidden into the presence of his monarch. The still stationary 
 Orientals ascribe to their emperors celestial relationsliips. 
 Schamyl, the prophet-chief of the Circassians, is beUeved to 
 have entire union with the Divine essence. And the Eussian 
 soldiers pray for their Czar as " our God upon earth." The 
 fealty of vassal to feudal lord — the devotion of Highland Celt 
 to chief — were exhibitions of the same feeling. Loyalty it made 
 the brightest virtue, and treason the blackest crime. 
 
 With the advance of civilization this awe of power diminishes. 
 Instead of looking up to the monarch as a God, it begins to view 
 him as a man reigning by divine authority — as " the Lord's 
 anointed." Submission becomes less abject. Subjects no 
 longer prostrate themselves before their rulers, nor do serfs 
 kiss their master's feet. .Obedience ceases to be unlimited: 
 men will choose their own faiths. Gradually, as there grow up 
 those sentiments which lead each to maintain his own rights, 
 and sympathetically to respect the rights of others — gradually 
 as each, thus, by the acquirement of self-restraining power, be- 
 comes fitted to live in harmony with liis fellow — so gradually 
 do men cease to need external restraint, and so gradually 
 does this feehng which makes them submit to that external 
 restraint decrease. The law of adaptation necessitates this. 
 The feeling must lose power just as fast as it. ceases to be 
 needful. As the new regulator grows, the old one must 
 dwindle. The first amehoration of a piu-e despotism is a partial 
 
POLITICAL RIGHTS. 199 
 
 supplanting of the one by the other. Mixed constitutions exhibit 
 the two acting conjointly. And whilst the one advances to 
 supremacy, the other sinks into decrepitude: divine right of 
 kings is exploded, and monarchical power becomes but a 
 name. 
 
 Although the adaptation of man to the social state has al- 
 ready made considerable progress — although the need for ex- 
 ternal restraint is less — and although consequently that rever- 
 ence for authority which makes restraint possible, has greatly 
 di m inished — diminished to such an extent that the holders 
 of power are daily caricatured, and men begin to listen to the 
 National Anthem with their hats on — stiU the change is far 
 from complete. The attributes of the aboriginal man have 
 not yet died out. We stiU trench upon each other's claims — 
 stQl pursue happiness at each other's expense. Our savage 
 selfishness is seen in commerce, in legislation, in social arrange- 
 ments, in amusements. The shopkeeper imposes on his lady 
 customer ; his lady customer beats down the shopkeeper. 
 Classes quarrel about their respective " interests ; " and cor- 
 ruption is defended by those who profit from it. The spirit of 
 caste morally tortures its victims with as much coolness as the 
 Indian tortures his enemy. Gamblers pocket their gains with 
 unconcern : and your share-speculator cares not who loses, so 
 that he gets his premium. No matter what their rank, no 
 matter in what they are engaged — whether in enacting a Com 
 Law, or in strugghng with each other at the doors of a theatre 
 — men show themselves as yet, little else than barbarians in 
 broadcloth. 
 
 Hence we still require shackles ; rulers to impose them ; and 
 power-worship to make those rulers obeyed. Just as much as 
 the love of God's law is deficient, must the fear of man's law 
 be called in to supply its place. And to the extent that man's 
 law is needful there must be reverence for it to ensure the 
 necessary allegiance. Hence, as men are still under the in- 
 fluence of this sentiment, we must expect their customs,, creeds, 
 and philosophies to testify of its presence. 
 
200 POLITICAL RIGHTS. 
 
 Here, theD, we have a rationale of the expediency-idea of 
 government. It is the latest and most refined form assumed 
 hy this disposition to exalt the state at the expense of the indi- 
 vidual. There have heen books written to prove that the 
 monarch's will should be the subject's absolute law; and if in- 
 stead of monarch we read legislature, we have the expediency- 
 theory. It merely modifies "divine right of kings" into 
 diviae right of governments. It is despotism democratized. 
 Between that old eastern regime under which the citizen was 
 the private property of his ruler, having no rights at aU, and 
 that final state under which his rights will be entire and in- 
 violable, there comes this intermediate state in which he is 
 allowed to possess rights, but only by sufferance of parUament. 
 Thus the expediency-philosophy falls naturally into its place 
 as a phenomenon attending our progress from past slavery to 
 future freedom. It is one of a series of creeds through which 
 mankind have to pass. Like each of its predecessors, it is 
 natural to a certain phase of human development. And it is 
 fated to lose its hold as fast as our adaptation to the social 
 state increases. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 It is only by bearing in mind that a theory of some kind 
 being needful for men tliey wiU espouse any absurdity in de- 
 fault of something better, that we can understand how Kousseau's 
 doctrine of Social Contract ever came to be so widely received. 
 This fact remembered, however, the belief in such a doctrine 
 becomes comprehensible. Here were men combined together 
 under government and law. It seemed clear that the arrange- 
 ment was on the whole a beneficial one. Hence the very 
 natural, though erroneous, conclusion that state-authority was 
 a moral institut€f. And state-authority being taken for a moral 
 institute, it became needful to account for it, to defend it, to 
 reconcile it with justice and truth. Under which stimulus there 
 suggested itself this theory of a covenant originally entered into 
 
POLITICAL RIGHTS. 201 
 
 between individuals on the one hand, and the community, or 
 agents acting for it, on the other, by -which allegiance was 
 agreed to he exchanged for protection ; and iu virtue of which 
 supposed covenant governments continue to exercise power and 
 demand obedience. 
 
 That such an explanation should have satisfied the unthink- 
 ing, is not to be wondered at ; but it is passing strange that it 
 should have gained credence amongst educated men. Observe 
 the battery of fatal objections which may be opened upon it. 
 
 In the first place, the assumption is a purely gratuitous one. 
 Before submitting to legislative control on the strength of an 
 agreement alleged to have been made by our forefathers, we ought 
 surely to have some proof that such agreement was made. But 
 no proof is given. On the contrary, the facts, so far as we can 
 ascertain them, rather imply that under the earliest social forms, 
 whether savage, patriarchal, or feudal, obedience to authority 
 was given unconditionally ; and that when the ruler afforded 
 protection it was because he resented the attempt to exercise 
 over one of his subjects a power similar to his own — a conclu- 
 sion quite in harmony with what we know of oaths of allegiance 
 taken in later times. 
 
 Again ; even supposing the contract to have been made, we 
 are no forwarder, for it has been repeatedly invalidated by the 
 violation of its terms. There is no people but what has from 
 time to time rebelled; and there is no government but what 
 has, in an infinity of cases, failed to give the promised protec- 
 tion. How, then, can this hypothetical contract be considered 
 binding, when, if ever made, it has been broken by both 
 parties ? 
 
 But, granting the agreement, and granting that nothing 
 positive has occurred to vitiate it, we have still to be shown on 
 what principle that agreement, made, no one knows when, by 
 no one knows/whom, can be held to tie people now hving. 
 Dynasties have,, changed, and different forms of government 
 have supplanted each other, since the alleged transaction could 
 have taken place ; -whilst, between the people who are supposed 
 
202 POLITICAL EIGHTS. 
 
 to have been parties to it, and their existing descendants, 
 unnumbered generations have lived and died. So we must 
 assume that this covenant has over and over again survived the 
 deaths of all parties concerned ! Truly a strange power this 
 which our forefathers wielded — to be able to fix the behaviour 
 of their descendants for all futurity! What would any one 
 think of being required to kiss the Pope's toe, because his great- 
 great-great-grandfather promised that he should do so ? 
 
 However, there never was such a contract. If there had 
 been, constant breaches must have destroyed it. And even if 
 undestroyed it could not bind us, but only those who made it. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 The self-importance of a Malvoho is sufficientiy ludicrous ; 
 but we must go far beyond it to parallel the presumption of 
 legislatures. Some steward who, deluded by an intense craving 
 after dominion, and an impudence equal to his craving, should 
 construe his stewardship into proprietorship, would more fitly 
 illustrate it. Were such an one to argue that the estate he was 
 appointed to manage had been virtually resigned into his 
 possession — that to secure the advantages of his administration 
 its owner had given up all titie to it — that he now lived on it 
 only by his (the steward's) sufierance — and that he was in 
 futiure to receive no emoluments firom it, except at his (the 
 steward's) good pleasure — then should we have an appropriate 
 travesty upon the behaviour of governments to nations ; then 
 should we have a doctrine perfectly analogous to this fashion- 
 able one, which teaches how men on becoming members of a 
 community, give up, for the sake of certain social advantages, 
 their natural rights. Adherents of tliis fashionable doctrine 
 will doubtless protest against such an interpretation of it. They 
 have no reasonable cause for doing so, however, as will appear 
 on submitting them to a cross-examination. Suppose we 
 begin it thus : — 
 
 "Your hypothesis that men, when they entered into the 
 
POLITICAL EIGHTS. 203 
 
 social state, surrendered their original freedom, implies that 
 they entered into such state voluntarily, does it not ? " 
 
 " It does." 
 
 " Then they must have considered the social state preferable 
 to that under which they had previously lived ? " 
 
 " Necessarily." 
 
 " Why did it appear preferable ? " 
 
 " Because it offered greater security." 
 
 " Greater security for what ? " 
 
 " Greater security for life, for property, for the things that 
 minister to happiness." 
 
 " Exactly. To get more happiness : that must have been 
 the object. If they had expected to get more ««happiness, 
 they would not have wiUingly made the change, would they ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Does not happiness consist in the due satisfaction of all 
 the desires ? in the due exercise of all the faculties ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "And this exercise of the faculties is impossible without 
 freedom of action. The desires cannot be satisfied without 
 liberty to pursue and use the objects of them." 
 
 " True." 
 
 "Now it is this freedom to exercise the faculties within 
 specific limits, which we signify by the term ' rights,' is it not ? " 
 (Page 77.) 
 
 " It is." 
 
 " Well, then, summing up your answers, it seems that, by 
 your hypothesis, man entered the social state voluntarily ; 
 which means that he entered it for the sake of obtaioiag 
 greater happiness ; which means that he entered it to obtain 
 fuller exercise of his faculties; which means that he entered 
 it to obtain security for such exercise; which means that he 
 entered it for the guaranteeing of his ' rights.' " 
 
 " Put your proposition iu a more tangible form." 
 
 " Very good. If this is too abstract a statement for you, let 
 us attempt a simpler one. You say that a state of political com- 
 
204 POLITICAL RIGHTS. 
 
 bination was preferred mainly because it afforded greater se- 
 curity for life and property than the isolated state, do you 
 not ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " Are not a man's claims to his life and his property amongst 
 ■what we term his rights ; and moreover, the most important of 
 them ? " 
 
 " They are." 
 
 " Then to say that men formed themselves into communities 
 to prevent the constant violation of their claims to life and 
 property, is to say that they did it for the preservation of their 
 rights ? " 
 
 " It is." 
 
 " Wherefore, either way we find that the preservation of rights 
 was the object sought." 
 
 " So it would seem." 
 
 " But your hypothesis is that men give up their rights on 
 entering the social state ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " See now how you contradict yourself. You assert that on 
 becoming members of a society, men give up, what by your 
 own showing they joined it the better to obtain ! " 
 
 " Well, perhaps I ought not to have said that they ' give up' 
 their rights, but that they place them in trust." 
 
 " In whose trust ? " 
 
 " In that of a government." 
 
 " A government, then, is a kind of agent employed by tlie 
 members of a community, to take care of, and administer for 
 their benefit, something given into its charge ? " 
 
 " Exactly." 
 
 "And of course, like all other agents, exercises authority 
 only at the wiU of those who appoint it — performs aU that it is 
 commissioned to do subject to their approval?" 
 
 " Just so." 
 
 " And the things committed to its charge still belong to the 
 original owners. The title of the people to the rights they 
 
POLITICAL RIGHTS. 205 
 
 have placed in trast continues valid : the people may demand 
 from this agent the full benefit accruing from these rights ; and 
 may, if they please, resume possession of them ? " 
 
 " Not so." 
 
 " Not so ! What, can they not reclaim their own ? " 
 
 " No. Having once consigned their rights into the keeping 
 of a legislature, they must he content with such use of them as 
 that legislature permits." 
 
 And thus we arrive at the ciuious doctrine above referred to, 
 that the members of a community having entrusted an estate 
 (their rights) to the care of a steward (their government) j 
 thereby lose all proprietorship in such estate, and can have no : 
 benefit from it, except what their steward pleases to vouchsafe ! 
 
 § 6. 
 
 But it is needless to assault this theory of government- 
 omnipotence from without, for it is betrayed from witliin. It 
 is self-destructive. It is disproved by its own innermost 
 principle. The very witness called to testify of its truth lets 
 out its falsity. For to what end is this attempted denial of 
 rights ? It is to the end of estabhshing the law of the greatest 
 happiness to the greatest number — a law to carry out which 
 government is said to exist — a law by whose dictates alone 
 government ought to be guided — a law, therefore, of higher 
 authority than government ; antecedent to it — a law to which 
 government must be subservient, subordinate. But what, when 
 scrutinized, does this law of the greatest happiness to the 
 greatest number resolve itself into ? Why, into the ultra- 
 democratic dogma — all men have equal rights to happiness 
 (page 22). . Wherefore it is to carry out the law — all men 
 have equal rights to happiness, that government exists. And 
 thus, even according to the opposition hypothesis, rights are 
 the be-aU and end-aU of government ; and rank above it, as 
 the end above the means. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE RIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 
 § 1. 
 
 As a corollary to the proposition that all institutions must be 
 subordinated to the law of equal freedom, we cannot choose but 
 admit the right of the citizen to adopt a condition of voluntary 
 outlawry. If every man has freedom to do aU that he wills, 
 provided he infiinges not the equal freedom of any other man, 
 then he is free to drop connection with the state — to relinquish 
 its protection, and to refuse paying towards its support. It is 
 self-evident that in so behaving he in no way trenches upon the 
 liberty of others ; for his position is a passive one ; and whilst 
 passive he cannot become an aggressor. It is equally self- 
 evident that he cannot be compelled to continue one of a 
 political corporation, without a breach of the moral law, seeing 
 that citizenship involves payment of taxes ; and the taking away 
 of a man's property against his will, is an infringement of his 
 rights (p. 134). Government being simply an agent employed 
 in common by a number of individuals to secure to them certain 
 advantages, the very nature of the connection implies that it is 
 for each to say whether he will employ such an agent or not. 
 If any one of them determines to ignore this mutual-safety 
 confederation, nothing can be said except that he loses all claim 
 to its good offices, and exposes himself to the danger of mal- 
 treatment — a thing he is quite at liberty to do if he likes. He 
 cannot be coerced into political combination without a breach 
 of the law of equal freedom ; he can withdraw from it without 
 committing any such breach ; and he has therefore a right so 
 to withdraw. 
 
THE EIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 207 
 
 § 2. 
 
 " No human laws are of any validity if contraiy to the law of 
 nature ; and such of them as are valid derive all their force and 
 all their authority mediately or immediately from this original." 
 Thus writes Blaekstone, to whom let all honour he given for 
 having so far outseen the ideas of his time ; and, indeed, we 
 may say of our time. A good antidote, this, for those pohtical 
 superstitions which so widely prevail. A good check upon that 
 sentiment of power- worship which sdll misleads us by magnify- 
 ing the prerogatives of constitutional governments as it once 
 did those of monarchs. Let men learn that a legislature is not 
 " our God upon earth," though, by the authority they ascribe 
 to it, and the things they expect from it, they would seem to 
 think it is. Let them learn rather that it is an institution 
 serving a purely temporary purpose, whose power, when not 
 stolen, is at the best borrowed. 
 
 Nay, indeed, have we not seen (p. 13) that government is 
 essentially immoral? Is it not the offspring of evil, bearing 
 about it all the marks of its parentage ? Does it not exist 
 because crime exists ? Is it not strong, or, as we say, despotic, 
 when crime is great ? Is there not more liberty, that is, less 
 government, as crime diminishes ? And must not government 
 cease when crime ceases, for very lack of objects on which to 
 perform its function ? Not only does magisterial power exist 
 because of evil, but it exists by evil. Violence is employed to 
 maintain it; and all violence iavolves criminality. Soldiers, 
 policemen, and gaolers ; swords, batons, and fetters, are instru- 
 ments for inflicting pain ; and aU infliction of pain is in the 
 abstract wrong. The state employs evil weapons to subjugate 
 evil, and is alike contaminated by the objects with which it 
 deals, and the means by which it works. Morality cannot 
 recognise it; for morality, being simply a statement of the 
 perfect law, can give no countenance to anything growing out 
 of, and living by, breaches of that law (Chap. I.). Where- 
 
208 THE RIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 
 
 fore, legislative authority can never be ethical— must always 
 be conventional merely. 
 
 Hence, there is a certain inconsistency in the attempt to 
 determine the right position, structure, and conduct of a govern- 
 ment by appeal to the first principles of rectitude. For, as just 
 pointed out, the acts of an institution which is in both nature 
 and origin imperfect, cannot be made to square with the per- 
 fect law. All that we can do is to ascertain, firstly, in what 
 attitude a legislature must stand to the community to avoid 
 being by its mere existence an embodied wrong; — secondly, in 
 what manner it must be constituted so as to exhibit the least 
 incongruity with the moral law ; — and thirdly, to what sphere its 
 actions must be limited to prevent it firom multiplying those 
 breaches of equity it is set up to prevent. 
 
 The first condition to be confoimed to before a legislature 
 can be established without violating the law of equal fi:eedom, 
 is the acknowledgment of the right now under discussion — the 
 right to ignore the state ^. 
 
 §3. 
 
 Upholders of pure despotism may fitly beheve state-control 
 to be unlimited and unconditional. They who assert that 
 men are made for governments and not governments for men, 
 may consistently hold that no one can remove himself beyond 
 the pale of poUtical organization. But they who maintain that 
 the people are the only legitimate source of power — that legis- 
 lative authority is not original, hut deputed — cannot deny, the 
 right to ignore the state without entangling themselves in an 
 absurdity. 
 
 For, if legislative authority is deputed, it follows that those 
 firom whom it proceeds are the masters of those on whom it is 
 conferred : it follows further, that as masters they confer the 
 said authority voluntarily : and this impUes that they may give 
 or withhold it as they please. To call that deputed which is 
 
 ° Hence may be drawn an argiunent for direct taxation ; seeing that only when 
 taxation ia direct does repudiation of state burdens become possible. 
 
THE EIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 209 
 
 wrenched from men whether they will or not, is nonsense. 
 But what is here true of all collectively is equally true of each 
 separately. As a government can rightly act for the people, 
 only when empowered by them, so also can it rightly act for 
 the individual, only when empowered by him. If A, B, and C, 
 debate whether they shall employ an agent to perform for them 
 a certain service, and if whilst A and B agree to do so, C dis- 
 sents, C cannot equitably be made a party to the agreement in 
 spite of himself. And this must be equally true of thirty as of 
 three; and if of tliirty, why not of three hundred, or three 
 thousand, or three millions ? 
 
 § 4. 
 
 Of the pohticai superstitions lately alluded to, none is so 
 universally diffused as the notion that majorities are omnipo- 
 tent. Under the impression that the preservation of order will 
 ever require power to be wielded by some party, the moral 
 sense of our time feels that such power cannot rightly bo 
 conferred on any but the largest moiety of society. It inter- 
 prets literally the saying that " the voice of the people is the 
 voice of God," and transferring to the one the sacredness 
 attached to the other, it concludes that from the wiU of the 
 people, that is, of the majority, there can be no appeal. Yet is 
 this belief entirely erroneous. 
 
 Suppose, for the sake of argument, that, struck by some 
 Malthusian panic, a legislature duly representing pubhc opinion 
 were to enact that all children bom during the next ten years 
 should be drowned. Does any one think such an enactment 
 would be warrantable ? If not, there is evidently a Hmit to the 
 power of a majority. Suppose, again, that of two races living 
 together — Celts and Saxons, for example — the most numerous 
 determined to make the others their slaves. Would the autho- 
 rity of the greatest number be in such case vahd ? If not there 
 is something to which its authority must be subordinate. Sup- 
 pose, once more, that all men having incomes under £50 a year 
 
 p 
 
210 THE RIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 
 
 were to resolve upon reducing every income above that amount 
 to their own standard, and appropriating the excess for public 
 purposes. Could their resolution be justified ? If not it must 
 be a third time confessed that there is a law to which the 
 popular voice must defer. What, then, is that law, if not the 
 law of pure equity — the law of equal freedom ? These restraints, 
 which aU would put to the will of the majority, are exactly the 
 restraints set up by that law. We deny the right of a majority 
 to murder, to enslave, or to rob, simply because mui-der, en- 
 slaving, and robbery are violations of that law — violations too 
 gross to be overlooked. But if great violations of it are wrong, 
 so also are smaller ones. If the will of tlie many cannot 
 supersede the first principle of morality in these cases, neither 
 can it in any. So that, however insignificant the minority, and 
 however trifling the proposed trespass against their rights, no 
 such trespass is permissible. 
 
 When we have made our constitution purely democratic, 
 thinks to himself the earnest reformer, we shall have brought 
 government into harmony wdth absolute justice. Such a faith, 
 though perhaps needful for the age, is a very erroneous one. 
 By no process can coercion be made equitable. The freest 
 form of government is only the least objectionable form. The 
 rule of the many by the few we call tyranny ; the rule of the 
 few by the many is tyranny also ; only of a less intense kind. 
 " You shall do as we will, and not as you will," is in either case 
 the declaration ; and if the hundred make it to the ninety-nine, 
 instead of the ninety-nine to the hundred, it is only a fraction 
 less immoral Of two such parties, whichever fulfils this decla- 
 ration necessarily breaks the law of equal fi-eedom : the only 
 difference being that by the one it is broken in the persons of 
 ninety-nine, whilst by the other it is broken in the persons of a 
 hundred. And the merit of the democratic form of government 
 consists solely in this, that it trespasses against the smallest 
 number. 
 
 The very existence of majorities and minorities is indicative 
 of an immoral state. The man whose character hannonizes 
 
THE RIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 211 
 
 with the moral law, we found to be one who can obtain com- 
 plete happiness without diminishing the happiness of Ms fellows 
 (Chap. III.). But the enactment of public arrangements by vote 
 implies a society consisting of men otherwise constituted — 
 impUes that the desires of some cannot be satisfied without 
 sacrificing the desires of others — implies that in the pursuit of 
 their happiness the majority inflict a certain amount of ?<whap- 
 piness on the minority — impUes, therefore, organic immorality. 
 Thus, from another point of view, we again perceive that 
 even in its most equitable form it is impossible for government 
 to dissociate itself from evil ; and further, that unless the right 
 to ignore the state is recognised, its acts must be essentially 
 criminal. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 That a man is free to abandon the benefits and throw off the 
 burdens of citizenship, may indeed be inferred from the admis- 
 sions of existing authorities and of current opinion. Unpre- 
 pared as they probably are for so extreme a doctrine as the one 
 here maintained, the radicals of our day j'et unwittingly profess 
 their behef in a maxim which obviously embodies this doctrine. 
 Do we not continually hear them quote Blackstone's assertion 
 that " no subject of England can be constrained to pay any 
 aids or taxes even for the defence of the realm or the support 
 of government, but such as are imposed by his own consent, or 
 that of his representative in parliament ? " And what does this 
 mean ? It means, say they, that every man should have a 
 vote. True : but it means much more. If there is any sense 
 in words it is a distinct enunciation of the very right now con- 
 tended for. In affirming that a man may not be taxed unless 
 he has directly or indirectly given his consent, it affirms that 
 he may refuse to be so taxed ; and to refuse to be taxed, is to 
 cut aU connection with the state. Perhaps it will be said that 
 this consent is not a specific, but a general one, and that the 
 citizen is understood to have assented to everything his repre- 
 sentative may do, when he voted for him. But suppose he did not 
 
 p 2 
 
•212 THE RIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 
 
 vote for him ; imd on tlie contrary did all in his power to get 
 elected some one holding opposite views — what then ? The 
 reply will probably be that^ by taking part in such an election, 
 he tacitly agreed to abide by the decision of the majority. And 
 how if he did not vote at all ? Why then he cannot justly 
 complain of any tax, seeing that he made no protest against its 
 imposition. So, cuiiously enough, it seems that he gave his 
 consent in whatever way he acted — whether he said yes, whether 
 he said no, or whether he remained neuter ! A rather awkward 
 doctrine this. Here stands an unfortunate citizen who is 
 asked if he will pay money for a certain proffered advantage ; 
 and whether he employs the only means of expressing his 
 refusal or does not employ it, we are told that he practically 
 agrees ; if only the number of others who agree is greater than 
 the number of those who dissent. And thus we are introduced 
 to the novel principle that A's consent to a thing is not deter- 
 mined by what A says, but by what B may happen to say I 
 
 It is for those who quote Blackstone to choose between tliis 
 absurdity and the doctiine above set forth. Either his maxim 
 implies the right to ignore the state, or it is sheer nonsense. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 There is a strange heterogeneity in our political faiths. 
 Systems that have had their day, and are beginning here and 
 there to let the dayliglit through, are patched with modem 
 notions utterly unlike in quality and colour ; and men gravely 
 display these systems, wear them, and walk. about in tliem, 
 quite unconscious of their grotesqueness. This transition state 
 of ours, partaking as it does equally of the past and the future, 
 breeds hybrid theories exhibiting the oddest union of bygone 
 despotism and coming freedom. - Here are types of the old 
 organization curiously disguised by germs of the new— pecu- 
 liarities sliowing adaptation to a preceding state modified by 
 rudiments that prophecy of something to come— making alto- 
 gether so chaotic a mixture of relationships that there is 
 
THE EIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 213 
 
 no saj'ing to what class these births of the age should be 
 referred. 
 
 As ideas must of necessity bear the stamp of the time, it is 
 useless to lament the contentment with which these incongruous 
 beliefs are held. Otherwise it would seem unfortunate that 
 men do not pursue to the end the trains of reasoning which 
 have led to these partial modifications. In the present case, for 
 example, consistency would force them to admit that, on other 
 points besides the one just noticed, they hold opinions and use 
 arguments in which the right to ignore the state is involved. 
 
 For what is the meaning of Dissent ? The time was when a 
 man's faith and his mode of worship were as much determinable 
 by law as his secular acts; and, according to provisions extant 
 in our statute-book, are so still. Thanks to the growth of a 
 Protestant spirit, however, we have ignored the state in this 
 matter — wholly in theory, and partly in practice. But how 
 have we done so ? By assuming an attitude which, if con- 
 sistently maintained, implies a right to ignore the state entirely. 
 Observe the positions of the two parties. " This is your creed,'' 
 says the legislator ; " you must believe and openly profess what 
 is here set down for you." " I shall not do anything of the 
 kind," answers the nonconformist ; " I will go to prison rather." 
 " Your religious ordinances," pursues the legislator, " shall be 
 such as we have prescribed. You shall attend the churches we 
 have endowed, and adopt the ceremonies used in them." 
 " Nothing shall induce me to do so," is the reply; " I altogether 
 deny your power to dictate to me in such matters, and mean to 
 resist to the uttermost." "Lastly," adds the legislator, "we 
 shall require you to pay such sums of money towards the 
 support of these religious institutions, as we may see fit to ask.' 
 " Not a farthing Avill you have from me," exclaims our sturdy 
 Independent: "even did I believe in the doctrines of your 
 church (which I do not), I should still rebel against your 
 interference ; and if you take my property, it shall be by force 
 and under protest." 
 
 What now does this proceeding amount to when regarded in 
 
214 THE RIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 
 
 the abstract ? It amounts to an assertion by the individual of 
 the right to exercise one of his faculties — the religious senti- 
 ment — -without let or hindrance, and with no Umit save that set 
 up by the equal claims of others. And what is meant by 
 ignoring the state ? Simply an assertion of the right similarly 
 to exercise all the faculties. The one is just an expansion of 
 the other — rests on the same footing with the other — must 
 stand or faU with the other. Men do indeed speak of civil and 
 religious liberty as different things : but the distinction is quite 
 arbitrary'. They are parts of the same whole and cannot 
 philosophically be separated. 
 
 "Yes they can," interposes an objector; "assertion of the 
 one is imperative as being a rehgious duty. The liberty to 
 worship God in the way that seems to him right, is a hberty 
 without which a man cannot fulfil what he believes to be 
 Divine commands, and therefore conscience requires him to 
 maintain it." True enough; but how if the same can be 
 assertod of all other liberty ? How if maintenance of this also 
 turns out to be a matter of conscience ? Have we not seen 
 that human happiness is the Divine will — that only bv exer- 
 cising our faculties is this happiness obtainable — and that it is 
 impossible to exercise them without freedom ? (Chap. IV.) 
 And if this freedom for the exercise of faculties is a condition 
 without which the Divine will cannot be fulfilled, the preserva- 
 tion of it is, by our objector's own showing, a duty. Or, in 
 other words, it appeai-s not only that the maintenance of hberty 
 of action may be a point of conscience, but that it ought to be 
 one. And thus we are clearly shown that the claims to ignore 
 the state in rehgious and in secular matters ai-e in essence 
 identical. 
 
 The other reason commonly assigned for nonconformity, 
 admits of similar treatment. Besides resisting state dictation 
 m the abstract, the dissenter resists it from disapprobation of 
 the doctrines taught. No legislative injunction will make him 
 adopt what he considers an eiToneous behef ; and, bearing in 
 mmd his duty towards his fellow-men, he refuses to help 
 
THE RIGHT TO IGNOllE THE STATE. 215 
 
 through the medium of his purse in disseminating this erroneous 
 heUef. The position is perfectly intelhgible. But it is one 
 which either commits its adherents to civil nonconformity also, 
 or leaves them in a dilemma. For why do they refuse to he 
 instrumental in spreading error? Because error is adverse 
 to human happiness. And on what ground is any piece of 
 secular legislation disapproved ? For the same reason — because 
 thought adverse to human happiness. How then can it he 
 shown that the state ought to be resisted in the one case and 
 not in the other ? Will any one deliberately assert that if a 
 government demands money from us to aid in teaching what 
 we think will produce evil, we ought to refuse it ; but that if 
 the money is for the purpose of doing what we think will 
 produce evil, we ought not to refuse it ? Yet, such is the 
 hopeful proposition which those have to maintain who recog- 
 nise the right to ignore the state in rehgious matters, but deny 
 it in civil matters. 
 
 The substance of this chapter once more reminds us of the 
 incongruity between a perfect law and an imperfect state. The 
 practicabihty of the principle here laid down varies directly as 
 social morality. In a thoroughly vicious community its ad- 
 mission would be productive of anarchy. In a completely 
 virtuous one its admission will be both innocuous and in- 
 evitable. Progress towards a condition of social health — a 
 condition, that is, in which the remedial measm-es of legislation 
 will no longer be needed, is progress towards a condition in 
 which those remedial measures will be cast aside, and the 
 authority prescribing them disregarded. The two changes are 
 of necessity co-ordinate. That moral sense whose supremacy 
 will make society haimonious and government unnecessary, is 
 the same moral sense which will then make each man assert 
 his freedom even to the extent of ignoring the state — is the 
 same moral sense which, by deterring the majority from coercing 
 the minority, will eventually render government impossible. 
 
216 THE EIGHT TO IGNORE THE STATE. 
 
 And as wliat are merely different manifestations of the same 
 sentiment must bear a constant ratio to each other, the 
 tendency to repudiate governments will increase only at the 
 same rate that governments become needless. 
 
 Let not any be alarmed, therefore, at the promulgation of the 
 foregoing doctrine. There are many changes yet to be passed 
 through before it can begin to exercise much influence. Pro- 
 bably a long time will elapse before the right to ignore the 
 state will be generally admitted, even in theory. It will be still 
 longer before it receives legislative recognition. And even then 
 there will be plenty of checks upon the premature exercise of 
 it. A sharp experience will sufficiently instruct those who may 
 too soon abandon legal protection. Whilst, in the majority of 
 men, there is such a love of tried arrangements, and so great a 
 dread of experiments, that they will probably not act upon this 
 right until long after it is safe to do so. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE *. 
 § 1- 
 
 Of the several conclusions deducible from the law of equal 
 freedom there are few more manifest or more generally agreed 
 to than this, that all members of a community have like claims 
 to political power. If evei-y man has freedom to do all that he 
 Avills, provided he infringes not the equal fi-eedom of any 
 other man, then each is free to exercise the same authority 
 in legislation as his fellows; and no individual or class can 
 exercise greater authority than the rest without \iolating the 
 law. 
 
 Evidently, therefore, a purely democratic government is the 
 only one which is morally admissible — is the only one 
 that is not intrinsically criminal. As lately shown, no 
 government can have any ethical authority. The highest 
 form it can assume is that in which the moral law remains 
 passive with regard to it — tolerates it — no longer protests 
 against it. The first condition of that form is that citizenship 
 shall be voluntary ; the second — that it shall confer equal 
 privileges. 
 
 It is a tolerably well- ascertained fact that men are stiU selfish. 
 And that beings answering to this epithet will employ the power 
 
 ^ The immediate interest of the subject will sufficiently explain the lenfi:th to 
 which this chapter is extended ; and if the style of argument used in it is somewhat 
 too popular for a work like the present, the same consideration must serve as an 
 excuse. Two of the sections have already appeared in print. 
 
218 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 placed in their hands for their omi advantage is self-evident. 
 Directly or indii-ectly, either by hook or by crook, if not openly, 
 then in secret, their private ends will be served. Granting the 
 proposition that men are selfish, we cannot avoid the corollary, 
 that those who possess authority will, if pennitted, use it for 
 selfish purposes. 
 
 Should any one need facts in proof of this, he may find 
 them at every page in the nearest volume of history. Under 
 the head— ^Monarchy, he will read of insatiable cravings after 
 more territory ; of confiscations of the subjects' property ; of 
 justice sold to the liighest bidder; of continued debasements 
 of coinage ; and of a greediness which could even descend to 
 share the gains of prostitutes. 
 
 He will find Feudalism exemplifying the same spirit by the 
 cruelties inflicted upon serfs ; by the right of private war ; by the 
 predatory incursions of borderers; by robberies practised on 
 Jews; and by the extortionate tribute wrung from burghers — 
 all of them illustrations of that motto, so characteristic of the 
 system, " Thou shalt want ere I want." 
 
 Does he seek like evidence in the conduct of later aristo- 
 cracies ? He may discover it in every state in Europe: in Spain, 
 where the lands of nobles and clergy were long exempted 
 from direct taxation ; in Hungary, where, until lately, men of 
 rank were fi-ee of ail turnpikes, and only the mercantile and 
 working classes paid; in France, before the first revolution, 
 where the tiers-etat had to bear all the state burdens ; in 
 Scotland, where less than two centuries ago it was the cus- 
 tom of lairds to kidnap tlie common people, and export them 
 as slaves ; in Ireland, where at the rebellion a band of usurping 
 landowners hunted and shot the Catholics as they would game, 
 for daring to claim their own. 
 
 If more proofs are wanted that power will be made to sei-ve 
 the purposes of its possessors, Enghsh legislation can furnish 
 many such. Take, for example, the significantly named 
 " Black Act " (9th of George I.), which declares that any one 
 disguised and in possession of an ofiensive weapon " appearino' 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 219 
 
 in any waiTeu, or place where hares or conies have been, or 
 shall be usually kept, and being thereof duly convicted, shall 
 be adjudged guilty of felony, and shall suffer death, as in cases 
 of felony, without benefit of clergy." Instance again the In- 
 closiu'e Laws, by which commons were divided amongst 
 the neighbouring landowners, in the ratios of their holdings, 
 regardless of the claims of the poor cottagers. Notice also 
 the manoeuvre by which the land tax has been kept stationary, 
 or has even decreased, whilst other taxes have so enormously 
 increased. Add to these the private monopoUes (obtained from 
 the King for " a consideration "), the perversion of the funds 
 of public schools, the manufacture of places, and pensions. 
 
 Nor is the disposition to use power for private ends less 
 manifest in our own day. It shows itself in the assertion that 
 an electoral system should give a preponderance to the landed 
 interest. We see it in the legislation which relieves fanners 
 from sundry assessed taxes, that they may be enabled to pay 
 more rent. It is palpably indicated in the Game Laws. The 
 conduct of the squire, who gets his mansion rated at one-third 
 of its value, bears witness to it. It appears in the law enabling 
 a landlord to anticipate other creditors, and to obtain bis rent 
 by immediate seizure of his tenant's property. We are re- 
 minded of it by the often-mentioned legacy and probate duties. 
 It is imphed by the fact that whilst no one dreams of com- 
 pensating the discharged workman, gentlemen sinecuiists must 
 have their "vested interests" bought up if their offices are 
 abolished. In the tracts of the Anti-Corn Law League it re- 
 ceived abundant illustration. It is seen in the votes of the 
 hundred and fifty military and naval members of Parliament. 
 And lastly, we find this self-seeking of those in authority creeps 
 out, even in the doings of the "Right Reverend Fathers in 
 God " forming the Ecclesiastical Commission, who have ap- 
 propriated, for the embellishment of their own palaces, funds 
 entrusted to them for the benefit of the Church. 
 
 But it is needless to accumulate illustrations. Though 
 every historian the world has seen should bo subpoened as a 
 
220 THE CONSTITUTION OK THE STATE. 
 
 witness, the fact could not be rendered one whit more certain 
 than it is akeady. Why ask whether those in power have 
 sought their own advantage in preference to that of others ? 
 With human nature as we know it, they must have done so. 
 It is tliis same tendency in men to pursue gratification at the 
 expense of their neighbours that renders government needful. 
 Were we not selfish, legislative restraint would be unnecessary. 
 Evidently, then, the very existence of a state- authority proves 
 that irresponsible rulers will sacrifice the public good to their 
 personal benefit ; all solemn promises, specious professions, and 
 carefully-arranged checks and safeguards, notwithstanding. 
 
 If, therefore, class-legislation is the inevitable consequence 
 of class-power, there is no escape from the conclusion that 
 the interest of the wJiole society can be secured, only by giving 
 power into the hands of the whole people. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Against the position tliat to ensure justice to the nation at 
 large all its members must be endowed with like powers, it is 
 indeed urged that, as tlieworldng classes constitute the majority, 
 to endow all with Uke powers, is practically to make the work- 
 ing classes supreme. And it will probably be added that by 
 virtue of this same self-seeking tendency just insisted upon, 
 legislation in their hands would inevitably be twisted to seiTe 
 the ends of labour regardless of the claims of property. 
 
 Of course those who raise this objection do not wish to in- 
 sinuate that the people would use their power after the fashion 
 of brigands. Although in the old Norman day, when the 
 sacking and burning of towns by neighbouring nobles was not 
 unfirequent, a change to popular rule involved retaliatory attacks 
 upon the strongholds of these feudal buccaneers, yet we may 
 fairly conclude that the increased social morality which deters 
 modern aristocracies from direct robbery of the people, would 
 also prevent die people from inflicting any direct injury upon 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 221 
 
 them. The danger this objection points to — the only danger 
 to he rationally feared — is that the same insensible bias by 
 which our present rulers are swayed, would lead the working 
 classes to sacrifice the rights of the rich on the altar of their 
 own desires — would give rise to a code of laws favouring poverty 
 at the expense of wealth. 
 
 Even were there no answer to this, the evidence would still 
 preponderate in favour of popular enfranchisement. For what 
 at the utmost does the argument amount to ? Just this : — 
 that the few must continue to trespass against the many, 
 lest the many should trespass against the few. The well 
 fed, the luxuriously housed and clothed, the placemen and 
 pensioners, may perhaps think it better that the masses should 
 suffer for their benefit (as they do) than that they should suffer 
 for the benefit of the masses (as they might). But would a 
 just arbitrator say this ? Would he not say, on the contrary, 
 that even if their respective members were blessed with equal 
 advantages, the minority ought to be sacrificed rather than the 
 majority ; but that as the most numerous are at the same time 
 the least favoured, their claim becomes still more imperative. 
 Surely, if one of the two parties must submit to injustice, it 
 ought to be the rich hundreds, and not the poor thousands. 
 
 The foregoing objection, however, is not so sound as it looks. 
 It is one thing for a comparatively small class to unite in the 
 pursuit of a common advantage, and it is another thing for a 
 dispersed multitude to do so. Some thousands of individuals 
 having identical interests, moving together in the same circle, 
 brought up with like prejudices, educated in one creed, hound 
 together by family ties, and meeting annually in the same city, 
 may easily enough combine for the obtainment of a desired 
 object. Bui for half a dozen millions of working men, dis- 
 tributed over a vast area, engaged in various occupations, be- 
 longing to different religious sects, and divided into two totally 
 distinct bodies, the one imbued with thefeeUngs and theories of 
 town life, the other retaining aU those prejudices of the past 
 which yet linger in the country — for these to act with unanimity 
 
222 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 is scarcely possible. Their mass is too great, too incongnioiis, 
 too scattered, for effective combination. We have current 
 proof of this. The Chartist agitation shows us men, who, 
 during the last twenty years, have gradually imbibed ideas of 
 political freedom — men who have been irritated by a sense of 
 injustice — men who have been slighted by their fellow-citizens 
 — men who have been suffering daily privations — men, therefore, 
 who have had an accumulated stimulus to unite in obtaining 
 what they feel themselves entitled to, and what they see reason 
 to beheve would greatly beneiit them. And how have they 
 prospered in the attempt to carry their point? Disputes, 
 divisions, apathy, adverse influences of every kind, have joined 
 to produce repeated failures. Xow if, with the aid of that 
 enthusiasm which a righteous cause always inspires, the masses 
 have not attained to that unity of action needful for the ac- 
 compUsliment of their object, much less would they be able 
 successfully to unite were that object a dishonest one. 
 
 § *■ 
 
 Whoever demui's to the enfranchisement of the working 
 men on tlie ground that they are immoral, is bound to point 
 out a constituency wliich is not immoral. When it is alleged 
 that the venaUty of the people renders them unfit for the 
 possession of votes, it is assumed that some class not charge- 
 able with venaUty may be found. But no such class exists. 
 Bring them all to trial and not a single section of the com- 
 munity would obtain a verdict of " not guilty." 
 
 Were the shopkeepers put upon their examination, how 
 would they excuse their trade practices ? Is it moral to put 
 potatoes and alum in bread ; to add salt, tobacco, and colchi- 
 cum to beer ; to mix lard with butter ; to manufacture milk in 
 vai-ious known and unknown ways; to adulterate oils, chemicals, 
 colours, wines— in short, everything capable of adulteration ? 
 Does the existence of inspectors of weights and measures in- 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 223 
 
 dicate morality ? Or is it honest to sell over the counter, goods 
 whose quality is inferior to that of the samples ticketed in the 
 window ? 
 
 Did the manufacturers make any pretension to purity, they 
 might have to encounter some awkward hints as to the practice 
 of tearing up old rags into shoddy to be worked into cloth 
 along with new wool. Disagreeable questions might be asked 
 concerning the proportion of cotton woven into some fabrics, 
 pretended to be wholly of silk. The piracy of patterns, too, 
 would be a deUcate subject. And the practice of using gypsum 
 to increase the weight and substance of paper, could hardly be 
 defended on the principles of the Decalogue. 
 
 Not less discreditable would be the sentence deserved by the 
 agriculturists. In spite of the refining effects which poets 
 ascribe to intercourse with nature, it is nevertheless an un- 
 doubted fact that the farmers — in Dorsetshire, at least — have 
 been convicted of paying their labourers in damaged wheat, 
 charged at the full price — a habit not altogether conscientious. 
 It is matter of histoiy, too, that before the enactment of the 
 New Poor Law, it was in many districts the custom to give 
 farm servants but half wages ; the remainder being made up to 
 them out of the poor-rates, over which their masters exercised 
 the chief control. And to these samples of morality the trans- 
 actions of the cattle-market and the horse-fair would probably 
 furnish fit companions. 
 
 Neither in such a scratiny would the professions escape un- 
 scathed. Who can hear the word " venaUty " without straight- 
 way thinking of the law ? Attorneys already stand in too bad 
 repute to need their sins hinting at ; and even the gentlemen of 
 the bar are not without reproach. The attempt to make a 
 known felon appear innocent denotes rather confused ideas of 
 right and wrong. Then their habit of taking fees to plead 
 in a cause, "which other engagements will not permit them 
 to attend, and keeping the pay, although they do not perform 
 the work, scarcely impUes that honesty deemed so requisite 
 for the proper use of political power. 
 
224 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 Our members of Parliament, too, were the gauntlet token up 
 on their behalf, would come off but indifferently. That arrange- 
 ment which places them beyond the reach of their creditors, 
 is hardly consistent with the moral law ; nor does it imply 
 the nicest sense of honour. And then that disease of the 
 representative system — bribery; ought the rich to escape all 
 the odium attaching to it — should cdl the disgrace fall upon the 
 poor electors ? 
 
 Nor can those who move in titled circles boast of superior 
 integrity. In the trickeries of the turf, and in the midnight 
 scenes at gaming-houses, the denizens of Mayfair and Belgravia 
 play a sufficiently conspicuous part. The Huntingtower bank- 
 ruptcy was not to the credit of the caste, any more than are 
 those acts of outlawry to which, from time to time, members 
 of it are subjected. And did the aristocracy possess strict 
 notions -of equity it is probable that a httle more respect would 
 be shown by them to the claims of their tradesmen, than is 
 indicated by their proverbially bad character as paymasters. 
 
 Nay, even our highest officers of state participate in the 
 general contamination. Did not the Mazzini affair show some 
 laxity of principle ? Was it nothing, as the Westminster Re- 
 view put it, to teach that theft is permissible when officials 
 wish to steal information from a letter — that lying is permis- 
 sible if they desire to conceal the theft by re- sealing that letter 
 — that forgery is permissible for the puqsose of counterfeiting 
 seals ? And then our present ministers — are they any better 
 than their predecessors ? If so, how shall we explain away 
 the garbling of some of the West Indian despatches, and the 
 suppression of others \ 
 
 No, no; let not any "one oppose the enfranchisement of tlae 
 people on the score of their immorality, lest he be put to the 
 blush by the exposure of his own offences, or the offences of 
 his class. Let him that is guiltless cast the first stone. Vice, 
 dishonest)', venality, pervade all ranks ; and if political power 
 must be denied to working men because they are corrupt, it 
 must be denied to all classes whatever for the same reason. 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 225 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Some indeed allege that the masses are more vicious than 
 the rest of the community. But those who express this 
 opinion arrive at it very illogically. They glance at assize 
 proceedings, read through the names and occupations in the 
 calendar of prisoners, skim over statistics of crime, and because 
 they meet with an immense preponderance of vagrants, fann- 
 servants, bricklayers, drovers, bargemen, porters, factory hands, 
 and the like, they forthwith set down the peasant and artizan 
 class as greatly inferior in moral character to every other class. 
 They take no account of the fact, that in number, the labour- 
 ing population is at least six times all the rest put together. 
 They do not inquire whether, if the cases that appear in the 
 police sheets of swindling advertisers, of false-ticketing trades- 
 men, of embezzling clerks, of young gentlemen concerned in 
 drunken sprees, attacks on the police, insults to women, and so 
 on, were multiplied by six, they would not approach in number 
 the otlier cases daily reported. Were this done, however — ■ 
 were the crimes committed by each class reduced to a per- 
 centage upon the size of that class, there would be found much 
 less inequality than is commonly thought to exist. 
 
 Moreover, it should be remembered that the immorahty of 
 the middle and upper ranks assumes a different guise from that 
 worn by the vices of the poor. Men comparatively well off are 
 not likely to be guilty of those grosser offences seen amongst 
 the lower orders, for their circumstances remove them almost 
 beyond temptation to these. But the bad propensities may 
 and do exist in full force notwithstanding; and enough of 
 their workings may any day be seen in courts of law. Fraudu- 
 lent bankruptcies, actions for debt, suits for the restitution 
 of usurped rights, quarrels about wiUs — all these show the 
 activity of passions which, under other conditions, might have 
 produced acts technically called crimes. Men who, by legal 
 chicanery, cheat others out of thek property, or who refuse to 
 discharge the claims justly made upon them until forced by 
 
 Q 
 
•220 THE CONSTITDTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 law, are men who, in a lower walk of life, would have picked 
 pockets or robbed hen-roosts. We must measure morality by 
 motives, not by deeds. And if we thus estimate the characters 
 of the trading and richer grades, taking into account also the 
 consideration above adverted to — number — we shall find that 
 the data on the strength of which we attribute especial immo- 
 rality to the labouring classes are by no means sufficient. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 It is a pity that those who speak disparagingly of the masses 
 have not -wisdom enough, or candour enough, to make due 
 allowance for the unfavourable circumstances in which the 
 masses are placed. Suppose that after carefully weighing the 
 evidence it should turn out that the working men do exhibit 
 gi-eater vices than those more comfortably off; does it therefore 
 follow that they are morally worse ? Are the additional tempta- 
 tions under wliich they labour to be left out of the estimate ? 
 Shall as much be expected at their hands as from those born 
 into a more fortimate position ? Ought the same demands to 
 be made upon the possessors of five talents as upon the pos- 
 sessors of ten ? Surely the lot of the hard-handed labourer is 
 pitiable enough without having harsh judgments passed upon 
 Mm. To be wholly sacrificed to other men's happiness ; to be 
 made a mere human tool ; to have every faculty subordinated 
 to the sole function of work — this, one would say, is alone a 
 misfortune, needing all sympathy for its mitigation. Consider 
 well these endowments of his — these capacities, affections, tastes, 
 and the vague yearnings to which they give birth. Think of 
 Mm now with his caged-up desires doomed to a daily, weekly, 
 yearly round of painful toil, with scarcely any remission but 
 for food and sleep. Observe how he is tantalized by the 
 pleasures he sees Ms richer brethren partaking of, but from 
 which he must be for ever debarred. Note the humiliation he 
 suffers from being looked down upon as of ho account amongst 
 men. And then remember that he has nothing to look forward 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 227 
 
 to but a monotonous continuance of this till death. Is this a 
 salutary state of tilings to live under ? 
 
 It is very easy for you, respectable citizen, seated in your 
 easy chair, mth your feet on the fender, to hold forth on the 
 misconduct of the people ; — very easy for you to censure their 
 extravagant and vicious habits ; — very easy for you to be a pat- 
 tern of fi-ugality, of rectitude, of sobriety. What else should 
 you be ? Here are you surrounded by comforts, possessing 
 multiplied sources of lawful happiness, with a reputation to 
 maintain, an ambition to fulfil, and the prospect of a compe- 
 tency for your old age. A shame indeed would it be if with 
 these advantages you were not well regulated in your beha- 
 viom-. You have a cheerful home, are warmly and cleanly 
 clad, and fare, if not sumptuously every day, at any rate abund- 
 antly. For your hours of relsixation there are amusements. 
 A newspaper arrives regularly to satisfy your curiosity ; if your 
 tastes are Hterary, books may be had in plenty : and there is a 
 piano if you like music. You can afford to entertain your 
 friends, and are entertained in return. There are lectures, 
 and concerts, and exhibitions, accessible if you inchne to 
 them. You may have a hohday when you choose to take one, 
 and can spare money for an annual trip to the sea-side. And 
 enjoying all these privileges you take credit to yourself for 
 being a well-conducted man ! Small praise to you for it ! 
 If you do not contract dissipated habits where is the merit ? 
 you have few incentives to do so. It is no honour to you that 
 you do not spend your savings in sensual gratification; you 
 have pleasures enough without But what would you do if 
 placed in the position of the labourer? How would these 
 virtues of yours stand the wear and tear of poverty ? Where 
 would your prudence and self-denial be if you were deprived of all 
 the hopes that now stimulate you ; if you had no better prospect 
 than that of the Dorsetshire farm-servant with his 7*-. a week, 
 or that of the perpetually-straitened stocking- weaver, or that of 
 the miU-hand with his periodical suspensions of work ? Let 
 us see you tied to an irksome employment from dawn till dusk; 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 fed on meagre food, and scarcely enough of that; married to a 
 factory girl ignorant of domestic management; deprived of the 
 enjoyments which education opens up; with no place of recrea- 
 tion but the pot-house, and then let us see whether you would 
 be as steady as you ai-e. Suppose your savings had to be 
 made, not, as now, out of sui-plus income, but out of wages 
 already insufficient for necessaries ; and then consider whether 
 to be provident would he as easy as you at present find it. 
 Conceive yourself one of a despised class contemptuously 
 termed " the great unwashed ; " stigmatized as brutish, stohd, 
 vicious ; suspected of harbouring wicked designs ; excluded from 
 the dignity of citizenship ; and then say whether the desire to 
 be respectable would be as practically operative on you as now. 
 Lastly, imagine that seeing your capacities were but ordinary, 
 your education next to nothing, and your competitors innu- 
 merable, you despaired of ever attaining to a higher station ; 
 and then think whether the incentives to perseverance and 
 forethought would be as strong as your existing ones. ReaUze 
 these circumstances, comfortable citizen, and then answer 
 whether the reckless, disorderly habits of the people are so 
 inexcusable. 
 
 How offensive is it to hear some pert, self- approving per- 
 sonage, who thanks God that he is not as other men are, 
 passing harsh sentence on his poor hard-worked heavily-bur- 
 dened fellow-countryinen ; including them all in one sweep- 
 ing condemnation, because in their struggles for existence they 
 do not maintain the same prim respectabihty as himself Of 
 all stupidities there are few greater, and yet few in which we 
 more doggedly persist, than this of estimating other men's con- 
 duct by the standard of our own feehngs. There is no more 
 mischievous absurdity than this judging of actions from the 
 outside as they look to us, instead of from the inside as they 
 look to the actors; nothing more irrational than to criticize 
 deeds as though the doers of them had the same desires, hopes, 
 fears, and restraints with ourselves. We cannot understand 
 another's character except by abandoning our own identity, 
 
THE CONSTITUTrON OF THE STATE. 229 
 
 and realizing to ourselves his frame of mind, his want of 
 knowledge, his hardships, temptations, and discouragements. 
 And if the wealthier classes would do this before forming their 
 opinions of the working man, their verdicts would savour some- 
 what more of that charity which covereth a multitude of sins. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 After all it is a pitiful controversy, this about the rela- 
 tive vices of rich and poor. Two school-boys taunting each 
 other, with faults of which they were equally guilty, would 
 best parody it: Whilst indignant EadioaUsm denounces "the 
 vile aristocrats," these in their turn enlarge with horror on the 
 brutality of the mob. Neither party sees its own sins. Neither 
 part}' recognises in the other, itself in a different dress. Neither 
 party can believe that it would do all the other does if placed 
 in like circumstances. Yet a cool bystander finds nothing to _ 
 choose between them ; knows that these class recriminations 
 are but the inflammatory symptoms of a uniformly-diffused im- 
 morality. Label men how you please with titles of " upper," 
 and "middle," and "lower," you cannot prevent them being 
 units of the same society, acted upon by the same spirit of the 
 age, moulded after the same type of character. The mechani- 
 cal law, that action and reaction are equal, has its moral ana- 
 logue. The deed of one man to another tends ultimately to 
 produce a hke effect upon both, be the deed good or bad. Do 
 but put them in relationship, and no division into castes, no 
 differences of wealth, can prevent men from assimilating. Whoso 
 is placed amongst the savage wiU in process of time get savage 
 too ; let his companions be treacherous, and he will become 
 treacherous in self-defence ; surround him with the kind-hearted 
 and he wiU soften ; amidst the refined he will acquire polish ; 
 and the same influences which thus rapidly adapt the indi- 
 vidual to his society, ensure, though by a slower process, the 
 general uniformity of a national character. This is no unsup- 
 ported theory. Look when or where we please, thickly-strewn 
 
230 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 proofs may be gathered. The cnielties of the old Koman rulers 
 were fully paralleled by those over which the populace gloated 
 ill their arenas. During the servile wars of the middle ages, 
 barons tortured rebels, and rebels tortured barons, with equally 
 diabolical ferocity. Those massacres which took place a few 
 years since in Galhcia covered with infamy both the people who 
 committed them and the government who paid for them at per 
 head. The Assam chiefs, to whom the East India Company have 
 allowed compensation for abandoning their established right of 
 plunder, are neither better nor worse than the mass of the 
 people, amongst whom joint-stock robbing companies are 
 common. A similar sameness is exliibited in Eussia, where all 
 are alike swindlers, from the Prince Marshal who cheats the 
 troops out of their rations, the ofBtcers who rob the Emperor of 
 his stores, the magistrates who require bribing before they will 
 act, the police who have secret treaties with the thieves, the 
 shopkeepers who boast of their successful trickeries, down to 
 tlie postmasters and dhrosky- drivers with their endless imposi- 
 tions. In Ireland, during the last century, wliilst the people 
 had their faction fights and secret revenge societies, duelling 
 formed the amusement of the gentry, and was carried to such a 
 pitch that the barrister was bound to give satisfaction to the wit- 
 ness he had bullied, or to the client who was dissatisfied with him*. 
 And let us not forget how completely this unity of character 
 is exhibited by the Irish of to-day, amongst wbom Orangemen 
 and Catholics display the same truculent bigotry; amongst 
 whom magistrates and people join in party riots ; and amongst 
 whom the improvidence of the peasantry is only to be paralleled 
 by that of the landlords. Our own histoiy furnishes like 
 illustrations in plenty. The time when England swarmed with 
 highwaymen and outlaws, and when the populace had that 
 sneaking kindness for a bold robber still shown in some parts 
 
 " It is time," said a veteran of this school, " to retire from the bar, since this 
 new-fengled special pleading has superseded the use of gunpowder." — Sketches of 
 Jrdand Sixtij Years Ago. 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 231 
 
 of the Continent, was the time when kings also played the 
 bandit; when they cheated their creditors by debasing the 
 coinage ; when they impressed labourers to build their palaces 
 (Windsor Castle, for instance), obUging them under pain of 
 imprisonment to take the wages offered ; and when they seized 
 and sold men's goods, paying the owners less than a third of 
 what the goods realized. During the age of religious persecu- 
 tion, Papists martyred Protestants, and Protestants mart^Tcd 
 Papists, with equal cruelty; and Cavaliers and Eoundheads 
 treated each other with the same rancour. In the present day 
 dishonesty shows itself not less in the falsification of dockyard 
 accounts, or the " cooking" of railway-reports, than in burglai-y 
 or sheep -stealing ; whilst those who see heartlessuess in the 
 dealings of slop-tailors and their sweaters, may also find it in 
 the conduct of rich landlords, who get double rent from poor 
 allotment holders ^, and in that of respectable ladies who under- 
 pay half-starved seamstresses'". Changes in tastes and amuse- 
 ments are similarly common to all. The contrast between the 
 Squire Westerns and their descendants has its analogy amongst 
 the people. As in Spain a bull fight is stiU the favourite pas- 
 time of both the Queen and her subjects, so in England fifty 
 
 ^ " Allotments are generally given on poor and useless pieces of land, but the 
 thorough cultivation they receive soon raises them to a high pitch of fertility. The 
 more fertile they become the more the rent of each portion is increased, and we were 
 informed that there are at present allotments on the Duke's property which, under 
 the influence of the same competition which exists with reference to farms, bring his 
 Grace a rent of 11., V.., and even U. an acre." — Times AgricvUural Commissiontn- on 
 the Blenheim Estates. 
 
 ^ See Letters on " Labour and the Poor." An officer's widow says : — " Generally, 
 the ladies are much harder as to their terms than the tradespeople ; oh, yes, the trades- 
 people usually show more lenity towards the needlewomen than the ladies. I know 
 the mistress of an institution who refused some chemises of a lady who wanted to 
 have them made at Sd. She said she would not impose upon the poor workpeople 
 so much as to get them made at that price."— J/o™i«^ Chronicle, November 1 6, 1 849. 
 A vendor of groundsel and turfi for singing birds says :— " The ladies are very 
 hard with a body. They tries to beat me down, and particular in the matter of 
 turfs. They tell me they can buy half-a-dozen for Id., so I 'm obligated to let'em 
 have three or iom:."—MorKing Chronicle, November 20, 1849. 
 
282 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 vears ago, the cock-pit and the prize-ring were patronized alike 
 by peer and pauper; and a reference to the sporting papers 
 ■will show that the Ungering instincts of the savage are at 
 this moment exhibited by about an equal percentage of all 
 classes. 
 
 Thus the alleged homogeneity of national character is abund- 
 antly exemphfied. And so long as the assimilating influences 
 productive of it continue at work, it is folly to suppose any one 
 gi-ade of a community can be morally different from the rest. 
 In wliichever rank you see corruption, be assured it equally 
 pervades all ranks — be assui'ed it is the symptom of a bad 
 social diathesis. Whilst the virus of depravity exists in one 
 pait of the body politic, no other part can remain healthy. 
 
 § «■ 
 
 When it is urged that the working classes ought not to be 
 admitted within the pale of the constitution because they are 
 ignorant, it is tacitly assumed that the existing electors are en- 
 lightened. And, quietly making this assumption, the opponents 
 of popular enfranchisement argue, at their ease, that it would 
 be extremely impolitic to swamp intelligent ten-pound house- 
 holders, freeholders, and tenants at will, by letting in upon 
 them the masses lying in outer darkness. 
 
 Painful as it may be, the pleasing illusion that our present 
 constituency is thus honourably distinguished, must be dis- 
 pelled. If by ignorance is meant want of information on 
 matters which, for the due perfoiTnance of liis function, the 
 citizen should understand (and no other definition is to the 
 point), then it is a great error to suppose that ignorance is 
 pecuhar to the unenfranchised. Were there no other illustra- 
 tions, sufficient proof that this ignorance is shared by those on 
 the register, might be gathered from their conduct at elections. 
 Much might be infeiTed fi-om the tuft-hunting spirit exhibited 
 in the choice of aristocratic representatives. It might be asked 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 233 
 
 whether those are intelUgent voters whose ears are tickled by 
 the euphony of a title, whose eyes are attracted by heraldic 
 emblazonry, or whose votes are determined by the acreage of a 
 candidate's estates. Some doubts might be cast on the pene- 
 tration of men who, whilst they complain of the pressure of 
 taxation, send to parliament hordes of military and naval 
 officers, who have an interest in making that taxation still 
 greater. Or the pretensions of the present monopohsts of 
 political power might be tested by quotations from the debates 
 of a fanner's market-ordinary, and from those of the assembly 
 into which electoral wisdom is distilled. But without dilating 
 upon these general considerations, let us examine a few of the 
 opinions entertained by the mercantile classes upon state ques- 
 tions, and see how far these opinions entitle them to a reputation 
 for enhghtenment. 
 
 "Money is wealth," was the dogma universally held by 
 legislators and economists before the days of Adam Smith, as a 
 self-evident truth ; and in conformity with it acts of parhament 
 were, by general consent, framed to attract and retain in the 
 country as much coin as possible. Mr. Mill, in the introduc- 
 tion to his recent elaborate work, assumes that this belief is 
 now extinct. It may be so amongst philosophers, but it is still 
 prevalent in the trading world. We continue to hear acts 
 praised as tending to " circulate money ; " and on analyzing the 
 alarm periodically raised that " the money is going out of the 
 country," we find such an occurrence regarded as a disaster in 
 itself, and not simply as indicating that the country is poor in 
 some essential commodity. Is there not occasion for a little 
 " enlightenment" here ? 
 
 Again ; no small number of respectable people seeing thut 
 increased consumption always accompanies prosperity, infer 
 that consumption is in itself beneficial— is the cause of pros- 
 perity, instead of its collateral efi"ect; and hence, on witnessing a 
 fire, or the mad extravagance of some spendthrift, they console 
 themselves with the reflection that such things are " good for 
 
234 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 trade." Dangerous voters these, if sound political knowledge 
 is a needful qualification. 
 
 Similarly diffused amongst the middle ranks, is a notion that 
 the withdrawal of a large pai-t of the funds of the community 
 ty the non-producing classes is no real detriment to the rest ; 
 for that as the money thus abstracted is subsequently spent 
 amongst the rest, it eventually comes to the same thing as 
 though it had not been abstracted at all. Even a professed 
 political economist — Doctor Chalmers— maintains that the 
 revenues of landowners form no deduction from the means of 
 society, seeing that the expenditure of such revenues consists 
 "in a transference to the industrious of sustenance and support 
 for their services : " which proposition amounts to this — that it 
 matters not iu the end whether A and his servants B, C, and D, 
 live on the produce of their own industry, or on the produce of 
 other men's industry " ! 
 
 Another mistake current alike amongst rich and poor is, that 
 the speculations of corn-dealers are injurious to the public. So 
 indignant are many well-meaning men at what they conceive to 
 be a practice of intolerable cruelty, that it is scarcely possible 
 to make them see how perfect freedom of trade is nationally 
 advantageous in tliis, as in all other cases. Their anger bhnds 
 them to the fact that were not the price raised immediately after 
 a deficient harvest by the purchases of these large factors, there 
 would be nothing to prevent the people from consuming food 
 at their ordinary rate ; which would end in the inadequate 
 supply being eaten up long before the ripening of the next 
 crop. They do not perceive that this mercantile operation is 
 
 ' No doubt the belief which Dr. Chalmers combats, viz., that the landlord's 
 revenue is wholly consumed by him, is an erroneous one ; for, as he points out, the 
 greater portion of it goes to maintain those who directly or indirectly minister to the 
 landlord's wants : but Dr. Chalmers overlooks the fact that did the landlord not 
 exist, the services which such now render to him in return for " sustenance and 
 support," would be rendered to those producers from whom the landlord's revenue 
 originally came ; and that in the loss of these services society suffers. 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 235 
 
 analogous in its effect to putting the crew of a vessel on 
 diminished rations when the stock of provisions is found in- 
 sufficient to last out the voyage. A somewhat serious error 
 this, for electors to labour under ; especially as many of them 
 would prevent the buying up of com hy legal penalties ! 
 
 What crude theories prevail also respecting the power of a 
 legislature to encourage different branches of industry — " agri- 
 cultural interests" and other "interests." It is not farmers 
 only who labour under the mistake that their occupation can be 
 made permanently more prosperous than the rest by act of 
 parliament : educated towns people, too, participate in the delu- 
 sion ; quite forgetting that the greater profitableness artificially 
 given to any particular trade, inevitably draws into that trade 
 such an increased number of competitors as quickly to reduce 
 its proffered advantages to the general level, and even for a 
 time below that level. Is not the educator wanted behind the 
 counter and on the farm, as well as in the workshop ? 
 
 Note again the wild ideas entertained on currency questions. 
 We smile at tlie simphcity which in times past led a famine- 
 pinched populace to ascribe the high price of bread to the 
 covetousness of bakers and millers; yet there is no Uttle 
 analogy between such a theory and that which attributes 
 national distress to bad monetary arrangements. Just as the 
 poor man, when made to feel the scarcity of food by having to 
 pay double the usual sum for a loaf, straightway taxed the 
 seller of the loaf with the evil ; so do many traders to whom 
 commercial depression comes in the shape of a difficulty in 
 getting advances from their bankers, or cash for their bills of 
 exchange, conclude that the "circulating medium" is in fault; 
 being ignorant, hke their hungry prototypes, that the primary 
 cause of the mischief is a deficiency in the national stock of 
 food or other commodities. To suppose that a state of general 
 privation can be cm'ed by the issue of bank notes, is to err with 
 the projector of perpetual motion, who hopes to make power 
 •out of nothing. 
 
 Thus the tu quoque argument, which we found so completely 
 
236 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 to neutralize the inference drawn from the alleged immorality 
 of the labouring classes, is a not much less cogent answer to 
 the objection urged against the extension of the suffrage on 
 the ground of popular ignorance. If, because they are deficient 
 in information, the people should continue unenfranchised, then 
 for a like reason should the existing electoral body be dis- 
 franchised. If the two classes are to have their relative degrees 
 of competence to wield political power determined by comparing 
 the amounts of their knowledge — their political knowledge, 
 mind — then the advantage on the side of the present holders of 
 such power is quite insufficient to give them an exclusive claim 
 to it. As we have just seen, a great proportion of them are in 
 error on the most important public questions — on the nature of 
 wealth, on what things are "good for trade," on the relationship 
 of producers and non-producers, on dealings in the people's 
 food, on the "encouragement" of trade, on the influences of 
 currency, and so forth. Where, then, is their great superiority 
 over the non-electors ? Have many artizans mistaken excessive 
 competition for the cause of an evil, instead of taking it for 
 what it is — the symptom of one ? why tliey are countenanced in 
 this error by not a few of the educated. I>o working men 
 hold wrong opinions concerning machinery? so likewise do 
 nearly all the farmers and no small number of tradesmen. Is 
 the false impression that manufacturers can raise or lower 
 wages at will, prevalent amongst the masses ? it is widely enter- 
 tained, too, by their richer neighbours. How, then, can the 
 ignorance of the people be urged as a reason for refusing them 
 votes ? 
 
 § 9. 
 
 Tliose who cut short the arguments in favour of democracy 
 by saying that it has been tried and found wanting, would do 
 well to consider whether the governments they refer to really 
 were democratic ones — whether a true democracy has ever been 
 known — whether such a thing can be found even now. Of 
 arrangements simulating it, the world has seen not a few. But 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 237 
 
 that democracy itself has ever existed — existed, that is, for a 
 sufficient length of time to admit of its fruits heing judged — or 
 that it was possible for it so to have existed during the past 
 condition of humanity, is denied. A return to definitions 
 settles the matter at once. A democracy, properly so called, is 
 a political organization modelled in accordance with the law of 
 equal freedom. And if so, those cannot he called democracies 
 under which, as under the Greek and Eoman governments, 
 from four-fifths to eleven-twelfths of the people were slaves. 
 Neither can tliose he called democracies, wliich, like the consti- 
 tutions of medieeval Italy, conferred power on the burghers and 
 nobles only. Nor can those even be -called democracies, which, 
 like the Swiss states, have alwaj's treated a certain unincorpo- 
 rated class as poUtical outlaws. Enlarged aristocracies these 
 should be tei-med ; not democracies. No matter whether they 
 be a minority or a majority to whom power is denied; the 
 exclusion of them is in spirit the same, and the definition of a 
 democracy is equally broken. The man who steals a penny we 
 call dishonest, as well as the man who steals a pound ; and we 
 do so because his act equally testifies to a certain defect of 
 character. Similarly we must consider a government aristo- 
 cratic, be the class it excludes large or small. 
 
 They, however, make the strangest mistake who, referring as 
 they commonly do to the United States, urge the existence of 
 slavery as itself an argument against democracy. Put in a 
 definite form, this would aptly serve the logician as a specimen 
 absurdity. A pseudo-democracy is found not democratic enough, 
 and it is therefore inferred that democracy is a bad thing I 
 Whilst some Autolycus is eulogizing honesty and quoting 
 himself as a sample of it, he is detected in the act of picking 
 his neighbour's pocket; whereupon it is argued that honesty 
 ought forthwith to be repudiated! With his mouth fuU of 
 "noble sentiments," and leading a seemingly moral life, a 
 Joseph Surface deceives his friends ; and, on its being discovered 
 that he is a villain, there arises the exclamation — " What a 
 shocking thing is this morality! " 
 
238 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 But, passing over what might fuither he said concerning the 
 alleged failure of democracies, let it he gi-anted that they have 
 failed; let it he granted that there have from time to time heen 
 forms of government approaching to the democratic — nay, that 
 in die course of revolutions the thing itself has had a transient 
 existence ; let all this be granted, it still proves nothing. For 
 which is it amongst the endeavours of man that does not at first 
 fail? Is not perseverance through a series of defeats the 
 natural history of success? Does not the process we pass 
 through in learning to walk afford us a tjqoe of all human 
 experiences ? Though we see a child make hundreds of boot- 
 less attempts to maintain its balance, we do not conclude that 
 it is doomed to remain for ever upon all -fours. Nor do we, in 
 the conduct of its education, cease telling it to " try again," 
 because it has many times fallen short of a desired achieve- 
 ment. Doubtless it would be unwise to base an argument upon 
 the assumed analogy between the growth of the individual and 
 of the state (though, both being governed by the same laws of 
 human development, there is probably a genuine analogy 
 between them) ; but the simile may fairly be employed to hint 
 that the failure of past "^efforts made by society to preserve the 
 erect attitude of democracy, by no means shows that such 
 attitude is not the proper one. 
 
 And, in fact, our theory anticipates such failures. We have 
 already seen that a high form of government is rendered prac- 
 ticahle only by a high type of chai-acter — that freedom can 
 increase only as fast as control becomes needless — that the 
 perfect man alone can realize the perfect state. A democracy, 
 therefore, being the highest form that a government can 
 assume — indicative, if not of the ultimate phase of civihzation, 
 stUl of the penultimate one — must of necessity fail in the hands 
 of barbarous and semi-barbarous men. 
 
 Whilst, then, it is maintained that nearly all these alleged 
 failures of democracy are not failures of democracy at all, 
 but of something else, it is ai-gued that the fact of those 
 comparatively genuine democracies set up during revolutions. 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 239 
 
 lapsing rapidly back into pre-existing arrangements, is in nowise 
 at variance with our position. 
 
 § 10. 
 
 Whether in any given case a democracy is practicable, is a 
 question that ■will always find its own solution. The physio- 
 logist shows us that in an animal organism, the soft parts deter- 
 mine the forms of the hard ones ; and it is equally true that in 
 the social organism, the seemingly fixed framework of laws and 
 institutions is moulded by the seemingly forceless thing — cha- 
 racter. Social arrangements are the bones to that body, of 
 which the national morality is the hfe; and they will grow 
 into free, healthy shapes, or into sickly and cramped ones, 
 according as that morality, that life, is vigorous or otherwise. 
 
 The vital principle of society we have seen to be the law of 
 equal freedom : and we have further seen that in the compound 
 faculty originating a moral sense, there exists an agent enabUng 
 men to appreciate, to love, and to act up to this law (Chaps. 
 IV. and v.). We have seen that to reaUze the Divine idea — 
 greatest happiness — the human constitution must be such as 
 that each man confining himself within his own sphere of ac- 
 tivity, shall leave intact the similar spheres of activity of others 
 (Chap. III.) ; and we have further seen that an instinct of our 
 own fi-eedom, and a sympathy which makes us respect the Hke 
 freedom of our fellows, compose a mechanism capable of esta- 
 blishing this state of things. If these feeUngs are undeveloped, 
 a people's beliefs, laws, customs, and manners, will be aggres- 
 sive in their character : let them act with due force, and the 
 organization of the community, equally with the conduct of 
 its members, will be in harmony with the social law. Political 
 forms indicate the degree of efiiciency with which this mental 
 mechanism works; are in a manner supplementary to such 
 mechanism; are bad and coercive if it is defective; become 
 ameUorated in proportion as it acts well And thus demo- 
 cracv, as one of the higher social forms, is of necessity identi- 
 
240 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 fied, both in origin and practicability, with a dominant moral 
 sense. This fact has been already more than once hinted; 
 but it will be desirable now to examine more attentively than 
 heretofore the grounds on which it is alleged. 
 
 Observe first, then, that in the earUer stages of civilization, 
 before the process of adaptation has yet produced much efi'ect, 
 the desire for political equahty does not exist. There were no 
 agitations for representative government amongst the Egyp- 
 tians, or the Persians, or the Assyrians ; with them all disputes 
 were as to who should be tyrant. By the Hindoos a similar 
 state of things is exhibited to the present hour. The Eus- 
 sians, too, are still under this phase ; and, in their utter care- 
 lessness of civil Uberty, shun any one who preaches justice and 
 condemns tyranny, as a perverse malcontent. The like mental 
 condition was sho\vn during the earUer stages of our own pro- 
 gress. In the middle ages fealty to a feudal lord was accounted 
 a duty, and the assertion of personal freedom a crime. Eights 
 of man were not then dreamed of. Eevolutions were nothing 
 but dynastic quarrels ; not what they have been in later times 
 • — attempts to make government more popular. And if, after 
 glancing at the changes that have taken place between the far 
 past and the present, we reflect upon the character of modern 
 ideas and agitations, on declarations of rights, liberty of the 
 press, slave emancipation, removal of religious disabilities, 
 Eeform Bills, Chartism, &c., and consider how through all 
 of them there runs a kindred spirit, and how this spuit is 
 manifesting itself with constantly-increasing intensity and uni- 
 versality, we shall see that these facts imply some moral 
 change; and exphcable as they are by the growth of this 
 compound faculty responding to the law of equal freedom, it 
 is reasonable to consider them as showing the mode in which 
 such faculty seeks to place social arrangements in harmony 
 with that -law; or, in other words, as illustrating the efforts 
 of the moral sense to realize the democratic state. 
 
 If a democracy is produced by this agency, so also is it ren- 
 dered practicable by it. The popular fonn of government as 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 241 
 
 contrasted with the monarchical, is professedly one ■which 
 places less restraint upon the individual. In speaking of it we 
 use such terms as free institutions, civil liberty, self-govern- 
 ment, all implying this. But the diminution of external re- 
 straint can take place only at the same rate as the increase of 
 internal restraint. Conduct has to he ruled either from with- 
 out or from within. If the rule from within is not efficient, 
 there must exist a supplementary rule from without. If, on 
 the other hand, all men are properly ruled from within, govern- 
 ment becomes needless, and all men are perfectly free. Now the 
 chief faculty of self-rule heingthe moral sense (Chap. V.), the 
 degree of freedom in their institutions which any given people 
 can hear, will be proportionate to the diffiision of this moral 
 sense amongst them. And only when its influence greatly 
 predominates can so large an instalment of freedom as a 
 democracy become possible. 
 
 Lastly, the supremacy of tins same faculty affords the only 
 guarantee for the stabihty of a democracy. On the part of 
 the people it gives rise to what we call a jealousy of their 
 liberties— a watchful determination to resist anything like 
 encroachment upon their rights : whilst it generates amongst 
 those in power such a respect for these rights as checks any 
 desire they may have to aggress. Conversely, let the ruled 
 be deficient in the instinct of freedom, and they will be indif- 
 ferent to the gradual usurpation of their privileges so long as 
 it entails no immediate inconvenience upon them ; and the 
 rulers in such case, being deficient in sympathetic regard for 
 these privileges, will be, to a like extent, unscrupulous in 
 usurping. Let us observe, in detail, the different modes 
 in which men thus contradistinguished comport themselves 
 under a representative form of government. Amongst a peo- 
 ple not yet fitted for such a form, citizens, lacking the impulse 
 to claim equal power with each other, become careless in the 
 exercise of their franchise, doubt whether it is of any use to 
 them, and even pride themselves on not interfering in pub- 
 
 E 
 
•<!42 THE CONSTITQTIOX OF THK STATE. 
 
 lie affiiirs^. Provided tlieir liberties are but indirectly affected, 
 they will watch the passing of the most insidious measures 
 with vacant unconcern. It is only barefaced aggressions that 
 they can perceive to be aggi'essions at all. Placing as they do 
 but little value upon their privileges, they are readily bribed. 
 When tlu-eatened, instead of assuming that altitude of dogged 
 resistance which the instinct of freedom dictates, they ti-uckle. 
 If tricked out of a right of citizenship, they are quite indiffer- 
 ent about getting it again ; and indeed when the exercise of it 
 conflicts with any immediate interest are glad to give it up, — 
 will even petition, as in times past did many of the corporate 
 towns, both in England and Spain, that they may be excused 
 from electing representatives. Meanwhile, in accordance with 
 that law of social homogeneity lately dwelt upon, those in au- 
 thority are in a like ratio ready to encroach. They intimidate, 
 they bribe, they plot, and by degrees estabhsh a comparatively 
 coercive government. On the other hand, amongst a people 
 sufficiently endowed with the faculty responding to the law of 
 equal freedom, no such retrograde process is possible. The 
 man of genuinely democratic feeUng loves liberty as a miser 
 loves gold, for its own sake and quite irrespective of its advan- 
 tages (p. 9o). What he thus highly values he sleeplessly 
 watches ; he quickly detects any attempt at diminution of it ; 
 and he opposes aggression the moment it commences. Should 
 any assume undue prerogatives, he straightway steps up to 
 them, and demands their authority for so doing. Transactions 
 that seem in the remotest degree underhand awaken his sus- 
 picions, which are not be laid so long as anything remains 
 unexplained. He scents out an abuse with instinctive saga- 
 city, and having found one, never rests until it is abolished. 
 If in any proposed arrangement there be a latent danger to the 
 liberties of himself and others— any germ of irresponsible power, 
 he instantly discovers it and refuses his consent. He is alarmed 
 
 " Instance the behaviour of the Prasaian electors since the late revolution. 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THK STATE. 243 
 
 by sucli a proposal as the disfranchisement of a constituency by 
 the legislature ; for it at once occurs to him that the measure 
 thus levelled against one may be levelled against many. To 
 call that responsible government under which a cabinet minis- 
 ter can entangle the nation in a quarrel about some paltry ter- 
 ritory before they know anything of it, he sees to be absurd. 
 It needs no chain of reasoning to show him that the assump- 
 tion, by a delegated assembly, of the power to lengthen its own 
 existence from three years to seven, is an infraction of the 
 representative principle ; he feels that it is so ; and no plau- 
 sible professions of patriotism, no boasting of honourable in- 
 tentions, can check his opposition to the setting up of so 
 dangerous a precedent. Still more excited is he when applied 
 to for grants of pubhc money, with the understanding that on 
 a future occasion he shall be told how they have been spent. 
 Fhmsy excuses about " exigencies of the state," and the like, 
 cannot entrap him into so glaring an act of self-stultification. 
 He listens to them frowningly, and maintaining as he does 
 that the protection of men's rights is the chief, or rather the 
 sole, " exigency of the state," sternly negatives the request. 
 Thus is he ever on the watch to extirpate incipient oppression ; 
 to nip abuses in the bud ; or, if such an expression is allow- 
 able, to stop encroachment before it begins. And when a 
 community consists of men animated bythe spirit thus exem- 
 plified, the continuance of liberal institutions is certain. 
 
 Political freedom, therefore, is, as we say, an external result 
 of an internal sentiment — is alike, in origin, practicability, and 
 permanence, dependent on the moral sense; and it is only 
 when this is supreme in its influence that so liigh a form of 
 social organization as a democracy can be maintained. 
 
 § 11. ■ 
 
 And thus we arrive at the true answer to that question at 
 present so widely agitated — Is a purely popular form of govern- 
 ment practicable now? For, as the sentiment by which a 
 
 E 2 
 
244 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 State of perfect political liberty is generated, is also the one by 
 which it is upheld, there immediately suggests itself the corol- 
 lary that, when the sentiment is strong enough to generate it, 
 it is strong enough to uphold it. Whenever, therefore, a 
 people calmly arrives at the conclusion that democratic institu- 
 tions are right ; whenever they dispassionately determine that 
 they shall be adopted ; or, in other words, whenever the circum- 
 stances show that the setting up of such institutions is not an 
 accident, but results from the ascendancy^ of the aforesaid senti- 
 ment ; then, and then alone, are such institutions permanently 
 possible. 
 
 In the opinion, now happily so prevalent, that the pacific 
 mode of working out political changes is the only efficient one, 
 we have a collateral expression of this truth. Men see that 
 freedom achieved by the sword is uniformly lost again; but 
 that it is lasting when gained by peaceful agitation. Hence 
 they very properly infer the propriety of carrying reforms solely 
 by means which the moral law recognises — means wliich do 
 not involve violations of it. Eight as this conclusion may be, 
 however, it is not philosopliicaUy understood. Men do not see 
 why the thing is so. There is no truth in the usual supposi- 
 tion that the loss of liberties obtained by violence is a kind of 
 retribution. It is not that bloodshed vitiates the free institu- 
 tions it may help to set up ; nor is it that when peacefully 
 established such institutions are preserved by virtue of their 
 being so estabUshed ; but it is that the manner in wliich the 
 change is wrought itidicates the national character, and 
 proves it to be respectively unfit or fit for the new social form. 
 A brief examination of tlie moral conditions impUed by these 
 different kinds of revolution -will show this. 
 
 When an old regime is overthrown by force, no guarantee is 
 given that the new one put in its place will satisfy the wants of 
 the age. The occurrence is simply a demonstration that the 
 miseries inflicted under this old regime were no longer bearable. 
 To j-epeat the saying of Sully, quoted by Burke, and which is 
 perfectly true when applied to convulsions of this nature—" It 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 245 
 
 is never from the desire to attack that the people rise, but from 
 impatience under suffering." Now anger against an agent 
 inflicting pain is a passion, exhibited by brutes as well as by 
 men; and a social revolution wrought out by such a motive 
 power is not likely to leave behind it a state of things specially 
 adapted to the people's circumstances. Tliat sudden display of 
 ill-temper with which a man dashes on the ground something 
 that has given him much provocation, and yet the loss of which 
 he wiU subsequently regret, serves in some measure to illustrate 
 the conduct of a people thus excited. They are irritated, and 
 justly so; the hold which authority has had over them is 
 weakened ; that sentiment of power-worship — that loyalty, as 
 we term it — which was but the index of a certain adaptation 
 between their characters and the rule they had lived under, is 
 for the time being in abeyance — is silenced, drowned in the 
 rising tide of their wrath ; and when, after they have destroyed 
 the old framework of things, another becomes needful, it is very 
 improbable that the one set up during this temporary state of 
 excitement will be one really in harmony with their natural 
 characters. Nay, indeed, it is sure to be out of harmony with 
 their natural characters ; for consider, the institutions they set 
 up wiU bear the impress of the feeling then prevalent — a feel- 
 ing widely different from that previously exhibited, and also from 
 that which will come uppermost again by-and-by. Stimulated by 
 transpiring events, the germs of those sentiments destined some 
 day to establish genuine political freedom, assume a precocious 
 activity — seem much stronger and more general than they really 
 are ; whilst, on the contrary, those sentiments which upheld the 
 preceding state of things are almost wholly dormant. The 
 improvised form of government exactly answers to this excep- 
 tional condition of mind, and might work could that condition 
 be maintained; but as fast as the popular feeling ebbs back 
 into its ordinary channels, so fast does the incongruity between 
 the new arrangements and the old character make itself felt ; 
 and so fast is the retrogression. 
 
 On viewing the facts, through the foregoing theory of moral- 
 
246 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 sense agency, it becomes still more manifest that free institu- 
 tions obtained by violence are of necessity premature. For 
 what are the requisite antecedents to one of these social convul- 
 sions? They are the tonnents of a wide-spread and deep- 
 sea;ted injustice. And of what character is this injustice the 
 exponent ? Evidently a character deficient in those sentiments 
 which deter men from aggression — a chai-acter in which the 
 faculties of the social man are as yet imperfectly developed — a 
 character, that is, by which the law of equal freedom is not duly 
 responded to. Hence the unscrupulous trespasses on the one 
 pai-t, and the culpable submission on the othei-, which, by their 
 accumulated results, have induced so terrible a crisis. Well : 
 though by a revolution the people may re-make their govern- 
 ment, they cannot re-make themselves. Slightly changed, 
 perhaps, they mav be in the passing through a period of such 
 fiery excitement ; but, in the main, they are still the men they 
 were. The old process will consequently repeat itself The 
 storm of passion having died away, there will again begin these 
 encroachments and tliis indifference ; and they wiU continue 
 until, by a gradual imposition of fresh bonds, the nation has 
 been reduced, not, indeed, to a condition as bad as before, but 
 to a condition not greatly in advance of it. 
 
 Of political ameUorations pacifically wrought out, exactly 
 the opposite is predicable. These appertain to a higher phase 
 of civilization. In the first place they presuppose tlie popular 
 suflFeriug to be of a comparatively mild type — no longer unbear- 
 able, maddening; and, other tilings equal, tliis indicates a 
 diminished amount of injustice ; and a diminished amount of 
 injustice imphes a more prevalent and e^iergetic moral sense. 
 Thus the verj^ antecedents of a peaceful agitation serve in some 
 measure to ensure the success of the fr-ee institutions obtained by 
 it. But it is in the process by which one of these bloodless revo- 
 lutions is brought about that the existence of the needful popular 
 character is most clearly evinced. For in what consists the 
 vitality of such a movement ? What is the secret power that 
 originates it ; to which its growth is due ; and by the help of 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 247 
 
 which it triumphs ? Manifestly this feehng that responds to 
 the law of equal freedom. These pertinacious demands for 
 pohtical equality are simply the signs of its increasing activity. 
 Not hunger, nor the anxiety to escape' from torture, nor the 
 desire for vengeance, is now the transforming force, but a calm 
 unswerving determination to get human hberties recognised. 
 The carrying out one of these battles of opinion to a successful 
 issue through long delays and discouragements, through ridicule 
 and misrepresentation, impUes a perennial source of energy quite 
 different from mere insurrectionary rage. In place of a passing 
 gust of anger, a persistent and ever-strengthening sentiment 
 is here the acting agent. Agitation is its gymnasium. Men in 
 whom it predominates cultivate it in the rest. They address it 
 in speeches ; they wiite articles to it ; they convene meetings 
 for its manifestation. It is aroused by denunciations of in- 
 justice; it is appealed to in the name of conscience; it is con- 
 jured by all that is fair and upright and equitable. Pictures of 
 the slave and the tyrant are exhibited to excite its abhorrence ; 
 a state of pure fr'cedom is described to it as the one to be loved 
 and hoped for; and it is made sensible of the sacredness of 
 human rights. After men's minds have been for many years 
 thus exercised and stimulated, a sufficiently intense manifesta- 
 tion of feeling is produced, and then comes the reform. But 
 this feeling, mark, proceeds from that same combination of 
 faculties by which, as we have seen, free institutions are upheld 
 and made practicable. One of these agitations, therefore, is a 
 kind of apprenticeship to the hberties obtained by it. The 
 power to get freedom becomes the measure of the power to use 
 it. The law of social forms is that they shall be expressive of 
 national character; they come into existence bearing its im- 
 press; and they live only so long as it supphes them with 
 vitahty. Now a general dissatisfaction with old arrangements 
 is a sign that the national character requires better ones ; and 
 for the people in pursuit of these better ones to have organised 
 associations, maintained lecturers, and for session after session 
 to have wearied the legislature with petitions — to have continued 
 
248 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 
 
 this, too, until the accumulated force of opinion has become 
 irresistible, is to have given conclusive proof that the change 
 brought about is really in haimony with the wants of the age. 
 The new institutions do not now express an exceptional state 
 of the popular mind, but express its habitual state, and hence 
 are certain to be fitted to it. 
 
 § 12. 
 
 Here then is encouragement for timid reformers. Men of 
 true insight need none of these detailed considerations to steady 
 their convictions by. The mathematician does not call for a 
 pair of compasses to test a proved theorem with ; nor does the 
 man of healthy faith wait for more evidence after he hears what 
 the moral law says. It is enough for him that a thing is right. 
 He will never behave that the carrying out of what is right by 
 right means, can be injurious. And this is the only spirit 
 worthy to be named religious. But as, unhappily, the many are 
 not endowed with so trusting a belief, it is requisite to back the 
 dictates of equity with supplementary arguments. The moral 
 infidehty of the expediency school requires meeting. And it is 
 to those infected by it that the above considerations are com- 
 mended, as showing that they need not fear to exhibit whatever 
 sympathy with democratic principles they possess — need not 
 fear to throw thek energies at once into the popular cause, for 
 that when equitable institutions are equitably obtained, they 
 must necessarily prosper. 
 
 § 13. 
 
 Thus the claim deducible from the law of equal freedom — the 
 claim possessed by each citizen to hke pohtical power with the 
 rest — is not counterbalanced by any of those prudential con- 
 siderations commonly urged against it. We find that so long 
 as selfishness makes government needful at aU, it must make 
 every government corrupt, save one in which aU men are repre- 
 sented. The assertion that conceding universal suffrage would 
 
THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE. 249 
 
 be creating a comparatively immoral constituency, proves to be 
 quite unwarrantable ; seeing that all classes are immoral, and, 
 ■when numbers and circumstances are taken into account, 
 apparently in an equal degree. A glance at the evidence shows 
 that popular ignorance also is a two-edged objection; for, in 
 the knowledge which may be supposed needful for the right 
 use of votes, the mass of those inside the pale of the constitu- 
 tion are about as deficient as those outside of it. The argu- 
 ment that purely representative institutions have been tried and 
 have failed, is not only based upon inappUcable instances, but 
 would prove nothing if substantiated. Lastly, in this, as in 
 other cases, it turns out that the possibihty of fulfilling the 
 injunctions of the moral law is proportionate to the advance 
 men have made towards the moral state ; pohtical arrangements 
 inevitably adjusting themselves to the popular character. So 
 that whilst we may say to the ardent democrats — " Be sure that 
 a democracy will be attained whenever the people are good 
 enough for one" — we may on the other hand say to those of 
 little faith — -"Fear not that a democracy, when peacefully 
 attained, can be attained too soon." 
 
CHAPTEE XXI. 
 
 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 § 1- 
 
 As already said (pp. 207 and 208), moralitj' stands towards 
 government only in the nature of a limitation— behaves nega- 
 tively with regard to it, not positively — replies to all inquiries by 
 silently iudicatiag the conditions of existence, constitution, and 
 conduct, under wliich alone it may be ethically tolerated. And 
 thus, ignoring government altogether, the moral law can give us 
 no direct information as to what a government ought to do — 
 can merely say what it ought not to do. That we are left with 
 no precise knowledge beyond this, may indeed be infeiTed from 
 a preceding chapter. For if, as was shown, every man has a 
 right to secede from the state, and if, as a consequence, the 
 state must be regarded as a body of men voluntaiily associated, 
 there remains nothing to distinguish it in the abstract from any 
 other incorporated society — nothing to determine its specific 
 function ; and we may conceive its members assigning to it any 
 function that does not involve a breach of the moral law. 
 
 Immediate guidance in this matter being thus impossible, we 
 must follow such indirect ways of arriving at the truth as are 
 open to us. The question is no longer one of pure ethics, and 
 is therefore incapable of solution by any exact methods : ap- 
 proximative ones only are available. Fortunately there are 
 several of these ; and converging as they do to the same conclu- 
 sion, that conclusion assumes something like the character of 
 certainty. Let us now successively employ them. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 251 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Good, and perfect, and complete, are words applicable to 
 whatever is thoroughh^ fitted to its purpose ; and by the word 
 moral we signify the same property in a man. A thing which 
 entirely answers its end cannot be improved ; and a man whose 
 nature leads him to a spontaneous fulfilment of the Divine 
 will cannot be conceived better. To be quite self-sufficing — to 
 have powers exactly commensurate with what ought to be 
 done, is to be organically moral. Given the ordained object — 
 happiness ; given the conditions under which this happiness is 
 to be compassed ; and perfection consists in the possession of 
 faculties exactly adapted to these conditions : whilst the moral 
 law is simply a statement of that Une of conduct by which the 
 conditions are satisfied. Hence to the rightly-constituted man 
 aU external help is needless — detrimental even. Just as the 
 healthy body wants no crutch, tonic, or stimulus, but has within 
 itself the means of doing everything required of it, so the 
 normally-developed character asks no artificial aids ; and in- 
 deed repudiates them as pre-occupying the sphere for the exer- 
 cise of faculties which the hypothesis supposes it to have. 
 When, on the other hand, man's constitution and the conditions 
 of his existence are not in harmony there arise external agencies 
 to supply the place of deficient internal faculties. And these 
 temporary substitutes being supplementary to the faculties, and 
 assisting the imperfect man as they do to fulfil the law of his 
 being — the moral law, as we call it — obtain a certain reflex 
 authority from that law, varying with the degree in which they 
 subserve its requirements. Whatever may be its special func- 
 tion, it is clear that govei'nment is one of these artificial aids ; 
 and the most important of them. 
 
 Or the case may perhaps be more clearly stated thus : — If 
 government has any duty at all, that duty must be to perfonn 
 a service of some kind — to confer a benefit. But every possi- 
 
252 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 ble benefit or service which can be rendered to a man is com- 
 prehended under the general expression of assisting him to 
 fulfil the law of his being. Whether you feed the hungrj', or cure 
 the diseased, or defend the weak, or curb the vicious, you do 
 but enable or constrain them to conform to the conditions of 
 complete happiness more nearly than they would otherwise do. 
 And causing conformity to the conditions of complete happi- 
 ness is causing conformity to the moral law. If, therefore, all 
 benefits that can be conferred on men are aids to the fulfilment 
 of the moral law, the benefits to be conferred by government 
 must be of this nature. 
 
 So much being conceded, let us next inquire how the moral 
 law may be most essentially subserved. Practicability mani- 
 festly underhes performance. That which makes an act feasible 
 must take precedence of the act itself Before the injunction — 
 Do this, there necessarily comes the postulate — It can be done. 
 Before establishing a code for the right exercise of faculties, 
 there must be established the condition which makes the exer- 
 cise of faculties possible. Now, this condition which makes 
 the exercise of faculties possible is — power to pursue the ob- 
 jects on which they are to be exercised — the objects of desire ; 
 and tliis is what we otherwise call Uberty of action — fireedom. 
 But that which makes the exercise of faculties possible, is that 
 which makes the fulfilment of the moral law possible. And 
 fi-eedom being thus the grand pre-requisite to the fulfilment of 
 the moral law, it follows that if a man is to be helped in ful- 
 filhng the moral law, the first thing to be done is to secure 
 to him this all-essential freedom. This aid must come before 
 any other aid — is, in fact, that which renders any other aid 
 practicable ; for no faculty to which liberty of action is denied 
 can be assisted in the performance of its function until Uberty 
 of action has been restored. Of all institutions, therefore, 
 which the imperfect man sets up as supplementary to his nature, 
 the chief one must have for its office to guarantee his freedom. 
 But the freedom that can be guaranteed to each is bounded by 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 253 
 
 the like freedom to be guaranteed to all others. This is neces- 
 sitated both by the moral law and by the simultaneous claims 
 made upon the institution itself by its chents. Hence we must 
 infer that it is the function of this chief institution which we 
 call a government, to uphold the law of equal freedom. 
 
 To determine the duty of the state by reverting to a supposed 
 understanding entered into by the founders of society — a social 
 contract — we have already seen to be impracticable (p. 200). 
 Men did not deliberately estabhsh pohtical arrangements, but 
 grew into them unconsciously — probably had no conception of 
 an associated condition until they found themselves in it. 
 Moreover, were the hypothesis of an original agreement reason- 
 able, it could not help us ; for it would be folly to assume that 
 the duties imposed by a horde of savages on their cliief, or 
 council of chiefs, must necessarily be the duties of governments 
 throughout all time. Nevertheless, if, instead of speculating as 
 to what might have happened during the infancy of civilization, 
 we consider what mws^ have happened, something may be learnt. 
 On turning to page 203, the reader will find it argued at length 
 that for men to have remained in the associated state imphes , 
 that on the whole they found it preferable to the isolated one ;' 
 which means that they obtained a greater sum total of gratifi- 
 cation under it ; which means that it afforded them fuller exer- 
 cise for their faculties ; wliich means that it offered a safer 
 guarantee for such exercise — more security for their claims to 
 life and property; that is, for their rights. But if men could 
 have continued in the associated state only because on the 
 average it insured their rights better than the previous one, 
 then the insurance of their rights becomes the special duty 
 which society in its corporate capacity has to perform towards 
 individuals. That function by which a thing begins to exist 
 we may safely consider its all-essential function. Now, whilst 
 those majiy aids to gratification which civilization has brought 
 us were yet undeveloped, society must have existed only because 
 it protected its members in the pursuit of those things which 
 afford satisfaction to the faculties. But to protect men in the 
 
254 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 pursuit of those things -which afford satisfaction to the facylties 
 is to maintain their rights. And if it was by maintaining the 
 rights of its members that society began to be, then to maintain 
 their rights must ever be regarded as its primary duty. 
 
 Further confirmation may be drawn from the universal 
 practice of mankind in this matter. Widely as people have 
 differed respecting the proper bounds of legislative superin- 
 tendence, all have held them to include the defence of the sub- 
 ject against aggression. Whilst, in various countries and times, 
 a hundred different functions have been assigned to the state — 
 whilst there have probably been no two governments that have 
 entirely agreed in the number and nature of their functions — 
 whilst the things specially attended to by some have been 
 wholly neglected by others, and thereby proved non-essential, 
 there is one office — that of protector — which has been common 
 to them all. Did this fact stand alone it might bv a stretch of 
 incredulity be construed into an accident But coinciding as it 
 does -with the foregoing inferences drawn from the nature of man's 
 constitution and the necessary origin of society, we may safely 
 take it as a further evidence that the duty of the state is — to 
 protect — to enforce the law of equal freedom ; to maintain 
 men's rights, or, as we commonly express it— to administer 
 justice. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 The question — What is the thing to be done by a govern- 
 ment ? being answered, there arises the other — Which is the 
 most efficient mode of doing it ? To the proposition— the ad- 
 ministration of justice is the special duty of the state, there 
 hangs the corollary— the state ought to employ the best 
 methods of fuliilhng that duty ; and this brings us to the 
 inquiry — "What are they ? 
 
 By our hypothesis the connection of each individual with 
 the community as poUtically organized, must be voluntary. 
 In virtue of its very office an institution which proposes to 
 guarantee a man's freedom to exercise his faculties, can onlv 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 255 
 
 tender its services to liim ; cannot coerce him into the accept- 
 ance of them. If it does it becomes self-contradicting — vio- 
 lates that very freedom which it proposes to maintain. Citi- 
 zenship then being -willingly assumed, we must inquire what 
 agreement is thereby tacitly entered into between the state and 
 its members. Two things are conceivable. There may either 
 be an understanding that whoever applies to the judicial power 
 for assistance shall defray the costs thereupon incurred by it 
 on his behalf, or it may be provided that the payment of a 
 constant contribution towards the expenses of this judicial 
 power shall entitle the contributor to its services whenever he 
 needs them. The first of these arrangements does not seem 
 altogether practicable ; the other is one to wliich existing sys- 
 tems partially assimilate. In either case, however, it is taken 
 for gi'anted that the parties will duly fulfil their promises ; that 
 equivalents of protection and taxation shall be exchanged; that, 
 on the one side, if the individual chooses to avail liimself of 
 state guardianship, he shall not refuse his fair share of state 
 burdens ; and on the other, that when the state has imposed the 
 burdens it shall not withhold the guardiansliip. 
 
 Self-evident as is this interpretation of the agreement, which 
 citizenship presupposes, judicial practice is but little guided 
 by it. Our system of jurisprudence takes a very one-sided 
 view of the matter. It is indeed stringent enougli in enforc- 
 ing the claim of the state against the subject ; but as to the 
 reciprocal claim of the subject against the state it is compara- 
 tively careless. That it recognises the title of the tax-payer 
 to protection is true ; but it is also true that it does this but 
 partially. From certain infringements of rights, arbitrarily 
 classed as criminal, it is ready to defend every complainant ; but 
 against others, not so classed, it leaves every one to defend 
 himself The most trifling injury, if inflicted in a specified 
 manner, is cognizable by the magistrate, and redress may be 
 obtained free of charge; but if othei-wise inflicted, the injury, 
 no matter how serious, must be passively borne, unless the suf- 
 ferer has plenty of money and a sufficiency of daring. Let a 
 
256 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 man have his hat knocked over his eyes, and the law will 
 zealously espouse his cause — will mulct his assailant in a fine 
 and costs, and will do this without charge. But if, instead of 
 having been bonneted, he has been wrongfully imprisoned, he 
 is politely referred to a solicitor, with the information that the 
 offence committed against him is actionable : which means, that 
 if rich he may play double or quits with Fate ; and that if poor 
 he must go without even this chance of compensation. Against 
 picking of pockets, as ordinarily practised, the ruhng power 
 grants its lieges gratuitous protection; but pockets may be 
 picked in various indirect ways, and it will idly look on unless 
 costly means are taken to interest it. It will rush to the de- 
 fence of one who has been deprived of a few turnips by a 
 half- starved tramp ; but as to the estate on which these tur- 
 nips grew, that may be stolen without risk, so long as the 
 despoiled owner is left friendless and penny less'. Some com- 
 plaints need only to be whispered, and it forthwith plays the 
 parts of constable, lawyer, judge, and gaoler; whilst to others 
 it turns a deaf ear unless they are made through its bribed 
 hangers-on. Now it is the injured man's champion ; and now 
 it throws down its weapons to sit as umpire, whilst oppressor 
 and oppressed run a tilt at each other- Over such and such 
 portions of a citizen's rights it mounts guard and cries — " Wlio 
 goes there ? " to every intruder ; but upon the rest any one may 
 trample without fear of being challenged by it. 
 
 To a man with perceptions unblunted by custom, this mode 
 of carrying out the agreement subsisting between himself and 
 the state, would seem strange enough. It is not impossible that 
 he might call the transaction a swindle ; might argue that his 
 property had been taken ii-om him under false pretences. " To 
 what purpose," he might ask, " did I submit myself to your 
 laws, if I am now to be denied the advantages promised in 
 
 ^ It is trne that a plaintiff who can swear that he is not worth £5 may sue in 
 forma paupei-is. But this privilege is almost a dead letter. Actions sn instituted 
 are usually found to fail, because those who conduct them, having to plead 
 gratuitously, plead carelessly. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 257 
 
 Tetum ? Have I not complied with all the stipulations ? You 
 demanded allegiance, and I gave it. You said money was 
 needful, ajid I paid the uttermost farthing of your exactions, 
 heavy as they were. You required me to fulfil certain civil 
 functions, and I fulfilled them cheerfully. Yet now when I 
 ask you to give me that for which I made these sacrifices, you 
 shuffle. I supposed you were to act the part of an Argus- 
 eyed and Briareus- armed guardian, ever watching over my in- 
 terests, ever ready to step in and defend them ; so that -whether 
 sleeping or waking, absorbed in business or immersed in plea- 
 sure, I might have the gratifying consciousness of being care- 
 fully shielded from injury. Now, however, I find, not only 
 that my rights may be trespassed upon in many ways without 
 attracting your notice, but that even when I tell you I have 
 been wronged, and demand your interposition, you shut the 
 door in my face, and will not hsten until I have exorbitantly 
 feed some of the servants who have access to your private ear. 
 What am I to understand by this ? Is it that your revenue 
 is insufficient to defray the cost of dispensing justice in all 
 cases ? If so, why not say as much, and let us increase it ? 
 Is it that you cannot accomphsh what you profess? If so, 
 declare candidly what you are able to do, and what not. But 
 at any rate let us have some inteUigible understanding, and 
 not this jumble of contradictions — this conflict of promise and 
 performance — this taking of the pay without doing the duty." 
 
 § 4. 
 
 That men should sit down so a,pathetically as they do under 
 the present corrupt administration of justice, is not a little re- 
 markable. That we, with aU our jealousy of abuses ; with all 
 our opportunities of canvassing, blaming, and amending the 
 acts of the . legislature ; vnth all our readiness to organize 
 and a^tate; with the Anti-Com-Law, Slavery- Abohtion, and 
 CathoUc-Emancipation victories fresh in remembrance; that 
 we, the independent, determined, self-niUng Enghsh, should 
 
258 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 daily behold the giant abominations of our judicial system, and 
 yet do nothing to rectify them, is really quite incomprehen- 
 sible. It is not as though the facts were disputed; all men 
 are agreed upon them. The dangers of law are proverbial. 
 The names of its officers are used as synonymes for trickery 
 and greediness. The decisions of its courts are typical of 
 chance. In all companies you hear but one opinion, and each 
 person confirms it by a fresh illustration. Now you are in- 
 formed of d£300 having been expended in the recovery of forty 
 shiUings' worth of property ; and again of a cause that was 
 lost because an affirmation could not be received in place of 
 an oath. A right-hand neighbour can teU you of a judge who 
 allowed an indictment to be objected to, on the plea that the 
 words, "in the year of our Lord," were not inserted before the 
 date; and another to your left narrates how a thief lately 
 tried for steahng a guinea-pig was acquitted, because a guinea- 
 pig was shown to be a kind of rat, and a rat could not be 
 property. At one moment the story is of a poor man whose 
 rich enemy has deUberately ruined him by tempting him into 
 htigation ; and at the next it is of a child who has been kept 
 in prison for six weeks, in default of sureties for her appear- 
 ance as witness against one who had assaulted her^. This 
 gentleman has been cheated out of half his property, but dared 
 not attempt to recover it for fear of losing more; whilst his 
 less prudent companion can parallel the experience of him 
 who said that he had only twice been on the verge of ruin ; 
 once when he had lost a law-suit, and once when he had 
 gained one. On all sides you are told of trickery and oppres- 
 sion, and revenge, committed in the name of justice; of wrongs 
 endured for want of money wherewith to purchase redress ; oi 
 rights unclaimed because contention with the powerful usurper 
 was useless; of chancery-suits that outlasted the lives of the 
 smtors ; of fortunes swallowed up in settUng a title ; of estates 
 lost by an informality. And then comes a catalogue of vie- 
 
 The case occurred at Winchester in July, 1849. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 259 
 
 tims — of those who have trusted and been deceived; gray- 
 headed men whose hardly-earned savings went to fatten the 
 attorney; threadbare and hollow-cheeked insolvents who lost 
 all in the attempt to get their due ; some who had been re- 
 duced to subsist on the charity of friends; others who had 
 died the death of a pauper; with not a few whose anxieties 
 had produced insanity, or who in their desperation had com- 
 mitted suicide. Yet, whilst all parties echo each others' excla- 
 mations of disgust, these iniquities continue unchecked ! 
 
 § 5. 
 
 There are not wanting, however, men who defend this state 
 of things — who actually argue that government should perform 
 but imperfectly what they allow to be its special function. 
 Whilst, on the one hand, they admit that administration of jus- 
 tice is the vital necessity of civihzed Ufe, they maintain, on the 
 other, that justice may be administered too well ! " For," say 
 they, "were law cheap, aU men would avail themselves of it. Did 
 there exist no difficulty in obtaining justice, justice would be 
 demanded in every case of violated rights. Ten times as many 
 appeals would be made to the authorities as now. Men would 
 rush into legal proceedings on the sUghtest provocation ; and 
 litigation would be so enormously increased as to make the 
 remedy worse than the disease." 
 
 Such is the arg^ument ; an arg^ument involving either a gross 
 absurdity or an unwarrantable assumption. For obsei^ve : 
 when this great multiplication of law proceedings under a 
 gratuitous administration of justice is urged as a reason why 
 things should remain as they are, it is implied that the evils 
 attendant upon the rectification of all wrongs, would be greater 
 than are the evils attendant upon submission to those wrongs. 
 Either the great majority of civil aggressions must be home 
 in silence as now, or must be adjudicated upon as then ; and 
 the allegation is that the first alternative is preferable. But if 
 ten thousand litigations are worse than ten thousand injus- 
 
 s 2 
 
260 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 tices, then one litigation is worse than one injustice. ^Vhich 
 means that, as a general princiiDle, an appeal to the law for 
 protection is a greater evil than the trespass complained of. 
 Which means that it would he hetter to have no administration 
 of justice at all ! If for the sake of escaping this absurdity it be 
 assumed that, as things now are, all great wrongs are rectified, — 
 that the costhness of law prevents insignificant ones only from 
 being brought into court, and that consequently the above 
 inference cannot be drawn, — then, either denial is given to the 
 obvious fact that, by the poverty they inflict, many of the 
 greatest wrongs incapacitate their victims from obtaining re- 
 dress, and to the obvious fact that the civil injuries suffered 
 by the masses, though absolutely small, are relatively great; 
 or else it is taken for granted that on nine-tenths of the popu- 
 lation, who are too poor to institute legal proceedings, no civil 
 injuries of moment are ever inflicted ! 
 
 Nor is this all. It is not necessarily true that making the 
 law easy of access would increase litigation. An opposite 
 effect might be produced. The prophecy is vitiated by that 
 very common mistake of calculating the, result of some new 
 arrangement on the assumption that all other things would 
 remain as they are. It is taken for granted that under the 
 hypothetical regime just as many transgressions would occur 
 as at present. Whereas any candid observer can see that most 
 of the civil offences now committed, are committed in conse- 
 quence of the inefficiency of om- judicial system ; 
 
 " For sparing justice feeds iniquity." 
 
 It is the difficulty that he knows there will be in convicting 
 him which tempts the knave to behave knavislily. Were not 
 the law so expensive and so uncertain, dishonest traders would 
 never risk tlie many violations of it they now do. The tres- 
 passes of the wealthy against tlie poor would be rare, were it 
 not that the aggrieved have practically no remedy. Mark how, 
 to the man who contemplates wronging his fellow, our legal 
 system holds out promises of impunity. Should his proposed 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 261 
 
 victim be one of small means, there is the likehhood that he 
 will not be able to carry on a law-suit : here is encouragement. 
 Should he possess enough money, why, even then, having, like 
 most people, a great dread of Utigation, he will probably bear 
 his loss unresistingly : here is further encouragement. Lastly, 
 our plotter remembers that, should his victim venture an action, 
 judicial decisions are very much matters of accident, and that 
 the guilty are often rescued by clever counsel: here is still 
 more encouragement. And so, all things considered, he de- 
 termines to chance it. Now, he would never decide thus were 
 legal protection efficient. Were the administration of law 
 prompt, gratuitous, and certain, those probabilities and possi- 
 bilities which now beckon him on to fraudulent acts would 
 vanish. Civil injiuries wittingly committed would almost cease. 
 Only in cases where both parties sincerely believed themselves 
 right, would judicial arbitration be caUed for; and the number 
 of such cases is comparatively small. Litigation, therefore, 
 so far from inco'easing on justice being made easy of obtain- 
 ment, would probably decrease. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 But, after aU, it is not the setting up of this or that system of 
 jurisprudence which causes the intercourse of men with eacli 
 other to be equitable or otherwise. The matter Ues deeper. 
 As with forms of government, so with forms of law ; it is the 
 national character that decides. The power of an apparatus 
 primarily depends, not on the ingenuity of its design, but on 
 the strength of its materials. Be his plan never so well de- 
 vised — his arrangement of struts, and ties, and bolts, never so 
 good — his balance of forces never so perfect — yet if our engineer 
 has not considered whether the respective parts of his structure 
 will bear the strain to be put upon them, we must call him a 
 bungler. Similarly with the institution-maker. If the people 
 with whom he has to deal are not of the requisite quahty, no 
 cleverness in his contrivance wiU avail anything. Let us never 
 
262 THK DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 forget that institutions are made of men; that men are the 
 struts, ties, and bolts, out of which they are framed ; and that, 
 dovetail and brace them together as we may, it is their nature 
 which must finally determine whether the institutions can stand. 
 Always there will be some line of least resistance, along which, 
 if the humanity they are wrought out of be not strong enough, 
 they will give way; and having given way, will sink down into 
 a less trying attitude. Thus it is, amongst other things, with 
 judicial mechanisms. No matter how admirably devised, their 
 results will be good only in proportion as the nation is good. 
 The instrumentalities by which they are to act — -judges, juries, 
 constables, witnesses, gaolers, and the rest — must be units of 
 the people — will, on the average, be marked by the same imper- 
 fections as the people ; and though the system they are set to 
 work out be perfect, yet wiU the badness of their characters 
 degrade its acts down to a level with the general conduct of 
 society. 
 
 That justice can be well administered only in proportion as 
 men become just, is a fact too generally overlooked. "If they 
 had but trial by jury ! " says some one, moralizing on the Rus- 
 sians. But they can't have it. It could not exist amongst 
 them. Even if established it would not work. They lack that 
 substratum of honesty and truthfulness on wliich alone it can 
 stand. To be of use, this, like any other institution, must be 
 bom of the popular character. It is not trial by jury tliat 
 produces justice, but it is the sentiment of justice that pro- 
 duces trial by jury, as the organ through which it is to act; 
 and the organ wiU be inert unless the sentiment is there. 
 These social forms which we regard as so potential, are things 
 of quite secondary importance. What mattered it that the 
 Roman plebeians were endowed with certain privileges, when 
 the patricians prevented them from exercising those privileges 
 by ill-treatment carried even to the death ? What mattered it 
 that oui- statute-book contained equitable provisions, and that 
 officei-s were appointed to enforce them, when there needed a 
 Magna Charta to demand that justice should neither be sold, 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 263 
 
 denied, nor delayed ? What matters it even now, that all men 
 are declared equal hefore the law, when magistrates are swayed 
 by class sympathies, and treat a gentleman more leniently than 
 an artizan ? If we think that we can rectify the relationships 
 of men at will, we deceive ourselves. What Sir James Mackin- 
 tosh says of constitutions — that they are not made, but grow, 
 applies to all social arrangements. It is not true that once 
 upon a time men said — " Let there be law " ; and there was law. 
 Administration of justice was originally impracticable, Utopian; 
 and has become more and more practicable only as men have 
 become less savage. The old system of settling disputes by 
 personal contest, and the new system of settling them by state 
 arbitration, have coexisted throughout all ages ; the one httle 
 by little usurping the place of the other, outgrowing it. It 
 was only after some advance had been made that the civil 
 power could get recognised at all as a maintainer of rights. 
 The feudal baron with castle and retainers maintained his own 
 rights, and would have considered himself disgraced by asking 
 legal aid. Even after he had agreed to regard his suzerain as 
 umpire, it was still in the Hsts, and by the strength of his arm 
 and his lance, that he made good his cause. And when we 
 remember that equally amongst lords and labourers this prac- 
 tice lingers even now — that we have stiU duels, which it is 
 thought dishonourable for a gentleman to avoid by applying 
 to a magistrate — that we have still pugilistic fights, which the 
 people try to hide from the poUce — we are taught that it is 
 impossible for a judicial system to become efficient faster than 
 men become good. It is only after public morality has gained 
 a certain ascendancy, that the civil power gets strong enough 
 to perform its simplest functions. Before this it cannot even 
 put down banditti ; border forays continue in spite of it ; and 
 it is bearded in its very strongholds, as, amongst ourselves, 
 by the thieves of Whitefriars but two centuries ago. Under 
 early governments the officers of law are less friends than ene- 
 mies. Legal forms are habitually used for purposes of oppres- 
 sion. Causes are decided by favouritism, bribery, and back- 
 
264 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 Stairs intrigue. The judicial apparatus breaks down under the 
 work it has to do, and shows us in a Jonathan Wild, a Judge 
 Jeffries, and even a Lord Chancellor Bacon, how inevitably its 
 several parts are rendered inoperative by a generally-diffused 
 wickedness. 
 
 Of course the efficiency of present and future systems of 
 jurisprudence must be determined by the same influences. 
 Of our own legal arrangements we may say, what Emerson 
 has well said of institutions generally — that they are about 
 as good as the characters of men permit them to be. When 
 we read of Orange magistrates who become aggressors rather 
 than protectors ; of policemen who conspire with each other to 
 obtain convictions that they may be promoted ; and of the late 
 Palace Court, whose officers habitually favoured the plaintiff 
 with the view of inducing men to enter suits there, we find 
 that now, as of old, judicial protection is vitiated by the 
 depravity of the age. Nevertheless it is probable that we 
 are ripe for something better than we have. The universal 
 disgust with which law is regarded, may be taken as evidence 
 of this — as evidence, moreover, that a change is at hand. But 
 it is not likely that the mode of administering justice lately 
 pointed out as the proper one is immediately feasible ; seeing 
 that men, by not having yet even recognised it as theoretically 
 right, show themselves considerably below the state to which it 
 is natural. This, however, is no reason for not advocating its 
 adoption. For, what was said in the last chapter respecting an 
 equitable form of government, may be here said respecting an 
 equitable system of law ; that the power quietly to establish it 
 is the measure of its practicability. 
 
 § V. 
 
 By dispersing that haze of political superstition through 
 which the state and its appendages loom so large, the fore- 
 going considerations suggest a somewhat starthng question. 
 For if when men's savageness and dishonesty render the ad- 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 265 
 
 ministration of justice most necessary, it is impossible ; if it 
 becomes possible only in proportion as men themselves become 
 just; and if that same universal uprightness, which permits 
 the administration of justice to become perfect, also makes it 
 needless, as it evidently must, then we may naturally ask — 
 Can the state really administer justice at all ? Does it, looking 
 at society as a whole, secure to the people any fuller enjoyment 
 of their rights than they would have without it ? May we not 
 conclude that it takes away from men's liberties in one direc- 
 tion, as much as it gives in another ? Is it not a mere dead 
 mechanism worked by a nation's moral sense ; neither adding 
 to, nor deducting from, the force of that moral sense ; and con- 
 sequently unable to alter the sum-total of its effects ? 
 
 A strange idea, this, some wiU think ; and so at first sight 
 it seems. We have such a habit of regarding government in 
 its protective character, and forgetting its aggressive one, that 
 to ask whether the rights it secures are not about balanced by 
 the rights it violates, seems almost laughable. Nevertheless we 
 shall find that on drawing up a debtor and creditor account, 
 the absurdity of the doubt disappears. Passing over those 
 ruling powers of the East, which, in return for the small amount 
 of security they guarantee, are in the habit of confiscating, 
 under one pretence or other, any property not efficiently con- 
 cealed by the unfortunate owners, and which, in some cases, 
 push their exactions so far as to have to give back for seed in 
 the spring a part of that crop they had taken from the husband- 
 man at the previous harvest — passing over, too, those middle-age 
 systems of government under which protection, such as it was, 
 had to be purchased by the resignation of personal freedom, let 
 us institute as favourable a comparison as possible. Let us 
 take the relatively good governments we now know, and setting 
 down on the one side the benefits conferred, and on the other 
 the evils inflicted, let us strike a balance between them. Under 
 the head of obligations may be entered the efBcient curb which 
 our poUce system puts upon offences against person and pro- 
 perty ; our courts of law, too, with all their defects, afford a 
 
266 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 partial defence against civil injuries which needs setting down 
 in the estimate ; and to these must be added what far outweigh 
 them both— that sense of habitual security, and that consequent 
 abihty to fearlessly carry on the business of life, which are pro- 
 duced by the mere presence of an active civil power. Even 
 after deducting from these a heavy discount on the score of 
 shortcomings, there unquestionably remains a large surplus of 
 benefit for which the state may claim credit. Turn we now to 
 the iier contra statement. As the first item on the list there 
 stands that gigantic injustice inflicted upon nineteen-twentieths 
 of the community by the usurpation of the soil— by the breach 
 of their rights to the use of the earth (Chap. IX.). For this 
 the civil power is responsible — has itself been a party to the 
 aggression — has made it legal, and stiU defends it as right. 
 N ext comes the trespass committed against the many by sub- 
 ordinating them to the few, and forcing them to obey laws to 
 which their consent was never asked. Note again the tyrannies 
 accompanying national defence — the impressments and militia- 
 drawings, tlie continuous abnegation of liberty in the persons 
 of soldiers and sailors, ending not unfrequently in the sacrifice 
 of their lives. Eemember also how our rights are trenched 
 upon by commercial restrictions ; and how men are not only 
 prevented from buying and selhng where they please, but are 
 debarred from following certain occupations until they have 
 bought government permits. Nor let us forget the penalties 
 that until lately so seriously transgressed rehgious freedom — 
 penalties which, as the Anti-State-Church Association can show, 
 have by no means disappeared. And all these, together with 
 the many minor restrictions hedging us about, are accompanied 
 by those never-ceasing incursions made upon our property by 
 the tax-gatherer and the officers of customs and excise, by poor- 
 rate collectors and churchwardens. Measuring wrongs, as we 
 must, by the degree in which they limit the exercise of faculties, 
 let us now add up the two accounts and contrast thefr sum- 
 totals. On the one side government partially saves us (only par- 
 tially, mind) from those assaults, robberies, murders, clieatings. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 267 
 
 and kindred injuries, to which, were there no such institution, 
 the existing immorality of men would expose us. These we 
 must imagine to he distrihuted over the community at large, 
 and over the Ufe of each citizen, and then conceive to what 
 average restriction on the free exercise of faculties they Avould 
 be equivalent. On the other side government itself transgresses 
 men's liberties by the monopoly of land, by the usurpation of 
 power, by restrictions on trade, by the slavery and death of 
 thousands of soldiers, by the ruin of hundreds it ought to 
 protect, by favouritism to creeds and classes, by the civU 
 functions it makes imperative, by petty restraints too numerous 
 to name, but above all by a remorseless taxation, which, affecting 
 seven-eighths of the nation as it does by abstracting a large per- 
 centage from earnings already insufficient for necessaries, virtu- 
 ally obliterates, in great measure, the spheres needed for the 
 development of their natures. We have now to suppose these 
 marufold hmitations to the free exercise of faculties averaged 
 like the others, and then to ask ourselves whether the two 
 averages are, or are not, equal. Is the question after all so 
 very in-ational ? Is not the answer doubtful ? 
 
 Nay, indeed ; consider it rightly and the answer is not at aU 
 doubtful. It is very certain that government can not alter the 
 total amount of injustice committed. The absurdity is in sup- 
 posing that it can — in supposing that by some ingenious 
 artifice we may avoid the consequences of our own natures. 
 The civil power no more does what to the careless eye it seems 
 to do, than the juggler really performs his apparent miracles. 
 It is impossible for man to create force. He can only alter the 
 mode of its manifestation, its direction, its distribution. The 
 power that propels his steamboats and locomotives is not of his 
 making ; it was all lying latent in the coal. He telegraphs by 
 an agent set free during the oxidation of zinc ; but of which no 
 more is obtained than is due to the number of atoms that have 
 combined. The very energy he expends in moving Ms arm is 
 generated by the chemical affinities of the food he eats. In no 
 case can he do anything but avail himself of dormant forces. 
 
268 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 This is as true in ethics as in physics. Moral feeling is a 
 force — a force by which men's actions are restrained within 
 certain prescribed bounds; and no legislative mechanism can 
 increase its results one iota. By how much this force is 
 deficient, by so much must its work remain undone. In what- 
 ever degree we lack the qualities needful for our state, in the 
 same degree must we suffer. Nature will not be cheated. 
 Whoso should think to escape the influence of gravitation by 
 throwing bis limbs into some peculiar attitude, would not be 
 more deceived than are those who hope to avoid the weight of 
 their depravity by arranging themselves into this or tliat form 
 of political organization. Every jot of the evil must in one 
 way or other be borne — consciously or unconsciously; either in 
 a shape that is recognised, or else under some disguise. No 
 philosopher's stone of a constitution can produce golden conduct 
 from leaden instincts. No apparatus of senators, judges, and 
 police, can compensate for the want of an internal governing 
 sentiment. No legislative manipulation can eke out an insuffi- 
 cient morality into a sufficient one. No administrative sleight 
 of hand can save us fi:om ourselves. 
 
 But must not this imply that government is of no use what- 
 ever ? Not at all. Although unable to alter the sum-total of 
 injustice to be supported, it can still alter its distribution. 
 And this is what it really does. By its aid, men to a consider- 
 able extent equalize the evil they have to bear — spread it out 
 more uniformly over the whole community, and over the life of 
 each citizen. Entire freedom to exercise the faculties, inter- 
 rupted by entire deprivations of it, and marred by the perpetual 
 danger of these deprivations, is exchanged for a freedom on 
 which the restrictions are constant but partial. Instead of 
 those losses of life, of limb, or of the means of subsistence, 
 which, under a state of anarchy, all are liable to, and many 
 suffer, a political organization commits universal aggressions of 
 a comparatively mild type. Wrongs that were before occasional, 
 but crushing, are now unceasing, but bearable. The system is 
 one of mutual assurance against moral disastere. Just as men. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 2G9 
 
 whilst they cannot prevent fires and shipwrecks, can yet gua- 
 rantee each other against ruin from these, by bearing them in 
 common, and distiibuting the injuries entailed over long pe- 
 riods of time; so, although by uniting together for judicial 
 purposes men cannot diminish the amount of injustice to be 
 borne, they can, and do, insure themselves against its otherwise 
 fatal results. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 When we agreed that it was the essential function of tlie 
 state to protect — to administer the law of equal freedom — to 
 maintain men's rights — we virtually assigned to it the duty, not 
 only of shielding each citizen from the trespasses of his neigh- 
 bours, but of defending him, in common with the community 
 at large, against foreign aggressions. An invading force may 
 violate people's rights as much as, or far more than, an equal 
 body of felons ; and our definition requires that government 
 shall resist transgression in the one case as much as in the 
 other. .-'Protection, — this is what men seek by poUtical com- 
 bination ; and ^whether it he against internal or external enemies 
 matters not. /Unquestionably war is immoral. But so like- 
 wise is the violence used in the execution of justice; so is all 
 coercion. Ethical law is as certainly broken by the deeds of 
 judicial authorities as by those of a defensive army. There is, 
 in principle, no difference whatever between the blow of a 
 pohceman's baton and the thrust of a soldier's bayonet. Both 
 are infractions of the law of equal freedom in the persons of 
 those injured. In either case we have force sufiicient to pro- 
 duce submission ; and it matters not whether that force be 
 employed by a man in red, or by one in blue. Pohcemen are 
 soldiers who act alone : soldiers are pohcemen who act in 
 unison. Government employs the first to attack in detail ten 
 thousand criminals who separately make war upon society; 
 and it calls in the last when threatened by a Hke number of 
 criminals in the shape of drilled ti'oops. Kesistauce to foreign 
 
270 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 foes and resistance to native ones having consequently the 
 same object — the maintenance of men's rights, and being 
 effected by the same means — force, are in their nature identical, 
 and no greater condemnation can be passed upon the one than 
 upon the other. The doings of the battle-field merely exhibit 
 in a concentrated form that immoraUty which is ^ inherent in 
 government, and attaches to all its functions. What is so 
 manifest in its military acts is true of its civil acts, that it uses 
 ■wrong to put down wrong. 
 
 Defensive warfare (and of course it is solely to this that the 
 foregoing argument applies) must therefore be tolerated as the 
 least of two evils. There are indeed some who unconditionally 
 condemn it, and would meet invasion by non-resistance. To 
 such there are several repUes. 
 
 First, consistency requires them to behave in hke fashion to 
 their fellow-citizens. They must not only allow themselves 
 to be cheated, assaulted, robbed, wounded, without offering 
 active opposition, but must refuse help from the civil power ; 
 seeing that they who employ force by proxy, are as much re- 
 sponsible for that force as though they employed it them- 
 selves. 
 
 Again, such a theory makes pacific relationships between 
 men and nations look needlessly Utopian. If all agree not to 
 aggress, they must as certainly be at peace mth each other as 
 though they had all agreed not to resist. So that, whilst it 
 sets up so difficult a standard of behaviour, the rule of non- 
 resistance is not one whit more efficient as a preventive of war, 
 than the rule of non-aggression. 
 
 Moreover this principle of non-resistance is not deducible from 
 the moral law. The moral law says — Do not aggress. It can- 
 not say — Do not resist ; for to say this would be to presup- 
 pose its own precepts broken. As explained at the outset 
 (Chap. I.), Morality describes the conduct of perfect men; and 
 cannot include in its premises circumstances that arise from 
 imperfection. That rule which attains to universal sway when 
 all men are what they ought to be, must be the right rule. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 271 
 
 must it not ? And that rule which then becomes impossible of 
 fulfilment must be the wrong one ? Well ; in an ideal state 
 the law of non-aggression is obeyed by all — is the vital prin- 
 ciple of every one's conduct — is fully carried out, reigns, lives ; 
 whereas in such a state the law of non-resistance necessarily 
 becomes a dead letter. 
 
 Lastly, it can be shown that non-resistance is absolutely 
 wrong. We may not carelessly abandon our rights. We may 
 not give away our birthright for the sake of peace. If it be 
 a duty to respect other men's claims, so also is it a duty to 
 maintain our own. That which is sacred in their persons is 
 sacred in oin-s also. Have we not a faculty which makes us 
 feel and assert our title to freedom of action, at the same time 
 that, by a reflex process, it enables us to appreciate the like title 
 in our fellows ? Did we not find that this faculty can act 
 strongly on behalf of others, only when it acts strongly on our 
 own behalf (p. 98) ? And must we assume that, whilst its 
 sympathetic promptings are to he diligently listened to, its 
 direct ones are to be disregarded ? To suppose this, is to 
 suppose an incurable defect in our moral constitution — is to 
 suppose that the very sentiment intended to lead us will itself 
 mislead us. No : we may not be passive under aggression. In 
 the due maintenance of our claims is involved the practicability 
 of aU our duties. Without Uherty of action, without rights, 
 we cannot fuUy exercise our faculties; and if we cannot fully 
 exercise our faculties we cannot fulfil the Divine will ; and if 
 we allow ourselves to be deprived of that without which we can- 
 not fulfil the Divine will, we virtually neglect that wiU. 
 
 But how, if all coercion is immoral ? WiU it notfoUow that 
 it is immoral to use violence in opposing a trespasser ? Cer- 
 tainly. Then either alternative is wrong ? Just so : the law of 
 right conduct has been broken, and this dilemma is the con- 
 sequence. Action; and reaction are equal. The blow dealt at 
 morality in the person of the injured cannot end with itself: 
 there must be .a corresponding recoil. The first evil gives rise 
 to an equivalent second, whether it is met by resistance or not. 
 
272 THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 
 
 The assertion looks strange — will perhaps be incredible to many ; 
 nevertheless it must be made. And all we can say of this 
 seeming paradox is, that it shows how actions lapse into a moral 
 chaos when once the equilibrium of men's relationships is de- 
 stroyed. 
 
 Thus we find that the principle of non-resistance is not 
 ethically true, but only that of non-aggi-ession — that hence 
 a government is justified in taking up a defensive attitude to- 
 wards foreign enemies — and that the abstract criminahty un- 
 doubtedly attaching to such a proceeding is the same criminahty 
 which pervades the administration of justice, is the same crimi- 
 nality of which government is itself a consequence. 
 
 § 9. 
 
 Of international arbitration we must say, as of a free con- 
 stitution, or a good system of jurisprudence, that its possibiHty 
 is a question of time. The same causes which once rendered 
 all government impossible have hitherto forbidden this widest 
 extension of it. A federation of peoples — a universal society, 
 can exist only when man's adaptation to the social state has be- 
 come tolerably complete. We have already seen (p. 197), that 
 in the earhest stage of eivihzation, when the repulsive force is 
 strong, and the aggregative force weak, only small communities 
 are possible ; a modification of character causes these tribes, and 
 satrapies, and gientes, and feudal lordships, and clans, gradually to 
 coalesce into nations ; and a still further modification wiU aUow of 
 a still further union. That the time for this is now drawing 
 nigh, seems probable. We may gather as much from the favour 
 with which such an arrangement is regarded. The recognition 
 of its desirableness foreshadows its realization. In peace so- 
 cieties, in proposals for simultaneous disarmment, in interna- 
 tional visits and addresses, and in the frequency with which 
 friendly interventions now occur, we may see that humanity is 
 fast growing towards such a consummation. Though hitherto 
 impracticable, and perhaps impracticable at the present moment. 
 
THE DUTY OF THE STATE. 273 
 
 a brotherhood of nations is being made practicable by the very 
 efforts used to bring it about. These philantliropic enthusiasms, 
 ■which the worldly-wise think so ridiculous, are essential parts 
 of the process by which the desideratum is being wrought out. 
 Perhaps no fact is more significant of the change going on than 
 the spread of that non-resistance theory lately noticed. That 
 ■we should find sprinkled amongst us, men, who from the desire 
 to receive this ultra-humane doctrine do violence to their per- 
 ceptions of what is due to themselves, cannot but aiFord matter 
 for congratulation. Unsound as the idea may be, its origin is 
 good. It is a redundant utterance of that sympathy which 
 transforms the savage man into the social man, the brutal into 
 the benevolent, the unjust into the just; and, taken in con- 
 junction -with other signs of the times, prophesies that a better 
 relationship between nations is approaching. Meanwhile, hi 
 looking forward to some all-embracing federal arrangement, we 
 must keep in mind that the stability of so complicated a political 
 organization depends, not upon the fitness of one nation but 
 upon the fitness of many. 
 
CHAPTEE XXII. 
 
 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DDTY. 
 § 1- 
 
 Pa function to each organ, and each organ to its own function, 
 ,^is the law of all organization. To do its work well, an appa- 
 ratus must possess special fitness for that work ; and this will 
 amount to wMfitness for any other work. The lungs cannot di- 
 gest, the heart cannot respire, the stomach cannot propel blood. 
 Each muscle and each gland must have its own particular 
 nerve. There is not a fibre in the body but what has a chan- 
 nel to bring it food, a channel to take its food away, an agency 
 for causing it to assimilate nutriment, an agency for stimulat- 
 ing it to perform its peculiar duty, and a mechanism to take 
 away effete matter ; not one of which can be dispensed with. 
 Between creatures of the lowest type, and creatures of the 
 highest, we similarly find the essential difference to be, that 
 in the one the vital actions are carried on by a few simple 
 agents, whilst in the other the vital actions are severally de- 
 composed into their component parts, and each of these parts 
 has an agent to itself. In organizations of another order the 
 same principle is apparent. "When the manufacturer discovered 
 that by confining each of his employ6s wholly to one process, 
 he could immensely increase the productive powers of his esta- 
 blishment, he did but act upon this same rule, of one function 
 to one organ. If we compare the mercantile arrangements of 
 a village with those of a city, we shall find that the huxters of 
 the one carry on many trades each, whilst every shopkeeper of 
 the other confines himself to a single trade ; showing us how 
 a highly-developed apparatus for the distribution of commodi- 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 276 
 
 ties is similarly distinguished by subdivision of duties. Lan- 
 guage, too, exemplifies the same truth. Between its primitive 
 state, in -which it consisted of nothing but nouns, used vaguely 
 to indicate all ideas iadisoriminately, and its present state, in 
 which it consists of numerous " parts of speech," the process 
 of growth has been that of gradually separating words into 
 classes serving different purposes; and just as fast as this 
 process has advanced, has language become capable of com- 
 pletely fulfilling its end. 
 
 May we not, then, suspect that the assigning of one function 
 to one organ, is the condition of eflBciency in aU instrumentaU- 
 ties ? If, as far as we can see, such is the law not only of 
 natural organizations, but of what, in a superficial sense, we 
 call artificial ones, does it not seem probable that it is the uni- 
 versal law ? Will it not be the law of institutions ? Will it 
 not he the law of the state ? Must we not expect that with a 
 government also, special adaptation to one end implies non- 
 adaptation to other ends ? And is it not likely that by de- 
 volving on a goveiTunent additional functions, the due dis- 
 charge of its peculiar function wiU be sacrificed ? And would 
 not this imply that a government ought not to undertake such 
 additional functions ? 
 
 But laying aside analogy, let us inquire whether it is not the 
 fact, that in assuming any office besides its original one, the 
 state begins to lose the power of fulfilling that original one. 
 What is it that we call the state ? Men politically associated. 
 How associated ? Voluntarily. For what purpose ? For 
 mutual protection. Men voluntarily associated for mutual 
 protection: this then is our definition. Now, when rightly 
 ordered, the conditions on which this voluntary association 
 offers its sei-vices, must be such as enable it to afford the 
 greatest amount of protection possible. If otherwise — if it in- 
 sists on non-essential conditions which prevent some men from 
 accepting its services, or on conditions which unnecessarily 
 compromise the liberty of those men who do accept its ser- 
 vices, it manifestly fails to that extent iu performing its func- 
 
 T 2 
 
276 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 tioa. Now the moment the state undertakes a second office 
 it does all tliis. Men leagued together for a special ohject 
 will never unanimously agree in the pursuit of any other ob- 
 ject. So long as our joint-stock protection-society confines 
 itself to guaranteeing the rights of its members, it is pretty 
 certain to be co-extensive with the nation ; for whilst such an 
 organization is needed at all, most men will sacrifice something 
 to secure its guardiansliip. But let an additional duty be as- 
 signed to it, and there will immediately arise more or less 
 scliism. The dissenting minority may in such case consist of 
 two parties; the one comprising those who have so great a 
 repugnance to the contemplated arrangement, as to resolve 
 upon seceding rather than consent to it; and a larger party 
 consisting of those who grumble at the imposition of addi- 
 tional charges for the doing what they do not wish to be done, 
 but who think well to submit rather than give up the benefits 
 of protection. Towards both these parlies the state fails in its 
 duty. The one it drives away by disadvantageous terms ; and 
 from the other it exacts sacrifices beyond what are needful for 
 the performance of its original function ; and by so doing be- 
 comes an aggressor instead of a protector. Obsei*ve how the 
 case stands when put personally. 
 
 "Your taxes are heavier this year than last," complains a 
 citizen to the government; " how is it ?" 
 
 " The sums voted for these new school-houses, and for the 
 salaries of the masters and mistresses, have increased the draught 
 upon our exchequer," replies the government. 
 
 " School-houses, masters and mistresses — what have I to do 
 with these ? you are not charging me with the cost of them, 
 are you ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Why, I never authorized you to do so." 
 
 " True ; but parliament, or, in other words, the majority of 
 the nation, has decided that the education of the young shall 
 be entrusted to us, and has authorized us to raise such funds 
 as may be necessary for fulfilling this trust" 
 
THE LIMIT or STATE-DUTY. 277 
 
 "But suppose I -wish to superintend the education of my 
 children myself?" 
 
 "You may do as you please; but you must pay for the 
 privilege we offer, whether you avail yourself of it or not. 
 Even if you have no children you must stiU pay." 
 
 " And what if I refuse ? " 
 
 " Why, were we to act up to old precedents, we should 
 punish you; hut as things now stand we shall content our- 
 selves with giving notice that you have outlawed yourself." 
 
 "Nay, I have no wish to do that; I cannot at present dis- 
 pense with your protection." 
 
 " Very well, then you must agree to our terms, and pay your 
 share of the new tax." 
 
 " See, now, what a dilemma you place me in. As I dare not 
 relinquish the protection I entered into political combination 
 to obtain, I must either give you a part of my property for 
 nothing ; or, should I make a point of having some equivalent, 
 I must cease to do that which my natural affections prompt. 
 Will you answer me a few questions ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " What is it that you, as . a national executive, have been 
 appointed for ? Is it not to maintain the rights of those who 
 employ you ; or, in other words, to guarantee to each the 
 fullest freedom for the exercise of his faculties compatible 
 with the equal freedom of all others ? " 
 
 " It has been so decided." 
 
 "And it has been also decided that you are justified in 
 diminishing this freedom only to such extent as may be 
 needful for preserving the remainder, has it not ? " 
 
 " That is evidently a corollary." 
 
 " Exactly. And now let me ask what is this property, this 
 money, of which in the shape of taxes you are demanding from 
 me an additional amount ? Is it not that which enables me 
 to get food, clothing, shelter, recreation, or, to repeat the origi- 
 ginal expression — that on which I depend for the exercise of 
 most of my faculties ? " 
 
278 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 "It is." 
 
 " Therefore to decrease my property is to decrease my free- 
 dom to exercise my faculties, is it not ? " 
 
 " Clearly." 
 
 "Then this new impost of yours will practically decrease 
 my freedom to exercise my faculties ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Well, do you not now perceive the contradiction ? Instead 
 of acting the part of a protector you are acting the part of an 
 aggressor. What you were appointed to guarantee me and 
 others, you are now taking away. To see that the liberty of 
 each man to pursue the objects of his desires is unrestricted, 
 save by the like liberty of all, is your special function. To 
 diminish this Hberty by means of taxes, or civil restraints more 
 than is absolutely needful for performing such function, is 
 wrong, because adverse to the function itself. Now youx new 
 impost does so diminish this hberty more than is absolutely 
 needful, and it is consequently unjustifiable." 
 
 Thus we find, as was foretold, that whenever the state be- 
 gins to exceed its oflice of protector, it begins to lose protec- 
 tive power. Not a single supplementary service can it attempt 
 without producing dissent; and in proportion to the amount 
 of dissent so produced by it, the state defeats the end for which 
 it was estabhshed. Let it undertake many additional duties, 
 and there will be scarcely a man who does not object to being 
 taxed on account of one or more of them — scarcely a man, 
 therefore, to whom the state does not in some degree do tlie 
 very opposite of what it is appointed to do. Now this thing 
 wliich the state is appointed to do is the essential thing — the 
 thing by which society is made possible; and these other 
 things proposed to be done are non-essential, for society is 
 possible without them. And as the essential ought not to be 
 sacrificed to the non-essential, the state ought not to do any- 
 thing but protect. " ■ 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 279 
 
 § 2. 
 
 It will perhaps be urged, however, that the evil done by a 
 government, when it thus oversteps its original duty, is only an 
 apparent one ; seeing that though it diminishes men's spheres 
 of action in one dii-ection, it adds to them in another. All 
 such supplementary functions, an objector may say, subserve in 
 some way or other the wants of society ; that is, they facihtate 
 the satisfaction of men's desires ; that is, they afford to men 
 greater freedom for the exercise of their faculties. For if you 
 argue that taking away a man's property diminishes his freedom 
 to exercise his faculties, because it diminishes his means of 
 exercising them, then you must in fairness admit, that by 
 procuring for him certain of the objects he desires, or by 
 taking away the obstacles that lie between him and those 
 objects, or by otherwise helping him to his ends, the state is 
 increasing his power to exercise his faculties, and hence is 
 practically increasing his freedom. 
 
 To all which the answer is, that cutting away men's opportu- 
 nities on one side, to add to them on another, is at best accom- 
 panied by a loss. Let us remember that the force by which a 
 society, through its government, works out certain results, is 
 never increased by administrative mechanisms, but that part of 
 it escapes in friction. Government evidently cannot create any 
 facihties for the exercise of faculties ; all it can do is to re- 
 distribute them. It is easy to calculate what one of these 
 artificial arrangements can effect. Set down the amount of 
 power to satisfy his wants, which it takes from a citizen in 
 extra taxes ; deduct the serious waste occurring under official 
 manipulations ; and the remainder, transformed into some new 
 shape, is all that can be returned to him. The transaction is 
 consequently a losing one. So that, whilst in attempting to 
 serve the pubhc by undertaking supplementary functions, a 
 government fails in its duty towards all who dissent ; it does 
 not reaUy compensate for this by additional advantages afforded 
 
280 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 to the rest ; to whom it merely gives, with one hand, less than 
 it takes away with the other. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 But in truth the transaction is a yet more detrimental one 
 than it thus appears, for even the gift is a delusion — has a 
 minus sign hefore it, unobserved, perhaps, by the many, but 
 sufficiently visible to the analyst. The expediency-philosophy 
 of wliich this general state-superintendence is a practical ex- 
 pression, embodies the belief that government ought not only 
 to guarantee men in the unmolested pursuit of happiness, but • 
 should provide the happiness for them and deliver it at their 
 doors. Now no scheme could be more self-defeating, for no 
 scheme could be more completely at variance with the consti- 
 tution of things. ]\'Ian, as briefly delineated at the outset, 
 (p. 19) consists of a congeries of faculties, qualifying him for 
 surrounding conditions. Each of these faculties, if normally 
 developed, yields to him, when exercised, a gratification consti- 
 tuting part of his happiness ; whilst, in the act of exercising it, 
 some deed is done subserving the wants of the man as a whole, 
 and afibrding to the other faculties the opportunity of perform- 
 ing in turn their respective functions, and of producing every 
 one its pecuhar pleasure : so that, when healthily balanced, 
 each subserves all, and all subserve each. We cannot live at 
 all unless this mechanism works with tolerable efficiency ; and 
 we can live entirely — that is can have entire happiness — only 
 when the reciprocity between capacities and requirements is 
 perfect. As before said, the complete man is the self-sufficing 
 man — the man who is in every point fitted to his circumstances 
 — the man in whom there are desires corresponding not only to 
 all the acts which are immediately advantageous, but to those 
 which are remotely so. Evidently, one who is thus rightly con- 
 stituted cannot be helped. To do anything for him by some 
 artificial agency, is to supersede certain of his powers — is to 
 leave them unexercised, and therefore to diminish his happi- 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 281 
 
 ness. To healthily-developed citizens, therefore, state aid is 
 doubly detrimental. It injures them both by what it takes 
 and by what it does. By the revenues required to support its 
 agencies it absorbs the means on which certain of the faculties 
 depend for their exercise ; and by the agencies themselves it 
 shuts out other faculties from their splieres of action. 
 
 " But men are not complete ; they are not healthily de- 
 veloped ; they have not capacities in harmony with their wants ; 
 and therefore, as matters stand, a government does not by its 
 interpositions preoccupy offices which there are faculties to 
 fill." Veiy true ; but next to being what we ought to be, 
 the most desirable thing is that we should become what we 
 ought to he as fast as possible. We are undergoing the process 
 of adaptation. We have to lose the characteristics which - 
 fitted us for our original state, and to gain those which will fit 
 us for our present state ; and the question to be asked, respect- 
 ing these mechanical remedies for our deficiencies, is — do they 
 faciUtate the change ? Certainly not. A moment's thought 
 . will convince us that they retard it. No one can need remind- 
 ing that demand and supply is the law of hfe as well as the law 
 of trade — that strength will show itself only where strength is 
 called for — that an undeveloped capability can be developed 
 only under the stem discipline of necessity. Would you draw 
 out and increase some too feeble sentiment ? Then you must 
 set it to do, as well as it can, the work required of it. It must 
 be kept ever active, ever strained, ever inconvenienced by its 
 incompetency. Under this treatment it will, in the slow lapse 
 of generations, attain to efficiency ; and what was once its 
 impossible task will become the source of a healthy, pleasurable, 
 and desired excitement. But let a state-instrumentality be 
 thrust between such faculty and its work, and the process of 
 adaptation is at once suspended. Growth ceases; and in its 
 place commences retrogression. The embryo agency now super- 
 seded by some commission — some board and stafi^ of officers, 
 straightway dwindles ; for power is as inevitably lost by inac- 
 tivity as it is gained by activity. Hence, humanity no longer 
 
282 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DOTY. 
 
 goes on moulding itself into harmony with the natural require- 
 ments of the social state; but begins, instead, to assume a 
 form fitting these artificial requirements. It is consequently 
 stopped in its progress towards that self-sufficingness charac- 
 teristic of the complete man; or, in other words, is prevented 
 from fulfilling the conditions essential to complete happiness. 
 And thus, as before said, not only does a government reverse 
 its function by taking away more property than is needful for 
 protective purposes, but even what it gives, in return for the 
 excess so taken, is in essence a loss. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 There is indeed one faculty, or rather combination of facul- 
 ties, for whose shortcomings the state, as far as in it lies, may 
 advantageously compensate — that, namely, by which society is 
 made possible. It is cleax that any being whose constitution is 
 to be moulded into fitness for new conditions of existence must 
 be placed under those conditions. Or, putting the proposition 
 specifically — it is clear that man can become adapted to the 
 social state, only by being retained in the social state. This 
 granted, it follows that as man has been, and is still, deficient 
 in those feelings which, by dictating just conduct, prevent the 
 perpetual antagonism of individuals and their consequent dis- 
 union, some artificial agency is required by which their union 
 may be maintained. Only by the process of adaptation itself 
 can be produced that character which makes social equilibrium 
 spontaneous. And hence, whilst this process is going on, an 
 instrumentality must be employed, firstly to bind men into an 
 associated state, and secondly to check all conduct endangering 
 the existence of that state. Such an instrumentality we have 
 in a government. 
 
 And now mark that whether we consider government from 
 this point of view, or from that previously occupied, our con- 
 clusions respecting it are in essence identical. For when 
 government fulfils the function here assigned it, of retaining 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 283 
 
 men in the circumstances to ■which they are to be adapted, it 
 fiilfils the function which we on other grounds assigned it — 
 that of protector. To administer justice, — to mount guard 
 over men's rights, — to prevent aggression, — is simply to render 
 society possible, to enable men to Hve together — to keep them 
 in contact with their new conditions. And seeing that the two 
 definitions are thus at root the same, we shall be prepared for the 
 fact that, in whichever way we specify its duty, the state cannot 
 exceed that duty without defeating itself. Por, if regarded as a 
 protector, we find that the moment it does anything more than 
 protect, it becomes an aggressor instead of a protector ; and, if 
 regarded as a help to adaptation, we find that when it does 
 anything more than sustain the social state, it retards adaptation 
 instead of hastening it. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Thus much for the positive evidence : let us now enter upon 
 the negative. The expediency-philosophers say that govern- 
 ment has other functions to fulfil besides that of upholding 
 men's lights. If so, what are they ? To the assertion that the 
 boundary line of state-duty as above drawn is at the wrong 
 place, the obvious rejoinder is— show us where it should be 
 drawn. This appeal the expediency-philosophers have never 
 yet been able to answer. Their alleged definitions are no defi- 
 nitions at all. As was proved at the outset (p. 3), to say that 
 government ought to do that which is "expedient," or to do 
 that which will tend to produce the " greatest happiness," or to 
 do that wliich will subserve the "general good," is to say just 
 nothing; for there is infinite disagreement respecting the 
 natures of these desiderata. A definition of which the terms 
 are indefinite is an absurdity. Whilst the practical interpreta- 
 tion of "expediency" remains a matter of opinion, to say that a 
 government should do that which is " expedient," is to say that 
 it should do, what we tlrink it should do ! 
 
 StiU then our demand is — a definition. Between the two 
 
284 THE -LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 extremes of its possible power — the everything and the notliing 
 with ■wluch a government may be entrusted, where is the proper 
 limitation ? Of the innumerable fields of action lying open to 
 an uncontrolled legislature, which shall it occupy? Shall it ex- 
 tend its interference to the fixing of creeds, as in the old times ; 
 or to overlooking modes of manufacture, farming operations, 
 and domestic affairs, as it once did; or to commerce, as of late— 
 to education, as now — to public health, as some wish — to dress, 
 as in China — to literature, as in Austria — to charity, to manners, 
 to amusements? If not to all of them, to which of them ? 
 Should the peiplexed inquirer seek refuge in authority, he will 
 find precedents not only for these lout for many more such 
 interferences. If, like those who disapprove of master tailors 
 having their work done ofi' the premises, or like those who want 
 to prevent the produce of industrial prisons displacing that of 
 free artizans, or like those who would restrain charity-school 
 children from competing with seamstresses, he thinks it desir- 
 able to meddle with trade aiTangements, there are plenty of 
 exemplars for him. There is the law of Henry VII., which 
 directed people at what fail's they should sell their goods ■; and 
 that of Edward VI., which enacted a fine of JEIOO for a usmious 
 bargain ; and that of James I., which prescribed the quantity 
 of ale to be sold for a penny ; and that of Henry VIII., which 
 made it penal to sell any pins but such as are " double headed, 
 and have their head soldered fast to the shank, and well 
 smoothed ; the shank well shaven ; the point well and round-filed 
 and sharpened." He has the countenance, too, of those enact- 
 ments which fixed the wages of labour ; and of those which 
 dictated to farmers, as in 1533, when the sowing of hemp and 
 flax was made compulsory ; and of those which forbad the use 
 of certain materials, as that now largely-consumed article, log- 
 wood, was forbidden in 1597. If he approves of so extended 
 a superintendence, perhaps he would adopt M. Louis Blanc's 
 idea that " government should be considered a^ the supreme 
 regulator of production," and having so adopted it, push state 
 control as far as it was once carried in France, when manufacturers 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 285 
 
 were pilloried for defects in the materials they employed, and 
 in the texture of their fabrics ; when some were fined for weav- 
 ing of worsted a kind of cloth which the law said should he 
 made of mohair, and others because their camlets were not of 
 the specified width ; and when a man was not at hberty to choose 
 the place for his establishment, nor to work at all seasons, nor 
 to work for everybody. Is this considered too detailed an in- 
 terference ? Then, perhaps, greater favour will be shown 
 to those German regulations by which a shoemaker is pre- 
 vented from following his craft until an inspecting jury has 
 certified to his competence ; which disable a man who has 
 chosen one calling from ever adopting another ; and which 
 forbid any foreign tradesman from settling in a German town 
 without a hcence. And if work is to be regulated, is it not 
 proper that work should be provided, and the idle compelled to 
 perform a due amount of it ? In which case how shall we deal 
 with our vagrant population ? Shall we take a hint from 
 rietcher of Saltoun, who warmly advocated the establishment 
 of slavery in Scotland as a boon to " so many thousands of 
 our people who are at this day dying for want of bread " ? or 
 shall we adopt the analagous suggestion of IMr. Carlyle, who 
 would remedy the distresses of Ireland by organizing its people 
 into drilled regiments of diggers ? The hours of labour too 
 — what must be done about these ? Having acceded to the 
 petition of the factory workers, ought we not to entertain that 
 of the journeymen bakers ? and if that of the journeymen 
 bakers, why not, as Mr. Cobden asks, consider the cases of the 
 glass-blowers, the nightmen, the iron-founders, the Shefiield 
 knife-grinders, and indeed aU other classes, including the hard- 
 worked M.P.s themselves ? And when employment has been 
 provided, and the hours of labour fixed, and trade regulations 
 settled, we must decide how far the state ought to look after 
 peoples' minds, and morals, and health. There is this educa- 
 tion question: having satisfied the prevalent wish for govern- 
 ment schools with tax-paid teachers, and adopted Mr. Ewart's 
 plan for town-libraries and museums, should we not canvass the 
 
286 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 supplementary proposal to have national lecturers ? and if this 
 proposal is assented to, would it not be well to carry out the 
 scheme of Sir David Brewster, who desires to have " men or- 
 dained by the State to the undivided functions of science" — 
 "an intellectual priesthood," "to develop the glorious truths 
 which time and space embosom"?^ Then having established 
 " an intellectual priesthood " to keep company with our re- 
 ligious one, a priesthood of physic such as is advocated by 
 certain feeless medical men, and of which we have already the 
 germ in our union doctors, would nicely complete the trio. And 
 when it had been agreed to put the sick under the care of pub- 
 lic officials, consistency would of course demand the adoption 
 of Mr. G. A. Walker's system of government funerals, under 
 which " those in authority " are " to take especial care " that 
 " the poorest of our brethren " shall have " an appropriate and 
 solemn transmission " to the grave, and are to grant in certain 
 cases " gratuitous means of interment." Having carried out 
 thus far the communist plan of doing everything for everybody, 
 should we not consider the peoples' amusements, and, taking ex- 
 ample from the opera-subsidy in France, estabhsh public baU- 
 roomSj and gratis concerts, and cheap theatres, with state-paid 
 actors, musicians and masters of the ceremonies ; using care at 
 the same time duly to regulate the popular taste, as indeed in 
 the case of the Art-Union subscribers oui- present Government 
 proposed to do ? Speaking of taste naturally reminds us of 
 dress, in which sundry improvements might be enforced; for 
 instance — the abolition of hats : we should have good precedent 
 either in Edward IV., who fined those wearing " any gown or 
 mantell " not according to specification, and who Umited the 
 superfluity of peoples' boot toes, or in Charles II., who pre- 
 scribed the material for his subjects' grave-clothes. The matter 
 of health, too, would need attending to ; and, in deaUng with 
 this, might we not profitably reconsider those ancient statutes 
 which protected peoples' stomachs by restricting the expenses 
 
 " See Address to the British Association at Edinburgh, in 1850. 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 287 
 
 of their tables : or, remembering bow injurious are our fasbion- 
 able late bours, migbt we not advantageously take a bint from 
 tbe old Norman practice, and fix tbe time at wbicb people 
 sbould put out their fires and go to bed : or might we not with 
 benefit act upon tbe opinion of M. Beausobre, a statesman, 
 who said it was " proper to watch during the fruit season, 
 lest tbe people eat that wbicb is not ripe " ? And, then, by 
 way of mating tbe superintendence quite complete, would it 
 not he "well "to follow tbe example of that Danish king "who 
 gave directions to his subjects how they should scour their 
 floors, and poHsb their furniture ? 
 
 Multiply these questions into a volume full ; add to them 
 the endless subordinate ones to which in practice they must 
 give rise ; and some idea may be formed of the maze through 
 wbicti the expediency-philosopher has to find his way. Where 
 now is his clue ? Again comes tbe inquiry — how does be 
 propose to determine between what should be attempted and 
 what should not ? which is his definition ? If he would escape 
 tbe charge of poUtical empiricism, be must show us some 
 scientific test by which he can in each case determine whether 
 or not state-superintendence is desirable. Between the one 
 extreme of entire non-interference, and the other extreme in 
 which every citizen is to be transformed into a grown-up baby, 
 " with bib and pap-spoon,", there he innumerable stopping 
 places ; and be who would have tbe state do more than protect 
 is required to say where be means to draw tbe hue, and to give 
 us substantial reasons why it must be just there and nowhere 
 else. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 After the difficulty of finding out tbe thing to be done, there 
 comes the other difficulty of finding out the way to do it. Let 
 us excuse the expediency-philosopher one half of bis task — 
 let us for the occasion assume something to be unanimously 
 agreed to as a proper undertaking ; and now suppose we en- 
 quire of him — How about your means of accomplishing it ? 
 
288 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DDTY. 
 
 Are you quite sure they will answer ? Are you quite sure that 
 your apparatus will not break down under its work ? quite sure 
 that it wiU produce the result you wish ? quite sure that 
 it will not produce some very different result ? quite sure 
 that you will not get into one of those imbroglios that so 
 many have lost themselves in ? There is no lack of warnings. 
 " Let us put down usury," said to themselves the rulers of the 
 middle ages : they tried; and did just the reverse of what they 
 intended ; for it has turned out, that " all regulations inter- 
 fering with the interest of money render its terms more rigorous 
 and burdensome." " We will exterminate Protestantism," 
 whispered the continental Catholics to each other : they tried ; 
 and instead of doing this they planted in England the germs of 
 a manufacturing organization which has to a great extent su- 
 perseded tlieir own. " It will be well to give the labouring 
 classes fixed settlements " thought the Poor Law legislators ; 
 and having acted out this thought there eventually gi-ew up 
 the clearance system, with its overcrowded cottages, and non- 
 resident labour-gangs. "We must suppress these brothels," 
 decided the authorities of Berlin in 1845 : they did suppress 
 them ; and in 1848, the registrar's books and the hospital re- 
 turns proved matters to be considerably worse than before*. 
 " Suppose we compel the London parishes to maintain and 
 educate their pauper cliildren in the country," said statesmen 
 in the time of George III ; " ' it would greatly tend to the 
 preservation of the lives of the infant parish poor : ' " so they 
 passed the 7 Geo. III., c. 39 ; and by-and-by there began the 
 business of child-farming, ending in the Tooting tragedy. Are 
 not such warnings worthy of attention ? Or does the expe- 
 diency-pliilosopher value those facts only which are embodied 
 in Blue-books and Board of Trade tables ? 
 
 Then as to his administrative mechanisms — can he answer for 
 the satisfactory working of them ? The common remark that 
 public business is worse managed than all other business, is 
 not altogether unfounded. To-day he will find it illustrated in 
 
 • Reports of Dr. Fr. J. Behrend. See Medical Tivies, March 16, 1850. 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 289 
 
 the doings of a department whicli makes a valuable estate like 
 the New Forest, a loss to the country of £3000 a year ; -which 
 allowed Salcey Forest to be wholly cut down and made away 
 with by a dishonest agent ; and which, in 1848, had its accounts 
 made up to March, 1839, only. To-morrow he may read of 
 Admiralty bunglings — of ships badly built, pulled to pieces, 
 re-built and patched — of nearly a million spent on iron war- 
 steamers which are now found not to stand cannon shot — and 
 of a sluggishness which puts the national dockyards " about 
 seven years " behind all others. Now the exposure is of an' 
 extravagance which builds gaols at a cost of £1200 per prisoner ; 
 and now of a carelessness which permits important legal records 
 to rot amongst rubbish. Here is a sailor of whom the State 
 demanded sixpence a month towards a hospital which was never 
 provided, and whose pension from the Merchant-Seamen's Fund 
 is nothing like what it would have been from an ordinary 
 assurance society; and there, on the other hand, is a Mint 
 moneyer who gets more than £4000 a year for doing what 
 a tithe of the amount would amply pay for. Official delay is 
 seen in the snail-paced progress of the Museum Catalogue ; 
 official mismanagement in the building of Houses of Parhament 
 not fit for speaking in ; and official perversity in the opposition 
 uniformly made to improvement by the Excise, the Customs, 
 and the Post Office authorities. Does the expediency-philoso- 
 pher feel no apprehensions on contemplating such evidence ? 
 Or, as one specially professing to be guided by experience, does 
 he think that on the whole experience is in his favour ? 
 
 Perhaps he has not heard that of ten mechanical inventions, 
 usually some nine fail ; and that, before the tenth can be made 
 to answer, endless obstacles that had never been dreamed of 
 have to be surmounted. Or, if he has heard this, does he think 
 that the properties of humanity beiug so much easier to under- 
 stand than those of iron and brass, and an institution con- 
 structed of living men being a simple thing as compared with 
 an inanimate mechanism, legislative schemes are not likely thus 
 to miscarry ? 
 
 u 
 
290 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 § 7- 
 
 " It is a gross delusion to believe ia tte sovereign power of 
 political machinery," says M. Guizot. True: and it is not 
 only a gross delusion, but a very dangerous one. Give a child 
 exaggerated notions of its parent's power, and it will by-and-by 
 cry for the moon. Let a people believe in government-omni- 
 potence, and they will be pretty certain to get up revolutions to 
 achieve impossibHities. Between their exorbitant ideas of what 
 the state ought to do for them on the one side, and its miser- 
 able performances on the other, there will surely be generated 
 feelings extremely inimical to social order — feelings which, by 
 adding to the dissatisfaction otherwise produced, may occasion 
 outbreaks that would not else have occurred. 
 
 But this belief in " the sovereign power of political machi- 
 nery " is not bom with men ; they are taught it. And how are 
 they taught it? Evidently by these preachers of universal 
 legislative superintendence — by the pretensions of statesmen 
 themselves — and by having seen, firom their childhood, all 
 kinds of functions undertaken by government officials. The 
 idea which, in his critique upon the late events in France, M. 
 Guizot calls a " gross delusion," is an idea which he, in common 
 with others, has been practically inculcating. Following in the 
 steps of his predecessors, he has kept in action, and in some 
 cases even extended, that system of official supervision to which 
 this idea owes its birth. Was it not natural that men, living 
 under the regulation of legions of prefects, sub -prefects, in- 
 spectors, controllers, intendants, commissaries, and other civil 
 employes to the number of 535,000 — men who were educated 
 by the government, and taught religion by it — who had to ask 
 its consent before they could stir from home — who could not 
 publish a handbill without a permit from the authorities, nor 
 circulate a newspaper after the censor's veto — who daily saw 
 it dictating regulations for railways, inspecting and managing 
 mines, building bridges, making roads, and erecting monu- 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 291 
 
 ments — who were led to regard it as the patron of science, 
 literature, and the fine arts, and as the dispenser of honours 
 and rewards — who found it undertaking the manufacture of 
 gunpowder, superintending the hreeding of horses and sheep, 
 playing the part of puhHc pawnhroker, and monopoUzing the 
 sale of tohacco and snuff — who saw it attending to everything, 
 from the execution of puhhc works down to the sanitary in- 
 spection of prostitutes — was it not natural that men so circum- 
 stanced should acquire exalted ideas of state power ? And, 
 having acquired such ideas, were they not likely to desire the 
 state to compass for them unattainable benefits ; to get angry 
 because it did not do this ; and to attempt by violent means 
 the enforcement of their wishes ? Evidently the reply must be 
 affirmative. And if so, it is not too much to say that this 
 overstepping of the proper sphere of government, leading as it 
 does to that " gross delusion," a belief in " the sovereign power 
 of political machinery," is the natural foreruimer of such 
 schemes as those of Blanc and Cabet, and of that confusion 
 which the attempt to realize them by state-agency must pro- 
 duce. 
 
 There are other modes, too, in which social stability is en- 
 dangered by this interference system. It is a very expensive 
 system : the farther it is carried, the larger become the revenues 
 required : and we all know that heavy taxation is inseparable 
 from discontent. Moreover it is in its nature essentially de- 
 spotic. In governing everything it unavoidably cramps men ; 
 and, by diminishing their liberty of action, angers them. It 
 galls by its infinity of ordinances and restrictions ; it offends 
 by professing to help those whom it wiU not allow to help 
 themselves ; and it vexes by its swarms of dictatorial officials, 
 who are for ever stepptag in between men and their pursuits. 
 Those regulations by which the French manufacturers were 
 hampered during the last century, when the state decided on 
 the persons to be employed, the articles to be made, the 
 materials to be used, and the qualities of the products — when 
 inspectors broke the looms and burnt the goods that were not 
 
 u 2 
 
292 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 made according to law — and when improvements were illegal 
 and inventors were fined — had no small share in producing the 
 great revolution. Nor, amongst the causes which conspired to 
 overthrow the government of Louis PhiUppe, must we forget 
 the irritation generated by an analogous supervision, under 
 which a mine cannot be opened without the permission of the 
 authorities ; under which a bookseller or printer may have his 
 business suspended by the withdrawal of his Ucence ; and under 
 which it is penal to take a bucket of water out of the sea. 
 
 Thus, if we regard government as a means of upholding the 
 social state, we find that, besides suffering a direct loss of 
 power to perform its duty on attempting anything else, there 
 are several subsidiary ways in which the assumption of ad- 
 ditional functions endangers the fulfilment of its original 
 function. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 But we have not sufficiently considered the infinite presump- 
 tion discernible in this attempt at regulating all the doings of 
 men by law. To make up for defects in the original constitu- 
 tion of things — ^this is the meaning of the scheme, nakedly 
 stated. It is said of a certain personage, that he wished he had 
 been consulted when the world was being made, for that he 
 could have given good advice; and not a Uttle historical 
 celebrity has attached to this personage, in virtue of his so- 
 thought unparalleled arrogance. Shallow, shallow ! Why, the 
 great majority of our statesmen and politicians do as much 
 every day. Advice, indeed ! they do not stop at advice. They 
 actively interpose, take into their own hands matters that God 
 seems to be mismanaging, and undertake to set them right ! 
 It is clear to them that social wants and relationships have been 
 60 carelessly provided for, that without their vigilant manage- 
 ment all will go wrong. As for any silent influences by which 
 imperfections are in process of being removed, they do not 
 beheve in them. But by a commission, a staff of officers, and a 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 293 
 
 parliamentary grant, every deficiency shall be made good, and 
 the errors of Omniscience be rectified ! 
 
 In truth it is a sad sight for any one who has been, what 
 Bacon recommends — " a servant and interpreter of nature," to 
 see these political schemers, with their clumsy mechanisms, 
 trying to supersede the great laws of existence. Such an one, 
 no longer regarding the mere outsides of things, has learned 
 to look for the secret forces by wliich they are upheld. After 
 patient study, this chaos of phenomena into the midst of which 
 he was born has begun to generalize itself to him ; and where 
 there seemed nothing but confusion, he can now discern the 
 dim outlines of a gigantic plan. No accidents, no chance ; 
 but everywhere order and completeness. One by one excep- 
 tions vanish, and all becomes systematic. Suddenly what had 
 appeared an anomaly answers to some intenser thought, ex- 
 hibits polarity, and ranges itself along with kindred facts. 
 Throughout he finds the same vital principles, ever in action, 
 ever successfal, and embracing the minutest details. Growth 
 is unceasing ; and though slow, all powerful : showing itself 
 here in some rapidly-developing outline ; and there, where the 
 necessity is less, exhibiting only the fibrils of incipient organ- 
 ization. Irresistible as it is subtle, he sees in the worker of 
 these changes, a power that bears onwards peoples and govern- 
 ments regardless of their theories, and schemes, and prejudices 
 — a power which sucks the life out of their lauded institutions, 
 shrivels up their state-parchments with a breath, paralyzes long- 
 venerated authorities, obliterates the most deeply-graven laws, 
 makes statesmen recant and puts prophets to the blush, buries 
 cherished customs, shelves precedents, and which, before men 
 are yet conscious of the fact, has wrought a revolution in aU 
 things, and filled the world with a higher life. Always towards 
 perfection is the mighty movement — towards a complete deve-J 
 lopment and a more unmixed good ; subordinating in its uni- 
 versality all petty irregularities and falUngs back, as the curva- 
 ture of the earth subordinates mountains and valleys. Even in 
 evils, the student learns to recognise only a straggling benefi- 
 
294 THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 
 
 cence. But, above all, he is struck -with the inherent sufficing- 
 ness of things," and -with the complex simplicity of those prin- 
 ciples by which every defect is being remedied — principles that 
 show themselves ahke in the self-adjustment of planetary per- 
 turbations, and in the heaHng of a scratched finger — in the 
 balancing of social systems, and in the increased sensitiveness 
 of a bhnd man's ear — in the adaptation of prices to produce, 
 and in the acclimatization of a plant. Day by day he sees a 
 fiirther beauty. Each new fact illustrates more clearly some 
 recognised law, or discloses some inconceived completeness: 
 contemplation thus perpetually discovering to him a higher 
 harmony, and cherishing in him a deeper faith. 
 
 And now, in the midst of his admiration and his awe, the 
 student shall suddenly see some flippant red-tapist get upon his 
 legs and tell the world how he is going to put a patch upon 
 nature ! Here is a man who, in the presence of all the wonders 
 that encompass him, dares to announce that he and certain of 
 his colleagues have laid their heads together and found out a 
 way to improve upon the Divine arrangements ! Scarcely an 
 idea have these meddlers got of what underlies the facts with 
 which they propose to deal ; as you shall soon find on sounding 
 their philosophy: and yet, could they carry out their preten- 
 sions, we should see them self-appointed nurses to the uni- 
 verse ! They have so little faith iu the laws of things, and so 
 much faith in themselves, that, were it possible, they would 
 chain earth and sun together, lest centripetal force should fail ! 
 Nothing but a parliament-made agency can be depended upon ; 
 and only when this infinitely-complex humanity of ours has 
 been put under their ingenious regulations, and provided for by 
 their supreme intelligence, will the world become what it ought 
 to be ! Such, in essence, is the astounding creed of these 
 creation-menders. 
 
 §9. 
 
 Consider it then in what light we may — morally or scientifi- 
 cally, with reference to its practicableness, or as a question of 
 
THE LIMIT OF STATE-DUTY. 295 
 
 political prudence, or even in its bearings upon religious faith 
 — we find this theory, that a government ought to undertake 
 other ofi&ces besides that of protector, to be an untenable 
 theory. It has been shown that if the maintaining of rights be 
 regarded as the special function of the state, the state cannot 
 fulfil any other function without a partial loss of power to fulfil 
 its special one. When, from another point of view, the state is 
 looked upon as an aid to adaptation, we still find that it cannot 
 exceed its duty of guarding men's Uberties, without becoming 
 a hindrance to adaptation, instead of an aid. It turns out that 
 to abolish the limit of legislative interposition now contended 
 for, is in fact to abolish all hmits whatever — is to give the civil 
 power a field of action to which no bounds can be fixed, save 
 in some arbitrary and ntterly unphilosophical way. Moreover, 
 even could certain supplementary affairs, considered fit for 
 government supervision, be duly distinguished irom the rest, 
 there would still he the fact that all experience shows govern- 
 ment to be an incompetent manager of such supplementary 
 affairs. It is further urged, that the system of extended oflicial 
 control is bad, because unfavourable to social stability. And, 
 finally, that system is repudiated, as involving an absurd and 
 even impious presumption. 
 
 Such, then, are the general arguments brought forward to 
 prove that whilst the state ought to protect, it ought to do 
 nothing more than protect. By the abstract thinker they may 
 perhaps be deemed conclusive. There are others, however, with 
 whom they will weigh comparatively little ; and, for the con- 
 viction of these, it wOl be needful to examine in detail each 
 of the several cases in which legislative superintendence is 
 coiomonly advocated. Let us now proceed to do this. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 
 § 1. 
 
 Arrangements whicli alter the natural course of trade are of 
 two kinds ; they may he classed as either artificial stimuli or 
 artificial restraints — hounties or restrictions. 
 
 Of bounties must here be said specially what was said in the 
 last chapter of factitious advantages generally ; namely, that a 
 government cannot give them without indirectly reversing its 
 function. Not being requisite for the due maintenance of the 
 citizen s rights, the taking away of his property for the purpose 
 of encouraging certain branches of production, would he wrong 
 even were collateral benefits given in exchange ; and as, instead 
 of affording him collateral benefits, the commercial derange- 
 ments consequent upon it put additional hmits to the exer- 
 cise of his faculties, such a measure is doubly wrong. Now 
 that the faith in mercantile bribes is nearly extinct, it is need- 
 less to enforce this abstract inference by any supplementary 
 reasoning. 
 
 Of restrictions it scarcely needs saying that they are even 
 more directly inequitable than hounties. Deducible as it 
 is from the law of equal freedom, the right of exchange is 'as 
 sacred as any other right (Chap. XIII.), and exists as much 
 between members of different nations as between members of 
 the same nation. Morahty knows nothing of geographical 
 boundaries, or distinctions of race. You may put men on 
 opposite sides of a river or a chain of mountains; may else 
 part them by a tract of salt water; may give them, if you 
 like, distinct languages ; and may even colour their skins dif- 
 
THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 297 
 
 ferently ; but you cannot change their fundamental relationships. 
 Originating as these do in the facts of man's constitution, they 
 are unalterable by the accidents of external condition. The 
 moral law is cosmopoUte — is no respecter of nation ah ties : 
 and between men who are the antipodes of each other, either 
 in locality or anything else, there must still exist the same 
 balance of rights as though they were next-door neighbours 
 in all things. 
 
 Hence, in putting a veto upon the commercial intercourse 
 of two nations, or in putting obstacles in the way of that in- 
 tercourse, a government trenches upon men's Hberties of action ; 
 and by so doing directly reverses its function. To secure for 
 each man the fullest freedom to exercise his faculties, compa- 
 tible with the like freedom of all others, we find to be the state's 
 duty. Now trade prohibitions and trade restrictions not only 
 do not secure this freedom, but they take it away. So that 
 in enforcing "them the state is transformed from a maintainer 
 of rights into a violator of rights. If it be criminal in a civil 
 power commissioned to shield us from murder to turn murderer 
 itself; if it be criminal in it to play the thief, though set to 
 keep off thieves; then must it be criminal in it to deprive men, 
 in any way, of liberty to pursue the objects of desire, when it 
 ■was appointed to ensure them that hberty. Whether it kills, 
 or robs, or enslaves, or shackles by trade regulations, its guilt 
 is alike in kind, and differs only in degree. In the one ex- 
 treme it wholly destroys the power to exercise the faculties ; 
 in the other it does this partially. And in strict ethics the 
 same species of condemnation must be visited upon it in both 
 cases. 
 
 §2. 
 
 Not a few will be startled by this view of the matter. Let 
 such reflect awhile upon the antecedents and associations of 
 this tradcrruling. They will find, on doing so, that it is allied 
 in both origin and practice to all other forms of wrong. More 
 
298 THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 
 
 than once it has been pointed out, that as unjust customs and 
 institutions derive their viciousness from a moral defect in the 
 people living Tinder them, they must he uniformly pervaded 
 by that viciousness — that as social laws, creeds, and arrange- 
 ments consist merely of solidified character, the same character 
 will be shown in all the social laws, creeds, and arrangements 
 which co-exist ; and, further, that any process of amelioration 
 will affect them simultaneously. This truth was amply illustrated 
 (pp. 161 and 178). We saw that tyranny in forms of govern- 
 ment, tyranny in the conduct of lord to serf, tyranny in rehgious 
 organizations and discipline, tyranny in the matrimonial rela- 
 tionship, and tyranny in the treatment of children, regularly 
 flourished together and regularly decreased at a like rate. In 
 the same category we must now put — tyranny in commercial 
 laws. Sinking those minor irregularities which pervade all 
 nature's processes, we shall find that from the days when ex- 
 portation was a capital crime, down to our own free- trade era, 
 there has been a constant ratio kept between the stringency of 
 mercantile restraints and the stringency of other restraints, as 
 there has between the increase of commercial liberty and the 
 increase of general liberty. 
 
 A few facts will sufficiently exemplify this. Take as one 
 the instance just alluded to, in which associated with autocratic 
 rule in chrurch, in state, and in feudal hall, we find Edward III., 
 for the purpose of making foreigners come and buy in our 
 markets, prohibiting his subjects from sending abroad any 
 staple goods " under penalty of death and confiscation ; " and 
 further enacting, " that the law should be unalterable either by 
 himself or his successors." Observe, too, how this same de^ 
 spotic spirit was exhibited in the regulations requiring these 
 continental traders to reside during their stay with certain in- 
 spectors commissioned to see the cargoes sold withih a speci- 
 fied time, and the proceeds re-invested in Enghsh goods, and 
 charged to transmit to the Exchequer periodical statements of 
 each merchant's bargains — ^regulations, by the way, of which 
 the abandonment was in after times lamented by the vene- 
 
THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 299 
 
 raters of ancestral ■wisdom, mucli as the abolition of the sUding 
 scale is mourned over by a certain party of our own day. 
 Note again how, under the same regime, labourers were coerced 
 into working for fixed wages; and then how, to keep the 
 balance even, shopkeepers had the prices of provisions dictated 
 to them. Mark further, that when the most tyrannical of 
 these ordinances fell into disuse, there still continued the 
 less burdensome ones, such as those usury laws, orders to 
 farmers, prescribings of the material for grave-clothes, instruc- 
 tions to manufacturers, &c., referred to iu the last chapter. 
 But without going into further detail — without enlarging upon 
 the fact that those intolerable restraints once borne by the 
 manufacturing classes of France were cotemporary with intense 
 despotism at court, and a stiU hngering feudahsm in the pro- 
 vinces — without tracing the paraUeHsm that exists between the 
 political and commercial bondage, under which, in spite of their 
 revolutions, the French still live — without pointing out at 
 length the same coimection of phenomena in Prussia, in 
 Austria, and in other similarly-ruled countries — without doiog 
 all this, the evidence adduced suf&ciently shows that the op- 
 pressiveness of a nation's mercantile laws varies as the oppres- 
 siveness of its general arrangements and government. Whilst, 
 conversely, if we glance over the annals of progress, and then 
 contemplate the changes that have taken place within these 
 few years, or which are yet in progress, we cannot but re- 
 mark a similar kinship between the manifestations of a juster 
 feeling in poHtical organization, in ecclesiastical affairs, in the 
 family, and in our commercial code. 
 
 Thus, trade restrictions are of the same race with irrespon- 
 sible government and slavery. An obtuse perception of, and 
 an insufficient sympathy with, the claims of man, are the 
 parents of all tyrannies and dishonesties, bear they what name 
 they may. Interferences with the freedom of exchange are 
 as certainly their progeny as are the worst violations of human 
 rights : they are constantly found in the society of these : 
 and though not popularly classed as crimes, they are in both 
 origin and nature closely related to them. 
 
THE EEGUJLATION OF COMMERCE. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 There is another aspect under which these trade regulations, 
 in common with many kindred contrivances for the management 
 of social affairs, may be regarded. They £u:e all in essence 
 idolatrous. The worship of dead, powerless things made with 
 human hands is not extinct, as people flatter themselves — 
 cannot be extinct — never will be entirely extinct. The elements 
 of man's nature are persistent: the change is in their ratios. 
 Typical remains of every disposition must continue traceable 
 even to the remotest future. If, on the one band, it is an 
 error to suppose that humanity has not altered at all, it is, 
 on the other hand, an error to suppose that it has altered, 
 or even will alter, so completely as to retain no traces of its 
 bygone character. 
 
 Scientifically defined, idolatry is a mode of thought under 
 which all causation is attributed to entities. It results from 
 the first generahzation of the undeveloped intellect, which, 
 having constantly seen results produced by visible, tangible 
 objects, infers that all results are so produced. In the mind 
 of the savage every effect is believed to be due to a special 
 worker, because special workers have been observed to precede 
 effects in a multitude of instances. The laws of mental action 
 necessitate that, as all known causes have presented themselves 
 to him as personal agencies, all unknown causes must be con- 
 ceived by him of the same nature. Hence the original fetishism. 
 A stone thrown by an unseen hand, a piece of wood that, when 
 heated, bursts into flame, or an animal found in the nei<Thbour- 
 hood of some natural catastrophe, is at once assumed to be 
 the acting power. Here is a phenomenon — a visible change of 
 state in some observed object: past experience inevitably sug- 
 gests that there is a worker of this change : past experience also 
 inevitably suggests that such worker is an entity : the entity to 
 which the character of worker is ultimately ascribed will be that 
 which past experience points out as most probable : aad, in the 
 absence of other entities, this character of worker wUl attach to 
 
THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 301 
 
 the wood that gives out the flame, or to the stone that inflicts 
 the blow. Thus the wood and stone, being looked upon as agents 
 of unknown power capable of inflicting injury, are prayed to and 
 propitiated. 
 
 From the very first, however, there begins an accumulation of 
 facts calculated to undermine this theory of things, and certain 
 ultimately to overthrow it For, whilst he regards aU phenomena 
 as the doings of living beings, the primitive man necessarily 
 attributes to such beings qualities similar to those of the beings 
 he sees — men and brutes. Eeasoning, as he must^ from the 
 known to the unknown, he is obliged to conceive the unknown 
 generators of change to be like the known ones in all things : 
 and we find that he does this ; we find that he represents them 
 by forms either human, or bestial, or both, and that he imagines 
 their passions and habits to be like his own. Now an attiibute, 
 possessed in common by all the beings known to him, is that 
 of irregular volition. He sees no creature whose acts are so 
 uniform that he can say positively what its future behaviour 
 wiU be. Hence it happens that when certain natural events, 
 originally ascribed by him to living agents — events such as the 
 rising and setting of the sun and the falling of bodies to the 
 earth — come to be perpetually repeated, and follow the same 
 antecedents without exception, his notion of personal agency is 
 shaken. This perfect uniformity of action is at variance with 
 his knowledge of all known beings — is at variance with his 
 very conception of a being. And thus in respect to the most 
 familiar sequences, experience silently forces upon him the idea 
 of a constant course of procedure — or what we express by the 
 word law ; and a belief in iwpersonal agency slowly supplants 
 the original belief in personal agency. This revolution in his 
 mode of thinking, though at first confined to the every-day in- 
 stances of causation, extends in process of time to a wider and 
 wider range of cases. The unceasing accumulation of facts 
 which begins when increase of population provides a multitude 
 of observers, continually furnishes new illustrations of that uni- 
 formity of sequence which conflicts with the notion of special 
 
302 THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 
 
 workers ; and thus the domain of the so-called supernatural 
 is step hy step usurped by the so-called natural. Still, it is 
 only in as far as uniformity of sequence is made abundantly 
 manifest, that the old theory is superseded. Though, amongst 
 the Greeks, Thales taught that there were laws of matter, he 
 nevertheless considered that a load-stone had a soul. Where 
 the occiurence is unusual — that is, where the connection be- 
 tween antecedent and consequent is not familiar — that is, where 
 circumstances do not discountenance the original belief in spe- 
 cial workers, that behef is still held. Hence it happens that, 
 long after all ordinary phenomena have come to be considered 
 as due to the properties of things, or, in other words, to im- 
 personal agency, such an event as an eclipse or an earthquake 
 is explained as a dragon eating the sun, or as a god turning 
 over in his sleep ; an epidemic is ascribed to witchcraft ; a lumi- 
 nous whiff of marsh-gas is regarded as a " Will o' the whisp ; " 
 a failure in the dairy or brewhouse is set down to fairy malice ; 
 and there are myths about Giants' Causeways andDevils' Bridges. 
 Where the connection between cause and effect is very remote 
 or obscure, as in matters of fortune and in certain bodily affec- 
 tions, this disposition to attribute power to entities continues 
 even after science has made great progress ; and thus we find 
 that in our own day the old fetishism still lingers in the regard 
 shown to crooked sixpences, wart- charms, and omens. 
 
 It hngers, moreover, as already hinted, in less suspected forms. 
 Many much-reverenced social instrumentalities, also, have ori- 
 ginated in this primitive necessity of ascribing all causation 
 to special workers — this inabihty to detach the idea of force 
 from an individual something. Just in proportion as natural 
 phenomena are regarded by any people as of personal instead 
 of impersonal origin, will the phenomena of national life be 
 similarly construed : and, indeed, since moral sequences are less 
 obvious than physical ones, they wiU be thus construed even 
 more generally. The old belief that a king could fix the 
 value of coinage, and the cry raised at the change of style — 
 " Give us our eleven days," obviously implied minds incapable 
 
THE REGULATION OF COMMERCE. 303 
 
 of conceiving social affairs to be regulated by other than visible, 
 tangible agencies. That there should be at work some unseen 
 but universally-diffused influence determining the buyings and 
 sellings of citizens and the transactions of merchants from 
 abroad, in a way the most advantageous to all parties, was an 
 idea as foreign to such minds as was that of uniform physical 
 causation to the primitive Greeks ^ ; and, conversely, as the pri- 
 mitive Greeks could understand the operations of nature being 
 performed by a number of presiding individuahties, so to the 
 people of the middle ages it was comprehensible that a proper 
 production and distribution of commodities should be ensured 
 by acts of Parhament and government officials. Whilst the 
 due regulation of trade by a natural indestructible force was 
 inconceivable to them, they could conceive trade to be duly re- 
 gulated by a force resident in some material instrumentality put 
 together by legislators, clothed in the robes of office, painted by 
 court flatterers, and decorated with "jewels five words long."'' 
 
 But with the complex phenomena of commerce, as with the 
 simpler phenomena of the inorganic world, constancy of sequence 
 has gradually undermined the theory that power dwells in entities. 
 Irresistible evidence is at length estabhshing a belief in the law 
 of supply and demand, as some thousands of years ago it esta- 
 blished a belief in the law of gravitation. And the development 
 of politico-economical science, being thus a further conquest of 
 the faith in impersonal agencies over the faith in personal agen- 
 cies, must be regarded as one of that series of changes which 
 commenced with the first victory of natural philosophy over 
 superstition. 
 
 §4. 
 
 Fortunately it is now needless to enforce the doctrine of 
 commercial freedom by any considerations of poHcy. After 
 making continual attempts to improve upon the laws of trade, 
 
 ' See Grate's History. 
 
 ^ A metaphor that "has been nsed to denote the pride with which the German 
 officials regard their titles. 
 
304 THE KEGULATION OF COMMERCE. 
 
 from the time of Solon downwards, men are at length be- 
 ginning to see that such attempts are worse than useless. 
 Pohtical economy has sho'^n us in this matter — what indeed 
 it is its chief mission to show — that our wisest plan is to let 
 things take their own course. An increasing sense of justice, 
 too, has assisted in convincing us. We have here learned, 
 what our forefathers learned in some cases, and what, alas ! 
 we have yet to learn in many more, that nothing hut evil can 
 arise from inequitable regulations. The necessity of respecting 
 the principles of abstract rectitude — this it is that we have had 
 another lesson upon. Look at it rightly and we shall find that 
 all the Anti-Com-Law League did, with its lectures, its news- 
 papers, its bazaars, its monster meetings, and its tons of tracts, 
 was to teach people — what should have been very clear to them 
 without any such teaching — that no good can come of violating 
 men's rights. By bitter experience and a world of talk we have 
 at length been made partially to believe as much. Be it txue 
 or not in other cases, we are now quite certain that it is true in 
 trade. In respect to this at least we have declared that, for the 
 future, we will obey the law of equal freedom. 
 
CHAPTEE XXIV. 
 
 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 § 1- 
 
 As a matter of routine, it is needful here to point out what the 
 reader -will have inferred irom Chap. XXII., that, by devoting a 
 portion of its revenues or a part of the nation's property to the 
 propagation of Christianity or any other creed, a government 
 necessarily commits a wrong. If, as with ourselves, such go- 
 vernment forcibly takes a citizen's money for the support of a 
 national church, it is guilty of infiinging the rights it ought 
 to maintain — of trespassing upon that freedom to exercise the 
 faculties which it was commissioned to guard. For, as already 
 shown, by diminishing a subject's hberty of action more than 
 is needful for securing the remainder, the civil power becomes 
 an aggressor instead of a protector. If, on the other hand, 
 the right to ignore the state is recognised, as, in considering 
 the question abstractedly, we must suppose it to be, then, by 
 insisting upon conditions which drive some men to abandon its 
 aid, and which unnecessarily restrict the freedom of those who 
 do not, the state fails to that extent in discharging its duty. 
 Hence, specifically applying the principle lately set forth in 
 general terms, we find that a government cannot undertake the 
 teaching of a reUgious faith without either directly reversing its 
 function, or partially incapacitating itself for the performance of 
 that function, 
 
 §2. 
 
 In the conduct of English churchmen we have a curious 
 illustration of the way in which men will re- adopt, when it is 
 
 X 
 
306 EELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 thinly disguised, a belief they had iDdignantly cast from them. 
 That same Romish dogmatism, against -which our clergy ex- 
 claim with such vehemence, they themselves defend when it is 
 exercised on behalf of their o-mi creed. Eveiy state-church 
 is essentially popish. We also have a Vatican — St. Stephen's. 
 It is true that our arch-priest is a composite one. It is true 
 that -with us the triple tiara is separated into its parts — one for 
 monarch, one for peers, and one for commons. But this fact 
 makes no difference. In substance, popeiy is the assumption of 
 infallibiUty. It matters not in principle whether this assump- 
 tion is made by one man, or by an assembly of men. No doubt 
 the astounding announcement — "You must believe what we say 
 is right, and not what you think is right," comes less offensively 
 from the hps of a parHamentary majority than from those of a 
 single individual. But there still arises the question — By what 
 authority do these men assert tliis ? Whence do they derive their 
 infalUbility ? 
 
 That in establishing any religion a government does claim to 
 be infallible, scarcely needs proof Before a church organization 
 can be set to work, a distinct understanding as to what it is to 
 do must be arrived at. Before state-paid ministers can be set to 
 preach, it must first be decided what they are to preach. And 
 who is to say ? Clearly the state. Either it must itself elabo- 
 rate a creed, or it must depute some man or men to do so. It 
 must in some way sift out truth from error, and cannot escape 
 the responsibihty attending this. If it undertakes itself to settle 
 the doctiines to be taught, it is responsible. If it adopts a 
 ready-made .set of doctrines, it is equally responsible. And if 
 it selects its doctrines by proxy, it is still responsible ; both as 
 appointing those who chose for it, and as approving their choice. 
 Hence, to say that a government ought to set up and main- 
 tain a system of rehgious instruction, is to say that it ought 
 to pick out from amongst the various tenets that men hold or 
 have held, those wliich are right ; and that, when it has done 
 this — when it has settled between the Roman Catholic, the 
 G-reek, the Lutheran, and the Anglicaii creeds, or between 
 
EELIGIODS ESTABLISHMENTS. 307 
 
 the Puseyite, BQgh Church, and Evangelical ones — when it 
 has decided whether we should he haptized during infancy 
 or at a mature age, whether the truth is with Trinitarians 
 or Unitarians, whether men are saved by faith or by works, 
 whether pagans go to hell or not, whether ministers should 
 preach in black or white, whether confirmation is scriptural, 
 whether or not saints' days should be kept, and (as we have 
 lately seen it debating) whether baptism does or does not re- 
 generate — when, in short, it has settled all those controversies 
 which have split mankind into innumerable sects, it ought to 
 assert that its judgment is incapable of eiTor — is unquestionable 
 — is beyond appeal. There is no alternative. Unless the state 
 says this, it convicts itself of the most absurd inconsistency. 
 Only on the supposition of infaUibihty can its ecclesiastical 
 doings be made to seem tolerable. How else shall it demand 
 rates and tithes of the dissenter? What answer can it make to 
 his expostulations? "^Are you quite sm'e about these doctrines 
 of yours ?" inquires the dissenter. " No," rephes the state ; "not 
 quite sure, but nearly so." " Then it is just possible you may 
 he wrong, is it not ?" "Yes." "And it is just possible that I 
 may he right, is it not ? " " Yes." " Yet you threaten to inflict 
 penalties upon me for nonconformity ! You seize my goods ; you 
 imprison me if I resist ; and all to force from me the means to 
 preach up doctrines which you admit may be false, and by im- 
 plication to preach down doctrines which you admit may be true ! 
 How do you justify this ? " No reply. Evidently, therefore, 
 if the state persists, the only position open to it is that its 
 judgment cannot he mistaken — that its doctrines cannot he 
 erroneous. And now observe, that if it says this, it stands 
 committed to the whole Roman Catholic discipline as well as 
 to its theory. Having a creed that is beyond the possibility of 
 doubt, and being commissioned to disseminate that creed, the 
 state is in duty hound to employ the most efiicient means 
 of doing this — is bound to put down all adverse teachers, as 
 usurping its function and hindering the reception of its un- 
 questionable doctrine — is hound to use as much force as may 
 
 X 2 
 
308 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 be needful for doing this — is bound, therefore, to imprison, to 
 fine, and if necessary, to inflict severer penalties, so that error 
 may be exterminated and truth be triumphant. There is no 
 half-way. Being charged to put men in the way to heaven, 
 it cannot without sin permit some to be led the other way. 
 If, rather than punish a few on earth, it allows many to be 
 eternally damned for misbelief, it is manifestly culpable. 
 Evidently it must do all, or it must do nothing. If it does 
 not claim infallibility, it cannot in reason set up a national re- 
 ligion ; and if, by setting up a national rehgion, it does claim 
 infaUibnity, it ought to coerce all men into the belief of that 
 religion. Thus, as was said, every state-church is essentially 
 popish. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 But there has been gradually dawning upon those who think, 
 the conviction that a state-church is not so much a rehgious 
 as a political institution. " Who does not see," inquires Locke, 
 speaking of the clergy, " that these men ai-e more ministers of 
 the government than ministers of the gospel V Probably in 
 Locke's time there were few who did see this ; but there are 
 now many. Nor, indeed, is the fact altogether derded, as you 
 shall hear firom some poUtic supporter of rehgious estabhsh- 
 ments during an after-dinner confidence. " Between ourselves," 
 will whisper such an one, " these churches and parsons, and 
 all the rest of it, are not for sensible men, such as you and I ; 
 we know better ; we can do without all that ; but there must 
 be something of the Mud to keep the people in order."' And 
 then he will go on to show what influential restraints religious 
 services are; how they encourage subordination and content- 
 ment; and how the power which the clergy obtain over their 
 parishioners strengthens the hands of the civil ruler. That 
 some such view widely prevails may be gathered fi-om the acts 
 and proposals of our statesmen. How otherwise can we under- 
 stand that avowed wilUngness in the pohtical leaders of all par- 
 
 The writer has himself been thus addressed. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 309 
 
 ties to endow the Koman Catholic Church in Ireland if the 
 religious piihlic of England -would let them ? Or what but 
 a political motive can that States' lieutenant — the East India 
 Company — have for giving an annual subsidy of 23,000 rupees 
 to the temple of Juggernaut, reimbursing itself by a tax upon 
 the pilgrims ? Or why else should the Ceylon government take 
 upon itself to be curator of Buddha's tooth, and to commission 
 the Buddhist priests ^ ? 
 
 § 4- 
 
 Of the clergy who, on the other hand, commonly advocate 
 a state-church as being needful for the upholding of reUgion, 
 it may be said that by doing this they condemn their own case, 
 pass sentence upon their creed as worthless, and bring them- 
 selves in guilty of hypocrisy. What ! will they allow this faith, 
 which they value so highly, to die a natural death if they are not 
 paid for propagating it ? Must all these people, about whose 
 salvation they profess such anxiety, be left to go to perdi- 
 tion if livings, and canonries, and bishoprics, are abohshed ? 
 Has that apostolic inspiration, of which they claim to be the 
 inheritors, brought with it so little apostolic zeal that there 
 would be no preaching were it not for parsonages and tithes ? 
 Do they who, on ordination, declared themselves " inwardly 
 moved by the Holy Ghost," now find that they are inwardly 
 moved only by the chink of gold ? This would be called 
 slander coming from any but themselves. And then their flocks 
 — what say they of these ? Do these care so httle for the faith 
 they have been taught, that its maintenance cannot be entrusted 
 to them ? After centuries of church-culture, has Christianity 
 got so little root in men's hearts that but for government 
 watering-pots it must wither away ? Are we to understand that 
 these perpetual prayers and sacraments, these homilies and 
 exhortations, these visitings and scripture-readings, have not 
 even generated as much enthusiasm as can keep itself alive ? 
 
 ' See letter of Sir Colin Campbell to Lord Stanley, May 2, 1845. 
 
310 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 Have ten thousand sermons a week done so little that the 
 hearers will not contribute a sum sufficient for the sustenta- 
 tion of a ministry ? Why, if this he true, what is the system 
 good for ? These advocates do but open their briefs, and then 
 straightway argue themselves out of court. They labour to 
 prove either how powerless is the faith they teach, or how 
 miserably they teach it ! The sum and substance of their plea 
 for the state propagation of this creed is, that it has failed in 
 animating its ministers with its owa spirit of self-sacrifice, and 
 failed to arouse in its devotees a spark of its own generosity ! 
 
 § 5. 
 
 It is needless, however, in this year of grace 1850, with its 
 Gorham controversies and Puseyite divisions, with its Romish 
 and Rationahst secessions, with confusion inside the church, 
 and a hostile association outside — to debate the question at 
 greater length. Events are proving to most of the reflective 
 — -even to many of the clergy themselves — that a state-sup- 
 port of any particular faith is wrong, and that in England at 
 least, it must shortly cease. For those who do not yet see 
 this there are already volumes of argument to which addition is 
 almost superfluous. The conclusions above come to, that the 
 state cannot establish a rehgion without assuming infallibiUty, 
 and that to argue an estabhshment of it needful is to condemn 
 the rehgion itself, will sufficiently enforce, for present purposes, 
 our abstract proposition. 
 
CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 POOR-LAWS. 
 § 1. 
 
 In common with its other assumptions of secondary offices, 
 the assumption hy a government of the office of Reliever- 
 general to the poor, is necessarily forbidden by the principle 
 that a government cannot rightly do anything more than pro- 
 tect. In demanding from a citizen contributions for the 
 mitigation of distress — contributions not needed for the due 
 administration of men's rights — the state is, as we have seen, 
 reversing its fanction, and diminishing that liberty to exercise 
 the faculties which it was instituted to maintain. Possibly, un- 
 mindful of the explanations already given, some will assert that 
 by satisfying- the wants of the pauper, a government is in 
 reality extending his liberty to exercise his faculties, inasmuch as 
 it is giving him something without which the exercise of them 
 is impossible ; and that hence, though it decreases the rate- 
 payer's sphere of action, it compensates by increasing that of 
 the rate-receiver. But this statement of the case imphes a 
 confounding of two widely-different things. To enforce the 
 fundamental law — to take care that every man has freedom to 
 do aU that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal free- 
 dom of any other man — this is the special purpose for which 
 the civil power exists. Now insuring to each the right to pur- 
 sue within the specified limits the objects of his desires with- 
 out let or hindrance, is quite a separate thing from insuring 
 him satisfaction. Of two individuals, one may use his hberty 
 
312 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 of action successfully — may achieve the gratifications he seeks 
 after, or accumulate what is equivalent to many of them — pro- 
 perty ; whilst the other, having like privileges, may fail to do 
 [_^o. But with these results the state has no concern. All that 
 . lies within its commission is to see that each man is allowed to 
 I use such powers and opportunities as he possesses ; and if it 
 1 takes from him who has prospered to give to him who has not, 
 \ it violates its duty towai'ds the one to do more than its duty 
 \ towards the other. Or, repeating the idea elsewhere expressed 
 S (p. 278), it breaks down the vital law of society, that it may 
 1 effect what social vitality does not caU for. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 The notion popularized by Cobhett, that every one has a 
 right to a maintenance out of the soil, leaves those who adopt 
 it in an awkward predicament. Do but ask them to specify, 
 and they are set fast. Assent to their principle ; tell them you 
 will assume their title to be valid ; and then, as a needful pre- 
 liminary to the hquidation of their claim, ask for some precise 
 definition of it — inquire " What is a maintenance ? " They 
 are dumb. " Is it," say you, " potatoes and salt, with rags ^ 
 and a mud cabin ? or is it bread and bacon, in a two-roomed 
 cottage ? WiU a joint on Sundays sufiice ? or does the de- 
 mand include meat and malt liquor daily ? Will tea, cofiee, 
 and tobacco be expected ? and if so, how many ounces of each ? 
 Are bare walls and brick floors aU that is needed ? or must 
 there be carpets and paper-hangings? Are shoes considered 
 essential ? or will the Scotch practice be approved ? Shall the 
 clothing be of fustian ? if not, of what quality must the broad- 
 cloth be ? In short, just point out where, between the two 
 extremes of starvation and luxury, this something called a 
 maintenance hes." Again they are dumb. You expostulate. 
 You explain that nothing can be done until the question is 
 satisfactorily answered. You show that the claim must be re- 
 duced to a detailed, intelligible shape before a step can be taken 
 
POOR-LAWS. 313 
 
 towards its settlement. " How else," you ask, " shall we kaow 
 whether enough has been awarded, or whether too much?" 
 Still they are dumb. And, indeed, there is no possible reply 
 for them. Opinions they may offer in plenty ; but not a pre- 
 cise, unanimous answer. One thinks that a bare subsistence is 
 all that can fairly be demanded. Here is another who hints at 
 something beyond mere necessaries. A third maintains that a 
 few of the enjoyments of Ufe should be provided for. And 
 some of the more consistent, pushing the doctrine to its le- 
 gitimate result, will rest satisfied with nothing short of com- 
 munity of property. Who now shall decide amongst these 
 conflicting notions ? Or, rather, how shall their propounders 
 be brought to an agreement ? Can any one of them prove 
 that his definition is tenable and the others not ? Yet he must 
 do this if he would make out a case. Before he can prosecute 
 his claim against society, in the high court of morahty, he must 
 "file his bill of particulars." If he accompUshes this he is en- 
 titled to a hearing. If not, he must evidently be non-suited. 
 
 The right to labour — that French translation of our poor- 
 law doctrine — may be similarly treated. A criticism parallel 
 to the foregoing would place its advocates in a parallel dilemma. 
 But there is another way in which the fallacy of this theory, 
 either in its Enghsh or its continental form, may be made 
 manifest — a way that may here be fitly employed. 
 
 And first let us make sure of the meaning wrapped up in 
 this expression — right to labour. Evidentlyif we would avoid 
 mistakes we must render it hterally — right to the labour ; for 
 the thing demanded is not the Uberty of labouring : this, no one 
 disputes; but it is the opportunity of labouring — the having re- 
 munerative employment provided, which is contended for. Now, 
 without dwelling upon the fact that the word right as here 
 used, bears a signification quite different from its legitimate 
 ong — that it does not here imply something inherent in man, 
 but something depending upon external circumstances — not 
 something possessed in virtue of his faculties, but something 
 springing out of his relationship to others — not something true 
 
314 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 of him as a solitary individual, but something which can be 
 trae of him only as one of a community — not something ante- 
 cedent to society, but something necessarily subsequent to it 
 — not something expressive of a claim to do, but of a claim to 
 be done unto — without dwelhng upon this, let us take the ex- 
 pression as it stands, and see how it looks when reduced to its 
 lowest terms. When the artizan asserts his right to have work 
 provided for him, he presupposes the existence of some power 
 on which devolves the duty of providing such work. What 
 power is this ? The government, he says. But the govern- 
 ment is not an original power, it is a deputed one — is subject 
 therefore, to the instruction of its employer — must do that only 
 which its employer directs — and can be held responsible for 
 nothing save the performance of its employer's behests. Now 
 who is its employer ? Society. Strictly speaking, therefore, 
 the assertion of our artizan is, that it is the duty of society to 
 find work for him. But he is himself a member of society — 
 is consequently a unit of that body who ought, as he says, to 
 find work for every man — has hence a share in the duty of 
 finding work for every man. Whilst, therefore, it is the duty 
 of all other men to find work for him, it is his duty to help in 
 finding work for all other men. And hence, if we indicate his 
 fellows alphabetically, his theory is that A, B, C, D, and the 
 rest of the nation, ai-e bound to employ him ; that he is bound, 
 in company with B, C, D, and the rest, to employ A; that he 
 is bound, in company with A, C, D, and the rest, to employ B ; 
 is bound, with A, B, D, and the rest, to employ C, with A, B 0, 
 and the rest, to employ D ; and so on with each individual of 
 the half score or score millions, of whom the society may be 
 composed ! 
 
 Thus do we see how readily imaginary rights are distin- 
 guishable from real ones. They need no disproof: they dis- 
 prove themselves. The ordeal of a definition breaks the illusion 
 at once. Bubble-hke, they wiU bear a cursory glance ; but dis- 
 appear in the grasp of any one who tries to lay hold of 
 them. 
 
POOR-LAWS. 3 1 5 
 
 Meanwhile we must not overlook the fact that, erroneous as 
 are these poor-law and communist theories — these assertions 
 of a man's right to a maintenance, and of his right to have 
 work provided for him — they are, nevertheless, nearly related 
 to a truth. They are unsuccessful efforts to express the fact, 
 that whoso is bom on to this planet of ours thereby obtains 
 some interest in it — may not be summarily dismissed again — 
 may not have his existence ignored by those in possession. 
 In other words, they are attempts to embody that thought 
 which finds its legitimate utterance in the law — all men have 
 equal rights to the use of the Earth (Chap. IX.). The pre- 
 valence of these crude ideas is natural enough. A vague per- 
 ception that there is something wrong about the relationship in 
 which the great mass of mankind stand to the soil and to hfe, 
 was sure eventually to grow up. After getting from under the 
 grosser injustice of slavery, men could not help beginning in 
 course of time to feel what a monstrous thing it was that nine 
 people out of ten shoTild live in the world on sufferance, not 
 having even standing room, save by allowance of those who 
 claimed the Earth's surface (p. 114). Could it be right that 
 aU these human beings should not only be without claim to 
 the necessaries of life— should not only be denied the use of 
 those elements from which such necessaries axe obtainable — 
 but should further be unable to exchange their labour for such 
 necessaries, except by leave of their more fortunate fellows? 
 Could it be that the majority had thus no better title to exist- 
 ence than one based upon the good-wiU or convenience of the 
 minority? Could it be that these landless men had "been 
 mis-sent to this earth, where all the seats were already taken ? " 
 Surely not. And if not, how ought matters to stand ? To all 
 which questions, now forced upon men's minds in more or less 
 definite shapes, there come, amongst other answers, these theo- 
 ries of a right to a maintenance and a right of labour. Whilst, 
 therefore, they must be rejected as untenable, we maystiU re- 
 cognise in them the imperfect utterances of the moral sense in 
 its efforts to express equity. 
 
316 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 The -wrong done to the people at large by robbing them of 
 their birthright— their heritage in the earth — is, indeed, thought 
 by some a sufficient excuse for a poor-law, -which is regarded 
 by such as an instrumeutahty for distributing compensation. 
 There is much plausibihty in this construction of the matter. 
 But as a defence of national organizations for the support of 
 paupers, it -will not bear criticism. Even were there no better 
 reason for demurring to the supposed compromise, it might 
 still be objected that to counterbalance one injury by inflicting 
 another, and to perpetuate these mutual injuries without know- 
 ing whether they are or are not equivalents, is at best a very 
 questionable policy. Why organize a diseased state? Some 
 time or other this morbid constitution of things, under which 
 the greater part of the body-politic is cut off from direct access 
 to the source of hfe, must be changed. Difficult, no doubt, 
 men will find it to estabhsh a normal condition. There is no 
 knowing how many generations may pass away before the task 
 is accomphshed. But accomplished it will eventually be. AU 
 arrangements, however, which disguise the evils entailed by 
 the present inequitable relationship of mankind to the soil, 
 postpone the day of rectification. " A generous poor-law " is 
 openly advocated as the best means of pacifying an irritated 
 people. Workhouses are used to mitigate the more acute 
 symptoms of social unhealthiness. Parish pay is hush-money. 
 Whoever, then, desires the radical cure of national maladies, 
 but especially of this atrophy of one class, and hypertrophy 
 of another, consequent upon unjust land tenure, cannot con- 
 sistently advocate any kind of compromise. 
 
 But a poor-law is not the means of distributing compensa- 
 tion. Neither in respect of those from whom it comes, nor 
 in respect of those to whom it goes, does pauper-rehef fulfil 
 the assumed purpose. According to the hypothesis poors'-rates 
 should bear whoUy upon the land.' But they do not. And 
 
POOR-LAWS. 317 
 
 at least that part of them •which hears upon the land shoulo: 
 come from the usm:pers or their descendants. But it does not 
 According to the hypothesis the burden should not fall upon 
 the innocent. But it does; for poors' -rates were imposed after 
 landed property had in many cases changed hands hy purchase. 
 According to the hypothesis the burden should not fall upon 
 those already defrauded. But it does; for the majority of rate- 
 payers belong to the non-landowning class. According to the 
 hypothesis all men kept out of their inheritance should receive 
 a share of this so-called compensation. But they do not; for 
 only here and there one, gets any of it. In no way, therefore, 
 is the theory carried out. The original depredators are beyond 
 reach. The guiltless are taxed in their place. A large propor- 
 tion of those afready robbed are robbed afresh. And of the rest, 
 only a few receive the proceeds. 
 
 The usual reason assigned for supporting a poor-law is, 
 that it is an indispensable means of mitigating popular suffering. 
 Given by a churchman such a reason is natural enough; but 
 coming, as it often does, from a dissenter, it is strangely incon- 
 sistent. Most of the objections raised by the dissenter to an 
 established religion •wiU tell with equal force against established 
 charity. He asserts that it is unjust to tax him for the support 
 of a creed he does not beheve. May not another as reasonably 
 protest against being taxed for the maintenance of a system of 
 reUef he disapproves ? He denies the right of any bishop or 
 councU to choose for him which doctrines he shall accept and 
 ■which he shall reject. Why does he not also deny the right of 
 any commissioner or vestry to choose for him who are worthy of 
 his charity and who are not ? If he dissents from a national 
 church on the ground that religion wiU be more general and 
 more sincere when voluntarily sustained, should he not similarly 
 dissent from a poor-law on the ground that spontaneous bene- 
 ficence will produce results both wider and better ? Might not 
 
318 POOE-LAWS. 
 
 the corruption which he points out as neutralizing the effects of 
 a state-taught creed, be paralleled hy those evils of pauperism 
 accompanying a state-provision for the poor ? Should not his 
 nonconformity in respect to faith be accompanied by non- 
 conformity in respect to good works ? Certainly his present 
 opinions are incongruous beyond all reconciling. He resists 
 every attempt to interfere with the choice of his religion, but 
 submits to despotic dictation as to the exercise of that rehgion. 
 Whilst he denies the right of a legislature to explain the theory, 
 he yet argues the necessity of its direction in the practice. 
 It is inconceivable that these positions can be harmonized. 
 Whoso believes that spiritual destitution is to be remedied only 
 by a national church, may with some show of reason propose to 
 deal with physical destitution by an analogous instrumentality. 
 But the advocate of voluntaryism is bound to stand by his 
 principle in the one case as much as in the other. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Whether the sufferings of the unfortunate shall be soothed in 
 obedience to the gentle whisperings of benevolence, or whether 
 fear of the harsh threats of law shall be the motive for relieving 
 them, is indeed a question of no small importance. In deciding 
 how misery is best alleviated we have to consider, not only what 
 is done for the aSlicted, but what is the reactive effect upon 
 those who do it. The relationship that springs up between be- 
 nefactor and beneficiary is, for this present state of the world, a 
 refining one. Having power to muzzle awhile those propensi- 
 ties of the savage which yet Hnger in us — corrective as it is of 
 that cold, hard state of feeling in which the every- day business 
 of life is pursued — and drawing closer as it does those links of 
 mutual dependence which keep society together — charity is in 
 its nature essentially civilizing. The emotion accompanying 
 every generous act adds an atom to the fabric of the ideal man. 
 As no cruel thing can be done without character being thrust a 
 degree back towards barbarism, so no kind thing can be done 
 
POOR-LAWS. 319 
 
 without character heing moved a degree forward towards perfec- 
 tion. Doubly efBcacious, therefore, are all assuagings of distress 
 instigated by sympathy; for not only do they remedy the parti- 
 cular e-vils to be met, but they help to mould humanity into a 
 form by which such evils will one day be precluded. 
 
 Far otherwise is it with law-enforced plans of relief These 
 exercise just the opposite influence. "The quality of mercy 
 (or pity) is not strained," says the poet. But a poor-law tries 
 to make men pitiful by force. " It droppeth as the gentle rain 
 fi-om heaven," continues the poet. By a poor-law it is wrung 
 from the unwilling. " It blesses him that gives, and him 
 that takes," adds the poet. A poor-law makes it curse both ; 
 the one with discontent and recklessness, the other with com- 
 plainings and often-renewed bitterness. 
 
 This turning of bahn into poison must have been remarked 
 by the most careless. Watch a ratepayer when the collector's 
 name is announced. You shall observe no kindling of the eye 
 at some thought of happiness to be conferred — no relaxing of 
 the mouth as though selfish cares had for the moment been for- 
 gotten — no softening of the voice to tell of compassionate 
 emotion : no, none of these ; but rather shall you see contracted 
 features, a clouded brow, a sudden disappearance of what habitual 
 kiadhness of expression there may be ; the tax-paper is glanced 
 over half in fear and half in vexation ; there are grumblings 
 about the short time that has elapsed siace the last rate ; the 
 purse comes slowly from the pocket ; every coin is grudgingly 
 parted with ; and after the collector (who is treated with bare 
 civihty) has made his exit, some little time passes before the 
 usual equanimity is regained. Is there anything in this 
 to remind us of the virtue which is " twice blessed ? " Note 
 again how this act-of-parliament charity perpetually super- 
 sedes men's better sentiments. Here is a respectable citizen 
 with enough and to spare : a man of some feeling ; liberal, 
 if there is need ; generous even, if his pity is excited. A beg- 
 gar knocks at his door ; or he is accosted in his walk by some 
 way-worn tramp. What does he do ? Does he Hsten, inves- 
 
320 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 tigate, and, if proper, assist ? No ; he commonly cuts short 
 the tale with — " I have nothing for you, my good man ; you 
 must go to your parish." And then he shuts the door, or 
 -walks on, as the case may be, with evident unconcern. Should 
 it strike him the next moment that there was something very 
 wo-begone in the petitioner's look, this uncomfortable thought 
 is met by the reflection, that so long as there is a poor-law. 
 he cannot starve, and that it will be time enough to consider 
 his claims when he appUes for rehef. Thus does the conscious- 
 ness that there exists a legal provision for the indigent, act as 
 an opiate to the yearnings of sympathy. Had there been no 
 ready-made excuse, the behaviour would probably have been 
 diiFerent. Commiseration, pleading for at least an inquiry 
 into the case, would most Ukely have prevailed ; and, in place 
 of an application to the board of guardians, ending in a pit-' 
 tance coldly handed across the pay-table to be thanklessly re- 
 ceived, might have commenced a relationship good for both 
 parties — a generosity humanizing, to the one, and a succour 
 made doubly valuable to the other by a few words of conso- 
 lation and encouragement, followed, it may be, by a Hft into 
 some self-supporting position. 
 
 In truth there could hardly be found a more efficient device 
 for estranging men from each other, and decreasing their fellow- 
 feeUng, than this system of state -almsgiving. Being kind by 
 proxy ! — could anything be more blighting to the finer instincts ? 
 Here is an institution through which, for a few shilhngs periodi- 
 cally paid, the citizen may compound for all kindness owing 
 from him to his poorer brothers. Is he troubled with twinges 
 of conscience ? here is an anodyne for him, to be had by sub- 
 scribing so much in the pound on his rental. Is he indifferent 
 as to the welfare of others ? why then iu return for punctual 
 payment of rates he shall have absolution for hardness of heart. 
 Look : here is the advertisement. " Gentlemen's benevolence 
 done for them, in the most business-like manner, and on the lowest 
 terms. Charity doled out by a patent apparatus, warranted to 
 save all soiling of fingers and offence to the nose. Good works 
 
POOR-LAWS. 321 
 
 undertaken by contract. Infallible remedies for self-reproach 
 always on hand. Tender feelings kept easy at per annum." 
 
 And thus we have the gentle, softening, elevating intercourse 
 that should be habitually taking place between rich and poor, 
 superseded by a cold, hard, hfeless mechanism, bound together 
 by dry parcliment acts and regulations — managed by commis- 
 sioners, boards, clerks, and collectors, who perform their re- 
 spective fanctions as tasks — and kept a-going by money forcibly 
 taken from all classes indiscriminately. In place of the music 
 breathed by feelings attuned to kind deeds, we have the harsh 
 creaking and jarring of a thing that cannot stir without creating 
 discord — a thing whose every act, from the gathering of its funds 
 to their final distribution, is proUfic of grumblings, discontent, 
 anger — a thing that breeds squabbles about authority, disputes 
 as to claims, brow-beatings, jealousies, litigations, corruption, 
 trickery, lying, ingratitude — a tiling that supplants, and there- 
 fore makes dormant, men's nobler feelings, whilst it stimulates 
 their baser ones. 
 
 And now mark how we find illustrated in detail the truth 
 elsewhere expressed in the abstract, that whenever a govern- 
 ment oversteps its duty — the maintaining of men's rights — 
 it inevitably retards the process of adaptation. For what fa- 
 culty is it whose work a poor-law so officiously undertakes ? 
 Sympathy. The very faculty above all others needing to be 
 exercised. The faculty which distinguishes the social man 
 from the savage. The faculty which originates the idea of 
 justice — w^liich makes men regardful of each other's claims — 
 which renders society possible. The faculty of whose growth 
 civiUzation is a liistory — on whose increased strength the future 
 ameHorations of man's state mainly depend — and by whose 
 ultimate supremacy, human morality, freedom, and happiness 
 will be secured. Of this faculty poor-laws partially supply 
 the place. By doing which they diminish the demands made 
 upon it, limit its exercise, check its development, and therefore 
 retard the process of adaptation. 
 
 Y 
 
823 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 §6. 
 
 f Pervading all nature we may see at work a stem discipline, 
 which is a little cruel that it may be veij kind. That state of 
 universal warfare maintained throughout the lower creation, to 
 the great pei-plexity of many worthy people, is at bottom the 
 most merciful provision which the circumstances admit of. It 
 is much better that the ruminant animal, when deprived by age 
 of the vigour which made its existence a pleasure, should be 
 killed by some beast of prey, than that it should linger out a 
 
 j life made painful by infirmities, and eventually die of starvation. 
 
 By the destruction of all such, not only is existence ended be- 
 fore it becomes burdensome, but room is made for a younger 
 generation capable of the fullest enjopnent; and, moreover, out 
 of the very act of substitution happiness is derived for a tribe 
 of predatory creatures. Note further, that their carnivorous 
 enemies not only remove from herbivorous herds individuals 
 past their prime, but also weed out the sickly, the malformed, 
 and the least fleet or powerful. By the aid of which purifying 
 process^ as well as by the fighting, so universal in the pairing 
 season, all vitiation of the race through the multiplication of 
 its inferior samples is prevented ; and the maintenance of a 
 constitution completely adapted to surrounding conditions, and 
 therefore most productive of happiness, is ensured. 
 
 The development of the higher creation is a progress towards 
 a form of being capable of a happiness undiminished by these 
 drawbacks. It is in the human race that the consummation is 
 to be accomphshed. Civilization is the last stage of its accom- 
 plishment. ^ And the ideal man is the man in whom all the 
 conditions of that accomplishment are fulfilled. Meanwhile 
 the -well-being of existing humanity, and the unfolding of it 
 into this ultimate perfection, are both secured by that same 
 beneficent, though severe discipline, to -which the animate 
 creation at large is subject : a discipline which, is pitiless in 
 
POOR-LAWS. 323 
 
 the -working out of good : a felicity-pursuing law -which never 
 swerves for the avoidance of partial and temporary suffering. 
 The poverty of the incapable, the distresses that come upon the 
 imprudent, the starvation of the idle^ and those shoulderings 
 aside of the weak by the strong, which leave so many " in 
 shallows and in miseries," are the decrees of a large, far-seeing 
 benevolence. It seems hard that an unskilfulness which -with 
 all his efforts he cannot overcome, should entail hunger upon 
 the artizan. It seems hard that a labourer incapacitated 
 by sickness from competing -with his stronger fellows, should 
 have to bear the resulting privations. It seems hard that 
 widows and orphans should be left to struggle for life or death. 
 Nevertheless, when regarded not separately, but in connection 
 with the interests of universal humanity, these harsh fataUties 
 are seen to be full of the liighest beneficence — the same be- 
 neficence which brings to early graves the children of diseased 
 parents, and singles out the low-spirited, the intemperate, and 
 the debilitated as the victims of an epidemic. 
 
 There are many very amiable people — people over whom in 
 so far as their feelings are concerned we may fitly rejoice — 
 who have not the nerve to look this matter fairly in the face. 
 Disabled as they are by their sympathies -with present suffer- 
 ing, from duly regarding ultimate consequences, they pursue 
 a course which is very injudicious, and in the end even cruel. 
 We do not consider it true kindness in a mother to gratify 
 her chUd -with sweetmeats that are certain to make it ill. We 
 should think it a very fooUsh sort of benevolence which led 
 a surgeon to let liis patient's disease progi-ess to a fatal issue, 
 rather than inflict pain by an operation. Similarly, we must 
 call those spurious philanthropists, who, to prevent present 
 misery, would entail gi-eater misery upon future generations. 
 All defenders of a poor-law must, however, be classed 
 amongst such. That rigorous necessity which, when allowed 
 to act on them, becomes so sharp a spur to the lazy, and so 
 strong a bridle to the random, these paupers' friends would 
 
 Y 2 
 
324 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 repeal, because of the wailings it here and there produces. 
 Blind to the fact, that under the natural order of things society 
 is constantly excreting its unhealthy, imbecile, slow, vacillating, 
 faithless members, these unthinkiiig, though well-meaning, men 
 advocate an interference which not only stops the purifying pro- 
 cess, but even increases the vitiation — absolutely encourages 
 the multiplication of the reckless and incompetent by offering 
 them an unfaihng provision, and (/wcourages the multiplication 
 of the competent and provident by heightening the prospective 
 difficulty of maintaining a family. And thus, in their eagerness 
 to prevent the really salutary sufferings that surround us, these 
 sigh-wise and groan-fooHsh people bequeath to posterity a con- 
 tinually increasing ourse. 
 
 Eetuming again to the highest point of view, we find that 
 there is a second and still more injiuious mode in which law- 
 enforced charity checks the process of adaptation. To become 
 fit for the social state, man has not only to lose his savageness, 
 but he has to acquire the capacities needful for civilized life. 
 Power of application must be developed ; such modification of 
 the .intellect as shall quahfy it for its new tasks must take 
 place; and, above all, there must be gained the ability to 
 sacrifice a small immediate gratification for a future gi-eat one. 
 The state of transition will of course be an unhappy state. 
 Misery inevitably results from incongruity between constitution 
 and conditions. All these evils, which afflict us, and seem 
 to the uninitiated the obvious consequences of this or that re- 
 movable cause, are unavoidable attendants on the adaptation 
 now in progress. Humanity is being pressed against the in- 
 exorable necessities of its new position— is being moulded into 
 harmony with them, and has to bear the resulting uuhappiness 
 as best it can. The process must be undergone, and the suf- 
 ferings must be endured. No power on earth, no cunningly- 
 devised laws of statesmen, no world-rectifying schemes of the 
 humane, no communist panaceas, no reforms that men ever 
 did broach or ever will broach, can diminish them one jot. 
 
POOR-LAWS. 325 
 
 Intensified they may be, and ai-e ; and in preventing their in- 
 tensification, the philanthropic will find ample scope for exertion. 
 But there is hound up with the change a normal amount of 
 suffering, which cannot he lessened without altering the very 
 laws of life. Every attempt at mitigation of this eventuates in 
 exacerhation of it. All that a poor-law, or any kindred insti- 
 tution can do, is to partially suspend the transition — to take off 
 for awhile, from certain members of society, the painful pressure 
 which is effecting their transformation. At best this is merely 
 to postpone what must ultimately be borne. But it is more 
 than this : it is to undo what has already been done. For the 
 circumstances to which adaptation is taking place cannot be 
 superseded without causing a retrogression — a partial loss of 
 the adaptation previously effected; and as the whole process 
 must some time or other be passed through, the lost ground 
 must be gone over again, and the attendant pain borne afresh. 
 Thus, besides retarding adaptation, a p<Dor-law adds to the dis- 
 tresses inevitably attending it. 
 
 At first sight these considerations seem conclusive against 
 all relief to the poor — voluntary as well as compulsory; and it 
 is no doubt true that they imply a condemnation of whatever 
 private charity enables the recipients to elude the necessities 
 of our social existence. With this condemnation, however, 
 no rational man will quarrel. That careless squandering of 
 pence which has fostered into perfection a system of organized 
 begging — which has made skilful mendicancy more profitable 
 than ordinary manual labour — which induces the simulation of 
 palsy, epilepsy, cholera, and no end of diseases and deformities 
 — which has called into existence warehouses for the sale and 
 hire of impostor's dresses — which has given to pity-inspiring 
 babes a market value of 2d. per day — the unthinking be- 
 nevolence which has generated all this, cannot but be disap- 
 proved by every one. Now it is only against this injudicious 
 charity that the foregoing argument tells. To that charity 
 which may be described as helping men to help themselves, it 
 makes no objection — countenances it rather. .And in helping 
 
326 POOE-LAWS. 
 
 men to help themselves, there remains abundant scope for the 
 exercise of a people's sympatlues. Accidents will still supply 
 victims on whom generosity may be legitimately expended. 
 Men tin-own upon their hacks hy unforeseen events, men who 
 have failed for want of knowledge inaccessible to them, men 
 ruined by the dishonesty of others, and men in whom hope 
 long delayed has made the heart sick, may, with advantage to 
 all pai-ties, be assisted. Even the prodigal, after severe hard- 
 ship has branded his memory with the unbending conditions of 
 social life to which he must submit, may properly have another 
 trial afforded him. And, although hy these ameliorations the 
 process of adaptation must be remotely interfered with, yet in 
 the majority of cases, it will not be so much retarded in one 
 direction as it will be advanced in another. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 Objectionable as we find a poor-law to be, even under the 
 supposition that it does what it is intended to do — diminish 
 present suffering — how shall we regard it on finding that in 
 reality it does no such thing — cannot do any such thing ? 
 Yet, paradoxical as the assertion looks, this is absolutely the 
 fact. Let but the observer cease to contemplate so fixedly one 
 side of the phenomenon — pauperism and its relief, and begin to 
 examine the other side — rates and the ultimate contributors of 
 them, and he will discover that to suppose the sum-total of dis- 
 tress dimiuishable by act-of-parliament bountj' is a delusion. 
 A statement of the case in terms of labour and produce will 
 quickly make this clear. 
 
 Here, at any specified period, is a given quantity of food and 
 things exchangable for food, in the hands or at the command 
 of the middle and upper classes. A certain portion of this food 
 is needed by these classes themselves, and is consumed by them 
 at the same rate, or very near it, be there scarcity or abundance. 
 Whatever variation occurs in the sum- total of food and its equi- 
 valents must therefore affect the remaining portion, not used by 
 
POOR-LAWS. 327 
 
 these classes for personal sustenance. This remaining portion 
 is given by them to the people in return for their labour, which 
 is pai-tly expended in the production of a further supply of ne- 
 cessaries, and partly in the production of luxuries. Hence, by 
 how much this portion is deficient, by so much must the people 
 come short. Manifestly a re-distribution by legislative or other 
 agency cannot make that sufficient for them which was pre- 
 viously insufficient. It can do nothing but change the parties 
 by whom the insufficiency is felt. If it gives enough to some 
 who else would not have enough, it must inevitably reduce cer- 
 tain others to the condition of not having enough. And thus, 
 to the extent that a poor-law mitigates distress in one place, 
 it unavoidably produces distress in another. 
 
 Should there be any to whom this abstract reasoning is 
 unsatisfactory, a concrete statement of the case will, perhaps, 
 remove their doubts. A poors'-rate collector takes from the 
 citizen a sum of money equivalent to bread and clothing for 
 one or more paupers. Had not this sum been so taken, it 
 would either have been used to purchase superfluities, which 
 the citizen now does without, or it would have been paid by 
 him into a bank, and lent by the banker to a manufacturer, 
 merchant, or tradesman ; that is, it would ultimately have been 
 given in wages either to the producer of the superfluities or 
 to an operative, paid out of the banker's loan. But this sum 
 having been carried off as poors'-rate, whoever would have re- 
 ceived it as wages must now to that extent go without wages. 
 The food which it represented having been taken to sustain a 
 pauper, the artizan to whom that food would have been given 
 in return for work done, must now lack food. And thus, as 
 at first said, the transaction is simply a change of the paities 
 by whom the insufficiency of food is felt. 
 
 Nay, the case is even worse. Akeady it has been pointed 
 out, that by suspending the process of adaptation, a poor-law 
 increases the distress to be borne at some future day ; and here 
 we shall find that it also increases the distress to be borne now. 
 For be it remembered, that of the sum taken in any year to 
 
328 POOR-LAWS. 
 
 support paupers, a large portion would otherwise have gone to 
 support labourers employed in new reproductive works — land- 
 drainage, machine-building, &c. An additional stock of com- 
 modities would by-and-by have been produced, and the number 
 of those who go short would consequently have been diminished. 
 Thus the astonishment expressed by some that so much misery 
 should exist, notwithstanding the distribution of fifteen milhons 
 a year by endowed charities, benevolent societies, and poor-law 
 unions, is quite uncalled for; seeing that the larger the sum 
 gratuitously administered, the more intense will shortly become 
 the suffering. Manifestly, out of a given population, the greater 
 the number living on the bounty of others, the smaller must 
 be the number hving by labour ; and the smaller the number 
 living by labour, the smaller must be the production of food 
 and other necessaries ; and the smaller the production of neces- 
 saries, the greater must be the distress. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 We fijid, then, that the verdict given by the law of state- duty 
 against a public provision for the indigent is enforced by sundry 
 independent considerations. A critical analysis of the alleged 
 rights, for upholding which a poor-law is defended, shows them 
 to be fictitious. Nor does the plea that a poor-law is a means 
 of distributing compensation for wrongs done to the disinherited 
 people turn out to be valid. The assumption that only by law- 
 administered relief can physical destitution be met, proves to be 
 quite analogous to the assumption that spiritual destitution ne- 
 cessitates a law- administered reUgion ; and consistency requires 
 those who assert the sujBBiciency of voluntary effort in the one 
 case to assert it in the other also. The substitution of a me- 
 chanical charity for charity prompted by the heart is manifestly 
 unfavourable to the growth of men's sympathies, and therefore 
 adverse to the process of adaptation. Legal bounty further 
 retards adaptation by intei-posing between the people and the 
 conditions to which they must become adapted, so as partially 
 
POOR-LAWS. 329 
 
 to suspend those conditions. And, to crown all, we find, not 
 only that a poor-law must necessarily fail to diminish popular 
 suffering, but that it must inevitably increase that suffering, 
 both directly by checking the production of commodities, and 
 indirectly by causing a retrogression of character, which painful 
 discipline must at some future day make good. 
 
CHAPTEE XXVI. 
 
 KATIONAL EDUCATION, 
 
 § 1. 
 
 In the same way that our definition of state-duty forhids the 
 state to administer religion or chaiity, so Ukewise does it for- 
 bid the state to administer education. Inasmuch as the taking 
 away, by government, of more of a man's property than is need- 
 ful for maintaining his rights, is an infringement of his rights, 
 and therefore a reversal of the government's function towards 
 him ; and inasmuch as the taking away of his property to edu- 
 cate his own or other people's children is not needful for the 
 maintaining of his rights ; the taking away of his property for 
 such a purpose is %vroug. 
 
 Should it be said that the rights of the children are involved, 
 and that state-interposition is required to maintain these, the 
 reply is that no cause for such intei-position can be shown until 
 the childi-en's rights have been violated, and that thek rights 
 are not violated by a neglect of their education. For, as re- 
 peatedly explained, what we call rights are merely arbitrary 
 subdivisions of the general liberty to exercise the faculties ; 
 and that only can be called an infringement of rights which 
 actually diminishes this Uberty — cuts off a previously existing 
 power to pui-sue the objects of desire. Now the parent who is 
 careless of a child's education does not do tliis. The hberty to 
 exercise the faculties is left intact. Omitting instruction in no 
 way takes fi-om a child's freedom to do whatsoever it wills in the 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 331 
 
 best way it can ; and this freedom is all that equity demands. 
 Every aggression, be it remembered — every infraction of rights, 
 is necessarily active; whilst evei7 neglect, carelessness, omis- 
 sion, is as necessarily passive. Consequently, however wrong 
 the non-performance of a parental duty may be — however much 
 it is condemned hy that secondary morahty — the moraUty of be- 
 neficence (pp. 68 and 69) — it does not amount to a breach of the 
 law of equal freedom, and cannot therefore be taken cognizance 
 of by the state. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 Were there no direct disproof of the frequently alleged right 
 to education at the hands of the state, the absurdities in which 
 it entangles its assertors would sufficiently show its invahdity. 
 Conceding for a moment that the government is bound to edu- 
 cate a man's children, then, what kind of logic will demonstrate 
 that it is not bound to feed and clothe them ? If there should 
 be an act-of-parliament provision for the development of their 
 minds, why should there not be an act-of-parhament provision 
 for the development of their bodies ? If the mental wants of 
 the rising generation ought to be satisfied by the state, why not 
 thek physical ones ? The reasoning wliich is held to estabUsh 
 the right to intellectual food, will equally well establish the 
 right to material food : nay, will do more — will prove that chil- 
 dren should be altogether cared for by government. For if the 
 benefit, importance, or necessity of education be assigned as 
 a sufficient reason why government should educate, then may 
 the benefit, importance, or necessity of food, clothing, shelter, 
 and warmth be assigned as a sufficient reason why government 
 should administer these also. So that the alleged right can- 
 not be established without annulling all parental responsibihty 
 whatever. 
 
 Should further refutation be thought needful, there is the 
 ordeal of a definition. We lately found this ordeal fatal to the 
 assumed right to a maintenance; we shall find it equally fatal 
 to this assumed right to education. For what is an education ? 
 
332 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 Where, between the teaching of a dame-school, and the most 
 comprehensive university curriculum, can be drawn the line 
 separating that portion of mental culture which may be justly 
 claimed of the state, from that which may not be so claimed ? 
 What pecuhar quahty is there in reading, writing, and arithmetic, 
 which gives the embryo citizen a right to have them imparted 
 to him, but which quahty is not shared in by geography, and 
 history, and drawing, and the natural sciences ? Must calcu- 
 lation be taught because it is useful? why so is geometry, 
 as the cai-penter and mason will tell us; so is chemistiy, as 
 we may gather from dyers and bleachers; so is physiology, 
 as is abundantly proved by the ill-health written in so many 
 faces. Astronomy, mechanics, geology, and the various connate 
 sciences — should not these be taught, too ? they are all useful. 
 Where is the unit of measure by which we may determine the re- 
 spective values of different kinds of knowledge ? Or, assuming 
 them determined, how can it be shown that a child may claim 
 fi-om the civil power knowledge of such and such values, but 
 not knowledge of certain less values ? Wlien those who demand 
 a state-education can say exactlj' how much is due — can agree 
 upon what the young have a right to, and what not — it will be 
 time to Hsten. But until they accomplish tliis impossibility, 
 then' plea cannot be entertained. 
 
 §3. 
 
 A sad snare would these advocates of legislative teaching 
 betray themselves into, could they substantiate their doctrine. 
 For what is meant by saying that a government ought to edu- 
 cate the people ? why should they be educated ? what is the 
 education for? Clearly to fit the people for social life— to 
 make them good citizens. And who is to say what are good 
 citizens? The government: there is no other judge. Ajad 
 ■who is to say how these good citizens may be made ? The 
 government : there is no other judge. Hence the proposition 
 is convertible into tliis — a government ought to mould children 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 333 
 
 into good citizens, using its own discretion in settling what a 
 good citizen is, and how' the child may be moulded into one. 
 It must first fonn for itself a definite conception, of a pattern 
 citizen ; and having done this, must elaborate such system of 
 discipline as seems best calculated to produce citizens after that 
 pattern. This system of discipUne it is bound to enforce to the 
 uttermost. For if it does otherwise, it allows men to become 
 different from what in its judgment they should become, and 
 therefore fails in that duty it is charged to fulfil. Being thus 
 justified in can-ying out rigidly such plans as it thinks best, 
 every government ought to do what the despotic governments 
 of the Continent and of China do. That regulation under 
 which, in France, " private schools cannot be established 
 without a licence from the minister, and can be shut up by 
 a simple ministerial order," is a step in the right direction, 
 but does not go far enough ; seeing that the state cannot 
 permit its mission to be undertaken by others, without en- 
 dangering the due performance of it. The forbidding of all 
 private schools whatever, as until recently in Prussia, is nearer 
 the mark. Austrian legislation, too, realizes with some con- 
 sistency the state-education theory. By it a tolerably stringent 
 control over the mental culture of the nation is exercised. 
 Much thinking being held at variance with good citizenship, 
 the teaching of metaphysics, political economy, and the like, 
 is discouraged. Some scientific works are prohibited. And a 
 reward is ofiered for the apprehension of those who circulate 
 bibles — the authorities in the discharge of their function pre- 
 ferring to entrust the interpretation of that book to their em- 
 ployes the Jesuits. But in China alone is the idea carried out 
 with logical completeness. There the government pubhshes a 
 Ust of works which may be read ; and considering obedience 
 the supreme virtue, authorizes such only as are friendly to des- 
 potism. Fearing the unsettling effects of innovation, it allows 
 nothing to be taught but what proceeds from itself To the 
 end of producing pattern citizens it exerts a stringent discipline 
 over all conduct. There are " rules for sitting, standing, walk- 
 
334 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 ing, talking, and bowing, laid down -with the greatest precision. 
 Scholars are prohibited from chess, football, flying kites, shuttle- 
 cock, playing on wind instruments, training beasts, birds, fishes, 
 or insects — all -(vhich amusements, it is said, dissipate the mind 
 and debase the heart." 
 
 Now a minute dictation like this, which extends to every 
 action, and will brook no nay, is the legitimate realization of 
 this state-education theory. Whether the government has got 
 erroneous conceptions of what citizens ought to be, or whether 
 the methods of training it adopts are injudicious, is not the 
 question. According to the hypothesis it is commissioned to 
 discharge a specified function. It finds no ready-prescribed 
 way of doing this. It has no alternative, therefore, but to 
 choose that way which seems to it most fit. And as there 
 exists no liigher authority, either to dispute or confirm its judg- 
 ment, it is justified in the absolute enforcement of its plans, be 
 they what they may. As from the proposition that government 
 ought to teach rehgion, there springs the other proposition, 
 that government must decide what is religious truth, and how 
 it is to be taught; so, the assertion that government ought to 
 educate, necessitates the fuither assertion that it must say what 
 education is, and how it shall be conducted. And the same 
 rigid popery, which we found to be a logical consequence in 
 the one case (p. 307), follows in the other also. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 There are few sayings more trite than this, that love of 
 offspring is one of our most powerful passions. To become 
 a parent is an almost universal wish. The intensity of affec- 
 tion exhibited in the ghstening eye, the warm kiss, and the 
 fondling cai-ess — in the untiring patience, and the ever ready 
 alarm of the mother, is a theme on which philosophers have 
 written and poets have sung in all ages. Every one has 
 remarked how commonly the feeling overmasters all others. 
 Observe the self-gratulation with which maternity witnesses 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 335 
 
 her first-bom's unparalleled achievements. Mark the pride 
 ■with which the performances of each little brat are exhibited 
 to every visitor as indicating a precocious genius. Consider 
 again the deep interest which in later days a father feels in his 
 children's mental welfare, and the anxiety he manifests to get 
 them on in life ; the promptings of his natm'al affection being 
 ofttimes sharpened by the reflection that the comfort of his 
 old age may, perchance, be dependent upon their success. 
 
 Now " servants and interpreters of nature " have usually 
 supposed these feeUngs to be of some use. Hitherto they 
 have always thought that the gratification accruing to a mother 
 from the forwardness of her httle ones serves as a stimulus to 
 the proper culture of their minds — that the honour which the 
 father expects to derive from the distinction of his sons acts as 
 an incentive to their improvement — and that the anticipation 
 by parents of the distress which ill-trained children may one 
 day entail constitutes an additional spur to the proper manage- 
 ment of them. In these strong affections and mutual depend- 
 encies observers believed they saw an admirably-arranged 
 chain of influences, calculated to secure the mental and 
 physical development of successive generations ; and in the 
 simpUcity of their faith had concluded that these divinely- 
 appointed means were fully sufficient for this purpose. It 
 would appear, however, according to the state-educationists, 
 that they have been mistaken. It seems that this apparatus of 
 feeUngs is whoUy insufficient to work out the desideratum — 
 that this combination of affections and interests was not 
 provided for such a purpose, or, what is the same thing, tliat 
 it has no purpose at aU. And so, in default of any natural 
 provision for supplying the exigency, legislators exhibit to us 
 the design and specification of a state-machine, made up of 
 masters, ushers, inspectors, and councils, to be worked by a 
 due proportion of taxes, and to be plentifully supplied with 
 raw material, in the shape of httle boys and girls, out of wluch 
 it is to grind a population of well-trained men and women, 
 who shall be "useful members of the community" ! 
 
336 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 But it is argued that parents, and especially those whose 
 children most need instructing, do not know what good 
 iustraction is. " In the matter of education," says ]\Ir. Mill, 
 " the inten'ention of government is justifiable ; because the 
 case is one in which the interest and judgment of the con- 
 sumer axe not sufficient secuiity for the goodness of the 
 commodity." 
 
 It is strange that so judicious a writer should feel satisfied 
 with such a worn-out excuse. This alleged incompetency on 
 the part of the people has been the reason assigned for all 
 state-interferences whatever. It was on the plea that buyers 
 were unable to teU good fabrics from bad, that those compli- 
 cated regulations which encumbered the French manufacturers 
 were estabUshed. The use of certain dyes here in England 
 was prohibited, because of the insufficient discernment of the 
 people. Directions for the proper making of pins were issued, 
 under the idea that experience would not teach the purchasers 
 which were best. Those examinations as to competency 
 which the German handicraftsmen undergo, are held needful, 
 as safeguards to the consumers. A stock argument for the 
 state-teaching of religion has been that the masses cannot 
 distinguish false religion from true. There is hardly a single 
 department of life over which, for similar reasons, legislative 
 supervision has not been, or may not be, established. Here is 
 Mr. H. Hodson Eugg, M.K.C.S., pubUshing a pamphlet to 
 point out the injury inflicted upon poor ignorant householders 
 by the adulteration of milk, and proposing as a remedy that 
 there shall be government officers to test the milk, and to con- 
 fiscate it when not good — police to inspect the ventilation of 
 cow-sheds, and to order away invalid cattle — and a government 
 cow-infirmary, with veterinary surgeon attached. To-morrow 
 some one else may start up to teU us that bad bread is still 
 more injurious than bad milk, equally common, quite as diffi- 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 337 
 
 cult to distinguish, and that, consequently, bakehouses ought 
 to be overlooked by the authorities. Next there will be wanted 
 officials with hydrometers and chemical re-agents, to dabble in 
 the vats of the porter-breweries. In the wake of these must, 
 of course, follow others, commissioned to watch the doings of 
 wine merchants. And so on, until, in the desire to have all 
 processes of production duly inspected, we approach a condition 
 somewhat Uke that of the slave states, in which, as they say, 
 " one-half of the community is occupied in seeing that the 
 other half does its duty." And for each additional interference 
 the plea may be, as it always has been, that " the interest and 
 judgment of the consumer are not sufficient security for the 
 goodness of the commodity." 
 
 Should it be said that the propriety of legislative control 
 depends upon circumstances ; that respecting some articles the 
 judgment of the consumer is sufficient, whilst respecting other 
 articles it is not ; and that the difficulty of deciding upon its 
 quality, places education amongst these last; the reply again 
 is, that the same has been said on behalf of all meddlings in 
 turn. Plenty of trickeries, plenty of difficulties in the detection 
 of fraud, plenty of instances showing the inability of purchasers 
 to protect themselves, are quoted by the advocates of each 
 proposed recourse to official regulation ; and in each case it is 
 urged that here, at any rate, official regulation is required. 
 Yet does experience disprove these inferences one after ano- 
 ther, teaching us that, in the long run, the interest of the 
 consumer is not only an efficient guarantee for the goodness of 
 the things consumed, but the best guarantee. Is it not un- 
 wise, then, to trust for the hundredth time in one of these 
 plausible but deceptive conclusions ? Is it not rational, 
 rather, to infer, that however much appearances are to the 
 contrary, the choice of the commodity — education, Uke the 
 choice of all other commodities, may be safely left to the 
 discretion of buyers ? 
 
 StUl more reasonable will this inference appear on observing 
 that the people are not, after aU, such incompetent judges of 
 
 z 
 
388 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 education as they seem. Ignorant parents are generally quick 
 enough to discern the effects of good or bad teaching ; will 
 note them in the children of others, and act accordingly. 
 Moreover it is easy for them to follow the example of the 
 better instructed, and choose the same schools. Or they may 
 get over the difficulty by asking advice ; and there is generally 
 some one both able and wilUng to give the uneducated parent 
 a trustworthy answer to his inquiry about teachers. Lastly, 
 there is the test of price. With education, as with other 
 things, price is a tolerably safe index of value ; it is one open 
 to all classes ; and it is one which the poor instinctively appeal ■ 
 to in the matter of schools ; for it is notorious that they look 
 coldly at very cheap or gratuitous instruction. 
 
 But even admitting that, whilst this defect of judgment is 
 not virtually so extreme as is alleged, it is nevertheless great, 
 the need for interference is still denied. The evil is under- 
 goiug rectification, as all analogous ones are or have been. 
 The rising generation wiU better understand what good educa- 
 tion is than their parents do, and their descendants will have 
 clearer conceptions of it still. Whoso thinks the slowness of 
 the process a sufficient reason for meddling, must, to be con- 
 sistent, meddle in all other things ; for the ignorance which in 
 every case serves as an excuse for state-interposition is of very 
 gradual cure. The errors both of consumers and producers 
 often take generations to set right. Improvements in the 
 carrying on of commerce, in manufactures, and especially in 
 agriculture, spread almost imperceptibly. Take rotation of 
 crops for an example. And if this tardiness is a valid argu- 
 ment for interference in one case, why not in others ? Why 
 not have farms superintended by government, because it may 
 take a century for farmers generally to adopt the plans sug- 
 gested by modern science ? 
 
 Did we duly realize the fact that society is a growth, and 
 not a manufactm-e — a thing that makes itself, and not a thing 
 that can be artificially made — we should fall into fewer mis- 
 takes; and we should see that amongst other imperfections 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 339 
 
 this incompetence of the masses to distinguish good instruction 
 from bad, is being outgrown. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 When in the matter of education " the interest and judg- 
 ment of the consumer" are said not to be " sufficient security 
 for the goodness of the commodity," and when it is argued 
 that government superintendence is therefore needful, a very 
 questionable assumption is made : the assumption, namely, that 
 "the interest and judgment" of a government are sufficient 
 security. Now there is good reason to dispute this, nay, even 
 to assert that, taking the future into account, they offer much 
 less security. 
 
 The problem is, how best to develop minds : a problem 
 amongst the most difficult — may we not say, the most difficult ? 
 Two things are needful for its solution. First, to know what 
 minds should be fashioned into. Next, to know how they may 
 be so fashioned. From the work to be done, turn we now to 
 the proposed doers of it. Men of education (as the word 
 goes) they no doubt are ; well-meaning, many of them ; 
 thoughtful, some ; philosophical, a few ; men, however, for the 
 most part, bom with silver spoons in their mouths, and prone 
 to regard human affairs as reflected in these — somewhat dis- 
 tortedly. Very comfortable lives are led by the majority of 
 them, and hence "things as they are" find favour iu their eyes. 
 For their tastes — they are shown in the subordination of na- 
 tional business to the shooting of grouse and the chasing of 
 foxes. For their pride — it is in wide estates or long pedigrees ; 
 and should the family coat of arms bear some such ancient 
 motto as " Strike hard," or, " Furth fortune, and fill the 
 fetters," it is a great happiness. As to their ideal of society, it 
 is either a sentimental feudalism ; or it is a state, something 
 Uke the present, under which the people shall be respectful to 
 their betters, and " content with that station of life to which it 
 has pleased God to call them ; " or it is a state arranged with 
 
 z 2 
 
340 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 the -view of making each labourer the most efficient producing 
 tool, to the end that the accumulation of wealth may be the 
 greatest possible. Add to this, that theii- notions of moral 
 discipline are shown in the maintenance of capital punishment, 
 and in the sending of their sons to schools where flogging is 
 practised, and where they themselves were brought up. Now 
 could the judgment of such respecting the commodity — educa- 
 tion be safely relied on ? Certainly not. 
 
 Still less might their "interest" be trusted. Though at 
 variance with that of the people, it would inevitably be followed 
 in preference. The self-seeking which, consciously or uncon- 
 sciously, sways rulers in other cases, would sway them in this 
 likewise — could not fail to do so, whilst the character of men 
 is what it is. With taxation unequally distributed, with such 
 a glaringly unjust apportionment of representatives to popula- 
 tion, with a nepotism that fiUs lucrative places with Greys and 
 Elliots, with a sttiff of a hundred admirals more than are 
 wanted, with lavish pensions to the undeserving, with a system 
 of retrenchment which discharges common men and retains 
 ofiBcers, and with such votes as those given by the military, 
 the naval, the landed, and the clerically-related members of 
 parliament, we may be quite sure that a state-education would 
 be administered for the advantage of those in power, rather 
 than for the advantage of the nation. To hope for anything 
 else is to fall into the old error of looking for grapes fi-om 
 thorns. Nothing can be more truly Utopian than expecting that, 
 with men and things as they are, the influences which have 
 vitiated iall other institutions would not vitiate this one. 
 
 Thus, .even were it true that in the matter of education " the 
 interest and judgment of the consumer are not sufficient 
 security for the goodness of the commodity," tlie wisdom of 
 superseding them by the "interest and judgment" of a govern- 
 ment is by no means obvious. It may, indeed, be said that the 
 argument proves only the unfitness of existing governments to 
 become national teachers, and not the unfitness of a govern- 
 ment normally constituted: whereas the object of inquiry 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 341 
 
 being to determine what a government should do, the hypo- 
 thesis must be that the government is what it should be. To 
 this the reply is, that the nature of the allegation to he met 
 necessitates a descent to the level of present circumstances. 
 It is on the defective " interest and judgment" of the people, as 
 they now are, that the plea for legislative superintendence is 
 based; and, consequently, in criticising this plea we must take 
 government as it now is. We cannot reason as though go- 
 vernment were what it should be ; since, before it can become 
 so, any alleged deficiency of "interest and judgment" on the 
 part of the people must have disappeared. 
 
 The impohcy of setting up a national organization for cul- 
 tivating the popular mind, and commissioning the government 
 to superintend this organization, is further seen in the general 
 tnith that every such organization is in spirit conservative, and 
 not progressive. - All institutions have an instruct of self- 
 preservation growing out of the selfishness of those connected 
 with them. Being dependent for their vitality upon the con- 
 tinuance of existing an-angements, they naturally uphold these. 
 Their roots are in the past and the present; never in the future. 
 Change threatens them, modifies them, eventually destroys 
 them ; hence to change they are uniformly opposed. On the 
 other hand, education, properly so called, is closely associated 
 with change — is its pioneer — is the never-sleeping agent of 
 revolution — is always fitting men for higher things, and 
 Mwfitting them for things as they are. Therefore, between 
 institutions whose very existence depends upon man continuing 
 what he is, and true education, which is one of the instruments 
 for making him something other than he is, there must always 
 be enmity. 
 
 From the time of the Egyptian priesthood downwards, the 
 conduct of corporations, whether poHtical, ecclesiastical, or edu- 
 cational, has given proof of this. Some 300 years B.C., un- 
 
342 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 licensed schools were forbidden by the Athenian senate. In 
 Rome, the liberty of teaching was attacked twice before the 
 Christian era ; and again, afterwards, by the Emperor Julian. 
 The existing continental governments show, by their ana- 
 logous pohcy, how persistent the tendency is. In the univer- 
 sality of censorships we see the same fact further illustrated. 
 The celebrated saying of the Empress Catharine to her prime 
 minister, well exhibits the way in which rulers regard the 
 spread of knowledge. And whenever governments have under- 
 taken to educate, it has been with the view of forestalling that 
 spontaneous education which threatened their own supremacy. 
 Witness the case of China, where diligently-impressed ideas, 
 such as, " O ! how magnificent are the affairs of government !" 
 " ! what respect is due to the officers of government ! " suffi- 
 ciently indicate the intention. Witness, again, the case of 
 Austria, where, in accordance with the will of the Emperor 
 Erancis, the training of the popular mind was entrusted to the 
 Jesuits, that they might " counteract the propagandism of 
 liberty, by the propagandism of superstition."^ Nor have 
 there been wanting signs of a like spirit here in England. 
 That attempt in Cobbett's day to put down cheap hterature, by 
 an act which prevented weekly publications from being sold for 
 less than sixpence, unmistakably indicated it. It was again 
 exhibited in the reluctance with which the newspaper stamp 
 duty was reduced, when resistance had become useless. And 
 we may still see it in the double-facedness of a legislature 
 which professes to favour popular enhghtenment, and yet con- 
 tinues to raise a milUon and a quarter sterUng yearly from 
 " taxes on knowledge." 
 
 « And not without success, according to Mr. Wilde, who (writing before the late 
 revolution) tells us, by way of panegyric upon the Austrian system of education, 
 that the people " sigh not for a state of political liberty about which they know 
 nothing. The government wisely preventing their minds from being inflamed by 
 those blisters upon society that have written and preached our own countrymen into 
 the fever of discontent and disaffection, the effects of which are now so visible in 
 Great Britain." (!) 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 343 
 
 How unfriendly all ecclesiastical todies have been to the 
 spread of education every one knows. The obstinacy shown 
 by the Brahmin in fighting against the truths of modem 
 science — the fanaticism with which the Mahometan doctor 
 ignores all books but the Koran — and the prejudice fostered 
 by the religious institutions of our own country against the 
 very name of philosophy — are kindred illustrations of the con- 
 duct which this self- conserving instinct produces. In that 
 saying of the monks, " We must put down printing, or printing 
 will put down us," the universal motive was plainly expressed ; 
 as it was, again, tlirough the mouth of that French bishop 
 who denounced the Bell and Lancaster systems as inventions 
 of the devil. Nor let any one conclude that the educational 
 zeal latterly manifested by Church clergy indicates a new 
 animus. Those who remember the bitterness with which Sun- 
 day schools were at first assailed by them ; and those who 
 mark how keenly they now compete with dissenters for the 
 children of the poor, can see clearly enough that they are 
 endeavouring to make the best of a necessity — that, having 
 a more or less defined consciousness of the inevitability of 
 educational progress, they wish to educate the people ia alle- 
 giance to the Church. 
 
 Still more manifest becomes this obstructive tendency on 
 considering that the very organizations devised for tlie spread- 
 ing of knowledge, may themselves act as suppressors of it. 
 Thus it is said, that Oxford was one of the last places in which 
 the Newtonian philosophy was acknowledged. We read again, 
 in the life of Locke, that " there was a meeting of the heads of 
 houses at Oxford, where it was proposed to censure and discou- 
 rage the reading of this essay (On the Human Understanding) ; 
 and after various debates, it was concluded that without any 
 public censure each head of a house shall endeavour to prevent 
 its being read in his own college." At Eton, too, in Shelley's 
 time, " Chemistry was a forbidden thing," even to the banish- 
 ment of chemical treatises. So uniformly has it been the habit 
 of these endowed institutions to close the door against innova- 
 
344 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 tions, that tliey are amongst the last places to Tvhich any one 
 looks for improvements in the art of teaching, or a better choice 
 of subjects to be taught. The attitude of the universities towards 
 natural science has been that of contemptuous non-recognition. 
 College authorities have long resisted, either actively or pas- 
 sively, the making of physiolog}', chemistry, geology, &c., sub- 
 jects of examination; and only of late, under pressure from 
 without, and under the fear of being supplanted by rival in- 
 stitutions, have new studies been gingerly taken to. 
 
 Now, although vis inerticB may be very useful in its place — 
 although the resistance of office-holders has its function — al- 
 though we must not quarrel with this instinct of self-preservation 
 which gives to institutions then- vitahty, because it also upholds 
 them through a lingering decrepitude — we may yet wisely refuse 
 to increase its natural effect. It is very necessary to have in our 
 social economy a conservative force as well as a reforming one, 
 that there may be progress for the resultant ; but it is liighly 
 impolitic to afford the one an artificial advantage over the other. 
 To establish a state-education is to do this, however. The 
 teaching organization itself, and the government which directs 
 it, will inevitably lean to things as they are ; and to give them 
 control over the national mind, is to give them the means of re- 
 pressing aspirations after things as they should be. Just that 
 culture which seems compatible with their own preservation will 
 these institutions allow, whilst just that culture which, by ad- 
 vancing society, threatens to sap their own foundations, or, in 
 other words — ^just that culture which is most valuable, they will 
 oppose. 
 
 The sanguine will perhaps hope that, though this has been 
 the rule hitherto, it will not be the rule in future. Let them 
 not deceive themselves. So long as men pursue private ad- 
 vantage at the expense of the common weal, that is to say — so 
 long as government is needful at all, so long will this be true. 
 Less marked the tendency will no doubt be in proportion as 
 men are less unjustly selfish. But to whatever extent they 
 lack perfect conscientiousness, to the same extent wiU vested 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 345 
 
 interests sway them, and to the same extent will institutions 
 resist change. 
 
 §8. 
 
 Did the reader ever watcH a boy ia the first heat of a garden- 
 ing fit ? The sight is an amusing, and not uninstructive one. 
 Probably a slice of a border — some couple of square yards or so 
 ■ — has been made over to him for his exclusive use. No small 
 accession of dignity, and not a little pride of proprietorship, does 
 he exhibit. So long as the enthusiasm lasts, he never tires of 
 contemplating his territory; and every companion, and every 
 visitor with whom the hberty can be taken, is pretty sure to 
 be met with the request — " Come and see my gai'den." Note 
 chiefly, however, with what anxiety the growth of a few scrubby 
 plants is regarded. Three or four times a day will the httle 
 m-chin rash out to look at them. How provokingly slow their 
 progress seems to him. Each morning on getting up he hopes 
 to find some marked change; and lo, everything appears just 
 as it did the day before. When will the blossoms come out ! 
 For nearly a week has some forward bud been promising him 
 the triumph of a fii-st flower, and stUl it remains closed. Surely 
 there must be something wrong ! Perhaps the leaves have stuck 
 fast. Ah ! that is the reason, no doubt. And so ten to one you 
 shall some day catch our young florist very busily engaged in 
 pulhng open the calyx, and, it may be, trying to rmfold a few 
 of the petals. 
 
 Somewhat like this childish impatience is the feehng exhibited 
 by not a few state-educationists. Both they and their type show 
 a lack of faith in natural forces — almost an ignorance that there 
 are such forces. In both there is the same dissatisfaction with 
 the ordained rate of progress. And by both, artificial means 
 are used to remedy what are conceived to be nature's failures. 
 Within these few years men have aU at once been awakened to 
 the importance of instructing the people. That to which they 
 were awhile since indiiferent or even hostile has suddenly be- 
 come an object of enthusiasm. With all the ardour of recent 
 
346 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 converts — with all a novice's inordinate expectations — with all 
 the eagerness of a lately-aroused desire — do they await the hoped- 
 for result ; and, with the unreasonableness ever attendant upon 
 such a state of mind, are dissalislied, because the progress li-om 
 general ignorance to universal enlightenment has not been com- 
 pleted in a generation. One would have thought it sufficiently 
 clear to everybody that the great changes taking place in tliis 
 world of ours are uniformly slow. Continents are upheaved at 
 the rate of a foot or two in a century. The deposition of a delta 
 is the work of tens of thousands of yeai-s. The transformation 
 of barren rock into life-suppordng soil takes countless ages. If 
 any think society advances under a different law, let them read. 
 Has it not required the whole Christian era to abolish slavery in 
 Europe ? as far at least as it is aboUshed. Did not a hundred 
 generations live and die while picture-writing grew into printing ? 
 Have not science and commerce and mechanical skill increased 
 at a similarly tardy pace ? Yet are men disappointed that a 
 pitiful fifty years has not sufficed for thorough popular enlighten- 
 ment ! Although within tliis period an advance has been made 
 far beyond what the calm thinker would have expected — far be- 
 yond what the past rat€ of progress in human affairs seemed to 
 prophesy — yet do these so impatient people summarily condemn 
 the voluntary system as a failure ! A natural process — a process 
 spontaneously set up — a process of self- unfolding which the 
 national mind had commenced, is pooh-poohed because it has 
 not wrought a total transformation in the course of what con- 
 stitutes but a day in the hfe of humanity ! And then, to make 
 up for nature's incompetency, the unfolding must be hastened 
 by legislative fingerings ! 
 
 § 9. 
 
 There is, indeed, one excuse for attempts to spread education 
 by artificial means, namely, the anxiety to diminish crime, of 
 which education is supposed to be a preventive. " We hold," 
 says Mr. Macaulay, " that whoever has the right to hang has the 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 347 
 
 right to educate." * Aad in a letter relative to the Manchester 
 district- system, Miss Martineau writes — " Nor can I see that 
 political economy ohjects to the general rating for educational 
 purposes. As a mere pohce-tax this rating -would he a very 
 cheap affair. It would cost us much less than we now pay 
 for juvenile depravity." In hoth which remains this prevalent 
 hehef is implied. 
 
 Now, with all respect to the many high authorities holding it, 
 the truth of this hehef may he disputed. We have no evidence 
 that education, as commonly understood, is a preventive of crime. 
 Those pei-petually re-iterated newspaper paragraphs, in which the 
 ratios of instructed to iminstructed convicts are so triumphantly 
 stated, prove just nothing. Before any inference can he drawn, 
 it must be shown that these instructed and uninstructed convicts, 
 come from two equal sections of society, alike in all other re- 
 spects hut that of knowledge — similar in rank and occupation, 
 having similar advantages, labom-ing under similar temptations. 
 But this is not only not the truth ; it is nothing like the truth. 
 The many ignorant criminals belong to a most unfavourably 
 circumstanced class ; whilst the few educated ones are from a 
 class comparatively favoured. As things stand it would be 
 equally logical to infer that crime arises from going without 
 animal food, or from living in badly-ventilated rooms, or from 
 wearing dirty shirts ; for were the inmates of a gaol to be cate- 
 chised, it would doubtless be found that the majority of them 
 had been placed in these conditions. Ignorance and crime are 
 not cause and effect ; they are coincident results of the same 
 cause. To be wholly untaught is to have moved amongst those 
 whose incentives to wrong-doing are sti'ongest; to be partially 
 taught is to have been one of a class subject to less urgent 
 temptations ; to be well taught is to have hved almost beyond 
 the reach of the usual motives for transgression. Ignorance, 
 therefore (at least in the statistics referred to), simply indicates 
 the presence of crime-producing influences, and can no more be 
 
 ^ Quoted irom a speech at Edinburgh. 
 
348 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 called tlie cause of ciime than the falling of a barometer can be 
 called the cause of rain. 
 
 So far indeed from proving that morality is increased by 
 education, the facts prove, if anything, the reverse. Thus 
 ■we are told, in a report by the Eev. Joseph Kingsmill, head 
 chaplain of Pentonville Prison, that the proportion borne by 
 the educated to the uneducated convicts is fully as high as 
 that vrliich exists between the educated and the uneducated 
 classes in the general population ; although, as just explained, 
 ■we might reasonably expect, that having had fewer tempta- 
 tions, the educated convicts ■would bear a smaller ratio to their 
 class. Again, it has been sho-wn from government returns— 
 " That the number of juvenile offenders in the metropolis 
 has been steadily increasing every year since the institution 
 of the Ragged School Union ; and that ■whereas the number 
 of criminals ■who cannot read and -write has decreased from 
 24,856 (in 1844) to 22,968 (in 1848)— or no less than 1888 
 in that period — the number, of those -who can read and ■write 
 imperfectly has increased from 33,337 to 36,229 — or 2857 
 — in the same time." — Morning Chronicle, April 25, 1850. 
 Another contributor to the series of articles on "Labour and 
 the Poor," from ■which the above statement is quoted, remarks 
 that " the mining population (in the north) are exceedingly lo^w 
 in point of education and intelligence ; and yet they contradict 
 the theories generally entertained upon the connection of igno- 
 rance with crime, by presenting the least ciiminal section of the 
 population of England." — Morning Chronicle, Dec. 27, 1849. 
 And, speaking of the women employed in the iron-works and 
 collieries throughout South Wales, he says — " their ignorance 
 is absolutely a-wful ; yet the retmiis show in them a singular 
 immunity from crime." — Morning Chronicle, March 21, 1850. 
 If these testimonies are thought insufficient, they may be en- 
 forced by that of Mr. Fletcher, who has entered more elaborately 
 into this question than perhaps any other ■writer of the day. 
 Summing up the results of his investigations, he says : — 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 349 
 
 " 1 . In comparing the gross commitments for criminal oifences 
 ■with the proportion of instruction in each district, there is found 
 to be a small balance in favour of the most instructed districts 
 in the years of most industrial depression (1842-3-4), but a 
 greater one against them in the years of less industrial depres- 
 sion (1845-6-7); while in comparing the more with the less 
 instructed portions of each district, the final result is against 
 the former at both periods, though fourfold at the latter what 
 it is at the former. 
 
 " 2. No correction for the ages of the population in different 
 districts, to meet the excess of criminals at certain younger 
 periods of life, will change the character of this superficial 
 evidence against instruction ; every legitimate allowance of the 
 kind having already been made in arriving at these results. 
 
 " 3. Down to this period, therefore, the comparison of the 
 criminal and educational returns of this, any more than of any 
 other country of Europe, has afforded no sound statistical evi- 
 dence in favour, and as Httle against, the moral effects associated 
 with instruction, as actually disseminated among the people." ^ 
 
 To all which evidence may be added that of Messrs. Gurrea 
 and Dupin, who have shown that the most highly-educated 
 districts in France are the most criminal districts. 
 
 The fact is, that scarcely any connection exists between 
 moraJity and the discipline of ordinary teaching. Mere cul- 
 ture of the intellect (and education as usually conducted 
 amounts to httle more) is hardly at aU operative upon con- 
 duct. Creeds pasted upon the memory, good principles learnt 
 by rote, lessons in right and wrong, will not eradicate vicious 
 propensities, though people, in spite of then experience as pa- 
 rents, and as citizens, persist in hoping they wiU. AU history, 
 both of the race and of individuals, goes to prove that in the 
 majority of cases precepts do not act at all. And where they 
 seem to act, it is not by them, but by pre-existing feelings 
 
 ^ Sommaiy of tte Moral Statistics of England and Wales. By Joseph Fletcher, 
 Esq., Barrister-at-Law, one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools. 
 
360 NATIONAL EDDCATION. 
 
 which respond to them, that the effects are really produced. 
 Intellect is not a power, but an instrument — not a thing which 
 itself moves and works, but a thing which is moved and worked 
 by forces behind it. To say that men are ruled by reason, is as 
 irrational as to say that men are ruled by their eyes. Reason 
 is an eye — the eye thi-ough which the desires see their way to 
 gratification. And educating it only makes it a better eye — 
 gives it a vision more accurate and more comprehensive — does 
 not at all alter the desires subserved by it. However far-seeing 
 you make it, the passions will still determine the directions in 
 which it shall be turned — the objects on which it shall dwell. 
 Just those ends which the instincts or sentiments propose 
 will the intellect be employed to accomplish : culture of it 
 having done notliing but increase the ability to accomplish 
 them. Probably some will urge that enlightening men enables 
 them to discern the penalties which naturally attach to ^\Tong- 
 doing ; and in a certain sense this is true. But it is only 
 superficially true. Though they may learn that the grosser 
 crimes commonly bring retribution in one shape or other, they 
 will not learn that the subtler ones do. Their sins will merely 
 be made more Machiavelhan. If, as Coleridge says, " a knave 
 is a fool with a circumbendibus," then by instructing the knave 
 you do but make the circumbendibus a wider one. Did much 
 knowledge and piercing intelligence suffice to make men good, 
 then Bacon should have been honest, and Napoleon should have 
 been just. Where the character is defective, intellect, no matter 
 how high, fails to regulate rightly, because predominant desires 
 falsify its estimates. Nay, even a distinct foresight of evil con- 
 sequences will not restrain when strong passions are at work. 
 How else does it happen that men will get drunk, though they 
 k?iow drunkenness will entail on them sufi'ering, and disgrace, 
 and (as with the poor) even starvation ? How else is it that 
 medical students, who know the diseases brought on by disso- 
 lute living better than other young men, are just as reckless, 
 and even more reckless ? How else is it that the London thief. 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 351 
 
 who has heen at the treadmill a dozen times, will steal again as 
 soon as he is at liberty ? How else is it that people, who have 
 all their lives long heen taught Christianity, will not behave as 
 Christians, though they believe that dire penalties are entailed 
 by behaving otherwise ? 
 
 It is, indeed, strange that with the facts of daily life before them 
 in the street, in the counting-house, and in the family, thinking 
 men should still expect education to cure crime. If armies of 
 teachers, regarded with a certain superstitious reverence, have 
 been unable to purify society in aU these eighteen centuiies, it 
 is hardly likely that other armies of teachers, not so regarded, 
 will be able to do it. If natural persuasion, backed by super- 
 natural authority, will not induce men to do as they would be 
 done by, it is hardly hkely that natural persuasion alone wUl 
 induce them. If hopes of eternal happiness and terrors of 
 eternal damnation fail to make human beings virtuous, it is 
 hardly hkely that the commendations and reproofs of the 
 schoolmaster will succeed. 
 
 There is, in fact, a quite sufficient reason for failure — no less 
 a reason than the impossibihty of the task. The expectation 
 that crime may presently be cured, whether by state-education, 
 or the sUent system, or the separate system, or any other sys- 
 tem, is one of those Utopianisms fallen into by people who 
 pride themselves on being practical. Crime is incurable, save 
 by that gradual process of adaptation to the social state which 
 humanity is undergoing. Crime is the continual breaking out 
 of the old unadapted nature — the index of a character unfitted 
 to its conditions — and only as fast "as the unfitness diminishes 
 can crime diminish. To hope for some prompt method of 
 putting down crime, is in reaUty to hope for some prompt 
 method of putting down all evils — laws, governments, taxation, 
 poverty, caste, and the rest ; for they and crime have the same 
 root. Eeforming men's conduct without reforming their na- 
 tures is impossible; and to expect that their natures may be re- 
 formed, otherwise than by the forces which are slowly civihzing 
 us, is visionary. Schemes of disciphne or culture are of use 
 
352 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 only in proportioD as they organically alter the national charac- 
 ter, and the extent to -which they do this is by no means great. 
 It is not by humanly-devised agencies, good as these may be in 
 their way, but it is by the never-ceasing action of circumstances 
 upon men — by the constant pressure of their new conditions 
 upon them — that the required change is mainly effected. 
 
 Meanwliile it may be remarked, that whatever moral benefit 
 can be effected by education, must be effected by an education 
 which is emotional rather than preceptive. If, in place of mak- 
 ing a child understand that this thing is right and the other 
 wrong, you make it feel that they are so — if you make virtue 
 loved and vice loathed — if you arouse a noble desire, and make 
 torpid an iuferior one — if you bring into Ufe a previously dor- 
 mant sentiment — if you cause a sympathetic impulse to get the 
 better of one that is selfish — if, in short, you produce a state 
 of mind to which projoer behaviour is natural, spontaneous, 
 instinctive, you do some good. But no drilling in catecliisms, 
 no teaching of moral codes, can effect this. Only by repeatedly 
 awakening the appropriate emotions can character be changed. 
 Mere ideas received by the intellect, meeting no response fi.-om 
 within — having no roots there — are quite inoperative upon con- 
 duct, and are quickly forgotten upon entering into life. 
 
 Perhaps it will be said that a discipline like this now de- 
 scribed as the only efficient one, might be undertaken by the 
 state. No doubt it might. But from all legislative attempts 
 at emotional education may Heaven defend us ! 
 
 § 10. 
 
 Yet another objection remains. Just as we found, on close 
 examination, that by poor-laws a government cannot really cure 
 distress, but can only shift it from one section of the community 
 to another (p. 327), so, astounding as the assertion looks, 
 we shall find that a government cannot in fact educate at all, 
 but can only educate some by Mweducating others. If, before 
 agitating the matter, men had taken the precaution to define 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 353 
 
 education, they would probably have seen that the state can 
 afford no true help in the matter. But having unfortunately 
 neglected to do this, they have confined then: attention solely 
 to the education given at school, and have forgotten to inquire 
 how their plans bear upon the education which commences 
 when school-days end. It is not indeed that they do not know 
 this discipline of daily duty to be valuable — more valuable, in 
 fact, than the disciplLue of the teacher. You may often hear 
 them remark as much. But, with the eagerness usual amongst 
 schemers, they are so absorbed in studying the action of their 
 proposed mechanism as to overlook its reaction. 
 
 Now of all qualities which is the one men most need ? To 
 the absence of what quahty are popular distresses mainly at- 
 tributable ? What is the quality in which the improvident 
 masses are so deficient? Self-restraint — the abiUty to sacri- 
 fice a small present gratification for a prospective gi'eat one. 
 A labourer endowed with due self-restraint would never spend 
 liis Saturday-night's wages at the pubUc-house. Had he enough 
 self-restraint, the artizan would not live up to his income 
 during prosperous times and leave the future unprovided for. 
 More self-restraint would prevent imprudent marriages and the 
 growth of a pauper population. And were there no drunken- 
 ness, no extravagance, no reckless multiplication, social miseries 
 would be trivial. 
 
 Consider next how the power of self-restraint is to be in- 
 creased. By a sharp experience alone can anything be done. 
 Those in whom this faculty needs drawing out — educating 
 must be left to the discipHne of nature, and allowed to bear 
 the pains attendant on their defect of character. The only 
 cure for imprudence is the suffering which imprudence entails. 
 Nothing but bringing him face to face with stem necessity, and 
 letting him feel how unbending, how unpitying, are her laws, 
 can improve the man of ill-governed desires. As already shown 
 (p. 324), all interposing between humanity and the conditions 
 of its existence — cusliioning-off consequences by poor-laws or 
 the like — serves but to neutralize the remedy and prolong the 
 
 A A 
 
354 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 evil. Let us never forget that the law is — adaptation to cir- 
 cumstances, be they what they may. And i^ rather than allow 
 men to come in contact with the real cii-cumstances of their 
 position, we place tliem in artificial — in false circumstances, 
 they will adapt themselves to these instead; and will, in the end, 
 have to undergo the miseries of a re-adaptation to the real ones. 
 
 Of all iucentives to self-restraint, perhaps none is so strong 
 as the sense of parental responsibility. And if so, to diminish 
 that sense is to use the most effectual means of preventing self- 
 restraiut from being developed. We have ample proof of this 
 in the encouragement of improvident marriages by a poor-law ; 
 and the effect which a poor-law produces by relieving men from 
 the final responsibihty of maintaining their children, must be 
 produced in a smaller degree by taking away the responsibUity 
 of educating their children. The more the state undertakes to 
 do for his family, the more are the expenses of the married man 
 reduced, at the cost of the unmarried man, and the greater be- 
 comes the temptation to marry. Let not any think that the 
 offer of apparently gratuitous instruction for his offspring would 
 be of no weight with the working man deliberating on the pro- 
 priety of taking a wife. Whoever has watched the freaks which 
 strong passion plays in the councils of the intellect — has marked 
 how it will buUy into silence the weaker feeUngs that oppose it 
 — how it will treat shghtingly the most conclusive adverse evi- 
 dence, whilst, in urging the goodness of its own cause, " trifles 
 light as air are confirmations strong as proofs of Holy Writ" — 
 whoever has marked this, can hardly doubt that, in the delibera- 
 tions of such an one, the prospect of public training for children 
 would in no small degree affect the decision. Nay, indeed, it 
 would afford a positive reason for giving way to his desires. 
 Just as a man at an expensive dinner will eat more than he 
 knows is good for him, on the principle of having his money's 
 worth, so would the artizan find one excuse for marrying in 
 the fact that, unless he did so, he would be paying education- 
 rates for nothing. 
 
 Nor is it only thus that a state- education would encourage 
 
NATIONAL EDUCATION. 355 
 
 men to obey present impulses. An influence unfavourable to 
 the increase of self-control would be exercised by it throughout 
 the whole of parental life. That powerful restraint which the 
 anxiety to give children schooling now imposes upon the im- 
 provident tendencies of the poor, would be removed. Many a 
 man who, as things are, can but just keep the master)' over some 
 vicious or extravagant propensity, and whose most efficient curb 
 is the thought that if he gives way it must be at the sacrifice 
 of that book-learning which he is ambitious to give his family, 
 would fall were this curb weakened — would not only cease to 
 improve in power of self-control as he is now doing, but would 
 probably retrograde, and bequeath his offspring to a lower in- 
 stead of a higher phase of civihzation. 
 
 Hence, as was said, a government can educate in one direc- 
 tion only by Mweducating in another — can confer knowledge 
 only at the expense of character. It retards the development 
 of a quality universally needed — one in the absence of which 
 poverty, and recklessness, and crime, must ever continue ; and 
 all that it may give a smattering of information. 
 
 What a contrast is there between these fatile contrivances of 
 men and the admirable, sUent-working mechanisms of nature ! 
 Nature, with a perfect economy, turns aU forces to account. 
 She makes action and re-action alike useful. This strong af- 
 fection for progeny becomes in her hands the agent of a double 
 culture, serving at once to fashion parent and child into tlie 
 desired form. And beautiful is it to see how the most power- 
 ful of instincts is made the means of holding men under a disci- 
 pUne to which, perhaps, nothing else could make them submit. 
 Yet this skilf idly- devised arrangement statesmen propose to 
 dislocate, confidently opining that their own patent apparatus 
 will answer a great deal better ! 
 
 § 11. 
 
 Thus, ia the present, as in other cases, we find the dictate 
 of the abstract law enforced by secondary considoations. The 
 
 A A 2 
 
356 NATIONAL EDUCATION. 
 
 alleged right to education at the hands of the state proves to be 
 untenable ; first, as logically committing its supporters to other 
 claims too absurd for consideration ; and again, as being inca- 
 pable of definition. Moreover, could the claim be estabhshed, 
 it would imply the duty of government despotically to enforce 
 its system of disciphne, and the duty of the subject to submit. 
 That education ought not to be dealt in after the same manner 
 as other things, because in its case " the interest and judgment 
 of the consumer are not sufiicient security for the goodness of 
 the commodity," is a plea with most suspicious antecedents; 
 having been many times employed in other instances, and many 
 times disproved. Neither is the implied assumption that the 
 " interest and judgment " of a government would constitute 
 a sufficient security admissible. On the contrary, experience 
 proves that the interests of a government, and of all the insti- 
 tutions it may set up, are directly opposed to education of the 
 most important kind. Again, to say that legislative teaching 
 is needful, because other teaching has failed, presupposes a 
 pitiably narrow view of human progress ; and further, involves 
 the strange scepticism that, though natural agencies have 
 brought the enlightenment of mankind to its present height, 
 and are even now increasing it at an unparalleled rate, they 
 will no longer answer. The belief that education is a pre- 
 ventive of crime, having no foundation either in theory or fact, 
 cannot be held an excuse for interference. And, to crown 
 all, it turns out that the institution so much longed for is a 
 mere dead machine, which can only give out in one form the 
 power it absorbs in another, minus the friction — a thing which 
 cannot stir towards effecting this kind of education without 
 abstracting the force now accomplishing that — a thing, there- 
 fore, which cannot educate at all. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 § 1- 
 
 A COLONY being a community, to ask whether it is right for 
 the state to found and govern colonies, is practically to ask, 
 whether it is right for one community to found and govern 
 other communities. And this question not being one in which 
 the relationships of a society to its own authorities are alone 
 involved, but being one into which there enter the interests of 
 parties external to such society, is in some measure removed 
 out of the class of questions hitherto considered. Nevertheless, 
 our directing principle affords satisfactory guidance in this case 
 as well as in the others. 
 
 That a government cannot undertake to administer the affairs 
 of a colony, and to support for it a judicial staff, a constabulary, 
 a garrison, and so forth, Avithout trespassing against the parent 
 society, scarcely needs pointing out. Any expenditure for these 
 purposes, be it like our own some three and a half miUions 
 sterhng a year, or but a few thousands, involves a breach of 
 state-duty. The taking from men property beyond what is 
 needful for the better securing of their rights, we have seen to 
 be an infringement of their rights. Colonial expenditure can- 
 not be met without property being so taken. Colonial expen- 
 diture is therefore unjustifiable. 
 
 An objector might indeed allege, that by maintaining in a 
 settlement a subordinate legislature, the parent legislature does 
 but discharge towards the settlers its original office of protector, 
 and that the settlers have a claim to protection at its hands. 
 But the duty of a society towards itself, that is, of a govern- 
 
358 GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 ment towards its subjects, will not permit the assumption of 
 such a responsibility. For, as it is the function of a govern- 
 ment to administer the law of equal freedom, it cannot, without 
 reversing its function, tax one portion of its subjects at a higher 
 rate than is needful to protect them, that it may give protection 
 to another portion below prime cost ; and to guard those who 
 emigrate, at the expense of those who remain, is to do this. 
 Manifestly, the guardianship which a nation in its corporate ca- 
 pacity extends to each of its members, is limited by conditions. 
 The citizen must defray his share of the expenses, must agree 
 to perform certain political duties, and must reside -within spe- 
 cified geographical boundaries. If he prefers to go elsewhere, 
 it may be presumed that he has duly considered, on the one 
 hand, the benefits promised by his contemplated emigration, 
 and on the other, the evils attending loss of citizenship, and 
 that the prospective advantages of a change preponderate. At 
 any rate he cannot show that, by refusing to send out officers to 
 the antipodes to take care of him, society violates a recognised 
 or impUed contract. 
 
 Moreover, colonial government, properly so called, cannot be 
 carried on without transgressing the rights of the colonists. 
 For if, as generally happens, the colonists are dictated to by 
 authorities sent out from the mother country, then the law of 
 equal freedom is broken in their persons, as much as by any 
 other kind of autocratic rule. If, again, they are allowed to 
 administer their own affairs, the parent state retaining only a 
 veto-power, there is still injustice in the assumption of greater 
 freedom by the members of the old community than is conceded 
 to those of the new one. And if the new community is as com- 
 pletely self-governed as the old one, then, politically speaking, 
 it is not a colony at all, but a separate nation. In one way, 
 however, legislative union between a parent state and its colo- 
 nies may be maintained without breach of the law ; namely, by 
 making them integral parts of one empire, severally represented 
 in a united assembly commissioned to govern the whole. But 
 theoretically just as such an arrangement may be, and even car- 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 359 
 
 ried out though it is hy France, it is still too palpably impolitic 
 for serious consideration. To propose that, whilst the Enghsh 
 joined in legislating for the people of Austraha, of the Cape, 
 of New Zealand, of Canada, of Jamaica, and of the rest, these 
 should in turn legislate for the English, and for each other, 
 is much Uke proposing that the butcher should superintend the 
 classification of the draper's goods, the draper draw up a tariif 
 of prices for the grocer, and the grocer instruct the baker in 
 making bread. 
 
 Hence, the poUtical union of a parent state with a colony 
 is inadmissible ; seeing tliat, as usually maintained, such union 
 necessarily infringes the rights of the members of both com- 
 munities, and seeing that it cannot be made just without at 
 the same time being made absurdly unfit. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 It was exceedingly cool of Pope Alexander YI. to parcel 
 out the unknown countries of the Earth between the Spaniards 
 and Portuguese, granting to Spain aU discovered and undis- 
 covered heathen lands lying west of a certain meridian drawn 
 through the Atlantic, and to Portugal those lying east of it. 
 Queen Elizabeth, too, was somewhat cool, when she empowered 
 Sir Humphrey GUbert " to discover and take possession of re- 
 mote and heathen countries," and "to exercise rights, royal- 
 ties, and jurisdiction, in such countries and seas adjoining." 
 Nor did Charles II. show less coolness, when he gave to 
 Winthrop, Mason, and others, power to " kill, slay, and de- 
 stroy, by all fitting ways, enterprises, and means whatsoever, 
 all and every such person or persons as shall at any time here- 
 after attempt or enterprise the destruction, invasion, detriment, 
 or annoyance of the inhabitants," of the proposed plantation of 
 Connecticut. Indeed, aU colonizing expeditions down to those 
 of our own day, with its American annexations, its French oc- 
 cupations of Algiers and Tahiti,^ and its British conquests of 
 Scinde, and of the Punjaub, have borne a very repulsive 
 
360 GOVEENMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 likeness to the doings of buccaneers. As usual, however, 
 these unscrupulous acts have brought deserved retributions. 
 Insatiate greediness — a mere blind impulse to clutch whatever 
 lies within reach — has generated very erroneous beliefs, and be- 
 trayed nations into most disastrous deeds. " Men are rich in 
 proportion to their acres," argued pohticians. " An increase of 
 estate is manifestly equivalent to an increase of wealth. What, 
 then, can be clearer than that the acquirement of new territory 
 must be a national advantage?" So, misled by the analogy, and 
 spurred on by acquisitiveness, we have continued to seize pro- 
 vince after province, in utter disregard of the losses uniformly 
 entailed by them. In fact, it has been inconceivable that they 
 do entail losses. That the addition of anything must enrich 
 seems so self-evident a truth, that it has never struck men to 
 ask what happens when the thing added is a minus quantity. 
 And even now, though doubt is beginning to dawn upon the 
 public mind, the instinctive desire to keep hold is too strong to 
 permit a change of policy. Our predicament is Hke that of the 
 monkey in the fable, who, putting his hand into a jar of fruit, 
 grasps so large a quantity that he cannot get his hand out 
 again, and is obUged to drag the jar about with him, never 
 thinking to let go what he has seized. When we shall attain 
 to something more tban the ape's wisdom remains to be seen. 
 Happily the old piratical spirit is on the decline. A conquest 
 is no longer gloried in as a national aggrandisement. Our last 
 Indian annexation was lamented as an unfortunate necessity. 
 Experience is fast teaching us that distant dependencies are 
 burdens, and not acquisitions. And thus this earhest motive 
 for state-colonization — the craving for wider possessions — will 
 very soon be destroyed by the conviction that territorial ag- 
 gression is as impolitic as it is unjust. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 Whilst the mere propensity to thieve, — commonly known 
 under some grandiloquent alias, disguised by glittering false- 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 361 
 
 hoods, and made sublime in men's eyes by the largeness of 
 its aims, — has been the real prompter of colonizing invasions, 
 from those of Cortez and Pizarro downwards, the ostensible 
 purpose of them has been either the spread of religion or the 
 extension of commerce. In modem days the latter excuse has 
 been the favourite one. To obtain more markets — this is what 
 people have said aloud to each other, was the object aimed at. 
 And, though second to the widening of empire, it has been to 
 the compassing of this object that colonial legislation has been 
 mainly directed. Let us consider the worth of such legislation. 
 Those holy men of whom the middle ages were so prolific, 
 seem to have delighted in exhibiting their supernatural powers 
 on the most trifling occasions. It was a common feat with 
 them, when engaged in church -building, magically to lengthen 
 a beam which the carpenter had made too short. Some were 
 in the constant habit of calhng down fire from heaven to light 
 their candles. When at a loss where to deposit his habiliments, 
 St. Goar, of Treves, would transform a sunbeam into a hat-peg. 
 And it is related of St. Columbanus that he wrought a miracle 
 to keep the grubs from his cabbages. Now, although these ex- 
 amples of the use of vast means for the accomphshment of insig- 
 nificant ends are not quite paralleled by the exertions of govern- 
 ments to secure colonial trade, the absurdity attaching to both 
 differs only in degree. An expenditure of power ridiculously 
 disproportionate to the occasion is their common characteristic. 
 In the one case, as in the other, an unnatural agency is em- 
 ployed to effect what a natural agency would effect as weU. 
 Trade is a simple enough thing that wiU grow up wherever 
 there is room for it. But, according to statesmen, it must be 
 created by a gigantic and costly machiaery. That trade only 
 is advantageous to a country which brings in return for what 
 is directly and indirectly given, a greater worth of commodities 
 than could otherwise be obtained. But statesmen recognise no 
 such limit to its benefits. Every new outlet for Enghsh goods, 
 kept open at no matter what cost, they think valuable. Here 
 is some scrubby little island, or wild territory — unhealthy, or 
 
362 GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 barren, or inclement, or uninhabited even — which by right of 
 discovery, conquest, or diplomatic manoeuvring, may be laid 
 hands on. Possession is forthwith taken ; a high salaried go- 
 vernor is appointed; officials collect round him; then follow 
 forts, garrisons, guardships ; from these by-and-bye come quar- 
 rels with neighbouring peoples, incursions, war; and these again 
 call for more defensive works, more force, more money. And 
 to all protests against this reckless expenditure, the reply is — 
 " Consider how it extends our commerce." If you grumble at 
 the sinking of £800,000 in fortifying Gibraltar and Malta, at 
 the outlay of ^£130,000 a year for the defence of the Ionian 
 Islands, at the maintenance of 1200 soldiers in such a good- 
 for-nothing place as the Bermudas, at the garrisoning of St. 
 Helena, Hong Kong, Heligoland, and the rest, you are told 
 that aU this is needful for the protection of our commerce. 
 If you object to the expenditure of ;£l 10,000 per annum on 
 the government of Ceylon, it is thought a sufficient answer 
 that Ceylon buys manufactures from us to the gross value 
 of £240,000 yearly. Any criticisms you may pass upon the 
 policy of retaining Canada, at an annual cost of £800,000, 
 are met by the fact that this amounts to only 30 per cent, 
 upon the sum which the Canadians spend on our goods ^. 
 Should you, imder the fear that the East India Company's 
 debt may some day be saddled upon the people of England, 
 lament the outlay of £17,000,000 over the Aifghan war, the 
 sinking of £1,000,000 a year in Scinde, and the swallowing up 
 of untold treasure in the subjugation of the Punjaub, there still 
 comes the everlasting excuse of more trade. A Bomean jungle, 
 the deserts of KafBcaria, and the desolate hills of the Falkland 
 Islands, are all occupied upon this plea. The most profuse ex- 
 penditure is forgiven, if but followed by an insignificant demand 
 for merchandise; even though such demand be but for the sup- 
 ply of a garrison's necessities — glass for barrack windows, starch 
 for officers' shirts, and lump-sugar for the governor's table — all 
 
 ' For these and other such facts, see Sir W. Molesworth's speeches delivered 
 during the sessions of 1848 and 18i9. 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 363 
 
 of which you shall find carefully included in Boai-d of Trade 
 Tables, and' rejoiced over as constituting an increase in our 
 exports. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 But not only do we expend so much to gain so little, we 
 absolutely expend it for nothing ; nay, indeed, in some cases 
 to achieve a loss. All profitable trade with colonies will come 
 without the outlay of a penny for colonial administration — 
 must flow to us naturally ; and whatever trade will not flow to 
 us naturally, is not profitable, but the reverse. If a given 
 settlement deals solely with us, it does so from one of Iwo 
 causes : either we make the articles its inhabitants consume at 
 a lower rate than any other nation, or we obhge its inhabitants 
 to buy those articles firom us, though they might obtain them 
 for less elsewhere. Manifestly, if we can undersell other pro- 
 ducers, we should still exclusively supply its markets, were the 
 settlement independent. If we cannot undersell them, it is 
 equally certain that we are indirectly injuring ourselves and the 
 settlers too; for, as M'Oulloch says: — "Each country has 
 some natural or acquired capabilities that enable her to carry 
 on certain branches of industry more advantageously than any 
 one else. But the fact of a country being undersold in the 
 markets of her colonies, shows conclusively that, instead of 
 having any superiority, she labours under a disadvantage, as 
 compared with others, in the production of the peculiar articles 
 in demand in them. And hence, in providing a forced market 
 in the colonies for articles that we should not otherwise be 
 able to dispose of, we really engage a portion of the capital 
 and labour of the country in a less advantageous channel than 
 that into which it would naturally have flowed." And if to 
 the injury we do ourselves by manufacturing goods which we 
 could more economically buy, is added the injury we suiFer in 
 pacifying the colonists, by purchasing firom them commodities 
 obtainable on better terms elsewhere, we have before us the 
 twofold loss which these much-coveted monopolies entail. 
 
364 GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 Thus are we again taught how worthy of all reverence are 
 the injunctions of equity, and how universal is their applica- 
 bihty. Just that commercial intercourse with colonies which 
 may be had without breaking these injunctions, brings gain ; 
 whilst just that commercial intercourse which cannot be so 
 had, brings loss. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Passing from home interests to colonial interests, we still 
 meet nothing but evil results. It is a prettily sounding expres- 
 sion that of mother-coimtry protection, but a very delusive one. 
 If we are to believe those who have known the thing rather 
 than the name, there is but little of the maternal about it. In 
 the Declaration of American Independence we have a candid 
 statement of experience on this point. Speaking of the king — 
 the personification of the parent state, the settlers say: — 
 
 " He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing 
 his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers. 
 
 " He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither 
 swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their sub- 
 stance. 
 
 " He has kept among us in times of peace standing armies, 
 without the consent of our legislatures. 
 
 " He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdic- 
 tion foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our 
 laws ; giving his assent to their pretended acts of legislation: — - 
 
 " For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us. 
 
 " For protecting them by a mock trial from punishment for 
 any murders which they should commit on the inliabitants of 
 these states. 
 
 " For cutting oflf our trade with all parts of the world. 
 
 " For imposing taxes upon us without our consent. 
 
 " For depriving us in many cases of the benefits of trial by 
 jury," &c., &c., &c. 
 
 Now, though tyrannies so atrocious as these do not com- 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 365 
 
 monly disgrace colonial legislation in the present day, we have 
 but to glance over the newspapers published in our foreign 
 possessions, to see that the arbitrary rule of the Colonial 
 Office is no blessing. Chronic irritation, varying in intensity 
 from that of -which petitions are symptomatic, to that exhibited 
 in open rebellions, is habitually present in these forty-six 
 scattered dependencies which statesmen have encumbered us 
 ■with. Two outbreaks in fifteen years pretty plainly hint the 
 feeling of the Canadas — a feeling still extant and growing, as 
 recent events testify. Within the same period the Cape Boers 
 have revolted thrice ; and we have just had a tumultuous agi- 
 tation and a violent paper war about convicts. In the West 
 Indies there is universal discontent. Jamaica advices tell of 
 stopped supplies, and state-machinery at a dead lock. Guiana 
 sends Uke news. Here are quarrels about retrenchment ; there, 
 insurrectionary riots ; and anger is everywhere. The name of 
 Ceylon calls to mind the insolence of a titled governor on the 
 one side, and on the other the bitterness of insulted colonists. 
 In the Australian settlements, criminal immigration has been 
 the sore subject ; whilst from New Zealand there come protests 
 against official despotism. All winds bring the same tale of a 
 negligence caring for no expostulations, impertinence without 
 end, blunderings, disputes, delays, corruption. Canadians 
 complain of having been induced by a proffered privilege to 
 sink their capital in flour-mills, which subsequent legislation 
 made useless. With an ever-varying amount of protec- 
 tion, sugar-planters say they do not know what to be at. 
 South Africa bears witness to a mismanagement that at one 
 time makes enemies of the Griquas, and at another entails a 
 Kaffir war. The emigrants of New Zealand lament over a seat 
 of government absurdly chosen, money thrown away upon use- 
 less roads, and needful works left undone. South Australia 
 is made bankrupt by its governors extravagance; lands are 
 apportioned so as to barbarize the settlers by dispersion, and 
 labourers are sent out in excess, and left to beg. Our Chinese 
 trade gets endangered by the insulting behaviour of military 
 
866 GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 officers to the natives ; and the authorities of Labuan make 
 their first settlement in a pestilential swamp. 
 
 Nevertheless, these odd results of mother-country protection 
 need not surprise us, if we consider by whom the duties of 
 maternity are discharged. Dotted here and there over the 
 earth, at distances varying from one thousand to fourteen 
 thousand miles, and to and from some of which it takes three- 
 quarters of a year to send a question and get back an answer, 
 are forty-six communities, consisting of different races, placed 
 in different circumstances. And the affairs of these numerous, 
 far-removed communities — their commercial, social, political, 
 and religious interests, are to be cared for — by whom? By 
 six functionaries and their twenty-three clerks, sitting at desks 
 in Downing Street! being at the rate of 0"18 of a functionary 
 and half a clerk to each settlement ! 
 
 Is it not, then, sufficiently clear that this state-colonization 
 is as indefensible on the score of colonial welfare, as on that 
 of home interests ? May we not reasonably doubt the pro- 
 priety of people on one side of the earth being governed by 
 officials on the other ? Would not these transplanted societies 
 probably manage their affairs better than we can do it for 
 them ? At any rate our benevolent anxiety on their behalf 
 may be at rest, should it turn out that they would willingly 
 dispense with our superintendence. All that the most ro- 
 mantic generosity can require from us, is the tender of our 
 good offices; and should these be decUned, our consciences 
 may feel fcdly discharged of any assumed duty. Now on poll- 
 ing the inhabitants of each colony on the question whether 
 England should conrinue legislating for them or not, we should 
 be pretty certain to get the answer that, were it the same thini^ 
 to us, they would much rather legislate for themselves. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Great, however, as are tlie evils entailed by govei-nment 
 colonization upon both parent state and settlers, thev look 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 367 
 
 insignificant wlien compared with those it inflicts upon the 
 aborigines of the conquered countries. The people of Java 
 beheve that the souls of Europeans pass at death into the 
 bodies of tigers ; and it is related of a Hispaniolan chief that 
 he hoped not to go to heaven when he heard there would be 
 Spaniards there. Significant facts these : darkly suggestive of 
 many an unrecorded horror. But they hint nothing worse 
 than history tells of. Whether we think of the extinct West- 
 Indian tribes, who were worked to death in mines ; or of the 
 Cape Hottentots, whose masters punished them by shooting 
 small shot into their legs ; or of those nine thousand Chinese 
 whom the Dutch massacred one morning in Batavia; or of the 
 Arabs lately suffocated in the caves of Dabra by the French, 
 we do but call to mind solitary samples of the treatment com- 
 monly received by subjugated races from so-called Christian 
 nations. Should any one flatter himself that we English are 
 guiltless of such barbarities, he may soon be shamed by a nar- 
 rative of our doings in the East. The Anglo-Indians of the 
 last century — " birds of prey and of passage," as they were 
 styled by Burke — showed themselves only a shade less cruel 
 than their prototypes of Peru and Mexico. Imagine how black 
 mjist have been their deeds, when even the Directors of the 
 Company admitted that "the vast fortunes acquired in the 
 inland trade have been obtained by a scene of the most tyran- 
 nical and oppressive conduct that was ever known in any age 
 or country." Conceive the atrocious state of society described 
 by Vansittart, who tells us that the Enghsh compelled tlae 
 natives to buy or sell at just what rates they pleased, on pain 
 of flogging or confinement. Judge to what a pass things must 
 have come when, in describing a journey, Warren Hastings 
 says, " most of the petty towns and serais were deserted at 
 our approach." A cold-blooded treachery was the estabhshed 
 policy of the authorities. Princes were betrayed into war with 
 each other ; and one of them having been helped to overcome 
 his antagonist, was then himself dethroned for some alleged 
 misdemeanor. Always some muddied stream was at hand as a 
 
368 GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 pretext for official wolves. Dependent chiefs holding coveted 
 lands were impoverished by exorbitant demands for tribute; 
 and their ultimate inabihty to meet these demands was con- 
 strued into a treasonable offence, punished by deposition. Even 
 down to our own day kindred iniquities are continued^. Down 
 to our own day, too, are continued the grievous salt- monopoly, 
 and the pitiless taxation, that wrings from the poor j^ots 
 nearly half the produce of the soil. Down to our omi day 
 continues the cunning despotism which uses native soldiers 
 to maintain and extend native subjection — a despotism under 
 which, not many years since, a regiment of sepoys was dehbe- 
 rately massacred, for refasing to march without proper clothing. 
 Down to our own day the police authorities league with 
 wealthy scamps, and allow the machinery of the law to be 
 used for purposes of extortion. Down to our own day, so- 
 called gentlemen will ride their elephants through the crops 
 of impoverished peasants ; and -nill supply themselves with 
 provisions from the native villages without paying for them. 
 And down to our own day, it is coromon with the people in the 
 interior to run into the woods at sight of a European ! 
 
 No one can fail to see that these cruelties, these treacheries, 
 these deeds of blood and rapine, for which European nations in 
 general have to blush, are mainly due to the carrying on of 
 colonization under state-management, and with the help of 
 state-funds and state-force. It is quite needless to point to 
 the recent affair at Wairau in New Zealand, or to the Kaffir 
 war, or to our perpetual aggressions in the East, or to colonial 
 history at large, in proof of this, for the fact is self-evident. 
 A schoolboy, made overbearing by the consciousness that there 
 is always a big brother to take his part, typifies the colonist, 
 who sees in his mother-country a bully ever ready to back and 
 defend him. Unprotected emigrants, landing amongst a 
 strange race, and feeling themselves tlie weaker partv, are 
 tolerably certain to behave well, and a community of them is 
 
 " See Sir Alexander Burns' de.-patches. 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 369 
 
 likely to grow up in amicable relationship with the natives. 
 But let these emigrants be followed by regiments of soldiers — 
 let them have a fort built, and cannons mounted — let them feel 
 that they have the upper hand, and they will no longer be tlie 
 same men. A brutality will come out, which the discipline of 
 civilized life had kept under ; and not unfrequently they will 
 prove more vicious than they even knew themselves to he. 
 Various evil influences conspire with their own bad propensi- 
 ties. The military force guarding them has a strong motive to 
 foment quarrels ; for war promises prize-money. To the civil 
 employes, conquest holds out a prospect of more berths and 
 quicker promotion — a fact which must bias them in favour of 
 it. Thus an aggressive tendency is encouraged in all — a ten- 
 dency which is sure to show itself in acts, and to beti-ay the 
 colonists into some of those atrocities that disgrace civilization. 
 
 § '• 
 
 As though to round oif the argument more completely, his- 
 tory presents us with proof that whilst government coloniza- 
 tion is accompanied by endless miseries and abominations, 
 colonization naturally carried on is free from these. Notwith- 
 standing the misconduct he is accused of, to WilUam Penn 
 belongs the honour of having shown men that the kindness, 
 justice, and truth of its inhabitants, are better safeguards to a 
 colony than troops and fortifications and the bravery of go- 
 vernors. In all points Pennsylvania illustrates the equitable, 
 as contrasted with the inequitable, mode of colonizing. It was 
 founded not by the stat€, but by private individuals. It needed 
 no mother-country protection, for it committed no breaches of 
 the moral law. Its treaty with the Indians, described as " the 
 only one ever concluded which was not ratified by an oath, and 
 the only one that was never broken," served it in better stead 
 than any garrison. For the seventy years dtuing which the 
 Quakers retained tbe chief power, it enjoyed an immunity from 
 that border warfare, with its concomitant losses, and fears, and 
 
 B B 
 
S7() GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 
 
 bloodshed, to which other settlements were subject. On the 
 otlier hand, its people maintained a friendly and mutually-be- 
 neficial intercourse with the natives ; and, as a natural conse- 
 quence of complete security, made unusually rapid progress in 
 material prosperity. 
 
 That a like policy would have been similarly advantageous 
 in other cases, may reasonably be inferred. No one can doubt, 
 for instance, that had the East India Company been denied 
 miUtary aid and state-conferred privileges, both its own affairs, 
 and the affairs of Hindostan, would have been in a far better 
 condition than they now are. Insane longing for empire would 
 never have burdened the Company with the enormous debt 
 wliich at present paralyzes it. The energy that has been 
 expended in aggressive wars would have been employed in 
 developing the resources of the country. Unenervated by 
 monopohes, trade would have been much more successful. The 
 native rulers, influenced by a superior race on friendly terms 
 with them, would have facilitated improvements ; and we 
 should not have seen, as now, rivers unnavigated, roads not 
 bridged or metalled, and the proved capabilities of the soil 
 neglected. Private enterprise would long ago have opened up 
 these sources of wealth, as in fact it is at length doing, in 
 spite of the discouragements thi-own in its way by conquest- 
 loving authorities. And had the settlers thus turned their 
 attention wholly to the development of commerce, and con- 
 ducted themselves peaceably, as their defenceless state would 
 have compelled them to do, England would have been better 
 supphed with raw materials, the markets for her goods would 
 have enlarged, and something appreciable towards the civiliza- 
 tion of the East would have been accomphshed. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 In many ways, then, does experience enforce the verdict 
 pronounced by the law of state-duty against state-colonization. 
 It turns out that extension of empire is not sjTionymous with 
 
GOVERNMENT COLONIZATION. 371 
 
 increase of wealth ; but that, on the contrary, aggressions 
 bred of the desire for territorial gain, entail loss. The notion 
 that we secure commercial benefits by legislative connection 
 with colonies, is a proved delusion. At best we throw away 
 the whole sum which colonial government costs us ; whilst we 
 may, and often do, incur further loss, by establishing an arti- 
 ficial trade. The plea for protection to the settlers must be 
 abandoned ; seeing that this so-called protection is in practice 
 oppression ; and seeing that the settlers, from whose judg- 
 ment on the matter there is no appeal, liint very plainly their 
 wish to dispense with it. As for the aborigines, it is manifest 
 that the cruelties inflicted on them have been mainly due to 
 the backing of emigrants by the parent state. And, lastly, we 
 have conclusive proof not only that voluntary colonization is 
 practicable, but that it is free from those many evils attendant 
 upon colonization managed by a government. 
 
 B B ic 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 § 1- 
 
 The current ideas respecting legislative interference in sanitary 
 matters do not seem to have taken the form of a definite 
 theory. The Eastern Medical Association of Scotland does 
 indeed hold " that it is the duty of the state to adopt measures 
 for protecting the health as well as the property of its sub- 
 jects;" and the Times latelv asserted that "the Privj' Council 
 is chargeable with the health of the Empire;"'' but no con- 
 siderable political party has adopted either of these dogmas 
 by way of a distinct confession of faith. Nevertheless, the 
 opinions that widely prevail on questions of sewage, water- 
 supply, ventilation, and the like, fully commit their advocates 
 to the behef these dogmas embody. 
 
 That it comes within the proper sphere of government to 
 repress nuisances is evident. He who contaminates the atmo- 
 sphere breathed by his neighbour, is infringing his neighbour's 
 rights. Men having equal claims to the free use of the elements 
 — having faculties which need this free use of the elements 
 for their due exercise — and having that exercise more or less 
 limited by whatever makes the elements more or less unusable, 
 are obviously trespassed against by any one who unnecessarily 
 vitiates the elements, and renders them detrimental to health, 
 or disagreeable to the senses ; and in the discharge of its func- 
 tion as protector, a government is obviously called upon to 
 afford redress to those so trespassed against. 
 
 * See Timts, Oct. 17, 1848. 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 373 
 
 Beyond this, however, it cannot lawflilly go. As akeady 
 shown in several kindred cases, for a 'government to take from 
 a citizen more property than is needful for the efficient defence 
 of that citizen's rights, is to infringe his rights — is, conse- 
 quently, to do the opposite of what it, the government, is com- 
 missioned to do for him — or, in other words, is to do wrong. 
 And hence all taxation for sanitary superintendence coming, as 
 it does, within this categorj', must be condemned. 
 
 This theory, of which Boards of Health and the like are 
 embodiments, is not only inconsistent with our definition of 
 state-duty, but is further open to strictures, similar to, and 
 equally fatal with, those made in analogous cases. If by say- 
 ing "that it is the duty of the state to adopt measures for 
 protecting the health of its subjects," it is meant (as it is 
 meant by the majority of the medical profession) that the state 
 should interpose between quacks and those who patronize them, 
 or between the druggist and the artizan who wants a remedy 
 for his cold — if it is meant that to guard people against em- 
 pirical treatment, the state should forbid all unlicensed per- 
 sons from prescribing — then the reply is, that to do so is 
 directly ta violate the moral law. Men's rights are infringed 
 by these, as much as by all other trade interferences. The 
 invalid is at Uberty to buy medicine and advice from whomso- 
 ever he pleases ; the unlicensed practitioner is at Hberty to seU 
 these to whomsoever will buy. On no pretext whatever can a 
 barrier be set up between them, without the law of equal 
 freedom being broken ; and least of all may the government, 
 whose office it is to uphold that law, become a transgressor 
 of it. 
 
 Moreover this doctrine, that it is the duty of the state to 
 protect the health of its subjects, cannot be established, for the 
 same reason that its kindred doctrines cannot, namely, the 
 impossibility of saying how far the alleged duty shall be car- 
 
<'J74 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 ried out. Health depends upon the fulfilment of numerous 
 conditions — can he "protected" only hy ensuring that fulfil- 
 ment : if, therefore, it is the duty of the state to protect the 
 health of its subjects, it is its duty to see that all the condi- 
 tions of health are fulfilled by them. Shall this duty be con- 
 sistently discharged ? If so, the legislature must enact a 
 national dietary ; prescribe so many meals a day for each 
 individual; fix the quantities and quaJities of food, both for 
 men and women; state the proportion of fluids, when to be 
 taken, and of what kind ; specify the amount of exercise, and 
 define its character ; describe the clothing to be employed ; 
 determine the houre of sleep, allowing for the difference of age 
 and sex : and so on with all other particulars, necessary to 
 complete a perfect synopsis, for the daily guidance of the 
 nation : and to enforce these regulations it must employ a 
 sufliciency of duly-qualified officials, empowered to direct every 
 one's domestic arrangements. If, on the other hand, a uni- 
 versal supervision of private conduct is not meant, then there 
 comes the question — Where, between this and no supervision 
 at all, lies the boundary up to which supervision is a duty ? 
 To which question no answer can be given. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 There is a manifest analogy between committing to govern- 
 ment-guardianship the physical health of the people, and com- 
 mitting to it their moral health. The two proceedings are 
 equally reasonable, may be defended by similar ai-guments, and 
 must stand or fall together. If the welfare of men's souls can 
 be fitly dealt with by acts of parliament, why then the welfare 
 of their bodies can be fitly dealt with likewise. He who thinks 
 the state commissioned to administer spiritual remedies, may 
 consistently think that it should administer material ones. The 
 disinfecting society from vice may natui-ally be quoted as a pre- 
 cedent for disinfecting it from pestilence. Purifying the haunts 
 of men fmm noxious vapours may be held quite as legitimate 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 375 
 
 as purifying their moral atmosphere. The fear that false 
 doctrines may be instilled by unauthorized preachers, has its 
 analogue in "the fear that unauthorized practitioners may give 
 deleterious medicines or advice. And the persecutions once 
 committed to prevent the one evil, countenance the penalties 
 used to put down the other. Contrariwise, the arguments em- 
 ployed by the dissenter to show that the moral sanity of the 
 people is not a matter for state superintendence, are applicable, 
 with a slight change of terms, to their physical sanity also. 
 
 Let no one think this analogy imaginai^. The two notions 
 are not only theoretically related ; we have facts proving that 
 they tend to embody themselves in similar institutions. There 
 is an evident inclination on the part of the medical profession 
 to get itself organized after the fashion of the clericy. Moved 
 as are the projectors of a railway, who, whilst secretly hoping 
 for salaries, persuade themselves and others that the proposed 
 railway will be beneficial to the public — moved as all men are 
 under such circumstances, by nine parts of self-interest gilt 
 over with one part of philanthropy — surgeons and physicians 
 are vigorously striving to erect a medical establishment akin to 
 our religious one. Little do the public at large know how ac- 
 tively professional publications are agitating for state-appointed 
 overseers of the public health. Take up the Lancet, and you shall 
 find articles written to show the necessity of making poor-law 
 medical ofiicers independent of Boards of Guardians by ap- 
 pointing them for Ufe, holding them responsible only to central 
 authority, and giving them handsome salaries from the Conso- 
 lidated Fund. The Journal of Public Health proposes that 
 " every house on becoming vacant be examined by a competent 
 person as to its being in a condition adapted for the safe dwelUng 
 in of the future tenants ; " and to this end would raise by fees, 
 chargeable on the landlords, " a revenue adequate to pay a sufE- 
 cient staff of inspectors four or five hundred pounds a year each.' 
 A non-professional publication, echoing the appeal, says — 
 " No reasonable man can doubt that if a proper system of venti- 
 lation were rendered imperative upon landlords, not only would 
 
876 SANITAKV SUPERVISION. 
 
 the cholera and other epidemic diseases be checked, but the ge- 
 neral standard of health would be raised." Whilst the Medical 
 Times shows its leanings, by announcing, with marked appro- 
 bation, that " the Ottoman government has recently published 
 a decree for the appointment of physicians to be paid by the 
 state," who " are bound to treat gratuitously all — both rich and 
 poor — who shall demand advice." 
 
 More or less distinctly expressed in these passages there is 
 an unmistakable wish to establish an organized, tax-supported 
 class, chai-ged with the health of men's bodies, as the clergy 
 are charged with the health of their souls. And whoever has 
 watched how institutions grow — how by little and little a very 
 innocent-looking infancy unfolds into a formidable maturity, 
 with vested interests, political influence, and a strong instinct 
 of self-preservation, will see that the germs here peeping forth 
 are quite capable, under favourable circumstances, of developing 
 into such an organization. He will see further, that favourable 
 circumstances are not wanting — that the prevalence of unem- 
 ployed professional men, with whom these proposals for sanitary 
 inspectors and public surgeons mostly originate, is likely to con- 
 tinue; and that continuing, it will tend to multiply the offices 
 it has created, much in the same way that the superabundance 
 of clergy multiplies churches. He will even anticipate that, as 
 the spread of education is certain to render the pressure upon 
 the intellectual labour-market still more intense than it now is, 
 there will by-and-by be a yet greater stimulus to the manufac- 
 ture of berths — a yet greater tendency on the part of all who 
 want genteel occupations for their sons, to countenance this 
 manufacture— and, therefore, a yet greater danger of the growth 
 of a medical establishment. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 The most specious excuse for not extending to medical ad- 
 vice the principles of free- trade, is the same as that given for 
 not leaving education to be diffused under them ; namely, that 
 
SA^'ITAKY SDPERVISION. 377 
 
 the j udgment of the cousumer is uot a sufficient guarantee for 
 the goodness of the commodity. The intolerance shown by or- 
 thodox surgeons and physicians, towards unordained followers 
 of their calling, is to he understood as arising from a desire 
 to defend the pubHc against quackery. Ignorant people say 
 they cannot distinguish good treatment from had, or skilful ad- 
 visers from unskilful ones : hence it is needful that the choice 
 should be made for them. And then, following in the track 
 of priesthoods, for -whose persecutions a similar defence has 
 always been set up, they agitate for more stringent regula- 
 tions against unlicensed practitioners, and descant upon the 
 dangers to wliich men are exposed by an unrestricted system. 
 Hear Mr. Wakley. Speaking of a recently-revived law re- 
 lating to chemists and druggists, he says, " It must have the 
 effect of checking, to a vast extent, that fi'ightful evil called 
 counter practice, exercised by unqualified persons, wliich has 
 so long been a disgrace to the operation of the laws relating 
 to medicine in this country, and which, doubtless, has been 
 attended with a dreadful sacrifice of human life." {Lancet, 
 Sept. 11, 1841.) And again, " There is not a chemist and 
 druggist in the empire who would refuse to prescribe in his 
 own shop in medical cases, or who would hesitate day by day 
 to prescribe simple remedies for the ailments of infants and 
 children." * » * * " We had previously considered the 
 evil to he of enormous magnitude, hut it is quite clear that 
 we had under- estimated the extent of the danger to which the 
 pubhc are exposed." {Lancet, Oct. 16, 1841.) 
 
 Any one may discern through these ludicrous exaggerations 
 much more of the partizan tlian of the philanthropist. But 
 let that pass. And without dwelUng upon the fact, that it is 
 strange a " dreadful sacrifice of human Life " should not have 
 drawn the attention of the people themselves to this " frightful 
 evil," — without doing more than glance at the further fact, that 
 nothing is said of those benefits conferred by " counter practice," 
 which would af least form a considerable set-off against this 
 " evil of enormous magnitude," — let it be conceded that very 
 
378 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 many of the poorer classes are injured by druggists' prescrip- 
 tions and quack medicines. The allegation having been thus, 
 for argument's sake, admitted in full, let us now consider 
 whether it constitutes a sufficient plea for legal interference. 
 
 Inconvenience, suffering, and death, are the penalties at- 
 tached by nature to ignorance, as well as to incompetence — 
 are also the means of remedying these. And whoso tliinks he 
 can mend matters by dissociating ignorance and its penalties, 
 lays claim to more than Divine wisdom, and more than Divine 
 benevolence. If there seems harslmess in those ordinations of 
 tilings, wliich, with unfaltering firmness, punish every breach of 
 law — if there seems harshness in those ordinations of things 
 which visit a shp of the foot with a broken Hmb — which send 
 lingering agonies to follow the inadvertent swallowing of a 
 noxious herb — which go on quietly, age after age, giving fevers 
 and agues to dwellers in marshes — and which, now and then, 
 sweep away by pestilence tens of thousands of unhealthy livers 
 — if there seems harshness in such ordinations, be sure it is 
 apparent only, and not real. Pai-tly by weeding out those of 
 lowest development, and partly by subjecting those who remain 
 to the never-ceasing discipHne of experience, nature secures the 
 growth of a race who shall both understand the conditions of 
 existence, and be able to act up to them. It is impossible in 
 any degree to suspend this discipline by stepping in between 
 ignorance and its consequences, without, to a corresponding de- 
 gree, suspending the progress. If to be ignorant were as safe 
 as to be wise, no one would become wise. And all measures 
 wliich tend to put ignorance upon a par with wisdom, inevitably 
 check the growth of wsdom. Acts of parliament to save silly 
 people from the evils which putting faith in empirics may entail 
 upon them, do this, and are therefore bad. Unpitying as it 
 looks, it is best to let the foolish man suffer the appointed pe- 
 nalty of his foolishness. For the pain — he must bear it as well 
 as he can : for the experience — he must treasure it up, and act 
 more rationally in future. To others as weU as to liimself will 
 his case be a warning. And by multiplication of such warn- 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 379 
 
 ings, there cannot fail to be generated in all men a caution 
 corresponding to the danger to be shunned. Are there any 
 who desire to facilitate the process ? Let them dispel eiTor ; 
 and, provided they do this in a legitimate -way, the faster they 
 do it the better. But to guard ignorant men against the evils 
 of their ignorance — to divorce a cause and consequence which 
 God has joined together — to render needless the intellect put 
 into us for our guidance — to unhinge what is, in fact, die very 
 mechanism of existence — must necessarily entail nothing but 
 disasters. 
 
 Who, indeed, after pulling off the coloured glasses of preju- 
 dice, and thrusting out of sight his pet projects, can help seeing 
 the folly of these endeavours to protect men against themselves ? 
 A sad population of imbeciles would our schemers fill the world 
 with, could their plans last. A sorry kind of human constitution 
 would they make for us — a constitution lacking the power to 
 uphold itself, and requiring to be kept alive by superintendence 
 from without — a constitution continually going wrong, and need- 
 ing to be set right again — a constitution even tending to self- 
 destruction. Why the whole effort of nature is to get rid of 
 such^^— to clear the world of them, and make room for better. 
 Nature demands that every being shall be self-sufficing. All 
 that are not so, nature is perpetually withdrawing by death. 
 Intelligence sufficient to avoid danger, power enough to fulfil 
 every condition, ability to cope with the necessities of existence 
 — these are qualifications invariably insisted on. Mark how 
 the diseased are dealt with. Consumptive patients, with lungs 
 incompetent to perform the duties of lungs, people ^Yith assi- 
 milative organs that will not take up enough nutriment, people 
 with defective hearts that break down under excitement of the 
 circulation, people with any constitutional flaw preventing the 
 due fulfilment of the conditions of life, are continually dying 
 out, and leaving behind those fit for the cUmate, food, and 
 habits to which they are born. Even the less-imperfectly or- 
 ganized, who, under ordinary circumstances, can manage to live 
 with comfortj ai-e still the first to be carried off by epidemics ; 
 
380 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 and only such as are robust euougli to resist these — that is, 
 only such as are tolerably well adapted to both the usual and 
 incidental necessities of existence, remain. And thus is the 
 race kept free from vitiation. Of course this statement is in 
 substance a truism ; for no other arrangement of things is con- 
 ceivable. But it is a truism to which most men pay little re- 
 gard. And if they commonly overlook its application to body, 
 still less do they note its bearing upon mind. Yet it is equally 
 true here. Nature just as much insists on fitness between men- 
 tal character and circumstances, as between physical character 
 and circumstances ; and radical defects are as much causes of 
 death in the one case as in the other. He on whom his own 
 stupidity, or vice, or idleness, entails loss of Hfe, must, in the 
 generalizations of philosophy, be classed ■with the victims of 
 weak viscera or malformed limbs. In his case, as in the others, 
 there exists a fatal non-adaptation ; and it matters not in the 
 abstract whether it be a moral, an intellectual, or a corporeal 
 one. Beings thus imperfect are nature's failures, and are re- 
 called by her laws when foiind to be such. Along with the rest 
 they are put upon trial. If they are sufficiently complete to Hve, 
 they do Hve, and it is well they should live. If they ard not 
 sufficiently complete to Hve, they die, and it is best they should 
 die. Whether the incompleteness be in strength, or agUity, or 
 perception, or foresight, or self-control, is not heeded in the 
 rigorous proof they ai'e put to. But if any faculty is unusually 
 deficient, the probabilities are that, in the long run, some dis- 
 astrous, or, in the worst cases — fatal result will follow. And, 
 however irregular the action of this law may appear — however 
 it may seem that much chaff is left behind wliich should be 
 winnowed out, and that much grain is taken away which should 
 be left behind, yet due consideration must satisfy every one that 
 the average effect is to purify society from those who are, in 
 some respect or other, essentially faulty. 
 
 Of course, in so far as the severity of this process is mitigated 
 by the spontaneous s}'mpathy of men for each other, it is proper 
 tliat it should be mitigated: albeit there is unquestionably harm 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION". 381 
 
 done when sympathy is shown, without any regard to ultimate 
 results. But the drawhacks hence arising are nothing like com- 
 mensurate with the benefits othenvise conferred. Only when 
 this sympathy prompts to a breach of equity — only when it 
 originates an interference forbidden by the law of equal freedom 
 — only when, by so doing, it suspends in some particular depart- 
 ment of life the relationship between constitution and conditions, 
 does it work pure evil. Then, however, it defeats its own end. 
 Instead of diminishing suffering, it eventually increases it. 
 It favours the multiplication of those worst fitted for existence, 
 and, by consequence, hinders the multiplication of those best 
 fitted for existence — leaving, as it does, less room for them. 
 It tends to fill the world with those to whom Ufe will bring 
 most pain, and tends to keep out of it those to whom life will 
 bring most pleasure. It inflicts positive misery, and prevents 
 positive happiness. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Turning now to consider these impatiently-agitated schemes 
 for improving' our sanitary condition by act of parliament, the 
 first criticism to be passed upon them is that they are altogether 
 needless, inasmuch as there are already efficient influences at 
 work gradually accomplishing every desideratum. 
 
 Seeing, as do the philanthropic of our day, like the con- 
 genitally blind to whom sight has just been given — looking at 
 things through the newly-opened eyes of sympathy — they form 
 very crude and very exaggerated notions of the evils to be dealt 
 with. Some, anxious for the enlightenment of their fellows, collect 
 statistics exhibiting a lamentable amount of ignorance; publish 
 these; and the lovers of their kind are startled. Others dive 
 into the dens where poverty hides itself, and shock the world 
 with descriptions of what they see. Others, again, gather to- 
 gether information respecting crime, and make the benevolent 
 look grave by their disclosures. Whereupon, in their horror 
 at these revelations, men keep thoughtlessly assuming that the 
 evils have lately become greater, when in reality it is they who 
 
382 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 have become more observant of them. If few comphiints have 
 hitherto been heard about crime, and ignorance, and misery, 
 it is not that in times past these were less widely spread ; for 
 the contrary is the fact; but it is, that our forefathers were 
 comparatively indifferent to them— thought Little about them, 
 and said little about them. Overlooking which circumstance, 
 and forgetting that social evils have been undergoing a gradual 
 amelioration — an amelioration likely to progress \\-ith increas- 
 ing rapidity — manv entertain a needless alarm lest fearful con- 
 sequences should ensue, if these evils are not immediately re- 
 medied, and a visionary hope that immediate remedy of them 
 is possible. 
 
 Such are the now prevalent feehngs relative to sanitary reform. 
 We have had a multitude of blue-books. Board of Health reports, 
 leading articles, pamphlets, and lectures, descriptive of bad 
 drainage, ovei-flowing cesspools, festeiing graveyards, impure 
 water, and the filthiness and humidity of low lodging houses. 
 The facts thus published are thought to warrant, or rather to 
 demand, legislative interference. It seems never to be asked, 
 whether any corrective process is going on. Although evei7 
 one knows that the rate of mortaUty has been gradually de- 
 creasing, and that the value of Life is higher in England than 
 elsewhere — although every one knows that the cleanliness of 
 our towns is greater now than ever before, and that our spon- 
 taneously-grown sanitary arrangements are far better than those 
 existing on the Continent, where the stinks of Cologne, the 
 uncovered drains of Paris, the water-tubs of Berhn^, and the 
 miserable footways of the German towns, show what state- 
 management effects — although every one knows these things, 
 yet is it perversely assumed that by state-management only 
 can the remaining impediments to public health be removed. 
 Surely the causes which have brought the sewage, the paving 
 and Ughting, and the water-supply of our towns, to their pre- 
 sent state, have not suddenly ceased. Surely that amelioration, 
 
 " For putiing out fires in Berlin they depend on open tubs of water that stand 
 about the city at certain points, ready to be dragged where they are wanted. 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 383 
 
 Avhich has been taking place in tbe condition of London for 
 these two or three centuries, may be expected to continue. 
 Surely the public spirit, which has carried out so many urban 
 improvements since the Municipal Corporations Act gave 
 greater facilities, can carry out other improvements. "Surely, 
 if all that has been done towEirds making cities healthy, has 
 been done, not only without government aid, but in spite of 
 government obstructions — in spite, that is, of the heavy ex- 
 pense of local acts of parliament — we may reasonably suppose, 
 that what remains to be done can be done in the same way, 
 especially if the obstructions are removed. One would have 
 thought that less excuse for meddKng existed now than ever. 
 Now that so much has been effected; now that spontaneous 
 advance is being made at an unparalleled rate ; now that the 
 laws of health are beginning to be generally studied ; now that 
 people are reforming their habits of living ; now that the use 
 of baths is spreading; now that temperance, and ventilation, 
 and due exercise are getting thought about — to interfere now, 
 of all times, is surely as rash and uncalled-for a step as was 
 ever taken. 
 
 And then to think that, in their hot haste to obtain by law 
 healthier homes for the masses, men should not see that the 
 natural process already commenced is the only process which 
 can eventually succeed. The Metropolitan Association for Im- 
 proving the Dwellings of the Labouring Classes is doing all that 
 is possible in the matter. It is endeavouring to show that, 
 under judicious management, the building of salubrious habita- 
 tions for the poor becomes a profitable employment of capital. 
 If it shows this, it wUl do all that needs to be done ; for capital 
 will quickly flow into investments offering good returns. If it 
 does not show this — if, after due trial, it finds that these Model 
 Lodging Houses do not pay, £tnd that better accommodation 
 than the working people now have can be obtained for them 
 only by diminishing the interest on money sunk in building, 
 then not all tlie acts of parHament that can be passed between 
 now and doomsday will improve matters one jot. These plans 
 
384 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 for making good ventilation imperative ; insisting upon water- 
 supply, and fixing the price for it, as Lord Morpeth's Bill would 
 have done; having empty houses cleansed before re-occupation, 
 and charging the owners of them for inspection — these plans 
 for coercing landlords into giving additional advantages for the 
 same money are nothing but repetitions of the old proposal, 
 that "the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops," and are just 
 as incapable of reahzation. The first result of an attempt to 
 carry them out would be a diminution of the profits of house- 
 owners. The interest on capital invested in houses no longer 
 being so high, capital would seek other investments. The 
 building of houses would cease to keep pace with the growth 
 of population. Hence would arise a gradual increase in the 
 number of occupants to each house. And this change in the 
 ratio of houses to people would continue until the demand for 
 houses had raised the profits of the landlord to what they were, 
 and undJ, by overcrowding, new sanitary evils had been pro- 
 duced to parallel the old ones". If, by building in larger 
 
 ^ Such results have actually heen brought about by the Metropolitan Buildings 
 Act. Whilst this Act has introduced some reform in the better class of houses 
 (although to nothing like the expected extent, for the surveyors are bribed, and 
 moreover the fees claimed by them for inspecting every trifling alteration operate as 
 penalties on improvement), it has entailed far more evil, just where it was intended 
 to confer benefit. An architect and surveyor describes it as having worked after 
 the following manner. In those districts of London consisting of inferior houses, 
 built in that insubstantial fashion which the New Building Act was to mend, there 
 obtains an average rent, sufficiently remunerative to landlords whose houses were 
 run up economically before the New Building Act passed. This existing average 
 rent fixes the rent that must be charged in these districts for new houses of the 
 same accommodation — that is, the same number of rooms, for the people they are 
 built for do not appreciate the extra safety of living within walls strengthened with 
 hoop-iron bond. Now it turns out upon trial, that houses built in accordance with 
 the present regulations, and let at this established rate, bring in nothing like a rea- 
 sonable return. Builders have consequently confined themselves to erecting houses 
 in better districts (where the possibility of a profitable competition with pre-existing 
 houses shows that those pre-existing houses were tolerably substantial), and have 
 ceased to erect dwellings for the masses, except in the suburbs where no pressing 
 sanitary evils exist Meanwhile, in the inferior districts above described, has re- 
 sulted an increase of overcrowding — half-a-dozen families in a house — a score lodgers 
 to a room. Nay, more than this has resulted. That state of miserable dilapidation 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 386 
 
 masses, and to a greater height, such an economy can be 
 achieved in ground-rent, the cost of outer walls, and of roof- 
 ing, as to give more accommodation at the same expense as 
 now (which happily seems probable), then the fact only needs 
 proving, and, as before said, the competition of capital for in- 
 vestment will do all that can be done ; but if not, the beUef 
 that legislative coercion can make things better is a fit com- 
 panion to the behef that it can fix the price of bread and the 
 rate of wages. 
 
 Let those who are anxious to improve the health of the poor, 
 through the indirect machinery of law, bring their zeal to bear 
 directly upon the work to be done. Let them appeal to men's 
 sympathies, and again to their interests. Let them prove to 
 people of property that the making of these reforms wiU pay. 
 Let them show that the productive powers of the labourer will 
 be increased by bettering his health, whilst the poors' -rates will 
 be diminished. Above all, let them demand the removal of 
 those obstacles which existing legislation puts in the way of 
 sanitary improvement". Their efforts thus directed will really 
 
 into which these abodes of the poor are allowed to fall, is due to the absence of com- 
 petition from new houses. Landlords do not find their tenants tempted awaj' by the 
 offer of better accommodation. Repairs, being unnecessary for securing the largest 
 amount of profit, are rot made. And the fees demanded by the surveyor, even when 
 an additional chimney-pot is put up, supply ready excuses for doing nothing. Thus, 
 whilst the New Building Act has caused some improvement where improvement was 
 not greatly needed, it has caused none where it was needed, but has instead generated 
 evils worse than those it was to remove. In fact, for a large percentage of the very 
 horrors which our sanitary agitators are now trying to cure by law, we have to thank 
 previous agitators of the same school ! 
 
 ^ Writing before the repeal of the brick-duty, the Builder says, " It is supposed 
 that one-fourth of the cost of a dwelling which lets for 2s. 6d. or 3s. a week is caused 
 by the expense of the title-deeds and the tax on wood and bricks used in its construc- 
 tion. Of course the owner of such property must be remunerated, and he therefore 
 charges 7id. or 9d. a week to cover these burdens." Mr. C. Gatlif^ secretary to the 
 Society for Improving the Dwellings of the 'Working Classes, describing the effect of 
 the window-tax, says, " They are now paying upon their institution in St. Pancras 
 the sum of £162 16s. in window-duties, or 1 per cent, per annum upon the original 
 outlay. The average rental paid by the Society's tenants is 6s. 6(i. per week, and 
 the window-duty deducts from this Hd. per week." — Deputation to Lord Ashley, 
 see TiiMS. Jan. 31, 1850. Mr. W. Voller, a master-taUor, says, " I lately inserted 
 
 C C 
 
386 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 promote progress. Whereas their efforts as now directed are 
 either needless or injurious. 
 
 § 6. 
 These endeavours to increase the salubrity of town-life by 
 law, are not only open to the criticism that the natiu'al forces 
 already at work render them unnecessaij, and to the additional 
 criticism that some of the things strained after are impossible 
 of legislative achievement, but it must farther be observed, that 
 even the desiderata which acts of parliament will reach, can be 
 so reached only through very faulty instrumentahties. It is, in 
 this case, as in many others, the peculiarity of what are oddly 
 styled " practical measures," that they supersede agencies which 
 are answering well by agencies which are not likely to answer 
 well. Here is a heavy charge of inefficiency brought against 
 the drains, cesspools, stink-traps, &c., of England in general, 
 and London in particular. The evidence is voluminous and 
 conclusive, and by common consent a verdict of proven is re- 
 turned. Citizens look grave and determine to petition parlia- 
 ment about it. Parliament promises to consider the matter; 
 and after the usual amount of debate, says — " Let there be a 
 Board of Health." Whereupon petitioners rub their hands, 
 and look out for great things. They have unbounded sim- 
 plicity — these good citizens. Legislation may disappoint them 
 fifty times running, without at all shaking their faith in its 
 efficiency. They hoped that Church abuses would be rectified 
 by the Ecclesiastical Commission: the poor curates can say 
 whether that hope has been reahzed. Backed by an act of 
 parliament, the Poor-Law Commissioners were to have eradi- 
 cated able-bodied pauperism : yet, vmtil checked by the re- 
 cent prosperity, the poors'-rates have been rapidly rising to 
 their old level. The New Building Act was to have given 
 the people of London better homes ; whereas, as we lately saw, 
 
 one of Dr. Amott's ventilators in the chimney of the workshop, little thinking I 
 should be called upon by Mr. Badger, our district surveyor, for a fee of 25s." — 
 Morning Chronicle, Feb. 4, 1850. 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 387 
 
 it has made worse the homes that most wanted improving. 
 Men were sanguine of reforming criminals by the silent system, 
 or the separate system ; hut, if we are to judge hy the dis- 
 putes of their respective advocates, neither of these plans is 
 very successful. Pauper children were to have been made into 
 good citizens hy industrial education ; from all quarters, how- 
 ever, come statements that a very large percentage of them get 
 into gaol, or become prostitutes, or return to the workhouse. 
 The measures enjoined by the Vaccination Act of 1840 were 
 to have exterminated small-pox; yet the Eegistrar-General's 
 reports show that the deaths from small-pox have been in- 
 creasing. And thus does year after year add to those abortive 
 schemes, of which so many have been quoted (pp. 8, 46, 288). 
 Yet scarcely a doubt seems to arise, respecting the competency 
 of legislators to do what they profess. From the times when 
 they tried to fix the value of money down to our own day, 
 when they have but just abandoned tlie attempt to fix the price 
 of com, statesmen have been undertaking all kinds of things, 
 from regulating the cut of boot-toes, up to preparing people 
 for Heaven; and have been constantly failing, or producing 
 widely- different results from those intended. Nevertheless such 
 inexhaustible faith have men, that, although they see this, and 
 although they are daily hearing of imbecihties in pubhc depart- 
 ments — of Admiralty Boards that squander three millions a 
 year in building bad ships and breaking them up again — of 
 Woods and Forests Commissioners who do not even know the 
 rental of the estates they manage — of bungling excise-chemists 
 who commit their chiefs to losing prosecutions, for which com- 
 pensation has to be made — yet government needs but to an- 
 nounce another plausible project, and men straightway hurrah, 
 and throw up their caps, in the full expectation of getting all 
 that is promised. 
 
 But the belief that Boards of Health, and the like, will never 
 effect what is hoped, needs not whoUy rest either upon abstract 
 considerations, or upon our experience of state-instrumentalities 
 in general. We have one of these organizations at work, and, 
 
 c c 2. 
 
388 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 as far as may be at present judged, it has done anything but 
 answer people's expectations. To condemn it, because choked 
 sewers, and open gullv-holes, and filthy alleys remain much as 
 they were, would, perhaps, be unreasonable, for time is needed 
 to rectify evils so widely established. But there is one test by 
 which we may fairly estimate its efficiency, viz., its conduct be- 
 fore and during the late pestilence. It had more than a year's 
 notice that the cholera was on its way here. There were two 
 whole sessions of parhament intervening between the time when 
 a second invasion from that disease was foreseen and the time 
 when the mortality was highest. The Board of Health had, 
 therefore, fiiU opportunity to put forth its powers, and to get 
 greater powers if it wanted them. Well, what was the first step 
 that might have been looked for from it ? Shall we not say 
 the suppression of intramural interments ? Burying the dead 
 in the midst of the hving was manifestly hurtful ; the evils at- 
 tendant on the practice were universally recognised ; and to put 
 it down required little more than a simple exercise of authority. 
 If the Board of Health believed itself possessed of authority 
 sufficient for this, why did it not use that authority when the 
 advent of the epidemic was rumoured ? If it thought its au- 
 thority not great enough (which can hardly be, remembering 
 what it ultimately did), then why did it not obtain more? 
 Instead of taking either of these steps, however, it occupied 
 itself in considering future modes of water-supply, and devis- 
 ing systems of sewage. Whilst the cholera was approaching, 
 the Board of Health was cogitating over reforms, from which 
 the most sanguine could not expect any considerable benefit 
 for years to come. And then, when the enemy was upon us, 
 this guardian, in which men were putting their trust, suddenly 
 bestirred itself, and did what, for the time being, made worse 
 the evils to be remedied. As was said by a speaker, at one of 
 the medical meetings held during the height of the cholera, 
 " the Commissioners of Public Health had adopted the very 
 means Hkely to produce that complaint. Instead of taking their 
 measures years ago, they had stirred up all sorts of abominations 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 389 
 
 now. They had removed dunghills and cesspools, and added fael 
 tenfold to the fire that existed. (Hear, hear.) Never since he 
 could recollect had there been such accumulations of abomi- 
 nable odours as since the Health of Towns Commission had at- 
 tempted to purify the atmosphere. (A laugh, and Hear, hear.)" 
 At length, when, in spite of all that had been done (or, perhaps, 
 partly in consequence of it), the mortality continued to increase, 
 the closing of graveyards was decided upon, in the hope, as 
 we must suppose, that the mortality would thereby be checked. 
 As though, when there were hundreds of thousands of bodies 
 decomposing, the ceasing to add to them would immediately 
 produce an appreciable effect ! 
 
 . If to these faots we add the further one, that, notwithstanding 
 the directions issued for prophylactic treatment, and the system 
 of domiciliary visits, the cholera carried off a greater number 
 than before, we have some reason for thinking that this sanitary 
 guardianship did no good, hut, it may be, even harm. 
 
 Should it be said that the Board of Health is badly consti- 
 tuted, or has not sufficient power, and that had a better organ- 
 ization been given to it we should have seen different results, 
 the reply is, that the almost invariable occurrence of some such 
 fatal hitch is one of the reasons for condemning these inter- 
 ferences. There is always some provoking if iu the way. 
 If the established clergy were what they should be, a state- 
 church might do some good. If parish relief were judiciously 
 administered, a poor-law would not be so bad a thing. And 
 if "a sanitary organization could be made to do just what it is 
 intended to do, something might be said in its favour. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 Even could state-agency compass for our towns the most 
 perfect salubrity, it would be in the end better to remain as 
 we are, rather than obtain such a benefit by such means. It is 
 quite possible to give too much even for a great desideratum. 
 However valuable good bodily health may be, it is very' dearly . 
 
390 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 purchased when mental health goes in exchange. Whoso thinks 
 that government can supply sanitary advantages for nothing, 
 or at the cost of more taxes only, is woefizlly mistaken. They 
 must be paid for with character as well as with taxes. A full 
 equivalent must be given in other coin than gold, and even 
 more than an equivalent. 
 
 Let it be again remembered that men cannot make force. 
 All they can do is to avail themselves of force already existing, 
 and employ it for working out this or that purpose. They can- 
 not increase it ; they cannot get from it more than its specific 
 effect ; and as much as they expend of it for doing one thing, 
 must they lack of it for doing other things. Thus it is now be- 
 coming a received doctrine, that what we call chemical affinity, 
 heat, light, electricity, magnetism, and motion, are aU mani- 
 festations of the same primordial force — that they are severally 
 convertible into each other — and, as a corollary, that it is im- 
 possible to obtain in any one form of this force more than its 
 equivalent in the previous form. Now this is equally true of 
 the agencies acting in society. It is quite possible to divert 
 the power at present working out one result, to the working 
 out of some other resrdt. You may transform one kind of in- 
 fluence into another kind. But you cannot make more of it, 
 and you cannot have it for nothing. You cannot, by legislative 
 manoeuvring, get increased ability to achieve a desired object, 
 except at the expense of something else. Just as much better 
 as this particular thing is done, so much worse must another 
 tiling be done. 
 
 Or, changing the illustration, and regarding society as an 
 organism, we may say that it is impossible artificially to use 
 up social vitality for the more active performance of one func- 
 tion, without diminishing the activity with which other func- 
 tions are performed. So long as society is let alone, its various 
 organs will go on developing in due subordination to each 
 other. If some of them are very imperfect, and make no 
 appreciable progress towards efficiency, be sure it is because 
 still more important organs are equally imperfect, and because 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 391 
 
 the amount of vital force pervading society being limited, the 
 rapid growth of these involves cessation of growth elsewhere. 
 Be sure, also, that whenever there arises a special necessity for 
 the better performance of any one fiinction, or for the estabhsh- 
 ment of some new function, nature will respond. Instance in 
 proof of this, the increase of particular manufacturing towns 
 and sea-ports, or the formation of incorporated companies. Is 
 there a rising demand for some commodity of general con- 
 sumption ? Immediately the organ secreting that commodity 
 becomes more active, absorbs more people, begins to enlarge, 
 and secretes in greater abundance. Instrumentalities for the 
 fulfilment of other social requirements — for the supply of re- 
 ligious culture, education, and so forth, are similarly provided : 
 the less needful being postponed to the more needful; just as 
 the several parts of the embryo are developed in the order of 
 their subservience to Ufe. To interfere with this process by 
 producing premature development in any particular direction 
 is inevitably to disturb the due balance of organization, by 
 causing somewhere else a corresponding atrophy. Let it never 
 be forgotten that at any given time the amount of a society's 
 vital force is fixed. Dependent as is that vital force upon the 
 degree of adaptation that has taken place — upon the extent to 
 which men have acquired fitness for a co-operative life — upon 
 the efficiency with which they can combine as elements of the 
 social organism, we may be quite certain that, whilst their 
 characters remain constant, nothing can increase its total 
 quantity. We may be also certain that this total quantity can 
 produce only its exact equivalent of results ; and that no legis- 
 lators can get more from it ; although by wasting it they may, 
 and always do, get less. 
 
 Already, in treating of Poor-Laws and National Education, 
 we have examined in detail the reaction by which these at- 
 tempts at a multiplication of results are defeated. In the case 
 of sanitary administrations, a similar reaction may be traced ; 
 showing itself, amongst other ways, in the checking of all 
 social improvements that demand popular enterprise and per- 
 
392 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 severance. Under the natural order of things, the unfolding 
 of an intelligent, self-helping character, must keep pace with 
 the ameUoration of physical circumstances — the advance of the 
 one -with the exertions put forth to achieve the other ; so that 
 in establishing arrangements conducive to robustness of body, 
 robustness of mind must be insensibly acquired. Contrariwise, 
 to whatever extent activity of thought and firmness of purpose 
 are made less needful by an artificial performance of their work, 
 to that same extent must their increase, and the dependent 
 social improvements, be retarded. 
 
 Should proof of this be asked for, it may be found in the 
 contrast between Enghsh energy and Continental helplessness. 
 English engineers (Manby, Wilson, and Co.) established the 
 first gas-works in Paris, after the failure of a French com- 
 pany ; and many of the gas-works throughout Europe have 
 been constructed by Englishmen. An English engineer 
 (MiUer) introduced steam navigation on the Rhone ; another 
 Enghsh engineer (Pritchard) succeeded in ascending the 
 Danube by steam, after the French and Germans had failed. 
 The first steam-boats on the Loire were built by Englishmen 
 (Fawcett and Preston) ; the great suspension bridge at Pesth 
 has been built by an EngUshman (Tiemey Clarke) ; and an 
 Enghshman (VignoUes) is now building a still greater suspen- 
 sion bridge over the Dnieper ; many continental railways have 
 had Englishmen as consulting engineers ; and in spite of the 
 celebrated Mining College at Freyburg, several of the mineral 
 fields along the Rhine have been opened up by Enghsh capital 
 employing English skiU. Now why is this ? Why were our 
 coaches so superior to the dihgences and eilwagen of our 
 neighbours ? Why did our railway system develop so much 
 faster ? Why are our towns better drained, better paved, and 
 better supplied with water ? There was originally no greater 
 mechanical aptitude, and no greater desire to progress in us 
 than in the connate nations of northern Europe. If anything, 
 we were comparatively deficient in these respects. Early im- 
 provements in the arts of life were imported. The germs of 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 393 
 
 owe silk and woollen manufactures came from abroad. The first 
 water- works in London were erected by a Dutchman. How 
 happens it, then, that we have now reversed the relationship ? 
 How happens it, that instead of being dependent on continental 
 skill und enterprise, our skill and enterprise are at a premium 
 on the Continent ? Manifestly the change is due to difierence 
 of discipline. Having been left in a greater degree than others 
 to manage their own affairs, the English people have become 
 self-helping, and have acquired great practical ability. Whilst 
 conversely that comparative helplessness of the patemaUy-go- 
 vemed nations of Europe, illustrated in the above facts, and 
 commented upon by Laing, in his " Notes of a Traveller," and 
 by other observers, is a natural result of the state-superintend- 
 ence policy — is the reaction attendant on the action of official 
 mechanisms— is the atrophy corresponding to some artificial 
 hypertrophy. 
 
 § 8. 
 
 One apparent difficulty accompanying the doctrine now 
 contended for remains to be noticed. If sanitary administra- 
 tion by the state be wrong, because it implies a deduction from 
 the citizen's property greater than is needful for maintaining 
 his rights, then is sanitary administration by municipal au- 
 thorities wrong also for the same reason. Be it by general 
 government or by local government, the levying of compulsory 
 rates for drainage, and for paving and lighting, is inadmissible, 
 as indirectly making legislative protection more costly than 
 necessary, or, in other words, turning it into aggression 
 (p. 278) ; and if so, it foUows that neither the past, present, 
 nor proposed methods of securing the health of towns are 
 equitable. 
 
 This seems an awkward conclusion; nevertheless, as dedu- 
 cible from our general principle, we have no alternative but to 
 take to it. How streets and courts are rightly to be kept in 
 order remains to be considered. Kespecting sewage there 
 would be no difficulty. Houses might readily be drained on 
 
394 SANITARY SUPERVISION. 
 
 the same mercantile principle that they are now supplied ■vrith 
 water. It is highly probahle that in the hands of a private 
 company the resulting manure would not only pay the cost of 
 collection, but would yield a considerable profit. But if not, 
 the return on the invested capital would be made up by charges 
 to those whose houses were drained : the alternative of having 
 their connections with the main sewer stopped, being as good 
 a security for payment as the analogous ones possessed by 
 water and gas companies. Paving and lighting would properly 
 fall to the management of house-owners. Were there no public 
 provision for such conveniences, house-owners would qidckly 
 find it their interest to furnish them. Some speculative build- 
 ing society having set the example of improvement in this 
 direction, competition would do the rest. DweUings without 
 proper footway before them, and with no lamps to show the 
 tenants to their doors, would stand empty, when better accom- 
 modation was offered. And good paving and lighting having 
 thus become essential, landlords would combine for the more 
 economical supply of them. 
 
 To the objection that the perversity of individual landlords 
 and the desire of others to take unfair advantage of the rest, 
 would render such an arrangement impracticable, the reply is 
 that in new suburban streets not yet taken to by the authori- 
 ties such an arrangement is, to a considerable extent, already 
 carried out, and would be much better carried out but for the 
 consciousness that it is merely temporary. Moreover, no 
 adverse inference could be drawn, were it even shown that for 
 the present such an arrangement is impracticable. So, also, 
 was personal freedom once. So once was representative go- 
 vernment, and is stiU with many nations. As repeatedly 
 pointed out, the practicability of recognising men's rights is 
 proportionate to the degree in which men have become moral. 
 That an organization dictated by the law of eq^ual freedom 
 cannot yet be fully reaUzed is no proof of its imperfection : is 
 proof only of our imperfection. And as by diminishing this, 
 the process of adaptation has already fitted us for institutions 
 
SANITARY SUPERVISION. 395 
 
 which were once too good for us, so will it go on to fit us for 
 others that may be too good for us now. 
 
 § 9. 
 
 We find, then, that besides being at variance with the moral 
 law, and besides involving absurdities, the dogma that it is the 
 duty of the state to protect the health of its subjects may be 
 successfully combated on grounds of policy. It turns out, 
 upon examination, to be near akin to the older dogma that it 
 is the duty of the state to provide for the spiritual welfare of 
 its subjects — must, if consistently followed out, necessitate a 
 co-extensive organization — and must, for aught there appears 
 to the contrary, produce analogous results. Of the sufferings 
 consequent upon imrestrained empuicism, it may safely be said 
 that they are not so great as is represented ; and that in as far 
 as they do exist, they are amongst the penalties nature has 
 attached to ignorance or imbecility, and which cannot be dis- 
 sociated firom it without ultimately entaiUng much greater 
 sufferings. The anxiety to improve by legislative measures 
 the salubrity of our towns, is deprecated on the ground that 
 natural causes insure the continutince of progress — insure 
 further sanitary reforms, just as they insure advancement in the 
 arts of life, the development of manufactures and commerce, 
 and the spread of education. Moreover, it appears that such 
 of these measures as are directed to the improvement of habi- 
 tations, aim at what laws either cannot do, or what is being 
 done much better without them ; and to the rest it is objected, 
 that they are not likely to accomphsh the proposed end — a 
 belief founded upon the results of all analogous legislation, 
 and confirmed by the little experience we have at present had 
 of sanitary legislation itself. Further it is argued that even 
 could the hoped-for advantages be fully realized they would 
 be purchased at too great a cost; seeing that they could be 
 obtained only by an equivalent retardation iu some still more 
 important department of social progress. 
 
CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 
 § 1- 
 
 So constandy have the ideas currency and government been 
 associated — so "universal has heen the control exercised by law- 
 givers over monetary systems — and so completely have men 
 come to regard this control as a matter of course, that scarcely 
 any one seems to inquire what would result were it abolished. 
 Perhaps in no case is the necessity of state- superintendence so 
 generally assumed ; and in no case will the denial of that 
 necessity cause so much surprise. Yet must the denial be 
 made. 
 
 That laws interfering with currency cannot be enacted with- 
 out a reverssJ of state-duty is obvious ; for to either forbid the 
 issue or enforce the receipt of certain notes or coin in return 
 for other things, is to infringe the right of exchange — is to 
 prevent men making exchanges which they otherwise would 
 have made, or to oblige them to make exchanges which they 
 otherwise would not have made — is, therefore, to break the law 
 of equal freedom in their persons (Chap. XXIII.). If there 
 be truth in our general principle, it must be impolitic as well 
 as wrong to do this. Nor will those who infer as much be 
 deceived ; for it may be shown that all such dictation is not 
 only needless, but necessarily injurious. 
 
 The monetary arrangements of any community are ulti- 
 mately dependent, like most of its other arrangements, on the 
 morality of its members. Amongst a people altogether dis-. 
 
CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 397 
 
 honest, every mercantile transaction must he effected in coin 
 or goods ; for promises to pay cannot circulate at all, Tvhere, 
 by the hypothesis, there is no probability that they will be 
 redeemed. Conversely, amongst perfectly honest people paper 
 alone will form the circulating medium ; seeing that as no one 
 of such -will give promises to pay more than his assets will 
 cover, there can exist no hesitation to receive promises to pay 
 in all cases; and metallic money -will be needless, save in 
 nominal amount to supply a measure of value. Manifestly, 
 therefore, during any intermediate state, in which men are 
 neither altogether dishonest nor altogether honest, a mixed 
 currency -will exist ; and the ratio of paper to coin will vary 
 with the degree of trust individuals can place in each other. 
 There seems no evading this conclusion. The greater the 
 prevalence of fraud, the greater will be the number of trans- 
 actions in which the seller will part with his goods only for an 
 equivalent of intrinsic value; that is, the greater will be the 
 number of transactions in which coin is required, and the more 
 will the metaUic currency preponderate. On the other hand, 
 the more generally men find each other trustworthy, the more 
 frequently will they take payment in notes, bills of exchange, 
 and checks; the fewer wiU be the cases in which gold and 
 silver are called for, and the smaller will be the quantity of 
 gold and silver in circulation. 
 
 Thus, self-regulating as is a currency when let alone, laws 
 cannot improve its arrangements, although they may, and con- 
 tinually do, derange them. That the state should compel every 
 one who has given promises to pay, be he merchant, private 
 banker, or shareholder in a joint-stock bank, duly to discharge 
 the responsibilities he has incurred, is very true. To do this, 
 however, is merely to maintain men's rights — to administer 
 justice ; and therefore comes within the state's normal function. 
 But to do more than this — to restrict issues, or forbid notes 
 below a certain denomination, is no less injurious than inequit- 
 able. For, limiting the paper in circulation to an amount 
 smaller than it would otherwise reach, inevitably necessitates 
 
398 CUERENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 
 
 a corresponding increase of coin; and as coin is locked-up 
 capital, on which the nation gets no interest, a needless in- 
 crease of it is equivalent to an additional tax equal to the 
 additional interest lost. 
 
 Moreover, even under such restrictions, men must still 
 depend mainly upon each other's good faith and enlightened 
 self-interest ; seeing that only hy requiring the banker to keep 
 sufficient specie in his coffers to cash all the notes he has 
 issued, can complete security be given to the holders of them ; 
 and to require as much is to destroy the motive for issuing 
 notes. It should be remembered, too, that even now the 
 greater part of our paper currency is wholly unguaranteed. 
 Over the bills of exchange in circulation", which represent 
 liabiUties three times as great as are represented by notes, no 
 control is exercised. Por the honouring of these there exists 
 no special security, and the multiplication of them is without 
 any limit, save that natural one above mentioned — the credit 
 men find it safe to give each other. 
 
 Lastly, we have experience completely to the point. Whilst 
 in England banking has been perpetually controlled, now by 
 privileging the Bank of England, now by limiting banking 
 partnerships, now by prohibiting banks of issue within a spe- 
 cified circle, and now by restricting the amounts issued — 
 whilst " we have never rested for many years together without 
 some new laws, some new regulations, dictated by the fancy 
 and theory fashionable at particular periods"''- — and whilst " by 
 constant interference we have prevented public opinion, and the 
 experience of bankers themselves, adapting and moulding their 
 business to the best and safest course""^ — there has existed in 
 Scotland for nearly two centuries a wholly uncontrolled system, 
 — a complete free-trade in currency. And what have been the 
 comparative results? Scotland has had the advantage, both 
 
 ° Tfaougli not literally currency, bills of exchange, serving in many cases to effect 
 mercantile transactions whicli would otherwise be effected in money, to that extent 
 perform its function. 
 
 ^ Capital, Currency, and Banking. By James Wilson, Esq., M.P. ' Ibid. 
 
CnRRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 399 
 
 in security and economy. The gain in security is proved by 
 the fact that the proportion of bank failures in Scotland has 
 been far less than iu England. Though " by law there has 
 never been any restriction against any one issuing notes in 
 Scotland ; yet, in practice, it has ever been impossible for any 
 unsound or nnsafe paper to obtain currency."* And thus the 
 natural guarantee in the one case has been more ejfficient than 
 the legislative one in the other. The gain in economy is proved 
 by the fact that Scotland has carried on its business vdth a 
 circulation of £3,500,000, -whilst ia England the circulation is 
 from ^650,000,000 to £60,000,000 ; or, allowing for difference 
 of popiilation, England has required a currency three times 
 greater than Scotland. 
 
 When, therefore, we find a priori reason for concluding 
 that in any given community the due balance between paper 
 and coin will be spontaneously maintained — when we also 
 find that three-fourths of our own paper circulation is self- 
 regulated — that the restrictions on the other fourth entail a 
 useless sinking of capital — and further, that facts prove a self- 
 regulated system to be both safer and cheaper, we may fairly 
 say, as above, that legislative interference is not only needless, 
 but injurious. 
 
 If evil arises when the state takes upon itself to regulate 
 currency, so also does evil arise when it turns banker. True, 
 no direct breach of duty is committed in issuing notes ; for 
 the mere transfer of promises to pay to those who wiU take 
 t"hem, necessitates neither infringement of men's rights nor 
 the raising of taxes for illegitimate purposes. And did the 
 state confine itself to this, no harm would result ; but when, 
 as in practice, it makes its notes, or, rather, those of its proxy, 
 legal tender, it both violates the law of equal freedom and 
 opens the door to abuses that were else impossible. Having 
 enacted that its agent's promises to pay shall be taken in 
 discharge of all claims between man and man, there readily 
 
 " Capital, Currency, and BanJdng. By James "Wilson, Esq., M.P. 
 
400 CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 
 
 follows, -when occasion calls, the further step of enacting that 
 these promises to pay shall be taken in discharge of all clauns 
 on its agent. This done, further liabilities are iucurred with- 
 out difficulty, for they can be liquidated in paper. Paper 
 continues to be issued without hmit, and then comes depre- 
 ciation ; which depreciation is virtually an additional taxation, 
 imposed without the popular consent— a taxation which, if 
 directly imposed, would make men reahze the extravagance 
 of their national expenditure, and condemn the war necessi- 
 tating it. Seeing, then, that there could never occur depre- 
 ciation, and its concomitant evils, were there no notes made 
 inconvertible by act of parliament — and seeing that there 
 could never exist any motive to make notes legally incon- 
 vertible, save for purposes of state-banking— there is good 
 reason to consider state-banking injurious. Should it be 
 urged that, for the occasional evils it entails, state-banking 
 more than compensates by the habitual supply of many mil- 
 lions' worth of notes, whose place could not be supplied by 
 other notes of equal credit, it is rephed that had the Bank 
 of England no alliance with the state^, its notes would stiU 
 circulate as extensively as now, provided its proprietors con- 
 tinued their sohcitude (so constantly shown at the half- 
 yearly meetings) to keep their assets more than three millions 
 above their habilities. 
 
 There is a third capacity in which a government usually 
 stands related to the currency, viz., as a manufacturer of 
 coins. That in theory a government may carry on the trade 
 of stamping bullion without necessarily reversing its proper 
 function is admitted. Practically, however, it never does so 
 without collaterally transgressing. For the same causes which 
 prevent it from profitably competing with private individuals 
 in other trades, must prevent it from profitably competing 
 
 * The alliance consists in this, that on the credit of a standing debt of £14,000,000, 
 due from the Government to the Bank, the Bank is allowed to issue notes to that 
 amount (besides further notes on other security), and hence to the extent of this 
 debt the notes have practically a Government guarantee. 
 
CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 401 
 
 with them in this — a truth which inquiry into the management 
 of the mint will sufficiently enforce. And if so, a government 
 can manufacture coins without loss, only hy forbidding every 
 one else to manufacture them. By doing this, however, it 
 diminishes men's hberty of action in the same way as by any 
 other trade restriction — iu short, does wrong. And, ulti- 
 mately, the breach of the law of equal freedom thus committed 
 results in society having to pay more for its metalUc currency 
 than would otherwise be necessary. 
 
 Perhaps to many it wiU seem that by a national mint alone 
 can the extensive diffusion of spurious coinage be prevented. 
 But those who suppose this, forget that under a natural system 
 there would exist the same safeguards against such an evil as 
 at present. The ease with which bad money is distinguished 
 from good, is the ultimate guarantee for genuineness; and this 
 guarantee would be as efficient then as now. Moreover, 
 whatever additional security arises from the punishment of 
 " smashers " would still be afforded ; seeing that to bring to 
 justice those who by paying in base coin obtain goods "under 
 false pretences," comes within the state's duty. Should it be 
 urged that in the absence of legislative regulations there would 
 be nothing to prevent makers from issuing new mintages of 
 various denominations and degrees of fineness, the reply is 
 that only when some obvious public advantage was to be 
 obtained by it, could a coin differing from current ones get 
 into circulation. Were private mints now permitted, the pro- 
 prietors of them would be obUged to make their sovereigns 
 like existing ones, because no others would be taken. For the 
 size and weight — they would be tested by gauge and balance, 
 as now (and for a while with great caution). For the fineness 
 — it would be guaranteed by the scrutiny of other makers. 
 Competing firms would assay each other's issues whenever 
 there appeared the least reason to think them below the 
 estabUshed standard, and should their suspicions prove cor- 
 rect, would quickly find some mode of diffusing the infomia- 
 tion. Probably a single case of exposure and the consequent 
 
 D D 
 
40Ji CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 
 
 ruin would ever after prevent attempts to circulate coins of 
 inferior fineness." 
 
 It is not unlikely that many readers, though unprepared 
 with definite replies to these reasonings, will stiU doubt their 
 correctness. That the existing monetary system— an actual 
 working system, seemingly kept going hy the state— would be 
 benefited by the withdrawal of state- control, is a belief which 
 the strongest arguments will in most cases fail to instil. Cus- 
 tom wiU bias men in this case, much as in another case it does 
 the vine-growers of France, who, having long been instructed 
 by state- commissioned authorities when to commence the vin- 
 tage, believe that such dictation is beneficial. So much more 
 does a reahzed fact influence us than an imagined one, that 
 had the baking and sale of bread been hitherto carried on by 
 government-agents, probably the supply of bread by private 
 entei-prise would scarcely be conceived possible, much less 
 advantageous. The philosophical free-trader, however, re- 
 membering this efiect of habit over the convictions — remem- 
 bering how innumerable have been the instances in which 
 legislative control was erroneously thought necessary — remem- 
 bering that in this very matter of currency men once considered 
 it requisite " to use the most ferocious measures to bring as 
 much foreign bullion as possible into the country, and to 
 prevent any going out" — remembering how that interference, 
 hke others, proved not only needless but injurious — remem- 
 bering thus much, the philosophical free-trader will infer that 
 in the present instance also, legislative control is m -desirable. 
 Reasons for considering trade in money an exception to the ge- 
 neral rule, wiU weigh but little with him ; for he will recollect 
 that similar reasons have been assigned for restricting various 
 
 •" Whilst these sheets are passing through the press, &cts, which he is not now 
 at liberty to quote, have been communicate<i to the writer, conclusively proving the 
 superior economy of a coin-nianu&cture conducted by private individnals ; together 
 with other facts suggesting the obvious truth that the debasement of coinage, from 
 which our forefathers suifered so much, was made possible only by legal compulsion 
 — would never have been possible had the currency been left to itsell 
 
CDRRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 403 
 
 trades, and disproved by the results. Eatlier wiU he conclude 
 that as, in spite of all prophecies and appearances to the con- 
 trary, entire freedom of exchaBge has been beneficial in other 
 cases, so, despite similar prophecies and adverse appearances, 
 will it be beneficial in this case. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 What was lately said respecting the stamping of bullion may 
 here be repeated respecting the carrying of letters, viz., that it 
 is not intrinsically at variance with state-duty; for it does not 
 in the abstract necessitate any infringement of men's rights, 
 either directly, or by taxes raised for non-protective purposes. 
 Nevertheless, just as we found reason to think that govern- 
 ment could not continue to manufacture coin unless by pre- 
 venting private individuals from doing the same, we shall 
 also find reason to think that it would cease to carry let- 
 ters did it not forbid competition. And if so, a government 
 cannot undertake postal functions without reversing its essen- 
 tial function. 
 
 Evidence that private enterprise would supersede state- 
 agency in this matter, were it allowed the opportunity, is 
 deducible not only from our general experience of the infe- 
 riority of government in the capacity of manufacturer, trader, 
 or manager of business, but fi-om facts immediately bearing 
 upon the question. Thus we must remember that the efiSciency 
 to which; our postal system has actually attained is not due to 
 its being under public administration, but is due to pressure 
 from without. Changes have been forced upon the authorities, 
 not introduced by them. The mail-coach system was esta- 
 bUshed, and for a length of time managed, by a private indi- 
 vidual, and Hved down official opposition. The reform origi- 
 nated by Mr. Eowland HiU was strenuously resisted ; and it is 
 generally reported that even now, official perversity prevents his 
 plans from being frilly carried out. Whereas, seeing that the spe- 
 culative spirit of trade is not only ready, but eager to satisfy social 
 
 D D 2 
 
404 CDRRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 
 
 ■wants, it is probable that under a natural state of things modem 
 postal improvements would have been willingly adopted, if not 
 forestalled. Should it be alleged that private entei-prize would 
 not be competent to so gigantic an undertaking, it is replied 
 that already there are extensive organizations of analogous 
 character which work well. The establishments of our large 
 carriers ramify throughout the whole kingdom ; whilst we have 
 a Parcels' Deliveiy Company, co-extensive in its sphere with 
 the London District Post, and quite as efficient. Private 
 agencies for communicating information beat public ones even 
 now, wherever they are permitted to compete with them. The 
 foreign expresses of our daily papers are uniformly before the 
 government expresses. Copies of a royal speech, or state- 
 ments of an important vote, are diffused throughout the country 
 by the press, with a rapidity exceeding that even achieved by 
 the Post Office ; and if expedition is shown in the stamping 
 and sorting of letters, it is far surpassed by the expedition of 
 parliamentary reporting. Moreover, much of the postal ser- 
 vice itself is already performed by private agency. Not only 
 are our internal mails carried by contract, but nearly all our 
 external ones also ; and where they are carried by government 
 they are carried at a great loss. In proof of which assertion it 
 needs but to quote the fact that the Peninsular and Oriental 
 Steam Navigation Company offers to secure for us a direct 
 monthly communication with Australia ; two communications, 
 monthly, from Southampton to Alexandria ; two communica- 
 tions, monthly, fi-om Suez to Ceylon, Singapore, and China ; 
 and two communications, monthly, from Calcutta to Singapore 
 and China; besides performing the sei-vice twice a month 
 between Suez and Bombay, and all for the same sum of money 
 which the latter sei-vice alone (Suez to Bombay) now costs the 
 governments of India and Great Britain. 
 
 If, then, public letter-carrying has been brought to its ex- 
 isting efficiency by the thought, enterprize, and urgency of 
 private persons, in spite of official resistance — if organizations 
 similar to our postal ones already exist and work well — if, as 
 
CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 406 
 
 conveyers of intelligence by other modes than the mail, trading 
 bodies uniformly excel the s^te — if much of the mail service 
 itself is performed by such trading bodies, and that, too, on 
 the largest scale, with incomparably greater economy than the 
 state can perform it with — there is nothing unreasonable in the 
 conclusion that, were it permitted, commercial enterprize would 
 generate a lettor-carrying system as efficient as, if not more 
 efficient than, our present one. It is trae that many obstacles 
 stand in the way of such a result. But because it is now 
 scarcely possible to see our way over these, it does not at all 
 follow that they may not be surmounted. There are moral 
 inventions, as well as physical ones'. And it frequently hap- 
 pens that the instramentalities which ultimately accomplish 
 certain social desiderata, are as Httle foreseen as are the me- 
 chanical appliances of one generation by the previous one. 
 Take the Railway Clearing House for an example. Hence it 
 is not too much to expect that under the pressui-e of social 
 necessity, and the stimulus of self-interest, satisfactory modes 
 of meeting all such difficulties would be discovered. 
 
 However, any doubts which may still be entertained on the 
 point do not militate against our general principle. It is clear 
 that the restriction put upon the liberty of trade, by forbidding 
 private letter-carrying estabhshments, is a breach of state-duty. 
 It is also clear that were that restriction abolished, a natural 
 postal system would eventually grow up, could it surpass in 
 efficiency our existing one. And it is further clear that if it 
 could not surpass it, the existing system might rightly con- 
 tinue ; for, as at first said, the fulfilment of postal functions by 
 the state is not intrinsically at variance with the fulfilment of 
 its essential function. 
 
 §3. 
 
 The execution by government of what are commonly called 
 public works, as hghthouses, harbours of refuge, &c., imply- 
 ing, as it does, the imposition of taxes for other purposes than 
 
406 CURRENCY, POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS, ETC. 
 
 maiataining men's rights, is as much forbidden by our defini- 
 tion of state-duty as is a system of national education, or a 
 rehgious establishment. Nor is this unavoidable inference 
 really an inconvenient one ; however much it may at first seem 
 so. The agency by which these minor wants of society are 
 now satisfied, is not the only agency competent to satisfy them. 
 Wherever there exists a want, there will also exist an impulse 
 to get it fulfilled, and this impulse is sure, eventually, to 
 produce action. In the present case, as in others, that which 
 is beneficial to the community as a whole, it will become the 
 private interest of some part of the community to accomphsh. 
 And as this private interest has been so ef&cient a provider of 
 roads, canals, and railways, there is no reason why it should 
 not be an equally efficient provider of harbours of refuge, 
 hghthouses, and all analogous appHances. Even were there 
 no classes whose private interests would be obviously sub- 
 served by executing such works, this inference might still be 
 defended. But there are such classes. Ship-owners and mer- 
 chants have a direct and ever-waking motive to diminish the 
 dangers of navigation ; and were they not taught by custom to 
 look for state-aid, would themselves quickly unite to establish 
 safeguards. Or, possibly, they would be anticipated by a com- 
 bination of Marine Insurance Of&ces (themselves protective 
 institutions, originated by self-interest). But inevitably, in 
 some way or other, the numerousness of the parties concerned, 
 and the largeness of the capital at stake, would guarantee the 
 taking of all requisite precautions. That enterprise which built 
 the docks of London, Liverpool, and Birkenhead — which is 
 enclosing the Wash — which so lately bridged the Atlantic by 
 steam — and which is now laying down the electric telegraph 
 across the Channel — might safely be trusted to provide against 
 the contingencies of coast navigation. 
 
PART IV. 
 
CHAPTEE XXX. 
 
 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 § 1. 
 
 Social philosophy may be aptly divided (as political economy 
 has been) into statics and dynamics ; the first treating of the 
 equilibrium of a perfect society, the second of the forces by 
 which society is advanced towards perfection. To determine 
 what laws we must obey for the obtainment of complete hap- 
 piness is the object of the one, whilst that of the other is to 
 analyze the influences which are making us competent to obey 
 these laws. Hitherto we have concerned ourselves chiefly with 
 the statics, touching upon the dynamics only occasionally for 
 purposes of elucidation. Now, however, the dynamics claim 
 special attention. Some of the phenomena of progress already 
 referred to need further explanation, and many others associated 
 virith them remain to be noticed. There are also sundry gene- 
 ral considerations not admissible into foregoing chapters, which 
 may here be fitly included. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 And first let us mark, that the course of civiHzation could 
 not possibly have been other than it has been. Whether a 
 perfect social state might have been at once estabUshed; and 
 why, if it might have been, it was not — why for unnumbered 
 ages the world was filled with inferior creatures only — and why 
 mankind were left to make it fit for human life by clearing it 
 of these — are questions that need not be discussed here. But 
 
410 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 given an unsubdued earth ; given the being — man, appointed to 
 overspread and occupy it ; given the laws of life what they are ; 
 and no other series of changes than that which has taken place, 
 could have taken place. 
 
 For be it remembered, that the ultimate purpose of creation 
 — the production of the greatest amount of happiness — can be 
 fulfilled only under certain fixed conditions (p. 68). Each 
 member of the race fulfilling it, must not only be endowed with 
 faculties enabling him to receive the liighest enjoyment in the 
 act of living, but must be so constituted that he may obtain 
 full satisfaction for every desire, without diminishing the power 
 of others to obtain Kke satisfaction : nay, to fulfil the purpose 
 perfectly, must derive pleasure from seeing pleasure in others. 
 Now, for beings thus constituted to multiply in a world already 
 tenanted by inferior creatures — creatures that must be dispos- 
 sessed to make room — is a manifest impossibility. By the 
 definition such beings must lack all desire to exterminate the 
 races they are to supplant. They must, indeed, have a repug- 
 nance to exterminating them, for the ability to derive pleasure 
 from seeing pleasure, involves the liability to pain from seeing 
 pain : the sjonpathy by which either of these results is efiected, 
 simply having for its function to reproduce observed emo- 
 tions, irrespective of their kind. Evidently, therefore, having 
 no wish to destroy — to destroy giving them, on the contrary, 
 disagi-eeable sensations — these hj'pothetical beings, instead of 
 subjugating and overspreading the earth, must themselves be- 
 come the prey of pre-existing creatures, in whom destructive 
 desires predominate. How then are the circumstances of the 
 case to be met ? Evidently the aboriginal man must have a 
 constitution adapted to the work he has to perform, joined with 
 a dormant capabOity of developing into the ultimate man when 
 the conditions of existence permit. To the end that be may 
 prepare the earth for its future inhabitants— his descendants, 
 he must possess a character fitting him to clear it of races 
 endangering his life, and races occupying the space required 
 by mankind. Hence he must have a desire to kill, for it is 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 411 
 
 the universal law of life that to every needful act must attach 
 a gratification, the desire for which may serve as a stimulus 
 (p. 19). He must further he devoid of sympathy, or must 
 have hut the germ of it, for he would otherwise he incapacitated 
 for his destructive ofBce. In other words, he must he what 
 we call a savage, and must he left to acquire fitness for social 
 Hfe as fast as the conquest of the earth renders social hfe 
 possible. 
 
 Whoever thinks that a thoroughly-civilized community could 
 he formed out of men quaUfied to wage war with the pre-exist- 
 ing occupants of the earth — that is, whoever thinks that men 
 might behave sympathetically to their fellows, whilst behaving 
 unsympathetically to inferior creatures, wiU discover his error 
 on looking at the facts. He will find that human beings are 
 cruel to one another, in proportion as their habits are predatoiy. 
 The Indian, whose life is spent in the chase, dehghts in tortur- 
 ing his brother man as much as in kilUng game. His sons are 
 schooled into fortitude by long days of torment, and his squaw 
 made prematurely old by hard treatment. The treachery and 
 vindictiveness which Bushmen or Austrahans show to one 
 another and to Europeans, are accompaniments of that never- 
 ceasing enmity existing between them and the denizens of the 
 wilderness. Amongst partially-civilized nations the two cha- 
 racteristics have ever borne the same relationship. Thus the 
 spectators in the Eoman amphitheatres were as much deUghted 
 by the slaying of gladiators as by the death-struggles of wild 
 beasts. The ages during which Europe was thinly peopled, 
 and hunting a chief occupation, were also the ages of feudal 
 violence, universal brigandage, dungeons, tortures. Here in 
 England a whole province depopulated to make game preserves, 
 and a law sentencing to death the serf who killed a stag, 
 show how great activity of the predatory instinct and utter 
 indifference to human happiness coexisted. In later days, 
 when brdl-baiting and cock-fighting were common pastimes, 
 the penal code was far more severe than now; prisons were 
 full of horrors ; men put in the pillory were maltreated by the 
 
413 GENERAL CONSIDEIUTIONS. 
 
 populace; and the inmates of lunatic asylums, chained naked 
 to the wall, were exhibited for money, and tormented for the 
 amusement of visitors. Conversely, amongst ourselves a de- 
 sire to diminish human misery is accompanied by a desire 
 to ameliorate the condition of inferior creatures. Whilst the 
 kindlier feeling of men is seen in all varieties of philanthropic 
 effort, in charitable societies, in associations for improving the 
 dwellings of the labouring classes, in anxiety for popular edu- 
 cation, in attempts to abolish capital punishment, in zeal for 
 temperance reformation, in ragged schools, in endeavours to 
 protect climbing boys, in inquiries concerning " labour and the 
 poor," in emigration funds, in the milder treatment of children, 
 and so on, it also shows itself in societies for the prevention of 
 cruelty to animals, in acts of parliament to put down the use 
 of dogs for purpose of draught, in the condemnation of steeple- 
 chases and battues, in the late inquiry why the pursuers of a 
 stag should not be punished as much as the carter who maltreats 
 his horse, and lastly, in vegetarianism. Moreover, to make the 
 evidence complete, we have the fact that men, partially adapted 
 to the social state, retrograde on being placed in circumstances 
 which caU forth the old propensities. The barbarizing of 
 colonists, who live under aboriginal conditions, is universally 
 remarked. The back settlers of America, amongst whom un- 
 avenged murders, rifle duels, and Lynch law prevail — or, better 
 stiU, the trappers, who leading a savage life have descended to 
 savage habits, to scalping, and occasionally even to cannibalism 
 — sufficiently exemplify it. 
 
 But, indeed, without collecting from so wide a field, illustra- 
 tions of the truth that the behaviour of men to the lower animals 
 and their behaviour to each other, bear a constant relationship, 
 it becomes clear that such is the fact, on observing that the 
 same impulses govern in either case. The blind desire to inflict 
 suffering, distinguishes not between the creatures who exhibit 
 that suffering, but obtains, gratification indifferentiy from the 
 agonies of beast and human being — dehghts equally in worry- 
 ing a brute, and in putting a prisoner to the rack. Conversely, 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 413 
 
 the ' sympathy which prevents its possessor from inflictiag pain, 
 that he may avoid pain himself, and which tempts him to give 
 happiness that he may have happiness reflected back upon him, 
 is similarly undistinguishing. As already said, its function is 
 simply to reproduce in one heing the emotions exhibited by 
 other beings ; and every one must have noticed that it extracts 
 pleasure from the fiiskiness of a newly-unchained dog, or excites 
 pity for an ill-used beast of burden, as readily as it generates 
 fellow feeling with the joys and sorrows of men. 
 
 So that only by giving us some utterly different mental con- 
 stitution could the process of civiUzation have been altered. 
 Assume that the creative scheme is to be wrought out by 
 natural means, and it is necessai-y that the primitive man 
 should be one whose happiness is obtained at the expense 
 of the happiness of other beings. It is necessary that the 
 ultimate man should be one who can obtain perfect happiness 
 without deducting from the happiness of others. After accom- 
 plishing its appointed purpose, the first of these constitutions 
 has to be moulded into the last. And the manifold evils 
 which have filled the world for these thousands of years — the 
 murders, enslavings, and robberies — the tyrannies of rulers, 
 the oppressions of class, the persecutions of sect and party, 
 the multiform embodiments of selfishness in unjust laws, bar- 
 barous customs, dishonest deahngs, exclusive manners, and the 
 like — are simply instances of the disastrous working of this 
 original and once needful constitution, now that mankind have 
 grown into conditions for which it is not fitted — are nothing 
 but svmptoms of the suffering attendant upon the adaptation of. 
 humanity to its new circumstances. 
 
 § 3. 
 
 But why, it may be asked, has this adaptation gone on so 
 slowly ? Judging from the rapidity with which habits are 
 formed in the individual, and seeing how those habits, or 
 rather the latent tendencies towards them, become hereditary, 
 
414 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 it would seem that the needful modification should have been 
 completed long ago. How, then, are we to understand the 
 delay ? 
 
 The answer is that the new conditions to which adaptation 
 has been taking place have themselves grown up but slowly. 
 Only when a revolution in circumstances is at once both 
 marked and permanent, does a decisive alteration of character 
 follow. If the demand for increase of power in some particular 
 faculty is great and unceasing, development will go on mth 
 proportionate speed. And, conversely, there will be an appre- 
 ciable dwindling in a faculty altogether deprived of exercise. 
 But the conditions of human life have undergone no changes 
 sudden enough to produce these immediate results. 
 
 Thus, note in the first place, that the warfare between man 
 and the creatures at enmity with Mm has continued up to the 
 present time, and over a large portion of the globe is going on 
 now. Note, further, that where the destructive propensities 
 have almost fulfilled their purpose, and are on the eve of losing 
 their gratification, they make to themselves an artificial sphere 
 of exercise by game-preserving, and are so kept in - activity 
 after they would otherwise have become dormant. But note, 
 chiefly, that the old predatory disposition is in a certain sense 
 self-maintained. For it generates between men and men a 
 hostile relationship, similar to that which it generates bet^veen 
 men and inferior animals ; and by doing so provides itself a 
 lasting source of excitement. This happens inevitably. The 
 desires of the savage acting, as we have seen, indiscriminately, 
 necessarily lead him to perpetual trespasses against his fellows, 
 and, consequently, to endless antagonisms — to quarrels of 
 individuals, to fightings of tribes, to feuds of clan with clan, 
 to wars of nations. And thus being by their constitutions 
 made mutual foes, as well as foes to the lower races, men keep 
 ahve in each other the old propensities, after the original need 
 for them has in great measure ceased. 
 
 Hitherto, then, human character has changed but slowly, 
 because it has been subject to two conflicting sets of condi- 
 
GENEEAL CONSIDERATIONS. 415 
 
 tions. On the one hand, the discipline of the social state has 
 been developing it into the sympathetic form ; whilst on the 
 other hand, the necessity for self-defence partly of man against 
 brute, partly of man against man, and partly of societies 
 against each other, has been maintaining the old unsympa- 
 thetic form. And only where the influence of the first set of 
 conditions has exceeded that of the last, and then only in pro- 
 portion to the excess, has modification taken place. Amongst 
 tribes who have kept each other's anti-social characteristics in 
 fuU activity by constant conflict, no advance has been possible. 
 But where warfare against man and beast has ceased to be 
 continuous, or where it h&s become the employment of but a 
 portion of the people, the effects of hving in the associated 
 state have become greater than the effects of barbarizing an- 
 tagonisms, and progress has resulted. 
 
 Eegarded thus, civilization no longer appears to be a regular 
 unfolding after a specific plan; but seems rather a develop- 
 ment of man's latent capabiHties under the action of favourable 
 circumstances ; which favourable circumstances, mark, were 
 certain some time or other to occur. Those complex influences 
 underlying the higher orders of natural phenomena, but more 
 especially those underlying the organic world, work in subor- 
 dination to the law of probabiHties. A plant, for instance, 
 produces thousands of seeds. The greater part of these are 
 destroyed by creatures that live upon them, or fall into places 
 where they cannot germinate. Of the young plants produced 
 by those which do germinate, many are smothered by their 
 neighbours; others are bhghted by insects, or eaten up by 
 animals ; and in the average of cases, only one of them pro- 
 duces a perfect specimen of its species, which, escaping all 
 dangers, brings to maturity seeds enough to continue the race. 
 Thus is it also with every kind of creature. Thus is it also, as 
 M. Quetelet has shown, with the phenomena of human hfe. 
 And thus was it even widi the germination and growth of 
 society. • The seeds of civilization existing in the aboriginal 
 man, and distributed over the earth by his multiplication, were 
 
416 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 certain in the lapse of time to fall here and there into circum- 
 stances fit for their development ; and, in spite of all blight- 
 ings and uprootings, were certain, by sufficient repetition of 
 these occun-ences, ultimately to originate a civilization which 
 should outlive all disasters and arrive at perfection. 
 
 § 4. 
 
 Whilst the continuance of the old predatory instinct after 
 the fulfilment of its original purpose, has retarded civilization 
 by giving rise to conditions at variance with those of social 
 life, it has subserved civilization by clearing the earth of in- 
 ferior races of men. The forces which are working out the 
 great scheme of perfect happiness, taking no account of inci- 
 dental sufiering, exterminate such sections of mankind as stand 
 in their way, with the same sternness that they exterminate 
 beasts of prey and herds of useless ruminants- Be he human 
 being, or be he brute, the hindrance must be got rid of. Just 
 as the savage has taken the place of lower creatures, so must 
 he, if he have remained too long a savage, give place to his 
 superior. And, observe, it is necessarily to his superior that, 
 in the great majority of cases, he does give plaee. For what 
 are the pre-requisites to a conquering race? Numerical 
 strength, or an improved system of warfare ; both of which 
 are indications of advancement. Numerical strength implies 
 certain ci^^lizing antecedents. Deficiency of game may have 
 necessitated agricultural pursuits, and so made the existence of 
 a larger population possible ; or distance firom other tribes may 
 have rendered war less . frequent, and so have prevented its 
 perpetual decimations ; or accidental superiority over neigh- 
 bouring tribes, may have led to the final subjugation and 
 enslaving of these : in any of wliich cases the comparatively 
 peaceful condition resulting, must have allowed progress to 
 commence. Evidently, therefore, firom the very beginning, 
 the conquest of one people over another has been, in the 
 main, the conquest of the social man over the anti-social 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 41 7" 
 
 man ; or, strictly speaking, of the more adapted over the less 
 adapted. 
 
 In another mode, too, the continuance of the unsympathetic 
 character has indirectly aided civilization -whilst it has directly 
 hindered it ; namely, by giving rise to slavery. It has heen 
 observed — and, as it seems, truly enough — that only by such 
 stringent coercion as is exercised over men held in bondage, 
 could the needful power of continuous application have been 
 developed. Devoid of this, as from his habits of life the 
 aboriginal man necessarily veas (and as, indeed, existing spe- 
 cimens show), probably the severest discipline continued for 
 many generations was required to make him submit contentedly 
 to the necessities of his new state. And if so, the barbarous 
 selfishness which maintained that discipline, must be considered 
 as having worked a collateral benefit, though in itself so radi- 
 cally bad. 
 
 Let not the reader be alarmed. Let him not fear that these 
 admissions will excuse new invasions and new oppressions. 
 Nor let- any one who fancies himself called upon to take 
 Nature's part in this matter, by providing discipline for idle 
 negroes or others, suppose that these dealings of the past will 
 serve for precedents. Eightly understood, they will do no 
 such thing. That phase of civiHzation during which forcible 
 supplantings of the weak by the strong, and systems of savage 
 coercion, are on the- whole advantageous, is a phase which 
 spontaneously and necessarily gives birth to these things. It 
 is not in pursuance of any calmly-reasoned conclusions respect- 
 ing nature's intention that men conquer and enslave their 
 fellows — it is not that they smother their kindly feelings to 
 subserve ci-vilization ; but it is that as yet constituted they 
 care little what suffering they inflict in the pursuit of gratifica- 
 tion, and even think the achievement and exercise of mastery 
 honourable. ; As soon, however, as there arises a perception 
 that these subjugations and tyrannies are not right — as soon as 
 the sentunent to which they are repugnant becomes sufficiently 
 
 " E E 
 
418 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 powerful to suppress them, it is time for them to cease. The 
 question altogether hinges upon the amount of moral sense 
 possessed by men ; or, in other -words, upon the degree of 
 adaptation to the social state they have undergone. Uncon- 
 sciousness that there is anything wrong in exterminating in- 
 ferior races, or in reducing them to bondage, presupposes an 
 almost rudiraentary state of men's sympathies and their sense 
 of human rights. The oppressions they then inflict and submit 
 to, are not, therefore, detrimental to their characters — do not 
 retard in them the growth of the social sentiments, for these 
 have not yet reached a development great enough to be offended 
 by such doings. And hence the aids given to civihzation by 
 clearing the earth of its least advanced inhabitants, and by 
 forcibly compelling the rest to acquire industrial habits, are 
 given without moral adaptation receiving any corresponding 
 check. Quite otherwise is it, however, wlien the flagitiousness 
 of these gross forms of injustice begins to be recognised. Then 
 the times give proof that the old regime is no longjer fit. 
 Further progi-ess cannot be made until the newly-felt wrong 
 has been done away or diminished. Were it possible under 
 such circumstances to uphold past institutions and practices 
 (which, happily, it is not), it would be at the expense of a 
 continual searing of men's consciences. The feelings whose 
 predominance gives possibiHty to an advanced social state 
 would be constantiy repressed — kept down on a level with 
 the old arrangements, to the stopping of aU further progress ; 
 and before those who have grown beyond one of these proba- 
 tionary states could re-iastitute it, they must resume that in- 
 ferior character to which it was natural. Before a forced 
 servitude could be again estabUshed for the industrial discipline 
 of eight hundred thousand Jamaica blacks, the thirty miUions 
 of English whites who established it would have to retrograde 
 in all things — in truthfulness, fidehty, generosity, honesty, and 
 even in material condition; for to diminish men's moral sense 
 is to diminish their fitness for acting together, and, therefore 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 419 
 
 to render the best producing and distributing organizations 
 impracticable. Another illustration this of the perfect economy 
 of Nature. Whilst the injustice of conquests and enslavings is 
 not perceived, they are on the whole beneficial ; but as soon as 
 they ai'e felt to be at variance with the moral law, the con- 
 tinuance of them retards adaptation in one direction, more than 
 it advances it in another : a fact which our new preacher of 
 the old doctrine, that might is right, may profitably consider 
 a little. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Contrasted as are their units, primitive communities and 
 advanced ones must essentially differ in the principles of their 
 structure. Like other organisms, the social organism has to 
 pass in the course of its development through temporary forms, 
 in which sundry of its functions are fulfiUed by appliances 
 destined to disappear as fast as the ultimate appliances become 
 efficient. Associated humanity has larval appendages analo- 
 gous to those of individual creatures. As in the common 
 Triton of our ponds, the external lungs or hranchise dwindle 
 away when the internal lungs have grown to maturity ; and as 
 during the embryo stage of the higher vertebrata, temporary 
 organs appear, serve their purpose awhile, and are subsequently 
 re-absorbed, leaving only^igns of their having been; so, in the 
 earlier forms of the body poUtic do there exist institutions 
 which after answering their ends for a time are superseded and 
 become extinct. 
 
 But deciduous institutions imply deciduous sentiments. De- 
 pendent as they are upon popular character, established poli- 
 tical systems cannot die out until the feeling which upholds 
 them dies out. Hence during man's apprenticeship to the 
 social state there must predominate in him some impulse 
 corresponding to the arrangements requisite; which impulse 
 diminishes as the probationary organization made possible by 
 it, merges into the ultimate organization. The nature and 
 operation of this impulse now demand oui- attention. 
 
 E E 2 
 
420 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 " I had so great a respect for the memory of Henry IV.," 
 said the celebrated French robber and assassin, Cartouche, 
 "that had a victim I was pursuing taken refuge under his 
 statue on the Pont Neuf, I would have spared his life." An 
 apt illustration, this, of the co-existence of profound hero-wor- 
 ship with the extremest savageness, and of the means hero- 
 worship affords whereby the savage may be ruled. The neces- 
 sity for some such sentiment to bind men together whilst they 
 are as yet unsympathetic, has been elsewhere shown. For the 
 anti-social man to be transformed into the social man, he must 
 live in the social state. But how can a society be maintained 
 when, by the hypothesis, the aggressive desires of its members 
 are destructive of it ? Evidently its members must possess 
 some counterbalancing tendency which shall keep them in the 
 social state despite the incongruity — which shall make them 
 submit to the restraint imposed — and which shall diminish 
 as adaptation to the new circumstances renders restraint less 
 needful. Such counterbalancing tendency we have in this 
 same sentiment of hero-worship ; a sentiment which leads men 
 to prostrate themselves before any manifestation of power, be it 
 in chief, feudal lord, king, or constitutional government, and 
 makes them act in subordination to that power. 
 
 Facts illustrating this alleged connection between strength 
 of hero-worship and strength of the aggressive propensities, 
 together with other facts illustrating the simultaneous decline 
 of both, were given when the matter was first discussed (p. 197). 
 Now, however, we may appropriately examine the evidence in 
 detail. The proposition is, that in proportion as the members 
 of a community are barbarous, that is, in proportion as they 
 show a lack of moral sense by seeking gratification at each 
 other's expense, in the same proportion will they show depth 
 of reverence for authority. What, now, are the several indica- 
 tions of deficient moral sense ? First on the list stands disre- 
 gard of human life ; next, habitual violation of pereonal liberty ; 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 421 
 
 next to that, theft, and the dishonesty akin to it. Each of 
 these, if the foregoing theory he true, we ought to find most 
 prevalent where the awe of power is most profound. 
 
 Well, is it not a fact that grovelHng suhmission to despotic 
 mle flourishes side hy side with the practice of human sacri- 
 fices, infanticide, and assassination ? We find suttees and 
 thuggee amongst a race who have ever heen abject slaves. In 
 some of the Pacific isles, where the immolation of children to 
 idols, and the burying of parents alive, are common, " so high 
 is the reverence for hereditary chieftainship that it is often 
 connected with the idea of Divine power." Complete abso- 
 lutism uniformly co-exists with cannibalism. We read of 
 human hecatombs in connection with the extremest prostration 
 of subjects to rulers. In Madagascar, where men are put to 
 death on the most trifling occasions, and where the coast is 
 decorated with skulls stuck on poles, the people are governed 
 on the severest maxims of feudal law, by absolute chieftains 
 under an absolute monarch. The head-hunting Djaks of 
 Borneo have petty tyrants over them. There is autocratic 
 government, too, for the bloodthirsty Mongolian races. Both 
 positive and negative proof of this association is given by Mr. 
 Grote, where he says, " In no city of historical Greece did there 
 prevail either human sacrifices or deliberate mutilations, such 
 as cutting off the nose, ears, hands, feet, &c., or castration, or 
 selling of children into slavery, or polygamy, or the feeling of 
 unlimited obedience towards one man; all of them customs, 
 which might be pointed out as existing amongst the contem- 
 porary Carthaginians, Egyptians, Persians, Thracians," &c. If 
 we consult mediaeval history, there, along with loyalty strongly 
 manifested, are the judicial combats, right of private war, con- 
 stant wearing of arms, religious martyrdoms and massacres, 
 &c., to prove that Ufe was held in less respect than now. 
 Glancing over modem Europe, we find the assassinations of 
 Italy, the cruelties of the Croats and Czecks, and the Aus- 
 trian butcheries, illustrating the relationship. Whilst, amongst 
 
422 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 ourselves, diminished reverence for authority has occurred 
 simultaneously with diminished sanguinariness in our criminal 
 code. 
 
 That infringements of personal liberty are greatest where awe 
 of power is greatest, is in some sort a truism, seeing that forced 
 servitude, through which alone extensive violations of human 
 liberty can be made, is impossible, unless the sentiment of power- 
 worship is strong. Thus, the ancient Persians could never have 
 allowed themselves to be considered the private property of their 
 monarchs, had it not been for the overwhelming influence of 
 this sentiment. But that such submission is associated with a 
 defect of moral sense, is best seen in the acknowledged- truth 
 that readiness to cringe is accompanied by an equal readiness 
 to tyrannize. Satraps lorded it over the people as their king 
 over them. The Helots were not more coerced by their Spartan 
 masters than these in turn by their oligarchy. Of the ser- 
 vile Hindoos we are told that " they indemnify themselves for 
 their passiveness to their superiors by their tyranny, cruelty, 
 and violence to those in their power." During the feudal 
 ages, whilst the people were bondsmen to the nobles, the 
 nobles were vassals to their kings, their kings to the pope. 
 In Eussia, at the present moment, the aristocracy are dictated to 
 by their emperor much as they themselves dictate to their serfs. 
 And when to these facts we add the significant one elsewhere 
 dwelt upon (pp. 161 and 178), that the treatment of women by 
 tbeir husbands, and children by their parents, has been tyranni- 
 cal in proportion as the seixihty of subjects to rulers has been 
 extreme, we have sufficient proof that hero-worship is strongest 
 where there is least regard for human freedom. 
 
 Equally abundant evidence exists that the prevalence of theft 
 is similarly associated with a predominance of the loyalty-pro- 
 ducing faculty. Books of travels give proof that amongst 
 uncivilized races pilfering and the irresponsible power of chiefs 
 co-exist. The same association of dishonesty and submissive- 
 ness is found amongst more advanced peoples. It is so with 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 423 
 
 the Handoos, with the Cinghalese, and with the inhahitants of 
 Madagascar. The piracy of the Malays, and of the Chinese, 
 and the long- continued predatory hahits of tlie Arah races, hoth 
 on land and sea, exist in conjunction with obedience to despotic 
 rule. " One quaUty," says Kohl, "which the Lettes show, with 
 all enslaved tribes, is a great disposition to thieving." The 
 Eiussians, to whom worship of their emperor is a needful luxury, 
 confess openly that they are cheats, and laugh over the confes- 
 sion. The Poles, whose servile salutation is, " I throw myself 
 under your feet," and amongst whom nobles are cringed to 
 by the Jews and citizens, and these again by the people, axe 
 certainly not noted for probity. Turning to the superior 
 races, we find that they, too, have passed through phases in 
 which this same relationship of characteristics was strongly 
 marked. Thus, the times when fealty of serfs to feudal barons 
 was strongest, were times of universal rapine. " In Germany a 
 very large proportion of the rural nobility lived by robbeiy ; " 
 their castles being built with a special view to this occupation, 
 and that even by ecclesiastics '^. Burghers were fleeced, towns 
 were now and then sacked, and Jews were tortured for their 
 money. Kin gs were as much thieves as the rest. They laid 
 violent hands upon the goods of their vassals, like John of 
 England and PliiUp Augustus of France; they cheated their 
 creditors by debasing the coinage ; they impressed men's horses 
 without paying for them ; and they seized the goods of traders, 
 sold them, and pocketed a large part of the proceeds. Mean- 
 time, whilst freebooters overran the land, pirates covered the 
 sea, the Cinque Ports and St. Maloe's being the head quarters 
 of those infesting the English Channel. 
 
 Between these days and ours, the gradual decline of loyalty — 
 as shown in the extinction of feudal relationships, in tlie abandon- 
 
 » " An Archbishop of Cologne having built a fortress of this kind, the goTemor 
 inquired how he was to maintain himself, no revenue having been assigned for that 
 purpose. The prelate only desired him to remark, that the castle was situated near 
 the junction of four cross roads." — TlaUamss Middle Ages. 
 
43-1 GENEKAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 ment of di\'iue right of kings, in the reduction of monarchical 
 power, and in the comparative leniency with which treason is 
 now punished — has accompanied an equally gradual increase of 
 honesty, and of regard for people's lives and liberties. By how 
 much men are still deficient in respect for each other's rights, 
 by so much are they still penetrated with respect for authority ; 
 and we may even trace in existing parties the constant ratio 
 presei-ved between these characteristics. It has been shown, for 
 instance, that the unskilled labourers of the metropolis, who, 
 instead of entertaining violently democratic opinions, appear 
 to have no poUtical opinions whatever, or, if they think at all, 
 rather lean towards the maintenance of " things as they are," 
 and part of whom (the coalwhippers) are extremely proud of 
 their having turned out to a man on the 10th of April, 1848, 
 and become special constables for the "maintenance of law and 
 order" on the day of the great Chardst Demonstration, — it 
 has been sho'UTi that these same unskilled labourers constitute 
 the most immoral class. The Criminal-Eetums prove them to 
 be nine times as dishonest, five times as drunken, and nine 
 times as savage (shown by the assaults), as the rest of the 
 community. Of like import is the observation respecting 
 convicts, quoted and confirmed by Captain Maconochie, that 
 " a good prisoner {«'. e. a submissive one) is usually a bad 
 man."* If, again, we turn over the newspapers which circulate 
 amongst court satellites, and chronicle the movements of the 
 haut-ion, which ascribe national calamities to the omission of a 
 royal title from a new coin, and which apologise for continental 
 despots ; we read in them excuses for war and standing armies, 
 sneeiiags at " peace-mongers," defences of capital punishment, 
 condemnations of popular enfranchisement, diatribes against 
 freedom of exchange, rejoicings over territoiial robberies, and 
 vindications of church-rate seizures : showing that, where belief 
 in the sacredness of authority most lingei-s, belief in the sacred- 
 ness of life, of hberty, and of property, is least displayed. 
 
 ' See pamphlets on the Mark System of Discipline. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 426 
 
 § r. 
 
 The fact that, during civilizatioii, hero -worship and moral 
 sense vary inversely, is simply the obverse of the fact already 
 hinted, that society is possible so long only as they continue 
 to do this. Where there is insufficient reverence for the Divine 
 Law, there must be supplementary reverence for human law ; 
 otherwise there will be complete lawlessness or barbarism. 
 Evidently, if men are to live together, the absence of internal 
 power to rule themselves rightly towards each other, necessitates 
 the presence of external power to enforce such behaviour as 
 may mate association tolerable ; and this power can become 
 operative only by being held in awe. So that wild races 
 deficient in the allegiance-producing sentiment cannot enter 
 into a civilized state at aU.; but have to be supplanted by 
 others that can. And it must further follow, that if in any 
 community loyalty diminishes at a greater rate than equity 
 increases, there will arise a tendency towards social dissolu- 
 tion — a tendency which the populace of Paris threaten to 
 illustrate. 
 
 How needful the continuance of a savage selfishness renders 
 the continuance of a proportionate amount of power-worship, 
 may be perceived daily. Listen to the chattings of men about 
 their afifairs ; examine into trade practices; read over business 
 correspondence; or get a solicitor to detail his conversations 
 with clients: — you will find that in most cases conduct depends, 
 not upon what is right, but upon what is legal. Provided they 
 "keep o' the windy side of the law," the great majority are but 
 httle restrained by regard for strict rectitude. The question with 
 your every-day man of the world is, not— May the claimant 
 justly require thus much of me ? but rather — "Is it so nomi- 
 nated in the bond ? " If " an action will he," such an one will 
 commonly enough take proceedings to obtain what he knows 
 himself not equitably entitled to ; and if " the law allows it|pnd 
 the court awai'ds it," will pocket aU he can get without scruple. 
 
426 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 When we find doings like these regai-ded as matters of course, 
 and those guilty of them passing for respectable men — when 
 we thus find that so many will deal fairly by their fellows 
 only on compulsion — we discover how requisite is tlie senti- 
 ment fi-om which the compelling insti'umentahty derives its 
 power. 
 
 Without doubt this sentiment has begotten many gigantic 
 evils, some of which it still nurtures. The various superstitions 
 that have prevailed, and that still prevail, as to the great things 
 legislatures can do, and the disastrous meddlings growing out 
 of these superstitions, are due to it. The veneration which 
 produces submission to a government, unavoidably invests that 
 government with proportionately high attributes ; for being in 
 essence a worship of power, it can be strongly drawn out to- 
 wards that only which either has great power, or is believed to 
 have it. Hence, the old delusions that rulers can fix the value 
 of money, the rate of wages, and the price of food. Hence, the 
 still current fallacies about mitigating distress, easing monetary 
 pressures, and cming over-population by law. Hence, also, the 
 monstrous, though generally-received doctiine, that a legislature 
 may equitably take people's property to such extent, and for such 
 purposes, as it thinks fit — for maintaining state-chm'ches, feed- 
 ing paupers, paying schoolmasters, founding colonies, &c. And 
 hence, lastly, the astounding belief that an act of parliament 
 can abrogate one of Nature's decrees — can, for instance, render 
 it criminal in a trader to buy goods in France, and bring them 
 here to sell, wliilst the moral law saj's it is criminal to prevent 
 him ! As though conduct could be made right or wi-ong by 
 the votes of some men sitting in a room in Westminster ! 
 Yet, in spite of all this — in spite of the false theories and mis- 
 chievous interferences, the numberless oppressions, disasters, 
 and miseries, in one way or other traceable to it, we must ad- 
 mit that this power-worsliip has fulfilled, and does sdll fulfil, 
 ^\5|?y ™Portant function, and that it may advantageously last 
 as long as it can. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 427 
 
 §8. 
 
 That it cannot last longer than needfal may be readily proved. 
 In a way equally simple and perfect it is made to decUne as fast 
 as it can be done ■without. The very feeUng, during whose 
 minority it exercises regency over men, becomes the destroyer 
 of its power. Between the temporary ruler and the ultimate 
 rightful one, there is an unceasing conflict, in which the wane 
 of influence on the one side is necessitated by its growth on 
 the other. 
 
 For, as already shown (p. 97), the sense of rights, by 
 whose sympathetic excitement men are led to behave justly 
 towards each other, is the same sense of rights by which they 
 are prompted to assert their own claims — their own liberty of 
 action — their own freedom to exercise their faculties, and to 
 resist every encroachment. This impulse brooks no restraint, 
 save that imposed by fellow feeUng; and disputes all assumption 
 of extra privilege by whomsoever made. Consequently, it is in 
 perpetual antagonism with a sentiment which dehghts in sub- 
 serviency. " Eeverence this authority," suggests power-worship. 
 " Why should I ? who set it over me ? " demands instinct of 
 freedom. " Obey," whispers the one. " Rebel," mutters the 
 other. " I will do what your Highness bids," says the one with 
 bated breath. "Pray, sir," shouts the other, "who are you, 
 that you should dictate to me?" "This man is Divinely ap- 
 pointed to iTile over us, and we ought therefore to submit," 
 argues the one. " I tell you, no," repUes the other ; " we have 
 Divinely-endorsed claims to freedom, and it is our duty to 
 maintain them." And thus the controversy goes on : conduct 
 during each phase of civihzation being determined by the re- 
 lative strengths of the two feelings. Whilst yet too feeble to 
 be operative as a social restraint, moral sense, by its scai'cely- 
 heard protest, does not hinder a predominant hero-worship from 
 giving possibility to the most stringent despotism. Gradually, 
 as it grows strong enough to deter men fi'om the grosser tres- 
 passes upon each other, does it also grow strong enough to 
 
428 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 Struggle successfiilly against that excess of coercion no longer 
 required. And when it shall finally have attained sufficient 
 power to give men, by its reflex function, so perfect a regard 
 for each other's rights as to make government needless ; then 
 will it also, by its direct function, give men so wakeful a 
 jealousy of their own rights as to make government impossible. 
 A further example, this, of the admirable simplicity of nature. 
 The same sentiment which fits us for freedom, itself makes us 
 fi-ee. 
 
 Of course the institutions of any given age exliibit the com- 
 promise made by these contending moral forces at the signing 
 of their last truce. Between the state of unlimited government 
 arising from supremacy of the one feeling, and the state of no 
 government arising from supremacy of the other, lie interme- 
 diate forms of social organization, beginning with " despotism 
 tempered by assassination," and ending with that highest de- 
 velopment of the representative system, under which the right 
 of constituents to instruct their delegates is fully admitted — 
 a system wliich, by making the nation at large a dehberative 
 body, and reducing the legislative assembly to an executive, 
 carries self-government to the fullest extent compatible with 
 the existence of a ruling power. Of necessity the mixed con- 
 stitutions that characterize tliis transition period, are in the ab- 
 stract absurd. The two feeUngs answering to the popular and 
 monarchical elements, being antagonistic, give utterance to an- 
 tagonistic ideas. And to suppose that these can be consistently 
 united, is to suppose that yes and no can be reconciled. The 
 monarchical theoi7 is, that the people are in duty bound to sub- 
 mit themselves with all humility to a certain individual ought 
 
 to be loyal to him— ought to give allegiance to him, that is 
 
 ought to subordinate their wills to his will. Contrariwise the 
 democratic theory — either as specifically defined, or as embodied 
 in our own constitution under the form of a power to withhold 
 supplies and in the legal fiction that the citizen assents to 
 the laws he has to obey — is, that the people ought not to be 
 subject to the will of one, but should fulfil their own wills. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 429 
 
 Now these ■ are flat contradictions, ■which no reasoning can 
 harmonize. If a king may rightfully claim obedience, then 
 should that obedience be entire ; else there starts up the 
 unanswerable question — why must we obey in this and not in 
 that ? But if men should mainly rule themselves, then should 
 they rule themselves altogether. Otherwise it may be asked — 
 why are they their own masters in such and such cases, and 
 not in the rest ? 
 
 Nevertheless, though these mixed governments, combining 
 as they do two mutually-destructive hypotheses, are utterly 
 irrational in principle, they must of necessity exist, so long 
 as they are in harmony with the mixed constitution of the 
 partially-adapted man. And it seems that the radical incon- 
 gruity pervading them cannot be recognized by men, whilst 
 there exists a corresponding incongruity in their own natures : 
 -a good illustration of the law that opinion is ultimately deter- 
 mined by the feelings, and not by the intellect. 
 
 § 9. 
 
 How completely, indeed, conceptions of right and wrong in 
 these matters depend upon the balance of impulses existing in 
 men, may be worth considering a moment. And first, observe 
 that no tracing out of actions to their final good or bad con- 
 sequences, is, by itself, capable of generating approbation, or 
 reprobation, of those actions. Could it do this, men's moral 
 codes would be high or low, according as they made these 
 analyses well or ill, that is — according to their intellectual 
 acuteness. Whence it would follow, that in all ages and na- 
 tions, men of equal intelhgence should have hke etliical theories, 
 ■whilst contemporaries should have unlike ones, if their reflective 
 powers are unhke. But facts do not answer to these inferences. 
 On the contrary, they point to the law above specified. Both 
 history and daily experience prove to us that men's ideas of 
 rectitude correspond to the sentiments and instincts predomi- 
 nating in them (pp. 25, 159, 350). We constantly read of ty- 
 
430 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 rants defending their claims to nnlimited sway as being Divinely 
 authorized. The rights of rival princes were of old asserted 
 by their respective partisans, and are still asserted by modern 
 legitimists, with the same warmth that the most ardent democrat 
 asserts the rights of man. To those living in the feudal times, 
 so unquestionable seemed the duty of serfs to obey their lords, 
 tliat Luther (no doubt acting conscientiously) urged the barons 
 to vengeance on the rebellious peasants, calling on all who could 
 " to stab them, cut them down, and dash their brains out, as if 
 they were mad dogs." Moreover, we shall find, that absence of 
 the ethical sentiment completely disables the mind from realiz- 
 ing the abstract title of the human being to freedom. Thus, with 
 all his high reasoning powers, Plato could conceive of nothing 
 better for his ideal repubHc than a system of class despotism ; 
 and, indeed, up to his time, and long after it, there seems 
 to have existed no man who saw anything wrong in slavery. 
 It is narrated of Colonel D'Oyley, the first governor of Jamaica, 
 that within a few days after having issued an order " for the dis- 
 tribution to the army of 1701 Bibles," he signed another order 
 for the " payment of the summe of twenty pounds sterUng, out 
 of the impost money, to pay for fifteen doggs, brought by John 
 Hoy, for the hunting of the negroes." The holding of slaves 
 by ministers of religion in America is a parallel fact. We read 
 that the Chinese cannot understand why European women are 
 treated with respect ; and that they attribute the circumstance 
 to the exercise of demoniacal arts by them over the men. 
 Here and there amongst ourselves, analogous phenomena may 
 be detected. For example. Dr. Moberly, of Winchester Col- 
 lege, has written a book to defend fagging, which he says, as a 
 system of school-government, gives " more security of essential 
 deep-seated goodness than any other which can be devised." 
 Again, in a recent pamphlet, signed " A Country Pai-son," it 
 is maintained, that "you must convert the Chartist spirit as 
 you would reform the drunkard's spuit, by shoAving that it is a 
 rebeUion agaiust the laws of God." But the strangest pecu- 
 liarity exhibited by those deficient in sense of rights or rather 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 431 
 
 that which looks the strangest to us — is their inahihty to re- 
 cognize their own claims. We are told, for instance, hy Lieu- 
 tenant Bernard", that in the Portuguese settlements on the 
 African coast, the free negroes are " taunted hy the slaves as 
 having no -white man to look after them, and see them righted 
 when oppressed;" and it is said that in America the slaves 
 themselves look down upon the fr-ee blacks, and call them 
 ruhhish. Which anomalous-looking facts are, however, easily 
 conceivahle when we remember that here in England, in tliis 
 nineteenth century, most women defend that state of servitude 
 in which they are held by men. 
 
 To account, by any current hypothesis, for the numberless 
 disagreements in men's ideas of right and wrong here briefly 
 exemplified, seems scarcely possible. But on the theory that 
 opinion is a resultant of moral forces, whose equilibrium varies 
 with every race and epoch — that is, with every phase of adapta- 
 tion — the rationale is self-evident. Nor, indeed, considering 
 the matter closely, does it appear that society could ever hold 
 together were not opinion thus dependent upon the balance of 
 feehngs. For were it otherwise, races yet needing coercive go- 
 vernment might reason their way to the conclusion that co- 
 ercive government was bad, as readily as more advanced races. 
 The Russians might see despotism to be wrong, and fr-ee insti- 
 tutions to be right, as clearly as we do. And did they see this, 
 social dissolution would ensue ; for it is not conceivable that 
 they would any longer remain contented . under that stringent 
 rule needed to keep them in the social state. 
 
 § 10. 
 
 The process by which a change of political arrangements is 
 effected, when the incongruity between them and the popular 
 character becomes suf&cient, must be itself in keeping with that 
 character, and must be violent or peaceful accordingly. There 
 are not a few who exclaim against all revolutions wrought out 
 
 a « y/irfifi Year^ Cruize ill the Mozamhiqite Clio.n'nel," 
 
432 GENERA.I, CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 by force of arms, forgetting that the quality of a revolution, like 
 that of an institution, is determined by the natures of those who 
 make it. Moral suasion is very admirable ; good for us ; good, 
 indeed, for all who can be induced to use it. But to suppose 
 that, in the earUer stages of social growth, moral suasion can 
 be employed, or, if employed, would answer, is to overlook the 
 conditions. Stating the case mechanically, we may say that as, 
 in proportion to their unfitness for associated Hfe, the framework 
 within which men are restrained must be strong, so must the 
 efforts required to break up that framework, when it is no 
 longer fit, be convulsive. The existence of a government which 
 does not bend to the popular will — a despotic government 
 — presupposes several circumstances which make any change 
 but a violent one impossible. First, for coercive rule to have 
 been practicable, implies in the people a predominance of that 
 awe of power ever indicative of still hngering savageness. 
 Moreover, with a large amount of power-worship present, dis- 
 affection can take place only when the cumulative evils of mis- 
 government have generated great exasperation. Add to which, 
 that as abundance of the sentiment upholding external rule, in- 
 volves lack of the sentiments producing internal rule, no such 
 check to excesses as that afforded by a due regard for the lives 
 and claims of others, can be operative. And where there are 
 comparatively active destructive propensities, extreme anger, 
 and deficient self-restraint, violence is inevitable. Peaceful 
 revolutions occur under quite different circumstances. They 
 become possible only when society, no longer consisting of 
 members so antagonistic, begins to cohere from its own in- 
 ternal organization, and needs not be kept together by rm- 
 yielding external restraints; and when, by consequence, the force 
 required to effect change is less. They become possible only 
 when men, having acquired greater adaptation to the social 
 state, will neither inflict on each other, nor submit to, such 
 extreme oppressions, and when, therefore, the causes of popular 
 indignation are diminished. They become possible only when 
 character has grown more sympathetic, and when, as a result 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 433 
 
 of this, the tendency towards angry retaliation is partially neu- 
 tralized. Indeed, the very idea that reforms may and ought to 
 be effected peacefully impUes a large endowment of the moral 
 sense. Without this, such an idea cannot even be conceived, 
 much less carried out; with this, it may be both. 
 
 Hence, we must look upon social convulsions as upon other 
 natural phenomena, which work themselves out in a certain 
 inevitable, unalterable way. We may lament the bloodshed — 
 may wish it had been avoided ; but it is folly to suppose that, 
 the popular character remaining the same, things could have 
 been managed differently. If such and such events had not 
 occurred, say you, the result would have been otherwise ; 
 if this or that man had hved, he would have prevented the 
 catastrophe. Do not be thus deceived. These changes are 
 brought about by a power far above individual wills. Men 
 who seem the prime movers, are merely the tools with which 
 it works ; and were they absent, it would quickly find others. 
 Incongruity between character and institutions is the disturb- 
 ing force, and a revolution is the act of restoring equilibrium. 
 Accidental circumstances modify the process, but do not per- 
 ceptibly alter the effect. They precipitate ; they retard ; they 
 intensify or ameliorate ; but, let a few years elapse, and the 
 same end is arrived at, no matter what the special events 
 passed through. 
 
 That these violent overtumings of early institutions fail to 
 do what their originators hope, and that they finally result in 
 the setting up of institutions not much better than those super- 
 seded, is very true (p. 244). But it is not the less time that 
 the modifications they effect can be effected in no other way. 
 Non-adaptation necessitates a bad mode of making changes, 
 as well as a bad political organization. Not only must the 
 habitual rule it calls for be severe, but even small ameUo- 
 rations of this cannot be obtained without much- suffering. 
 Conversely, the same causes which render a better social 
 state possible, render the successive modifications of it easier. 
 
 F F 
 
434 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 These occur under less pressure; with smaller disturbance; 
 and more frequently: until, by a gradual diminution in the 
 amounts and intervals of change, the process merges into one 
 of uninterrupted growth. 
 
 § 11. 
 
 There is another form under which civilization can be ge- 
 neralized. We may consider it as a progress towards that 
 constitution of man and society required for the complete 
 manifestation of every one's individuality. To be that which 
 he naturally is — to do just what he would spontaneously do — 
 is essential to the full happiness of each, and therefore to the 
 greatest happiness of all. Hence, in virtue of the law of 
 adaptation, our advance must be towards a state in which this 
 entke satisfaction of every desire, or perfect fulfilment of indi- 
 vidual Hfe, becomes possible. In the beginning it is impos- 
 sible. If imcontrolled, the impulses of the aboriginal man 
 produce anarchy. Either his individuality must be curbed, or 
 society must dissolve. With ourselves, though restraint is still 
 needful, the private wiU of the citizen, not being so destructive 
 of order, has more play. And further progress must be towards 
 increased sacredness of personal claims, and a subordination of 
 whatever limits them. 
 
 There are plenty of facts illustrating the doctrine that under 
 primitive governments the repression of individuality is greatest, 
 and that it becomes less as we advance. Eeferring to the 
 people of Egypt, Assyria, China, and Hindostan, as contrasted 
 with those of Greece, Mr. Grote says, "The religious and 
 political sanction, sometimes combined and sometimes sepa- 
 rate, determined for every one his mode of life, his creed, his 
 duties, and his place in society, without leaving any scope for 
 the wiU or reason of the individual himself." The ownership of 
 people by rulers, from its pure form under Darius, through its 
 various modifications down to the time of " L'etat c'est mbi " 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 435 
 
 and as even still typified amongst oui-selves in the expression, 
 " my subjects," must be considered as a greater or less merging 
 of many individualities into one. The parallel relationships of 
 slaves or serfs to their master, and of the family to its head, 
 have implied the same thing. In short, all despotisms, whether 
 political or religious, whether of sex, of caste, or of custom, 
 may be generalized as limitations of individuality, which it is 
 in the nature of civilization to remove. 
 
 Of course, in advancing from the one extreme, in which the 
 state is everything and the individual nothing, to the other 
 extreme, in which the individual is everything and the state 
 nothing, society must pass through many intermediate phases. 
 Aristocracy and democracy are not, as they have been called, 
 separate and conflicting principles ; but they and their various 
 mixtures with each other and with monarchy mark the stages 
 in this progress towards complete individuaUty. Nor is it only 
 by amelioration of goverimiental forms that the growth of pri- 
 vate claims as opposed to pubUc ones is shown. It is shown, 
 too, by the alteration in voluntary unions — in pohtical parties, 
 for instance ; the manifest tendency of which is towards disso- 
 lution, by internal divisions, by diminution of power over their 
 members, by increasing heterogeneity of opinion; that is — 
 by the spread of a personal independence fatal to them. Still 
 better do the changes in religious organizations illustrate this 
 law. That multiplication of sects which has been going on in 
 these latter times with increasing rapidity, and which is now so 
 abundantly exemplified by the severing of the Estabhshment 
 into Evangelical, High Church, and Puseyite ; again, by the 
 Free Church secession ; again, by the schism of the Method- 
 ists ; again, by Unitarian differences ; again, by the splitting- 
 off of numberless local congregations not to be classed ; and, 
 again, by the preaching that identity of opinion should not be 
 the bond' of union — the universal tendency to separate thus 
 exhibited, is simply one of the ways in which a growing asser- 
 tion of individuaUty comes out. Ultimately, by continual sub- 
 division, what we call sects will disappear ; and in place of 
 
 F F 2 
 
43G GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 that artificial unifonnity, obtained by stamping men after an 
 authorized pattern, there -will arise one of nature's uniformities 
 — a general similarity, ■with infimtesimal differences. 
 
 § 12. 
 
 From the point of view now arrived at, we may discern how 
 what is termed in our artificial classifications of truth, morality, 
 is essentially one with physical truth — is, in fact, a species of 
 transcendental physiology. That condition of things dictated 
 by the law of equal freedom — that condition in which the 
 individuality of each may be unfolded without limit, save the 
 like individualities of others — that condition towards which, as 
 we have just seen, mankind are progressing, is a condition 
 towards which the whole creation tends. Already it has been 
 incidentally pointed out that only by entire fulfilment of the 
 moral law can life become complete (p. 195) ; and now we 
 shaU find that all life whatever may be defined as a quality, 
 of which aptitude to fulfil this law is the highest manifestation. 
 
 A theory of life developed by Coleridge has prepared the 
 way for this generalization. " By life," says he, " I everywhere 
 mean the true idea of Hfe, or that most general form under 
 which life manifests itself to us, which includes all other forms. 
 This I have stated to be the tendency to individuation; and 
 the degrees or intensities of life to consist in the progressive 
 realizations of this tendency." To make this definition inteUi- 
 gible, a few of the facts sought to be expressed by it must be 
 specified — facts exemplifying the contrast between low and high 
 types of structure, and low and high degrees of vitality. 
 
 Eestricting our illustrations to the animal kingdom, and 
 beginning where the vital attributes axe most obscure, we find, 
 for instance, in the genus Porifera, creatures consisting of 
 nothing but amorphous semi-fluid jelly, supported upon homy 
 fibres (sponge). This jelly possesses no sensitiveness, has no 
 organs, absorbs nutriment from the water which permeates its 
 mass, and, if cut in pieces, lives on, in each part, as before: 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 437 
 
 So that this " gelatinous film," as it has been called, shows little 
 more individuality than a formless lump of inanimate matter ; 
 for, like that, it possesses no diistinction of parts, and, Uke that 
 also, has no greater completeness than the pieces it is divided 
 into. In the compound polyps which stand next, and with 
 which Coleridge commences, the progress towards individuality 
 is manifest ; for there is now distinction of parts. To the 
 originally uniform gelatinous mass with canals running through 
 it, we have superadded, in the Alcyonidm, a number of digestive 
 sacks, with accompanying mouths and tentacles. Here is, 
 evidently, a partial segregation into individualities — a progress 
 towards separateness. There is still complete community of nu- 
 trition ; whilst each polyp has a certain independent sensitive- 
 ness and contractility. From this stage onwards, there appear 
 to be several routes ; one through the Corallida, in which the 
 polyp-bearing mass surrounds a calcareous axis, up to the 
 Tubiporidie, in which the polyps, no longer united, inhabit 
 separate cells, seated in a common calcareous framework. But 
 Coleridge has overlooked the remarkable mode in which these 
 communist polyps are linked with higher individual organisms 
 by the transitional arrangement seen in the common Hydrw, or 
 fresh-water polyps of our ponds. These creatures (which are 
 in structure similar to the separate members of the compound 
 animal above described), multiply by gemmation, that is, by 
 the budding out of young ones from the body of the parent. 
 " During the first period of the formation of these sprouts, 
 they are evidently continuous with the general substance from 
 which they arise ; and even when considerably perfected, and 
 possessed of an internal cavity and tentacula, their stomachs 
 
 freely communicate with that of their parent As 
 
 soon as the newly-formed hydra is capable of catching prey, 
 it begins to contribute to the support of its parent; the food 
 which it captures passing through the aperture at its base into 
 the body of the original polyp. At length, when the young is 
 fully formed, and ripe for independent existence, the point of 
 union between the two becomes more and more slender, until 
 
438 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 a slight effort on the part of either is sufficient to detach them, 
 
 and the process is completed Sometimes six or 
 
 seven gemmae have heen observed to sprout at once from the 
 same hydra ; and although the whole process is concluded in 
 twenty-four hours, not unfrequently a third generation may be 
 observed springing from the newly-formed polyps even before 
 their separation from their parent ; eighteen have in this man- 
 ner been seen united into one group." ^ Now here is a creature 
 which cannot strictly be called either simple or compound. 
 Nominally, it is an individual ; practically, it never is so. In 
 the alcyonide polyp many individuals are permanently united 
 together : in this genus they are temporarily united, in so far 
 as particular individuals are concerned, but otherwise perma- 
 nently so ; for there is always a group, though that group keeps 
 changing its members. Indeed, may we not say that the 
 "tendency to individuation" is here most visible; seeing that 
 the HydrtB are, as it were, perpetually striving to become indi- 
 viduals, without succeeding? And may we not further say that 
 in the gradually-decreasing recurrence of this budding, and 
 the simultaneous appearance of a higher method of reproduc- 
 tion by ova (which in the Bryozoa co-exists with a compara- 
 tively languid gemmation), this " tendency to individuation" is 
 still farther manifested ? 
 
 After complete separateness of organisms has been arrived 
 at, the law is still seen in successive improvements of structure. 
 By greater individuality of parts — by greater distinctness in 
 the nature and functions of these, are all creatures possessing 
 high vitality distinguished from inferior ones. Those Hydra} 
 just referred to, which are mere bags, with tentacles round the 
 orifice, may be turned inside out with impunity : the stomach 
 becomes skin, and the skin stomach. Here, then, is evidently 
 no speciality of character ; the duties of stomach and skin are 
 performed by one tissue, which is not yet individualized into 
 two separate parts, adapted to separate ends. The contrast 
 
 ■' A Gemral Outline of the Animal Kingdom. By Professor T, R, Jones, F.Gr.S. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 439 
 
 between this state and that in which such a distinction exists, 
 ■will sufficiently explain what is meant by individuation of 
 organs. How clearly this individuation of organs is traceable 
 throughout the whole range of animal life, may he seen in the 
 successive forms which the nervous system assumes. Thus in 
 the Acrita, a class comprehending all the genera above-men- 
 tioned, " no nervous filaments or masses have been discovered, 
 and the neurine or nervous matter is supposed to be diffused 
 in a molecular condition through the body."* In the class 
 next above this, the Nematoneura, we find the first step to- 
 wards individuation of the nervous system : " the nervous 
 matter is distinctly aggregated into filaments."'' In the Homo- 
 gangliata, it is still further concentrated into a number of 
 small equal-sized masses — ganglia. In the Heterogangliata, 
 some of these small masses are collected together into larger 
 ones. Finally, in the Vertelrata, the greater part of the ner- 
 vous centres are united to form a brain. And -with the rest of 
 the body there has simultaneously taken place just the same 
 process of condensation into distinct systems — muscular, re- 
 spiratory, nutritive, excreting, absorbent, circulatory, &c. — and 
 of these again into separate parts, with special functions. 
 
 The changes of vital manifestation associated with and con- 
 sequent upon these changes of structure, have the same signi- 
 ficance. To possess a greater variety of senses, of instincts, 
 of powers, of qualities — to be more complex in chai'acter and 
 attributes, is to be more completely distinguishable from all 
 other created things; or to exhibit a more marked individuality. 
 For, manifestly, as there are some properties which all entities, 
 organic and inorganic, have in common, namely, weight, mo- 
 bility, inertia, &c. ; and as there are additional properties 
 which all organic entities have in common, namely, powers of 
 growth and multiplication; and as there are yet further pro- 
 perties which the higher organic entities have in common, 
 namely, sight, hearing, &c. ; then those still higher organic 
 
 * Jones. •> Ibid. 
 
440 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 entities possessing characteristics not shared in by the rest, 
 thereby differ from a larger number of entities than the rest, 
 and differ in more points — that is, are more separate, more 
 individual. Observe, again, that the greater power of self- 
 preservation shown by beings of superior type may also be 
 generalized under this same term— a " tendency to individua- 
 tion." The lower the organism, the more is it at the mercy of 
 external circumstances. It is continually liable to be destroyed 
 by the elements, by want of food, by enemies ; and eventually 
 is so destroyed in nearly all cases. That is, it lacks power to 
 preserve its individuality; and loses this, either by returning to 
 the form of inorganic matter, or by absorption into some other 
 individuality. Conversely, where there is strength, sagacity, 
 swiftness (all of them indicative of superior structure), there 
 is corresponding abiUty to maintain life — to prevent the indi- 
 viduality from being so easily dissolved ; and therefore the in- 
 dividuation is more complete. 
 
 In man we see the highest manifestation of this tendency. 
 By virtue of his complexity of structure, he is furthest removed 
 from the inorganic world in which there is least individuality. 
 Again, his intelligence and adaptability commonly enable him 
 to maintain hfe to old age — to complete the cycle of his 
 existence ; that is, to fill out the hmits of this individuality to 
 the full. Again, he is self-conscious ; that is, he recognizes 
 his own individuality. And, as lately shown, even the change 
 observable in human affairs is still towards a greater develop- 
 ment of individuality — may still be described as " a tendency 
 to individuation." 
 
 But note lastly, and note chiefly, as being the fact to which 
 the foregoing sketch is introductory, that what we call the 
 moral law — the law of equal freedom, is the law under which 
 individuation becomes perfect; and that abihty to recognise 
 and act up to this law, is the final endowment of humanity — 
 an endowment now in process of evolution. The increasing ' 
 assertion of personal rights, is an increasing demand that the 
 external conditions needful to a complete unfolding of the in- 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 441 
 
 dividuality shall be respected. Not only is there now a con- 
 sciousness of individuality, and an intelligence whereby indi- 
 viduality may be preserved ; but there is a perception that the 
 sphere of action requisite for due development of the indi- 
 viduality may be claimed ; and a correlative desire to claim it. 
 And when the change at present going on is complete — when 
 each possesses an active instinct of freedom, together with an 
 active sympathy — then will aU the stiU existing limitations to 
 individuality, be they governmental restraints, or be they the 
 aggressions of men on one another, cease. Then, none will be 
 hindered from duly unfolding their natures; for whilst every 
 one maintains his own claims, he wUl respect the like claims of 
 others. Then, there will no longer be legislative restrictions 
 and legislative burdens ; for by the same process these will 
 have become both needless and impossible. Then, for the first 
 time in the history of the world, wiU there exist beings whose 
 individualities can be expanded to the full in all directions. 
 And thus, as before said, in the ultimate man perfect morahty, 
 perfect individuation, and perfect life will be simultaneously 
 realized. 
 
 § 13. 
 
 Yet must this highest individuation be joined with the 
 greatest mutual dependence. Paradoxical though the asser- 
 tion looks, the progress is at once towards complete separate- 
 ness and complete union. But the separateness is of a kind 
 consistent with the most complex combinations for fulfilling 
 social wants ; and the union is of a kind that does not hinder 
 entire development of each personaHty. Civilization is evolv- 
 ing a state of things and a Mnd of character, in which two 
 apparently conflicting requirements are reconciled. To achieve 
 the creative purpose — the greatest sum of happiness, there must 
 on the one hand exist an amount of population maintainable 
 only by the best possible system of production; that is, by the 
 most elaborate subdivision of labour ; that is, by the extremest 
 mutual dependence : whilst on the other hand, each individual 
 
442 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 must have tlie opportunity to do whatever his desires prompt. 
 Clearly these two conditions can be harmonized only by that 
 adaptation humanity is undergoing — that process during which 
 all desires inconsistent with the most perfect social organiza- 
 tion are dying out, and other desires corresponding to such an 
 organization are being developed. How this will eventuate in 
 producing at once perfect individuation and perfect mutual 
 dependence, may not be at once obvious. But probably an 
 illustration will sufficiently elucidate the matter. Here are 
 certain domestic affections, which can be gratified only by the 
 estabhshment of relationships with other beings. In the ab- 
 sence of those beings, and the consequent dormancy of the 
 feelings with which they are regarded, life is incomplete — the 
 individuality is shorn of its fair proportions. Now as the 
 normal unfolding of the conjugal and parental elements of the 
 individuality depends on having a family, so, when civilization 
 becomes complete, will the normal unfolding of all other ele- 
 ments of the individuality depend upon the existence of the 
 civilized state. Just that kind of individuality wiU be acquired 
 which finds in the most highly-organized community the 
 fittest sphere for its manifestation — which finds in each social 
 arrangement a condition answering to some faculty in itself — 
 which could not, in fact, expand at all, if otherwise circum- 
 stanced. The ultimate man will be one whose private require- 
 ments coincide with public ones. He will be that manner of 
 man, who, in spontaneously fulfilling his own nature, inci- 
 dentally performs the functions of a social unit; and yet is only 
 enabled so to fulfil his own nature, by all others doing the like. 
 
 § 14. 
 
 How truly, indeed, human progress is towards greater mu- 
 tual dependence, as weU as towards greater individuation — how 
 truly the welfare of each is daily more involved in the welfare 
 of all — and how, truly, therefore, it is the interest of each to 
 respect the interests of all, may, with advantage, be illustrated 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 443 
 
 at length ; for it is a fact of which many seem wofully igno- 
 rant. Men cannot break that vital la^y of the social organism 
 — the law of equal freedom, without penalties in some way or 
 other coming round to them. Being themselves members of 
 the community, they are affected by whatever affects it. Upon 
 the goodness or badness of its state depends the greater or less 
 efficiency with which it administers to their w^ants ; and the 
 less or greater amount of evil it inflicts upon them. Through 
 those vicious arrangements that hourly gall them, they feel the 
 cumulative result of all sins against the social law ; their own 
 sins included. And they suffer for these sins, not only in 
 extra restraints and alarms, but in the extra labour and ex- 
 pense required to compass their ends. 
 
 That every trespass produces a reaction, partly general and 
 partly special — a reaction which is extreme in proportion as 
 the trespass is great, has been more or less noticed in aU ages. 
 Thus the remark is as old as the time of Thales, that tyrants 
 rarely die natural deaths. From his day to ours, the thrones 
 of the East have been continually stained with the blood of 
 their successive occupants. The early histories of all European 
 states, and the recent history of Eussia, illustrate the same fact ; 
 and if we are to judge by his habits, the present Czar lives in 
 constant fear of assassination. Nor is it true that those who 
 bear universal sway, and seem able to do as they please, can 
 really do so. They limit their own freedom in limiting that of 
 others : their despotism recoils, and puts them also in bondage. 
 We read, for instance, that the Eoman emperors were the 
 puppets of their soldiers. " In the Byzantine palace," says 
 Gibbon, " the emperor was the first slave of the ceremonies 
 he imposed." Speaking of the tedious etiquette of the time of 
 Louis le Grand, Madame de Maintenon remarks, " Save those 
 only who fill the highest stations, I know of none more un- 
 fortunate than those who envy them. If you could only form 
 an idea of what it is ! " The same reaction is felt by slave- 
 owners. Some of the West India planters have acknowledged 
 that before negro emancipation they were the greatest slaves 
 
444 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 on their estates. The Americans, too, ai-e shackled in various 
 ways by their own injustice. In the south, the whites are 
 self-coerced, that they may coerce the blacks. Marriage with 
 one of the mixed race is forbidden ; there is a slave-owning 
 quaUfication for senators ; a man may not liberate his own 
 slaves without leave ; and only at the risk of lynching dare any 
 one say a word in favour of abolition. 
 
 It is, indeed, becoming clear to most that these gross trans- 
 gi-essions return upon the perpetrators — that " this even-handed 
 justice commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice to 
 our own lips ; " but it is not yet clear to them that the like is 
 true of those lesser transgressions they are themselves guilty 
 of. Probably the modem maintainers of class power can 
 see well enough that their feudal ancestors paid somewhat 
 dearly for keeping the masses in thraldom. They can see that, 
 what with armour and hidden mail, what with sliding panels, 
 secret passages, dimly-lighted rooms, precautions against poi- 
 son, and constant fears of surprise and treachery, these barons 
 had but uncomfortable lives of it at the best. They can see 
 how delusive was the notion that the greatest wealth was to 
 be obtained by making serfs of the people. They can see 
 that in Jacqueries and GaUician massacres, when bondsmen 
 glut their vengeance by burning castles and slaughtering the 
 inmates, there arrive fatal settlements of long-standing ba- 
 lances. But they cannot see that their own inequitable deeds, 
 in one way or other, come home to them. Just as these feudal 
 nobles mistook the evils they suffered under for unalterable 
 ordinations of nature, never dreaming that they were the reflex 
 results of tyranny, so do their descendants fail to perceive that 
 many of their own unhappinesses are similarly generated. 
 
 And yet, whilst in some cases it is scarcely possible to trace 
 the secret channels through which our misbehaviour to others 
 returns upon us, there are other cases in which the reaction is 
 palpable. An audience rushing out of a theatre on fire, and 
 in their eagerness to get before each other jamming up the 
 doorway so that no one can get tlirough, ofi'ers a good example 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 445 
 
 of unjust selfishness defeating itself. An analogous result 
 may be witnessed at the American ordinaries, where the at- 
 tempts of greedy guests to get more tlian a fair share, have 
 generated a competition in fast eating which not only frus- 
 trates these attempts, but entails on all, immediate loss of 
 enjoyment and permanent ill-health. In such cases it is clear 
 enough, that by trespassing upon the claims of others, men hurt 
 themselves also. The reaction is here direct and immediate. 
 In all other cases, however, reaction is equally sure, though it 
 may come round by some circuitous route, or after a consider- 
 able lapse of time, or in an unrecognized form. The country 
 squire who thinks it a piece of profound policy to clear his 
 estate of cottages, that he may saddle some other place with 
 the paupers, forgets that landowners in neighbouring parishes 
 will eventually defeat him by doing the same ; or that if he is 
 so situated as to settle his labourers upon towns, the walking 
 of extra miles to and fro must gradually lower the standard of 
 a day's work, raise the cost of cultivation, and, in the end, 
 decrease rent. Nor does he see that by the overcrowded bed- 
 rooms and neglected drainage and repairs to which this poUcy 
 leads, he is generating debihty or disease, and raising his 
 poors-rates in one way, whilst he lowers them in another. 
 The Dorsetshire farmer who pays wages in taiHngs of wheat 
 charged above market price, imagines he is economizing. It 
 never occurs to him that he loses more than the difference by 
 petty thefts, by the destruction of his hedges for fuel, by the 
 consequent pounding of his cattle, and by the increase of 
 county-rates, for the prosecution of robbers and poachers. It 
 seems very clear to the tradesman that all extra profit made by 
 adulterating goods, is so much pure gain ; and for a while, 
 perhaps, it may be. By-and-by, however, his competitors do 
 as he does — are in a measure compelled to do so— and the 
 rate of profit is then brought down to what it was before. 
 Meanwhile the general practice of adulteration has been en- 
 couraged — has got into other departments — has deteriorated 
 the articles our shopkeeper buys ; and thus, in his capacity of 
 
44G GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 consumer, he suffers from the vicious system he has helped to 
 strengthen. When, during negro apprenticeship, the West 
 India planters had to value slaves who wished to huy them- 
 selves off, before " the Queen's free," they no doubt thought it 
 cunning to make oath to a higher worth per day than the true 
 one. But when, awhile after, having to pay wages, they had 
 their own estimates quoted to them, and found that the negroes 
 would take nothing less, they probably repented of their dis- 
 honesty. It is often long before these recoils come ; but they 
 do come, nevertheless. See how the Irish landlords are at 
 length being punished for their rack-renting, their evictions, 
 their encouragement of middlemen, and their utter recklessness 
 of popular welfare. Note, too, how for having abetted those 
 who wronged the native Irish, England has to pay a penalty, 
 in the shape of loans wliich are not refunded,, and in the 
 misery produced by the swarms of indigent immigrants, who 
 tend to bring down her own people to their level. Thus, be 
 they committed by many or by few — be they seen in efforts to 
 despoil foreigners by restrictive duties, or in a tradesman's 
 trickeries — breaches of equity are uniformly self-defeating. 
 Whilst men continue social units, they cannot transgress the 
 life principle of society without disastrous consequences some- 
 how or other coming back upon them. 
 
 § 15. 
 
 Not only does the ultimate welfare of the citizen demand 
 that he should himself conform to the moral law; it equally 
 concerns him that every one should conform to it. This inter- 
 dependence which the social state necessitates makes aU men's 
 business his business, in a more or less indirect way. To 
 people whose eyes do not wander beyond their ledgers, it seems 
 of no consequence how the affairs of mankind go. They think 
 they know better than to trouble themselves with public matters, 
 making enemies and damaging their trade. Yet if they are 
 indeed so selfish as to care nothing about their fellow-crea- 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 447 
 
 tures, whilst their o^\^l flesh-pots are -well filled, let them 
 leam that tliey have a pounds, shilhngs, and pence interest at 
 stake. Mere pocket prudence should induce them to further 
 human welfare, if no higher motive will. To help in putting 
 things on a juster footing will eventually pay. The diffusion of 
 sound principles and the improvement of pubhc morality, end in 
 diminishing household expenses. Can they not see that when 
 buying meat and bread and groceries, they have to give some- 
 thing towards maintaining prisons and police ? Can they not 
 see that in the price of a coat they are charged a large per- 
 centage to cover the tailor's bad debts ? Every transaction of 
 their lives is in some way hampered by the general immorality. 
 They feel it in the rate of interest demanded for capital, which 
 (neglecting temporary variations) is high in proportion as men 
 are bad^. They feel it in the amount of attorneys' bills ; or in 
 having to suffer robbery, lest the law should commit on them 
 greater robbery. They feel it in their share of the two and a 
 half millions a year, which our metallic currency costs. They 
 feel it in those collapses of trade, which follow extensive gam- 
 bling speculations. It seems to them an absurd waste of time 
 to help in spreading independence amongst men ; and yet, did 
 they call to mind how those railway shares, which they bought 
 at a premium, went down to a ruinous discount because the 
 directors cringed to a rich bully, they would leam that the pre- 
 valence of a manly spirit may become of money- value to them. 
 They suppose themselves unconcerned in the quarrels of neigh- 
 bouring nations ; and yet, on examination, they will find that a 
 Hungarian war by the loans it calls for, or a Danish blockade 
 by its influence upon our commerce, more or less remotely 
 affects their profits, in whatever secluded nook of England they 
 may Hve. Their belief is that they are not at all interested in 
 the good government of India; and yet a little reflection would 
 show them that they continually suffer from those fluctuations 
 
 * When dishonesty and improvidence are extreme, capital cannot be had under 
 30 to 40 per cent., as in the Burmese empire, or in England in the time of King John. 
 — See Mill's Political Economy. 
 
448 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 of trade consequent upon the irregular and insufficient supply of 
 cotton from America — fluctuations which would probably have 
 ceased, had not India been exhausted by its rulers' extravagance. 
 Not interested ? Why even the better education of the Chinese 
 is of moment to them, for Chinese prejudice shuts out English 
 merchants. Not interested? Why they have a stake in the 
 making of American railways and canals, for these ultimately 
 affect the price of bread in England. Not interested ? Why the 
 accumulation of wealth by every people on the face of the earth 
 concerns them ; for whilst it is the law of capital to overflow 
 from those places where it is abundant, to those where it is 
 scarce, rich nations can never fully enjoy the fruits of their own 
 laboiu- until other nations are equally rich. The well ordering 
 of human affairs in the remotest and most insignificant com- 
 munities is beneficial to all men : the ill ordering of them 
 calamitous to all men. And though the citizen may be but 
 slightly acted upon by each pai-ticular good or evil influence, 
 at work within his own society, and still more shghtly by each 
 of those at work within other societies — although the effect on 
 him may be infinitesimal, yet it is on the cumulative result of 
 myriads of these infinitesimal influences that his happiness or 
 misery depends. 
 
 § 16. 
 
 Still more clearly seen is this ultimate identity of personal 
 interests and social interests, when we discover how essentially 
 vital is the connection between each person and the society of 
 which he is a unit. We commonly enough compare a nation 
 to a Uving organism. We speak of " the body politic," of the 
 functions of its several pai-ts, of its growth, tmd of its diseases, 
 as though it were a creature. But we usually employ these 
 expressions as metaphors, httle suspecting how close is the 
 analogy, and how far it will bear carrying out. So completely, 
 however, is a society organized upon the same system as an in- 
 dividual being, that we may almost say there is something more 
 than analog}' between them. Let us look at a few of the facts. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 449 
 
 Observe first, that the parallel gains immensely in reason- 
 ableness, when we learn that the human body is itself com- 
 pounded of innumerable microscopic organisms, which possess 
 a kind of independent vitality, which grow by imbibing nutri- 
 ment from the circulating fluids, and which multiply, as the in- 
 fusorial monads do, by spontaneous fission. The whole process 
 of development, beginning with the first change in the ovum, 
 and ending with the production of an adult man, is funda- 
 mentally a perpetual increase in the number of these ' cells 
 by the mode of fissiparous generation. On the other hand, that 
 gradual decay witnessed in old age, is in essence a cessation 
 of this increase. During health, the vitality of these cells is 
 subordinated to that of the system at large ; and the presence 
 of insubordinate cells implies disease. Thus, small-pox arises 
 from the intrusion of a species of cell, foreign to that commu- 
 nity of cells of which the body consists, and which, absorbing 
 nourishment from the blood, rapidly multiplies by spontaneous 
 division, until its progeny have diffused themselves throughout 
 the tissues; and if the excreting energies of the constitution 
 fail to get rid of these aliens, death ensues. In certain states 
 of body, indigenous cells will take on new forms of life, and 
 by continuing to reproduce their like, give origin to para- 
 sitic growths, such as cancer. Under the microscope, cancer can 
 be identified by a specific element, known as the cancer-cell. 
 Besides those modifications of cell-vitality, which constitute 
 mahgnant diseases, there occasionally happens another in which 
 cells, without any change in their essential nature, rebel against 
 the general governing force of the system ; and, instead of ceas- 
 ing to grow, whilst yet invisible to the naked eye, expand to 
 a considerable size, sometimes even reaching several inches in 
 diameter. These are called Hydatids or Aceplialo cysts'^, and 
 
 ^ " The primitive forms of all tissues are free cells, which grow by imbibition, 
 and which develop their like from their nucleus of hyaline. All the animal tissues 
 result from transformations of these cells. It is to such cells that the acephalocvst 
 bears the closest analogies in physical, chemical, and vital properties. • « * • 
 We may, with some truth, say that the human body is primarily composed or built 
 up of acephalocysts ; microscopical, indeed, and which, under natural and healthy 
 
 G G 
 
450 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 have, until lately, been taken for internal parasites or entozoa. 
 Still closer appears the relationship between tissue-cells and 
 the lowest independent organisms, on finding that there exists 
 a creature called the Gregarina, very similar in structure to 
 the Hydatid, but which is admitted to be an entozoon. 
 Consisting as it does of a ceU-membrane, inclosing fluid and 
 fl solid nucleus, and multiplying as it does by the spontaneous 
 fission of this nucleus and subsequent division of the ceU-walls, 
 the Gregarina difiers from a tissue-cell merely in size, and in 
 not forming part of the organ containing it^ Thus there may 
 
 conditions, are metamorphosed into cartilage, bone, nerve, muscular fibre, &c 
 When, instead of such change, the organic cells grow to dimensions which make 
 them recognisable to the naked eye, such development of acephalocysts, as they are 
 then called, is commonly connected in the human subject with an enfeeblement of 
 the controlling plastic force, which, at some of the weaker points of the frame, seems 
 unable to direct the metamorphosis of the primitive cells along the right road to 
 the tissues they were destined to form, but permits them to retain, as it were, 
 their embryo condition, and - to grow by the imbibition of the surrounding fluid, 
 and thus become the means of injuriously affecting or destroying the tissues which 
 they should have supported and repaired. I regard the different Acephalocysts, 
 therefore, as merely so many forms or species of morbid or dropsical cells." — 
 Professor Owen^s Hunterian Lectures. 
 
 ^ " Schleiden has viewed these Gregarina as essentially single organic cells, and 
 would refer them to the lowest group of plants. And here, indeed, we have a good 
 instance of the essential unity of the organic di%'ision of matter. It is only the power 
 of self-contraction of tissue, and its solubility in acetic acid, which turn the scale 
 in favour of the animality of the Gregari-iia ; they have no mouth and no stomach 
 which have commonly been deemed the most constant organic characteristics of an 
 animal." 
 
 "1846, Henle and others have questioned the title of the Grcyai-iTia to be regarded 
 as an organic species or individual at all, or as anything more than a monstrous cell : 
 thus applying to it my idea, propounded in 1843, of the true nature of the acepha- 
 locyst." 
 
 "1848, KoUicker has recently published an elaborate memoir on the genus, in which 
 good and sufficient grounds are given for concluding that the Gregarina not merely 
 resembles, but actually is an animated cell ; it stands on the lowest step of the ani- 
 mal series, parallel with that of the single-celled species of the vegetable kingdom. 
 The Gregarina consists, as Schleiden and others have well shoivn, of a cell-membrane 
 of the fluid and granular contents of the cell, and of the nucleus with (occasional) 
 nucleoli. The nucleus is the hardest part, resisting pressure longest, like that of 
 the Polygastrian. It divides, and its division is foUowed by spontaneous fission."— 
 Professor Owen's Hunterian Lectures. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 451 
 
 coexist in the same organism cells of which that organism is 
 constituted, others which should have helped to build it up, 
 but which are insubordinate or partially separate, and others 
 which are naturally separate, and simply reside in its cavities. 
 Hence we are warranted in considering the body as a common- 
 wealth of monads, each of which has independent powers of hfe, 
 growth, and reproduction ; each of which unites with a number 
 of others to perform some function needful for supporting itself 
 and all the rest; and each of which absorbs its share of nutri- 
 ment from the blood. And when thus regai-ded, the analogy 
 between an individual being and a human society, in which 
 each man, whilst helping to subserve some pubhc want, absorbs 
 a portion of the circulating stock of commodities brought to 
 his door, is palpable enough. 
 
 A still more remarkable fulfilment of this analogy is to be 
 found in the fact, that the different kinds of organization wliich 
 society takes on, in progressing from its lowest to its highest 
 phase of development, are essentially similar to the different 
 kinds of animal organization. Creatures of inferior tj'pe are 
 httle more than aggregations of numerous like parts — are 
 moulded on what Professor Owen terms the principle of ve- 
 getative repetition ; and in tracing the forms assumed by suc- 
 cessive grades above these, we find a gi-adual diminution in 
 the number of hke parts, and a multiplication of unhke ones. 
 In the one extreme there are but few functions, and many 
 similar agents to each function : in the other, there are many 
 functions, and few similar agents to each function. Thus the 
 visual apparatus in a fly consists of two gi'oups of fixed lenses, 
 numbering in some species 20,000. Every one of these lenses 
 produces an image; but as its field of view is extremely narrow, 
 and as there exists no power of adaptation to different distances, 
 the vision obtained is probably very imperfect. Whilst the 
 mammal, on the other hand, possesses but two eyes ; each of 
 these includes numerous appendages. It is compounded of 
 several lenses, having different forms and duties. These lenses 
 are capable of various focal adjustments. There are muscles 
 
 G G 2 
 
452 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 for directing them to the right and to the left, to the ground 
 and to the sky. There is a curtain (the iiis) to regulate the 
 quantity of light admitted. There is a gland to secrete, a tube 
 to pour out, and a drain to carry off the lubricating fluid. 
 There is a lid to wipe the surface, and there are lashes to give 
 warning on the approach of foreign bodies. Now the contrast 
 between these two kinds of visual organ is the contrast between 
 all lower and higher types of structure. If we examine the 
 framework employed to support the tissues, we find it consist- 
 ing ill the Annelida (the common worm, for instance) of an 
 extended series of rings. In the Myriapoda, which stand next 
 above the Annelida, these rings are less numerous and more 
 dense. In the higher Myriapoda they are united into a com- 
 paratively few large and strong segments, whilst in the Insecta 
 this condensation is carried still further. Speaking of analogous 
 changes in the crustaceans, the lowest of which is constructed 
 much as the centipede, and the highest of which (the crab) 
 has nearly all its segments united, Professor Jones says — "And 
 even the steps whereby we pass from the Annelidan to the 
 Myriapod, and from thence to the Insect, the Scorpion, and 
 the Spider, seem to be repeated as we thus review the pro- 
 gressive development of the class before us." Mark again, 
 that these modifications of the exo-skeleton are completely 
 paralleled by those of the endb-skeleton. The vertebra are 
 numerous in fish, and in the opliidian reptiles. They are 
 less numerous in the higher reptiles ; less numerous still in 
 the quadrupeds ; fewest of all in man : and whilst their number 
 is diminished, their forms and the functions of their appendages 
 are varied, instead of being, as in the eel, nearly all alike. 
 Thus, also, is it with locomotive organs. The spines of the 
 echinus and the suckers of the star-fish are multitudinous. 
 So likewise are the legs of the centipede. In the crastaceans 
 we come down to fourteen, twelve, and ten ; in the arachnidans 
 and insects to eight and six ; in the lower mammalia to four ; 
 and in man to two. The successive modifications of the di- 
 gestive cavity are of analogous nature. Its lowest form is that 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 453 
 
 of a sack with but one opening. Next it is a tube with two 
 openings, having different offices. And in higher creatures, 
 this tube, instead of being made up of absorbents from end to 
 end — that is, instead of being an aggregation of like parts — 
 is modified into many unlike ones, having different structures 
 adapted to the different stages into which the assimilative 
 function is now divided. Even the classification under which 
 man, as forming the genus Bimana, is distinguished from the 
 most nearly related genus Quadrumana, is based on a dimi- 
 nution in the number of organs that have similar foi-ms and 
 duties. 
 
 Now just this same coalescence of like parts, and separation 
 of unlike ones — just this same iacreasing subdivision of func- 
 tions — takes place in the development of society. The earliest 
 social organisms consist almost wholly of repetitions of one 
 element. Every man is a warrior, hunter, fisherman, builder, 
 agriculturist, toolmaker. Each portion of the community per- 
 forms the same duties with every other portion ; much as each 
 portion of the polyp's body is alike stomach, skin, and lungs. 
 Even the chiefs, in whom a tendency towards separateness of 
 function first appears, still retain their similarity to the rest 
 in economic respects. The next stage is distinguished by a 
 segregation of these social units into a few distinct classes — 
 soldiers, priests, and labourers. A further advance is seen in 
 the sundering of these labourers into different castes, having 
 special occupations, as amongst the Hindoos. And, without 
 further illustration the reader will at once perceive, that from 
 these inferior types of society up to oui' own complicated and 
 more perfect one, the progress has ever been of the same nature. 
 Wliilst he will also perceive that this coalescence of like parts, 
 as seen in the concentration of particular manufacttu-es in par- 
 ticular districts, and this separation of agents having separate 
 functions, as seen in the more and more minute division of 
 labour, are still going on. 
 
 Significant of the alleged analogy is the further fact con' 
 sequent upon the above, that the sensitiveness exhibited by 
 
454 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 societies of low and high structure differs in degree, as does the 
 sensitiveness of similarly-contrasted creatures. That peculiar 
 faculty possessed by inferior organisms of hving on in each 
 part after heing cut in pieces, is a manifest corollary to the 
 other peculiarity just described; namely, that they consist of 
 many repetitions of the same elements. The ability of the 
 several portions into which a polyp has been divided, to grow 
 into complete polyps, obviously implies that each portion con- 
 tains all the organs needful to life ; and each portion can be 
 thus constituted only when those organs recur in every part of 
 the original body. Conversely, the reason why any member 
 of a more higlily-organized being cannot live when separated 
 from the rest is, that it does not include aU the vital elements, 
 but is dependent for its supplies of nutriment, nervous energy, 
 oxygen, &c., upon the members from which it has been cut off. 
 Of course, then, the earliest and latest forms of society, being 
 similarly distinguished in structure, will be similarly distin- 
 guished in susceptibihty of injury. Hence it happens that a 
 tribe of savages may be divided and subdivided with little or no 
 inconvenience to the several sections. Each of these contains 
 every element wliich the whole did — is just as self-suf&cing, 
 and quickly assumes the simple organization constituting an 
 independent tribe. Hence, on the contrary, it happens, that 
 in a community hke our own no pai't can be cut off or in- 
 jured without all parts suffeiing. Annihilate the agency em- 
 ployed in distributing commodities, and much of the rest would 
 die before another distributing agency could be developed. 
 Suddenly sever the manufacturing portion from the agricultural 
 portion, and the one would expire outright, whilst the other 
 would long hnger in grievous distress. This interdependence 
 is daily shown in commercial changes. Let the factory hands 
 be put on short time, and immediately the colonial produce 
 markets of London and Liverpool are depressed. The shop- 
 keeper is busy or otherwise, according to the amount of the 
 wheat crop. And a potato-blight may ruin dealers in con- 
 sols. 
 
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 455 
 
 Thus do we find, not only that the analogy hetween a society 
 and a living creature is borne out to a degree quite unsuspected 
 by those who commonly draw it, but also, that the same defi- 
 nition of life applies to both. This union of many men into 
 one community — tliis increasing mutual dependence of units 
 which were originally independent — this gradual segregation 
 of citizens into separate bodies, with reciprocally subservient 
 functions — this formation of a whole, consisting of numerous 
 essential parts — this growth of an organism, of which one por- 
 tion cannot be injured without the rest feeling it — may all be 
 generaUzed under the law of individuation. The development 
 of society, as well as the development of man and the develop- 
 ment of life generally, may be described as a tendency to in- 
 dividuate — to become a thing. And rightly interpreted, the 
 manifold forms of progress going on around us, are uniformly 
 significant of this tendency. 
 
 Returning now to the point whence we set out, the fact that 
 public interests and private ones are essentially in unison, can- 
 not fail to be more vividly reahzed, when so vital a connection 
 is found to subsist between society and its members. Though 
 it would be dangerous to place implicit trust in conclusions 
 founded upon the analogy just traced, yet harmonizing as they 
 do with conclusions deducible from every-day experience, they 
 unquestionably enforce these. When, after observing the re- 
 actions entailed by breaches of equity, the citizen contemplates 
 the relation in which he stands to the body pohtic — when he 
 leams that it has a species of hfe, and conforms to the same 
 laws of growth, organization, and sensibiUty that a being does 
 — when he finds that one vitahty circulates through it and him, 
 and that whilst social health, in a measure, depends upon 
 the fulfilment of some function in which he takes part, his 
 happiness depends upon the normal action of eVery organ 
 in the social body — when he duly understands this, he must 
 see that his own welfare and all men's welfare are inseparable, 
 He must see that whatever produces a diseased state in one 
 
456 GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS. 
 
 part of the community, must inevitably inflict injury upon all 
 other parts. He must see that his own life can become what 
 it should be, only as fast as society becomes what it should be. 
 In short, he must become impressed with the salutary truth, 
 that no one can be perfectly free till all are free; no one can be 
 perfectly moral till all are moral ; no one can be perfectly happy 
 till all are happy. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 SUMMARY. 
 
 § 1. 
 
 By bringing -within narrow compass the evidences that have 
 been adduced in support of the Theory of Equity now before 
 him, the reader will be aided in coming to a final judgment 
 upon it. 
 
 At the head of these evidences stands the fact that, from 
 whatever side we commence the investigation. Our paths alike 
 converge towards the principle of which this theory is a deve- 
 lopment. If we start with an a priori inquiry into the condi- 
 tions under which alone the Divine Idea — greatest happiness — 
 can be realized, we find that conformity to the law of equal 
 freedom is the first of them (Chap. III.). If, turning to man's 
 constitution, we consider the means provided for achieving 
 greatest happiness, we quickly reason our way back to this 
 same condition ; seeing that these means cannot work out 
 their end, unless the law of equal freedom is submitted to 
 (Chap. IV.). If, pursuing the analysis a step further, we 
 examine how subordination to the law of equal freedom is 
 secured, we discover certain faculties by which that law is 
 responded to (Chap. V.). If, again, we contemplate the phe- 
 nomena of civilization, we perceive that the process of adapta- 
 tion under which they may be generalized, can never cease 
 until men have become instinctively obedient to this same law 
 of equal freedom (Chap. II.). To all -which positive proofs 
 may also be added the negative one, that to deny this law of 
 equal freedom is to assert divers absurdities (Chap. VI.). 
 
458 SUMMARY. 
 
 §2. 
 
 Further confirmation may be found in the circumstance that 
 pre-existing theories, which are untenable as they stand, are yet 
 absorbed, and the portion of truth contained in them assimi- 
 lated, by the theory now proposed. Thus the production of 
 the greatest happiness, though inappUcable as an immediate 
 guide for men, is nevertlieless the true end of morality, re- 
 garded from the Divine point of view ; and as such, forms part 
 of the present system (Chap. III.). The moral-sense principle, 
 also, whilst misappUed by its propounders, is still based on fact ; 
 and, as was shown, harmonizes, when rightly interpreted, with 
 what seem conflicting beliefs, and unites with them to produce 
 a complete whole. Add to this, that the philosophy now con- 
 tended for, includes, and affords a wider application to, Adam 
 Smith's doctrine of sjTnpathy (p. 97) ; and lastly, that it 
 gives the finishing development to Coleridge's "Idea of Life" 
 (p. 436). 
 
 § 3. 
 
 The power which the proposed theory possesses of reducing 
 the leading precepts of current morality to a scientific form, 
 and of comprehending them, in compemy with sundry less 
 acknowledged precepts, under one generalization, may also be 
 quoted as additional evidence in its favour. Not as heretofore 
 by considering whether, on the whole, manslaughter is produc- 
 tive of unhappiness, or otherwise — not by inquiring if theft is, or 
 is not, expedient — not by asking in the case of slavery what are 
 its efi'ects on the common weal — not by any such complex and 
 inexact processes, neither by the disputable decisions of un- 
 aided moral sense, are we here guided; but by undeniable 
 inferences from a proved first principle. Nor are only the 
 chief rules of right conduct and the just ordering of the con- 
 nubial and parental relationships thus determined for us ; this 
 same first principle indirectly gives distinct answers respecting 
 
SUMMARY. 459 
 
 the proper constitution of governments, their duties, and the 
 limits to their action. Out of an endless labyrinth of con- 
 fused debate concerning the poUcy of these or those public 
 measures, it opens short and easily-discerned ways ; and the 
 conclusions it leads to are enforced, both generally, by an 
 abundant experience of the fallacy of expediency decisions, 
 and specially, by numerous arguments bearing on each succes- 
 sive question. Underlying, therefore, as this first principle 
 does, so wide a range of duty, and appUed as it is by a process 
 of mental admeasurement nearly related to the geometrical — • 
 namely, by ascertaining the equality or inequality of moral 
 quantities (p. 110) — we may consider that a system of ethics 
 synthetically developed from it, partakes of the character of an 
 exact science ; and as doing this possesses additional claims to 
 our confidence. 
 
 §4. 
 
 Again, the injunctions of the moral law, as now interpreted, 
 coincide with and anticipate those of political economy. Po- 
 litical economy teaches that restrictions upon commerce are 
 detrimental : the moral law denounces them as wrong (Chap. 
 XXIII.). Pohtical economy tells us that loss is entailed by 
 a forced trade with colonies : the moral law will not permit 
 such a trade to be estabhshed (Chap. XXVII.). Political 
 economy says it is good that speculators should be allowed to 
 operate on the food-markets as they see well : the law of equal 
 freedom (contrary to the current notion) holds them justified 
 in doing this, and condemns all interference with them as 
 inequitable. Penalties upon usury are proved by pohtical 
 economy to be injurious : by the law of equal fi-eedom they 
 are prohibited as involving an infringement of rights. Ac- 
 cording to political economy, machinery is beneficial to the 
 people, rather than hurtful to them : in unison with this the 
 law of equal freedom forbids aU attempts to restrict its use. 
 One of the settled conclusions of pohtical economy is, that 
 
460 SUMMARY. 
 
 wages and prices cannot be artificially regulated : meanwhile it 
 is an obvious inference from the law of equal freedom that no 
 artificial regulation of them is morally permissible. We are 
 taught by pohtical economy that to be least injurious taxa- 
 tion must be direct : coincidently we find that direct taxation 
 is the only kind of taxation against which the law of equal 
 freedom does not unconditionally protest (p. 208). On sundry 
 other questions, such as the hurtfulness of tamperings with 
 currency, the futility of endeavours to permanently benefit one 
 occupation at the expense of others, the impropriety of legis- 
 lative interference with manufacturing processes, &c., the con- 
 clusions of pohtical economy are similarly at one with the 
 dictates of this law. And thus the laboured arguments of 
 Adam Smith and his successors are forestalled, and for prac- 
 tical purposes made needless, by the simplest deductions of 
 fundamental moraUty : a fact which, perhaps, will not be duly 
 realized until it is seen that the inferences of political economy 
 are true, only because they are discoveries by a roundabout pro- 
 cess of what the moral law commands. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 Moreover, the proposed theory includes a pliilosophy of civi- 
 lization. WHulst in its ethical aspect it ignores evil, yet in 
 its psychological aspect it shows how evil disappears. Whilst, 
 as an abstract statement of what conduct should he, it assumes 
 human perfection— is, in fact, the law of that perfection— yet, 
 as a rationale of moral phenomena, it explains why conduct is 
 becoming what it should be, and why the process through 
 which humanity has passed was necessary. 
 
 Thus we saw that the possession by the aboriginal man of 
 a constitution enabling him to appreciate and act up to the 
 principles of pure rectitude would have been detrimental, and 
 indeed fatal (p. 410). We saw that in accordance with the 
 law of adaptation, the faculties responding to those piinciples 
 began to unfold as soon as the conditions of existence called 
 
SUMMARY. 461 
 
 for them. From time to time it has been shown that the 
 leading incidents of progress indicate the continued develop- 
 ment of these faculties. That supremacy of them must precede 
 the reahzation of the perfect state, has been implied in nume- 
 rous places. And the influence by which their ultimate su- 
 premacy is ensured has been pointed out (Chap. II.). 
 
 So that though one side of the proposed theoiy, in exhibiting 
 the conditions under wliich alone the Divine Idea may be 
 reaUzed, overlooks the existing defects of mankind ; the other 
 side, in exhibiting the mental properties requisite for fulfilling 
 these conditions, shows what civilization essentially is ; why it 
 was needful ; and explains for us its leading traits. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Finally, there is the fact lately alluded to, that moral truth, 
 as now interpreted, proves to be a development of physiological 
 truth; for the so-called moral law is in reahty the law of com- 
 plete life. As more than once pointed out, a total cessation in 
 the exercise of faculties is death ; whatever partially prevents 
 their exercise, produces pain or partial death ; and only when 
 activity is permitted to all of them, does hfe become perfect. 
 Liberty to exercise the faculties being thus the first condition 
 of life, and the extension of that Hberty to the furthest point 
 possible being the condition of tlie highest hfe possible, it fol- 
 lows that the liberty of each, limited only by the hke Hberty of 
 all, is the condition of complete life as apphed to mankind at 
 large. 
 
 Nor is this true of mankind in their individual capacities 
 only : it is equally true of them in their corporate capacity ; 
 seeing that the vitality which a community exhibits is high 
 or low according as this condition is or is not fulfilled. For, 
 as the reader no doubt observed in the course of our late ana- 
 lysis, those superior types of social organization, characterized 
 by the mutual dependence of their respective parts, are possible 
 only in as far as their respective parts can confide in each other; 
 
462 SUMMARY. 
 
 that is, only in as far as men behave justly to their fellows ; 
 that is, only in as far as they obey the law of equal freedom. 
 
 Hence, broadly generalizing, as it does, the prerequisites 
 of existence, both personal and social — being on the one hand 
 the law under which each citizen may attain complete hfe, and 
 on the other hand being, not figuratively, but literally, the vital 
 law of the social organism — being the law under which perfect 
 individuation, both of man and of society, is achieved — being, 
 therefore, the law of that state towards wliich creation tends — ■ 
 the law of equal freedom may properly be considered as a law 
 of nature. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 Having now briefly reviewed the arguments — having called 
 to mind that our first principle is anived at by several inde- 
 pendent methods of inquiry — that it unfolds into a system, 
 uniting in one consistent whole, theories, some of which seem 
 conflicting, and others unrelated — that it not only gives a scien- 
 tific derivation to the leading precepts of morality, but includes 
 them along with the laws of state-duty under one generalization 
 — that it utters injunctions coinciding with those of poUtical 
 economy — that civilization is explicable as the evolution of a 
 being capable of conforming to it — that, as the law of complete 
 life, it is Unked with those physical laws of which life is the 
 highest product — and lastly, that it possesses such multipUed 
 relationships, because it underhes the manifestations of life — 
 having called to mind these things, the reader will perhaps find 
 the rays of evidence thus brought to a focus, sufficient to dissi- 
 pate the doubts that may hitherto have lingered with him. 
 
CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 § 1- 
 
 A FEW words are needful respecting the attitude to be assumed 
 towards the doctrines that have heen enunciated. Probahly 
 many wiU eagerly search out excuses for disregarding the 
 restraints set up by the moral law as herein developed. The 
 old Tiabit of faUing back upon considerations of expediency — 
 a habit which men followed long before it was apotheosized by 
 Paley — wiU still have influence. Although it has been shown 
 that the system of deciding upon conduct by direct calculation 
 of results is a fallacious one — although the plea that, however 
 proper certain rules of action may be, occasional exceptions 
 axe necessary, has been found hollow (Lemma II.), yet we may 
 anticipate further apologies for disobedience, on the score of 
 " poHcy." Amongst other reasons for claiming latitude, it will 
 very Hkely be urged that, whereas the perfect moral code is 
 confessedly beyond the fulfilment of imperfect men, some other 
 code is needful for our present guidance. Not what is theo- 
 retically right, but what is the best course practicable under 
 existing circumstances, wiU probably be insisted on as the 
 thing to be discovered. Some again may argue, that which- 
 ever hue of conduct produces the greatest benefit as matters 
 stand, if noX. positively right, is still relatively so ; and is, there- 
 fore, for the time being, as obligatory as the abstract law itself. 
 Or it will perhaps be said, that if, with human nature what it 
 now is, a sudden re- arrangement of society upon the principles 
 
464 CONCLDSION. 
 
 of pure equity would produce disastrous results, it follows that, 
 until perfection is reached, some discretion must be used in de- 
 ciding how far these principles shall be carried out. And thus 
 may we expect to have expediency re- asserted as at least the 
 temporary law, if not the ultimate one. Let us examine these 
 positions in detail. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 To say that the imperfect man requires a moral code which 
 recognises his imperfection and allows for it, seems at first sight 
 reasonable. But it is not really so. Wherever such a code 
 differs fi'om the perfect code, it must so differ in being le^s 
 stringent; for as it is argued that the perfect code requires so 
 modifying as to become possible of fulfilment by existing men, 
 the modification must consist in omitting its hardest injunctions. 
 So that instead of saying — " Do not transgress at all," it is 
 proposed, in consideration of our weakness, to say — " Trans- 
 gress only in such and such cases." Stated thus, the propo- 
 sition almost condemns itself; seeing that it makes morality 
 countenance acts which are confessedly immoral. 
 
 Passing by this, however, suppose we inquire what advantage 
 is promised by so lowering the standard of conduct. Can it be 
 supposed that men will on the whole come nearer to a full dis- 
 charge of duty when the most difficult part of this duty is not 
 insisted on ? Hardly: for whilst performance so commonly falls 
 below its aim, to bring down its aim to the level of possibility, 
 must be to make performance fall below possibility. Is it that 
 any evil will result from endeavouiiug after a morality of which 
 we are as yet but partially capable? No; on the contrary, it 
 is only by pei-petual aspiration after what has been hitherto be- 
 yond our reach, that advance is made. And where is the need 
 for any such modification ? Whatever inability exists in us, 
 will of necessity assert itself; and in actual life our code will be 
 virtually lowered in proportion to that inability. If men cannot 
 yet entirely obey the law, why, they cannot, and there is an end 
 
CONCLUSION. 465 
 
 of the matter ; but it does not follow that we ought therefore 
 to stereotype their incompetency, by specifying how much is 
 possible to them and how much is not. Nor, indeed, could 
 we do this were it desirable. Only by experiment is it to be 
 decided in how far each individual can conform ; and the de- 
 gree of conformity achievable by one is not the same as that 
 achievable by others, so that one specification would not answer 
 for all. Moreover, could an average be struck, it would apply 
 only to the time being ; and would be inapplicable to the time 
 immediately succeeding. Hence a system of morals which 
 shall recognise man's present imperfections and allow for them, 
 cannot be devised; and would be useless if it could be de- 
 vised. 
 
 §3. 
 
 Those who, by way of excusing a little politic disobedience, 
 allege their anxiety to be practical, wiU do well to weigh their 
 words a little. By " practical," is described some mode of 
 action productive of benefit; and a plan which is specially so 
 designated, as contrasted with others, is one assumed to be, 
 on the whole, more beneficial than such others. Now this that 
 we call the moral law is simply a statement of the conditions 
 of beneficial action. Originating in the primary necessities of 
 things, it is the development of these into a series of limitations 
 within which all conduct conducive to the greatest happiness 
 must be confined. To overstep such limitations is to disregard 
 these necessities of things — to fight against the constitution of 
 nature. In other words, to plead the desire of being practical, 
 as a reason for transgressing the moral law, is to assume that in 
 the pursuit of benefit we must break through the bounds within 
 which only benefit is obtainable. 
 
 "What an insane notion is this that we can advantageously de- 
 vise, and arrange, and alter, in ignorance of the inherent condi- 
 tions of success; or that knowing these conditions we may slight 
 them ! In the field and the workshop we show greater wisdom. 
 We have learnt to respect the properties of the substances with 
 
 H H 
 
466 CONCLUSION. 
 
 which we deal. Weight, mobility, inertia, cohesion, are uni- 
 versally recognised — are virtually, if not scientifically, under- 
 stood to be essential attributes of matter; and none but the 
 most hopeless of simpletons disregard them. In morals and 
 legislation, however, we behave as though the things dealt with 
 had no fixed properties, no attributes. We do not inquire re- 
 specting this human nature what are the laws under which its 
 varied phenomena may be generalized, and accommodate our 
 acts to them. We do not ask what constitutes life, or wherein 
 happiness properly consists, and choose our measures accord- 
 ingly. Yet, is it not unquestionable that of man, of life, of 
 happiness, certain primordial truths are predicable which ne- 
 cessarily underUe all right conduct ? Is not gratification uni- 
 formly due to the fulfilment of their functions by the respective 
 faculties ? Does not each faculty grow by exercise, and dwindle 
 from disuse ? And must not the issue of every scheme of legis- 
 lation or culture, primarily depend upon the regard paid to these 
 facts ? Surely it is but reasonable, before devising measures 
 for the benefit of society, to ascertain what society is made of. 
 Is human nature constant, or is it not ? If so, why ? If not, 
 why not ? Is it in essence always the same ? then what are 
 its permanent characteristics ? Is it changing ? then what is 
 the nature of the change it is undergoing? what is it be- 
 coming, and why? Manifestly the settlement of these ques- 
 tions ought to precede the adoption of " practical measures." 
 The result of such measures cannot be matter of chance. 
 The success or failure of them must be determined by their 
 accordance or discordance with certain fixed principles of 
 things. What foUy is it, then, to ignore these fixed principles ! 
 Call you that "practical" to begin your twcKth book before 
 learning the axioms ? 
 
 But if we are not as yet capable of entirely fulfiUing the 
 perfect law, and if our inability renders needful certain supple- 
 
CONCIUSION. 4G7 
 
 mentary regulations, then, are not these supplementary regula- 
 tions, in virtue of their beneficial effects, ethically justifiable ? 
 and if the abolition of them, on the ground that they conflict 
 ■with abstract morality, would be disadvantageous, then, are they 
 not of higher authority, for the time being, than the moral law 
 itself? — must not the relatively right take precedence of the 
 positively right ? 
 
 The confident air with which this question seems to claim an 
 affirmative answer is somewhat rashly assumed. It is not true 
 that the arrangement best adapted to the time, possesses, in vir- 
 tue of its adaptation, any independent authority. Its authority 
 is not original, but derived. Whatsoever respect is due to it, 
 is due to it ordy as a partial embodiment of the moral law. 
 The whole benefit conferred by it is attributable to the ful- 
 filment of that portion of the moral law which it enforces. 
 For consider the essential nature of all advantages obtained by 
 any such arrangement. The use of every institution is to aid 
 men in the achievement of happiness. Happiness consists in 
 the due exercise of faculties. Hence an institution suited to 
 the time, must be one which in some way or other ensures to 
 men more facUity for the exercise of faculties — that is, greater 
 freedom for such exercise — than they would enjoy without it. 
 Thus, if it be asserted of a given people that a despotism is at 
 present the best form of government for them, it is meant that 
 the exercise of faculties is less hmited under a despotism, than 
 it would be hmited under the anarchical state entailed by any 
 other form of government ; and that, therefore, despotism gives 
 to such a people an amount of liberty to exercise the faculties 
 greater than they would possess in its absence. Similarly, all 
 apologies that can be made for a narrow suffrage, for censor- 
 ship of the press, for restraint by passports; and the like, resolve 
 themselves into assertions that the preservation of pubUc order 
 necessitates these restrictions — that social dissolution would 
 ensue on their abolition — that there would arise a state of uni- 
 versal aggression by men on each other — or, in other words, 
 that the law of equal freedom is less violated by the mainte- 
 
 H H 2 
 
468 CONCLUSION. 
 
 nance of these restrictions, than it would be violated were they 
 repealed. 
 
 If, then, the only excuse to be made for measures of tem- 
 porary expediency is, that they get the commands of the moral 
 law fulfilled better than any other measures can, their authority 
 may no more be compared with that of the moral law itself, 
 than the authority of a servant with that of a master. Whilst 
 a conductor of force is inferior to a generator of it — whilst an 
 instrument is inferior to the will which guides it, so long must 
 an institution be inferior to the law whose ends it subserves, 
 and so long must such institution bend to that law as the agent 
 to his principal. 
 
 And here let it be remarked, that we shall avoid much confu- 
 sion by ceasing to use the word right in any but its legitimate 
 sense ; that, namely, in which it describes conduct purely moral. 
 Rightness expresses of actions, what straightness does of hnes ; 
 and there can no more be two kinds of right action than there 
 can be two kinds of straight Une. If we would keep our con- 
 clusions free from ambiguity, we must reserve the term we em- 
 ploy to signify absolute rectitude, solely for this purpose. And 
 when it is needfiil to express the claims of imperfect, though be- 
 neficial, institutions, we must speak of them, not as "relatively 
 right," or " right for the time being," but as the least wrong 
 institutions now possible. 
 
 § 5. 
 
 The admission that social arrangements can be conformed to 
 the nioral law only in as far as the people are themselves moral, 
 will probably be thought a sufiicient plea for claiming liberty to 
 judge how far the moral law may safely be acted upon. For if 
 congruity between poUtical organization and popular character 
 is necessary ; and if, by consequence, a political organization in 
 advance of the age will need modification to make it fit the 
 age ; and if this process of modification must be accompanied 
 by great inconvenience, -^Jld even suffering ; then it would seem 
 
CONCLUSION. 469 
 
 to follow that for the avoidance of these evils our endeavour 
 should be to at first adapt such organization to the age. That 
 is to say, men's amhition to realize an ideal excellence must be 
 checked by prudential considerations. 
 
 " Progress, and at the same time resistance," — that celebrated 
 saying of M. G-uizot, with which the foregoing position is in 
 substance identical — no doubt expresses a truth ; but not at all 
 the order of truth usually supposed. To look at society from 
 afar off, and to perceive that such and such axe the principles 
 of its development, is one thing : to adopt these as rules for 
 our daily government, will turn out on examination to be quite 
 a different thing. Just as we saw that it is very possible for 
 the attainment of greatest happiness to be from one point of 
 view the recognised end of morahty, and yet to be of no value 
 for immediate guidance (Chap. III.), so, it is very possible for 
 " progress, and at the same time resistance," to be a law of 
 social life, without being a law by which individual citizens 
 may regulate their actions. 
 
 That the aspiration after things as they should be, needs 
 restraining by an attachment to things as they are, is fully 
 admitted. The two feeUngs answer to the two sides of our 
 present mixed nature — the side on which we continue adapted 
 to old conditions of existence, and the side on which we are 
 becoming adapted to new ones. Conservatism defends those 
 coercive arrangements which a still-Ungering savageness makes 
 requisite. Radicalism endeavours to realize a state more in 
 harmony with the character of the ideal man. The strengths 
 of these sentiments are proportionate to the necessity for the 
 institutions they respond to. And the social organization 
 proper for a given people at a given time, wil] be one bearing 
 the impress of these sentiment! in the ratio of their prevalence 
 amongst that people at that time. Hence the necessity for a 
 vigorous and constant manifestation of both of them. Whilst, 
 on the one hand, love of what is abstractedly just, indignation 
 against every species of aggression, and enthusiasm on behalf 
 of reform, are to be rejoiced over; we must, on the other hand, 
 
470 CONCLUSION. 
 
 tolerate, as indispensable, these displays of an antagonistic ten- 
 dency; be they seen in the detailed opposition to every im- 
 provement, or in the puerile sentimentalisms of Young England, 
 or even in some frantic effort to bring back the age of hero- 
 worship. Of all these nature has need, so long as they repre- 
 sent sincere beliefs. From time to time the struggle eventuates 
 in change ; and by composition of forces there is produced a 
 resultant, embodying the right amount of movement in the 
 right direction. Thus understood, then, the theory of " pro- 
 gress, and at the same time resistance," is correct. 
 
 Mark now, however, that for this resistance to be beneficial, 
 it must come from those who think the institutions they defend 
 really the best, and the innovations proposed absolutely wrong. 
 It must not come from those who secretly approve of change, 
 but think a certain opposition to it expedient. For if the true 
 end of this conflict of opinion is to keep social arrangements 
 in harmony with the average character of the people ; and if 
 (rejecting that temporary kind of opinion generated by revo- 
 lutionary passion) the honest opinion held by each man of any 
 given state of things is not an intellectual accident, but indi- 
 cates a preponderating fitness or unfitness of that state of things 
 to his moral condition (pp. 240, 427) ; then it follows that only 
 by a universal manifestation of honest opinions can harmony 
 between social arrangements and the average popular- character 
 be preserved. If, conceaUng their real sympathies, some of the 
 movement party join the stationary party, merely with the view 
 of preventing too rapid an advance, they must inevitably dis- 
 turb the adaptation between the community and its institutions. 
 So long as the natural conservatism ever present in society is 
 left to restrain the progressive tendency, things will go right ; 
 
 but add to this natural conservatism an artificial conservatism 
 
 a conservatism not founded on love of the old, but on a theory 
 that conservatism is needful— and the proper ratio between the 
 two forces is destroyed ; the resultant is no longer in the right 
 direction ; and the effect produced by it is more or less vitiated. 
 Whilst, therefore, there is truth in the belief that "progress, 
 
CONCLUSION. 471 
 
 and at the same time resistance," is the law of social change, 
 there is a fatal error in the inference that resistance should be 
 factitiously created. It is a mistake to suppose this the Mnd 
 of resistance called for; and, as M. Guizot's own experience 
 testifies, it is a further mistake to suppose that any one can say 
 how far resistance should he carried. 
 
 But, indeed, without entering upon a criticism like this, the 
 man of moral insight sees clearly enough that no such self- 
 contradicting behaviour can answer. Successful methods are 
 always genuine, sincere. The affairs of the imiverse are not 
 carried on after a system of benign double-dealing. In nature's 
 doings all things show their true qualities — exert whatsoever of 
 influence is reaUy in them. It is manifest that a globe bmlt 
 up partly of semblances instead of facts, would not be long on 
 tliis side chaos. And it is certain that a community composed 
 of men whose acts are not in harmony with their innermost 
 beliefs, will be equally unstable. To know in our hearts that 
 some proposed measure is essentially right, and yet to say by 
 our deeds that it is not right, will never prove really beneficial. 
 Society cannot prosper by lies. 
 
 § 6. 
 
 And yet it will still be thought unreasonable to deny discre- 
 tionary power in this matter. Neglecting prudential considera- 
 tions in the endeavour to put society on a purely equitable 
 basis, will probably be demurred to, as implying an entire 
 abandonment of private judgment. It must be confessed that 
 it does so. But whoso urges this objection, may properly ask 
 himself how much his private judgment, as applied to such a 
 subject, is worth ? 
 
 What is the question he proposes to solve ? Whether it is, 
 or is not, the time for some desired change to be made? — 
 whether the people are, or are not, fit for some higher social 
 foim than they have hitherto lived under ? Where now are his 
 
472 CONCLUSION. 
 
 qualifications for answering this question ? Has he ever seen 
 the millions for whom he would prescribe ? Some tenth part 
 of them perhaps. How many of these does he recognise? 
 Probably of one or two thousand he can tell you the names 
 and occupations. But with how many of these is he ac- 
 quainted ? Several hundi-eds, it may be. And of what fraction 
 of them does he personally know the characters ? They are 
 numbered by tens. Then it must be by what he reads in 
 books and newspapers, witnesses at meetings, and hears in 
 conversation that he judges? Partly so: from the salient 
 points of character thus brought under his notice, he infers the 
 rest. Does he then find his inferences trustworthy ? On the 
 contrary, when he goes amongst men he has read of, or heard 
 described, it usually turns out that he has got quite a wrong 
 impression of them. Does this evidence from which he judges 
 lead all persons to like conclusions ? No : with the same 
 sources of information open to them, others form opinions of 
 the people widely different from those he holds. Are his own 
 convictions constant ? Not at all : he continually meets with 
 facts which prove that he had generalized on insufficient data ; 
 and which compel a revision of his estimate. Nevertheless, 
 may it not be that by averaging the characters of those whom 
 he personally knows, he can form a tolerably correct opinion 
 of those whom he does not know ? Hardly : seeing that of 
 those whom he personally knows, his judgments are generally 
 incorrect. Very intimate friends occasionally astound him by 
 quite unexpected behaviour ; even his nearest relatives — bro- 
 thers, sisters, and children do so : nay, indeed, he has but a 
 limited acquaintance with himself; for though from time to 
 time he imagines very clearly how he shall act under certain 
 new circumstances, it commonly happens that when placed in 
 these circumstances his conduct is quite difierent from that 
 which he expected. 
 
 Now of what value is the judgment of so circumscribed an 
 intelligence upon the question — Is the nation ready for such 
 
CONCLUSION. 473 
 
 and such measures of reform, or is it not ? Here is one who 
 professes to say of some thirty millions of people, how they will 
 behave under arrangements a little freer than existing ones. 
 Yet nine-tenths of these people he has not even seen ; can 
 identify only a few thousands of them ; personally knows but 
 an injBnitesimal fraction ; and knows these so imperfectly that 
 on some point or other he finds himself mistaken respecting 
 nearly all of them. Here is one who cannot say even of him- 
 self how certain untried conditions will affect him, and yet who 
 thinks he can say of a whole nation how certain untried con- 
 ditions will affect it! Surely there is in this, a most absurd 
 incongruity between pretension and capability. 
 
 When the contrast between present institutions and projected 
 ones is very great — when, for example, it is proposed to change 
 at once from pure despotism to perfect freedom — we may, in- 
 deed, prophesy with certainty that the result will not fulfil 
 expectation. For whilst the success of institutions depends 
 on their fitness to popular character, and whilst it is impossible 
 for popular character to undergo a great change all at once, it 
 must follow that to suddenly substitute for existing institutions 
 others of a quite opposite nature, will necessitate unfitness, 
 and, therefore, failure. But it is not in cases like this that 
 the power of judging is contended for. As elsewhere shown 
 (p. 4:32), one of these extreme changes is never consequent 
 upon that peaceful expression of opiaion presupposed by the 
 hypothesis that the citizen should be cautious in advocating 
 reform ; on the contrary, it is always a result of some revolu- 
 tionary passion which no considerations of pohcy can control. 
 Only when an amelioration is being peaceably discussed and 
 agitated for — that is, only when the circumstances prove its 
 advent at hand — can the proposed discretion be exercised : and 
 then does the right use of tbia discretion imply an acquaintance 
 with the people accurate enough to say of them, " Now they 
 are not fit;" and, again, "Now they are fit" — an acquaintance 
 which it is preposterous to assume — an acquaintance which 
 nothing short of omniscience can possess. 
 
474 CONCLUSION. 
 
 Who, then, is to find out when the time for any given change 
 has arrived? No one : it will find itself out. For us to perplex 
 ourselves with such questions, is hoth needless and absurd. 
 The due apportionment of the truth to the time is already 
 provided for. That same modification of man's nature which 
 produces fitness for higher social forms, itself generates the 
 beUef that those forms are right (p. 427), and by doing this 
 brings them into existence. And as opinion, being the product 
 of character (pp. 25, 159), must necessarily be in harmony 
 with character, institutions which are in harmony with opinion, 
 must be in harmony with character also. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 The candid reader may now see his way out of the dilemma 
 in which he feels placed, between a conviction, on the one 
 hand, that the perfect law is the only safe guide, and a con- 
 sciousness, on the other, that the perfect law caonot be fulfilled 
 by imperfect men. Let him but duly realize the fact that 
 opinion is the agency through which character adapts external 
 arrangements to itself — that his opinion rightly forms part of 
 this agency — is a unit of force, constitutrng, with other such 
 units, the general power which works out social changes— and 
 he will then perceive that he may properly give full utterance 
 to his innermost conviction ; leaving it to produce what eflfect 
 it may. It is not for nothing that he has in him these sympa- 
 thies with some principles, and repugnance to others. He, with 
 aU his capacities, and desires, and behefs, is not an accident, 
 but a product of the time. Influences that have acted upon 
 precediug generations ; influences that have been brought to 
 bear upon him ; the education that disciplined his chUdhood ; 
 together with the circumstances in which he has since lived ; 
 have conspired to make him what he is. And the result thus 
 wrought out in him has a purpose. He must remember that 
 whilst he is a child of the past, he is a parent of the future. 
 The moral sentiment developed in him, was intended to . be 
 
CONCLUSION. 475 
 
 instrumental in producing further progress ; and to gag it, or 
 to conceal the thoughts it generates, is to balk creative design. 
 He, like every other man, may properly consider himself as an 
 agent through whom nature works ; and when nature gives 
 birth in him to a certain belief, she thereby authorizes him to 
 profess and to act out that belief. For — 
 
 " nature is made better by no mean, 
 
 But nature makes that mean : over that art 
 Which you say adds to nature, is an art 
 That nature makes." 
 
 Not as adventitious, therefore, will the wise man regard the 
 faith that is in him — not as something which may be shghted, 
 and made subordinate to calculations of policy ; but as tlie 
 supreme authority to which all his actions should bend. The 
 highest truth conceivable by him he will fearlessly utter ; and 
 will endeavour to get embodied in fact liis purest idealisms : 
 knowing that, let what may come of it, he is thus playing Ids 
 appointed part in the world — knowing that, if he can get done 
 the thing he aims at — well : if not — well also ; though not so 
 welL 
 
 § 8. 
 
 And thus, in teaching a uniform imquesdoning obedience, 
 does an entirely abstract philosophy become one with all true 
 rehgion. Fidelity to conscience — this is the essential precept 
 inculcated by both. No hesitation, no paltering about probable 
 results, but an implicit submission to what is beUeved to be the 
 law laid down for us. We are not to pay Hp homage to prin- 
 ciples which our conduct wilfully transgresses. We are not to 
 follow the example of those who, taking " Dotnine dirige nos" 
 for their motto, yet disregard the directions given, and prefer 
 to direct themselves. We are not to be guilty of that practical 
 atheism, which, seeing no guidance for human affairs but its 
 own limited foresight, endeavours itself to play the god, and 
 
476 
 
 CONCLDSION. 
 
 decide what will be good for mankind, and what bad. But, on 
 the contrary, we are to searcli out with a genuine humility the 
 rules ordained for us — are to do unfalteringly, without specu- 
 lating as to consequences, whatsoever these require; and we 
 are to do this in the belief that then, when there is perfect 
 sincerity — when each man is true to himself — when every one 
 strives to realize what he thinks the highest rectitude — then 
 must all things prosper. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 G. WoodfaUmd Soa, Printer., Angel Court. SViuner Street. London.