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33
When the 'Introduction to Morals & Legislation' was first published
Bentham imagined that the principle of sympathy & antipathy was to
be considered the groundwork of one of the theories of morals. In after
life he discovered that this was only the dogmatic, or ipse-dixit
principle divided into two branches :- the branch of sympathy
applying reward, — that of antipathy punishment — but wherever disassociated
from the greatest happiness principle, being really nothing but the
authority of the ipse-dixit doctrine
1829 June 6
H.2
Article on Utilitarianism
(2 28
The principle of caprice was the appellative that afterwds
occurred to and has been employed by him for the designatn.
of that branch of the ipse dixit principle which applies to
the civil or say non-penal branch of law including
every portion not comprised within the denominatn. of the
penal: the civil or say non-penal over which in his view of system
the matter we shall find have found presiding the non-disappointmt.
principle presides.
45.
Virtue & Vice, one conduces
to happiness the other
to unhappiness : adjunct
to virtue, self denial
i.e. sacrifice of present
good to supposed
future do. No such sacrifice
scarcely ever made : ex.
pleasures of sense in general.
To return to virtue & vice. By virtue under
the direction of the gret. Greatest happinessss prine. principle is understood that line of conduct
& correspondent disposition whh. is conducive to happiness:
by vice that whh. is conducive to unhappinessss In the case of
the virtue one adjunct addition however and that productive of
a limitative effect requires to be made ; this is that
of the sort of action denominated virtuous the
exercise requires more or less of self-denial: that is
to say of a sacrifice made of the present good
whether pleasure or exemption from pain to some greater good to come. For keeping the position
in question within the pale of truth this limitative adjunct
is altogether indispensable. For see now whether it be
not so. Among the actions by the exercise of which
the existence of the individual is continued and among
them of those by which pleasuree is experienced or
pain averted & excluded small is the proportion of those
by whh. virtue in any shape can with propriety be
said to be exercised. Why? Because in the exercise
made of them no self-denial no sacrifice of the
present to the future good is made performed. Thus it
is for example with the pleasures of sense in general..
46.
But if a man has
his desires so under control
that the sacrifice causes no
uneasiness, will you say
his virtue is on a lower level
in his mental frame, because
there is no self denial?
But, here comes in an objection. Suppose a man
to have his appetites & desires of all sorts in such complete
subjection, that, in the sacrifice of the lesser present
to the greater future good no uneasiness is experienced:-
nothing that can be called self-denial
is practised. Of such a man will you in this case say, of such a man-
that, in his composition mental frame virtue is at on a lower
level, in the scale of perfection, than in the case of
one in whom the contest between the lesser present
& greater future good, is continually renewed or, according
to Dean Swift's emblem, the game of leap-frog between
flesh & spirit, is continually renewed?
No
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