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34
Next come your politicians & votaries of ambition. In honor & in power – in the one
or the other and nothing better do these men place their summum bonum.
The reason reasoning – if such a thing it can be called – the reasoning is pretty much
as before – the language a little changed – for it was necessary to say something new –
and nothingness as well as other matters may vary its shape. Riches were slippery & unstable. Honor & power
are uncertain & deciduous: depending for the most part on popular breath, or
or pretended favour: admodum incerta et caduca; atpole qua ce arbitrio popularis auræ
(Horace is here – listen to Horace!) ant simlato hominum favora – pleurinque pendenta†
When it was of riches that our moralist had to speak, he told us that it was
not for themselves but for the sake of other things that they were sought after. But
neither in honor, no, nor yet in power, whatever their Votaries may fancy, is there
any intrinsic dignity, – or if there be intrinsic dignity it is not of that sort which
should cause them to be either desired or praised.
As to caducity, has it not the objection been answered where the objection of unsteadiness was answered.
But has it a meaning at all? If it have, he who has found a meaning for it is not
the Oxford Instructor. Honore? what means honore? Honor or honors. Natural
Good reputation – or political & factitious dignity; for it in England thus wide is
the distinction between singular & plural. Good repute – reputation, – is it that?
By accident, no doubt may good repute attend upon ill-desert, – and ill repute upon
good. But if this disastrous state of things be possible, – if it sometimes occur be witnessed – its
continuance is of rare occurrence. Were there even more truth in it than there is,
the use of such an instrument argument little becomes a moralist; – to underrate the power of the
moral sanction seems a strange way of advancing morality – to throw his weight
into the scale of false opinion & use employ that false opinion as an instrument in his
craft – is a sad exhibition or morality for the moralist to make. Others may undervalue, – and fling
aside the moral sanction – but is this fit for the moralist him to do – to undervalue
it is to undervalue his own occupation – to become a tradesman flinging
undeserved discredit on his own wares.
Is it honors – factitious reputation – the plural meaning. Here
as in the case of riches, the worse it is to lose, the better it is to have them: the
continuation of their enjoyment, must be contrasted with the cessation of their
possession. It is in the keeping them, & not in the parting with them that any body does would look for the summum bonum – of
any body who expected to find the summum bonum in them them there. To keep them, to
increase them is the ordinary course, – to lose them is but the accidental one.
But whether it be honor, or whether it be power – what means
does pretended – what does simulated mean. If favor has advanced a man to honor or dignity –
why should it be called insincere – & in what respect would be a man who is benefited by it be the
better if instead of a degrading title it was called by any other name had all the adornings which the finest phraseology could
gather around it.
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Identifier: | JB/015/166/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 15.
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015 |
deontology |
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166 |
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001 |
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linking material |
1 |
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recto |
f34 |
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sir john bowring |
[[watermarks::[prince of wales feathers] i&m 1818]] |
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arthur wellesley, duke of wellington |
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1818 |
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5382 |
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