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44

6 Magnificence which however is represented as under the
check of frugality in order to be deemed a virtue. It simply means the doing great things. Let And were
it a virtue the masses of mankind would be wholly excluded from
its exercise. A virtuequality whose power of action is confined to the extremely
small minority of mankind has happily no real claims to the recompense
or to the praise of virtue. Magnificence is a sort of grandiloquent
word for aristocratical beneficence. Ostentation has a dyslogistic character
and mingles some alloy of pride, – or vanity, – or scorn in its displays.
Magnificence, – even with frugality for its check & control, – is necessar is not
of necessity either worthy of praise or blame,– it may not have may not have
any claim tincture of vice or virtue. It may imply no
sacrifice to others – it may bring no pleasure to oneself – it
may be a mere waste of a means of pleasure. As a question
of expenditure, it may be prudential & it may be benevolent –
but if it absorb or subtract from means which might be employed
more prudentially & more benevolently it is supposing the expenditure
would, but for the magnificence haveing been employed for the
production of the greater instead of the lesser good – a source of
mischief equal to the amount of difference between that lesser &
that greater good. The decking magnificence with the pomp of
virtue is in the name of morality moral world a fallacy of a somewhat similar character to that
which has often intruded into the world of political economy, – namely that it is
more meritorious to spend than to save. They both grow out
of an inordinate estimate of the value of the social principle separately & narrowly viewed
that social principle which there is a great disposition to aggrandize at the expense
of the self regarding. Now the value & true influence of the social depends
on its subjection & subordination to the self-regarding, as the primary source of
action – in the same way as all the minor virtues
resolve themselves into the two major virtues – which hold
sole dominion over the regions of morality

Identifier: | JB/015/369/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 15.
Date_1		Marginal Summary Numbering
Box	015	Main Headings	deontology
Folio number	369	Info in main headings field
Image	001	Titles
Category	linking material	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	f44
Penner	sir john bowring	Watermarks	i i smith & son 1831
Marginals		Paper Producer	maria edgeworth
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year	1831
Notes public		ID Number	5585
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