JB/036/209/001

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1823. Feb. 27
Constitut. Code

Factitious honor and dignity

The more respect a man receives on account
of factitious honor and dignity or on account of ancestry, the
less the inducement he has to possess himself of those points of appropriate aptitude to produce those self-denials
those labours and those abstinences by which are more or
less necessary to a mans rendering himself serviceable to
mankind, the less therefore is likely to be his aggregate
appropriate aptitude with relation to the habit of such serviceableness
or in a word in relation to virtue public
and private virtue.

Oh no! cries the man of ancestry. I possess a title
to your esteem and confidence, a title such as no man who
is not equally gifted in this respect can pretend to. For
good conduct in all its modifications, I have an inducement
in which no other man whose ancestry is not as
illustrious as mine, can pretend to have an equal share.
Nothing dishonorable could I ever do without tarnishing the
lustre of my family as the lustre shed on it by my ancestors.

Oh how supremely silly all such language: supposing
it sincere, how perfect the blindness betrays of the ruling efficient
causes principles of human conduct! In common with all others
What he has in common with all others is the being dependent
for no small part of his comforts upon the good opinions
the good will the good offices positive and negative, of mankind the
human species in general to first he it happens to him to have most
intercourse. By anything otherwise than honorable by any
act of his that has anything dishonorable in it that good sincere
by favourableness kindness whatsoever kindness may be in their sentiments
and affections in relation to him will be lessened. Suppose this inducement
to have lost its force, what force in that same the tutelary direction in question can be exerted
by those empty sounds.
If his care for himself
be so little, on what ground
can it be regarded as any
greater force for a set of men
whom be more use, if
where he knows comparatively
nothing, from whom he never could have received any idea of kindness, to towards whom he never could have manifested any mark of kindness, and to whom his
qualities and his very existence were alike and perfectly unknown?

Identifier: | JB/036/209/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 36.
Date_1	1823-02-27	Marginal Summary Numbering
Box	036	Main Headings	constitutional code
Folio number	209	Info in main headings field	constitut. code
Image	001	Titles
Category	text sheet	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering
Penner	jeremy bentham	Watermarks	j whatman 1821
Marginals		Paper Producer	john flowerdew colls
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year	1821
Notes public		ID Number	11133
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