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NOTORIETY. LIBELS.
The effects of this combined with these other regulations
These consequences seem yet better secured & accelerated by the combination of the
of other regulations of the same nature, shutting up every source of intelligence & burying in darkness every subject of disquisition I am judging of the merit of a Law, we should not calculate it's effects upon the hypothesis of it's inexecution. regulations equally sanctioned by precedent & requescence
& therefore so much the more dangerous. I mean the respective standing prohibition of from publishing the
both of both Assemblies of Legislature & every Court of Judicature. It is easy to see By these if carried
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into effect every fountain of intelligence would be scaled up at once. The
reipublicae at aliena the effect the symptom genuine & the cause of loss of liberty that characteristic of an enslaved nation
I am not much given disposed to dispondency. I have not given I am well persuaded exhibited so many
of it as would best enable me best to ingratiate myself with the brooding humours of
my countrymen. I like not the Idea of the People dancing in a Net till it shall please those who hold the cords to draw it. Yet even this if it be necessary, inevitable if of two absolutely necessary evils it be the least I will subscribe to. But I do think this is my opinion that it is not so. I cannot bring the propositions Elements of Euclid to bear upon it, I cannot give it demonstration. All I can do is to entreat those whom it may concern to hear with calmness & condescention such probable arguments as the subject admit of and my limited intelligence supply will afford & [I am able] to adduce. Yet I am sure that great & good men have not considerd it
the consequences in the light that I do, when, if without not with complacence, yet without disapprobation
they have referred to & [argued built in the way of argument upon disposition of the from] this latter Law. But more of this in
another place.
But for no purpose of liberty can nor even of utility can it be necessary, that
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even just should be cast upon the Sovereign. Made irresponsible himself by a
Law of the constitution for the wisest reasons, he puts his Servants in his place
To please the people if it be not less consistent with their welfare than to disgust them — to pardon their frowardness, the necessary offspring of their ignorance, & sometimes of their knowledge — to pardon it & not to instate it [to shew [our] superiority over them by our freedom from their passions [to confound them not with sterness but with benignity.]
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Identifier: | JB/070/207/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 70.
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070 |
of laws in general |
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207 |
notoriety libels |
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001 |
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1 |
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recto |
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jeremy bentham |
[[watermarks::[gr motif] [britannia with shield motif]]] |
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23322 |
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