inverts the problem which deals with the relation of morality relation be and theo logy. tween ethics to the divine nature. Paley's method of treatment, they would say, inverts the relation in which theism stands to morality. The divine will cannot be thus arbitrarily connected with the moral law. It can be conceived to approve and sanction such an object as the happiness of mankind only when God is first of all regarded as a moral being, and the happiness of mankind as an object of moral action. If any relation of consequence can be asserted between them, the general happiness is to be regarded as a moral duty first, and only afterwards as a religious duty. When he comes to the political sanction, Bentham's treatment wants nothing in respect of fulness, and even those who do not agree with his estimate of the infelicific character of many existing institutions and enactments will admit that even the best-intentioned legislator cannot make utilitarian conduct a political duty. We must bear in mind here, also, the effect which individual desires and opinions have not only on social judgments, but also on statute-law. In arguing on the relation of the individual to the State, we are too ready to forget that the State is represented by a legislator or body of legislators, and that we can never assume that in their cases private interest has already become identified with the larger interests of the community. For were this the case, the accusation 1 1 This is clearly recognised by Bentham: “The actual end [as of class-legislation or private interest would not be heard so often as it is. tainty of the A modern disciple of Bentham would thus be (c) Uncercompelled, just as Bentham himself was, to make social sancutilitarianism neither a political nor religious but tion, a "moral" duty, enforced by and founded on the shifting and uncertain punishments or sanctions of society-what Professor Bain describes as "the unofficial expressions of disapprobation and the exclusion from social good offices."1 But as a logical proof of utilitarianism, this means is, if possible, weaker than the preceding; for social opinion, though of somewhat wider applicability than legal enactment, has probably been, for the most part, in even less exact correspondence than it with the general happiness. The social sanction is strict on indifferent points of etiquette, does not consult the general interests of mankind on points of honour, and is lenient towards acts that the utilitarian moralist condemns.2 distinguished from the right and proper end] of government is," he says, "in every political community, the greatest happiness of those, whether one or many, by whom the powers of government are exercised."-Constitutional Code, book i., Introd., § 2; Works, ix. 5. 1 The Emotions and the Will, p. 264. Professor 2 Cf. Bain, The Emotions and the Will, p. 287. Bain says (Emotions, p. 276 n.), “. we ought to have a written code of public morality, or of the duties imposed by society, over and above what parliament imposes, and this should not be a loosely written moral treatise, but a strict enumeration of what (d) and of the internal sanction so sult of the far as a re social. Professor Bain, however, advances from the external disapprobation to an internal sanctionlooking upon conscience as one of the powers which inflicts punishment, and lies at the source of the feeling of obligation. But if conscience is only "an ideal resemblance of public authority, growing up in the same individual mind, and working to the same end," it can, as little as its archetype, point to the maxim of utilitarianism. According to Professor Bain, it is through this sentiment-at first a mere imitation of external authority-that the individual becomes a law to himself, on recognising the utilities that led to the imposition of the law.1 But on this theory, in so far as conscience continues to point to the conduct impressed upon it by its external pattern, it fails to correspond with the utilitarian maxim. If, on the other hand, it is modified by the comprehensive and unselfish view of the effects of conduct which utilitarianism demands, it must be at the expense of correcting society requires under pain of punishment by excommunication or otherwise, the genuine offences that are not passed over." This would certainly be very desirable, were it not from the nature of the case impracticable. Popular judgment as to a man's conduct,—what society imposes,—is one of the things most difficult to predict: it is under the influence of most heterogeneous causes, personal, industrial, religious, political, &c. I do not think, for instance, that any one could safely undertake to describe exactly the kind of actions which will infallibly call forth the censure of British public opinion, or that of the smaller and intersecting groups into which society is divided. 1 Emotions, p. 288. its original edicts, and so far discrediting its author itative claims. social sanc logical proof The "social sanction" would be of much greater Value of the service if used to show how a solidarity is brought tion about between the interests and feelings of the individual and those of his neighbours, from which the utilitarian maxim may be arrived at by a generalisation of his principle of conduct as modified by the social impulse. But this would not consti- apart from tute a logical justification of utilitarianism : it would of utilitarishow how the principle has been arrived at, but anism. without giving a sufficient reason to the individual for adopting it. And this is really the tendency of much recent discussion-of Professor Bain's theory of conscience as a reflex of the external order, of George Grote's analysis of the moral sentiment, and of Mill's doctrine of the progressive identification of the individual's feelings with those of his neighbours through the gradual increase of sympathetic pleasures and pains: for it was to this source that Mill looked for the practical solution of the antinomy between his psychological and ethical theories, though he himself tried to pass from one position to the other by means of the "highway in the air" constructed by his own logic. Mill's attempt to pass by a logical method from 4. Mill's psychological hedonism to utilitarianism is an in- logical de. fence of utilitarian ism: (a) distinc of pleasure, structive commentary on the difficulties which beset the transition. His work may be described as a vindication of the utilitarian morality, first, from the charge of sensualism; and secondly, from that of selfishness. And it is largely owing to his polemic that utilitarianism is no longer looked upon as either a sensual or a selfish theory. It is not sensual, unless, indeed, the pleasures of most men are of a sensual kind. So far from being selfish, it is almost stoical in the subordination of individual desires it enjoins. But Mill wished to do more than clear the character of utilitarian ethics. He wished to show a logical reason for utilitarians pursuing elevated pleasures rather than base ones, and to demonstrate the connection of his moral imperative with the principles which the school he belonged to laid down for human motives. In both these respects his failure is conspicuous. In the former endeavour, he went against Bention of kinds tham by attempting to draw a distinction in kind amongst pleasures-a distinction not reducible to quantitative measurement. A higher degree of quality in the pleasure sought was to outweigh any difference in its amount or quantity. With this modification, utilitarianism is made to require a subordination of the lower or sensuous nature to the higher or intellectual nature. Pleasure, indeed, is still the end; but the "higher" pleasure takes precedence over the "lower," irrespective of the |