Chapter VI (2)

Remarking on such cases as these, Dr. Richardson notes that the nearest natural approach to the stage of passive efficiency is seen in hibernating animals. He states, however, that in hibernation the complete state of passive efficiency is not produced. He does not accept the opinion of those who consider that in true hibernation breathing ceases as above described. A slow respiration continues, he believes, as well as that low stage of active efficiency of circulation which we have already indicated. "The hibernating animal sleeps only; and while sleeping it consumes or wastes; and if the cold be prolonged it may die from waking." More decisive, because surer, is the evidence derived from the possibility of waking the hibernating animals by the common methods used for waking a sleeper. This certainly seems to show that animation is not positively suspended.

He asks next the question whether an animal like a fish, frozen equally through all its structures, is to be regarded as actually dead in the strict sense of the word or not, seeing that if it be uniformly and equally thawed it may recover from this perfectly frozen state. "In like manner," he says, "it may be doubted whether a healthy warm-blooded animal suddenly and equally frozen through all its parts is dead, although it is not recoverable." If, as seems certainly to be the case, the animal dies because in the very act of trying to restore it some inequality in the process is almost sure to determine a fatal issue, some vital centre passing into the pectous state, the animal could not have been dead before restoration was attempted; for the dead cannot die again. Albeit, the outlook is not encouraging, at any rate so far as the use of cold alone for maintaining suspended animation in full-grown warm-blooded animals is concerned. Cold will, however, for a long time maintain ready for motion active organs locally subject to it Even after death this effect of cold "may be locally demonstrated," Dr. Richardson tells us, "and has sometimes been so demonstrated to the wonder of the world." "For instance, on January 17, in the year 1803, Aldini, the nephew of Galvani, created the greatest astonishment in London by a series of experiments which he conducted on a malefactor, twenty-six years old, named John Forster, who was executed at Newgate, and whose body, an hour after execution, was delivered over to Mr. Keate, Master of the College of Surgeons, for research. The body had been exposed for an hour to an atmosphere two degrees below freezing-point,[75] and from that cause, though Aldini does not seem to have recognised the fact, the voluntary muscles retained their irritability to such a degree that when Aldini began to pass voltaic currents through the body, some of the bystanders seem to have concluded that the unfortunate malefactor had come again to life. It is significant also that Aldini in his report says that his object was not to produce reanimation, but to obtain a practical knowledge how far galvanism might be employed as an auxiliary to revive persons who were accidentally suffocated, _as though he himself were in some doubt_,"--that is, not in doubt only about the power of galvanism, but in doubt whether Forster had been restored to life for a while, or not! Dr. Richardson has himself repeated, on lower animals, these experiments of Aldini's, except that the animals on which he has experimented have passed into death under chloroform, not through suffocation. His object, in fact, was to determine the best treatment for human beings who sink under chloroform and other anaesthetics. He finds that in warm weather he fails to get the same results. Noticing this, he says, "I experimented at and below the freezing-point, and then found that both by the electrical discharge, and by injection of water heated to 130 degrees" (again this terrible inexactness of expression) "into the muscles through the arteries, active muscular movements could be produced in warm-blooded animals many hours after death. Thus, for lecture experiment, I have removed one muscle from the body of an animal that had slept to death from chloroform, and putting the muscle in a glass tube surrounded with ice and salt, I have kept it for several days in a condition for its making a final muscular contraction, and, by gently thawing it, have made it, in the act of final contraction, do some mechanical work, such as moving a long needle on the face of a dial, or discharging a pistol. In muscles so removed from the body and preserved ready for motion there is, however, only one final act. For as the blood and nervous supply are both cut off from it, there is nothing left in it but the reserved something that was fixed by the cold. But I do not see any reason why this should not be maintained in reservation for weeks or months, as easily as for days, in a fixed cold atmosphere."

Cold being, however, obviously insufficient of itself for the suspension of active life in warm-blooded animals, at least if such life is eventually to be restored, let us next consider some of the agencies which either alone or aided by cold may suspend without destroying life.

The first known of all such agencies was mandragora. Dioscorides describes a wine, called _morion_, which was made from the leaves and the root of mandragora, and possessed properties resembling those of chloral hydrate. That it must have been an effective narcotic is shown by the circumstance that painful operations were performed on patients subjected to its influence, without their suffering the least pain, or even feeling. The sleep thus produced lasted several hours. Dr. Richardson considers that the use of this agent was probably continued until the twelfth or thirteenth century. "From the use of it doubtless came," he says, "the Shaksperian legend of Juliet." He strangely omits to notice that Shakspeare elsewhere speaks of this narcotic by name, where Iago says of Othello:

"Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever med'cine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou own'dst yesterday."

Probably the use of mandragora as a narcotic may have continued much later than the thirteenth century. In earlier times it was certainly used as opium is now used, not for medicinal purposes, but to produce for a while an agreeable sensation of dreamy drowsiness. "There were those," says Dr. Richardson, in his interesting article on Narcotics in the CONTEMPORARY REVIEW for July last, "who drank of it for taste or pleasure, and who were spoken of as 'mandragorites,' as we might speak of 'alcoholists' or 'chloralists.' They passed into the land of sleep and dream, and waking up in scare and alarm were the screaming mandrakes of an ancient civilization." He has himself made the "morion" of the ancients, dispensing the prescription of Dioscorides and Pliny. "The same chemist, Mr. Hanbury," he says, "who first put chloral into my hands for experiment, also procured for me the root of the true mandragora. From that root I made the morion, tested it on myself, tried its effects, and re-proved, after a lapse perhaps of four or five centuries, that it had all the properties originally ascribed to it."

The "deadly nightshade" has similar properties. (In fact, morion was originally made from the _Atropa belladonna_, not from its ally the _Atropa mandragora_.) In 1851, Dr. Richardson attended two children who were poisoned for a time from eating the berries and chewing the leaves of the nightshade, which they had gathered near Richmond. They were brought home insensible, he says, "and they lay in a condition of suspended life for seven hours, the greatest care being required to detect either the respiration or the movements of the heart; they nevertheless recovered."

With the nitrite of amyl, Dr. Richardson has suspended the life of a frog for nine days, yet the creature was then restored to full and vigorous life. He has shown also that the same power of suspension, though in less degree, "could be produced in warm-blooded animals, and that the heart of a warm-blooded animal would contract for a period of eighteen hours after apparent death." The action of nitrite of amyl seems to resemble that of cold. In the pleasing language of the doctors, "it prevents the pectous change of colloidal matter, and so prevents _rigor mortis_, coagulation of blood, and solidification of nervous centres and cords." So long as this change is prevented, active life can be restored. But when in these experiments "the pectous change occurred, all was over, and resolution into new forms of matter by putrefaction was the result." From the analogy of some of the symptoms resulting from the use of nitrite of amyl with the symptoms of catalepsy, Dr. Richardson has "ventured to suggest that under some abnormal conditions the human body itself, in its own chemistry, may produce an agent which causes the suspended life observed during the cataleptic condition." The suggestion has an interest apart from the question of the possibility of safely suspending animation for considerable periods of time: it might be possible to detect the nature of the agent thus produced by the chemistry of the human body (if the theory is correct), and thus to learn how its power might be counteracted.

Chloral hydrate seems singularly efficient in producing the semblance of death,--so completely, indeed, as to deceive even the elect. Dr. Richardson states that at the meeting of the British Association at Exeter, some pigeons which had been put to sleep by the needle injection of a large dose of chloral, "fell into such complete resemblance of death that they passed for dead among an audience containing many physiologists and other men of science. For my own part," he proceeds, "I could detect no sign of life in them, and they were laid in one of the out-offices of the museum of the infirmary as dead. In this condition they were left late at night, but in the following morning they were found alive, and as well as if nothing hurtful had happened to them." Similar effects seem to be produced by the deadly poisons cyanogen gas and hydrocyanic acid, though in the following case, narrated by Dr. Richardson, the animal experimented upon (not with the idea of eventually restoring it to life) belonged to a race so specially tenacious of life that some may consider only one of its proverbial nine lives to have been affected. In the laboratory of a large drug establishment a cat, "by request of its owner, was killed, as was assumed, instantaneously and painlessly by a large dose of Scheele's acid. The animal appeared to die without a pang, and, presenting every appearance of death, was laid in a sink to be removed on the next morning. At night the animal was lying still in form of death in the tank beneath a tap. In the morning it was found alive and well, but with the fur wet from the dropping of water from the tap." This fact was communicated to Dr. Richardson by an eminent chemist under whose direct observation it occurred, in corroboration of an observation of his own similar in character.

Our old friend alcohol (if friend it can be called) possesses the power of suspending active vitality without destroying life, or at any rate without depriving the muscles of their excitability. Dr. Richardson records the case of a drunken man who, while on the ice at the Welsh Harp lake, fell into the water through an opening in the ice, and was for more than fifteen minutes completely immersed. He was extricated to all appearance dead, but under artificial respiration was restored to consciousness, though he did not survive for many hours. On the whole, alcoholic suspension of life does not appear to be the best method available. To test it, the patient must first get "very, very drunk," and even then, like the soldiers in the old song, must go on drinking, lest the experiment should terminate simply in the fiasco of a drunken sleep.

The last agent for suspending life referred to by Dr. Richardson is pure oxygen. But he has not yet obtained such information on the power of oxygen in this respect as he hopes to do.

Summing up the results of the various experiments made with narcotics and other agents for suspending life, Dr. Richardson remarks that much is already known in the world of science in respect to the suspension of animal life by artificial means: "cold as well as various chemical agents has this power, and it is worthy of note that cold, together with the agents named, is antiseptic, as though whatever suspended living action, suspended also by some necessary and correlative influence the process of putrefactive change." He points out that if the news from Brisbane were reliable, it would be clear that what had been done had been effected by the combination of one of the chemical agents above named, or of a similar agent, with cold. The only question which would remain as of moment is, not whether a new principle has been developed, but whether in matter of detail a new product has been discovered which, better than any of the agents we already possess, destroys and suspends animation. "In organic chemistry," he proceeds, "there are, I doubt not, hundreds of substances which, like mandragora and nitrite of amyl, would suspend the vital process, and it may be a new experimenter has met with such an agent. It is not incredible, indeed, that the Indian Fakirs possess a vegetable extract or essence which possesses the same power, and by means of which they perform their as yet unexplained feat of prolonged living burial." But he is careful to note the weak points of the Australian story--viz., first, the statement that the method used is a secret, "for men of true science know no such word;" secondly, that the experimenter has himself to go to America to procure more supplies of his agents; and, thirdly, that he requires two agents, one of which is an antidote to the other. As respects this third point, he asks very pertinently how an antidote can be absorbed and enter into the circulation in a body practically dead.

It is, of course, now well known that the whole story was a hoax, and a mischievous one. Several Australian farmers travelled long distances to Sydney to make inquiries about a method which promised such important results, only to find that there was not a particle of truth in the story.

RICHARD A. PROCTOR.

FOOTNOTES:

[70] Many fail to see a joke when it is gravely propounded in print, who would at once recognise it as such, were it uttered verbally, with however serious a countenance. Possibly this is due to the necessary absence in the printed account of the indications by which we recognise that a speaker is jesting--as a certain expression of countenance, or a certain intonation of voice, by which the grave utterer of a spoken jest conveys his real meaning. In a paper which recently appeared in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, Mr. Foster (Thomas of that ilk) propounded very gravely the theory that our Nursery Rhymes have in reality had their origin in Nature Myths. He explained, for instance, that the rhymes relating to Little Jack Horner were originally descriptive of sunrise in winter: Little Jack is the sun in winter, the Christmas pie is the cloud-covered sky; the thumb represents the sun's first ray piercing through the clouds; and Jack's rejoicing means the brightness of full sunlight. So also the rhymes beginning Hey Diddle Diddle are shown to be of deep and solemn import, all in manifest burlesque of some recent extravagant interpretations of certain ancient stories by Goldziher, Steinthal, and others. Yet this fun was seriously criticized by more than half the critics, by some approvingly, by some otherwise.

[71] For a full account of this clever hoax the reader is referred to my "Myths and Marvels of Astronomy."

[72] The most curious are given in the ninth essay of my work referred to in the preceding note.

[73] Few probably are aware how long some animals may remain without breathing and yet survive. Kittens and puppies have been brought to life after being immersed in water for nearly three-quarters of an hour.

[74] Objection has been taken to the italicized words in the following passage from "No Thoroughfare" (one of the parts certainly written by Dickens and not by Wilkie Collins): "The cry came up: 'His heart still beats against mine. I warm him in my arms. I have cast off the rope, for the ice melts under us, and the rope would separate me from him; but I am not afraid.' ... The cry came up, 'We are sinking lower, but his heart still beats against mine.' ... The cry came up, 'We are sinking still, and we are deadly cold. _His heart no longer beats against mine._ Let no one come down to add to our weight. Lower the rope only.' ... The cry came up with a deathly silence, 'Raise! softly!' ... She broke from them all and sank over him on his litter, with both her loving hands upon _the heart that stood still_." It has been supposed that Dickens wilfully departed here from truth, in order to leave the impression on the reader that Vendale was assuredly dead. That he wished to convey this impression is obvious. He often showed similar care to remove, if possible, all hope from the anxious reader's mind (markedly so in his latest and unfinished work, where nevertheless any one well acquainted with Dickens's manner knows not only that Drood is alive, but that disguised as Datchery he was to have watched Jasper to the end). But in reality, it has happened more than once that persons have been restored to life who have been found in snow-drifts not merely reduced to complete insensibility, but without any recognisable heart-beat. Dickens had probably heard of such cases when in Switzerland.

[75] Dr. Richardson will certainly excite the contempt of the northern professor who rebuked me recently for speaking of heat when I should have said temperature. "An atmosphere two degrees below freezing-point" is an expression as inadmissible, if we must be punctilious in such matters, as the expressions "blood-heat," "a heat of ten degrees," and so forth. Possibly, however, it is not desirable to be punctilious when there is no possibility of being misunderstood, especially as it may be noticed (the Edinburgh professor has often afforded striking illustrations of the fact by errors of his own) that too great an effort to be punctilious often results in very remarkable incorrectness of expression.

JOHN STUART MILL'S PHILOSOPHY TESTED.

IV.--UTILITARIANISM.

In some respects Mill's Essays, published under the title "Utilitarianism," are among his best writings. They have, in the first place, the excellence of brevity. Ninety-six pages, printed in handsome type, make but a light task for the student who wishes to enter into the intricacies of moral doctrine. Moreover, the last Essay consists of a digression concerning the nature and origin of the idea of Justice, and it occupies nearly one-third of the whole book. Thus Mill managed to compress his discussion of so important a subject as the foundations of Moral Right and Wrong into some sixty pleasant pages.

And pleasant pages they certainly are, for they are written in Mill's very best style. Now Mill, even when he is most prolix, when he is pursuing the intricacies of the most involved points of logic and philosophy, can seldom or never be charged with dulness and heaviness. His language is too easy, polished, and apparently lucid. In these Essays on Utilitarianism, he reaches his own highest standard of style. There is hardly any other book in the range of philosophy, so far as my reading has gone, which can be read with less effort. There is something enticing in the easy flow of sentences and ideas, and without apparent difficulty the reader finds himself agreeably borne into the midst of the most profound questions of ethical philosophy, questions which have been the battle-ground of the human intellect for two thousand five hundred years.

Partly to this excellence of style, partly to Mill's immense reputation, acquired by other works and in other ways, must we attribute the importance which has been generally attached to these ninety-six pages. Probably no other modern work of the same small typographical extent has been equally discussed, criticized, and admired, unless, indeed, it be the Essay on Liberty of the same author. The result is, that Mill has been generally regarded as the latest and best expounder of the great Utilitarian Doctrine--that doctrine which is, by one and no doubt the preponderating school, regarded as the foundation of all moral and legislative progress. Many there are who think that, what Hume and Paley and Jeremy Bentham began, Mill has carried nearly to perfection in these agreeable Essays.

Nothing can be more plain, too, than that Mill himself believed he was dutifully expounding the doctrines of his father, of his father's friend, the great Bentham, and of the other unquestionable Utilitarians among whom he grew up. Mill seems to pride himself upon having been the first, not indeed to invent, but to bring into general acceptance the name of the school to which he supposed himself to belong. He says:[76] "The author of this essay has reason for believing himself to be the first person who brought the word utilitarian into use. He did not invent it, but adopted it from a passing expression in Mr. Galt's 'Annals of the Parish.' After using it as a designation for several years, he and others abandoned it from a growing dislike to anything resembling a badge or watchword of sectarian distinction. But as a name for one single opinion, not a set of opinions--to denote the recognition of utility as a standard, not any particular way of applying it--the term supplies a want in the language, and offers, in many cases, a convenient mode of avoiding tiresome circumlocution."

In the Autobiography (p. 79), Mill makes a statement to the same effect, saying--

"I did not invent the word, but found it in one of Galt's novels,
the 'Annals of the Parish,' in which the Scotch clergyman, of whom
the book is a supposed autobiography, is represented as warning his
parishioners not to leave the Gospel and become utilitarians. With a
boy's fondness for a name and a banner I seized on the word, and for
some years called myself and others by it as a sectarian
appellation; and it came to be occasionally used by some others
holding the opinions it was intended to designate. As those opinions
attracted more notice, the term was repeated by strangers and
opponents, and got into rather common use just about the time when
those who had originally assumed it, laid down that along with other
sectarian characteristics."

It is pointed out, however, by Mr. Sidgwick in his article on Benthamism,[77] that Bentham himself suggested the name "Utilitarian," in a letter to Dumont, as far back as June, 1802.

Mill explicitly states that it was his purpose in these Essays on Utilitarianism to expound a previously received doctrine of utility. Towards the close of his first chapter, containing General Remarks, he says (p. 6): "On the present occasion, I shall, without further discussion of the other theories, attempt to contribute something towards the understanding and appreciation of the Utilitarian or Happiness theory, and towards such proof as it is susceptible of." He proceeds to explain that a preliminary condition of the rational acceptance or rejection of a doctrine is that its formula should be correctly understood. The very imperfect notion ordinarily formed of the Utilitarian formula was the chief obstacle which impeded its reception; the main work to be done, therefore, by a Utilitarian writer was to clear the doctrine from the grosser misconceptions. Thus the question would be greatly simplified, and a large proportion of its difficulties removed. His Essays purport throughout to be a defence and exposition of the Utilitarian doctrine.

But one characteristic of Mill's writings is that there is often a wide gulf between what he intends and what he achieves. There is even a want of security that what he is at any moment urging may not be the logical contrary of what he thinks he is urging. This happens to be palpably the case with the celebrated Essays before us. Mill explains and defends his favourite doctrine with so much affection and so much candour that he finally explains himself into the opposite doctrine. Yet with that simplicity which is a pleasing feature of his personal character, Mill continues to regard himself as a Utilitarian long after he has left the grounds of Paley and Bentham. Lines of logical distinction and questions of logical consistency are of little account to one who cannot distinguish between fact and feeling, between sense and sentiment. It is possible that no small part of the favour with which these Essays have always been received by the general public is due to the happy way in which Mill has combined the bitter and the sweet. The uncompromising rigidity of the Benthamist formulas is softened and toned down. An apparently scientific treatment is combined with so many noble sentiments and high aspirations, that almost any one except a logician may be disarmed.

But nothing can endure if it be not logical. These Essays may be very agreeable reading; they may make readers congratulate themselves on so easily becoming moral philosophers; but they cannot really advance moral science if they represent one thing as being another thing. I make it my business therefore in this article to show that Mill was intellectually unfitted to decide what was utilitarian and what was not. In removing the obstacles to the reception of his favourite doctrine he removed its landmarks too, and confused everything. It is true that I come rather late in the day to show this. Some scores, if not hundreds, of critics have shown the same fact more or less clearly. Eminent men of the most different schools and tones of thought--such as the Rev. Dr. Martineau, Mr. Sidgwick, Dr. Ward, Professor Birks, the late Professor Grote--have criticized and refuted Mill time after time.

Since commencing my analysis of Mill's Philosophy, I have been surprised to find, too, that some who were supposed to support Mill's school through thick and thin, have long since discovered the inconsistencies which I would now expose, at such wearisome length as if they were new discoveries. Such is the ground which my friend, Professor Croom Robertson, takes in his quarterly review, _Mind_, which must be considered our best authority on philosophical questions. As to this matter of Utilitarianism, a very eminent author, formerly a friend of Mill himself, assures me that the subject is quite threshed out, and implies that there is no need for me to trouble the public any more about it. In fact, it would seem to be allowed within philosophical circles that Mill's works are often wrongheaded and unphilosophical. Yet these works are supposed to have done so much good that obloquy attaches to any one who would seek to diminish the respect paid to them by the public at large. Philosophers, and teachers of the last generation at least, have done their best to give Mill's groundless philosophy a hold upon all the schools and all the press, and yet we of this generation are to wait calmly until this influence dissolves of its own accord. We are to do nothing to lessen the natural respect paid to the memory of the dead, especially of the dead who have unquestionably laboured with single-minded purpose for what they considered the good of their fellow-creatures. But in nothing is it more true than in philosophy, that "the evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones." Words and false arguments cannot be recalled. Throw a stone into the surface of the still sea, and you are powerless to prevent the circle of disturbance from spreading more and more widely. True it is, that one disturbance may be overcome and apparently obliterated by other deeper disturbances; but Mill's works and opinions were disseminated by the immense former influence of the united band of Benthamist philosophers. He is criticized and discussed and repeated, in almost every philosophical work of the last thirty or forty years. He is taken throughout the world as the representative of British philosophy, and it is not sufficient for a few eminent thinkers in Oxford, or Cambridge, or London, or Edinburgh, or Aberdeen, to acknowledge in a tacit sort of way that this doctrine and that doctrine is wrong. Eventually, no doubt, the opinion of the Lecture Halls and Combination Rooms will guide the public opinion; but it may take a generation for tacit opinions to permeate society. We must have them distinctly and boldly expressed. It is especially to be remembered that the public press throughout the English-speaking countries is mostly conducted by men educated in the time when Mill's works were entirely predominant. These men are now for the most part cut off, by geographical or professional obstacles, from the direct influence of Oxford or Cambridge. The circle of disturbance has spread beyond the immediate reach of those centres of thought. To be brief, I do not believe that Mill's immense philosophical influence, founded as it is on confusion of thought, will readily collapse. I fear that it may remain as a permanent obstacle in the way of sound thinking. _Citius emergit veritas ex errore, quam ex confusione._ Had Mill simply erred as did Hobbes about elementary geometry, and Berkeley about infinitesimals, it would be necessary merely to point out the errors and consign them to merciful oblivion. But it is not so easy to consign to oblivion ponderous works so full of confusion of thought that every inexperienced and unwarned reader is sure to lose his way in them, and to take for profound philosophy that which is really a kind of kaleidoscopic presentation of philosophic ideas and phrases, in a succession of various but usually inconsistent combinations. To the public at large, Mill's works still undoubtedly remain as the standard of accurate thinking, and the most esteemed repertory of philosophy. I cannot therefore consider my criticism superfluous, and at the risk of repeating much that has been said by the eminent critics already mentioned, or by others, I must show that Mill has thrown ethical philosophy into confusion as far as could well be done in ninety-six pages.

The nature of the Utilitarian doctrine is explained by Mill with sufficient accuracy in pp. 9 and 10, where he says--

"The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals, Utility, or
the Greatest Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in
proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to
produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure,
and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of
pleasure. To give a clear view of the moral standard set up by the
theory, much more requires to be said; in particular, what things it
includes in the ideas of pain and pleasure; and to what extent this
is left an open question. But these supplementary explanations do
not affect the theory of life on which this theory of morality is
grounded--namely, that pleasure, and freedom from pain, are the only
things desirable as ends; and that all desirable things (which are
as numerous in the utilitarian as any other scheme) are desirable
either for the pleasure inherent in themselves, or as means to the
promotion of pleasure and the prevention of pain."

Mill proceeds to say that such a theory of life excites inveterate dislike in many minds, and among them some of the most estimable in feeling and purpose. To hold forth no better end than pleasure is felt to be utterly mean and grovelling--a doctrine worthy only of swine. Mill accordingly proceeds to inquire whether there is anything really grovelling in the doctrine--whether, on the contrary, we may not include under pleasure, feelings and motives which are in the highest degree noble and elevating. The whole inquiry turns upon this question--Do pleasures differ in quality as well as in quantity? Can a small amount of pleasure of very elevated character outweigh a large amount of pleasure of low quality? We should never think of estimating pictures by their size and number. The productions of West and Fuseli, which were the wonder and admiration of our grandparents, can now be bought by the square yard, to cover the bare walls of eating-houses and music-halls. _Sic transit gloria mundi._ But a choice sketch by Turner sometimes sells for many pounds per square inch. It is clear, then, that in the opinion of connoisseurs, which must, for our present purpose, be considered final, high art is almost wholly a matter of quality. Two great pictures by West may be nearly twice as valuable as one; and two equally choice sketches by Turner are twice as good as one; but it would seem hardly possible in the present day for the disciple of "high art" to bring West and Turner into the same category of thought. I suppose that even Turner will presently begin to wane before "the higher criticism."

A corresponding difficulty lies at the very basis of the Utilitarian theory of ethics. The tippler may esteem two pints of beer doubly as much as one; the hero may feel double satisfaction in saving two lives instead of one; but who shall weigh the pleasure of a pint of beer against the pleasure of saving a fellow-creature's life.

Paley, indeed, cut the Gordian knot of this difficulty in a summary manner; he denied altogether that there is any difference between pleasures, except in continuance and intensity. It must have required some moral courage to write the paragraph to be next quoted; yet Paley, however much he may be said to have temporized and equivocated about oaths and subscription to Articles, cannot be accused of want of explicitness in this passage. There is a directness and clear-hitting of the point in Paley's writings which always charms me.

"In strictness, any condition may be denominated happy, in which the
amount or aggregate of pleasure exceeds that of pain; and the degree
of happiness depends upon the quantity of this excess. And the
greatest quantity of it ordinarily attainable in human life, is what
we mean by happiness, when we inquire or pronounce what human
happiness consists in. In which inquiry I will omit much usual
declamation on the dignity and capacity of our nature; the
superiority of the soul to the body, of the rational to the animal
part of our constitution; upon the worthiness, refinement, and
delicacy of some satisfactions, or the meanness, grossness, and
sensuality of others; because I hold that pleasures differ in
nothing, but in continuance and intensity: from a just computation
of which, confirmed by what we observe of the apparent cheerfulness,
tranquillity, and contentment, of men of different tastes, tempers,
stations, and pursuits, every question concerning human happiness
must receive its decision."[78]

Bentham, it need hardly be said, adopted the same idea as the basis of his ethical and legislative theories. In his uncompromising style he tells us[79] that

"Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign
masters, _pain_ and _pleasure_. It is for them alone to point out
what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do. On
the one hand the standard of right and wrong, on the other the chain
of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne. They govern us
in all we do, in all we say, in all we think: every effort we can
make to throw off our subjection will serve but to demonstrate and
confirm it. In words a man may pretend to abjure their empire: but
in reality he will remain subject to it all the while. The
_principle of utility_ recognises this subjection, and assumes it
for the foundation of that system, the object of which is to rear
the fabric of felicity by the hands of reason and of law. Systems
which attempt to question it, deal in sounds instead of sense, in
caprice instead of reason, in darkness instead of light."

Elsewhere Bentham proceeds to show how we may estimate the _values_ of pleasures and pains, meaning obviously by _values_ the quantities or forces. As these feelings are both the ends and the instruments of the moralist and legislator, it especially behoves us to learn how to estimate these values aright, and Bentham tells us most distinctly.[80]

To a person, he says, considered _by himself_, the value of a
pleasure or pain considered _by itself_, will be greater or less,
according to the four following circumstances. 1. Its _intensity_.
2. Its _duration_. 3. Its _certainty_ or _uncertainty_. 4. Its
_propinquity_ or _remoteness_. But when the value of any pleasure or
pain is to be considered for the purpose of estimating the general
tendency of the act, we have to take into account also, 5. The
_fecundity_, or the chance it has of being followed by sensations of
the same kind, that is, pleasures, if it be a pleasure; pains, if it
be a pain. 6. Its _purity_, or the chance it has of _not_ being
followed by sensations of the _opposite_ kind: that is, pains, if it
be a pleasure; pleasures, if it be a pain. Finally, when we consider
the interests of a number of persons, we must also estimate a
pleasure or pain with reference to, 7. Its extent; that is the
number of persons to whom it extends, or who are affected by it.

Thus did Bentham clearly and explicitly lay the foundations of the moral and political sciences, and to impress these fundamental propositions on the memory he framed the following curious mnemonic lines, which may be quoted for the sake of their quaintness:--

"_Intense, long, certain, speedy, fruitful, pure_----
Such marks in pleasures and in pains endure.
Such pleasures seek, if private be thy end:
If it be public, wide let them _extend_.
Such _pains_ avoid, whichever be thy view:
If pains _must_ come, let them _extend_ to few."

In all that Bentham says about pleasure and pain, there is not a word about the intrinsic superiority of one pleasure to another. He advocates our seeking _pure_ pleasures; but with him a pure pleasure was clearly defined as one not likely to be followed by feelings of the opposite kind; the pleasure of opium-eating, for instance, would be called impure, simply because it is likely to lead to bad health and consequent pain; if not so followed by evil consequences, the pleasure would be as pure as any other pleasure. With Bentham morality became, as it were, a question of the ledger and the balance-sheet; all feelings were reduced to the same denomination of value, and whenever we indulge in a little enjoyment, or endure a pain, the consequences in regard to subsequent enjoyment or suffering are to be inexorably scored for or against us, as the case may be. Our conduct must be judged wise or foolish according as, in the long-run, we find a favourable "hedonic" balance-sheet.

What Mill in his earlier life thought about these foundations of the utilitarian doctrine, and the elaborate structure reared therefrom by Bentham, he has told us in his Autobiography, pp. 64 to 70. Subsequently Mill revolted, as we all know, against the narrowness of the Benthamist creed. While wishing to retain[81] the precision of expression, the definiteness of meaning, the contempt of declamatory phrases and vague generalities, which were so honourably characteristic both of Bentham and of his own father, James Mill, John Stuart decided to give a wider basis and a more free and "genial" character to the utilitarian speculations.

Let us consider how Mill proceeded to give this "genial" character to the utilitarian philosophy. It must be admitted, he says,[82] that utilitarian writers in general have placed the superiority of mental over bodily pleasures _chiefly_ in the greater permanency, safety, uncostliness, &c., of the former--that is, in their circumstantial advantages rather than in their intrinsic nature. As regards Bentham, at least, Mill might have omitted the word _chiefly_. But according to Mill, there is no need why they should have taken such a ground.

"They might have taken the other, and, as it may be called, higher
ground, with entire consistency. It is quite compatible with the
principle of utility to recognise the fact, that some _kinds_ of
pleasure are more desirable and more valuable than others. It would
be absurd, that while, in estimating all other things, quality is
considered as well as quantity, the estimation of pleasures should
be supposed to depend on quantity alone."

Then Mill proceeds to point out, with all the persuasiveness of his best style, that there are higher feelings which we would not sacrifice for any quantity of a lower feeling. Few human creatures, he holds, would consent to be changed into any of the lower animals for a promise of the fullest allowance of a beast's pleasures; no intelligent human being would consent to be a fool, no instructed person would be an ignoramus, no person of feeling and conscience would be selfish and base, and so forth. Mill, in fact, treats us to a good deal of what Paley so cynically called the "usual declamation," on the dignity and capacity of our nature, and the worthiness of some satisfactions compared with the grossness and sensuality of others. It must be allowed that Mill has the best of it, at least with the majority of readers. Paley is simply brutal as to the way in which he depresses everything to the same level of apparent sensuality. Mill overflows with genial and noble aspirations; he hardly deigns to count the lower pleasures as worth putting in the scale; it is better, he thinks, to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. If the pig or the fool is of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides. In the pages which follow there is much nobleness and elevation of thought. But where is the logic? We are nothing if we are not logical. But does Mill, in the fervour of his revolt against the cold, narrow restraints of the Benthamist formulas, consider the consistency and stability of his position? Let us examine in some detail the position to which he has brought himself.

It is plain, in the first place, that pleasure is with Mill the ultimate purpose of existence; for the philosophy is that of utilitarianism, and Mill distinctly assures us (Autobiography, p. 178) that he "never ceased to be a utilitarian." We must, of course, distinguish between the pleasure of the individual and the pleasure of other individuals of the race, between Egoistic and Universalistic Hedonism, as Mr. Sidgwick calls these very different doctrines. But the happiness of the race is, of course, made up of the happiness of its units, so that unless most of the individuals pursue a course ensuring happiness, the race cannot be happy in the aggregate. Now, to acquire happiness the individual must, of course, select that line of conduct which is likely to--that is, will in the majority of cases--bring happiness. He must aim at something which is capable of being reached. Mill tells us (p. 18) that if by happiness be meant a continuity of highly pleasurable excitement, it is evident enough that this is impossible to attain.

"A state of exalted pleasure lasts only moments, or in some cases,
and with some intermissions, hours or days, and is the occasional
brilliant flash of enjoyment, not its permanent and steady flame. Of
this the philosophers who have taught that happiness is the end of
life were as fully aware as those who taunt them. The happiness
which they meant was not a life of rapture; but moments of such, in
an existence made up of few and transitory pains, many and various
pleasures, with a decided predominance of the actual over the
passive, and _having as the foundation of the whole, not to expect
more from life than it is capable of bestowing_.[83] A life thus
composed, to those who have been fortunate enough to obtain it, has
always appeared worthy of the name of happiness."

Then Mill goes on to point out what he considers has been sufficient to satisfy great numbers of mankind (p. 19):

"The main constituents of a satisfied life appear to be two, either
of which by itself is often found sufficient for the purpose:
tranquillity, and excitement. With much tranquillity, many find that
they can be content with very little pleasure: with much excitement,
many can reconcile themselves to a considerable quantity of pain.
There is assuredly no inherent impossibility in enabling even the
mass of mankind to unite both."

From these passages we must gather that at any rate the mass of mankind will attain happiness if they are satisfied with these main constituents, and we are especially told that the foundation of the whole utilitarian philosophy (Mill does not specify the substantive to which the adjective _whole_ applies in the above quotation, but it must from the context be either "utilitarian philosophy," "search for happiness," or some closely equivalent idea) is _not to expect from life more than it is capable of bestowing_.

The question, then, may fairly arise whether upon a fair calculation of probabilities they are not wise, upon Mill's own showing, who aim at moderate achievements in life, so that in accomplishing these they may insure a satisfied life. This seems the more reasonable, if, as Mill elsewhere tells us, the nobler feelings are very apt to be killed off by the chilly realities of life.

"Many," he says (p. 14), "who begin with youthful enthusiasm for
everything noble, as they advance in years sink into indolence and
selfishness. But I do not believe that those who undergo this very
common change, voluntarily choose the lower description of pleasure
in preference to the higher, I believe that before they devote
themselves exclusively to the one, they have already become
incapable of the other. Capacity for the nobler feelings is in most
natures a very tender plant, easily killed, not only by hostile
influences, but by mere want of sustenance; and in the majority of
young persons it speedily dies away if the occupations to which
their position in life has devoted them, and the society into which
it has thrown them, are not favourable to keeping that higher
capacity in exercise. Men lose their high aspirations as they lose
their intellectual tastes, because they have not time or opportunity
for indulging them; and they addict themselves to inferior
pleasures, not because they deliberately prefer them, but because
they are either the only ones to which they have access, or the only
ones which they are any longer capable of enjoying. It may be
questioned whether any one who has remained equally susceptible to
both classes of pleasure, ever knowingly and calmly preferred the
lower; though many, in all ages, have broken down in an ineffectual
attempt to combine both."

It would seem, then, that for the mass of mankind there is small prospect indeed of achieving happiness through high aspirations. They will not have time nor opportunity for indulging them. If they look for happiness solely to such aspirations they must be disappointed, and cannot have a satisfied life; if they attempt to combine the higher and lower lives they are likely to "break down in the ineffectual attempt." Now, I submit that, under these circumstances, it is folly, according to Mill's scheme of morality, to aim high; it is equivalent to going into a life-lottery, in which there are no doubt high prizes to be gained, but few and far between. It is simply gambling with hedonic stakes; preferring a small chance of high enjoyment to comparative certainty of moderate pleasures. Mill clearly admits this when he says (p. 14), "It is indisputable that the being whose capacities of enjoyment are low has the greatest chance of having them fully satisfied; and a highly endowed being will always feel that any happiness which he can look for, as the world is constituted, is imperfect."

Although, then, "the foundation of the whole" is not to expect from life more than it is capable of bestowing, we are actually to prefer becoming highly endowed, although we cannot expect life to satisfy the corresponding aspirations. That is to say, although seeking for happiness, we are to prefer the course in which we are approximately certain of not obtaining it.

But Mill goes on to give some explanations. He says that the highly endowed being can learn to bear the imperfections of his happiness, "if they are at all bearable" (p. 14). This is small comfort if they happen to be _not at all bearable_, an alternative which is not further pursued by Mill. And will not this intolerable fate be most likely to befall those whose aspirations have been pitched most highly? But Mill goes on:

"They (that is, the imperfections of life or happiness?) will not
make him envy the being who is indeed unconscious of the
imperfections, but only because he feels not at all the good which
those imperfections qualify. It is better to be a human being
dissatisfied, than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates
dissatisfied, than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, is
of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side
of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both
sides."

Concerning this position of affairs the most apposite remark I can make is contained in the somewhat trite and vulgar saying, "Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise." If Socrates is pretty sure to be dissatisfied, and yet, owing to his wisdom, cannot help wishing to be Socrates, he seems to have no chance of that individual happiness which depends on being satisfied, and not expecting from life more than it is capable of bestowing. The great majority of people who do not know what it is like to be Socrates, are surely to be congratulated that they can, without scruple or remorse, seek a prize of happiness which there is a fair prospect of securing. But Mill tells us that those who choose the lower life do so "because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides." Then Mill introduces a paragraph, already partially quoted, in which he allows that men often do, _from infirmity of character_, make their selection for the nearer good, though they know it to be the less valuable. Many who begin with youthful enthusiasm for everything noble, sink in later years into indolence and selfishness. The capacity for the nobler feelings is easily killed, and men lose their high aspirations because they have not time and opportunity for indulging them. I submit that, _from Mill's point of view_, these are all valid reasons why they should _not_ choose the higher life. We are considering here, not those who have always been devoid of the nobler feelings, but those who have in earlier life been full of enthusiasm and high aspirations. If such men, with few exceptions, decide eventually in favour of the lower life, they are parties who _do_ know both sides of the comparison, and deliberately choose not to be Socrates, with the prospect of the very imperfect happiness (probably involving short rations) which is incident to the life of Socrates.

Mill, indeed, calmly assumes that the vote goes in his own and Socrates' favour. He says (p. 15):

"From this verdict of the only competent judges, I apprehend there
can be no appeal. On a question which is the best worth having of
two pleasures, or which of two modes of existence is the most
grateful to the feelings, apart from its moral attributes and from
its consequences, the judgment of those who are qualified by
knowledge of both, or, if they differ, that of the majority among
them, must be admitted as final. And there need be the less
hesitation to accept this judgment respecting the quality of
pleasures, since there is no other tribunal to be referred to, even
on the question of quantity. What means are there of determining
which is the acutest of two pains, or the intensest of two
pleasurable sensations, except the general suffrage of those who are
familiar with both?"