1. CHAPTER I
GENERAL EFFECTS OF THE POLITICAL SUPERINTENDENCE OF OPINION
A principle which has entered deeply into the systems of the writers on
political law is that of the duty of governments to watch over the manners
of the people. 'Government' say they, 'plays the part of an unnatural step
mother, not of an affectionate parent, when she is contented by rigorous
punishments to avenge the commission of a crime, while she is wholly inattentive
beforehand to imbue the mind with those virtuous principles which might have
rendered punishment unnecessary. It is the business of a sage and patriotic
magistracy to have its attention ever alive to the sentiments of the people,
to encourage such as are favourable to virtue, and to check, in the bud,
such as may lead to disorder and corruption.
How long shall government be employed to display its terrors without ever
having recourse to the gentleness of invitation? How long shall she deal
in retrospect and censure to the utter neglect of prevention and remedy?'
These reasonings have, in some respects, gained additional strength by means
of the latest improvements, and clearest views, upon the subject of political
truth. It is now more evident than it was in any former period that government,
instead- of being an object of secondary consideration, has been the principal
vehicle of extensive and permanent evil to mankind. It was unavoidable therefore
to say 'since government can produce so much positive mischief, surely it
can do some positive good'.
But these views, however specious and agreeable they may in the first
instance appear, are liable to very serious question. If we would not be
seduced by visionary good, we ought here, more than ever, to recollect the
fundamental principles laid down and illustrated in the work, 'that government
is, in all cases, an evil', and 'that it ought to be introduced as sparingly
as possible'. Man is a species of being whose excellence depends upon his
individuality; and who can be neither great nor wise but in proportion as
he is independent.
But, if we would shut up government within the narrowest practicable limits,
we must beware how we let it loose in the field of opinion. Opinion is the
castle, or rather the temple, of human nature; and, if it be polluted, there
is no longer anything sacred or venerable in sublunary existence.
In treating of the subject of political obedience,[1] we settled, perhaps
with some degree of clearness, the line of demarcation between the contending
claims of the individual and of the community. We found that the species
of obedience which sufficiently discharged the claims of the community was
that which is paid to force, and not which is built upon a sentiment of deference;
and that this species of obedience was, beyond all others, least a source
of degeneracy in him that paid it. But, upon this hypothesis, whatever exterior
compliance is yielded, opinion remains inviolate.
Here then we perceive in what manner the purposes of government may be
answered, and the independence of the individual suffer the smallest degree
of injury. We are shown how government, which is, in all cases, an evil,
may most effectually be limited as to the noxiousness of its influence.
But, if this line be overstepped, if opinion be rendered a topic of political
superintendence, we are immediately involved in a slavery to which no imagination
of man can set a termination. The hopes of our improvement are arrested;
for government fixes the mercurialness of man to an assigned station. We
can no longer enquire or think; for enquiry and thought are uncertain in
their direction, and unshackled in their termination. We sink into motionless
inactivity and the basest cowardice; for our thoughts and words are beset
on every side with penalty and menace.
It is not the business of government, as will more fully appear in the
sequel, to become the preceptor of its subjects. Its office is not to inspire
our virtues, that would be a hopeless task; it is merely to check those excesses
which threaten the general security.
But, though this argument ought perhaps to be admitted as sufficiently
decisive of the subject under consideration, and cannot be set aside but
upon grounds that would invalidate all the reasonings of this work, yet the
prejudice in favour of the political superintendence of opinion has, with
some persons, been so great, and the principle, in some of its applications,
has been stated with such seeming plausibility, as to make it necessary that
we should follow it in these applications, and endeavour in each instance
to expose its sophistry.
In the meantime it may not be improper to state some further reasons in
confirmation of the general unfitness of government as a superintendent of
opinion.
One of these may be drawn from the view we have recently taken of society
considered as an agent.[2] A multitude of men may be feigned to be an individual,
but they cannot become a real individual. The acts which go under the name
of the society are really the acts now of one single person and now of another.
The men who by turns usurp the name of the whole perpetually act under the
pressure of encumbrances that deprive them of their true energy. They are
fettered by the prejudices, the humours, the weakness and the vice of those
with whom they act; and, after a thousand sacrifices to these contemptible
interests, their project comes out at last, distorted in every joint, abortive
and monstrous. Society therefore, in its corporate capacity, can by no means
be busy and intrusive with impunity, since its acts must be expected to be
deficient in wisdom.
Secondly, they will not be less deficient in efficacy than they are in
wisdom. The object at which we are supposing them to aim is to improve the
opinions, and through them the manners, of mankind; for manners are nothing
but opinions carried out into action: such as is the fountain, such will
be the streams that are supplied from it. But what is it upon which opinion
must be founded? Surely upon evidence, upon the perceptions of the understanding.
Has society then any particular advantage, in its corporate capacity, for
illuminating the understanding? Can it convey, into its addresses and expostulations
a compound or sublimate of the wisdom of all its members, superior in quality
to the individual wisdom of any? If so, why have not societies of men written
treatises of morality, of the philosophy of nature, or the philosophy of
mind? Why have all the great steps of human improvement been the work of
individuals?
If then society, considered as an agent, have no particular advantage
for enlightening the understanding, the real difference between the dicta
of society and the dicta of individuals must be looked for in the article
of authority. But authority is, by the very nature of the case, inadequate
to the task it assumes to perform. Man is the creature of habit and judgment;
and the empire of the former of these, though not perhaps more absolute,
is one at least more conspicuous. The most efficacious instrument I can possess
for changing a man's habits is to change his judgments. Even this instrument
will seldom produce a sudden, though, when brought into full operation, it
is perhaps sure of producing a gradual revolution. But this mere authority
can never of. Where it does most in changing the characters of men, it only
changes them into base and despicable slaves. Contending against the habits
of entire society, it can do nothing. It excites only contempt of its frivolous
endeavours. If laws were a sufficient means for the reformation of error
and vice, it is not to be believed but that the world, long ere this, would
have become the seat of every virtue. Nothing can be more easy than to command
men to be just and good to love their neighbours, to practise universal sincerity,
to be content with a little, and to resist the enticements of avarice and
ambition. But, when we have done, will the actions of men be altered by our
precepts? These commands have been decreed that every man should be hanged
that violated them, it is vehemently to be suspected that this would not
have secured their influence.
But it will be answered 'that laws need not deal thus in generals, but
may descend to particular provisions calculated to secure their success.
We may institute sumptuary laws, limiting the expense of our citizens in
dress and food. We may institute agrarian laws forbidding any man proclaim
prizes as the rewire of acts of justice, benevolence and public virtue'.
And, when we have done this, how far are we really advanced in our career?
If the people are previously inclined to moderation of expense, the walls
are a superfluous parade. If they are not inclined, who shall execute them,
or prevent their evasion? It is the misfortune in these cases that regulations
cannot be executed but by the individuals of that very people they are meant
to restrain. If the nation at large be infested with vice, who shall secure
us a succession of magistrates that are free from the contagion? Even if
we could surmount this difficulty, still it would be vain. Vice is ever more
ingenious in evasion than authority in detection. It is absurd to imagine
that any law can be executed that directly contradicts the propensities and
spirit of the nation. If vigilance were able fully to countermine the subterfuges
of art, the magistrates who thus pertinaciously adhered to the practice of
their duty could scarcely fail to become the miserable victims of depravity
exasperated into madness.
What can be more contrary to all liberal principles of human intercourse
than the inquisitorial spirit which such regulations imply? Who shall enter
into my house, scrutinize my expenditure, and count the dishes upon my table?
Who shall detect the stratagems I employ, 'to cover my real possession of
an enormous income, while I seem to receive but a small one? Not that there
is really anything unjust and unbecoming, as has been too often supposed,
in my neighbour's animadverting with the utmost freedom upon my personal
conduct.[3] But that all watchfulness that proposes for its object the calling
in of force as the corrective of error is invidious. Observe my conduct;
you do well. Report it as widely as possible, provided you report it fairly;
you are entitled to commendation. But the heart of man unavoidably revolts
against the attempt to correct my error by the infliction of violence. We
disapprove of the superior, however well informed he may be who undertakes,
by chastisement, to induce me to alter in my opinion, or vary in my choice;
but we disapprove still more, and we do well, of the man who officiates asthe Argus of my tyrant; who reports my conduct, not for the purpose of increasing
my wisdom and prudence, not for the purpose of instructing others, but that
he may bring down upon me the brute, the slavish and exasperating arm of
power.
Such must be the case in extensive governments: in governments of smaller
dimensions opinion would be all-sufficient; the inspection of every man over
the conduct of his neighbours, when unstained with caprice, would constitute
a censorship of the most irresistible nature. But the force of this censorship
would depend upon its freedom, not following the positive dictates of law,
but the spontaneous decisions of the understanding.
Again, in the distribution of rewards who shall secure us against error,
partiality and intrigue, converting that which was meant for the support
of virtue into a new engine for her ruin? Not to add that prizes are a very
feeble instrument for the generation of excellence, always inadequate to
its reward where it exists, always in danger of being bestowed on its semblance,
continually misleading the understanding by foreign and degenerate motives
of avarice and vanity.
The force of this argument, respecting the inefficacy of regulations,
has often been felt, and the conclusions that are deduced from it have been
in a high degree, discouraging. 'The character of nations,' it has been said,
'is unalterable, or at least, when once debauched, can never be recovered
to purity. Laws are an empty name when the manners of the people are become
corrupt. In vain shall the wisest legislator attempt the reformation of his
country when the torrent of profligacy and vice has once broken down the
bounds of moderation. There is no longer any instrument left for the restoration
of simplicity and frugality. It is useless to declaim against the evils that
arise from inequality of riches and rank, where this inequality has already
gained an establishment. A generous spirit will admire the exertions of a
Cato and a Brutus; but a calculating spirit will condemn them, as inflicting
useless. torture upon a patient whose disease was irremediable. It was from
a view of this truth that the poets derived their fictions respecting the
early history of mankind; well aware that, when luxury was introduced, and
the springs of intellect unbent, it would be a vain expectation that should
hope to recall men from passion to reason, and from effeminacy to energy.'[4]
But this conclusion from the inefficacy of regulations is so far from being
valid that in reality,
A third objection to the positive interference of society in its corporate
capacity for the propagation of truth and virtue is that such,interference
is altogether unnecessary. Truth and virtue are competent to fight their
own battles. They do not need to be nursed and patronized by the hand of
power.
The mistake which has been made in this case is similar to the mistake
which is now universally exploded upon the subject of commerce. It was long
supposed that, if any nation desired to extend its trade, the thing most
immediately necessary was for government to interfere, and institute protecting
duties, bounties and monopolies. It is now generally admitted by speculative
enquirers that commerce never flourishes so much as when it is delivered
from the guardianship of legislators and ministers, and is conducted upon
the principle, not of forcing other people to buy our commodities dear, when
they might purchase them elsewhere cheaper or better, but of ourselves feeling
the necessity of recommending them by their intrinsic advantages. Nothing
can be at once so unreasonable and hopeless as to attempt, by positive regulations,
to supersede the dictates of common sense, and the essential principles of
human understanding.
The same truth which has gained such extensive footing under the article
of commerce has made some progress in its application to speculative enquiry.
Formerly it was thought that the true religion was to be defended by acts
of uniformity, and that one of the first duties of the magistrate was to
watch the progress of heresy. It was truly judged that the connection between
error and vice is of the most intimate nature; and it was concluded that
no means could be more effectual to prevent men from deviating into error
than to check their wanderings by the scourge of authority. Thus writers
whose political views in other respects have been uncommonly enlarged have
been found to maintain 'that men ought indeed to be permitted to think as
they please, but not to propagate their pernicious opinions; as they may
be permitted to keep poisons in their closet, but not to offer them to sale
under the denomination of cordials'.[5] Or, if humanity have forbidden them
to recommend the extirpation of a sect which has already got footing in a
country, they have however earnestly advised the magistrate to give no quarter
to any new extravagance that might be attempted to be introduced.[6] The
reign of these two errors, respecting commerce, and theoretical speculation,
is nearly at an end; and it is reasonable to believe that the idea of teaching
virtue through the instrumentality of regulation and government will not
long survive them.
All that we should require on the part of government, in behalf of morality
and virtue, seems to be a clear stage upon which for them to exert their
own energies, and perhaps some restraint, for the present, upon the violent
disturbers of the peace of society, that the operations of these principles
may be permitted to go on uninterrupted to their genuine conclusion. Who
ever saw an instance in which error, unallied to power, was victorious over
truth? Who is there that can bring himself to believe that, with equal arms,
truth can be ultimately defeated? Hitherto it seems as if every instrument
of menace or influence had been employed to counteract her. Has she made
no progress? Has the mind of man the capacity to choose falsehood, and reject
truth, when evidence is fairly presented? When it has been once thus presented,
and has gained a few converts, does she ever fail to go on increasing the
number of her votaries? Exclusively of the fatal interference of government,
and the violent irruptions of barbarism threatening to sweep her from the
face of the earth, has not this been, in all instances, the history of science?
Nor are these observations less true in their application to the manners
and morals of mankind. Do not men always act in the manner which they esteem
best upon the whole, or most conducive to their interest? Is it possible
then that evidence of what is best, or what is most beneficial, can be stated
to no purpose? The real history of the changes of character they experience
in this respect seems to be this. Truth for a long time, spreads itself unobserved.
Those who are the first to embrace it are little aware of the extraordinary
events with which it is pregnant. But it goes on to be studied and illustrated.
It increases in dearness and amplitude of evidence. The number of those by
whom it is embraced is gradually enlarged. If it have relation to their practical
interests, if it show them that they may be a thousand times more happy and
more free than at present, it is impossible that, in its perpetual 'Increase
of evidence and energy, it should not, at last, break the bounds of speculation,
and become an operative principle of action. What can be less plausible than
the opinion which has so long prevailed 'that justice, and an equal distribution
of the means of happiness, may appear, with the utmost clearness, to be the
only reasonable basis of social institution, without ever having a chance
of being reduced into practice? that oppression and misery are draughts of
so intoxicating a nature that, when once tasted, we can never afterwards
refuse to partake of them? that vice has so many advantages over virtue as
to make the reasonableness and wisdom of the latter, however powerfully exhibited,
incapable of obtaining a firm hold upon our affections?'
While therefore we demonstrate the inefficacy of naked and unassisted
regulations, we are far from producing any discouragement in the prospect
of social improvement. The true tendency of this view of the subject is to
suggest indeed a different, but a more consistent and promising, method by
which this improvement is to be produced. The legitimate instrument of effecting
political reformation is knowledge. Let truth be incessantly studied, illustrated
and propagated, and the effect is inevitable. Let us not vainly endeavour,
by laws and regulations, to anticipate the future dictates of the general
mind, but calmly wait till the harvest of opinion is ripe. Let no new practice
in politics be introduced, and no old one he anxiously superseded, till the
alteration is called for by the public voice. The task which, for the present,
should occupy the first rank in the thoughts of the friend of man is enquiry,
communication, discussion. The time may come when his task shall appear to
be of another sort. Error indeed, if, with unaltered constancy to sink into
unnoticed oblivion, without almost one partisan adventurous enough to intercept
her fall. Such would probably be the event were it not for the restless and
misjudging impetuosity of mankind. But the event may be otherwise. Political
change, advancing too rapidly to its crisis, may be attended with commotion
and hazard; and it may then be incumbent on the generous and disinterested
man, suspending, to a certain degree, general speculations, and the labours
of science, to assist in unfolding the momentous catastrophe, and to investigate
and recommend the measures which the pressure of temporary difficulties shall
appear successively to require. If this should at any time be the case, if
a concert of action can become preferable to a concert of disquisition, the
duty of the philanthropist will then change its face. Instead of its present
sober, cheerful and peaceable character, it will be full of ardurousness,
solicitude and uncertainty, evils which nothing but an assured simplicity
and independence of conduct can ever purify or relieve. — To return.
In the fourth place, the interference of an organized society, for the
purpose of influencing opinions and manners, is not only useless, but pernicious.
We have already found that such interference is in one view of the subject
ineffectual. But here a distinction is to be made. Considered with a view
to the introduction of any favourable changes in the state of Society, it
is altogether impotent. But, though it be inadequate to change it, it is
powerful to prolong. This property is political regulation is so far from
being doubtful that to it alone we are to ascribe all the calamities that
government has inflicted on mankind. When regulation coincides with the habits
and propensities of mankind at the time it is introduced, it will be found
capable of maintaining those habits and propensities, in the greater part,
unaltered for centuries. In this view it is doubly entitled to jealousy and
distrust.
To understand this more accurately, let us apply it to the case of rewards,
which has always been a favourite topic with the advocates of an improved
legislation. How often have we been told 'that talents and virtues would
spring up spontaneously in a country, one of the objects of whose constitution
should be to secure to them an adequate reward'? Now, to judge of the propriety
of this aphorism, we should begin with recollecting that the discerning of
merit is an individual, not a social capacity. What can be more reasonable
than that each man, for himself, should estimate the merits of his neighbour?
To endeavour to institute a general judgement in the name of the whole, and
to melt down the different opinions of mankind into one common opinion, appears,
at first sight, so monstrous an attempt that it is impossible to augur well
of its consequences. Will this judgement be wise, reasonable or just? Wherever
each man is accustomed to decide for himself, and the appeal of merit is
immediately to the opinion of its contemporaries, there, were it not for
the false bias of some positive institution, we might expect a genuine ardour
in him who aspired to excellence, creating and receiving impressions in the
preference of an impartial audience. We might expect the judgement of the
auditors to ripen by perpetual exercise, and mind, ever curious and awake,
continually to approach nearer to its genuine standard. What do we gain in
compensation for this, by setting up authority as the oracle, from which
the active mind is to inform itself what sort of excellence it should seek
to acquire, and the public at large what judgement they should pronounce
upon the efforts of their contemporaries? What should we think of an act
of parliament appointing some individual president of the court of criticism,
and judge in the last resort of the literary merit of dramatic compositions?
Is there any solid reason why we should expect better things from authority
usurping the examination of moral or political excellence?
Nothing can be more unreasonable than the attempt to retain men in one
common opinion by the dictate of authority. The opinion thus obtruded upon
the minds of the public is not their real opinion; it is only a project by
which they are rendered incapable of forming an opinion. Whenever government
assumes to deliver us from the trouble of thinking for ourselves, the only
consequences it produces are torpor and imbecility. This point was perhaps
sufficiently elucidated when we had occasion directly to investigate the
principle of the right of private judgement.[7]
We shall be still more completely aware of the pernicious tendency of
positive institutions if we proceed explicitly to contrast the nature of
mind, and the nature of government. One of the most unquestionable characteristics
of the human mind has appeared to be its progressive nature. Now, on the
other hand, it is the express tendency of positive institution to retain
that with which it is conversant for ever in the same state. Is then the
perfectibility of understanding an attribute of trivial importance? Can we
recollect, with coldness and indifference, the advantages with which this
quality seems pregnant to the latest posterity? And how are these advantages
to be secured? By incessant industry, by a curiosity never to be disheartened
or fatigued, by a spirit of enquiry to which a philanthropic mind will allow
no pause. The circumstance most indispensably necessary is that we should
never stand still, that everything most interesting to the general welfare,
wholly delivered from restraint, should be in a state of change, moderate
and as it were imperceptible, but continual. Is there anything that can look
with a more malignant aspect upon the general welfare than an institution
tending to give permanence to certain systems and opinions? Such institutions
are two ways pernicious; first, which is most material, because they render
the future advances of mind inexpressibly tedious and operose; secondly because,
by violently confining the stream of reflection and holding it for a time
in an unnatural state, they compel it at last to rush forward with impetuosity,
and thus occasion calamities which, were it free from restraint, would be
found extremely foreign to its nature. If the interference of positive institution
had been out of the question, would the progress of intellect, in past ages,
have been so slow as to have struck the majority of ingenuous observers with
despair? The science of Greece and Rome upon the subject of politics was,
in many respects, extremely imperfect: yet could we have been so long in
appropriating their discoveries, had not the allurements of reward, and the
menace of persecution, united to induce us not to trust to the direct and
fair verdict of our own understandings?
The just conclusion from the above reasonings is nothing more than a confirmation,
with some difference in the mode of application, of the fundamental principle
that government is little capable of affording benefit of the first importance
to mankind. It is calculated to induce us to lament, not the apathy and indifference,
but the inauspicious activity of government. It incites us to look for the
moral improvement of the species, not in the multiplying of regulations,
but in their repeal. It teaches us that truth and virtue, like commerce,
will then flourish most when least subjected to the mistaken guardianship
of authority and laws. This maxim will rise upon us in its importance in
proportion as we connect it with the numerous departments of political justice
to which it will be found to have relation. As fast as it shall be adopted
into the practice of mankind, it may be expected to deliver us from a weight,
intolerable to mind, and, in the highest degree, hostile to the progress
of truth.
[[2]]
Book V, Chap. XXIII.
[[5]]
Gulliver's Travels, Part II, Chap. VI
[[6]]
Mably, de la legislation, Liv. IV, Chap. III: des Etats Unis d'Amerique,
Lettre III