The Gazette 1983

GAZETTE

JULY/AUGUST

198

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BOOK REVIEW An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation by Jeremy Bentham; edited by J. H. Burns and H. L. A. Hart, London, Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1982 (lxx, 343p.). Price £6.95p (Sterling). Jeremy Bentham, the son of a solicitor, was born in London in 1748. On being called to the Bar in 1772 he applied himself to the theory of law and became perhaps the greatest critic of legislation and government in his day. His first publication A Fragment on Government (1-776) contained the germs of most of his later writings and procured for him the acquaintance of the Marquis of Lansdowne at whose seat in Wiltshire he afterwards passed some of the most agreeable hours of his life. "Nature", says Bentham, "has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure ". The principle of utility, which recognises this subjection, is the foundation of his philosophy. By utility he meant the property in any object whereby it tends to produce benefit, advantage, pleasure or happiness or to prevent the happening of mischief, pain or evil to the party whose interest is considered. This principle approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever, either of a private individual or of a Government, according to the tendency which it has to augment or diminish the happiness of the interested party. While this doctrine of utility is the pervading principle in all his writings Bentham's favourite vehicle for it's expression was "the greatest happiness of the greatest number". Happiness for him consists in the enjoyment of pleasures and security from pain and the duty of government was to promote the happiness of society by punishing and rewarding. He was indeed a pioneer of liberalism and radicalism. Those who have the occasion to study Bentham will find his extraordinary, minute arid comprehensive diagnosis of man's nature and motives presented with care in the text and footnotes of this fine publication. Only in the Af aximes of La Rochefoucauld do we find a match for Bentham's utilitarianism. It is no easy task to peruse this volume with advantage. It's study is a labour of duty rather than of love and the student will find chapters dealing with the sources, kinds and measurement of pain and pleasure, the circumstances influencing sensibility, mischievous acts (including the non-payment of taxes), motives, conscious- ness, human actions and dispositions, division of offences and the proportion between them and punishment. An example of the quality and texture of his thinking may be found in his statement on the strength of intellectual powers to which he refers the several qualities of'readiness of apprehension, clearness of discernment, accuracy and tenacity of memory, amplitude of comprehension and vividity and rapidity of imagination'. After such labour is it any wonder that Bentham enjoyed his diversions at Bowood Park with Lord Lansdowne! A generation later the third marquis (Henry Petty Fitzmaurice) was the friend and patron of the poet Thomas Moore. Descended from the Fitzmaurices of Kerry and Sir William Petty of the Down Survey, this family enter- tained such varied people as Bentham, Mirabeau, Romilly and our own Tom Moore who composed many of the Irish Melodies when he lived in Sloperton Cottage on the estate. (continued on p. 141)

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