lish cants which his father and grandfather
canted before him, that he must learn, in the schools of the
Utilitarians, a new sleight of tongue, to make fools clap and wise men
sneer? Let our countrymen keep their eyes on the neophytes of this sect,
and see whether we turn out to be mistaken in the prediction which we
now hazard. It will before long be found, we prophesy, that, as the
corruption of a dunce is the generation of an Utilitarian, so is the
corruption of an Utilitarian the generation of a jobber.

The most elevated station that the "greatest happiness principle" is
ever likely to attain is this, that it may be a fashionable phrase among
newspaper writers and members of parliament--that it may succeed to
the dignity which has been enjoyed by the "original contract," by the
"constitution of 1688," and other expressions of the same kind. We do
not apprehend that it is a less flexible cant than those which have
preceded it, or that it will less easily furnish a pretext for any
design for which a pretext may be required. The "original contract"
meant in the Convention Parliament the co-ordinate authority of the
Three Estates. If there were to be a radical insurrection tomorrow, the
"original contract" would stand just as well for annual parliaments
and universal suffrage. The "Glorious Constitution," again, has meant
everything in turn: the Habeas Corpus Act, the Suspension of the Habeas
Corpus Act, the Test Act, the Repeal of the Test Act. There has not
been for many years a single important measure which has not been
unconstitutional with its opponents, and which its supporters have not
maintained to be agreeable to the true spirit of the constitution. Is it
easier to ascertain what is for the greatest happiness of the human
race than what is the constitution of England? If not, the "greatest
happiness principle" will be what the "principles of the constitution"
are, a thing to be appealed to by everybody, and understood by everybody
in the sense which suits him best. It will mean cheap bread, dear
bread, free trade, protecting duties, annual parliaments, septennial
parliaments, universal suffrage, Old Sarum, trial by jury, martial
law--everything, in short, good, bad, or indifferent, of which any
person, from rapacity or from benevolence, chooses to undertake the
defence. It will mean six-and-eightpence with the attorney, tithes at
the rectory, and game-laws at the manor-house. The Statute of Uses, in
appearanc