this sort, to settle in what human
happiness consists. Each of the ancient sects of philosophy held some
tenet on this subject which served for a distinguishing badge. The
summum bonum of the Utilitarians, as far as we can judge from the
passage which we are now considering, is the not being hanged.

That it is an unpleasant thing to be hanged, we most willingly concede
to our brother. But that the whole question of happiness or misery
resolves itself into this single point, we cannot so easily admit. We
must look at the thing purchased as well as the price paid for it. A
thief, assuredly, runs a greater risk of being hanged than a labourer;
and so an officer in the army runs a greater risk of being shot than a
banker's clerk; and a governor of India runs a greater risk of dying of
cholera than a lord of the bedchamber. But does it therefore follow that
every man, whatever his habits or feelings may be, would, if he knew
his own happiness, become a clerk rather than a cornet, or goldstick in
waiting rather than governor of India?

Nothing can be more absurd than to suppose, like the Westminster
Reviewer, that thieves steal only because they do not calculate the
chances of being hanged as correctly as honest men. It never seems to
have occurred to him as possible that a man may so greatly prefer the
life of a thief to the life of a labourer that he may determine to brave
the risk of detection and punishment, though he may even think that risk
greater than it really is. And how, on Utilitarian principles, is such
a man to be convinced that he is in the wrong? "You will be found
out."--"Undoubtedly."--"You will be hanged within two years."--"I expect
to be hanged within one year."--"Then why do you pursue this lawless
mode of life?"--"Because I would rather live for one year with plenty
of money, dressed like a gentleman, eating and drinking of the best,
frequenting public places, and visiting a dashing mistress, than break
stones on the road, or sit down to the loom, with the certainty of
attaining a good old age. It is my humour. Are you answered?"

A king, says the Reviewer again, would govern well, if he were wise,
for fear of provoking his subjects to insurrection. Therefore the true
happiness of a king is identical with the greatest happiness of society.
Tell Charles II. that, if he will be constant to his queen, sober
at table, regular at prayers, frugal in his expenses, active in the
transaction of business, if h