JB_036_183_001.xml

Title: [1821. May 10. 1822 Aug 9. In regard]

Description: 1821. May 10. 1822 Aug 9.

In regard to fiction two sources and of use and

of service require to be noted. One is, the extent of the

sinister service rendered: the other is, by the extent of

the class of persons to whom the service is rendered.

2. In respect of the

extent of the service rendered, the use of fiction may be

distinguished into general and particular .

By

particular use understand the particular benefit, which on

the occasion of such fiction,

results to the class or classes of persons

functionaries served by it; by the general use, the benefit

which accrues to all of them in the aggregate from the general

principle of demoralization, which it contributes to

establish: viz that

in regard to human actions in general, right & wrong,

proper ground for approbation and disapprobation depends — not on

the influence of the action or the greatest happiness of the greatest

number, but on the practice, consequently on the will, & thence or the

interest, real or supposed, of the aggregate of those same particular

classes. Of the establishment of this principle of demoralization, the

object and the effect is the causing men to behold, not merely with

indifference, but even with approbation — in the first place, the

perpetration of injustice, and in a word of political evil in all its

shapes; and, in the next place, the employing as an instrument in the

commission of such mischief falsehood — wilful deliberate and

self-conscious falsehood — in a word mendacity: the practicing on this occasion and for this purpose

that vice which when by individuals not armed with power it is employed to

purposes much less extensively mischievous is by these same men habitually

and to a vast extent visited with the severest punishment. Now go to

p.3.

JB_038_162_001.xml

Title: [1822 Aug. 9 Constitut. Code.]

Description: 1822 Aug. 9

Constitut. Code.

1.

Fiction, what. Falsehood acknowledged, from and acted on as true.

2.

Properties of falsehood in this form 1. Never employed but to a bad thence in unjustifiable purpose. No man employs falsehood when truth will serve. 2. Capable of being employed to every bad purpose. 3. Never, but with bad effect. 4. Evidence conclusive of the mischievousness of the exercise of power supported by it. 5. So of the the inaptitude of the form of government. 6. So of moral depravity in the inventory. 7. So in the constituted employers. 8. So of intellectual weakness in the acquiescing nation.

3.

Inventors and employers — lawyers, viz. 1. Judges 2. Law writers.

4.

Persons to whose sinister interest sinister service has been rendered by it. 1. The inventors. 2. The monarch, whose removable creatures they were.

5.

The sinister service is 1. Particular; enabling the inventor in each instance to operate the injustice, of which it was made the instrument.

6.

2. General: contributory to encrease in the people the intellectual weakness, on which their obsequiousness to it depends. 2. Their demoralization, by causing them to attribute to their rulers the power of converting vice into virtue; and thus to entertain a propensity to the practice of it.

JB_038_072_001.xml

Title: [1822. July 18 Constitut. Code]

Description: 1822. July 18

Constitut. Code

1.

Evils of factitious honor arbitrarily conferred as usual. In a general character of specific service to community, it affords either no indication or no proof.

2.

1. Evils. Burthen to the unhonored at large To those the by any single creature of factitious honor is in sensible: not so the aggregate.

3.

2. Evil 2. Burthen to the antecedently honored. By each new sharer, the value of the existing shares is diminished. Duchess of Northumberland, her years of spitting on a Peer.

4.

3. Evil 3. Burthen to meritorious unhonored. Hence discouragement to meritorious service: encouragement to the sinister d o. if any by which the honor was procured.

5.

By encrease of honor by natural honor by publication, no sense of injury is produced uneasiness to the un honored or less honored is an unmeasurable evil, and outweighted by the extra service naturally produced by the competition.

6.

4. Evil 4. Evil by contribution to corruption fund. The other elements of the corruption fund, power and money, can not be kept out of Ruler's hands: without them, government could not exist: to minimize them is all that can be done.

7.

5. Evil 5. Evil of demoralization by sinister independence: lessening dependence on good behaviour, by lessening sensibility to the force of the popular or moral sanction.

8.

See above how by an external instrument of felicity, as such, this effect is produced. In possession if operates as a bond of union with co-possessors, by the use of the sinister interest in which they share in expectation as an instrument of corruption of inducement, of temptation to betray trust.

9.

6. Evil 6. By pretence for depredation. For support of factitious dignity, money, if deficient must be supplied: i.e. at people's expence obtained by swindling, honor carries depredation in the belly of it

Nobles and their relatives added to the three classes.

10.

Operative rationale. 1. Factitious honor left bare of opulence the natural source of respect, contempt will naturally substitute itself: decomposition effected, the false colour varnishes. "Wearing "this, the man being a poor "creature, what is he good "for."

Discovered in the peer man its worthlessness may thus be recognized in the act.

11.

7. Evil 7. Evil by sanction given to the imposture — by encouragement and establishment given to delusion on the part of the party deluding — thence moral debasement — habit of employing deception.

12.

8. Evil 8. By propagation of delusion on the part of the deluded: viz. the community at large thence in intellectual debasement: habit of being deceived.

13.

9. Evil 9. Evil by aggravation of inequality. Inequality in power is necessary to existence of Government: in opulence unavoidable, and for security for subsistence, necessary d o. by factitious honor is needless and useless.

6

* Ways in which factitious honor produces evil in the shape - 1. General: - by producing obsequiousness to Monarch sinister will and d o. interest, thence aid to sinister sacrifice: it being clear that against his will it can not be obtained; and that the chance of obtaining it by him who is tempted by it is as the degree of obsequiousness and the felicity of the course suggested: thence so many persons thus tempted, so many obsequious to the sinister will, interest, and sacrifice.

6

** 2. Particular evil on this or that occasion promoting misconduct by overpowering the punitory and restraining force with which public opinion tribunal acts against it. As a reward for the sinister and dishonorable aid suppose the honor conferred: the mark of honor is seen by every body: the dishonorable conduct known to comparatively few: by the factitious honor the natural honor is covered over and drowned: incalculable the degree in which man may thus be rendered shame-proof and the number that may thus be led into the like similar courts.

14.

10. Evil 10. Evil by addition to aristocratical public opinion tribinal's anti social force. Seen above the hostility of this minority to the interest of the majority.