JB_127_325.xml

Title: [[Copyist's hand] 1818 July 23]

Description: [Copyist's hand]

1818 July 23

P

Reasons

II. Electors who

Universality

7

4

23

Experience has since the date of that publication enabled the argument to go still further. In the character of Representatives under the proposed plan think of the number that will be necessary to be got together and all along kept up for the production of mischief in any of the shapes in which you apprehend it: out of 668, 335. Now then judging from experience of this number 335 can any reasonable ground be found for the supposition that so much as a single man would be chosen out of any such class or description of men as in your eyes has been an object of terror, or a source of uneasiness. Look to the author of the Political Register and so many other forcibly written and widely disseminated tracts: look once more to the Spa-fields Orator. To both these, to each in his several walk[?] of eloquence you ascribe[?], in addition to the strongest desire imaginable a capacity for producing political mischief: a capacity which in the Instance of the Writer at least you yourselves can scarcely say has ever yet been equalled or can reasonably be expected to be ever exceeded. Well, on the occasion of the late Election these men looked round them every where and no where did they either of them find any the smallest chance of acceptance. As to the Writer he was absent. But the Orator, he was present: present, and with all his might blowing the Coals in what in your view of it, is the very focus of sedition.

JB_161_330.xml

Title: [1818 Jan y 7 Not Paul 88]

Description: 1818 Jan y 7

Not Paul

88

III Doctrine

Ch Asceticism

§ other checks

Suicide

Fortes ideo non sunt monomachi neque suicidæ―brave therefore is not the duellist nor

the suicide says an Ethical compend in which for the instruction of Academic youth

modern / scholastic / prejudices are engrafted in a summary of the text of

Aristotle. See Ethices

Compendium in usum Juventutis Academicæ, Oxford, 1745, p. 47: ‘ Fortes ideo non sunt Suicidæ …[n]eque

Monomachi’. Bentham used this elementary textbook on

moral philosophy as an undergraduate at Oxford in 1762: see Correspondence ( CW), i. 59-60 & n.

Brave are not the duellist or the suicide. Why not brave? exactly because for the

purpose of excluding the idea of bravery he has taken to fit up / get up / a

definition of his own―a definition such as agrees not with any conception which till

then had ever been associated with it.

Notable the contrivance; nor yet sparing the use. How oft has not this same

discovery been rediscovered! How many an elegant essay how many an edifying sermon

has been decorated by it: each time the penman paying himself for his labour with a

smile of self-complacency and congratulating himself on the felicity with which task

and genius have been employed in the service of piety and virtue.

Brave men? no: on the contrary cowards―real cowards both of them. How deplorably

universal till this discovery was made were men mistaken as to this point. Wherever

you see a man whom the world calls brave, be sure you see a coward. Behold that man

who without a chance of success is climbing up to that breach. Think how egregious

must be his cowardice. Wherefore is it that he mounts? Only because he has not the

fortitude to endure the reproach of cowardice.

131-130.xml

Title: [[mainly in copyist’s hand] 1819 June]

Description: [mainly in copyist’s hand]

1819 June 11

Parl. Reform Bill Reasons

Electors Who

Universality

Idiots Brougham

2 June 1818

1

Extract from M r Brougham’s Speech in the Debate of 2 June 1818 on Sir Francis Burdett’s Motion for Parliamentary Reform Resolution Hansard p. 1164

1 But M r Bentham was a real advocate for Universal Suffrage. He was a far more sturdy, and infinitely more consistent reformer than the hon. baronet, as he gave votes not only to all men, but to all women also. He drew no line at all; he weighed not with practical nicety the claims of different classes; he recollected that his principle was universal; he tossed away the rule and the scale altogether, and without restriction, let in all – young or old, men or women, sane or insane, all must vote – all must have a voice in Electing their Representatives. He did not even sanction the exceptions which the hon. Baronet seemed inclined to admit with respect to persons of an unsound mind. The veteran reformer (Major Cartwright) had lately favoured the world with a plan of suffrage, illustrated by plates, where balloting boxes, ball trays, stands, &c &c. in most accurate array met the eager gaze of the much edified enquirer. Now M r Bentham was the patron[?] of the Ballot, and his doctrine was, that all who can Ballot, may enjoy the elective franchise. The moment a person of either sex was able to put a pellet into a Box, no matter whether he were insane, and had one of the keepers of a mad-house to guide him, still M r Bentham said, that though he did not support the utility of allowing idiots or mad persons to vote, for their own sakes, yet, rather than make a distinction, he would allow them, as they could not do any harm, and the unbending consistency

might