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31 Aug 1811 1 Sept
Jug. Util.
7
B.II.
Ch.3
7
The idea that a man is not to chose his own pleasures
but that others are to chose them for him is the height of
tyranny. Given this he is not to do any thing for himself.
Bounaparte is a less pernicious tyrant.
For this folly and this presumption, and this mischievousness a sort of mask is made /by/ out of the ambiguous import of such words as pure and impure
purity and impurity, clean and unclean, cleanness and uncleanness: and on no better or other ground than the identity of denomination, and the weak and distant analogy by /in/ which that identity /took its use/ was produced, a /psychological/ moral quality is inferred from the physical.
Such or such an act /a mark/ where it is not accompanied with pleasure is disgusting to sense, and on this account may then may with propriety be /made/ termed unclean and impure. Be it so: for those /in that case/ being by the supposition not accompanied with preponderant pleasure, it has for its accompaniment pain—for this is the genus[?] under which the slightest imaginable as well as the most afflictive possible sensation of the disagreeable kind may be ranked—/in the way of sensation/ it has for its accompaniment pain and nothing else.
But in the other case /case in question/.
It is then from its being impure and unclean in the physical sense that its being impure and unclean in the psychological, the moral sense is inferred? Oh no: be it ever so impure and unclean in the physical sense no such attribute /quality/ as uncleanness or impurity will be attributed /ascribed/ to it in the moral, in the religious, sense, unless it be considered as accompanied with pleasure.
In the pleasure consists the impurity and thence with it the blame the ground for censure /cause the supposed/.
9.
Mask made for this folly and tyranny out of the ambiguity of pure, impure, clean,uncleanness, unclean on no better ground than identity of denomination, with the distant analogy by which it has been produced, a psychologico-moral quality in inferred from the physical.
10
When not accompanied with preponderant pleasure, such or such an act is accompanied with disgust, i.e. with pain. Is it in that case that by the ascetic it is termed impure unclear? No: add the pleasure then only is it impure unclean. Of the pleasure alone is formed the ground for censure.
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Title: [1819 Oct. 19 Not Paul Consult]Description: 1819 Oct. 19 Not Paul Consult Ch. Paul’s Doctrine Doctrine Asceticism §. Utility, dictates as to Pleasure 1. Insert before the improper mention of the proper sense of purity. 2. Add that the use of the word impurity in the sense in which moral is inferred from physical is an act of tyranny. 3. [...?] hypocrites. Hypocrites 1. Religious. 2. Philosophical or moral. 2. As to quality, considered apart from quantity, it is in the eye of reason a matter of perfect /the most entire/ indifference. For the sake of having it or not having it of such or such a quality, for what reasons should any the least particle /portion/ of the attainable quantity be given up. To the head /consideration/ of quality belongs that of the source from which it is derived—the instrument or instruments, interior or exterior to the bodily or mental frame of the individual in question by which (to change the metaphor) it is reaped. By the ascetic principle—and this is one of the delusions by which it operates— pleasure being [taken for] the subject the words pure and impure and pure are in use to be employed for the designation of two opposite attributes of which it is regarded as susceptible. In this case the groundwork of the idea is impurity alias turpitude in the physical sense: and from the circumstance of the physical disgust which in this case will in the instance of a number of persons more or less considerable have place, impurity or /and/ turpitude in /on the part of/ the act by which the physical impurity or turpitude is produced is inferred. and again from this imaginary moral turpitude, the existence of a sort of demand for punishment to be employed either for the torment of the offender or for the prevention of the offence, or both. [Now /In this case/ then in plain language what is the logic that is at the bottom of this rhetoric. It is this.] In the shape of disgust or some other shape I for my part should feel pain were I to perform this act; therefore if you to whom it would not be productive not of pain but of pleasure, were to perform it you ought to be made to suffer pain under the name of punishment.
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Title: [1817 Nov r 19. Not Paul II]Description: 1817 Nov r 19. Not Paul II. Doctrine Ch. Asceticism §.3. promoted by misappellation §.3. — how promoted by inapposite nomenclature—by the word impurity improperly applied Applied to pleasure and pain, the attributes pure and purity, with their opposites impure and impurity have in one sense a meaning which is at once determinate and rational. This sense is that in which a pleasure is considered as pure in so far as it is unattended with a feeling or feelings of the opposite description viz. pain or pains /nature: viz. that of pain/: and in which in like manner a pain is considered as pure in so far as it is unattended by a feeling or feelings of the opposite description /nature/ viz. a pleasure or pleasures /that of pleasure/. In this sense and in this alone are they employed by Bentham, in all his several works. See Introd. to the principles of Morals and Legislation: Traités de Legislation penale et civile par Dumont: Springs of Action Table, &c. Applied to pleasure of pain in any other sense they have not either of them any determinate meaning: the use of them has it source /root/ in illusion, and illusion in proportion to the influence exercised by the propositions /discourses/ in which they are employed is the result. In this indeterminate sense [though with equal propriety they might be either] scarcely are they to be seen applied to pain: scarcely applied otherwise than to pleasure. Applied /On the occasion of the application made of them/ to pleasure, from a sort /the idea/ of physical impurity, real or imaginary, a moral species of moral impurity is imagined and ascribed to it: and from the moral impurity thus groundlessly ascribed to it a pretence is made for endeavouring to subject to odium and even if possible to punishment every person who shall have been or have sought to be a partaker of it: and
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Title: [31 Aug 1811 1 Sept Jug. Util]Description: 31 Aug 1811 1 Sept Jug. Util or ? 6 B.II Ch.3. Mischief Tolling pleasure Nay but /Asceticism/ (says the ascetic—which is so much as to say the Christian—at any the Catholic and the Anglo Protestant Christians /Christian—though not as will be shewn in the genuine followers of Jesus/) the pleasures which Christianity /religion/ prescribes are not innocent are not pure pleasures—they are impure they are unclean ones. But in so far as any thing is meant by impurity other than that of being constantly or at least occasionally attended by a sensation of the opposite kind which otherwise would not have been felt /experienced/ all this language about innocence and purity, and impurity, and cleanness and uncleanness is so much empty sound. In the only precise sense just mentioned it is never meant: for in that a comparison and comparative estimate is implied, which is never made, a ballance which is never struck, nor was attempted to be struck: a balance which without the sensation of absurdity and tyranny /folly and presumption/ above brought to view /noticed/ could never have been attempted to be struck. But note the case where spiritous liquors are taxed to prevent drunkenness. But there no pains are employed: only innoxious pleasure rendered comparatively sharper. *7 Objection for Ascetic Proscribed by Christianity no pleasure but impure unclean ones. 8 Answer. Impure means nothing unless it be attended by a sensation of the opposite kind. Yet in this sole significant sense it is never meant: for it supposes comparison and estimate which never are made, nor could be without folly and tyranny as above.
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