14 Jan y 1817

Necessity Cat

1 Theory

§.4. Probity how securable

15

Q. 17. Well then: it seems to me that I can not but admitt that taking the word duty in the sense agreed on - no form of government is so good as it ought to be and might be in which any arrangement is omitted that promises to secure the coincidence between personal interest and duty. But now /still/ comes the grand question by what means can this coincidence most surely be effected?

A. This /One thing/ you will find no difficulty in admitting: viz. that if on the other side they have /it has/ nothing to oppose them /it/, his share in the universal interest will in so far as the conception entertained by him in relation to it is correct be on each occasion sufficient to secure the direction his conduct in that line which leads to the advancement of that universal interest: for producing this desirable /the effect desired/ this force, how small so ever it be will so long as it finds not on the other side any thing stronger, much /still/ more surely if it finds not on the other side any force at all to oppose it, be sufficient. But so long as it acts in this direction, be the government what it may, in so far as depends upon disposition, i.e. will, which is all that is at present in question, it has for its support by the supposition, the force of social sympathy in the shape of public spirit or say in the shape of patriotism: and, saving casual and comparatively rare exceptions, it may further count /reckon/ upon having for the further support that of the two military sanctions the moral or popular, or moral, and the religious sanction abovementioned: acting in the course /direction/ prescribed to him, as far as appears to him, by a regard for his own share in the universal interest, and thereby and therewith by his sympathy for that same universal interest, he will be acting in the direction prescribed to him by the value he sets on the action and goodwill of the public as towards him and by the /whatsoever/ eventual hope it may happen to him to entertain of the favour or fear of the displeasure of the Almighty.