[clx. 210]

1821. April 30.

First Lines

Constitutional

In an absolute Monarchy, the substantive branch of law having, throughout the whole texture of it, he same all-comprehensive and supremely improper end, in place of the greatest happiness of the greatest number - the greatest happiness of the one individual for whose sake it was composed, and of whose single will it is the expression, the adjective branch of law has for its object of course the same spurious end. What /But/, even in an absolute Monarchy, although, in so far as competition on any occasion has place, the greatets real happiness of the greatest real number which is throughout sacrificed to the interest real or imaginary of that one - yet - such is the connection between the one and the other interest, the interest of the whole /all/ community can not be left wholly unprovided for: for the gigantic mass of the matter of opulence accumulated for the single use of the Monarch and those to each of whom he finds it necessary to impart a portion to it, can not have been produced, or been kept up, otherwise than by means of the labour of the greatest number: and to labour a man must live. Hence, in the laws and other arrangements of even the most barbarous absolute monarchy, the mass of laws and other arrangements will, in conception at least, be divisible into two conceivably distinct portions: the one having, for its immediate as well as ultimate object, the happiness of the Monarch: the other, though having the same ultimate object, yet having, for its immediate object, the happiness of the greatest number of some large portion of it.

Here, then, are two distinguishable portions of substantive law in relation to which the degree of aptitude and subserviency appertaining to the institutions subservient to it viz. the adjective branch of law will have considerably different effects. In so far as, for the separate benefit of the Monarch, the happiness of the greatest number is sacrificed to his paticular and sinister interest, real or imagined, his subjects being in so far dealt with by him as enemies, in so far it is not by the aptitude but by the inaptitude of the adjective branch in relation /with reference/ to the substantive that the greatest happiness of the greatest number is most served