>92 DEMAND HOW CREATED. [Ch. 9- CHAPTER IX.
The demand for Political Fallacies: — how created by the state of interests.
In order to have a clear view of the object to which political fallacies will, in the greatest number of instances, be found to be directed, it will be necessary to advert to the state in which, with an exception comparatively inconsiderable, the business of Government ever has been, and still continues to be, in every country upon earth: and for this purpose must here be brought to view a few positions, the proof of which, if they require any, would require too large a quantity of matter for this place: positions which, if not immediately assented to, will at any rate, even by tho^ whom they find most averse, be allowed to possess the highest claim to attention and examination.
1. The end or object in view to which every political measure, whether established or proposed, ought according to the extent of it to be directed, is the greatest happiness of the greatest number of persons interested in it, and that, for the greatest length of time.
2. Unless the United States of North America be virtually an exception, in every known state the happiness of the many has been at the absolute disposal either of the one or of the comparatively few.
3. In every human breast, rare and short-lived ebullitions, the result of some extraordinary strong C//. 9] DEMAND now CREATED. 3^3 Stimulus or incitement, excepted, self-regarding interest is predominant over social interest: each person's own individual interest, over tlie interests of all other persons taken together.
4. In the few instances, if any, in which, throughout the whole tenour or the general tenour of his life, a person sacrifices his own individual interest to that of any other person or persons, such person or persons will be, a person or persons with whom he is connected by some domestic or other private and narrow tie of sympathy; not the whole number, or the majority of the whole number, of the individuals of which the political community to which he belongs is composed.
5. If in any political community there be any individuals by whom, for a constancy, the interests of all the other members put together, are preferred to the interest composed of their own individual interest, and thatofthefew persons particularly connected with them, these public-spirited individuals will be so few, and at the same time so impossible to distinguish from the rest, that to every practical purpose they may, without any practical error, be laid out of the account.
6. In this general predominance of self-regardinoover social interest, when attentively considered, there will not be found any just subject of regret any more than of contestation: for it will be found, that but for this predominance, no such species as that which we belong to could have existence: and that, supposing it, if possible, done away, in so much that all persons or most persons should find respectively, some one or more 391 DEMAND HOW CHEATED. [Ch. 9.
persons, whose interest was respectively, through the whole of life, dearer to them, and as such more anxiously and constantly watched over than their own, the whole species would necessarily, within a very short space of time, become extinct.
7. If this be true, it follows, by the unchangeable constitution of human nature, that in every political community, by the hands by which the supreme power over all the other members of the community is shared, the interest of the many over whom the power is exercised, will, on every occasion, in case of competition, be in act or in endeavour sacrified to the particular interest of those by whom the power is exercised.
8. But every arrangement by which the interest of the many is sacrificed to that of the few, may, with unquestionable propriety, if the above position be admitted, and to the extent of the sacrifice, be termed a bad arrangement: indeed, the only sort of bad arrangement: those excepted, by which the interest of both parties is sacrificed.
9. A bad arrangement, considered as already established and in existence, is, or may be termed, an abuse.
10. Insofar as any competition is seen, or supposed to have place, the interests of the subject many, being on every occasion, as above, in act or in endeavour constantly sacrificed by the ruling few to their own particular interests, hence, with the ruling few, a constant object of study and endeavour, is, the preservation Ch. 9] DEMAND HOW CREATED. 395 and extension of the mass of abuse: at any rate such is the constant propensity.
1 ]. In the mass of abuse, which, because it is so constantly their interest, it is constantly their endeavour to preserve, is included not only that portion from which they derive a direct and assignable profit, but also that portion from which they do not derive any such profit. For the mischievousness of that from which they do not derive any such direct and particular profit, cannot be exposed but by facts and observations, which, if pursued, would be found to apply also to that portion from which they do derive direct and particular profit. Thus it is, that in every community all men in power, or, in one word, the Ins, are, by self-regarding interest, constantly engaged in the maintenance of abuse in every shape in which they find it established.
12. But whatsoever the Ins have in possession, the Outs have in expectancy. Thus far, therefore, there is no distinction between the sinister interests of the Ins and those of the Outs^ nor, consequently, in the fallacies by which they respectively employ their endeavours in the support of their respective sinister interests.
13. Thus far the interests of the Outs coincide with the interest of the Ins. But there are other points in which their interests are opposite. For procuring for themselves the situations and mass of advantages possessed by the Ins, the Outs have one and but one mode of proceeding. This is the raising their own 396 DEMAND now CREATED. [C/l. 9place in the scale of political reputation, as compared with that of the Ins. For effecting this ascendancy, they have accordingly two correspondent modes: — the raising their own, and the depreciating that of their successful rivals.
14. In addition to that particular and sinister interest which belongs to them in their quality of ruling members, tliese rivals have their share in the universal interest which belongs to them in their quality of members of the community at large. In this quality, they are sometimes occupied in such measures as in their eyes are necessary for the maintenance of the universal interest; — for the preservation of that portion of the universal happiness of which their regard for their own interests does not seem to require the sacrifice: for the preservation, and also for the increase of it: for by every increase given to it, they derive advantage to themselves, not only in that character which is common to them with all the other members of the community, but, in the shape of reputation, in that character of ruling members which is peculiar to themselves.
15. But, in whatsoever shape the Ins derive reputation to themselves, and thus raise themselves to a higher level in the scale of comparative reputation, it is the interest of the Outs as such, not only to prevent them from obtaining this rise, but if possible, and as far as possible, to cause their reputation to sink. Hence on the part of the Outs there exists a constant tendency to oppose all good arrangements proposed Ch. 9.] DEMAND HOW CREATED. ^97 by the Ins. But generally speaking, the better an arrangement really is, the better it will generally be thought to be; and the better it is thought to be, the higher will the reputation of its supporters be raised by it. In so far, therefore, as it is in their power, the better a new arrangement proposed by the Ins is, the stronger is the interest by which the Outs are incited to oppose it. But the more obviously and indisputably good it is when considered in itself, the more incapable it is of being successfully opposed in the way of argument otherwise than by fallacies; and hence in the aggregate mass of political fallacies, may be seen the character and general description of that portion of it which is employed chiefly by the Outs.
16. In respect and to the extent of their share in the universal interest, an arrangement which is beneficial to that interest will be beneficial to themselves: and thus, supposing it successful, the opposition made by them to the arrangement would be prejudicial to themselves. On the supposition, therefore, of the success of such opposition, they would have to consider which in their eyes would be the greater advantage— their share in the advantage of the arrangement, or the advantage promised to them by the rise of their place in the comparative scale of reputation, by the elevation given to themselves, and the depression caused to their adversaries.
But generally speaking, in a Constitution such as the English in its present state, the chances are in a 398 DEMAND HOW CUEATIiD. [Ch. 9.
prodigious degree against the success of any opposition made by tiie Outs to even the most flagrantly bad measure of the Ins: much more, of course, to a really good one. Hence it is, that when the arrangement is in itself good, if with any prospect of success or advantage, any of the fallacies belonging to their side can be brought up against the arrangement, and this without prejudice to their own reputation, — they have nothing to stand in the way of the attempt.
17. In respect of those bad arrangements which by their sinister interest the Ins stand engaged to promote, and in the promotion of which the Outs have, as above, a community of interest, — the part dictated by their sinister interest is a curious and delicate one. By success, they would lessen that mass of sinister advantage which, being that of their antagonists in possession, is theirs in expectancy. They have, therefore, their option to make between this disadvantage and the advantage attached to a correspondent advance in the scale of comparative reputation. But, their situation securing to them little less than a certainty of failure, they are, therefore, as to this matter, pretty well at their ease. At the same time, seeing that whatsoever diminution from the mass of abuse they were to propose in the situation of Outs, they could not without loss of reputation, unless for some satisfactory reason, avoid bringing forward, or at least supporting, in the event of their changing places with the Ins, — hence it is, that any such defal- Ch..9.] DEMAND HOW CREATED. 399 cation which they can in genera) prevail upon themselves to propose, v/ill in general be either spurious and fallacious, or at best inadequate: — inadequate, — and by its inadequacy, and the virtual confession involved in it, giving support and confirmation to every portion of kindred abuse which it leaves untouched.
400 PARTS BEARABLE. [Ch. 10.
CHAPTER X.
Diff'erent parts which may be bornt in relation to Fallacies.
As in the case of bad money, so in the case of bad arguments, in the sort and degree of currency which they experience, diflferent persons acting so many different parts are distinguishable.
Fabricator, utterer, acceptor: these are the different parts acted in the currency given to a bad sliilling: these are the parts acted on the occasion of the currency given to a bad argument.
In the case of a bad argument, he who \'s, fabricator must be utterer likewise, or in general it would not make its appearance. But for one fabricator, who is an utterer, there may be utterers in any number, no one of whom was fabricator.
In the case of the bad argument, as in the case of the bad shilling, in the instance of each actor, the mind is, with reference to the nature and tendency of the transaction, capable of bearing different aspects, which, for purposes of practical importance, it becomes material to distinguish.
1. Evil consciousness, (in the language of Roman lawyers dolus; in the language of Roman and thence of English lawyers mala jides): blameable ignorance or inattention, say in one word, 2. temerity, (in the same language sometimes culpa, sometimes temeritas): Ch. 10.] PARTS BEARABLE. 401 3. Blameless agency, actus; which, notwithstanding anymischief that may have been the casual result of it, was free of blame: — by these several denominations are characterized so many habitudes, of which, with relation to any pernicious result, the mind is susceptible.
In the case of the argument, as in the case of the shilling, where the mind is in that state in which the charge of evil-consciousness may with propriety be made, that which the man is conscious of, is, the badness of the article which he has in hand.
In general it is in the case of the fabricator^ that the mind is least apt to be free from the imputation of evil-consciousness. Be it the bad shilling, be it the bad argument, the making of it will have cost more or less trouble; which trouble, generally speaking, the fabricator will not have taken but in the design of utterance, and in the expectation of making, by means of such utterance, some advantage. In the instance of the bad shilling, it is certain; in the instance of the bad argument, it is more or less probable (more probable in the case of the fabricator than in the case of the mere utterer) that the badness of it was known and understood. It is certainly possible that the badness of the argument may never have been perceived by the fabricator, or that the bad argument may have been framed without any intention of applying it to bad purposes. But in general, the more a man is exposed to the action of sinister interest, the more reason there is for charging him with evil-conscious- 402 PARTS BEARABLE. [Ch. 10.
ness, supposing him to be aware of the action of the sinister interest.
However the action of the sinister interest may have been either perceived or unperceived, for without a certain degree of attention a man no more perceives what is passing in his own than what is passing in other minds: the book that lies open before hiin, though it be the object nearest to him, and though he be ever so much in the habit of reading, may even while two eyes are fixt upon it be read or not read, according as it happens that circumstances have, or have not, called his attention to the contents.
The action of a sinister interest may have been immediate or un-immediate.
Immediate; it may have been perceived or not perceived: un-immediate; it has, almost to a certainty, been unperceived.
Sinister interest has two media through which it usually operates. These are prejudice and authority; and hence we have for the immediate progeny of sinister interest, interest-begotten prejudice and authority-begotten prejudice.
In what case soever a bad argument has owed its fabrication or its utterance to sinister interest, and that interest is not, at the time of fabrication or utterance, perceived, it has for its immediate parent either in-bred prejudice or authority.
Of the three operations thus intimately connected, viz. jabricationy utterance^ and acceptance^ that the two first are capable of having evil-consciousness for Cll. 10.] PARTS BEARABLE. 403 their accompaniment is obvious. As to acceptance, a distinction must be made before an answer can be given to the question, whether it is accompanied with evil-consciousness.
It may be distinguished into interior and exterior. Where the opinion, how false soever, is really believed to be true by the person to whom it has been presented, the acceptance given to it may be termed internal: where, whether by discourse, by deportment, or other tokens, a belief of its having experienced an internal acceptance at his hands is, with or without design on his part, entertained by other persons; in so far may it be said to have experienced at his hands an external acceptance.
In the natural state of things, both these modes of acceptance have place together: upon the internal, the external mode follows as a natural consequence. Either of them is, however, capable of having place without the other: feeling the force of an argument, I may appear as if I had not felt it: not having received any impression from it, I may appear as if I had received an impression of greater or less strength, whichever best suits my purpose.
It is sufficiently manifest that evil- consciousness cannot be the accompaniment of internal acceptance; but it may be an accompaniment, and actually is the accompaniment of external acceptance, as often as the external has not for its accompaniment the internal acceptance.
Supposing the argument such that the appellation of fallacy is justly applicable to it, whatsoever part is borne in relation to it, viz. fabrication, utterance, or acceptance, may, with propriety, be ascribed to want of probity or want of intelligence.
Hitherto the distinction appears plain and broad enough; but upon a closer inspection a sort of a mixed, or a middle state between that of evil-consciousness and that of pure temerity — between that of improbity and that of imbecility, may be observed.
This is where the persuasive force of the argument admits of different degrees; as when an argument which operates with a certain degree of force on the utterer's mind, is in the utterance given to it represented as acting with a degree of force to any amount more considerable.
Thus, a man who considers his opinion as invested only with a certain degree of probability, may speak of it as of a matter of absolute certainty. The persuasion he thus expresses is not absolutely false, but it is exaggerated, and this exaggeration is a species of falsehood.
The more frequent the trumpeter of any fallacy is in its performance, the greater the progress which his mind is apt to make from the state of evil-consciousness to the state of temerity — from the state of improbity to the state of imbecility; that is, imbecility with respect to the subject matter. It is said of gamblers, that they begin their career as dupes and end as thieves: in the present case, the parties begin with craft and end with delusion.
A phenomenon, the existence of which seems to be uot of dispute, is that of a liar l)y wiiom a lie of his Ch. 10.] PARTS BEARABLE. 405 own invention has so often been told as true, that at length it has come to be accepted as such even by himself.
But if such is the case with rei^ard to a statement composed of words, every one of which finds itself in manifest contradiction to some determinate truth, it may be imagined how much more easily, and consequendy how much more frequently, it may come to be the case, in regard to a statement of such nicety and delicacy, as that of the strength of the impression made by this or that instrument of persuasion, of which the persuasive force is susceptible of innumerable degrees, no one of which has ever vet been distinguished from any other, by any externally sensible signs or tokens, in the form of discourse or otherwise.
If substitution of irrelevant arguments to relevant ones is evidence of a bad cause, and of consciousness of the badness of that bad cause, much more is the substitution — of application made to the will, to applications made to the understanding: — of the matter of punishment or reward, to the matter of argument.
Arguments addressed to the understanding, may, if fallacious, be answered; and any mischief they had a tendency to produce, be prevented by counter arguments, addressed to the understanding.
Against arguments addressed to the will; those addressed to the understanding are altogether without effect, and the mischief produced by them is without remedv.
406 USES OF EXPOSURE. [67/. II.
CHAPTER XL Uses oftheprtceding E.vposure.
But of these disquisitions concerning the state and character of the mind of those by wiiom these instruments of deception are employed, what, it may be asked, is the practical use?
The use is the opposing such check as it may be in the power of reason to apply to the practice of employing these poisoned weapons. In proportion as the virtue of sincerity is an object of love and veneration, the opposite vice is held in abhorrence: — the more generally and intimately the public in general are satisfied of the insincerity of him by whom the arguments in question are employed, in that same proportion will be the efficiency of the motives by the force of which a man is withheld from employing these arguments.
Suppose the deceptions and pernicious tendency of these arguments, and thence the improbity of him who employs them, in such sort held up to view as to find the minds of men sufficiently sensible of it; and suppose that in the public mind in general, virtue in the form of sincerity is an object of respect, vice in the opposite form an object of aversion and contempt, Ch. ll.j USKS OF EXPOSURE. 407 the practice of this species of improbity will become as rare, as is the practice of any other species of improbity, to which the restrictive action of the same moral power, is in the habit of applying itself with the same force.
If, on this occasion, the object were to prove the deceptions nature and inconclusiveness of these arguments, the ex})osure thus given of the mental character of the persons by whom they are employed, would not have any just title to be received into the body of evidence applicable to this purpose. Be the improbity of the persons by whom these arguments are employed ever so glaring, the arguments themselves are exactly what they are, neither better nor worse. To employ as a medium of proof for demonstrating the impropriety of the arguments, the improbity of him by whom they are uttered, is an expedient which stands itself upon the Xisioi fallacies, and which in the foregoing pages has been brought to view.
But on the present occasion, and for the present purpose, the impropriety as well as the mischievousness of these arguments is supposed to be sufficiently established on other, and those unexceptionable, grounds: the object in view now is, to determine by what means an object so desirable as the general disuse of these poisonous weapons may in the completest and most effectual degree be attained.
Now, the mere utterance of these base arguments is not the only, it is not so much as the principal mis 408 USES OF EXPOSURE. [Ch. 11.
chief in the case. It is the reception of them in the character of conclusive or influential arguments, that constitutes the principal and only ultimate mischief. To the object of making men ashamed to utter them Hjust, therefore, be added, the ulterior object of making men ashamed to receive them: ashamed as often as they are observed to see or hear them, — ashamed to be known to turn tovi^ards them any other aspect than that of aversion and contempt.
But if the practice of insincerity be a practice uhich a man ought to be ashamed of, so is the practice of giving encouragement to — of forbearing to oppose discouragement to that vice: and to this same desirable and useful end does that man most contribute, by whom the immorality of the practice is held up to view in the strongest and clearest colours.
Nor, upon reflection, will the result be found so hopeless as at first sight might be supposed. In the most numerous assembly that ever sat in either house, perhaps, not a single individual could be found, by whom, in the company of a chaste and well-bred female, an obscene word was ever uttered. And if the frown of indignation were as sure to be drawn down upon the ofll^ender by an offence against this branch of the law of probity, as by an oflTence against the law of delicacy, transgression would not be less effectually banished from both those great public theatres, than it is already from the domestic circle.
If, of the fallacies in question, the tendency be Ch. 11.] USES OF EXPOSURE. 409 really pernicious, whosoever he be, who by lawful and unexceptionable means of any kind shall have contributed to this effect, will thereby have rendered to his country and to mankind good service.
But whosoever he be, who to the intellectual power, adds the moderate portion of pecuniary power necessary, in his power it lies completely to render tl)is good service.
In any printed report of the debates of the assembly in question, supposing any such instruments of deception discoverable, in each instance in which any such instrument is discoverable, let him, at the bottom of the page, by the help of the usual marks of reference, give intimation of it: describing it, for instance, if it be of the number of those which are included in the present list, by the name by which it stands designated in this list, or by any more apt and clearly designative denomination that can be found for it.
The want of sufficient time for adequate discussion, when carried on orally in a numerous assembly, has in no inconsiderable extent been held out by experience in the character of a real and serious evil. To this evil, the table of fallacies furnishes, to an indefinite extent, a powerful remedy.
There are few men of the class of those who read, to whose memory Goldsmith's delightful novel, the Vicar of Wakefield, is not more or less present. Amono; the disasters into which the 2:ood Vicar is betrayed by his simplicity, is the loss inflicted on him by 410 USES OF EXPOSUllE. \Ch. 11.
the craft of Ephraim Jenkins. For insinuating himself into the good opinion and confidence of men of more learning thin caution, the instrument he had formed to himself consisted apparently of an extempore sample of recondite learning, in which, in the character of the suhject, the cosmogony, and in the character of one of the historians, Sanchoniathon, were the principal figures. On one or two of the occasions on which it was put to use, the success corresponded with the design, and Ephraim remained undetected and triumphant. But at last, as the devil by his cloven foot, so was Ephraim, though in a fresh disguise, betrayed by the cosmogony and Sanchoniathon, to some persons to whose lot it had fallen to receive the same proof of recondite learning, word lor word. Immediately the chamber rings, with — " Your servant, Mr, Ephraim f' In the course of time when these imperfect sketches shall have received perfection and polish from some more skilful hand, so shall it be done unto him^ (nor is there need of inspiration for the prophecy,) so shall it be done unto him, who in the tabernacle of St. Stephen's or in any other mansion, higher or lower, of similar design and use, shall be so far oflf his guard as through craft or simplicity to let drop any of these irrelevant, and at one time deceptions arguments: and instead of, Order! Order! a voice shall be heard, followed, if need be, by voices in scores, crying aloud, "Stale I Stale! Fallacy of authority, Fallacy of distrust," 5fc.&c.
Ch. n.] USES OF KXPOSUHE. 411 " The faculty which detection has of divesting Deception of her power, is attested hy the poet, — "■ Qurere peregriiium, vicinia rauca reclamaiit."
The period of time at which, in the instance of the instruments of deception here in question, this change shall have been acknowledged to have been completely effected, will form an epoch in the history of civilization.
THE END.
Printed by Richard Taylor, Shoe- Lane, London.
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