It is on this account that, wherever a man is in a superior degree furnished as above with means of, and motives for, obtaining relevant information, the stronger the force of the sinister interest under the action of which his opinion is delivered, the stronger is his title to attention. In the way of direct and relevant argument applying to the question in hand in a direct and specific way, if the question be suscep- SecL 1.] FALLACIES OF AUIHOKITY. 41 tible of any such arguments, in proportion to the efficiency of the motives and means he has for the acquisition of such relevant information is the probability of his bringing such information to view. If, then, instead of bringing to view any such relevant information, or by way of supplement and support to such relevant information (when weak and insufficient), the arguments which he brings to view are of the irrelevant sort, the addition of such bad arguments aftbrds a sort of circumstantial evidence, and that of no mean degree of probative force, of the inability of the side thus advocated to furnish any good ones.
Closeness of the relation between the immediate subject in hand and the subject of the supposed opinion of which the authority is composed, has been mentioned as the third circumstance necessary to be considered in estimating the credit due to authority: — of this, it is evident enough, there cannot be any common and generally applicable measure. It is that sort of quantity of the amount of which a judgment can only be pronounced in each individual case.
As to the fourth, — fidelity of the medium through which the opinion constitutive of the authority in question has been, or is supposed to have been, transmitted, — it is only pro memoria that this topic is here brought to view in the list of the circumstances from which the legitimately persuasive force of an opinion constitutive of authority is liable to experience decrease: of its admission into this list the propriety is; on the 42 FALLACIES OF AUTHOIUTV. \Ch. 1.
bare mention, as manifest as it is in the power of reasoning to make it. In this respect the rule and measure as well as cause of such decrease stand exactly on the same ground as the rule with respect to any other evidence; authority being to the purpose in question neither more nor less than an article of circumstantial evidence. » The need for the legitimately persuasive force of authority, i. e. probability of comparatively superior information on the one hand, is in the inverse ratio of information on the part of the person on whom it is, designed to operate, on the other. The less the degree in which each man is qualified to form a judgment on any subject on the ground of specific and relevant information, — on the ground of direct evidence, — the more cogent the necessity he is under of trusting, with a degree of confidence more or less implicit, to that species of circumstantial evidence: and in proportion to the number of the persons who possess, each within himself, the means of forming an opinion on any given subject on the ground of such direct evidence, the greater the number of the persons to whom it ouglit to be matter of shame to frame and pronounce their respective decision, on no better ground than that of such inconclusive and necessarily fallacious evidence.
Of the truth of this observation, men belonging to the several classes, whose situation in the community has given to them in conjunction, with efficient power.
Sect. 1.] FALLACIES OF AUTHOIUTY. 43 a separate and sinister interest opposite to that of the community in general, have seldom failed to be in a sufficient degree percipient.
In this perception, in the instance of the fraternity of lawyers, may be seen one cause, though not the only one, of the anxiety betrayed, and pains taken, to keep the rule of action in a state of as complete incognoscibility as possible on the part of those whose conduct is professed to be directed by it, and whose fate is in fact disposed of by it.
In this same perception, in the instance of the clergy of old times in the Romish church, may be seen in like manner the cause, or at least one cause, of the pains taken to keep in the same state of incognoscibility the acknowledged rule of action in matters of sacred and supernatural law.
In this same perception, in the instance of the English clergy of times posterior to those of the Romish church, — in this same perception, — may be seen one cause of the exertions made by so large a proportion of the governing classes of that hierarchy to keep back and if possible render abortive the system of invention, which has for its object the giving to the exercise of the art of reading the highest degree of universality possible.
To return. Be the subject matter what it may, to the account of fallacies cannot be placed any mention made of an opinion to such or such an effect, as having been delivered or intimated by such or such a person by name, when the sole object of the reference is to 44 FALLACIES OF AUTHOlilTY. {Ch. 1.
point out a place where relevant arguments adduced on a given occasion may be found in a more complete or perspicuous state than they are on the occasion on which they are adduced.
In the case thus supposed there is no irrelevancy. The arguments referred to are, by the supposition, relevant ones; such as, if the person by whom they have been presented to view were altogether unknown, would not lose any thing of their weight: the opinion is not presented as constitutive of authority, as carrying any weight of itself, and independently of the considerations which he has brought to view.
Neither is there any fallacy in making reference to the opinion of this or that professional person, in a case to such a degree professional or scientific, with relation to the hearers or readers, that the forming a correct judgment on such relevant and specific arguments as belong to it, is beyond their competence. In matters touching medical science, chemistry, astronomy, the mechanical arts, the various branches of the art of war, &c., no other course could be pursued.
Sect. Q. Appeal to authority, in what cases fallacious^.
The case in which reference to authority is open to the imputation of fallacy, is where, in the course of a debate touching a subject lying in such sort within * " An unquestionable maxim " (it is said) is this: — " Reason and notauthoritysliould determine the judgement:" said? and by whom? even by a bishop; and by what bishop? even Bishop Warburton: and the comprehension of the debaters, that argument bearing the closest relation to it would be perfectly within the sphere of their comprehension, — authority (a sort of argument in the case here in question not relevant) is employed in the place of such relevant arguments as might have been adduced on one side, or, in opposition to irrelevant ones, adduced on the other side.
But the case in which the practice of adducing authority in the character of an argument is in the highest degree exposed to the itnputation of fallacy, is, where the situation of the debaters being such that the forming a correct conception of, and judgment on, such relevant arguments as the subject admits is not beyond their competency, the opinion, real or supposed, of any person who, from his profession or other particular situation, derives an interest opposite to that of the public, is adduced in the character of an argument, in lieu of such relevant arguments as the question ought to furnish. (In an appendix to this chapter will be given examples of persons whose declared opinions, on a question of legislation, are in a peculiar degree liable to be tinged with falsity by the action of sinister interest.)
He who, on a question concerning the propriety of any law or established practice with reference to the time being, refers to authority as decisive of the questhis not in one work only, but in two. The above words are from his Div. Legat, 2, 302; and in his AUiance, &c. is a passage to the same effect; here then we have authority aeainst authority.
46 FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. [C/t. 1.
tion, assumes the truth of one or other of two positions: viz. that the principle of utility, i. e. that the greatest happiness of the greatest number, is not at the time in question the proper standard for judging of the merits of the question, or that the practice of other and former times, or the opinion of other persons, ought to be regarded in all cases as conclusive evidence of the nature and tendency of the practice: — conclusive evidence, superseding the necessity and propriety of any recourse to reason or present experience.
In the first case, being really an enemy to the community, that he should be esteemed as such by all to whom the happiness of the community is an object of regard, is no more than right and reasonable, no more than what, if men acted consistently, would uniformly take place.
In the other case, what he does, is, virtually to acknowledge himself not to possess any powers of reasoning which he himself can venture to think it safe to trust to: incapable of forming for himself any judgment by which he looks upon it as safe to be determined, he betakes himself for safety to some other man, or set of men, of whom he knows little or nothing, except that they lived so many years ago; that the period of their existence was by so much anterior to his own time; by so much anterior, and consequently possessing for its guidance so much the less experience.
But when a man gives this account of himself,-^ Sect. 2.] FALLACIES OF AUTHORITV. 4/^ when he represents his own mind as labouring under this kind and degree of imbecility, — what can be more reasonable than that he should be taken at his word? that he should be considered as a person labouring under a general and incurable imbecility, from whom nothing relevant can reasonably be expected?
He who, in place of reasoning, deduced (if the subject be of a practical nature) from the consideration of the end in view, employs authority, makes no secret of the opinion he entertains of his hearers or his readers: he assumes that those to whom he addresses himself are incapable, each of them, of forming a judgment of their own. If they submit to this insult, may it not be presumed that they acknowledge the justice of it?
Of imbecility, at any rate of self-conscious and selfavowed imbecility, proportionable humility ought naturally to be the result; On the contrary, so far from humility, — of this species of idolatry, — of this worshipping of dead men's bones, all the passions the most opposite to humility, — pride, anger, obstinacy, and overbearingness, — are the frequent, not to say the constant accompaniments. With the utmost strength of mind that can be displayed in the field of reasoning, no reasonable man ever manifests so much heat, assumes so much, or exhibits himself disposed to bear so little, as these men, whose title to regard and notice is thus given up by themselves.
Whence this inconsistency? Whence this violence?
48 FALLACIES OF AUTIIOIltTY. [Cll. 1.
From this alone, that having some abuse to defend, some abuse in which they have an interest and a profit, and finding it on the ground of present public interest indefensible, they fly for refuge to the only sort of argument, in which so much as the pretension of being sincere in error can find countenance.
By authority, support, the strength of which is proportioned to the number of the persons joining in it, is given to systems of opinions, at once absurd and pernicious — to the religion of Buddh, of Brama, of Foh, of Mahomet.
And hence it may be inferred that the probative force of authority is no| increased by the number of those who may have professed a given opinion, unless indeed it could be proved that each individual of the multitudes who professed the opinion, possessed in the highest degree the means and motives for ensuring its correctness. Even in such a case it would not warrant the substitution of the authority for such direct evidence and arguments as any case in debate might be able to supply, supposing the debaters capable of comprehending such direct evidence and arguments; but that, in ordinary cases, no such circumstantial evidence should possess any such legitimately probative force as to warrant the addition, much less the substitution of it, to that sort of information which belongs to direct evidence, will, it is supposed, be rendered sufficiently apparent by the following considerations; 1. If in theory any tlie minutest degree of force Sect. 2.] FALLACIES OF AUTHOlJfTV. 4p were ascribed to the elementary monade of the body of authority thus composed, and this theory were followed up in practice, the consequence would be, the utter subversion of the existing state of things: — as for example, — If distance in point of time were not sufficient to destroy the probative force of such authority, the Catholic religion would in England be to be restored to the exclusive dominion it possessed and exercised for so many centuries: the Toleration laws would be to be repealed, and persecution to the length of extirpation would be to be substituted to whatever liberty in conduct and discourse is enjoyed at present; — and in this way, after the abolished religion had thus been triumphantly restored, an inexorable door would be shut against every imaginable change in it, and thence against every imaginable reform or improvement in it, through all future ages: 2. If distance in point of place were not understood to have the same effect, some other religion than the Christian, — the religion of Mahomet for example, or the way of thinking in matters of religion, prevalent in China, — would have to be substituted by law to the Christian religion.
In authority, defence, such as it is, has been found for every imperfection, for every abuse, for every the most pernicious and most execrable abomination that the most corrupt system of government has ever husbanded in its bosom: — And here may be seen the mischief necessarily at- £ tached to the course of him whose footsteps are regulated by the finger of this blind guide.
What is more, from hence may inferences be deduced— nor those ill-grounded ones — respecting the probity or improbity, the sincerity or insincerity, of him who, standing in a public situation, blushes not to look to this blind guide, to the exclusion of, or in preference to, reason — the only guide that does not begin with shutting his own eyes, for the purpose of closing the eyes of his followers.
As the world grows older, if at the same time it grows wiser, (which it will do unless the period shall have arrived at which experience, the mother of wisdom, shall have become barren,) the influence of authority will in each situation, and particularly in Parliament, become less and less.
Take any part of the field of moral science, private morality, constitutional law, private law, — go back a few centuries, and you will find argument consisting of reference to authority, not exclusively, but in as large a proportion as possible. As experience has increased, authority has been gradually set aside, and reasoning, drawn from facts and guided by reference to the end in view, true or false, has taken its place.
Of the enormous mass of Roman law heaped up in the school of Justinian, — a mass, the perusal of which would employ several lives occupied by nothing else, — materials of this description constitute by far the greater part. A. throws out at random some loose thought: B., catching it up, tells you what A. thinks — at least, what A. said: C. tells you what has been said by A. and B.; and thus like an avalanche the mass rolls on.
Happily it is only in matters of law and religion that endeavours are made, by the favour shown and currency given to this fallacy, to limit and debilitate the exercise of the right of private inquiry in as great a degree as possible, though at this time of day the exercise of this essential right can no longer be suppressed in a complete and direct way by legal punishment.
In mechanics, in astronomy, in mathematics, in the new-born science of chemistry, — no one has at this time of day either effrontery or folly enough to avow, or so much as to insinuate, that the most desirable state of these branches of useful knowledge, the most rational and eligible course, is to substitute decision on the ground of authority, to decision on the ground of direct and specific evidence.
In every branch of physical art and science, the folly of this substitution or preference is matter of demonstration, — is matter of intuition, and as such is universally acknowledged. In the moral branch of science, religion not excluded, the folly of the like receipt for correctness of opinion would not be less universally recognised, if the wealth, the ease, and the dignity attached to and supported by the maintenance of the opposite opinion, did not so steadily resist such recognition.
52 FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. [CIl. 1.
Causes of the employment and prevalence of this fallacy.
It is obvious that this fallacy, in all its branches, is so frequently resorted to by those who are interested in the support of abuses, or of institutions pernicious to the great body of the people, with the intention of suppressing all exercise of reason. A foolish or untenable proposition resting on its own support, or the mere credit of the utterer, could not fail speedily to encounter detection and exposure; — the same proposition extracted from a page of Blackstone, or from the page or mouth of any other person to whom the idle and unthinking are in the habit of unconditionally surrendering their understandings, shall disarm all opposition.
Blind obsequiousness, ignorance, idleness, irresponsibility, anticonstitutional dependence, anticonstitutional independence, are the causes which enable this fallacy to maintain such an ascendancy in the governing assemblies of the British empire.
First, In this situation one man is on each occasion ready to borrow an opinion of another, because through ignorance and imbecility he feels himself unable, or through want of solicitude unwilling, to form one for himself; and he is thus ignorant, if natural talent does not fail him, because he is so idle. Knowledge, especially in so wide and exten&ive a field, requires study; — study, labour of mind bestowed with more or less energy, for a greater or less length of time.
But, Secondly, In a situation for which the strongest talents would not be more than adequate, there is frequently a failure of natural talent; because, in so many instances admission to that situation depends either on the person admitted, or on others to whom, whether he has or has not the requisite talents is a matter of indifference, that no degree of intellectual deficiency, short of palpable idiocy, can have the effect of excluding a man from occupying it.
Thirdly, The sense of responsibility is in the instance of a large proportion of the members wanting altogether; because in so small a proportion are they at any time in any degree of dependence on the people whose fate is in their hands, and because in the instance of the few who are in any degree so dependent, the efficient cause and consequently the feeling of such dependence endures during so small a proportion of the time for which they enjoy their situations: because also, while so few are dependent on those on whom they ought to be dependent, so many are dependent on those who ought to be dependent on them, — those servants of the crown, on whose conduct they are commissioned by their constituents to act as judges. What share of knowledge, intelligence and natural talent is in the house, is thus divided between those who are, and their rivals who hope to be, servants of the crown. The consequence is, that, those excepted in whom knowledge, intelligence and talent are worse than useless, the house is composed of men the furniture of whose minds is made up of discordant 54 FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. {Ch. 1.
prejudices, of which on each occasion they follow that by which the interest or passion of the moment is most promoted.
Then, with regard to responsibility, so happily have matters been managed by the house, — a seat there is not less clear of obligation than a seat in the opera house: in both, a man takes his seat, then only when he cannot find more amusement elsewhere; for both, the qualifications are the same, — a ticket begged or bought: in neither is a man charged with any obligation, other than the negative one of not being a nuisance to the company; in both, the length as well as number of attendances depends on the amusement a man finds, except, in the case of the house, as regards the members dependent on the crown. True it is, that a self-called independent member is not necessarily ignorant and weak: if by accident a man possessed of knowledge and intelligence is placed in the house, his seat will not deprive him of his acquirements: all therefore that is meant is, only, that ignorance does not disqualify, not that knowledge does. Of the crown and its creatures it is the interest that this ignorance be as thick as possible. Why? Because the thicker the ignorance, the more completely is the furniture of men's minds made up of those interestbegotten prejudices, which render them blindly obsequious to all those who with power in their hands stand up to take the lead.
But the emperor of Morocco is not more irresponsible, and therefore more likely to be ignorant and prone to be deceived by the fallacy of authority, than a member of the British Parliament: — the emperor of Morocco's power is clear of obligation; so is the member's: — the emperor's power, it is true, is an integer, and the member's but a fraction of it; but no ignorance prevents a man from becoming or continuing emperor of Morocco, nor from becoming or continuing a member: — the emperor's title is derived from birth; so is that of many a member: — to enjoy his despotism, no fraud, insincerity, hypocrisy or jargon is necessary to the emperor; much of all to the member: — by ascending and maintaining his throne, no principle is violated by the emperor; by the member, if a borough-holder, many are violated on his taking and retaining his seat: — by being a despot, the emperor is not an impostor; the member is: — the emperor pretends not to be a trustee, agent, deputy, delegate, representative; lying is not among the accompaniments of his tyranny and insolence; the member does pretend all this, and (if a boroughholder) lies. — A trust-holder? yes; but a trust-breaker: — an agent? yes; but for himself: — a representative of the people? yes; but so as Mr. Kemble is of Macbeth: — a deputy? yes; because it has not been in their power to depute, to delegate any body else: — deputy, — delegate, — neither title he assumes but for argument, and when he cannot help it; deputation being matter of fact, the word presents an act with all its circumstances, viz. fewness of the electors, their want of freedom, &c.; representation is a more con- 56 FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. [C/l.].
venient word, the acts, &c. are kept out of sight by it; — it is a mere fiction, the offspring of lawyer-craft, and any one person or thing may be represented by any other. By canvass witli colours, a man is represented; by a king, the whole people; by an ambassador, the king, and thus the people.
Remedy against the influence of this fallacy* For banishing ignorance, for substituting to it a constantly competent measure of useful, appropriate and general instruction, the proper, the necessary, the only means lie not deep beneath the surface.
The sources of instruction being supposed at command, and the quantity of natural talent given, the quantity of information obtained will in every case be as the quantity of mental labour employed in the collection of it — the quantity of mental labour, as the aggregate strength of the motives by which a man is excited to labour.
In the existing order of things, there is, comparatively speaking, no instruction obtained, because no labour is bestowed, — no labour is bestowed, because none of the motives by which men are excited to labour are applied in this direction.
The situation being by the supposition an object of desire, if the case were such that, without labour employed in obtaining instruction, there would be no chance of obtaining the situation, or but an inferior chance, while in case of labour so employed there would be a certainty or a superior chance, — here, in- Sect. 2.] FALLACIES OF AUTHORJTY. 57 struction would have its motives, — here, labour applied to the attainment of instruction, — here, consequently, instruction itself would have its probably efficient cause.
The quality, i.e. the relative applicability of the mass of information obtained, is an object not to be overlooked.
The goodness of the quality will depend on the liberty enjoyed in respect of the choice. By prohibitions, with penalties attached to the delivery of alleged information relative to a subject in question, or any part of it, the quality of the whole mass is impaired, and an implied certificate is given of the truth and utility of whatsoever portion is thus endeavoured to be suppressed.
APPENDIX.
E:vamples of descriptions of persons xvhose declared opinions upon a question of legislation are peculiarly liable to be tinged with falsity by the action of sinister interest.
1. Lawyers; oppositeness of their interest to the universal interest.
The opinions of lawyers in a question of legislation, particularly of such lawyers as are or have been practising advocates, are peculiarly liable to be tinged with falsity by the operation of sinister interest. To the interest of the community at large, that of every advocate is in a state of such direct and constant opposition (especially in civil matters), that the above assertion requires an apology to redeem it from the 58 FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. [67/. 1.
appearance of trifling: the apology consists in the extensively prevailing propensity to overlook and turn aside from a fact so entitled to notice. It is the people's interest that delay, vexation and expense of procedure should be as small as possible: — it is the advocate's that they should be as great as possible: viz. expense in so far as his profit is proportioned to it; factitious vexation and delay, in so far as inseparable from the profit-yielding part of the expense. As to uncertainty in the law, it is the people's interest that each man's security against wrong should be as complete as possible; that all his rights should be known to him; that all acts, which in the case of his doing them will be treated as offences, may be known to him as such, together with their eventual punishment, that he may avoid committing them, and that others may, in as few instances as possible, suffer either from the wrong or from the expensive and vexatious remedy. Hence it is their interest, that as to all these matters the rule of action, in so far as it applies to each man, should at all times be not only discoverable, but actually present to his mind. Such knowledge, which it is every man's interest to possess to the greatest, it is the lawyer's interest that he possess it to the narrowest extent possible. It is every man's interest to keep out of lawyers' hands as much as possible; it is the lawyer's interest to get him in as often, and keep him in as long, as possible: thence that any written expression of the words necessary to keep non-lawyers out of his hand may as long as possible be prevented from coming into Sect. 2.] FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. 5^ existence, and when in existence as long as possible kept from being present to his mind, and when presented from staying there *. It is the lawyer's interest, therefore, that people should continually suffer for the non-observance of laws, which, so far from having received efficient promulgation, have never yet found any authoritative expression in words. This is the perfection of oppression: yet, propose that access to knowledge of the laws be afforded by means of a code, lawyers, one and all, will join in declaring it impossible. To any effect, as occasion occurs, a judge will forge a rule of law: to that same effect, in any determinate form of words, propose to make a law, that same judge will declare it impossible. It is the judge's interest that on every occasion his declared opinion be taken for the standard of right and wrong; that whatever he declares right or wrong be universally received as such, how contrary soever such declaration be to truth and utility, or to his own declaration at other times: — hence, that within the whole field of law, men's opinions of right and wrong should be as contradictory, unsettled, and thence as obsequious to him as possible: in particular, that the same conduct * A considerable proportion of what is termed the Common law of F.ngland is in this oral and unwritten state. The cases in which it has been clothed with words, that is, in which it has been framed and pronounced, are to be found in the various collections of reported decisions. These decisions, not having the sanction of a law passed by the legislature, are confirmed or overruled at pleasure by the existing judges; so that, except in matters of the most common and daily occurrence, they afford no rule of action at all.
60 FALLACIES OF AUTHORITY. [C/l. 1.
which to others would occasion shame and punishment, should to him and his occasion honour and reward: that on condition of telling a lie, it should be in his power to do what he pleases, the injustice and falsehood being regarded with complacency and reverence; that as often as by falsehood, money or advantage in any other shape can be produced to him, it should be regarded as proper for him to employ reward or punishment, or both, for the procurement of such falsehood. Consistently with men's abstaining from violences, by which the person and property of him and his would be alarmingly endangered, it is his interest that intellectual as well as moral depravation should be as intense and extensive as possible; That transgressions cognizable by him should be as numerous as possible; That injuries and other transgressions committed by him should be reverenced as acts of virtue; That the suffering produced by such injuries should be placed, not to his account, but to the immutable nature of things, or to the wrongdoer, who, but for encouragement from him, would not have become such. His professional and personal interest being thus adverse to that of the public, from a lawyer's declaration that the tendency of a proposed law relative to procedure, &c. is pernicious, the contrary inference may not unreasonably be drawn. From those habits of misrepresenting their own opinion (i. e. of insincerity), which are almost peculiar to this in comparison with other classes, one presumption is, that he docs not entertain the opinion thus declared;