{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_20887/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_20887","id":"gutenberg_20887","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20887","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Biographies","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Mill, John Stuart, 1806-1873","Philosophy"],"text":"Produced by Paul Murray, Janet Blenkinship and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n  CRITICAL\n  MISCELLANIES\n\n  BY\n  JOHN MORLEY\n\n  VOL. III.\n\n\n  ESSAY 2: THE DEATH OF MR MILL\n  ESSAY 3: MR MILL'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY\n\n\n  London\n  MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED\n  NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY\n  1904\n\n\n\n\n  CONTENTS\n\n\n  THE DEATH OF MR. MILL.\n\n\n  Peculiar office of the Teacher                                      37\n\n  Mill's influence in the universities and the press                  39\n\n  His union of science with aspiration                                40\n\n  And of courage with patience                                        42\n\n  His abstinence from society                                         45\n\n  Sense of the tendency of society to relapse                         46\n\n  Peculiar trait of his authority                                     47\n\n  The writer's last day with him                                      48\n\n\n  MR MILL'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY\n\n\n  The spirit of search                                                53\n\n  Key to Mill's type of character and its value                       54\n\n  Sensibility of his intellect                                        56\n\n  Yet no reaction against his peculiar education                      57\n\n  Quality of the Autobiography                                        58\n\n  One of its lessons--[Greek: memneso apistein]                       60\n\n  Mill's aversion to the spirit of sect                               60\n\n  Not a hindrance to systematisation                                  61\n\n  Criticism united with belief                                        63\n\n  Practical difficulties in the union of loyalty with tolerance       64\n\n  Impressiveness of Mill's self-effacement                            65\n\n  His contempt for socialistic declamation                            68\n\n  Yet the social aim paramount in him                                 69\n\n  Illustrated in his attack on Hamilton                               71\n\n  And in the Logic                                                    72\n\n  The book on the Subjection of Women                                 75\n\n  The two crises of life                                              77\n\n  Mill did not escape the second of them                              78\n\n  Influence of Wordsworth                                             79\n\n  Hope from reformed institutions                                     79\n\n  This hope replaced by efforts in a deeper vein                      80\n\n  Popular opinion of such efforts                                     81\n\n  Irrational disparagement of Mill's hope                             82\n\n  Mill's conception of happiness contrasted with his father's         84\n\n  Remarks on his withdrawal from society                              88\n\n  It arose from no moral valetudinarianism                            91\n\n\n\n\nTHE DEATH OF MR. MILL.\n\n(_May 1873._)\n\n\nThe tragic commonplaces of the grave sound a fuller note as we mourn for\none of the greater among the servants of humanity. A strong and pure\nlight is gone out, the radiance of a clear vision and a beneficent\npurpose. One of those high and most worthy spirits who arise from time\nto time to stir their generation with new mental impulses in the deeper\nthings, has perished from among us. The death of one who did so much to\nimpress on his contemporaries that physical law works independently of\nmoral law, marks with profounder emphasis the ever ancient and ever\nfresh decree that there is one end to the just and the unjust, and that\nthe same strait tomb awaits alike the poor dead whom nature or\ncircumstance imprisoned in mean horizons, and those who saw far and felt\npassionately and put their reason to noble uses. Yet the fulness of our\ngrief is softened by a certain greatness and solemnity in the event. The\nteachers of men are so few, the gift of intellectual fatherhood is so\nrare, it is surrounded by such singular gloriousness. The loss of a\npowerful and generous statesman, or of a great master in letters or art,\ntouches us with many a vivid regret. The Teacher, the man who has\ntalents and has virtues, and yet has a further something which is\nneither talent nor virtue, and which gives him the mysterious secret of\ndrawing men after him, leaves a deeper sense of emptiness than this; but\nlamentation is at once soothed and elevated by a sense of sacredness in\nthe occasion. Even those whom Mr. Mill honoured with his friendship, and\nwho must always bear to his memory the affectionate veneration of sons,\nmay yet feel their pain at the thought that they will see him no more,\nraised into a higher mood as they meditate on the loftiness of his task\nand the steadfastness and success with which he achieved it. If it is\ngrievous to think that such richness of culture, such full maturity of\nwisdom, such passion for truth and justice, are now by a single stroke\nextinguished, at least we may find some not unworthy solace in the\nthought of the splendid purpose that they have served in keeping alive,\nand surrounding with new attractions, the difficult tradition of patient\nand accurate thinking in union with unselfish and magnanimous living.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMuch will one day have to be said as to the precise value of Mr. Mill's\nphilosophical principles, the more or less of his triumphs as a\ndialectician, his skill as a critic and an expositor. However this trial\nmay go, we shall at any rate be sure that with his reputation will\nstand or fall the intellectual repute of a whole generation of his\ncountrymen. The most eminent of those who are now so fast becoming the\nfront line, as death mows down the veterans, all bear traces of his\ninfluence, whether they are avowed disciples or avowed opponents. If\nthey did not accept his method of thinking, at least he determined the\nquestions which they should think about. For twenty years no one at all\nopen to serious intellectual impressions has left Oxford without having\nundergone the influence of Mr. Mill's teaching, though it would be too\nmuch to say that in that gray temple where they are ever burnishing new\nidols, his throne is still unshaken. The professorial chairs there and\nelsewhere are more and more being filled with men whose minds have been\ntrained in his principles. The universities only typify his influence on\nthe less learned part of the world. The better sort of journalists\neducated themselves on his books, and even the baser sort acquired a\nhabit of quoting from them. He is the only writer in the world whose\ntreatises on highly abstract subjects have been printed during his\nlifetime in editions for the people, and sold at the price of railway\nnovels. Foreigners from all countries read his books as attentively as\nhis most eager English disciples, and sought his opinion as to their own\nquestions with as much reverence as if he had been a native oracle. An\neminent American who came over on an official mission which brought him\ninto contact with most of the leading statesmen throughout Europe, said\nto the present writer:--'The man who impressed me most of them all was\nStuart Mill; you placed before him the facts on which you sought his\nopinion. He took them, gave you the different ways in which they might\nfairly be looked at, balanced the opposing considerations, and then\nhanded you a final judgment in which nothing was left out. His mind\nworked like a splendid piece of machinery; you supply it with raw\nmaterial, and it turns you out a perfectly finished product.' Of such a\nman England has good reason to be very proud.\n\nHe was stamped in many respects with specially English quality. He is\nthe latest chief of a distinctively English school of philosophy, in\nwhich, as has been said, the names of Locke, Hume, Adam Smith, and\nBentham (and Mr. Mill would have added James Mill) mark the line of\nsuccession--the school whose method subordinates imagination to\nobservation, and whose doctrine lays the foundations of knowledge in\nexperience, and the tests of conduct in utility. Yet, for all this, one\nof his most remarkable characteristics was less English than French; his\nconstant admission of an ideal and imaginative element in social\nspeculation, and a glowing persuasion that the effort and wisdom and\ningenuity of men are capable, if free opportunity be given by social\narrangements, of raising human destiny to a pitch that is at present\nbeyond our powers of conception. Perhaps the sum of all his distinction\nlies in this union of stern science with infinite aspiration, of\nrigorous sense of what is real and practicable with bright and luminous\nhope. He told one who was speaking of Condorcet's Life of Turgot, that\nin his younger days whenever he was inclined to be discouraged, he was\nin the habit of turning to this book, and that he never did so without\nrecovering possession of himself. To the same friend, who had printed\nsomething comparing Mr. Mill's repulse at Westminster with the dismissal\nof the great minister of Lewis the Sixteenth, he wrote:--'I never\nreceived so gratifying a compliment as the comparison of me to Turgot;\nit is indeed an honour to me that such an assimilation should have\noccurred to you.' Those who have studied the character of one whom even\nthe rigid Austin thought worthy to be called 'the godlike Turgot,' know\nboth the nobleness and the rarity of this type.\n\nIts force lies not in single elements, but in that combination of an\nardent interest in human improvement with a reasoned attention to the\nlaw of its conditions, which alone deserves to be honoured with the high\nname of wisdom. This completeness was one of the secrets of Mr. Mill's\npeculiar attraction for young men, and for the comparatively few women\nwhose intellectual interest was strong enough to draw them to his books.\nHe satisfied the ingenuous moral ardour which is instinctive in the best\nnatures, until the dust of daily life dulls or extinguishes it, and at\nthe same time he satisfied the rationalistic qualities, which are not\nless marked in the youthful temperament of those who by and by do the\nwork of the world. This mixture of intellectual gravity with a\npassionate love of improvement in all the aims and instruments of life,\nmade many intelligences alive who would otherwise have slumbered, or\nsunk either into a dry pedantry on the one hand, or a windy, mischievous\nphilanthropy on the other. He showed himself so wholly free from the\nvulgarity of the sage. He could hope for the future without taking his\neye from the realities of the present. He recognised the social\ndestination of knowledge, and kept the elevation of the great art of\nsocial existence ever before him, as the ultimate end of all speculative\nactivity.\n\nAnother side of this rare combination was his union of courage with\npatience, of firm nonconformity with silent conformity. Compliance is\nalways a question of degree, depending on time, circumstance, and\nsubject. Mr. Mill hit the exact mean, equally distant from timorous\ncaution and self-indulgent violence. He was unrivalled in the difficult\nart of conciliating as much support as was possible and alienating as\nlittle sympathy as possible, for novel and extremely unpopular opinions.\nHe was not one of those who strive to spread new faiths by brilliant\nswordplay with buttoned foils, and he was not one of those who run amuck\namong the idols of the tribe and the market-place and the theatre. He\nknew how to kindle the energy of all who were likely to be persuaded by\nhis reasoning, without stimulating in a corresponding degree the energy\nof persons whose convictions he attacked. Thus he husbanded the\nstrength of truth, and avoided wasteful friction. Probably no English\nwriter that ever lived has done so much as Mr. Mill to cut at the very\nroot of the theological spirit, yet there is only one passage in the\nwritings published during his lifetime--I mean a well-known passage in\nthe Liberty--which could give any offence to the most devout person. His\nconformity, one need hardly say, never went beyond the negative degree,\nnor ever passed beyond the conformity of silence. That guilty and\ngrievously common pusillanimity which leads men to make or act\nhypocritical professions, always moved his deepest abhorrence. And he\ndid not fear publicly to testify his interest in the return of an\natheist to parliament.\n\nHis courage was not of the spurious kinds arising from anger, or\nignorance of the peril, or levity, or a reckless confidence. These are\nall very easy. His distinction was that he knew all the danger to\nhimself, was anxious to save pain to others, was buoyed up by no rash\nhope that the world was to be permanently bettered at a stroke, and yet\nfor all this he knew how to present an undaunted front to a majority.\nThe only fear he ever knew was fear lest a premature or excessive\nutterance should harm a good cause. He had measured the prejudices of\nmen, and his desire to arouse this obstructive force in the least degree\ncompatible with effective advocacy of any improvement, set the single\nlimit to his intrepidity. Prejudices were to him like physical\npredispositions, with which you have to make your account. He knew,\ntoo, that they are often bound up with the most valuable elements in\ncharacter and life, and hence he feared that violent surgery which in\neradicating a false opinion fatally bruises at the same time a true and\nwholesome feeling that may cling to it. The patience which with some men\nis an instinct, and with others a fair name for indifference, was with\nhim an acquisition of reason and conscience.\n\nThe value of this wise and virtuous mixture of boldness with tolerance,\nof courageous speech with courageous reserve, has been enormous. Along\nwith his direct pleas for freedom of thought and freedom of speech, it\nhas been the chief source of that liberty of expressing unpopular\nopinions in this country without social persecution, which is now so\nnearly complete, that he himself was at last astonished by it. The\nmanner of his dialectic, firm and vigorous as the dialectic was in\nmatter, has gradually introduced mitigating elements into the atmosphere\nof opinion. Partly, no doubt, the singular tolerance of free discussion\nwhich now prevails in England--I do not mean that it is at all\nperfect--arises from the prevalent scepticism, from indifference, and\nfrom the influence of some of the more high-minded of the clergy. But\nMr. Mill's steadfast abstinence from drawing wholesale indictments\nagainst persons or classes whose opinions he controverted, his generous\ncandour, his scrupulous respect for any germ of good in whatever company\nit was found, and his large allowances, contributed positive elements to\nwhat might otherwise have been the negative tolerance that comes of\nmoral stagnation. Tolerance of distasteful notions in others became\nassociated in his person at once with the widest enlightenment, and the\nstrongest conviction of the truth of our own notions.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nHis career, beside all else, was a protest of the simplest and loftiest\nkind against some of the most degrading features of our society. No one\nis more alive than he was to the worth of all that adds grace and\ndignity to human life; but the sincerity of this feeling filled him with\naversion for the make-believe dignity of a luxurious and artificial\ncommunity. Without either arrogance or bitterness, he stood aloof from\nthat conventional intercourse which is misnamed social duty. Without\neither discourtesy or cynicism, he refused to play a part in that dance\nof mimes which passes for life among the upper classes. In him, to\nextraordinary intellectual attainments was added the gift of a firm and\nsteadfast self-respect, which unfortunately does not always go with\nthem. He felt the reality of things, and it was easier for a workman\nthan for a princess to obtain access to him. It is not always the men\nwho talk most affectingly about our being all of one flesh and blood,\nwho are proof against those mysterious charms of superior rank, which do\nso much to foster unworthy conceptions of life in English society; and\nthere are many people capable of accepting Mr. Mill's social\nprinciples, and the theoretical corollaries they contain, who yet would\ncondemn his manly plainness and austere consistency in acting on them.\nThe too common tendency in us all to moral slovenliness, and a lazy\ncontentment with a little flaccid protest against evil, finds a constant\nrebuke in his career. The indomitable passion for justice which made him\nstrive so long and so tenaciously to bring to judgment a public\nofficial, whom he conceived to be a great criminal, was worthy of one of\nthe stoutest patriots in our seventeenth-century history. The same moral\nthoroughness stirred the same indignation in him on a more recent\noccasion, when he declared it 'a permanent disgrace to the Government\nthat the iniquitous sentence on the gas-stokers was not remitted as soon\nas passed.'\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMuch of his most striking quality was owing to the exceptional degree in\nwhich he was alive to the constant tendency of society to lose some\nexcellence of aim, to relapse at some point from the standard of truth\nand right which had been reached by long previous effort, to fall back\nin height of moral ideal. He was keenly sensible that it is only by\npersistent striving after improvement in our conceptions of duty, and\nimprovement in the external means for realising them, that even the\nacquisitions of past generations are retained. He knew the intense\ndifficulty of making life better by ever so little. Hence at once the\nexaltation of his own ideas of truth and right, and his eagerness to\nconciliate anything like virtuous social feeling, in whatever\nintellectual or political association he found it. Hence also the\nvehemence of his passion for the unfettered and unchecked development of\nnew ideas on all subjects, of originality in moral and social points of\nview; because repression, whether by public opinion or in any other way,\nmay be the means of untold waste of gifts that might have conferred on\nmankind unspeakable benefits. The discipline and vigour of his\nunderstanding made him the least indulgent of judges to anything like\ncharlatanry, and effectually prevented his unwillingness to let the\nsmallest good element be lost, from degenerating into that weak kind of\nuniversalism which nullifies some otherwise good men.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSome great men seize upon us by the force of an imposing and majestic\nauthority; their thoughts impress the imagination, their words are\nwinged, they are as prophets bearing high testimony that cannot be\ngainsaid. Bossuet, for instance, or Pascal. Others, and of these Mr.\nMill was one, acquire disciples not by a commanding authority, but by a\nmoderate and impersonal kind of persuasion. He appeals not to our sense\nof greatness and power in a teacher, which is noble, but to our love of\nfinding and embracing truth for ourselves, which is still nobler. People\nwho like their teacher to be as a king publishing decrees with herald\nand trumpet, perhaps find Mr. Mill colourless. Yet this habitual\neffacement of his own personality marked a delicate and very rare shade\nin his reverence for the sacred purity of truth.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMeditation on the influence of one who has been the foremost instructor\nof his time in wisdom and goodness quickly breaks off, in this hour when\nhis loss is fresh upon us; it changes into affectionate reminiscences\nfor which silence is more fitting. In such an hour thought turns rather\nto the person than the work of the master whom we mourn. We recall his\nsimplicity, gentleness, heroic self-abnegation; his generosity in\nencouraging, his eager readiness in helping; the warm kindliness of his\naccost, the friendly brightening of the eye. The last time I saw him was\na few days before he left England.[1] He came to spend a day with me in\nthe country, of which the following brief notes happened to be written\nat the time in a letter to a friend:--\n\n     'He came down by the morning train to Guildford station, where I\n     was waiting for him. He was in his most even and mellow humour. We\n     walked in a leisurely way and through roundabout tracks for some\n     four hours along the ancient green road which you know, over the\n     high grassy downs, into old chalk pits picturesque with juniper and\n     yew, across heaths and commons, and so up to our windy promontory,\n     where the majestic prospect stirred him with lively delight. You\n     know he is a fervent botanist, and every ten minutes he stooped to\n     look at this or that on the path. Unluckily I am ignorant of the\n     very rudiments of the matter, so his parenthetic enthusiasms were\n     lost upon me.\n\n[Footnote 1: April 5, 1873.]\n\n'Of course he talked, and talked well. He admitted that Goethe had added\nnew points of view to life, but has a deep dislike of his moral\ncharacter; wondered how a man who could draw the sorrows of a deserted\nwoman like Aurelia, in _Wilhelm Meister_, should yet have behaved so\nsystematically ill to women. Goethe tried as hard as he could to be a\nGreek, yet his failure to produce anything perfect in form, except a few\nlyrics, proves the irresistible expansion of the modern spirit, and the\ninadequateness of the Greek type to modern needs of activity and\nexpression. Greatly prefers Schiller in all respects; turning to him\nfrom Goethe is like going into the fresh air from a hothouse.\n\n'Spoke of style: thinks Goldsmith unsurpassed; then Addison comes.\nGreatly dislikes the style of Junius and of Gibbon; indeed, thinks\nmeanly of the latter in all respects, except for his research, which\nalone of the work of that century stands the test of nineteenth-century\ncriticism. Did not agree with me that George Sand's is the high-water\nmark of prose, but yet could not name anybody higher, and admitted that\nher prose stirs you like music.\n\n'Seemed disposed to think that the most feasible solution of the Irish\nUniversity question is a Catholic University, the restrictive and\nobscurantist tendencies of which you may expect to have cheeked by the\nactive competition of life with men trained in more enlightened systems.\nSpoke of Home Rule.\n\n'Made remarks on the difference in the feeling of modern refusers of\nChristianity as compared with that of men like his father, impassioned\ndeniers, who believed that if only you broke up the power of the priests\nand checked superstition, all would go well--a dream from which they\nwere partially awakened by seeing that the French revolution, which\noverthrew the Church, still did not bring the millennium. His radical\nfriends used to be very angry with him for loving Wordsworth.\n\"Wordsworth,\" I used to say, \"is against you, no doubt, in the battle\nwhich you are now waging, but after you have won, the world will need\nmore than ever those qualities which Wordsworth is keeping alive and\nnourishing.\" In his youth mere negation of religion was a firm bond of\nunion, social and otherwise, between men who agreed in nothing else.\n\n'Spoke of the modern tendency to pure theism, and met the objection that\nit retards improvement by turning the minds of some of the best men from\nsocial affairs, by the counter-proposition that it is useful to society,\napart from the question of its truth,--useful as a provisional belief,\nbecause people will identify serviceable ministry to men with service of\nGod. Thinks we cannot with any sort of precision define the coming\nmodification of religion, but anticipates that it will undoubtedly rest\nupon the solidarity of mankind, as Comte said, and as you and I believe.\nPerceives two things, at any rate, which are likely to lead men to\ninvest this with the moral authority of a religion; first, they will\nbecome more and more impressed by the awful fact that a piece of conduct\nto-day may prove a curse to men and women scores and even hundreds of\nyears after the author of it is dead; and second, they will more and\nmore feel that they can only satisfy their sentiment of gratitude to\nseen or unseen benefactors, can only repay the untold benefits they have\ninherited, by diligently maintaining the traditions of service.\n\n'And so forth, full of interest and suggestiveness all through. When he\ngot here, he chatted to R---- over our lunch, with something of the\nsimple amiableness of a child, about the wild flowers, the ways of\ninsects, and notes of birds. He was impatient for the song of the\nnightingale. Then I drove him to our little roadside station, and one of\nthe most delightful days of my life came to its end, like all other\ndays, delightful and sorrowful.'\n\nAlas, the sorrowful day which ever dogs our delight followed very\nquickly. The nightingale that he longed for fills the darkness with\nmusic, but not for the ear of the dead master: he rests in the deeper\ndarkness where the silence is unbroken for ever. We may console\nourselves with the reflection offered by the dying Socrates to his\nsorrowful companions: he who has arrayed the soul in her own proper\njewels of moderation and justice and courage and nobleness and truth, is\never ready for the journey when his time comes. We have lost a great\nteacher and example of knowledge and virtue, but men will long feel the\npresence of his character about them, making them ashamed of what is\nindolent or selfish, and encouraging them to all disinterested labour,\nboth in trying to do good and in trying to find out what the good\nis,--which is harder.\n\n\n\n\nMR. MILL'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY.\n\n\n_Chercher en gemissant_--search with many sighs--that was Pascal's\nnotion of praiseworthy living and choosing the better part. Search, and\nsearch with much travail, strikes us as the chief intellectual ensign\nand device of that eminent man whose record of his own mental nurture\nand growth we have all been reading. Everybody endowed with energetic\nintelligence has a measure of the spirit of search poured out upon him.\nAll such persons act on the Socratic maxim that the life without inquiry\nis a life to be lived by no man. But it is the rare distinction of a\nvery few to accept the maxim in its full significance, to insist on an\nopen mind as the true secret of wisdom, to press the examination and\ntesting of our convictions as the true way at once to stability and\ngrowth of character, and thus to make of life what it is so good for us\nthat it should be, a continual building up, a ceaseless fortifying and\nenlargement and multiplication of the treasures of the spirit. To make a\npoint of 'examining what was said in defence of all opinions, however\nnew or however old, in the conviction that even if they were errors\nthere might be a substratum of truth underneath them, and that in any\ncase the discovery of what it was that made them plausible would be a\nbenefit to truth,'[2]--to thrust out the spirit of party, of sect, of\ncreed, of the poorer sort of self-esteem, of futile contentiousness, and\nso to seek and again seek with undeviating singleness of mind the right\ninterpretation of our experiences--here is the genuine seal of\nintellectual mastery and the true stamp of a perfect rationality.\n\n[Footnote 2: Mill's _Autobiography_, 242.]\n\nThe men to whom this is the ideal of the life of the reason, and who\nhave done anything considerable towards spreading a desire after it,\ndeserve to have their memories gratefully cherished even by those who do\nnot agree with all their positive opinions. We need only to reflect a\nlittle on the conditions of human existence; on the urgent demand which\nmaterial necessities inevitably make on so immense a proportion of our\ntime and thought; on the space which is naturally filled up by the\nactivity of absorbing affections; on the fatal power of mere tradition\nand report over the indifferent, and the fatal power of inveterate\nprejudice over so many even of the best of those who are not\nindifferent. Then we shall know better how to value such a type of\ncharacter and life as Mr. Mill has now told us the story of, in which\nintellectual impressionableness on the most important subjects of human\nthought was so cultivated as almost to acquire the strength and quick\nresponsiveness of emotional sensibility. And this, without the too\ncommon drawback to great openness of mind. This drawback consists in\nloose beliefs, taken up to-day and silently dropped to-morrow;\nvacillating opinions, constantly being exchanged for their contraries;\nfeeble convictions, appearing, shifting, vanishing, in the quicksands of\nan unstable mind.\n\nNobody will impute any of these disastrous weaknesses to Mr. Mill. His\nimpressionableness was of the valuable positive kind, which adds and\nassimilates new elements from many quarters, without disturbing the\norganic structure of the whole. What he says of one stage in his growth\nremained generally true of him until the very end:--'I found the fabric\nof my old and taught opinions giving way in many fresh places, and I\nnever allowed it to fall to pieces, but was incessantly occupied in\nweaving it anew. I never in the course of my transition was content to\nremain, for ever so short a time, confused and unsettled. When I had\ntaken in any new idea, I could not rest till I had adjusted its\nrelations to my old opinions, and ascertained exactly how far its effect\nought to extend in modifying or superseding them' (p. 156). This careful\nand conscientious recognition of the duty of having ordered opinions,\nand of responsibility for these opinions being both as true and as\nconsistent with one another as taking pains with his mind could make\nthem, distinguished Mr. Mill from the men who flit aimlessly from\ndoctrine to doctrine, as the flies of a summer day dart from point to\npoint in the vacuous air. It distinguished him also from those\nsensitive spirits who fling themselves down from the heights of\nrationalism suddenly into the pit of an infallible church; and from\nthose who, like La Mennais, move violently between faith and reason,\nbetween tradition and inquiry, between the fulness of deference to\nauthority and the fulness of individual self-assertion.\n\nAll minds of the first quality move and grow; they have a susceptibility\nto many sorts of new impressions, a mobility, a feeling outwards, which\nmakes it impossible for them to remain in the stern fixity of an early\nimplanted set of dogmas, whether philosophic or religious. In stoical\ntenacity of character, as well as in intellectual originality and\nconcentrated force of understanding, some of those who knew both tell us\nthat Mr. Mill was inferior to his father. But who does not feel in the\nson the serious charm of a power of adaptation and pliableness which we\ncan never associate with the hardy and more rigorous nature of the\nother? And it was just because he had this sensibility of the intellect,\nthat the history of what it did for him is so edifying a performance for\na people like ourselves, among whom that quality is so extremely\nuncommon. For it was the sensibility of strength and not of weakness,\nnor of mere over-refinement and subtlety. We may estimate the\nsignificance of such a difference, when we think how little, after all,\nthe singular gifts of a Newman or a Maurice have done for their\ncontemporaries, simply because these two eminent men allowed\nconsciousness of their own weakness to 'sickly over' the spontaneous\nimpulses of their strength.\n\nThe wonder is that the reaction against such an education as that\nthrough which James Mill brought his son,--an education so intense, so\npurely analytical, doing so much for the reason and so little for the\nsatisfaction of the affections,--was not of the most violent kind. The\nwonder is that the crisis through which nearly every youth of good\nquality has to pass, and from which Mr. Mill, as he has told us, by no\nmeans escaped, did not land him in some of the extreme forms of\ntranscendentalism. If it had done so the record of the journey would no\ndoubt have been more abundant in melodramatic incidents. It would have\ndone more to tickle the fancy of 'the present age of loud disputes but\nweak convictions.' And it might have been found more touching by the\nlarge numbers of talkers and writers who seem to think that a history of\na careful man's opinions on grave and difficult subjects ought to have\nall the rapid movements and unexpected turns of a romance, and that a\nbook without rapture and effusion and a great many capital letters must\nbe joyless and disappointing. Those of us who dislike literary hysteria\nas much as we dislike the coarseness that mistakes itself for force, may\nwell be glad to follow the mental history of a man who knew how to move\nand grow without any of these reactions and leaps on the one hand, or\nany of that overdone realism on the other, which may all make a more\nstriking picture, but which do assuredly more often than not mark the\nruin of a mind and the nullification of a career.\n\nIf we are now and then conscious in the book of a certain want of\nspacing, of changing perspectives and long vistas; if we have perhaps a\nsense of being too narrowly enclosed; if we miss the relish of humour or\nthe occasional relief of irony; we ought to remember that we are busy\nnot with a work of imagination or art, but with the practical record of\nthe formation of an eminent thinker's mental habits and the succession\nof his mental attitudes. The formation of such mental habits is not a\nromance, but the most arduous of real concerns. If we are led up to none\nof the enkindled summits of the soul, and plunged into none of its\nabysses, that is no reason why we should fail to be struck by the pale\nflame of strenuous self-possession, or touched by the ingenuousness and\nsimplicity of the speaker's accents. A generation continually excited by\nnarratives, as sterile as vehement, of storm and stress and spiritual\nshipwreck, might do well, if it knew the things that pertained to its\npeace, to ponder this unvarnished history--the history of a man who,\nthough he was not one of the picturesque victims of the wasteful\ntorments of an uneasy spiritual self-consciousness, yet laboured so\npatiently after the gifts of intellectual strength, and did so much\npermanently to widen the judgments of the world.\n\nIf Mr. Mill's Autobiography has no literary grandeur, nor artistic\nvariety, it has the rarer merit of presenting for our contemplation a\ncharacter that was infested by none of the smaller passions, and warped\nby none of the more unintelligent attitudes of the human mind. We have\nto remember that it is exactly these, the smaller passions on the one\nhand, and slovenliness of intelligence on the other, which are even\nworse agencies in spoiling the worth of life and the advance of society\nthan the more imposing vices either of thought or sentiment. Many have\ntold the tale of a life of much external eventfulness. There is a rarer\ninstructiveness in the quiet career of one whose life was an incessant\neducation, a persistent strengthening of the mental habit of 'never\naccepting half-solutions of difficulties as complete; never abandoning a\npuzzle, but again and again returning to it until it was cleared up;\nnever allowing obscure corners of a subject to remain unexplored,\nbecause they did not appear important; never thinking that I perfectly\nunderstood any part of a subject until I understood the whole' (p. 123).\nIt is true that this mental habit is not so singular in itself, for it\nis the common and indispensable merit of every truly scientific thinker.\nMr. Mill's distinction lay in the deliberate intention and the\nsystematic patience with which he brought it to the consideration of\nmoral and religious and social subjects. In this region hitherto, for\nreasons that are not difficult to seek, the empire of prejudice and\npassion has been so much stronger, so much harder to resist, than in the\nfield of physical science.\n\nSect is so ready to succeed sect, and school comes after school, with\nconstant replacement of one sort of orthodoxy by another sort, until\neven the principle of relativity becomes the base of a set of absolute\nand final dogmas, and the very doctrine of uncertainty itself becomes\nfixed in a kind of authoritative nihilism. It is, therefore, a signal\ngain that we now have a new type, with the old wise device, [Greek:\nmemneso apistein]--_be sure that you distrust_. Distrust your own bias;\ndistrust your supposed knowledge; constantly try, prove, fortify your\nfirmest convictions. And all this, throughout the whole domain where the\nintelligence rules. It was characteristic of a man of this type that he\nshould have been seized by that memorable passage in Condorcet's Life of\nTurgot to which Mr. Mill refers (p. 114), and which every man with an\nactive interest in serious affairs should bind about his neck and write\non the tablets of his heart.\n\n'Turgot,' says his wise biographer, 'always looked upon anything like a\nsect as mischievous.... From the moment that a sect comes into\nexistence, all the individuals composing it become answerable for the\nfaults and errors of each one of them. The obligation to remain united\nleads them to suppress or dissemble all truths that might wound anybody\nwhose adhesion is useful to the sect. They are forced to establish in\nsome form a body of doctrine, and the opinions which make a part of it,\nbeing adopted without inquiry, become in due time pure prejudices.\nFriendship stops with the individuals; but the hatred and envy that any\nof them may arouse extends to the whole sect. If this sect be formed by\nthe most enlightened men of the nation, if the defence of truths of the\ngreatest importance to the common happiness be the object of its zeal,\nthe mischief is still worse. Everything true or useful which they\npropose is rejected without examination. Abuses and errors of every kind\nalways have for their defenders that herd of presumptuous and mediocre\nmortals, who are the bitterest enemies of all celebrity and renown.\nScarcely is a truth made clear, before those to whom it would be\nprejudicial crush it under the name of a sect that is sure to have\nalready become odious, and are certain to keep it from obtaining so much\nas a hearing. Turgot, then, was persuaded that perhaps the greatest ill\nyou can do to truth is to drive those who love it to form themselves\ninto a sect, and that these in turn can commit no more fatal mistake\nthan to have the vanity or the weakness to fall into the trap.'\n\nYet we know that with Mr. Mill as with Turgot this deep distrust of sect\nwas no hindrance to the most careful systematisation of opinion and\nconduct. He did not interpret many-sidedness in the flaccid watery sense\nwhich flatters the indolence of so many of our contemporaries, who like\nto have their ears amused with a new doctrine each morning, to be held\nfor a day, and dropped in the evening, and who have little more\nseriousness in their intellectual life than the busy insects of a summer\nnoon. He says that he looked forward 'to a future which shall unite the\nbest qualities of the critical with the best qualities of the organic\nperiods; unchecked liberty of thought, unbounded freedom of individual\naction in all modes not hurtful to others; but also convictions as to\nwhat is right and wrong, useful and pernicious, deeply engraven on the\nfeelings by early education and general unanimity of sentiment, and so\nfirmly grounded in reason and the true exigencies of life, that they\nshall not, like all former and present creeds, religious, ethical, and\npolitical, require to be periodically thrown off and replaced by others'\n(p. 166). This was in some sort the type at which he aimed in the\nformation of his own character--a type that should combine organic with\ncritical quality, the strength of an ordered set of convictions, with\nthat pliability and that receptiveness in face of new truth, which are\nindispensable to these very convictions being held intelligently and in\ntheir best attainable form. We can understand the force of the eulogy on\nJohn Austin (p. 154), that he manifested 'an equal devotion to the two\ncardinal points of Liberty and Duty.' These are the correlatives in the\nsphere of action to the two cardinal points of Criticism and Belief in\nthe sphere of thought.\n\nWe can in the light of this double way of viewing the right balance of\nthe mind, the better understand the combination of earnestness with\ntolerance which inconsiderate persons are apt to find so awkward a\nstumbling-block in the scheme of philosophic liberalism. Many people in\nour time have so ill understood the doctrine of liberty, that in some of\nthe most active circles in society they now count you a bigot if you\nhold any proposition to be decidedly and unmistakably more true than any\nother. They pronounce you intemperate if you show anger and stern\ndisappointment because men follow the wrong course instead of the right\none. Mr. Mill's explanation of the vehemence and decision of his\nfather's disapproval, when he did disapprove, and his refusal to allow\nhonesty of purpose in the doer to soften his disapprobation of the deed,\ngives the reader a worthy and masculine notion of true tolerance. James\nMill's 'aversion to many intellectual errors, or what he regarded as\nsuch, partook in a certain sense of the character of a moral feeling....\nNone but those who do not care about opinions will confound this with\nintolerance. Those, who having opinions which they hold to be immensely\nimportant, and their contraries to be prodigiously hurtful, have any\ndeep regard for the general good, will necessarily dislike, as a class\nand in the abstract, those who think wrong what they think right, and\nright what they think wrong: though they need not be, nor was my father,\ninsensible to good qualities in an opponent, nor governed in their\nestimation of individuals by one general presumption, instead of by the\nwhole of their character. I grant that an earnest person, being no more\ninfallible than other men, is liable to dislike people on account of\nopinions which do not merit dislike; but if he neither himself does\nthem any ill office, nor connives at its being done by others, he is not\nintolerant: and the forbearance which flows from a conscientious sense\nof the importance to mankind of the equal freedom of all opinions is the\nonly tolerance which is commendable, or to the highest moral order of\nminds, possible' (p. 51). This is another side of the co-ordination of\nCriticism and Belief, of Liberty and Duty, which attained in Mr. Mill\nhimself a completeness that other men, less favoured in education and\nwith less active power of self-control, are not likely to reach, but to\nreach it ought to be one of the prime objects of their mental\ndiscipline. The inculcation of this peculiar morality of the\nintelligence is one of the most urgently needed processes of our time.\nFor the circumstance of our being in the very depths of a period of\ntransition from one spiritual basis of thought to another, leads men not\nonly to be content with holding a quantity of vague, confused, and\ncontradictory opinions, but also to invest with the honourable name of\ncandour a weak reluctance to hold any one of them earnestly.\n\nMr. Mill experienced in the four or five last years of his life the\ndisadvantage of trying to unite fairness towards the opinions from which\nhe differed, with loyalty to the positive opinions which he accepted.\n'As I had showed in my political writings,' he says, 'that I was aware\nof the weak points in democratic opinions, some Conservatives, it seems,\nhad not been without hopes of finding me an opponent of democracy: as I\nwas able to see the Conservative side of the question, they presumed\nthat like them I could not see any other side. Yet if they had really\nread my writings, they would have known that after giving full weight to\nall that appeared to me well grounded in the arguments against\ndemocracy, I unhesitatingly decided in its favour, while recommending\nthat it should be accompanied by such institutions as were consistent\nwith its principle and calculated to ward off its inconveniences' (p.\n309). This was only one illustration of what constantly happened, until\nat length, it is hardly too much to say, a man who had hitherto enjoyed\na singular measure of general reverence because he was supposed to see\ntruth in every doctrine, became downright unpopular among many classes\nin the community, because he saw more truth in one doctrine than\nanother, and brought the propositions for whose acceptance he was most\nin earnest eagerly before the public.\n\nIn a similar way the Autobiography shows us the picture of a man uniting\nprofound self-respect with a singular neutrality where his own claims\nare concerned, a singular self-mastery and justice of mind, in matters\nwhere with most men the sense of their own personality is wont to be so\nexacting and so easily irritated. The history of intellectual eminence\nis too often a history of immoderate egoism. It has perhaps hardly ever\nbeen given to any one who exerted such influence as Mr. Mill did over\nhis contemporaries, to view his own share in it with such discrimination\nand equity as marks every page of his book, and as used to mark every\nword of his conversation. Knowing as we all do the last infirmity of\neven noble minds, and how deep the desire to erect himself Pope and Sir\nOracle lies in the spirit of a man with strong convictions, we may value\nthe more highly, as well for its rarity as for its intrinsic worth, Mr.\nMill's quality of self-effacement, and his steadfast care to look\nanywhere rather than in his own personal merits, for the source of any\nof those excellences which he was never led by false modesty to\ndissemble.\n\nMany people seem to find the most interesting figure in the book that\nstoical father, whose austere, energetic, imperious, and relentless\ncharacter showed the temperament of the Scotch Covenanter of the\nseventeenth century, inspired by the principles and philosophy of France\nin the eighteenth. No doubt, for those in search of strong dramatic\neffects, the lines of this strenuous indomitable nature are full of\nimpressiveness.[3] But one ought to be able to appreciate the\ndistinction and strength of the father, and yet also be able to see that\nthe distinction of the son's strength was in truth more really\nimpressive still. We encounter a modesty that almost speaks the language\nof fatalism. Pieces of good fortune that most people would assuredly\nhave either explained as due to their own penetration, or to the\nrecognition of their worth by others, or else would have refrained from\ndwelling upon, as being no more than events of secondary importance, are\nby Mr. Mill invariably recognised at their full worth or even above it,\nand invariably spoken of as fortunate accidents, happy turns in the\nlottery of life, or in some other quiet fatalistic phrase, expressive of\nhis deep feeling how much we owe to influences over which we have no\ncontrol and for which we have no right to take any credit. His saying\nthat 'it would be a blessing if the doctrine of necessity could be\nbelieved by all _quoad_ the characters of others, and disbelieved in\nregard to their own' (p. 169), went even further than that, for he\nteaches us to accept the doctrine of necessity _quoad_ the most marked\nfelicities of life and character, and to lean lightly or not at all\nupon it in regard to our demerits. Humility is a rationalistic, no less\nthan a Christian grace--not humility in face of error or arrogant\npretensions or selfishness, nor a humility that paralyses energetic\neffort, but a steadfast consciousness of all the good gifts which our\nforerunners have made ready for us, and of the weight of our\nresponsibility for transmitting these helpful forces to a new\ngeneration, not diminished but augmented.\n\n[Footnote 3: In an interesting volume (_The Minor Works of George\nGrote_, edited by Alexander Bain. London: Murray), we find Grote\nconfirming Mr. Mill's estimate of his father's psychagogic quality. 'His\nunpremeditated oral exposition,' says Grote of James Mill, 'was hardly\nless effective than his prepared work with the pen; his colloquial\nfertility in philosophical subjects, his power of discussing himself,\nand stimulating others to discuss, his ready responsive inspirations\nthrough all the shifts and windings of a sort of Platonic dialogue,--all\nthese accomplishments were to those who knew him, even more impressive\nthan what he composed for the press. Conversation with him was not\nmerely instructive, but provocative to the observant intelligence. Of\nall persons whom we have known, Mr. James Mill was the one who stood\nleast remote from the lofty Platonic ideal of Dialectic--[Greek: tou\ndidonai kai dechesthai logon] (the giving and receiving of\nreasons)--competent alike to examine others or to be examined by them in\nphilosophy. When to this we add a strenuous character, earnest\nconvictions, and single-minded devotion to truth, with an utter disdain\nof mere paradox, it may be conceived that such a man exercised powerful\nintellectual ascendancy over youthful minds,' etc.--_Minor Works of\nGeorge Grote_, p. 284.]\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn more than one remarkable place the Autobiography shows us distinctly\nwhat all careful students of Mr. Mill's books supposed, that with him\nthe social aim, the repayment of the services of the past by devotion to\nthe services of present and future, was predominant over any merely\nspeculative curiosity or abstract interest. His preference for deeply\nreserved ways of expressing even his strongest feelings prevented him\nfrom making any expansive show of this governing sentiment. Though no\nman was ever more free from any taint of that bad habit of us English,\nof denying or palliating an abuse or a wrong, unless we are prepared\nwith an instant remedy for it, yet he had a strong aversion to mere\nsocialistic declamation. Perhaps, if one may say so without presumption,\nhe was not indulgent enough in this respect. I remember once pressing\nhim with some enthusiasm for Victor Hugo,--an enthusiasm, one is glad to\nthink, which time does nothing to weaken. Mr. Mill, admitting, though\nnot too lavishly, the superb imaginative power of this poetic master of\nour time, still counted it a fatal drawback to Hugo's worth and claim to\nrecognition that 'he has not brought forward one single practical\nproposal for the improvement of the society against which he is\nincessantly thundering.' I ventured to urge that it is unreasonable to\nask a poet to draft acts of parliament; and that by bringing all the\nstrength of his imagination and all the majestic fulness of his sympathy\nto bear on the social horrors and injustices which still lie so thick\nabout us, he kindled an inextinguishable fire in the hearts of men of\nweaker initiative and less imperial gifts alike of imagination and\nsympathy, and so prepared the forces out of which practical proposals\nand specific improvements may be expected to issue. That so obvious a\nkind of reflection should not have previously interested Mr. Mill's\njudgment in favour of the writer of the _Outcasts_, the _Legend of the\nAges_, the _Contemplations_, only shows how strong was his dislike to\nall that savoured of the grandiose, and how afraid he always was of\neverything that seemed to dissociate emotion from rationally directed\neffort. That he was himself inspired by this emotion of pity for the\ncommon people, of divine rage against the injustice of the strong to the\nweak, in a degree not inferior to Victor Hugo himself, his whole career\nmost effectually demonstrates.\n\nIt is this devotion to the substantial good of the many, though\npractised without the noisy or ostentatious professions of more egoistic\nthinkers, which binds together all the parts of his work, from the\n_System of Logic_ down to his last speech on the Land Question. One of\nthe most striking pages in the Autobiography is that in which he gives\nhis reasons for composing the refutation of Hamilton, and as some of\nthese especially valuable passages in the book seem to be running the\nrisk of neglect in favour of those which happen to furnish material for\nthe idle, pitiful gossip of London society, it may be well to reproduce\nit.\n\n'The difference,' he says, 'between these two schools of philosophy,\nthat of Intuition and that of Experience and Association, is not a mere\nmatter of abstract speculation; it is full of practical consequences,\nand lies at the foundation of all the greatest differences of practical\nopinion in an age of progress. The practical reformer has continually to\ndemand that changes be made in things which are supported by powerful\nand widely spread feelings, or to question the apparent necessity and\nindefeasibleness of established facts; and it is often an indispensable\npart of his argument to show how those powerful feelings had their\norigin, and how those facts came to seem necessary and indefeasible.\nThere is therefore a natural hostility between him and a philosophy\nwhich discourages the explanation of feelings and moral facts by\ncircumstances and association, and prefers to treat them as ultimate\nelements of human nature; a philosophy which is addicted to holding up\nfavourite doctrines as intuitive truths, and deems intuition to be the\nvoice of Nature and of God, speaking with an authority higher than that\nof our reason. In particular, I have long felt that the prevailing\ntendency to regard all the marked distinctions of human character as\ninnate, and in the main indelible, and to ignore the irresistible proofs\nthat by far the greater part of those differences, whether between\nindividuals, races, or sexes, are such as not only might but naturally\nwould be produced by differences in circumstances, is one of the chief\nhindrances to the rational treatment of great social questions, and one\nof the greatest stumbling-blocks to human improvement. This tendency has\nits source in the intuitional metaphysics which characterised the\nreaction of the nineteenth century against the eighteenth, and it is a\ntendency so agreeable to human indolence, as well as to conservative\ninterests generally, that unless attacked at the very root, it is sure\nto be carried to even a greater length than is really justified by the\nmore moderate forms of the intuitional philosophy.... Considering then\nthe writings and fame of Sir W. Hamilton as the great fortress of the\nintuitional philosophy in this country, a fortress the more formidable\nfrom the imposing character, and the, in many respects, great personal\nmerits and mental endowments of the man, I thought it might be a real\nservice to philosophy to attempt a thorough examination of all his most\nimportant doctrines, and an estimate of his general claims to eminence\nas a philosopher; and I was confirmed in this resolution by observing\nthat in the writings of at least one, and him one of the ablest, of Sir\nW. Hamilton's followers, his peculiar doctrines were made the\njustification of a view of religion which I hold to be profoundly\nimmoral--that it is our duty to bow down and worship before a Being\nwhose moral attributes are affirmed to be unknowable by us, and to be\nperhaps extremely different from those which, when speaking of our\nfellow-creatures, we call by the same name' (pp. 273-275).\n\nThus we see that even where the distance between the object of his\ninquiry and the practical wellbeing of mankind seemed farthest, still\nthe latter was his starting point, and the doing 'a real service to\nphilosophy' only occurred to him in connection with a still greater and\nmore real service to those social causes for which, and which only,\nphilosophy is worth cultivating. In the _System of Logic_ the\ninspiration had been the same.\n\n'The notion that truths external to the mind,' he writes, 'may be known\nby intuition or consciousness, independently of observation and\nexperience, is, I am persuaded, in these times, the great intellectual\nsupport of false doctrines and bad institutions. By the aid of this\ntheory every inveterate belief and every intense feeling of which the\norigin is not remembered, is enabled to dispense with the obligation of\njustifying itself by reason, and is erected into its own all-sufficient\nvoucher and justification. There never was an instrument better devised\nfor consecrating all deep-seated prejudices. And the chief strength of\nthis false philosophy in morals, politics, and religion, lies in the\nappeal which it is accustomed to make to the evidence of mathematics\nand of the cognate branches of physical science. To expel it from these\nis to drive it from its stronghold.... In attempting to clear up the\nreal nature of the evidence of mathematical and physical truth, the\n_System of Logic_ met the intuitive philosophers on ground on which they\nhad previously been deemed unassailable; and gave its own explanation\nfrom experience and association of that peculiar character of what are\ncalled necessary truths, which is adduced as proof that their evidence\nmust come from a deeper source than experience. Whether this has been\ndone effectually is still _sub judice_; and even then, to deprive a mode\nof thought so strongly rooted in human prejudices and partialities of\nits mere speculative support, goes but a very little way towards\novercoming it; but though only a step, it is a quite indispensable one;\nfor since, after all, prejudice can only be successfully combated by\nphilosophy, no way can really be made against it permanently, until it\nhas been shown not to have philosophy on its side' (pp. 225-227).\n\nThis was to lay the basis of a true positivism by the only means through\nwhich it can be laid firmly. It was to establish at the bottom of men's\nminds the habit of seeking explanations of all phenomena in experience,\nand building up from the beginning the great positive principle that we\ncan only know phenomena, and can only know them experientially. We see,\nfrom such passages as the two that have been quoted, that with Mr. Mill,\nno less than with Comte, the ultimate object was to bring people to\nextend positive modes of thinking to the master subjects of morals,\npolitics, and religion. Mr. Mill, however, with a wisdom which Comte\nunfortunately did not share, refrained from any rash and premature\nattempt to decide what would be the results of this much-needed\nextension. He knew that we were as yet only just coming in sight of the\nstage where these most complex of all phenomena can be fruitfully\nstudied on positive methods, and he was content with doing as much as he\ncould to expel other methods from men's minds, and to engender the\npositive spirit and temper. Comte, on the other hand, presumed at once\nto draw up a minute plan of social reconstruction, which contains some\nideas of great beauty and power, some of extreme absurdity, and some\nwhich would be very mischievous if there were the smallest chance of\ntheir ever being realised. 'His book stands,' Mr. Mill truly says of the\n_System of Positive Polity_, 'a monumental warning to thinkers on\nsociety and politics of what happens when once men lose sight in their\nspeculations of the value of Liberty and Individuality' (p. 213).\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt was his own sense of the value of Liberty which led to the production\nof the little tractate which Mr. Mill himself thought likely to survive\nlonger than anything else that he had written, 'with the possible\nexception of the _Logic_,' as being 'a kind of philosophic text-book of\na single truth, which the changes progressively taking place in modern\nsociety tend to bring out into ever stronger relief; the importance to\nman and society, of a large variety in types of character, and of giving\nfull freedom to human nature to expand itself in innumerable and\nconflicting directions' (p. 253). It seems to us, however, that Mr.\nMill's plea for Liberty in the abstract, invaluable as it is, still is\nless important than the memorable application of this plea, and of all\nthe arguments supporting it, to that half of the human race whose\nindividuality has hitherto been blindly and most wastefully repressed.\nThe little book on the _Subjection of Women_, though not a capital\nperformance like the _Logic_, was the capital illustration of the modes\nof reasoning about human character set forth in his _Logic_ applied to\nthe case in which the old metaphysical notion of innate and indelible\ndifferences is still nearly as strong as ever it was, and in which its\nmoral and social consequences are so inexpressibly disastrous, so\nsuperlatively powerful in keeping the ordinary level of the aims and\nachievements of life low and meagre. The accurate and unanswerable\nreasoning no less than the noble elevation of this great argument; the\nsagacity of a hundred of its maxims on individual conduct and character,\nno less than the combined rationality and beauty of its aspirations for\nthe improvement of collective social life, make this piece probably the\nbest illustration of all the best and richest qualities of its author's\nmind, and it is fortunate that a subject of such incomparable importance\nshould have been first effectively presented for discussion in so\nworthy and pregnant a form.\n\nIt is interesting to know definitely from the Autobiography, what is\nimplied in the opening of the book itself, that a zealous belief in the\nadvantages of abolishing the legal and social inequalities of women was\nnot due to the accident of personal intimacy with one or two more women\nof exceptional distinction of character. What has been ignorantly\nsupposed in our own day to be a crotchet of Mr. Mill's was the common\ndoctrine of the younger proselytes of the Benthamite school, and Bentham\nhimself was wholly with them (_Autobiography_, p. 105, and also 244);\nas, of course, were other thinkers of an earlier date, Condorcet for\ninstance.[4] In this as in other subjects Mr. Mill did not go beyond his\nmodest definition of his own originality--the application of old ideas\nin new forms and connections (p. 119), or the originality 'which every\nthoughtful mind gives to its own mode of conceiving and expressing\ntruths which are common property' (p. 254). Or shall we say that he had\nan originality of a more genuine kind, which made him first diligently\nacquire what in an excellent phrase he calls _plenary possession_ of\ntruths, and then transfuse them with a sympathetic and contagious\nenthusiasm?\n\n[Footnote 4: Condorcet's arguments the reader will find in vol. i. of\nthe present series of these _Critical Miscellanies_, p. 249.]\n\nIt is often complained that the book on Women has the radical\nimperfection of not speaking plainly on the question of the limitations\nproper to divorce. The present writer once ventured to ask Mr. Mill why\nhe had left this important point undiscussed. Mr. Mill replied that it\nseemed to him impossible to settle the expediency of more liberal\nconditions of divorce, 'first, without hearing much more fully than we\ncould possibly do at present the ideas held by women in the matter;\nsecond, until the experiment of marriage with entire equality between\nman and wife had been properly tried.' People who are in a hurry to get\nrid of their partners may find this very halting kind of work, and a man\nwho wants to take a new wife before sunset, may well be irritated by a\nphilosopher who tells him that the question may possibly be capable of\nuseful discussion towards the middle of the next century. But Mr. Mill's\nargument is full of force and praiseworthy patience.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe union of boundless patience with unshaken hope was one of Mr. Mill's\nmost conspicuous distinctions. There are two crises in the history of\ngrave and sensitive natures. One on the threshold of manhood, when the\nyouth defines his purpose, his creed, his aspirations; the other towards\nthe later part of middle life, when circumstance has strained his\npurpose, and tested his creed, and given to his aspirations a cold and\npractical measure. The second crisis, though less stirring, less vivid,\nless coloured to the imagination, is the weightier probation of the two,\nfor it is final and decisive; it marks not the mere unresisted force of\nyouthful impulse and implanted predispositions, as the earlier crisis\ndoes, but rather the resisting quality, the strength, the purity, the\ndepth, of the native character, after the many princes of the power of\nthe air have had time and chance of fighting their hardest against it.\nIt is the turn which a man takes about the age of forty or\nfive-and-forty that parts him off among the sheep on the right hand or\nthe poor goats on the left. This is the time of the grand moral\nclimacteric; when genial unvarnished selfishness, or coarse and ungenial\ncynicism, or querulous despondency, finally chokes out the generous\nresolve of a fancied strength which had not yet been tried in the\nburning fiery furnace of circumstance.\n\nMr. Mill did not escape the second crisis, any more than he had escaped\nthe first, though he dismisses it in a far more summary manner. The\neducation, he tells us, which his father had given him with such fine\nsolicitude, had taught him to look for the greatest and surest source of\nhappiness in sympathy with the good of mankind on a large scale, and had\nfitted him to work for this good of mankind in various ways. By the time\nhe was twenty, his sympathies and passive susceptibilities had been so\nlittle cultivated, his analytic quality had been developed with so\nlittle balance in the shape of developed feelings, that he suddenly\nfound himself unable to take pleasure in those thoughts of virtue and\nbenevolence which had hitherto only been associated with logical\ndemonstration and not with sympathetic sentiment. This dejection was\ndispelled mainly by the influence of Wordsworth--a poet austere yet\ngracious, energetic yet sober, penetrated with feeling for nature, yet\npenetrated with feeling for the homely lot of man. Here was the\nemotional synthesis, binding together the energies of the speculative\nand active mind by sympathetic interest in the common feelings and\ncommon destiny of human beings.\n\nFor some ten years more (1826-1836) Mr. Mill hoped the greatest things\nfor the good of society from reformed institutions. That was the period\nof parliamentary changes, and such hope was natural and universal. Then\na shadow came over this confidence, and Mr. Mill advanced to the\nposition that the choice of political institutions is subordinate to the\nquestion, 'what great improvement in life and culture stands next in\norder for the people concerned, as the condition of their further\nprogress?' (p. 170). In this period he composed the _Logic_ (published\n1843) and the _Political Economy_ (1848). Then he saw what all ardent\nlovers of improvement are condemned to see, that their hopes have\noutstripped the rate of progress; that fulfilment of social aspiration\nis tardy and very slow of foot; and that the leaders of human thought\nare never permitted to enter into that Promised Land whither they are\nconducting others. Changes for which he had worked and from which he\nexpected most, came to pass, but, after they had come to pass, they were\n'attended with much less benefit to human wellbeing than I should\nformerly have anticipated, because they had produced very little\nimprovement in that which all real amelioration in the lot of mankind\ndepends on, their intellectual and moral state.... I had learnt from\nexperience that many false opinions may be exchanged for true ones,\nwithout in the least altering the habit of mind of which false opinions\nare the result' (p. 239). This discovery appears to have brought on no\nrecurrence of the dejection which had clouded a portion of his youth. It\nonly set him to consider the root of so disappointing a conclusion, and\nled to the conviction that a great change in the fundamental\nconstitution of men's modes of thought must precede any marked\nimprovement in their lot. He perceived that society is now passing\nthrough a transitional period 'of weak convictions, paralysed\nintellects, and growing laxity of principle,' the consequence of the\ndiscredit in the more reflective minds of the old opinions on the\ncardinal subjects of religion, morals, and politics, which have now lost\nmost of their efficacy for good, though still possessed of life enough\nto present formidable obstacles to the growth of better opinion on those\nsubjects (p. 239).\n\nThus the crisis of disappointment which breaks up the hope and effort of\nso many men who start well, or else throws them into poor and sterile\ncourses, proved in this grave, fervent, and most reasonable spirit only\nthe beginning of more serious endeavours in a new and more arduous vein.\nHitherto he had been, as he says, 'more willing to be content with\nseconding the superficial improvements which had begun to take place in\nthe common opinions of society and the world.' Henceforth he kept less\nand less in abeyance the more heretical part of his opinions, which he\nbegan more and more clearly to discern as 'almost the only ones, the\nassertion of which tends in any way to regenerate society' (p. 230). The\ncrisis of middle age developed a new fortitude, a more earnest\nintrepidity, a greater boldness of expression about the deeper things,\nan interest profounder than ever in the improvement of the human lot.\nThe book on the _Subjection of Women_, the _Liberty_, and probably some\npieces that have not yet been given to the world, are the notable result\nof this ripest, loftiest, and most inspiring part of his life.\n\nThis judgment does not appear to be shared by the majority of those who\nhave hitherto published their opinions upon Mr. Mill's life and works.\nPerhaps it would have been odd if such a judgment had been common.\nPeople who think seriously of life and its conditions either are content\nwith those conditions as they exist, or else they find them empty and\ndeeply unsatisfying. Well, the former class, who naturally figure\nprominently in the public press, because the press is the more or less\nflattering mirror of the prevailing doctrines of the day, think that Mr.\nMill's views of a better social future are chimerical, utopian, and\nsentimental. The latter class compensate themselves for the pinchedness\nof the real world about them by certain rapturous ideals, centring in\nGod, a future life, and the long companionship of the blessed. The\nconsequence of this absorption either in the immediate interests and\naims of the hour, or in the interests and aims of an imaginary world\nwhich is supposed to await us after death, has been a hasty inclination\nto look on such a life and such purposes as are set forth in the\nAutobiography as essentially jejune and dreary. It is not in the least\nsurprising that such a feeling should prevail. If it were otherwise, if\nthe majority of thoughtful men and women were already in a condition to\nbe penetrated by sympathy for the life of 'search with many sighs,' then\nwe should have already gone far on our way towards the goal which a\nTurgot or a Mill set for human progress. If society had at once\nrecognised the full attractiveness of a life arduously passed in\nconsideration of the means by which the race may take its next step\nforward in the improvement of character and the amelioration of the\ncommon lot,--and this not from love of God nor hope of recompense in a\nworld to come, and still less from hope of recompense or even any very\nfirm assurance of fulfilled aspiration in this world,--then that\nfundamental renovation of conviction for which Mr. Mill sighed, and that\nevolution of a new faith to which he had looked forward in the far\ndistance, would already have come to pass.\n\nMr. Mill has been ungenerously ridiculed for the eagerness and\nenthusiasm of his contemplation of a new and better state of human\nsociety. Yet we have always been taught to consider it the mark of the\nloftiest and most spiritual character, for one to be capable of\nrapturous contemplation of a new and better state in a future life. Why,\nthen, do you not recognise the loftiness and spirituality of those who\nmake their heaven in the thought of the wider light and purer happiness\nthat, in the immensity of the ages, may be brought to new generations of\nmen, by long force of vision and endeavour? What great element is\nwanting in a life guided by such a hope? Is it not disinterested, and\nmagnanimous, and purifying, and elevating? The countless beauties of\nassociation which cluster round the older faith may make the new seem\nbleak and chilly. But when what is now the old faith was itself new,\nthat too may well have struck, as we know that it did strike, the\nadherent of the mellowed pagan philosophy as crude, meagre, jejune,\ndreary.\n\nThen Mr. Mill's life as disclosed to us in these pages has been called\njoyless, by that sect of religious partisans whose peculiarity is to\nmistake boisterousness for unction. Was the life of Christ himself,\nthen, so particularly joyful? Can the life of any man be joyful who sees\nand feels the tragic miseries and hardly less tragic follies of the\nearth? The old Preacher, when he considered all the oppressions that are\ndone under the sun, and beheld the tears of such as were oppressed and\nhad no comforter, therefore praised the dead which are already dead more\nthan the living which are yet alive, and declared him better than both,\nwhich hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done\nunder the sun. Those who are willing to trick their understandings and\nplay fast and loose with words may, if they please, console themselves\nwith the fatuous commonplaces of a philosophic optimism. They may, with\neyes tight shut, cling to the notion that they live in the best of all\npossible worlds, or discerning all the anguish that may be compressed\ninto threescore years and ten, still try to accept the Stoic's paradox\nthat pain is not an evil. Or, most wonderful and most common of all,\nthey may find this joy of which they talk, in meditating on the moral\nperfections of the omnipotent Being for whose diversion the dismal\npanorama of all the evil work done under the sun was bidden to unfold\nitself, and who sees that it is very good. Those who are capable of a\ncontinuity of joyous emotion on these terms may well complain of Mr.\nMill's story as dreary; and so may the school of Solomon, who commended\nmirth because a man hath no better thing than to eat and to drink and to\nbe merry. People, however, who are prohibited by their intellectual\nconditions from finding full satisfaction either in spiritual raptures\nor in pleasures of sense, may think the standard of happiness which Mr.\nMill sought and reached, not unacceptable and not unworthy of being\ndiligently striven after.\n\nMr. Mill's conception of happiness in life is more intelligible if we\ncontrast it with his father's. The Cynic element in James Mill, as his\nson now tells us (pg. 48), was that he had scarcely any belief in\npleasures; he thought few of them worth the price which has to be paid\nfor them; and he set down the greater number of the miscarriages in life\nas due to an excessive estimate of them. 'He thought human life a poor\nthing at best, after the freshness of youth and of unsatisfied curiosity\nhad gone by.... He would sometimes say that if life were made what it\nmight be, by good government and good education, it would be worth\nhaving; but he never spoke with anything like enthusiasm even of that\npossibility.' We should shrink from calling even this theory dreary,\nassociated as it is with the rigorous enforcement of the heroic virtues\nof temperance and moderation, and the strenuous and careful bracing up\nof every faculty to face the inevitable and make the best of it. At\nbottom it is the theory of many of the bravest souls, who fare grimly\nthrough life in the mood of leaders of forlorn hopes, denying pleasures,\nyet very sensible of the stern delight of fortitude. We can have no\ndifficulty in understanding that, when the elder Mill lay dying, 'his\ninterest in all things and persons that had interested him through life\nwas undiminished, nor did the approach of death cause the smallest\nwavering (as in so strong and firm a mind it was impossible that it\nshould), in his convictions on the subject of religion. His principal\nsatisfaction, after he knew that his end was near, seemed to be the\nthought of what he had done to make the world better than he found it;\nand his chief regret in not living longer, that he had not had time to\ndo more' (p. 203).[5]\n\n[Footnote 5: For the mood in which death was faced by another person who\nhad renounced theology and the doctrine of a future state of\nconsciousness, see Miss Martineau's _Autobiography_, ii. 435, etc.]\n\nMr. Mill, however, went beyond this conception. He had a belief in\npleasures, and thought human life by no means a poor thing to those who\nknow how to make the best of it. It was essential both to the stability\nof his utilitarian philosophy, and to the contentment of his own\ntemperament, that the reality of happiness should be vindicated, and he\ndid both vindicate and attain it. A highly pleasurable excitement that\nshould have no end, of course he did not think possible; but he regarded\nthe two constituents of a satisfied life, much tranquillity and some\nexcitement, as perfectly attainable by many men, and as ultimately\nattainable by very many more. The ingredients of this satisfaction he\nset forth as follows:--a willingness not to expect more from life than\nlife is capable of bestowing; an intelligent interest in the objects of\nmental culture; genuine private affections; and a sincere interest in\nthe public good. What, on the other hand, are the hindrances which\nprevent these elements from being in the possession of every one born in\na civilised country? Ignorance; bad laws or customs, debarring a man or\nwoman from the sources of happiness within reach; and 'the positive\nevils of life, the great sources of physical and mental suffering--such\nas indigence, disease, and the unkindness, worthlessness, or premature\nloss of objects of affection.'[6] But every one of these calamitous\nimpediments is susceptible of the weightiest modification, and some of\nthem of final removal. Mr. Mill had learnt from Turgot and\nCondorcet--two of the wisest and noblest of men, as he justly calls them\n(113)--among many other lessons, this of the boundless improvableness of\nthe human lot, and we may believe that he read over many a time the\npages in which Condorcet delineated the Tenth Epoch in the history of\nhuman perfectibility, and traced out in words of finely reserved\nenthusiasm the operation of the forces which should consummate the\nprogress of the race. 'All the grand sources of human suffering,' Mr.\nMill thought, 'are in a great degree, many of them almost entirely,\nconquerable by human care and effort; and though their removal is\ngrievously slow--though a long succession of generations will perish in\nthe breach before the conquest is completed, and this world becomes all\nthat, if will and knowledge were not wanting, it might easily be\nmade--yet every mind sufficiently intelligent and generous to bear a\npart, however small and unconspicuous, in the endeavour, will draw a\nnoble enjoyment from the contest itself, which he would not for any\nbribe in the form of selfish indulgence consent to be without'\n(_Utilitarianism_, 22).\n\n[Footnote 6: For this exposition see _Utilitarianism_, pp. 18-24.]\n\nWe thus see how far from dreary this wise and benign man actually found\nhis own life; how full it was of cheerfulness, of animation, of\npersevering search, of a tranquillity lighted up at wholesome intervals\nby flashes of intellectual and moral excitement. That it was not seldom\ncrossed by moods of despondency is likely enough, but we may at least be\nsure that these moods had nothing in common with the vulgar despondency\nof those whose hopes are centred in material prosperity in this world\nand spiritual prosperity in some other. They were, at least, the\ndejection of a magnanimous spirit, that could only be cast down by some\nnew hindrance to the spread of reason and enlightenment among men, or\nsome new weakening of their incentives to right doing.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMuch has been said against Mr. Mill's strictures on society, and his\nwithdrawal from it. If we realise the full force of all that he says of\nhis own purpose in life, it is hard to see how either his opinion or his\npractice could have been different. He ceased to be content with\n'seconding the superficial improvements' in common ways of thinking, and\nsaw the necessity of working at a fundamental reconstitution of accepted\nmodes of thought. This in itself implies a condemnation of a social\nintercourse that rests on the base of conventional ways of looking at\nthings. The better kind of society, it is true, appears to contain two\nclasses; not only the class that will hear nothing said hostile to the\ngreater social conventions, including among these the popular theology,\nbut also another class who will tolerate or even encourage attack on\nthe greater social conventions, and a certain mild discussion of\nimprovements in them--provided only neither attack nor discussion be\nconducted in too serious a vein. A new idea about God, or property, or\nthe family, is handed round among the company, as ladies of quality in\nQueen Anne's time handed round a black page or a China monster. In\nBishop Butler's phrase, these people only want to know what is said, not\nwhat is true. To be in earnest, to show that you mean what you say, to\nthink of drawing blood in the encounter, is thought, and perhaps very\nnaturally thought, to be a piece of bad manners. Social intercourse can\nonly exist either pleasantly or profitably among people who share a\ngreat deal of common ground in opinion and feeling. Mr. Mill, no doubt,\nwas always anxious to find as much common ground as he honestly could,\nfor this was one of the most characteristic maxims of his propagandism.\nBut a man who had never been brought up in the popular religion, and who\nhad been brought up in habits of the most scrupulous fair dealing with\nhis own understanding; who had never closed his mind to new truths from\nlikely sources, but whose character was formed, and whose mind was made\nup, on the central points of opinion, was not in a position to derive\nmuch benefit from those who in all respects represent a less advanced\nstage of mental development. On the other hand, all the benefit which\nthey were in a position to derive from him could be adequately secured\nby reading what he wrote. Perhaps there is nothing wiser among the wise\nthings written in the Autobiography than the remarks on the fact that\npersons of any mental superiority, who greatly frequent society, are\ngreatly deteriorated by it. 'Not to mention loss of time, the tone of\ntheir feelings is lowered: they become less in earnest about those of\ntheir opinions respecting which they must remain silent in the society\nthey frequent: they come to look on their most elevated objects as\nunpractical, or at least too remote from realisation to be more than a\nvision or a theory: and if, more fortunate than most, they retain their\nhigher principles unimpaired, yet with respect to the persons and\naffairs of their own day, they insensibly adopt the modes of feeling and\njudgment in which they can hope for sympathy from the company they keep'\n(p. 228). That a man loses something, nay, that he loses much, by being\ndeprived of animating intercourse with other men, Mr. Mill would\nprobably have been the first to admit. Where that intercourse can be\nhad, nothing is more fit to make the judgment robust, nothing more fit\nto freshen and revive our interests, and to clothe them with reality.\nEven second-rate companionship has some clear advantages. The question\nis, whether these advantages outweigh the equally clear disadvantages.\nMr. Mill was persuaded that they do not.\n\nThose whom disgust at the aimlessness and insignificance of most of our\nsocial intercourse may dispose to withdrawal from it--and their number\nwill probably increase as the reaction against intellectual flippancy\ngoes on--will do well to remember that Mr. Mill's retirement and his\nvindication of it sprang from no moral valetudinarianism. He did not\nretire to gratify any self-indulgent whim, but only in order to work the\nmore uninterruptedly _and definitely_. The Autobiography tells us what\npains he took to keep himself informed of all that was going on in every\npart of the world. 'In truth, the modern facilities of communication\nhave not only removed all the disadvantages, to a political writer in\ntolerably easy circumstances, of distance from the scene of political\naction, but have converted them into advantages. The immediate and\nregular receipt of newspapers and periodicals keeps him _au courant_ of\neven the most temporary politics, and gives him a much more correct view\nof the state and progress of opinion than he could acquire by personal\ncontact with individuals; for every one's social intercourse is more or\nless limited to particular sets or classes, whose impressions and no\nothers reach him through that channel; and experience has taught me that\nthose who give their time to the absorbing claims of what is called\nsociety, not having leisure to keep up a large acquaintance with the\norgans of opinion, remain much more ignorant of the general state either\nof the public mind, or of the active and instructed part of it, than a\nrecluse who reads the newspapers need be. There are, no doubt,\ndisadvantages in too long a separation from one's country--in not\noccasionally renewing one's impressions of the light in which men and\nthings appear when seen from a position in the midst of them; but the\ndeliberate judgment formed at a distance, and undisturbed by\ninequalities of perspective, is the most to be depended on, even for\napplication in practice. Alternating between the two positions, I\ncombined the advantages of both.' Those who knew him will perhaps agree\nthat he was more widely and precisely informed of the transactions of\nthe day, in every department of activity all over the world, than any\nother person of their acquaintance. People should remember, further,\nthat though Mr. Mill saw comparatively little of men after a certain\ntime, yet he was for many years of his life in constant and active\nrelations with men. It was to his experience in the Indian Office that\nhe attributed some of his most serviceable qualities, especially this:\n'I learnt how to obtain the best I could, when I could not obtain\neverything; instead of being indignant or dispirited because I could not\nhave entirely my own way, to be pleased and encouraged when I could have\nthe smallest part of it; and when even that could not be, to bear with\ncomplete equanimity the being overruled altogether' (pp. 85, 86). In\nthese words we seem almost to hear the modest and simple tones of the\nwriter's own voice.","title":"Critical Miscellanies, (Vol. 3 of 3), Essay 2: The Death of Mr Mill; Essay 3: Mr Mill's Autobiography","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":14627}