John Stuart Mill: A Criticism with Personal Recollections

SIR JAMES STEPHEN S CRITICISM. in
The general tenor of Sir James Stephen s work, is to illustrate
the necessity of bringing force to bear upon human life at all
points : Religion and Morals included. His facts and argu
ments are well put, and often irresistible. He repeats the
common objection to Mill, founded on the admission that we
may disapprove of people for certain things, without being held 1
as punishing them. He asks what is the distinction in principle,
between an unfavourable judgment leading to no serious con
sequences, and fine or imprisonment. To which the reply~Ts,
that the position of our censure in the scale of infliction makes
a mighty difference, which we may call either principle or
practice. Whether certain errors of doctrine shall infer depo
sition from office, or merely be looked at with the sort of disap
proval that we entertain towards those that differ from us in
politics, is, to all intents and purposes, a question of principle.
The Jews, after their admission to Parliament, made no com
plaint, and no charge of inconsistency, against Christians for
disliking their tenets, in the milder forms that the dislike now
assumes. There are many other cases where difference of
degree makes all the difference in the world.
A great deal of what Sir James says as to the occasions when
force has operated as a civilizing agent, would be admitted by
Mill himself. He makes ample allowances for such cases.
Much of Sir James s argumentation would seem to be needless ;
while much of it gives a very unpalatable view of human life.
Mill s own remark as he read the articles, on their first appearing,
was that the author
"
does not know what he is arguing against ;
and is more likely to repel than to attract ". people This
last
observation is, I think, the juster of the two. Sir James may
be quite right in all that he urges upon the necessity of at times
converting people, in battalions, as Charlemagne did ; yet few
in the present day would think it a matter of pride, or of satis- .
faction in any way, to belong to a society thus recruited. A
large number of persons would rather give up religion altogether
than regard it as a rough-shod engine of state.
"
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