GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

33*
ETHICS
word higher? We can only conclude that Mill regaitis
certain other things besides pleasure, namely, those indicated
by the words "superior quality/' when he speaks of
"superior quality" pleasures! as being desirable, and that,
in so far as he does so, he gives up the hedonist position in
the form in which he professes to hold it, namely, that
pleasure is the only thing that is desirable*
It appears, then, to be impossible to hold that pleasure
is the only thing which is desirable, and yet to maintain
that pleasures can differ in quality.
That we ought to Aim at the Greatest Happiness of the
Greatest Number. The attempt to answer the question,
whose pleasure is entitled to count, leads Mill into
even greater difficulties. The answer officially given to the
question is "that everybody is to count for one, and nobody
for more than one". Let us consider this answer in the
light of Mill's hedonist contentions. Broadly, three positions
are possible: (A) that I am so constituted that I can only
desire my own pleasure; (B) that I can desire other things,
but ought only to desire my own pleasure; (C) that I can
desire other things, but ought to desire the greatest happiness
on the whole, the greatest happiness on the whole Being
commonly taken to mean the greatest happiness of the
greatest number of people. Bentham at various times holds
all three positions. (A) It is the first law of nature, he
says, to wish our own happiness, and his general view is,
as we have seen, expressed in the assertion1 that pleasure
and pain are the two sovereign masters of human nature.
He also holds (B) that, since pleasure is a good, the most
virtuous man is he who calculates most accurately how
to promote his own pleasure. Virtue, in fact, is the habit
of accurately estimating the course of conduct which is
most likely to secure one's own happiness. (C) The greatest
happiness of the greatest number is, Bentham holds, die
ultimate standard of value in a community, and is that
at which the legislator should aim, the good legislator
1 See p. 398.