Quotes from Bentham’s[I] An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation[II]:
Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do. On the one hand the standard of right and wrong, on the other the chain of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne. They govern us in all we do, in all we say, in all we think: every effort we can make to throw off our subjection, will serve but to demonstrate and confirm it. In words a man may pretend to abjure their empire: but in reality he will remain subject to it all the while. The principle of utility 6 recognizes this subjection, and assumes it for the foundation of that system, the object of which is to rear the fabric of felicity by the hands of reason and of law. Systems which attempt to question it, deal in sounds instead of sense, in caprice instead of reason, in darkness instead of light. But enough of metaphor and declamation: it is not by such means that moral science is to be improved. [Loc. 273-281]
[…] in principle and in practice, in a right track and in a wrong one, the rarest of all human qualities is consistency. [Loc. 318-319]
Is it possible for a man to move the earth? Yes; but he must first find out another earth to stand upon. [Loc. 322-323]
Among principles adverse 11 to that of utility, that which at this day seems to have most influence in matters of government, is what may be called the principle of sympathy and antipathy. By the principle of sympathy and antipathy, I mean that principle which approves or disapproves of certain actions, not on account of their tending to augment the happiness, nor yet on account of their tending to diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question, but merely because a man finds himself disposed to approve or disapprove of them: holding up that approbation or disapprobation as a sufficient reason for itself, and disclaiming the necessity of looking out for any extrinsic ground. [Loc. 421-426]
They call him benevolent in words, but they do not mean that he is so in reality. They do not mean, that he is benevolent as man is conceived to be benevolent: they do not mean that he is benevolent in the only sense in which benevolence has a meaning. [Nb. On God. Loc. 1797-1799]
The ways in which a religion may lessen a man’s means, or augment his wants, are various. Sometimes it will prevent him from making a profit of his money: sometimes from setting his hand to labour. Sometimes it will oblige him to buy dearer food instead of cheaper: sometimes to purchase useless labour: sometimes to pay men for not labouring: sometimes to purchase trinkets, on which imagination alone has set a value: sometimes to purchase exemptions from punishment, or titles to felicity in the world to come. [Loc 5062-5065]
It was the dread of evil, not the hope of good that first cemented societies together. [Loc 5353]
The state of language marks the progress of ideas. [Loc. 5353]
Quotes from Panopticon Writings[III] via The Works of Jeremy Bentham Volume 4 of 11[IV]:
To speak in sober sadness, I do dearly love, as you well know, in human dealings no less than in divine, to think and to say, as far as conscience will allow me, that whatever is, is right; as well concerning those things which are done, as concerning those which have been left undone. [Loc. 2256-2257]
What would you say, if by the gradual adoption and diversified application of this single principle, you should see a new scene of things spread itself over the face of civilized society?—morals reformed, health preserved, industry invigorated, instruction diffused, public burthens lightened, economy seated as it were upon a rock, the gordian knot of the poor-laws not cut but untied—all by a simple idea in architecture? [Loc. 2632-2634]
[I] “Jeremy Bentham (15 February 1748 [O.S. 4 February 1747] – 6 June 1832) was an English philosopher, jurist, and social reformer regarded as the founder of modern utilitarianism”. For further details see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Bentham.
[II] “A book by the English philosopher and legal theorist Jeremy Bentham, originally printed in 1780, and first published in 1789. It is where Bentham develops his theory of utilitarianism and is the first major book on the topic”. For further details see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Introduction_to_the_Principles_of_Morals_and_Legislation.
[III] “The Panopticon is a type of institutional building and a system of control designed by the English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the late 18th century. The scheme of the design is to allow all (pan-) inmates of an institution to be observed (-opticon) by a single watchman without the inmates being able to tell whether or not they are being watched. Although it is physically impossible for the single watchman to observe all the inmates’ cells at once, the fact that the inmates cannot know when they are being watched means that they are motivated to act as though they are being watched at all times. Thus, they are effectively compelled to regulate their own behaviour”. For further details see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon.
[IV] “The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham is a series of volumes which, when complete, will form a definitive edition of the writings of the philosopher and reformer Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832)”. For further details see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Collected_Works_of_Jeremy_Bentham.
