16.To return to the paragraph which it was the more immediate business of this chapter to examine:Were the path of obscurity less familiar to our Author,one should be tempted to imagine he had struck into it on the particular occasion before us,in the view of extricating himself from this dilemma.A discourse thus prudently indeterminate might express enough to keep fair with the rulers of the earth,without setting itself in direct array against the prejudices of the people.Viewed by different persons,it might present different aspects:to men in power it might recommend itself,and that from the first,under the character of a practical lesson of obedience for the use of the people;while among the people themselves it might pass muster,for a time at least,in quality of a string of abstract scientific propositions of jurisprudence.It is not till some occasion for making application of it should occur,that its true use and efficacy would be brought to light.The people,no matter on what occasion,begin to murmur,and concert measures of resistance.Now then is the time for the latent virtues of this passage to be called forth.The book is to be opened to them,and in this passage they are to be shewn,what of themselves,perhaps,they would never have observed,a set of arguments curiously strung together and wrapped up,in proof of the universal expedience,or rather necessity,of submission:a necessity which is to arise,not out of the reflection that the probable mischiefs of resistance are greater than the probable mischiefs of obedience,not out of any such debateable consideration;but out of a something that is to be much more cogent and effectual:to wit,a certain metaphysico-legal impotence,which is to beget in them the sentiment,and answer all the purposes of a natural one.Armed,and full of indignation,our malecontents are making their way to the royal palace.
In vain.A certain estoppel being made to bolt out upon them,in the manner we have seen,by the force of our Author's legal engineering,their arms are to fall,as it were by enchantment,from their hands.To disagree,to clamour,to oppose,to take back,in short,their wills again,is now,they are told,too late:it is what cannot be done:their wills have been put in hotchpot along with the rest:they have `united',they have `consented',they have `submitted'.Our Author having thus put his hook into their nose,they are to go back as they came,and all is peace.An ingenious contrivance this enough:but popular passion is not to be fooled,I doubt,so easily.
Now and then,it is true,one error may be driven out,for a time,by an opposite error:one piece of nonsense by another piece of nonsense:but for barring the door effectually and for ever against all error and all nonsense,there is nothing like the simple truth.
17.After all these pains taken to inculcate unreserved submission,would any one have expected to see our Author himself among the most eager to excite men to disobedience?and that,perhaps,upon the most frivolous pretences?in short,upon any pretence whatsoever?Such,however,upon looking back a little,we shall find him.I say,among the most eager;for other men,at least the most enlightened advocates for liberty,are content with leaving it to subjects to resist,for their own sakes,on the footing of permission:this will not content our Author,but he must be forcing it upon them as a point of duty.
18.`Tis in a passage antecedent to the digression we are examining,but in the same section,that,speaking of the pretended law of Nature,and of the law of revelation,`no human laws',he says,`should be suffered to contradict these'.(83)The expression is remarkable.It is not that no human laws should contradict them:but that no human laws should be SUFFERED to contradict them.He then proceeds to give us an example.This example,one might think,would be such as should have the effect of softening the dangerous tendency of the rule:on the contrary,itis such as cannot but enhance it;(84)and,in the application of it to the rule,the substance of the latter is again repeated in still more explicit and energetic terms.`Nay,'says he,speaking of the act he instances,`if any human law should allow or enjoin us to commit it,we are BOUND TO TRANSGRESS that human law,or else we must offend both the natural and the divine.'
19.The propriety of this dangerous maxim,so far as the Divine Law is concerned,is what I must refer to a future occasion for more particular consideration.(85)As to the LAW of Nature,if (as I trust it will appear)it be nothing but a phrase;(86)if there be no other medium for proving any act to be an offence against it,than the mischievous tendency of such act;if there be no other medium for proving a law of the state to be contrary to it,than the inexpediency of such law,unless the bare unfounded disapprobation of any one who thinks of it be called a proof;if a test for distinguishing such laws as would be contrary to the LAW of Nature from such as,without being contrary to it,are simply inexpedient,be that which neither our Author,nor any man else,so much as pretended ever to give;if,in a word,there be scarce an law whatever but what those who have not liked it have found,on some account or another,to be repugnant to some text of scripture,I see no remedy but that the natural tendency of such doctrine is to impel a man,by the force of conscience,to rise up in arms against any law whatever that he happens not to like.What sort of government it is that can consist with such a disposition,I must leave to our Author to inform us.
20.It is the principle of utility,accurately apprehended and steadily applied,that affords the only clue to guide a man through these straits.
