Of pains and pleasures considered as sanctions.

Abstract

We cannot influence the will but by motives; and he who speaks of motive, speaks of pain or pleasure.. A being whom we could not cause to feel either pain or pleasure, would be entirely independent of us. The pain or pleasure that is attached to the observation -of a law, forms what is called the sanction of that law. The laws of one state are not laws in another, having no sanction in that other-no binding force.We may divide good and evil into four classes. 1. Physical. 2. Moral. 3. Political. 4. Religious.We may consequently distinguish four sanctions in considering these varieties of good and evil, under the character of punishment and reward attached to certain rules of conduct.1. The pains and pleasures that we may experience or expect in the ordinary course of Nature, acting by herself without the intervention of man, compose the physical or natural sanction.2. The pains or the pleasures that we may experience or expect from men, by reason of their hatred, or their friendship, of their esteem or contempt, of their spontaneous disposition with regard to us, compose the moral sanction. We may call this the popular sanction, the sanction of the public opinion, ( 19) the (19) Elsewhere Mr. Bentham has called this, with great propriety, the public-opinion-tribunal. N.