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P. Ya. Levenson Jeremy Bentham. His life and social activities

Biographical sketch of P. Ya. Levenson

With a portrait of Bentham, engraved in Leipzig by Gedan

Preface

The name of the famous English thinker, who worked a lot in his long life for the benefit of humanity, belongs to the glorious galaxy of names of tireless idealistic workers who completely devoted their amazing work to serving the public good. A follower of Montesquieu, Helvetius and Beccaria, he made it his life's mission to spread sound ideas, economic, legal and humanitarian, among the cultural society of both hemispheres. The services Bentham rendered to his domestic legislation are recognized by the best minds in Great Britain. No one will dispute the predominant importance of Bentham among the outstanding jurists of the rest of Europe. This “great teacher for life and science,” as Robert von Mohl calls him, occupies the same place in the history of the development of legal consciousness among European peoples as Machiavelli - in the opposite sense, of course. Bentham also left a deep mark on the history of Russian law. His works were not forgotten either by Speransky or by the compilers of the “Judicial Charters” on November 20, 1864. Bentham was keenly interested in Russian affairs, visited Russia more than once, enjoyed the favor of Prince Potemkin, corresponded with Emperor Alexander I, and took an active part in the reform movement that swept the best part of society at the beginning of Alexander’s reign. He corresponded with the victorious emperor, with Mordvinov, Speransky and other outstanding figures, with whom he was on the most friendly terms.

An impeccably pure man, a true philosopher in life and in the field of thought, Jeremy Bentham stood morally immeasurably higher than his teachers, the French encyclopedists of the 18th century. He resembles Beccaria in many ways - in many ways, but not in all. Tempered in everyday struggle, not placed in such favorable conditions as the author of the treatise “Dei delitti e delie pene,” Bentham spent his entire life struggling with the existing order both in his homeland and abroad. His thoughts were constantly occupied with transformations of various branches of law, and the re-creation of the prison system. Helvetius had equal influence on Beccaria and Bentham, both of whom were animated by a passionate desire to see human society develop “the greatest sum of happiness among the greatest number of citizens.” The works of these two students of Helvetius were adequately appreciated in the far north, but the results of their activities, the paths they followed and, finally, the personal characters of both thinkers were completely different.

The gentle, complacent Milanese marquis, a happy family man, having tasted the sweetness of world fame in the full bloom of youth, soon rested on his laurels. The enslavement of his homeland, apparently, did not prevent him from enjoying all the pleasures of life. Being under the patronage of the governor of Lombardy, Beccaria was not particularly burdened by censorship, skillfully avoided its underwater reefs and dreamed of destroying the obsolete building of medieval jurisprudence. He was rather indifferent to all the outrages of the dignitaries of the Austrian administration, which in every possible way contributed to the deep enslavement of his native country. Beccaria had in mind exclusively the improvement of Italian legal proceedings, the abolition of torture, which disgraced the homeland of Dante and Michelangelo, caring little about the mitigation of criminal legislation in other countries. It happened, however, that the inspired word of the Milanese publicist shocked the hearts of the entire reading world, that his treatise made a huge revolution in the history of criminal law, became a reference book for royalty who wished and partly managed to fulfill, to a greater or lesser extent, the cherished dreams of the young enthusiast. He had the rare happiness of not only living to see the abolition of torture and the mitigation of criminal penalties, but himself to take part in the preparatory work for the introduction of new codes, which owe their appearance solely to his fiery preaching, which brilliantly proved the complete inconsistency, theoretical and practical, of all that , which was considered inviolable in the field of law and process.

The life situation in which his valiant follower, Jeremy Bentham, had to act was completely different. The son of a free country, having absorbed with his mother's milk all the traditions of the parliamentary regime, young Bentham early realized that life was created for a tireless struggle, without which it loses all reasonable meaning and turns into a stagnant swamp, infecting the air with putrid fumes and a corpse-like smell. An avid bachelor, who lived to a very old age almost as a recluse, not warmed by female affection, not influenced by the family hearth, Bentham in no way could put up with the orders that had historically been established in his fatherland and in the rest of Europe. This was a fighter who did not lay down his weapon until the last minute, until death closed the tired eyelids of the tireless Protestant. His activities were not limited to his native Great Britain. He offered his services to all peoples, all governments, European and American, republican and autocratic, who valued his advice and turned to him with requests. There was not a single branch of law, not a single aspect of government or political economy, where the authoritative voice of Bentham would not be decisive and welcome. The creator of an entire philosophical school known as utilitarianism, he listened sensitively to the demands of practical life, was not content with merely promoting his views and theories, but sought ways to reform exile and built model prisons on new principles. Failures did not discourage him; with the persistence characteristic of the British national character, he brought the matter to the end, fighting to the last opportunity. He did not live, like Beccaria, to see that blissful time when a person sees the fulfillment of his cherished dreams in certain forms - but most of his undertakings did not die out, they were realized after his death. To judge the significance of this restless worker, who did not distinguish himself from a specific specialty, one must get acquainted with his writings - the man was reflected in them. The feverish activity of this powerful mind, striving to improve the lot of all people, warmed by inexhaustible love for man, required assistants and like-minded people who would engage in detailed processing of the thoughts sketched out by their teacher. Bentham had no time to engage in literary finishing of his works; he did not have the writing talent of Beccaria, who managed to put his humane thoughts into a charming form; he distributed his writings, scribbled on separate sheets of paper, to his students and friends, who processed this raw material for printing. Not everything Bentham wrote was printed; many manuscripts, untouched by the hand of a conscientious and skillful popularizer, such as Dumont, Romilly and others, remained in boxes.

Among the students who contributed many to the dissemination of his ideas were such great figures as James Mill and his son John Stuart Mill. Bentham belongs to a group of types, although rarely found on the continent, who received their strength and significance only thanks to the conditions of the English public. They need fight like air; They are unthinkable without struggle; it strengthens character, but does not harden their hearts. The leader of English radicals, who skillfully conveyed his beloved views into society through the Westminster Review magazine he founded in 1823, Jeremy Bentham, who fought with everyone, from parental authority, teacher authority and ending with King George III, retained until the end of his days an amazing spiritual purity, clarity of mind, selfless love, ideal devotion for all humanity. This pure personality represents such a great figure, mental and moral, such a majestic character, worthy of the best times of classical antiquity, that a closer acquaintance with the inner world of his richly gifted nature, which has not buried its talents in the ground, is extremely interesting and instructive. To understand Bentham's ideals, it is necessary to trace his life, given the presence of exceptional conditions that made it possible for this remarkable man to take that place in modern history European society, which is rightfully assigned to him by posterity. A thinker, lawyer, economist, politician, publicist, philanthropist, he had in mind only one goal - the common good, “increasing the amount of pleasures, reducing the amount of suffering,” that very utilitarianism that was his guiding star throughout his long life , or, rather, activity, which was synonymous with life for him.

Chapter I

Family status. - Childhood. - Studying under the guidance of my father. - School years. - Oxford University. - Blackstone. - Brilliant achievements in science. - Advocacy. - Unsuccessful debut. - Leaving the class. – Bentham devotes himself entirely to scientific activity. – An excerpt about the government. – Success in society. – Personality and role of Dumont

Jeremy Bentham was born in London on February 15, 1748. He belonged by birth to a wealthy lawyer's family, where the practice of law was considered hereditary and passed from generation to generation. His father was a big businessman who made a decent fortune for himself, partly from his professional activity, partly due to successful speculation in the purchase and sale of land. Widowed quite early, he remarried the widow of Dr. John Abbott, who had a son from her first husband, Charles, the same age as Jeremiah. Both boys grew up together, receiving a serious upbringing under the guidance of a father who had high hopes for his son's bright future. The abilities of the frail, sickly, short Jeremiah were amazing for his age. At the age of four, on his father’s knee, under the latter’s guidance, he began to learn Greek; The rapid successes achieved by the remarkably gifted boy amazed those around him. He showed the same success in the Latin language. He studied ancient languages ​​so thoroughly that, as they say, he was already composing Latin odes at the age of eight, and two years later he was writing fluently in Greek. His innate talent, perseverance and passion for reading historical books attracted the attention of the teaching staff at Westminster School, where young Bentham was considered one of the most brilliant students. When he passed the entrance exam to Oxford University, looking at the tiny student, no one wanted to believe that this graduate of one of the best English universities was only 13 years old - an age unthinkable for listening to lectures at a higher educational institution. Jeremiah was considered a dwarf because his peers were still cramming syntax and poring over solving first-degree equations.

Under the guidance of experienced Oxford professors, the young man Bentham, who looked like a dwarf, developed into an excellent expert in classical literature, fluent in both ancient languages. He passed all the exams with great success and at the age of sixteen received his first bachelor's degree in arts. With a Master of Arts degree, the 20-year-old boy completed a university course - at an age when most students are just crossing the threshold of an academic classroom.

The time spent at the university left a residue of bitter disappointment in Bentham. The soulless formalism, the excessive pickiness of school discipline that reigned in a higher educational institution and, finally, the teaching method itself were disgusting to him. Beginning with the classical languages, which he soon grew tired of, although he knew them perfectly, and ending with the lecture of his famous teacher, Professor Blackstone, on natural law, he saw in everything shortcomings, conspicuous falsehood, a tangle of more or less successful sophisms, complete practical inapplicability. In this sweeping criticism of the school system, which he constantly so harshly condemned, Bentham completely agreed with the opinion of another celebrity - the creator of political economy, Adam Smith.

Jeremiah was raised with his half-brother Charles Abbott. The worldly experience of the father, who vigilantly monitored the development of both young men and supplied them with his practical advice, found an obedient follower not in his own son, as he expected, but in his stepson. Charles, without further ado, followed the beaten path and, like a true Molchalin, constantly succeeded in life, taking from it everything that could be taken. He was successful first in the legal profession, then in political activity, reached the rank of “speaker” (chairman) of the House of Commons and completed his career life path in the House of Lords, with the title of Lord Colchester.

The obstinate Jeremiah arranged his life completely differently. The discord between theory and practice, the discrepancy between abstract doctrine and the demands of everyday reality deeply shocked the morally sensitive young man. Upon entering the university, he was asked to sign a subscription to belonging to the dominant Anglican Church and observing all its rules. This was an ordinary formality that all students usually did automatically. So did his brother, Charles. But Jeremiah was curious to familiarize himself in detail with the contents of the 39 paragraphs of this document. He found it devoid of any reasonable meaning and, in addition, contrary to the spirit of Holy Scripture. He openly expressed these doubts to his superiors, who severely reprimanded him for lack of subordination and impudent censure of the custom established by higher authorities. There was nothing to be done, the fifteen-year-old Protestant had to reluctantly sign the document. This forced deal with his conscience inspired him with deep disgust, and all his life he felt disgust for such forcibly extorted obligations.

Upon completion of the legal science course, Bentham had to enroll in the class of local lawyers. His father, who had extensive practice, had long cherished the idea that his highly talented son, who had completed his course of science so early, would become not only the pride of the family where this profession was a succession, but the adornment of the entire legal profession. These rosy hopes of the child-loving father, alas, were not destined to come true. The views of father and son on the tasks of advocacy were completely different. The son treated the issue of fees extremely casually, while for such a practitioner as Jeremiah’s father was, this issue was of the greatest interest, which he could not talk about with indifference. Instead of trying to increase litigation, the young 20-year-old “barister” tried to persuade the parties to reach a settlement agreement. He was happy when his hopes were crowned with success.

“When I first entered the legal profession,” he said, “I was given two or three cases. My first concern was to close them at the very beginning, and my efforts were not unsuccessful.

Clients, not accustomed to such a preacher of peace, were surprised to hear an invitation to reconciliation and advice to stop strife. Whether the father of the aspiring lawyer was pleased with such an influx of conciliatory feelings is another question.

The reason for this aversion of the young lawyer to the specialty imposed on him was in its then ugly state in England, in the mass of contradictory laws due to the lack of codification, in the predominance of meaningless forms, in various tricks and tricks practiced when defending cases in court. Bentham was too clean a man not to disdain such methods that offended his moral dignity, methods unworthy of a self-respecting public figure. As an integral nature, incapable of any compromises, Bentham found the only way out of this situation - to part with the legal profession, despite the protest of his father and the deterioration of his financial situation.

Mill fully approves of this action of the young man. All judges and lawyers, he says, are aware of this situation, but the conscience of these learned people is little troubled. On the contrary, at every opportunity they proclaim that English law is the crown of human intelligence. Thousands of young people over a number of generations have been and are now in the position of Jeremiah at that time. “Bentham alone had enough moral sensitivity and independence of mind to tell himself that there was a whole gulf between word and deed. It is only to the rare union of independence of spirit and moral height that we owe it that Bentham acted as he did and not otherwise.”

The prospect of the upcoming severe hardships, inevitable in a brutal struggle for existence, did not frighten the young man. His decision was irrevocable and cost him a lot of moral suffering - at the sight of his father, deeply upset by the act of his beloved “fils Ieremy,” as he liked to call him in French. By nature, Bentham had the least chance of becoming a practicing lawyer. The sharp contrast that exists between abstract legal norms and their implementation in practice made a repulsive impression on the young thinker, who valued a philosophical system of law that had nothing in common with stupid idolatry of the letter of frequently changing laws.

Having decided to devote his entire life to science, Bentham decided to destroy outdated prejudices carefully guarded by English jurists, to shake the authority of his former professor Blackstone, and on the ruins of these fallen idols to create a new science based on the philosophical principles of law and morality. He began to work, new thoughts fell on paper in the form of separate notes and notes. In this mass of notes lay the germs of later remarkable works. In reading, thinking and sketching new thoughts that struck his mind, there was preparatory work for future activities that glorified his name along with the most famous thinkers of modern times. He explains the process of his gradual self-improvement as follows:

“The most interesting year for me,” he later wrote, “was 1789. I began to gain insight into practical philosophy. Montesquieu, Barrington, Beccaria, Helvetius, especially Helvetius, led me on the path of the principle of utility. One day I jotted down a few vague notes on the subject and happily admired my work. I remember the question arose to me: would I be willing to receive £500 for this piece of paper? Despite all my poverty at that time, I answered: no, under no circumstances.”

Despite the grief caused to his father by leaving the class of lawyers, the latter looked with great hope on the scientific studies of his “fils Ieremy”. He was too confident in the brilliant abilities of his son, jealously watched his studies, urged him, bored him, was tormented that his work was slowly moving forward, unaware of all the painful torture these urgings brought to his son. “Oh, poor fils Ieremy,” the son wrote, “how I was tormented! According to my father, I was too slow to succeed in my work. I looked for new paths, constantly freed myself from many prejudices, made discoveries here and there, trying to reconcile new information with old ones.”

No matter how slowly, in the opinion of the impatient father, the work moved, and the material gradually accumulated. In 1777, Bentham finally appeared before the reading public with his first significant work, entitled “A Fragment on Government.” This "Passage on Government", published without the author's signature, created a great sensation due to the boldness of the thoughts expressed in original form, and grace of style, which is generally very rare in Bentham. This work was exclusively directed by the young author against the doctrine of his former Oxford professor, Blackstone, the head of the dominant school of casuist jurists, enthusiastic admirers of the then order of things and the “happy constitution” of England. The book was a great success and dealt a fatal blow to Blackstone's favorite theories. The public decided that such a work, calling on people to throw off the tyrannical yoke of authority, saturated with corrosive criticism, came from the pen of an outstanding lawyer or public figure. The copyright was alternately attributed to Lords Camden, Mansfield, Burke or Lord Emberton. The book went on sale and was sold like hot cakes. The father was beside himself with delight and, in his joy, could not resist the temptation to blurt out on the sly that the author of this work was not a noble lord at all, but his young son... This unnecessary frankness significantly damaged the material success of the publication. The public, having learned the real name of the author, who turned out to be a failed lawyer, immediately cooled down, and sales of the book ceased. But her success still opened young man entry into the best houses of select society brought him closer to the most remarkable people of England and France.

Success in society and failure in the book market did not bother Bentham at all. He was not the type to be dizzy from the fleeting successes of tinsel brilliance, or to be confused by the first failure. He had one goal - the common good; It was to this that he devoted his entire life, but cared little about the rest. Bentham was so absorbed in the greatness of the difficult life task ahead of him that he did not pay attention to the rest of the world, which had no direct bearing on the issues that occupied him - about legislation, its limits, abuses and means to cure these ailments. His whole life was spent in the development and dissemination of ideas that he considered saving humanity. He did not look at human coexistence from the point of view of the now fashionable “patriotisme du clocher”, not much different from the views of the semi-savage tribes of Central Africa, who believe that personal well-being and social prosperity should be acquired at the expense of the ruin of a neighbor. Bentham was dear to the human race in its entirety, without division into race, nationality, religion, caste and class. The true purpose of legislation should be, in his opinion, the benefit and happiness of people as such. Anything that hinders the achievement of this ideal must be eliminated. Legislation imbued with such lofty aspirations helps eliminate all international strife and establish peace and fraternal unity on earth. Bentham’s amazing ability to analyze historically established facts, dissect their constituent elements, purify the essential from the superficial, and expose the nervus rerum of the desired and necessary transformation can only be compared with his deep, all-encompassing humanity, which permeates all his long-term activities, expressed in many writings. He used all the power of his powerful spirit, warmed by pure love for humanity, to fight the evil rooted in existing law, to uproot this evil, replacing it with more expedient accessories of law, goodness, and benefit as products of truth and morality. The task ahead was to renew the spirit of the legislation, to spread ruling spheres European society, the ideas arising from the enormous revolution produced by the Great French Revolution were too great for the strength of one person, even such a remarkable thinker as Bentham. He was too passionate about the struggle he had undertaken, worked too hard and too ardently to be able to engage in the literary finishing of his works, not to mention the fact that he cared little about details and neglected form.

Fortunately, Bentham found an excellent interpreter who edited his works with great talent and skill. It was his friend, the Swiss Dumont, whose services are invaluable in this regard. European literature and the entire cultural society owe it to Dumont that Bentham's ideas became so widespread. Thanks to his works, Bentham became accessible to the reading public - and this is an important merit.

The personality of Dumont, one of the most ardent adherents of his immortal teacher, is so interesting that it does not hurt to say a few words about it. A descendant of immigrants from France who left their homeland due to religious persecution, Pierre-Etienne-Louis Dumont was born in 1759 in Geneva, where his ancestors had long ago accepted Swiss citizenship. Dumont owed all his mental development to his mother, an intelligent and educated woman who ran a school. He lost his father early, so his mother’s influence was undeniable and indivisible. Having successfully completed a course of science at the Faculty of Theology, Dumont chose a career as a preacher, which at first “smiled” at him. His sermons created a sensation, attracting numerous listeners, but the thoughts expressed by the young pastor seemed to those in power to be too free-thinking for a spiritual person. The eloquent Vitiya had to not only part with his flock, but also leave hometown. He moved in 1782 to St. Petersburg, where, as Bentham wrote, his mother, sisters and other close relatives who were engaged in trade lived, and he himself was a pastor of the French Reformed Church for several years. He did not live long in St. Petersburg, where he managed to build a good reputation for himself, and after a year and a half, and not “a few years later,” he moved to England as the tutor of Lord Landsdowne’s son. The lord appreciated the teacher’s extraordinary abilities and made him his personal secretary, whose duty was to edit speeches made in parliament by the lord, who played a prominent political role in his homeland. In Lord Dumont's house he had the opportunity to meet outstanding public figures of the time, such as Fauquet, Sheridan, Lord Holland, the famous lawyer Romilly, big friend Bentham, and finally Bentham himself. Acquaintance with Bentham soon turned into the closest friendship and constant, uninterrupted cooperation. When the first signs of the French Revolution appeared, the former pastor, imbued with republican ideas, could not sit still - he was drawn to where terrible events were being prepared. In 1789, Dumont found himself in Paris and soon became right hand Mirabeau, co-editor of Le Courrier de Provence, which the famous tribune began to publish. It is argued that many of the latter’s addresses, for example, the address to the king about the removal of troops from Paris or his appeals to voters, belonged to the pen of Dumont. Menacingly approaching events forced him to leave France even before Mirabeau's illness. After spending some time in Switzerland, Dumont settled in England, where he exclusively devoted himself to studying Bentham’s works and disseminating his ideas. He became an indispensable collaborator of his learned friend.

Dumont was first struck by the originality of Bentham's thoughts in 1788, when the latter was visiting his patron, the Earl of Shelburne, later Lord Landsdowne, the former leader of the Whig party. Romilly invited him to read Bentham's works in manuscript. Fascinated by the logic of the young scientist’s conclusions, Dumont, as an ardent republican, enthusiastically declared that Bentham’s works would do a great service to the cause of freedom and undertook to translate them into French, the most common language in Europe. Bentham's works had one significant drawback - the lack of literary finishing. Dumont undertook to fill this gap and fulfilled his task perfectly. He had all the data for such a task: undeniable literary talent, ardent affection for the ideas of his teacher, which he fully shared, and, finally, the desire to spread these ideas in society. Dumont was not a translator in the literal sense of the word, but a real popularizer of the cherished thoughts of his beloved teacher, with whom he was connected by ties of personal friendship. He shortened, supplemented, replaced the dry presentation with attractive forms accessible to the mass of the reading public, explained with everyday examples the well-known conclusions of the stern thinker, which without this illustration could not have influenced society with due success.

The hospitable host, in whose house these two people met, strongly recommended that Bentham accept the offer of the ardent Swiss ex-pastor. Bentham agreed and subsequently had no reason to repent of this step. His friend made his first attempts to popularize Bentham in Mirabeau’s publication Le Courrier de Provence. Then began a series of editions of Bentham's works in French, which far outstripped Dr. Bowring's edition, which appeared only in 1843. All biographers of the famous thinker unanimously claim that Dumont rendered a tremendous service to European culture by providing his contemporaries with the opportunity to become closely acquainted with the works of the founder of the philosophical school of utilitarianism. Without Dumont's participation, his teacher's ideas could not have penetrated society with such speed and accessibility. The former Genevan preacher gave to this grateful and noble cause best years own life.

After the fall of Napoleon I, Dumont returned to his hometown. Switzerland gained full independence. Until the end of his life, Dumont took an active part in the destinies of his fatherland, in the legislation and administration of the Swiss Republic. As a follower of Bentham, he set about organizing the penitentiary prison in Geneva on a new basis, wrote the charter of the local representative council, of which he was a member until his death in September 1829. Thus, the teacher outlived his student by only three years.

Chapter II

Jeremy Bentham's brother, Samuel. - New acquaintances. - Invitation to Prince Potemkin. – Stay in Russia. – Life in Krichev. - “Protection of interest.” – Adam Smith's dying gift. - “Panopticon”. – Failure of General Samuel’s projects. - Bentham's return to England. – Letter to Emperor Paul I

The excitement caused by the appearance of the "Passage on Government" could not subside for a long time. Despite the decrease in sales, Bentham was preparing to publish a second edition of this book, in which he did not at all spare Professor Blackstone, who was the support and hope of all the friends of the existing order. This intention was vigorously opposed by the father, who, as an experienced lawyer, feared the initiation of numerous defamation proceedings against his son. My father's fears were quite well founded. Whatever political pamphlet appeared on sale, especially if it was distinguished by its harsh tone, rumor would certainly attribute it to the pen of Bentham. The father's efforts were crowned with success. The son abandoned his intention, content with the success that this book brought him in the highest circle of English society and abroad.

Thanks to her, Bentham became close friends with the Whig leader, Earl of Shelburne, on whose estate he often visited. French encyclopedists became interested in the innovator and struck up a personal acquaintance with him. He received an invitation from Prince Potemkin to visit him on his Belarusian estate, where the all-powerful temporary worker then lived. Bentham accepted the invitation of His Serene Highness and in 1785 went to see him in the town of Krichev, Mstislavsky district, Mogilev province. This was Bentham's first trip to Russia, which gave him the opportunity to thoroughly study the internal life of the country, for which he subsequently worked hard in the field legislative activity.

Jeremy Bentham had a brother, Samuel, who in 1774 went into the service of Potemkin, with whom he rose to the rank of general. The brothers lived very friendly with each other, carried on constant correspondence, most of which was devoted to the personality of the remarkable Russian statesman. The original personality of the highly talented favorite of Catherine II could not help but interest Jeremiah. The prince then rushed around with the thought of nothing more and nothing less than “transplanting British culture en masse into Belarus,” as if planting an alien centuries-old culture was easy, at the whim of a powerful dignitary. This idea cost the magnificent “Prince of Taurida” dearly; he spent a lot of money, but his attempt, as one might expect, was a complete fiasco. The town of Krichev and the entire surrounding area remained untouched by British civilization, content with their own home-grown products. What motivated the prince when he invited Samuel Bentham to his service is unknown, because brother Jeremiah did not have a strictly defined specialty. A former student of the Westminster School, who wrote Greek poetry well, was invited to serve as a shipbuilder, distiller, brewer, tanner, potter, blacksmith, coppersmith, ropemaker, and similar roles that had little in common with each other. In a word, Samuel was a jack of all trades, “a Swiss, a reaper, and a player of the pipe.” Going to Russia, he changed his lifestyle ahead of time, slept on the floor, assuming that in this unknown country they had no idea not only about comfort, but also about beds, and brought with him no more and no less than 86 letters of recommendation. Having somewhat become accustomed to Russian customs, Samuil, of course, changed his initial opinion about the country, where he found fertile ground for using his abilities as an inventor and projector. To carry out many of the transformations conceived by the prince, Samuel pointed him to his brother Jeremiah, who was then famous abroad. Jeremiah received an invitation to come to Krichev, and he was entrusted with collecting information about desirable improvements in the field of agriculture, gardening, manufacturing and trade, inviting a knowledgeable botanist, and so on. Jeremiah’s review of Potemkin, with whom he was in correspondence before his trip to Krichev, is interesting. The hardworking scientist was very dissatisfied with the slowness of his noble correspondent.

“I’m still waiting for letters from St. Petersburg,” he complained to one of his friends in 1785. “Because of my sins, I am dealing with the laziest man of the laziest people on the earth of Almighty God.” I write him one letter after another, about his own personal affairs... He, as they say, is very pleased with this. Do you think he's answering? Nothing happened. Orders my letters written in dog French to be translated into Russian. For what purpose is unknown, at least not for himself, because he speaks both languages ​​perfectly.”

In August 1785, Bentham set off on a long journey. He traveled at his own expense, and with 500 pounds sterling (5,000 rubles) sent by his Serene Highness, he sent a botanist and two women who had studied dairy farming well for a model farm that Potemkin wanted to set up on his estate. The path lay through Paris, where he stopped for a while. He really wanted to visit D'Alembert and other encyclopedists with whom he was in correspondence, but the innate shyness that he often had to endure in life prevented him from carrying out his plan. He left Paris without seeing people whom he had long and passionately desired to see. Bentham went to Nice, where he boarded a ship and after various vicissitudes, a month-long stop in Smyrna, and withstanding a terrible storm, he finally reached Constantinople.

Following the example of all his compatriots setting off on a long voyage, he was loaded with many letters of recommendation to various persons, those in power, to representatives of the diplomatic corps and, by the way, to the Russian envoy Bulgakov. Despite the fact that Bentham had previously known many Russians and became close friends with the Tatishchev brothers, whom he loved very much, although he often mocked their immoderate admiration for Montesquieu and Catherine, his acquaintance with the Russian diplomat made a strong impression on him. The thinker was sure that in the person of the representative great empress he will meet an uncouth barbarian, un mangeur de chandelles, as the Parisian boulevard philosophers say. It is easy to imagine his amazement when, instead of the expected savage, he saw a wonderfully handsome and quite intelligent man, who was in no way inferior to his colleagues in the diplomatic corps. Bulgakov invited him to a dinner party, seated him in a place of honor, talked to him a lot about Russia, about the Empress, about whom he spoke with delight, claiming that even snow and ice shine more in Russia than in other countries. Partly due to ignorance of secular decency, partly due to innate timidity, Bentham forgot to pay a visit to his hospitable host and his French colleague, for which he blamed his pitiful upbringing. Bentham stayed in Constantinople for a month and a half and went through Bulgaria and Romania to Russia, where he was destined to live for almost two years.

Many adventures befell him until he safely reached Krichev. Absolute ignorance of the Russian language and local customs harmed him enough during the various ordeals experienced in customs, quarantines, roadside taverns and inns in Little Russia. In January 1786 he arrived in Kremenchug. The local governor invited him to dinner. The modest philosopher was amazed by the mixture of luxury and slovenliness, the abundance of food and drink, and the behavior of the gentlemen who sported long boots, despite the presence of ladies. The card game before and after lunch, which he first saw at the Russian ambassador in Constantinople, was repeated in Kremenchug, on an even more impressive scale. “Gentlemen,” Bentham marveled, “who received salaries of no more than 600 rubles a year, lost 800 rubles at cards at one sitting.” Lunch dragged on for a very long time, then a hearty dinner was served. In the intervals between lunch and dinner, bishops' chanting antiphons were sung interspersed with Ukrainian and Great Russian folk songs.

Upon arrival at the princely estates, Bentham chose as his residence not Krichev, the central point of the Potemkin estates, but the nearby village of Zadobra, where he spent the entire time of his long stay in Russia in complete solitude, studying assiduously scientific works. His only entertainment was music, reading, correspondence with friends left behind in England, and growing flowers, which he loved passionately. The philosopher always gave preference to botany over mineralogy, on the grounds that its dissemination gives pleasure, while the mineralogist is deprived of the opportunity to breed stones and cannot share his reserves. He took home a huge collection of seeds collected in Russia, and subsequently distributed them to various botanists. The extent to which Bentham concentrated in his scientific pursuits can be judged by the fact that he did not even think of going to Krichev during the passage of the Empress, who was then making her famous tour of southern Russia - a trip that Potemkin furnished with incredible luxury and an abundance of amazing scenery.

In his solitude, Bentham wrote the famous essay “Defense of usury” in 1787. He had long been toying with the idea of ​​speaking out on this issue, which occupied the minds of many prominent economists. The question of whether it is necessary for the state to intervene in the private contractual relations of citizens among themselves or whether it is possible to do without this interference by the authorities, giving complete freedom to adult, legally capable citizens to regulate their financial accounts as they please, greatly occupied him. Turgot wrote about this twenty years before the appearance of Defense of Usury. In the French edition of Dumont, both of these studies on growth, its meaning and limits are placed side by side, as mutually complementary, expressing in clear form everything that has been said about usury. This issue was almost exhausted by the joint work of such two authoritative economists as Turgot and Bentham were rightly considered. It is not surprising that this essay by Potemkin’s guest made a huge impression throughout European literature.

The book about interest appeared completely by accident. Living in the princely estate, Bentham was deprived of the opportunity to indulge in his usual studies of philosophy and jurisprudence for a very simple reason: he did not have the necessary materials at hand. Then he decided to analyze the issue of usury, how reasonable and practical are the laws that limit the collection of growth, establishing a certain norm, the excess of which entails criminal liability. He could not help but be struck by the seemingly inexplicable fact that the consequences of a restrictive law are directly opposite to the good intentions of the legislator who wants to protect the interests of the debtor. “The result of my reflections on this subject,” says Bentham, “is for me this: no man who has reached the age of mental maturity, possessed of common sense, acting with complete freedom and knowledge of the matter, can be hindered even by considerations directed to his advantage. , to make, as he understands, a well-known transaction in order to get money for himself. Therefore, no one can be prevented from giving him a loan, on terms that he willingly accepts.” Analyzing in detail all the arguments usually given in defense of the legislator who has the right to limit the freedom of monetary loans, he proves their obvious absurdity. After all, the state does not interfere in the horse trade, but why is money trading better or worse than horse trading? The book owes its success partly to the glib language - which is a rare exception in Bentham - seasoned with caustic sarcasm, and, of course, goes to his eternal scapegoat, Professor Blackstone. It was written in the form of letters to a London friend, Wilson, with a request to publish them when the issue was sufficiently resolved.

The London friend hesitated for a long time, he was too cautious, especially since the last letter contained attacks on Adam Smith.

The matter would have dragged on for a long time if Bentham’s father had not intervened, who acted in his own way in this case. He grabbed the manuscript and sent it to the printing house without warning anyone, least of all the author of these letters. On his way back from Russia, passing through The Hague, Bentham received a printed volume of these letters to a friend as a gift from the English envoy. Adam Smith read the last letter and told him to tell the author that he completely agreed with his views. As proof of his sympathy and respect for the author, Adam Smith sent him a copy of his writings. This gift was delivered to Bentham shortly after receiving news of the death of the famous creator of political economy, author of The Wealth of Nations.

Another work Bentham wrote during his stay with Potemkin, although it appeared in print several years later, was his famous “Panopticon, or The inspection house.” This “Panopticon” is a treatise on the rational design of prisons, on the basis of solitary confinement and central supervision, with the establishment of the necessary workshops, schools, hospitals, with the aim of correcting and re-educating prisoners. The extreme, urgent need for prison reform was recognized by all thinking people that time. The best people devoted their activities to this good cause, because the state of the prisons at that time, not only in England, but throughout Europe, was truly terrifying. Bentham was no less interested in this matter than his glorious fellow countryman, philanthropist John Howard, who died in 1790 in Kherson. He borrowed the idea of ​​​​rebuilding prisons from his brother Samuil, who introduced many different innovations to the Potemkin estates. To fulfill the desire of his Serene Highness to establish manufacturing and craft establishments in Russia, Sir Samuel drew up a detailed plan with a detailed description of the structure he designed for a huge factory and craft phalanstery, intended to accommodate two thousand people of all ages, on the basis of central supervision. The project was not implemented for purely external reasons. Soon the Turkish war broke out, and Prince Potemkin had to leave Krichev and go to the active army, as its commander-in-chief. But the project of this “Panopticon” remained - and Jeremy Bentham used it to build a new type of prison.

Sir Samuel, whom brother Jeremiah esteemed very highly, was distinguished by remarkable ingenuity and ability for projects. He designed, among other things, to create a constant temperature for the chronometer, invented a new type of vessel, which he launched, as an experiment, along the Dnieper; the experiment turned out to be successful, like many of his other agricultural inventions. In the end, all these inventions and innovations failed. Potemkin, burning with the desire to turn the Krichevskoye estate into a model estate, not inferior to the best estates of Western European magnates, spent a lot of money and hired foreign workers and technicians. The work was in full swing under the main leadership of General Samuel and the German Stahl, but things were not going well. The aliens did not understand each other; some spoke Italian, others English, others German. None of them knew local conditions; The enslaved rural people stupidly and reluctantly carried out the Egyptian orders of their superiors. What chaos reigned there can be judged by the fact that the innocent Jeremiah Bentham, by mistake of the zemstvo police, was arrested and his property was described for someone else's debt - probably they confused Samuel with Jeremiah. The future employee of Speransky and Mordvinov had to, in the name of personal freedom and property security, enter into arguments with lawyers of the Mstislavsky district court and the Mogilev civil chamber.

In November 1787, Bentham left Russia and, not without difficulty, traveling through Poland, Prussia and Holland, returned to his homeland. He never ceased to be interested in Russian affairs, the course of military operations, the Russian army and Russian finances. His brother, who had great connections in high society, provided him with detailed information about everything that was happening in the Empire, where he lived for almost two years. He subsequently had to correspond with various authorities in Warsaw about the correct payment of the pension assigned by the last Polish king, in the amount of 500 ducats, to the widow of his friend Linda. When his efforts were unsuccessful, he wrote directly to Emperor Paul and achieved the desired results. Only with the accession of Alexander I did his constant relations with the best representatives of Russian society begin. It was then that he acquired in Russia the importance that he had every right to expect in view of his outstanding merits in various fields of scientific, journalistic and philanthropic activity.

Chapter III

French revolution. - Role of Bentham. - The services they rendered to the new order of things. – Treatise on parliamentarism. - Sophistry. - Elevation of Bentham to the rank of French citizen. – Love for France. – Prison reform. - Father's death. – Improvement of financial situation. – Construction of a model prison in London. – Pitta assistance. - Silent struggle with bureaucracy. - Controversy with the king. – Campaigning for the abolition of corporal punishment in school. – Westminster Review. - Irish question. – Intercession for Catholics and Jews

Bentham's desire to devote himself to parliamentary activities, due to the opposition of the Earl of Shelburne, turned out to be far from being as feasible as he thought. The hope that his book “On the Defense of Growth” would open the doors of parliament to him did not materialize. The Earl knew very well that Bentham's independent character would not allow him to blindly follow the instructions of the Whig leader, who only needed an extra vote in favor of his bill, and not a person worthy of taking his rightful place in the host of the people's representatives. Guided by these principles, the count gave the deputy seat to a more convenient candidate than Bentham, which was the reason for a certain cooling between recent friends. However, this cooling did not last long.

Meanwhile, the French Revolution broke out, attracting all the attention of Bentham, who had long been in friendly relations with many outstanding figures of the impending revolution. He became especially close friends with the famous Girondist Brissot, who spoke enthusiastically about both his personal character and reform activities recent Potemkin guest. In the posthumous notes published by his son, Brissot compares Jeremiah's activities with those of Howard.

“Before he proposed reform,” he says, “Bentham wanted to study the criminal law of all European nations. The enormity of the task ahead could not stop the zeal of a man completely imbued with love for the public good. Foreign codes had to be studied in the originals, so Bentham gradually acquired knowledge of these languages. He spoke and wrote excellent French, knew Italian, Spanish and German; I saw how he studied Swedish and Russian.”

Thanks to his deep knowledge and fiery love for humanity, the desire to be useful to him, Bentham subsequently became a great authority for the best figures of the then liberalism. People from all corners of the educated world turned to him for advice. His opinions and advice were sensitively listened to by everyone who cared about the interests of the people's welfare and social development.

He addressed the assembly of French representatives with a number of projects and instructions on how best to organize the legislative assemblies. The material for these works was the minutes of the regional diets that preceded the convening of the notables and the legislative assembly. To provide a service to the emerging parliamentarism of the French, he wrote his famous treatise “Essai of political Tactics” in 1791.

“With horror,” he says in the preface, “I reject any accusation of patriotism if, in order to be a friend of my country, I would have to be an enemy of the human race. I render a service to my fatherland if I can help to ensure that France receives the freest and happiest constitution."

The first note he submitted to the assembly through Mirabeau, which was nothing more than a statement of the forms of office work in the British Parliament, failed. Thanks to Sees, she was rejected. One of the deputies, turning to Mirabeau, directly told him:

“We don’t want to borrow anything from the British, we don’t want to imitate anyone.”

In his anarchist sophisms (“Anarchical Fallacies”) Bentham sharply criticizes the “declaration of the rights of the citizen and man” compiled by Mirabeau with the collaboration of our friend Dumont. Analyzing, as usual, thoroughly all the mistakes made during the preparation and publication of this document, Bentham does not leave in the shadows and good sides this important legislative act, which had a huge impact on the future fate of France. Bentham loved France too much to allow himself to imitate the mass of his fellow countrymen, who indiscriminately condemned the deep, bloody revolution taking place in a neighboring country, whose people, in his opinion, should not be held accountable for the sins and crimes committed by individual individuals.

In his book on political sophisms, “The Book of Fallacies,” he mercilessly exposed all the machinations of supporters of outdated orders and deep-rooted abuses, trying to defend their beloved antiquity, in the shadow of which they perfectly carry out their dark affairs. Skillfully grouping all the arguments brought by conservatives against any reform, he proves their internal inconsistency and moral rot. Bentham brings to the surface all the Jesuitical pitfalls and selfish motives of the ardent defenders of the dilapidated routine, aimed at paralyzing any reform and prolonging the existence of orders condemned by science and hindering the onset of better times. He presented many other useful bills to the assembly. At the suggestion of Brissot, in consideration of the services rendered to France by Bentham, the national assembly elevated him to the rank of French citizen on August 26, 1792. This award, which was awarded only to such famous foreigners as, for example, Washington, Pestalozzi, Klopstock, Kosciuszko, Wilberforce, Mackintosh, Kampe and others, Bentham was proud of until the end of his days. In a pamphlet addressed to the Convention and entitled: “Emancipate your Colonies!”, he strongly advised the liberation of the colonies, an idea that he constantly developed before the British government. The Convention was also indifferent to his petition, as was the English Parliament, which left his advice without consequences. This, however, did not in the least discourage the tireless fighter for freedom and independence. Being in constant correspondence with prominent representatives of the French people, starting with Mirabeau and ending with Lafayette, Bentham, shortly before his death, addressed the French people with an appeal - “Lettre fu peuple français” - in which he gave advice on the offensive new era caused by the July Revolution of 1830. The interests of the French nation were no less near and dear to him, as were the interests of his native Great Britain, because he owed a significant share of his mental development to France and its literature, and especially to the works of its encyclopedists.

Three questions especially occupied Bentham at the time we are describing - questions that, unfortunately, even now, after almost a whole century, are still very far from being resolved. These are prison reform, the threatening development of pauperism and the Irish question. He devoted countless brochures, voluminous reports, notes, and articles to the need for the first reform; she also occupied a prominent place in his varied correspondence with friends. Much of what he wrote on this subject still remains in manuscript.

The urgency of prison reform was clear. The condition of English prisons was truly terrible, beyond any description. They were constant centers of infections, specifically prison-related, such as, for example, “prison fever.” Both sexes and all ages were kept together in the same cells. Bankrupts and murderers, prisoners under investigation and those convicted or released long ago, but who did not manage to pay the established food money to the jailers, lived together. Prison authorities treated the poor harshly, but for money they helped wealthy prisoners to drink and debauch. It took the collective energy of more than one generation of people, inspired by the philanthropy of Bentham and Howard, to cleanse these Augean stalls. Howard paid with his life in this selfless service to the unfortunate. Bentham described him perfectly when he said that Howard “lived an apostle and died a martyr.”

In a number of books and pamphlets, such as: “View of the Hard Labor Bill”, “Panopticon”, “Panopticon versus New South Wales” and “Principles of Penal Law”, Bentham introduces the public to the results of his many years of observations on the English system. prisons and exile. Full of indignation, he proposes to replace these flagrant outrages with two reforms that will benefit both sides: humane treatment of prisoners and savings for the benefit of the treasury. With redoubled energy he began to propagate the urgency of this reform, and his passionate preaching, oral and printed, influenced society and government. Former Prime Minister Pitt promised Bentham his assistance and allowed him to make his first experiment.

At this time, the reformer's financial situation improved. He received a significant inheritance from his father, who died in 1792, an inheritance that provided him with an annual income of 6,000 rubles. Bentham used his capital, purchased land and began building a model prison in London for about a thousand people. Bentham set to work so ardently and was so confident of its success that he managed to convince Pitt of this, and he provided him with every possible assistance. Parliament approved the contract, and things began to boil. But our philosopher, who did not take into account the elusive pitfalls of administrative routine, had a hard time. At every step he was faced with obstacles. Having suffered for many years with this construction, he had to give up due to the insurmountable coalition of his bureaucratic opponents. The parliamentary commission established in 1811 did not accept his construction, on which he spent all his fortune, so at times the philosopher was penniless and had to move to an apartment with his brother, who was then in England. Finally, the government paid him 230,000 rubles to reimburse the amounts he had spent from his personal funds. This failure with Panopticon, his favorite creation, hit him hard. For a long time he could not see the matter concerning the building. “It is the same to me,” said Bentham, “as opening a box in which imps are hidden. My brother gave me the first idea about building this prison, which he borrowed from Russian peasant huts. In this building, supervision would be so simple, convenient, continuous. What a pity!"

Bentham attributed the cause of his failure entirely to King George III. That George did not like such a bold innovator as Bentham is quite natural. But the reason that caused the king's acute attack of hatred was quite original. It consisted of a newspaper controversy. George III wrote an article in the Leiden Gazette, where he advised the Danish king to abandon the alliance with Russia. On this occasion, Bentham, under the pseudonym "Anti-Machiavelli", published a series of poisonous articles in the Public Advertiser, refuting the absurd demands of the anonymous author. Infuriated by the pamphlets, the king could not stand it and, under the pseudonym “Partisan,” began to defend the policies of his cabinet. Bentham responded with such a thunderous article that discouraged his royal opponent from continuing the controversy. The cabinet heeded the sensible advice of the “Anti-Machiavelli” and recoiled from the royal projects. Having learned who exactly was hiding under the pseudonym “Anti-Machiavelli,” the king was beside himself. He took revenge on his opponent in a completely unknightly manner. Shortly before his death, Bentham published a pamphlet entitled "The Contest Between Jeremy Bentham and George III, Written by One of the Fighters."

“You can’t imagine,” said Bentham, “how he hated me.” The consequence of his revenge was lost millions. He destroyed the contract concluded by the Admiralty with my brother. He influenced the parliament not to fulfill the promise, the fulfillment of which I waited much longer than the Trojan War lasted. If it weren’t for him, all the poor people of the country and prisoners would be in my hands, and the criminal code drawn up by me would have been approved long ago.

It is remarkable that, while an Oxford student, young Bentham wrote a Latin ode on the occasion of the accession to the throne of George III. The ode received great praise from the strict critic, Dr. Johnson, but the author himself spoke differently about it.

Bentham's 1797 plan for the improvement of the condition of the poor, entitled "Situation and Relief of the Poor", was the basis for a number of measures sanctioned by the famous law of 1834. The project was so thoroughly developed that the legislator only had to use the practical instructions of the idealistic philanthropist, who even took care of what beds should be distributed to the poor. Drawing the government's attention to the urgent need for public education, Bentham was the first to propose the idea of ​​​​establishing savings banks, which subsequently became so widespread throughout the civilized world. He then became close friends with Robert Owen. Together they advocated for the abolition of family life and educational institutions corporal punishment, which in those days was considered the best means of moral correction for school-age children.

Bentham devoted most of his working life to the Irish question, which still worries public opinion in the United Kingdom. He wrote articles against the oppression of Catholics, demanded their equality, and with remarkable foresight predicted what awaited the country if this burning issue was not resolved in the desired sense. His warnings turned out to be prophetic. The people, whom the government oppresses in the public performance of their worship, forcing them to pay for the maintenance of the ruling heterodox clergy, hostile to their religion, will turn into a solid mass of gloomy conspirators, and in the end will become a horror for the state, and not its reliable guard. In a people deprived of the guidance of enlightened shepherds, given over to the power of gloomy fanatics, only ferocious instincts, secrecy and dark hatred will develop.

Advocating for the need for fundamental reforms of the parliamentary regime, for equal rights for Catholics, dissidents, Jews, and a reduction in government spending, Bentham made extensive use of the help of the Westminster Review magazine he founded, which in this case turned out to be his valuable assistant in influencing public opinion. He paid special attention to economic issues, which we will discuss below.

Chapter IV

Life in Bowood. - The only novel in Bentham's life. – “Principles of morality and legislation.” – Warm participation in all public issues. – Enhanced scientific activity

In the monotonous work life of Bentham, who lived as a real hermit, an event occurred that somehow does not fit with the idea of ​​a philosopher who renounced the world and all its temptations. Playful Cupid once looked into the thinker’s secluded cell and temporarily tore the tireless worker away from his usual activities. The story of this only romance in the life of a notorious bachelor is as follows.

Due to the success of his first essay, "Passages on Government", many high-ranking persons sought the acquaintance of the interesting author. Among these persons was the Earl of Shelburne, who was then the head of the cabinet. The acquaintance between the first minister of England and the young, struggling writer soon turned into a close friendship that lasted throughout his life. Bentham often and for long periods stayed at his friend's luxurious estate, Bowood, where he had the opportunity to meet Chatham, William Pitt, Camden, Romilly and other modern celebrities. Bentham's independent character, his ideal honesty and selflessness, contempt for wealth and honors involuntarily inspired deep respect for him on the part of the arrogant nobility, who fawned in droves on the powerful minister. The owner was delighted with his democratic friend. “His company,” he wrote to his father, “is priceless for me, for me, who spent my whole life in some kind of political hospital. His originality and unselfishness have the same refreshing effect on me as the country air on a Londoner.”

Bentham worked as usual in rural silence. There he wrote his major work, “Principles of Morals and Legislation.” During his vacation, he took up music, accompanying the ladies who played the harp on the violin. “Here I do whatever my heart desires,” he wrote to friends, “I ride a horse, talk with my father, read with my son, pet a leopard, play billiards and chess with the ladies.” Among the girls who often visited Bowood was Miss Caroline Fauquet, the sister of Lord Goland, a person distinguished in her intelligence and education. Young people often liked to talk and argue. At first, apparently, they argued about abstract, serious subjects, then the conversations imperceptibly moved on to other topics, less abstract, but more understandable to young people. It ended as one would expect - the young people fell in love with each other. This romance lasted for a long time; what reason prevented their marriage is unknown. The correspondence stopped, they did not see each other for many years - the novel was archived. After 16 years, Bentham met the object of his only love - she was not married. Memories of the past came to life in the memory of the aged philosopher. He was already 55 years old at that time - an age extremely inconvenient for explanations of love and marriage proposals. Nevertheless, Bentham, with the impracticality characteristic of all armchair people, risked proposing to Miss Fauquet. Alas, the offer was not accepted, and he remained a bachelor for the rest of his life.

In truth, Bentham was so engrossed in his work that he had no time to court the fair sex. One has only to read a simple list of his works devoted to the development of various social issues to be convinced that he had no time to think about the organization of personal happiness, a family hearth, and a calm and carefree old age. Not to mention the fact that most of what he wrote is still unpublished, the complete collection of his works, published by Dr. Bowring, occupies 11 volumes. He conducted a huge correspondence with prominent figures of the Old and New Worlds, drew up legislative projects for different countries, wanted to be a codifier of Russia, Poland, France, Spain, America, was engaged in the practical application of prison reform in his fatherland, and worked on political and economic issues.

There was not a single more or less serious issue in the state and public life of England in which Bentham did not appear among the main initiators and figures. He worked on the introduction of parliamentary and city reforms, took part in works on the mitigation of the criminal code, the abolition of exile, the radical transformation of the penitentiary system, the improvement of jury trials, the reduction of taxes on knowledge, public education, and the introduction of savings banks in the postal environment. departments and mutual benefit societies, organizing periodic national censuses, eliminating the exclusionary laws that applied to Catholics. It is unnecessary to mention his work to improve civil and criminal proceedings, where he had to endure a stubborn struggle with the petrified representatives of British justice, who strongly disliked him and put obstacles in his way at every step. The idea of ​​establishing eternal peace, which worried Kant, found a passionate champion in Bentham, who proposed that England and France set an example of general disarmament. Along with disarmament, he proposed that the European powers strive in their international relations and international law to achieve only one goal, one ideal: the greatest well-being of all peoples, in their entirety - that is, exactly what his later followers - Cobden and Bright - worked on. He set up a children's school in his garden to test in practice the correctness of his pedagogical views expressed in the "Chrestomatie", dedicated to the classification of sciences. Bentham spoke out for the abolition of the classical system of education, demanding its replacement with the teaching of exact sciences, but with the indispensable condition that teaching should not burden children, but, on the contrary, would captivate them and give them pleasure. He positively did not have enough time for his numerous activities, and he often said:

“If I could grow like a polyp and turn into six people, I would find work for all of us.”

Because of these activities, Bentham had to radically change his lifestyle and completely abandon visiting society. His day was distributed in such a way that a huge part of it was devoted to work, and only an insignificant part to rest. Beyond expectations, this way of life, this work until exhaustion was very useful to him. Once frail and puny, he began to recover and, thanks to the machine-like distribution of activities, lived to a ripe old age without complaining of ill health. The philosopher spent most of his time in London, in solitude, in his house, where, as he gladly added, “Milton once lived.” In the summer he lived at a dacha in Somersetshire, where he rented a secluded manor house with a huge garden. In the garden, one might say, he lived, caring for his favorite flowers. There he was visited by his closest friends and favorite students, among whom John Stuart Mill took first place. As a child, Mill, whose father, James, was very friendly with Bentham, often spent his summer holidays at his dacha, about which John Stewart retained the most pleasant memories for the rest of his life. “There,” he says, “I learned the charm of a broad and free life and a poetic feeling, which was favored by the sight of the former abbey, immersed in a shady garden filled with the sound of waterfalls.”

Bentham visited no one except his friend Romilly, with whom he was very close. He dined with him once a year and with this visit he wanted to get even with all the requirements of everyday etiquette. “Why go on a visit,” he said, “we’ll still meet in parliament and shake each other’s hands there.” Romilly visited him at his dacha, where he found that Bentham was faithful to his habits, as in the city: “He works for ten hours, draws up civil and criminal codes, writes about various branches of law, then walks to gain strength for the next preparatory work ahead. legislator of the future."

Bentham devoted a lot of time to enormous business correspondence with his Russian friends, with various English and foreign celebrities, including the hero of Waterloo, the Duke of Wellington, to whom he predicted that his fame would eclipse the glory of Cromwell if he only stuck to his legislative reform. Among his adherents were such people as Lord Broome and the ardent Irish patriot O'Connel, and among his host of intimate friends were Millie, father and son, Ricardo, Grote, Bowring and others. The fame that Bentham achieved then was very great not only in his homeland, but far beyond its borders. Foreign monarchs and legislative assemblies treated him incomparably more friendly and respectful than his compatriots, who managed to appreciate his unforgettable merits only after the death of an elderly hermit who retired to the house where the author of “Lost” once lived. Raya".

To judge his significance abroad, one must become acquainted with his activities in Russia, where he played a prominent role throughout the reign of Emperor Alexander I.

Chapter V

Accession of Alexander I. – Commission for drafting laws. - Dumont's trip to St. Petersburg. – Bentham’s popularity in high Russian society. – The attitude of Speransky and Admiral Mordvinov towards him. – Translation of Bentham’s articles into Russian. - The struggle of revolutionaries. – Appointment of Baron Rosenkampf. - The fall of Speransky. – A drama of weakness and insincerity. – Correspondence of Bentham with Alexander I. – Holy Alliance

With the accession of the young emperor, surrounded by his beloved peers and enlightened dignitaries, a reform movement began in Russia, foreshadowing a brilliant future for the country. The emperor's closest friends, for example Prince Kochubey, Count Stroganov, Prince Adam Czartoryski, Novosiltsov and others, were preoccupied with drafting civil and criminal codes. For this purpose, the “Commission for Drafting Laws” was formed, headed first by M. M. Speransky, and then by the Baltic lawyer, Baron Rosenkampf, who was then considered an ardent admirer of Bentham. The government turned to the most famous lawyers abroad, asking for their assistance in such an important matter as the codification of legislation, which was then in the most unsatisfactory state. Many of the highest representatives of Russian society were familiar with the works of Bentham, which had recently appeared in Dumont's French translation. Some of the prominent figures of this era who visited England were personally acquainted with Bentham - Admiral Mordvinov, Czartoryski, the Vorontsov brothers, Saltykov and Speransky. In order to spread the ideas of his teacher in Russian society, Dumont went to St. Petersburg in 1802, where he found a warm welcome.

Dumont's task was greatly facilitated by the fame that his teacher already enjoyed in Russia.

“Bentham’s work is considered superior to everything that preceded it. Would you believe,” Dumont wrote to his friend Romilly in June 1803, “that as many copies of my Bentham were sold in St. Petersburg as in London.” One hundred copies were sold in a very short time, and booksellers are still demanding new stock. This brought me the favor of many people, which I will take advantage of on occasion. People are surprised at the book, and the publisher humbly accepts his share in this surprise.”

Informing his friend about city rumors about the character of the emperor and his closest collaborators, expressing doubts about Rosenkampf’s ability to cope with the task entrusted to him, Dumont characterizes the Russian lawyers of that time as follows.

“If you knew,” he wrote, “what a local lawyer or a lawyer in general is, you would blush for the honor of your profession. And the judges! You, in England, cannot imagine the master's degree here. I’m sure that in 10 years everything will change here.”

The confidence of Bentham's venerable translator was premature. It took 63 years for the unattractive type of the then judge, who for a long time was the most rewarding subject for the satire of Griboyedov, Gogol and Saltykov, to be transformed into a worthy member of the real magistracy created by the “Judicial Charters” of Emperor Alexander II.

“Russia needs laws,” we read in a letter from one of the most educated people of his time, N. A. Sablukov, to Samuel Bentham. – Not only Alexander I wants to give her a code, Russia itself demands it. Let Jeremy Bentham prepare this code. I do not know Bentham, but I tell myself: if he dies without drawing up a code, he will be ungrateful to the Creator who awarded him such mental gifts. Your brother's book satisfies the soul, heart and mind equally; it fills the soul with enthusiasm, the heart with virtue and dispels spiritual darkness. I am Russian, my instinct does not give me rest. I wish for my fatherland to possess those truths that Bentham’s beneficent genius created for all mankind.”

The famous admiral Count N.S. Mordvinov had the same opinion about Bentham, who described him in enthusiastic terms in his letter to General Samuel Bentham.

“I wish to settle in London,” the admiral wrote, “and get to know your brother. In my eyes, he is one of the four geniuses who have done and will do the most for the happiness of mankind: Bacon, Newton, Adam Smith and Bentham. Each of them is the founder of a new science, each is a creator. I keep a certain amount in reserve for the purpose of spreading the light that comes from Bentham's works."

Mordvinov was one of the most ardent and convinced advocates of Bentham's ideas in Russian society and in the highest government spheres. Bentham's correspondence with the sovereign passed through his hands. Bentham called the admiral his commissioner, equipped with a "carte blanche". “In you,” Jeremiah wrote to him, “I see an enlightened friend of your fatherland and a proven friend of my brother. I look forward to the moment when I can shake your hand in my privacy.”

These completely friendly relations between Mordvinov, Speransky and Bentham continued all the time, despite the change in circumstances. When Bentham's complete works were published in 1823, the latter sent two copies to his Russian friends, Mordvinov and Speransky, expressing his pleasure that both were in good relations, which, according to him, “does not always happen between comrades in boards like yours, not to mention other boards.” Mordvinov was delighted with this gift and warmly thanked the philosopher for sending his works, which “the learned world reveres, and I study with the zeal of a student who is amazed at everything that comes from the pen of his teacher. I happened, as chairman of the department of civil and spiritual affairs of the State Council, to support my arguments in important processes with your enlightened judgments.” The teacher responded with a humorous message that, having not received a response from his students for a long time, he believed that they had probably thrown his works into the oven or had been exiled to Siberia for possessing such books.

Speransky also contributed a lot to the dissemination of Bentham's theories; he took a personal part in the translation into Russian of selected passages of his works. Speransky, who was the right hand of the then Minister Kochubey, was easy to follow the successful progress of the translation not from the English original, but from the French adaptation of Dumont, whose name the translator Russified.

This translation appeared at different times, in 3 volumes, in 1805, 1806 and 1811. But before his appearance, the reading public could get an idea of ​​Bentham from the articles published about him in the first Russian official publication of the Ministry of the Interior, which appeared in 1804 under the title “SPb. magazine". This magazine published articles on hospitals, “The thoughts of the glorious Bacon on government,” Bentham’s opinions “On the spread of knowledge of laws,” “On the freedom of printing.” To weaken Bentham's harsh judgment on censorship, the opinions of some anonymous people were cited that censorship is a very useful thing. In addition to numerous articles extracted from Bentham’s writings, the reading public was introduced to the essence of “Plato’s Republic,” to the “Opinions of the Greek Philosophers on Government,” to the teachings of Adam Smith, to ways to eliminate beggary, to the essence of the cell system practiced in Philadelphia prisons, and they wrote about freedom of the press, abuse of privileges, and so on. In a word, such serious issues of social life were touched on that presented the complete charm of novelty to Russian readers. And all this was published on the pages of the official organ of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. We must not forget that the initiator and inspirer of this body was M. M. Speransky. This energetic, highly talented figure was then rushing around with the thought of radical reforms of the state system on a new basis, he wanted to do away with the old days forever, or, as he liked to put it, “trancher dans le vif, tailler en plein drap.” The government, represented by its best representatives, wanted to renovate public life, enforce the rule of law, and spread education. The dark forces lurking in the depths of the service class, gravitating towards their cherished antiquity, spared no effort to slow down the forward movement as much as possible. These forces have acquired influential allies and patrons at home and abroad. At the head of the group of reformist fighters were Speransky, Mordvinov, Saltykov, Czartorysky, Chichagov and other figures inspired by Bentham’s ideas. Representatives of the backward elements of Russian society were Baron Rosenkampf, Shishkov, Magnitsky, Arakcheev, Archimandrite Photius; they enjoyed the sympathy of the then all-powerful Austrian diplomat Metternich. Between the ideas of Bentham and the activities of Metternich - this Bismarck of the first half of the last century - lay a whole abyss. It is needless to add that victory was not on the side of the followers of the London hermit-philosopher.

While the “Law Drafting Commission” was headed by energetic and talented people, like Speransky, who was, according to his biographer Count M. Korf, “the first celebrity of the younger generation,” Bentham was confident in the successful outcome of the undertaken legislative reform. But soon there was a reaction; the position of the Russian reformer was shaken. The hostile party won, and the cherished cause fell into the hands of the worst enemies of this reform. The head of the Commission was the Baltic lawyer, Baron Rosenkampf, who had previously been an ardent admirer of Bentham, when it was in fashion, and then sharply recoiled from the English thinker. Bentham considered the baron to be completely mediocrity, an ordinary bureaucrat, capable of discoloring the most serious issue and reducing to zero any fruitful undertaking. The following fact, told by one of Bentham’s Geneva friends, Duvernoy, clearly depicts the baron’s frivolous attitude towards his difficult and responsible task. Hearing enthusiastic reviews all around about the English thinker whom Saltykov was reading, whom Mordvinov called his teacher, the baron asked Duvernoy to lend him Bentham’s works to read. He kept these works for exactly 24 hours and returned them to Duvernois with the words that he had managed to read everything and spent the whole night thinking about what he had read. Bentham’s antipathy towards Speransky’s successor was so strong that in a letter to the Emperor he spoke rather harshly about this “radically incapable man,” assuring that he would rather agree to send his advice to the ruler of Morocco than to the Commission headed by Baron Rosenkampf.

The combination of all these reasons had an unfavorable effect on the activities of the Commission. Instead of real work that required knowledge, energy and a passionate attitude, the usual clerical rigmarole followed. Bentham sadly saw that he faced an impossible struggle with the all-powerful bureaucracy, which was hostile to him, considered him a dreamer, a restless person invading someone else's monastery with his rules. Arakcheev's party went ahead, seizing all branches of government into its hands. Most of the responsible positions were occupied by complete nonentities. The hope of becoming a Russian codifier in the way Bentham understood the tasks of codification was growing dim. He, who unselfishly offered his services to the government, out of love for the cause, was hampered by mediocrity, little interested in the fate of Russian codification, but far from indifferent to ranks and awards. Having lived for two years on Potemkin's estates, he had a much greater understanding of Russian regional life than many of the officials who never left the capital. Its only drawback was its foreign origin.

“It’s true,” he wrote to the Tsar in May 1814, “I am a stranger to Russia. But I am no more alien to her than any Courlander, Livonian or Finnish. To compare with Russian natives, I need different information just as much as they do. I would use them as readily as their message is desired.”

With the fall of Speransky, the last hope for the satisfactory completion of the task assigned to it by the Commission collapsed. A different order of things emerged, which Bentham called “the drama of weakness and insincerity.” Before irrevocably abandoning the fulfillment of his long-cherished hopes, Bentham decided to write his desiderata to the Sovereign in May 1814 - to give Russia its own code, and not a copy from foreign codes of laws. It will take only a few months to finalize the criminal code, the distinctive advantages of which will be “public accessibility, accuracy, uniformity and simplicity.” “As for reward, the honor of being chosen for such labor,” Bentham ends his letter, “and the pleasure inseparable from this honor, constitutes the only reward necessary in my situation - the only one that my way of thinking would allow me to accept.”

Almost a year later, Bentham received a handwritten response from Emperor Alexander I. This response, written in French in Vienna on April 10 (22), 1815, read as follows:

“I read with great interest, My Sovereign, the letter you wrote to me and your proposals contained in it to contribute with your knowledge to legislative works aimed at delivering a new code to my subjects. This matter is too close to my heart, and I attach such high importance to it that I cannot help but want to take advantage of your knowledge and experience in carrying it out. I will instruct the Commission entrusted with the execution of this matter to resort to your assistance and contact you with questions. Meanwhile, please accept my sincere gratitude and the enclosed gift, as a sign of the special respect that I have for you. Alexander".

The gift the emperor mentions was a precious ring enclosed in a sealed package. True to his principles of not accepting any reward for his labors, Bentham returned the package unopened. He outlined the reason for this refusal in detail in his letter to Prince Adam Czartoryski, who accompanied the Emperor on trips abroad.

In June 1815, Bentham sent the Emperor an extremely extensive letter. It was a whole memorandum, very detailed, in which he frankly expressed his thoughts regarding the fate of codification in Russia. Fruitful results can only be expected from a public discussion of legislative issues, as is customary in his homeland. Nothing good will come of the behind-the-scenes clerical work that the Commission is doomed to do. This, in essence, is the brief meaning of the long letter, which begins with an explanation of the reasons for the return of the package with the precious ring. He is quite happy, having acquired the good opinion of the Sovereign, “monetary value, like money itself, in the present case has absolutely no meaning.”

This was Bentham's last letter to the Emperor. The time was extremely inconvenient for carrying out legislative reforms. All attention was absorbed by concerns about ensuring universal peace after the ruinous Napoleonic wars. This was the era of the formation of the Holy Alliance, when there was a sharp turn in the way of thinking of Alexander I himself, who completely fell under the influence of the ideas of Metternich, which had nothing in common with the ideas of the English thinker. Bentham, who was concerned to free his royal correspondent from “the blindfold and the bandage on the shoulders” - as he put it in a letter to Prince Adam - was not mistaken that his letter could not please: “Whether he forgives me or not - That's not the question. I only need him to allow himself to be freed from the bandage and aids.”

The events that followed the formation of the Holy Alliance convinced Bentham that he had nothing to do in our country. He broke off all relations with Russian government officials, with the exception of Mordvinov and Speransky, with whom he corresponded until 1830.

Chapter VI

Old age. - Dying will. - The death of Bentham. – Utilitarianism. – Bentham’s accusation of preaching selfishness. – Opinion of D.-S. Mill on the meaning of Bentham. - Conclusion

The extreme old age that Bentham reached did not weaken his mental power, did not cool the ardent sympathy with which his loving heart was filled for all the suffering and oppressed. In the last years of his life, Bentham advocated just as ardently for the triumph of his ideas as in the best times of his youth. This old man, white with gray hair, remained “a youth all his life,” as his famous student Mill puts it, who had a feeling of reverent respect for his teacher. He lived and died a philosopher.

“Pureness of heart and meekness in the gaze, clarity in the brow, calmness in speech, composure in movements, equanimity combined with subtle sensitivity” - such was the portrait of the great thinker-philanthropist, drawn by one of his admirers. He continued to work for the common good until the last opportunity, despite his advanced age. Only a few days before his death, the pen fell from the exhausted hands of the tireless fighter.

The dying will of the 84-year-old man was in complete harmony with his entire working life, dedicated to public benefit. He demanded that his body be transferred to the anatomical theater, wanting to be useful to his “fellow citizens even after death.” On June 6, 1832, Jeremy Bentham died, his will was fulfilled. The corpse was given to Dr. Southwood to be dissected and to be lectured on to medical students and the public. It is not in Westminster Abbey, that tomb of illustrious citizens who glorified Great Britain in all fields of public activity, that the mortal remains of one of England's noblest sons rest. Bentham's dissected skeleton is kept in the Anatomical Theater of the University of London.

The size of this essay does not allow us to dwell in detail on the analysis of the numerous works left by the tireless thinker. A simple list of everything Bentham wrote during his long life proves that there was not a single issue in the field of law, morality, or political economy that did not interest a deep thinker, responsive to every good initiative. All his activities were aimed exclusively at the benefit of humanity, in the purest and noblest meaning of the word. The motto of his life was the desire to increase the amount of pleasure and reduce the amount of suffering of his neighbor. Bentham's working life ends with this humane aspiration; this is the essence of his literary and social activity, the philosophical direction of utilitarianism, of which he was the founder. In treatises devoted to the development of legislative and philosophical issues, one desire is visible - to arrange human society in such a way that people's suffering is reduced to a minimum, and the sum of their pleasures is brought to a maximum.

He was reproached, among other things, for preaching selfishness, which leads to the theory of utilitarianism, which found ardent admirers among the extreme parties of France and America. Shortly before his death, Bentham explained what his selfishness was, warmed by true love for his neighbors. “Yes, I am an egoist,” he wrote, “but my egoism is full of benevolence. There is no person on earth who sympathizes with someone else’s grief as much as I do, or rejoices so much in someone else’s happiness, unless, of course, this happiness is based on the detriment of others.”

The fate of his works is remarkable. Not everything he wrote was published. His manuscripts are stored in 80 boxes, awaiting the new Dumont, unknown to the reading public. But what he printed undoubtedly had a utilitarian purpose; he shed bright light on many issues of law, philosophy and government. During his lifetime, many considered Bentham a utopian; many respectable people treated his conclusions as paradoxes. After death, many of these paradoxes received the force of the current law and became the property of public legal consciousness. John Stuart Mill says that Bentham was more a great reformer in philosophical matters than a great philosopher. He did for politics and morality what Bacon did for the natural sciences. According to the famous English lawyer, Sir James Stevens, Bentham had the same influence on legislation as Adam Smith had on political economy.

For a long time he fought against archaic abuses that had taken deep roots in English legislation and in British public life. The fight was stubborn and cruel; Bentham's ideas were poorly accepted in his homeland. Foreign states showed more sensitivity to the voice of the great old man, who called on all peoples to update their state structure and to a more equitable settlement of social relations. Even many American states organized their legal relations under the influence of Bentham's teachings. In the end, he prevailed over his stubborn fellow countrymen. His voice was heard in the most fossilized spheres of the ruling classes in the homeland of Shakespeare and Byron. England began reforms, the need for which was indicated by Bentham.

“As a young man,” says Mill, “he began this struggle and only at the end of his days was he heard. Posterity will find it difficult to believe the power of prejudices that protected English legislation from any attempts by the spirit of inquiry. The honor of victory belongs entirely to Bentham. He owes this victory only to his remarkable talents, amazing perseverance, fortitude, practical sense, his method and habit of synthesis. He was not primarily a destroyer; on the contrary, he created from the ruins of what was destroyed. He taught how to replace outdated institutions with new ones that meet the urgent needs of the country. Before him, the philosophy of law was chaos, he made it a science.”

More than sixty years have passed since the death of Jeremy Bentham. Descendants not only have not forgotten the services they rendered to science and humanity, but, on the contrary, are trying to make amends for the injustice of the philosopher’s contemporaries, who did not fully assimilate his lofty aspirations aimed at improving the lot of disadvantaged people. Most of his projects, which seemed to his frightened contemporaries to be an unattainable utopia, little by little penetrate into life and are being made integral part current legislation. Of course, many of his thoughts still remain in the realm of good wishes, but the time will come when they will be paid attention to. Even such projects that seemed completely unrealistic at the time of their appearance in print, such as his dream of eternal peace, have now lost a significant share of their fantastic nature, bordering on pure utopia. Voices are being heard louder and louder, indicating the need to put a limit to the alarming growth of the armed forces, a growth that threatens in the near future to turn all of Europe into one continuous armed camp. The idea of ​​general disarmament as the only way out of the abnormal economic situation, ruinous for the entire civilized world, is penetrating deeper and deeper into public consciousness. The further development of this idea is not far from the establishment of such an international court, the existence of which would make an armed conflict extremely difficult.

Bentham devoted all the power of his mind to one idea that illuminated his life. This idea consisted of serving humanity as much as possible, in the name of its “benefit” and “happiness.” He saw the benefit and happiness of man, both individual and social, as an enviable destiny and the only task of the legislator. In the name of this dear, truly human idea, he fought all his life against all sorts of deviations from his ideal, against all kinds of evil and injustice. This desire permeates all of his works, devoted to the detailed development of various departments of law, process, state science and philosophy. And in this respect, it fully deserves the apt name given to it by Robert Mohl. He truly was “a great teacher in science and in life.”

The significance of Bentham “in science and in life” is far from exhausted by the extensive literature devoted to the great thinker. His multifaceted activities are increasingly being revealed - thanks to the latest research about him. The foremost scholars of the West place him on a par with the greatest figures who constitute the pride and beauty of European culture. In the consonant chorus of writers who give Bentham his due according to his merits, there is, however, one dissonance of an extremely unpleasant nature. Former professor at Moscow University B. N. Chicherin, in his “History of Political Doctrines,” dedicated a lengthy article to Bentham and his teaching. In expounding this doctrine, the venerable scientist, to the considerable astonishment of the reader, calls Bentham “an extremely limited mind,” a limited man, almost stupid. This is obviously a lapsus lingae or typographical error. Otherwise, it is impossible to explain to yourself how you can devote an extensive article of more than 60 pages to a person with an “extremely limited mind”, how can such a feeble-minded person be placed next to Machiavelli, Locke, Kant and other luminaries of Western European science! Limited people they are usually left alone, they are not refuted, they are not objected to - they are simply ignored.

In the modern history of England there are many famous names of people who dedicated their talents to serving all of humanity and did not limit their beneficial activities to the borders of their native country. These people rendered great services in various fields of public activity, or rather, public benefit, in the field of exact sciences and abstract thinking, poetic creativity, oratory, literature and journalism. Their names are known to everyone - it is unnecessary to name them. Jeremy Bentham is one of these names. There is hardly a single cultured people in both hemispheres who would not take advantage of the disinterested services of the famous codifier in drawing up a code of laws or a new political organization for their country. And this glorious name will not be forgotten in people's memory. All who value the interests of truth and justice will remember with deep respect the merits of the unforgettable Jeremy Bentham.

Sources

1. The Encyclopedia Britannica. Vol. 5, page 655. Eighth Edition.

2. Dr John Bowriug. The Works of Jeremy Bentham. Edinburgh, 1843, 11 volumes.

3. E. Dumont. Oeuvres de J. Bentham. Bruxelles, 1829-34, 1840, 6 volumes.

4. P. Larousse. La grande Encyclopedie, vol. 6, page 217.

5. Robert von Mhol. Die Geschichte und Literatur der Staatswissenschaften. Erlangen, XVIII, Th. 3, s. 595–635 (“Jeremias Bentham und seine Bedeutung für die Staatswissenschaften”).

6. S. Raffalowich. Bentham. Principles de législation et d'économie politique. Paris, 1887.

7. V. S. Ikonnikov. Count N. S. Mordvinov. St. Petersburg, 1873.

8. A. N. Pypin. Bentham's Russian relations. – “Bulletin of Europe”, 1868, Nos. 2 and 4.

9. B. N. Chicherin. History of political doctrines. Moscow, 1874. Part 3, p. 256–321.

Notes

1

In his Reader, Bentham characterizes parental ambition, which failed to be realized, in the following way: “The ambition of an apothecary,” he says, “is to see his son become a renowned physician, of an attorney, that his son should be Lord Chancellor, of a country priest, to have a son as an archbishop.”

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2

"hurray-patriotism" (French)

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3

Subsequently Lord Landsdowne.

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4

Romilly was one of London's best lawyers.

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5

This is the title under which Bentham appeared in this translation, which took place according to the Highest command: “Discourse on civil and criminal legislation. With a preliminary presentation of the principles of the law and the general outline of the complete Book of Laws and with the addition of experience about the influence of time and place regarding laws. Op. English legal adviser Jeremy Bentham. Published in French by Stepan Dumont, based on manuscripts delivered to him by the author. Translated by Mikhail Mikhailov, with the addition of additions reported by Mr. Dumont.”

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Preface

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Sources

BENTHAM, JEREMIAH(Bentham, Jeremy) (1748–1832), outstanding English philosopher, economist and legal theorist, founder of utilitarianism. Born in London on February 15, 1748. He studied at Westminster School, Queens College, Oxford University, and then entered Lincoln's Inn Law School. Soon, however, he became disillusioned with jurisprudence and decided to devote his life to the study of social, legal and political system and correcting its shortcomings and abuses. Having set the task of reforming society, Bentham was faced with the need to systematize and substantiate his ideas. Thus, his philosophy was not the fruit of abstract thoughts, but was based on the needs of practical life. Bentham owed some ideas to D. Hume and Helvetius, and he learned some from Priestley, W. Paley and C. Beccaria. If Bentham's works are similar to the writings of D. Hartley, then this can only be explained by coincidence. Bentham's views were called utilitarianism, although he himself preferred to talk not about utilitarianism, but about the “principle of greatest happiness.”

Bentham's utilitarianism, formulated, in particular, in his famous work Introduction to Morals and Law (An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, 1789), was based on ethical hedonism, the doctrine that good is happiness and the goal of ethical behavior is to achieve the greatest possible happiness for the greatest number of people. To properly understand this statement, it should be borne in mind that for Bentham, pleasure and happiness were synonymous and had the widest possible meaning - including intellectual, social, moral and altruistic pleasures, as well as less significant physical pleasures. "Pleasure" is anything that has value to a person, regardless of its nature or the person's reasons for considering something to be valuable. Despite the practical difficulties encountered in calculating the quantity of a good, Bentham was convinced that a good can be measured by intensity, duration, and other parameters. Theoretically, it is possible to construct a calculus that can determine what kind of action is best under certain circumstances (the so-called “calculus of happiness”). And then the purpose of the legislation becomes clear: to increase the amount of happiness of all people and in all possible directions. Punishment and the suffering and evil that accompany it should be used only in those cases where it prevents the emergence of even greater evil. Following these principles, Bentham and his followers initiated health care and insurance systems, poverty laws, prison reform, the use of punishment to prevent crime and rehabilitate criminals, and the spread of democracy and self-government to all spheres of public life. Bentham did not limit himself to discussing domestic problems and argued for the need for international law, the creation of the League of Nations and the abolition of the colonial system.

BENTHAM(Bentham) Jeremiah (February 15, 1748, London - June 6, 1832, ibid.) - English philosopher, jurist and reformer, one of the founders utilitarianism . Bentham's ideas influenced the nature of political reforms in Great Britain in the 1st half. 19th century, as well as on the theoretical views of many British thinkers (James Mill, J.S. Mill, D. Austin, D. Groth, etc.) and politicians. Born into the family of a hereditary lawyer. In early childhood he studied classical languages. He studied at Westminster School and in 1760 entered King's College, Oxford University. After graduating in 1764, he studied law at the London Barristers' School (Lincoln's Inn). Having qualified as a lawyer, he soon abandoned practical work, discovering his inability to compromise. Later he dealt with issues related to legal reform.

According to Bentham, the greatest influence on him was S.L. Montesquieu, C. Beccaria and especially C.A. Helvetius. In 1776 he published the book “A Fragment on Government,” dedicated to criticism of the views of the lawyer W. Blackstone, which, according to Bentham, were distinguished by excessive adherence to tradition and “antipathy to reform.” The work attracted the attention of the liberal statesman Lord Shelburne; Beginning in 1781, Bentham visited his house, where he met liberal politicians and lawyers. In the 1780s. worked on the essay “The Theory of Punishments and Rewards,” published in French (Theorie des peines et des recompenses, v. 1–2, 1811; English ed. The Rationale of Reward, 1825; The Rationale of Punishment, 1830). In 1785, through Italy and Constantinople, he went to Russia to visit his brother Samuel, who served as an engineer in the Russian army. For almost 2 years he lived near Krichev near Mogilev, wrote here the work “Defense of Usury” (Defense of Usury, 1787), proving that laws limiting the amount of interest on money lent are unjustified both from an economic and legal point of view; According to Bentham, every reasonable adult person has the right to borrow money on the terms he considers acceptable, and every person has the right to lend him money on those terms. In subsequent works devoted to political economy, he defended the principle of non-interference by the state in the economic activities of citizens. While in Russia, he created a plan for a “panoptic” prison, hoping that Catherine II would be interested in it. The project was published (“Panopticon, or the Inspection House”, 1791). Bentham wanted to give the prison an architectural form that would allow each prisoner to be observed at any time from a central tower located in front of the circular prison building; in this case, the latter should be built according to the “cell” principle, and the observer should remain invisible. The need and nature of the reform of correctional institutions, characterized by inhumane treatment of prisoners and poor general “economy”, Bentham substantiates in a number of works - “A View of the Hard Labor Bill”, “Panopticon versus New South” Wales" ("Panopticon, or New South Wales"), "Principles of penal Law" ("Fundamentals of criminal law"), etc. In 1788, Bentham returned to England and soon began building a model prison in London; the construction was not accepted by the parliamentary commission, and the project ended in failure. During the French Revolution, he addressed the French Legislative Assembly with proposals for the best device parliamentary activities. Related projects and thoughts were expressed in the treatise “Essay on Political Tactics” (1791). In “The Book of Fallacies” (1824), he summarized the arguments of conservatives against any reform, proving their inconsistency, incl. moral. In 1792, for his services to France, Bentham was granted citizenship of the French Republic. In the 1790s. developed projects to improve the situation of the poor: “Situation and Relief of the Poor”, “Poor Laws and Pauper Management”, which were used in the development of the law on poverty (1834). Bentham's views also influenced the nature of the first parliamentary reform of 1832 and some laws (in particular, on secret voting). In 1802, The Theory of Legislation was published, for the first time in French. In 1809 he wrote the treatise “A Catechism of Parliamentary Reform” (published 1817), where he defended the need for annual elections, equal constituencies, broad suffrage and secret ballot; proposed to parliament a number of resolutions, which were drawn up on the basis of the Catechism and discussed in the House of Commons (1818). In the 1820s. Bentham participated in the publication of parliamentary debates, distributing them by topic and accompanying them with comments indicating the mistakes of the speakers. In 1823 he participated in the founding of the Westminster Review magazine, which became an influential organ of “philosophical radicals”; on its pages he subsequently discussed the need for parliamentary reform, equal rights for Catholics and Jews, advocated a reduction in government spending and on various economic issues. Repeatedly addressed heads of state with a proposal to codify laws. Bentham did not care about publishing his works, and many of them were published thanks to the editorial efforts of his admirers and students (E. Dumont, J.S. Mill, etc.).

PRINCIPLES OF UTILITARIANISM. Bentham's goal was legal reform, which, in his opinion, implied moral reform. In An Introduction to the Principles of Moral and Legislation, 1789 and Deontology or The Science of Morality, v. 1–2, published posthumously in 1834) Bentham sought to free the attitude to legislation from the extremes of apathy and declarations of rights and to place it on a solid basis of empirically established moral principles, based on which the theory of law should extend to special sections of legislation. Rejecting the idea of ​​“ready-made” abstract principles of morality (and legislation), Bentham tried to build a comprehensive theory of human actions based on indisputable data of experience with the help of empirical and analytical method, demanded the responsible use of terms.

The main subject of legislation, which is designed to regulate human society, is the public good, or the common benefit. Bentham viewed society as a collection of individual people, considered the “social body” to be a fiction and focused on the benefit of individuals. People as such exist only in society, but primarily pursue their own private interests. When organizing society, the legislator must proceed from the principle of the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people. Determining what is good for an individual required a definition of human nature. According to Bentham, the main motives of man are pleasure and pain. They determine all his judgments, decisions and actions. It is human nature to strive for pleasure and avoid pain. The principle of benefit takes both of these motives into account. The concept of benefit expresses the property or ability of an object to protect from evil or provide good. Evil is suffering or the cause of suffering; good - pleasure or cause of pleasure. There is no other criterion for distinguishing between good and evil except the principle of benefit. Moral good is such because of its ability to produce physical good, moral evil is such because it produces physical evil. Bentham starts from the actual organization of man and implies pain and pleasure not only of the body, but also of the soul. He sees four sources of pleasure and pain: physical, political, moral and religious. Bentham uses the words “fair”, “unjust”, “moral”, “immoral”, etc. as collective expressions that contain the ideas of suffering and pleasure. Bentham recognized psychological, ontological and moral individualism as part of human nature. Each individual is driven by selfish interest, which prevails over public interest. But reason forces the individual to understand the dependence of his own well-being on the well-being of society. On the one hand, a person is driven by selfish interest, on the other hand, society is necessary for every individual, and therefore the interests of individuals are the same. A reasonable assessment of one's own interests should force the individual to identify them with the interests of society. When deciding to commit an action, an individual must proceed from the calculation of “the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.” Since the mechanism of psychological association associates certain pleasures and pains with certain things, the pleasures and pains experienced by an individual can be measured in terms of their strength, duration, certainty (or uncertainty), proximity (or distance) of the source (pleasure or pain) ) taking into account their fruitfulness (in the sense of the generation of subsequent pleasures by pleasure, and subsequent suffering by suffering), purity (the generation of feelings similar to themselves by them) and breadth (the number of people captured by them). Summing up the aforementioned distinctive characteristics, comparing the results on the side of good and evil, counting the number of people whose interests are affected, calculating the above-mentioned amounts for each of them will allow, according to Bentham, to judge the value of each specific action. Bentham warns that such a process of counting cannot precede every moral judgment, every legislative or judicial action, but it must always be kept in mind.

Bentham considers the advantages of the principle of utility to be based on human nature, universality, clarity, the objectivity of judgment it provides and the ability to make decisions in complex situations, as well as its affirmation of the equality of people (since it assumes their equivalence in the process of calculation).

POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY. Bentham's political radicalism is associated with his understanding of his role in updating the legal system, which must be brought into line with new capitalist institutions. In political philosophy, Bentham proceeds from the fact that people as such have always lived in society and there was no “pre-social” state. Bentham considers concepts important for previous political philosophy to be unfounded, incl. “natural law”, “state of nature”, “social contract”. He also denies the “naturalness” of freedom in the sense of its presence in people before the social state. Bentham understands human freedom as the absence of external coercion. Bentham explains the significance of the problem of freedom, on the one hand, by the presence of a difference between the public and private life of a person, and on the other hand, by the value of freedom from the perspective. the pleasure it brings. However, the law limiting it is necessary and justified because it ensures order and good governance, and thereby meets the personal interests of citizens. The concept of “natural rights” as allegedly inherent in people even before their social state is criticized in the most detail in the work “Anarchical Fallacies” (Anarchical Fallacies, 1791–95, published in 1816 in French). According to Bentham, law is created by law, and law, since Bentham understands it as an expression of the will of the ruler, already presupposes rule and community life. Bentham believes that the concept of “natural law” is ambiguous (for it means law in general and thereby abolishes law), figurative (since no rights precede government, and from this point of view, in particular, the theory of social contract, which assumes that individuals have rights that are alienated during its conclusion, is devoid of historical foundations and is harmful; after all, government is established either as a result of historically developed circumstances, or through the use of force) and entails anarchic consequences (since it presupposes freedom from coercion, in particular from legal coercion: after all, natural law would precede establishing the law). According to Bentham, rights can only be specific; they must exist if they are useful to society, and abolished if they are useless. Bentham also rejects other abstract concepts (“attitude”, “power”, “property”, “natural justice”, “moral sense”, “true reason”, etc.). Bentham believes that the forms of analysis of moral and legal problems corresponding to such concepts represent hidden dogmatism, since they do not give them reasonable meaning, but simply replace them with necessary reasoning and argumentation.

Bentham emphasized his commitment to reason and rationality, neglecting the role of feelings in human life. He attached great importance to the upbringing and education of the people, which he considered important as a means of improving the minds and thoughts of people, capable of directing their selfish feelings in the right direction. In 1816, Bentham's Chrestomathia, dedicated to education, was published.

Essays:

1. The Works of Jeremy Bentham, ed. J. Bowring, v. 1 – 11. L., 1838–43; reprint.: N.Y., 1962;

2. The correspondence of Jeremy Bentham, v. 1–10. L., 1968–84;

3. The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham, gen. ed. J. H. Burns. L., 1968;

4. in Russian Translation: Should interest be punished by law? A popular exposition of the doctrine of Bentham and Turgot about interest. St. Petersburg, 1865;

5. Favorite op. Jeremy Bentham, vol. 1. Introduction to the foundations of morality and legislation. Basic principles of the civil code. Basic principles of the criminal code, trans. A.N. Pypin and A.N. Nevedomsky, preface. Yu.G. Zhukovsky. St. Petersburg, 1867;

6. About judicial evidence. Treatise of Jeremy Bentham, edited by Dumont, trans. from French I. Goronovich. K., 1876;

7. Principles of legislation. – In the book: On the influence of conditions of time and place on legislation. Guide to Political Economy, trans. M.O.Gershenzon. M., 1896.

Literature:

1. Pokrovsky P. Bentham and his time. Pg., 1916;

2. Zhukovsky Yu.G. History of political literature of the 19th century, vol. 1. St. Petersburg, 1871;

3. Halevy E. La formation du radicalisme philosophique, ν. 1–3. P., 1901–04;

4. Harrison R. Bentham. L., 1983;

5. Stephen L. The English Utilitarians, v. 1–3. L., 1900, 1968.

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Jeremy Bentham (Jeremiah Bentham) was born in London on February 15 1748 of the year. He studied at Westminster School, Queens College, Oxford University, and then entered Lincoln's Inn Law School. Soon, he became disillusioned with jurisprudence and decided to devote his life to studying the social, legal and political system and correcting its shortcomings and abuses. Having set the task of reforming society, Bentham was faced with the need to systematize and substantiate his ideas. Thus, his philosophy was not the fruit of abstract thoughts, but was based on the needs of practical life. Bentham owed some ideas to D. Hume and Helvetius, and he learned some from Priestley, W. Paley and C. Beccaria. If Bentham's works are similar to the writings of D. Hartley, then this can only be explained by coincidence. Bentham's views were called utilitarianism, although he himself preferred to talk not about utilitarianism, but about the “principle of greatest happiness.”

Bentham's utilitarianism, formulated in particular in his famous work An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, 1789 ), was based on ethical hedonism, the doctrine that good is happiness and the goal of ethical behavior is to achieve the greatest possible happiness for the greatest number of people. To properly understand this statement, it must be borne in mind that for Bentham, pleasure and happiness were synonymous and had the widest possible meaning - including intellectual, social, moral and altruistic pleasures, as well as less significant physical pleasures. "Pleasure" is anything that is of value to a person, regardless of its nature or the person's reasons for considering something to be of value. Despite the practical difficulties encountered in calculating the quantity of a good, Bentham was convinced that a good can be measured by intensity, duration, and other parameters. Theoretically, it is possible to construct a calculus that can determine what kind of action is best under certain circumstances (the so-called “calculus of happiness”). And then the purpose of the legislation becomes clear: to increase the amount of happiness of all people and in all possible directions. Punishment and the suffering and evil that accompany it should be used only in those cases where it prevents the emergence of even greater evil. Following these principles, Bentham and his followers initiated health care and insurance systems, poverty laws, prison reform, the use of punishment to prevent crime and rehabilitate criminals, and the spread of democracy and self-government to all spheres of public life. Bentham did not limit himself to discussing domestic problems and argued for the need for international law, the creation of the League of Nations and the abolition of the colonial system.

Along with ethical hedonism, Bentham developed the concept of psychological hedonism, according to which each person actually strives for what gives him the greatest happiness. The apparent contradiction between these two teachings was eliminated by postulating seven or more “sanctions” - the reasons why an individual acts, focusing (consciously or unconsciously) on the common good. Law is needed to manipulate these sanctions through rewards and punishments. For the system to work effectively, the laws must be known and understood by society.

Bentham directed his main efforts to creating codes, sets of laws - simple, consistent and easy to understand. The codes he wrote were (in whole or in part) used in the legislation of France, Germany, Greece, Spain, Portugal, India, Australia, Canada, other countries in Europe and South America, as well as several American states. The philosopher's ideas were extremely popular in his time. Bentham understood that for democracy to be effective and for individual efforts to produce results in personal and public life, education and information must be widely disseminated. Bentham was one of the founders of the Westminster Review magazine. He took part in the establishment of the University of London and the improvement of the system school education. Bentham also did a lot to introduce the civil service system, government decision-making procedures, improve judicial proceedings, and also took part in the establishment of the police institute and other important social reforms. His liberal views were reflected in what he wrote in 1809 work A Catechism of Parliamentary Reform, published in 1817 ).

Bentham's contemporaries were, like himself, practical men, and, despite all the influence they had, their writings lost their significance after the reforms they advocated were put into practice. By the time of Bentham's death in London on 6 June 1832 many of them had already died or retired from old age, and Benthamism was taken up by a group of young people who belonged mainly to the world of literature and science. The most famous of them was J.S. Mill. The ideas of utilitarianism were also developed by A. Ben, G. Sidgwick, G. Spencer and L. Stephen.

Among Bentham's works, we note the treatise written in Russia, Defense of Usury, 1787 ), as well as the following works: Deontology, or The Science of Morality, v. 1-2, 1834 ); Theory of punishments and rewards (Theorie des peines et des recompenses, 1811 ).

Jeremy Bentham(1748-1832) - English lawyer and philosopher, political thinker, ideologist of the liberal political movement, one of the founders of the theory of utilitarianism. Born in London, into the family of a large landowner. Early mental development allowed him to enter Oxford University at the age of 13 and graduate at the age when he first entered it. At the age of 20 he already becomes a lawyer. In 1784-1787 visits France, Italy, Turkey, Russia, Prussia, Holland.

In 1789, his first major philosophical and political work, “Introduction to the Fundamentals of Morality and Legislation,” was published. In 1802, a significant collection of Bentham's works was published in the French edition of the famous publisher Dumont. The publication for the first time introduced the Western European and educated part of Russian society to the ideas of the English publicist. Repeated visits to Russia aroused in him strong hopes for the implementation of his ideas on Russian soil. In 1815, Bentham wrote a letter to Alexander I with a proposal to use his knowledge in drawing up a new code of laws for Russia and received the consent of the monarch. However, his plans were not destined to come true. A turn in the domestic policy of the Russian emperor changed his legislative plans. The project of M. Speransky was adopted.

In his Introduction to Morals and Legislation, while developing practical issues of law and ethics, Bentham put forward the doctrine of morality based on the principles of utility. According to the author, “nature has subordinated humanity to two supreme rulers - pain and pleasure... they govern us in everything... the principle of utility recognizes this subordination and accepts it as the basis of a system, the purpose of which is to erect a building by the hands of reason and law.” Hence, he concludes

Bentham, self-interest is the only spring of human activity.

Criticizing abstract principles, “anarchist sophisms”, rights proclaimed by the French Revolution, which in practice can only give rise to chaos, Bentham rejected the idea of ​​a social contract, the natural law theory of popular sovereignty, the principle of separation of powers, emphasizing the importance of sovereign supreme power (without certain boundaries), guided the beginning of benefit. He attacked the sophisms of the Conservative Party, the optimistic conservatism of Blackstone, and his famous “Commentaries on the Laws of England,” in which the reforming role of the legislature was belittled, and the existing English law was presented as the highest manifestation of reason.

The true goal of legislation and legislators is achievement in society "the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people" the achievement of personal success by everyone, increasing the total amount of happiness of atomized individuals. Bentham identified happiness with pleasure. Hence, the criterion of morality is “the achievement of benefit, benefit, pleasure, goodness and happiness.”

The art of legislators must be to find a means to achieve this. Such an important means can be public policy aimed at caring for the well-being of people, their favorable spiritual development, and the preservation of security, equality and freedom. He revealed these directions of state policy in the “Principles of Legislation” and “Fundamental Principles of the Civil Code.” Guided by these principles and the civil code, Bentham and his followers initiated the creation of health care and insurance, poverty laws, prison reform, the use of punishment to prevent crime, and the rehabilitation of criminals.

Unlike those who confused public and personal benefits, public and personal interests, moral feelings and selfish aspirations, he views the interests of atomized individuals as the only real ones, and public interests as a set of individual ones. This peculiar Bentan ipsidixionism (ipse dixit, lat. - letters,“I said it myself,” is used as a statement: “It’s so because I said it myself”) has become a kind of formula for expressing the interests of the individual as the only real ones.

Reflecting on the true boundaries of morality and legislation, Bentham divides morality into public and individual

(private). Since in society, in his opinion, there are no natural laws, but only laws adopted by the sovereign power, individuals are required to have a correct awareness of their behavior in society, awareness of their own and others’ interests.

An important subject of analysis in these works by Bentham is the activities of the state, state authorities, the main directions of state policy (ensuring security, guaranteeing individual freedom, protecting it from oppression by officials). According to Bentham, the state should act as an “active balancing force”, a regulator of the measure of social difference. The main thing is not to allow these social differences and injustices to undermine social unity.

Bentham became one of the pioneers who paved the way for profound reforms in England in the second quarter of the 19th century. In his opinion, only in a democratic state can one count on the successful progress of reform; in other conditions, any reform will do more harm than there will be good from what it should correct. According to the doctrine of state non-interference put forward by him, reforms should not concern the private (especially economic) sphere and freedom of self-determination, personal freedom and private activities of citizens. This meant the development of a program of liberal democracy based on the principles of expanding suffrage - “universal, secret, equal and annual voting.” The highest philosophical thesis of this program was “the greatest happiness of the greatest number”, and the highest political principle was the concept of popular sovereignty.

Bentham's teaching on the study of the boundaries of legislation, its shortcomings and ways to eliminate them influenced representatives of the liberal democratic trend.

• Bentham I. Introduction to the basis of morality and legislation // Anthology of world philosophy: In 4 volumes. M., 1971. T. 3. P. 587.