Note (return) — Chapter IV

Bentham's standard of 'pleasure and pain' constituted in many ways an important advance upon 'natural right.' It was in the first place founded upon a universally accepted fact; all men obviously do feel both pleasure and pain. That fact was to a certain extent measurable. One could, for instance, count the number of persons who suffered this year from an Indian famine, and compare it with the number of those who suffered last year. It was clear also that some pains and pleasures were more intense than others, and that therefore the same man could in a given number of seconds experience varying amounts of pleasure or pain. Above all, the standard of pleasure and pain was one external to the political thinker himself. John Stuart Mill quotes Bentham as saying of all philosophies which competed with his Utilitarianism: 'They consist, all of them, in so many contrivances for avoiding the obligation of appealing to any external standard, and for prevailing upon the reader to accept the author's sentiment or opinion as a reason for itself.'[29]