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Subject Area: Law

George Wilson to Bentham. - Jeremy Bentham, The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 10 (Memoirs Part I and Correspondence) [1843]

Edition used:

The Works of Jeremy Bentham, published under the Superintendence of his Executor, John Bowring (Edinburgh: William Tait, 1838-1843). 11 vols. Vol. 10.

Part of: The Works of Jeremy Bentham, 11 vols.

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George Wilson to Bentham.

“I could give very good reasons for not having sooner answered your letter from Crichoff of 29th May, or 9th June; but it would take some time to state them. As to our silence before that, you will recollect that we had reason to suppose that you desired to hear from neither of us, and that it was, in a manner, settled, before you set out, that we were not to correspond, because you found yourself involved in too many engagements of that sort already. Your letter from Leghorn we did not consider as any departure from this plan; but only as an infliction of your revenge on Trail, for his and his cousin’s calumnies against the Grand Duke. I say this by way of justification, and by no means with any spleen; for, I do assure you, I have felt great yearnings towards you since you left this country, and vehement longings for your return. If I had the advantage of a title, I should, no doubt, have found it easy, as Lord L. has done, to see your letters to Q. S. P. on my own terms. Trail received, on going to town last Friday, a scrap of paper from you, desiring an account of the new taxes; and before he returns, will do what he can to supply you. I am not sure that any supplement to Burn will come down low enough; but you will at least have a little table of taxes, published by Kearsley. Trail had before sent you by Mr King, The Debate on the Sinking Fund, and Report of the Committee, Baring’s Principle of the Commutation Act, Plan for settling the Black Poor near Sierra Leone, by Smeathman, who is since dead, and, I suppose, the plan with him; Character of Lord Sackville, by Cumberland, Correspondence between Lord Macartney and General Stewart, Burke’s Charges, and Hastings’ Defence, and Maty’s Reviews, down to August, inclusive. Newspapers we cannot send you; because they go to Scotland, to my sister, who, by the by, is very well, and has a son nine months old. While you are making Fermes Ornées in a country which is not to be found in our maps, other people here are invading your province of a reformer. There is a Mr Paley, a parson and archdeacon of Carlisle, who has written a book called Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy, in quarto, and it has gone through two editions, with prodigious applause. It is founded entirely on utility, or, as he chooses to call it, the will of God, as declared by expediency, to which he adds, as a supplement, the revealed will of God. But notwithstanding this, and some weak places, particularly as to oaths and subscriptions, where he is hampered by his profession and his past conduct, it is a capital book, and by much the best that has been written on the subject in this country. Almost everything he says about morals, government, and our own constitution, is sound, practical, and free from commonplace. He has got many of your notions about punishment, which I always thought the most important of your discoveries; and I could almost suspect, if it were possible, that he had read your introduction;* and I very much fear, that, if you ever do publish on these subjects, you may be charged with stealing from him what you have honestly invented with the sweat of your own brow. But, for all that, I wish you would come and try; for I am still persuaded, my dear Bentham, that you have, for some years, been throwing away your time; and that the way in which you are most likely to benefit the world and yourself is, by establishing, in the first place, a great literary reputation in your own language, and in this country, which you despise. But all this had been said often enough already, and it is needless to tire you with it any more. Paley’s book is written in a clear, manly, simple style, and he reasons with great accuracy. I meant to have copied and sent you an inquiry of his into the guilt of a drunken man who kills another, and the quantum of punishment that ought to be applied to him, which is as exhaustive and correct as if you had done it yourself, and, if I may say it without offence, less formal and prolix. But I have forgot it, and have not now the book by me. He has added, unnecessarily, a treatise on political economy, which he does not understand. You will see by the papers that there is a large subscription to erect a statue to your friend Howard, who is now making a tour of the Lazarettos for the plague in the Levant. Jonas Hanway, another of your fellow-labourers, but at some distance, is dead. Government are going at last to send the convicts to Botany Bay in New Holland; the Hulks being found, by sad experience, to be academies for housebreaking, and solitary confinement to any extent, impracticable from the expense of building. These colonists are not to be turned loose there; but are to have a government established over them, and some troops left; notwithstanding which, I much fear it will end in the ruin of the Friendly and Society Islands, which they will undoubtedly attempt to reach if they can either get or build ships; unless, indeed, the colony should expire, which is not unlikely, as, to 600 men there are but 70 women, and those probably not the most fertile. Will you have a few convicts for the Crimes? We have been reading here Cook’s last voyage, and are very desirous to know what is become of our good friend Major Behm, and whether our court ever interested itself to procure him any preferment. Tell us also, how far we may rely on De Tott’s account of the Turks. Eden went to Paris by no other revolution than that of his own principles, which came about more suddenly and with less pretext than any in this reign. He is to be a vice-treasurer of Ireland in the room of Lord Walsingham, who goes to Spain. It is universally believed that the French Commercial Treaty is settled; but the articles are not known: probably they will make some noise, as they cannot but touch some of our dearest prejudices. There is also an agreement about the mutual recovery of debts in France and England. It seems their courts have not been open to us, as ours are to them. Sir Gilbert Elliot is, I hope, by this time chosen for Berwick. The election was to be last Wednesday, and he was pretty safe. Douglas is well, and increasing in fame and wealth. Trail has left Ainge, and is now a complete and accomplished draughtsman, waiting for instructions. I am going on, or rather, standing still as before; for though I shall get rather more this year than the last, it is owing to accidents, and not to any regular or permanent business. There are great changes in the King’s Bench this year. Davenport is dead,—Tom Cowper dying,—Jack Lee paralytic, and John Wilson a judge by the death of Nares. By each of these events I get a step, as the soldier did when the general was killed. Bower is to have a silk gown;—so probably will Law, and Chambré, if he pleases. Erskine is at the head of the K.’s Bench decidedly, and Mingay almost before Bearcroft. Thurlow has been at death’s door, and is not well yet. Lord Mansfield still Chief-Justice, but unable to do the business. Thompson is Accomptant-general by the death of Anguish. All this you don’t care about; but I have no news but law news.”

Bentham announced the sending “Panopticon”—his great plan for a national penitentiary—to George Wilson in this letter, which answers that which precedes:—

[* ] See farther allusion to this subject in a letter from Wilson, of 39th November, 1788.