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Front Page Titles (by Subject) José del Valle to Bentham. - The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 11 (Memoirs of Bentham Part II and Analytical Index)
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José del Valle to Bentham. - Jeremy Bentham, The Works of Jeremy Bentham, vol. 11 (Memoirs of Bentham Part II and Analytical Index) [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. 11.
Part of: The Works of Jeremy Bentham, 11 vols.About Liberty Fund:Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals. Copyright information:The text is in the public domain. Fair use statement:This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit.
José del Valle to Bentham.“Guatemala, August 3, 1831. (Translation—Extract.) “My ever dear Father,—How I envy my cousin,* —with how much delight would I change my fate with his, that I might dwell in the abode of the best legislator of the world! “I shall take care to give circulation to your Constitutional Code. The light from Westminster shall illumine these lands. “You desire, as I do, universal instruction: and I labour to advance it. There are authorities to whom it is necessary perpetually to refer, in every branch of science—and you are one of them: in every soil I trace your footsteps.” CHAPTER XXVI.1831. Æt. 83.Declining Health.—Memoranda and Conversations.—Burdett.—Interview with Talleyrand.—Bentham’s Death.—His Character, the Structure of his Mind, and his domestic, social, and literary Habits.—Dr Southwood Smith’s Estimate of his Philosophy and Personal Character. In the summer of 1831, many symptoms exhibited themselves of a gradual breaking up of Bentham’s constitution. His reasoning powers had not lost their acuteness—his affections were as strong as ever; but his memory grew confused at times, and his spirits sometimes flagged. On one occasion, on the 18th May, while I was sitting opposite to him, he became suddenly speechless; and, taking a piece of paper, wrote on it, in a scarcely legible hand, that he was not able to speak. But he revived again; and in September wrote the commencement of a “Hudibrastic attack on Chancellor Brougham’s Defence of many-seated Judicatories.”
On the 24th October he wrote, in a hand that appeared more than ordinarily firm and intelligible, the following passage, which he sent to Lady Hannah Elice, as his autograph:— “The way to be comfortable is to make others comfortable. “The way to make others comfortable is to appear to love them. “The way to appear to love them—is to love them in reality. “Probatur ab experientiâ, per Jeremy Bentham, Queen’s Square Place, Westminster. Born, 15th February, anno 1748—Written (this copy) 24th October, 1831.” [* ] Don Prospero Herrera, the Minister from Guatemala to France, who was for some time a visiter to Bentham. |

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