lity
which the author regarded as equally the basis of ethics.

_I.--Calculation of Pleasures and Pains_

Mankind is governed by pain and pleasure. Utility is that property in
anything which tends to produce happiness in the party concerned,
whether an individual or a community. The principle of utility makes
utility the criterion for approval or disapproval of every kind of
action. An act which conforms to this principle is one which ought to be
done, or is not one which ought not to be done; is right, or, at least,
not wrong. There is no other criterion possible which cannot ultimately
be reduced to the personal sentiment of the individual.

The sources or sanctions of pleasure and pain are four--the physical, in
the ordinary course of nature; political, officially imposed; moral or
popular, imposed by public opinion; and religion. Pains under the first
head are calamities; under the other three are punishments. Under the
first three heads, they concern the present life only. The second,
third, and the fourth, as concerns this life, operate through the first;
but the first operates independently of the others.

Pleasures and pains, then, are the instruments with which the legislator
has to work; he must, therefore, be able to gauge their relative values.
These depend primarily and simply on four things--intensity, duration,
certainty or uncertainty, propinquity or remoteness. Secondarily, on
fecundity, the consequent probable multiplication of the like
sensations; and purity, the improbability of consequent contrary
sensations. Finally, on extent--the number of persons pleasurably or
painfully affected. All these being weighed together, if the pleasurable
tendency predominates, the act is good; if the painful, bad.

Pleasures and pains are either simple or complex--_i.e._, resolvable
into several simple pleasures, and may be enumerated; as those of the
senses, of wealth, of piety, of benevolence, of malevolence, of
association, of imagination. Different persons are sensible to the same
pleasure in different degrees, and the sensibility of the individual
varies under different circumstances. Circumstances affecting
sensibility are various--such as health, strength, sex, age, education;
they may be circumstances of the body, of the mind, of the inclinations.
Their influence can be reckoned approximately, but should be taken into
consideration so far as is practicable.

The legislator and the judge are conce