登陆注册
5589700000057

第57章 BENTHAM'S LIFE(1)

I.Early Life

Jeremy Bentham,(1)the patriarch of the English Utilitarians,sprang from the class imbued most thoroughly with the typical English prejudices.

His first recorded ancestor,Brian Bentham,was a pawnbroker,who lost money by the stop of the Exchequer in 1672,but was neither ruined,nor,it would seem,alienated by the king's dishonesty.He left some thousands to his son,Jeremiah,an attorney and a strong Jacobite.A second Jeremiah,born 2nd December 1712,carried on his father's business,and though his clients were not numerous,increased his fortune by judicious investments in houses and lands.Although brought up in Jacobite principles,he transferred his attachment to the Hanoverian dynasty when a relation of his wife married a valet of George II.The wife,Alicia Grove,was daughter of a tradesman who had made a small competence at Andover.Jeremiah Bentham had fallen in love with her at first sight,and wisely gave up for her sake a match with a fortune of £10,000.The couple were fondly attached to each other and to their children.The marriage took place towards the end of 1744,and the eldest son,Jeremy,was born in Red Lion Street,Houndsditch,4th February 1747-48(o.s.)The only other child who grew up was Samuel,afterwards Sir Samuel Bentham,born 11th January 1757.When eighty years old,Jeremy gave anecdotes of his infancy to his biographer,Bowring,who says that their accuracy was confirmed by contemporary documents,and proved his memory to be as wonderful as his precocity.Although the child was physically puny,his intellectual development was amazing.Before he was two he burst into tears at the sight of his mother's chagrin upon his refusal of some offered dainty.Before he was 'breeched,'an event which happened when he was three and a quarter,he ran home from a dull walk,ordered a footman to bring lights and place a folio Rapin upon the table,and was found plunged in historical studies when his parents returned to the house.In his fourth year he was imbibing the Latin grammar,and at the age of five years nine months and nineteen days,as his father notes,he wrote a scrap of Latin,carefully pasted among the parental memoranda.The child was not always immured in London.His parents spent their Sundays with the grandfather Bentham at Barking,and made occasional excursions to the house of Mrs Bentham's mother at Browning Hill,near Reading.

Bentham remembered the last as a 'paradise,'and a love of flowers and gardens became one of his permanent passions.

Jeremy cherished the memory of his mother's tenderness.The father,though less sympathetic,was proud of his son's precocity,and apparently injudicious in stimulating the unformed intellect.The boy was almost a dwarf in size.

When sixteen he grew ahead,(2)and was so feeble that he could scarcely drag himself upstairs.Attempts to teach him dancing failed from the extreme weakness of his knees.(3)He showed a taste for music,and could scrape a minuet on the fiddle at six years of age.He read all such books as came in his way.His parents objected to light literature,and he was crammed with such solid works as Rapin,Burnet's Theory of the Earth,and Cave's Lives of the Apostles.Various accidents,however,furnished him with better food for the imagination.He wept for hours over Ciarissa Harlowe,studied Gulliver's Travels as an authentic document,and dipped into a variety of such books as then drifted into middle-class libraries.A French teacher introduced him to some remarkable books.He read Télémaque,which deeply impressed him,and,as he thought,implanted in his mind the seeds of later moralising.He attacked unsuccessfully some of Voltaire's historical works,and even read Candide,with what emotions we are not told.

The servants meanwhile filled his fancy with ghosts and hobgoblins.To the end of his days he was still haunted by the imaginary horrors in the dark,(4)and he says(5)that they had been among the torments of his life.He had few companions of his own age,and though he was 'not unhappy'and was never subjected to corporal punishment,he felt more awe than affection for his father.His mother,to whom he was strongly attached,died on 6th January 1759.

Bentham was thus a strangely precocious,and a morbidly sensitive child,when it was decided in 1755to send him to Westminster.The headmaster,Dr Markham,was a friend of his father's.Westminster,he says,represented 'hell'for him when Browning Hill stood for paradise.The instruction 'was wretched.'The fagging system was a 'horrid despotism.'The games were too much for his strength.His industry,however,enabled him to escape the birch,no small achievement in those days,(6)and he became distinguished in the studies such as they were.He learned the catechism by heart,and was good at Greek and Latin verses,which he manufactured for his companions as well as himself.He had also the rarer accomplishment,acquired from his early tutor,of writing more easily in French than English.Some of his writings were originally composed in French.He was,according to Bowring,elected to one of the King's scholarships when between nine and ten,but as 'ill-usage was apprehended'the appointment was declined.(7)He was at a boarding-house,and the life of the boys on the foundation was probably rougher.In June 1760his father took him to Oxford,and entered him as a commoner at Queen's College.He came into residence in the following October,when only twelve years old.Oxford was not more congenial than Westminster.He had to sign the Thirty-nine Articles in spite of scruples suppressed by authority.The impression made upon him by this childish compliance never left him to the end of his life.(8)His experience resembled that of Adam Smith and Gibbon.

同类推荐
  • 九章算经

    九章算经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 南迁录

    南迁录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 题李处士幽居

    题李处士幽居

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 伤寒论类方

    伤寒论类方

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 佛说如来智印经

    佛说如来智印经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • King Lear

    King Lear

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 一个小公司老板的日常管理

    一个小公司老板的日常管理

    一个企业从创立那天开始,在领导的带领下,在团队的帮助下,通过扎实肯干打下一片属于自己的江山。然而,打江山容易,守江山难,若想让江山不断扩张,不断流传下去,就要看企业领导者的管理水平。只有把企业管理好了,企业才会拥有光明的前景。每个小老板都希望带领一支团队,为实现自己的个人追求和人生价值而奋斗,打造一份属于自己的光辉事业。
  • 掌上蔷薇

    掌上蔷薇

    宫们缓缓打开,她从门内款款走出。二哥,你这是何意?身批战甲的年轻男人低低一声笑,父皇病重,本王特来探望。巧了,父皇也有话让我带给你,二哥可要听?说。二皇子云乔诛杀异己,陷害朝臣,逼宫谋反,特令御林军将其擒拿,如遇反抗,格杀勿论!她一笑,向前几步,雪白的裙摆扫过冷冷的地面,二哥,我劝你还是束手就擒,或许父皇会念在父子之情饶你不死。妖女!她冷冷一笑,尖锐的声响划破灰色的天空,墙头之上瞬间搭上说不清的弓箭手。一瞬间,无数箭矢带着雷霆万钧之势奔袭而下!她素白的手终于在这样将要落下雪的日子里,拉开了兄弟残杀的序幕,割骨割肉,痛彻心扉,却是百死不悔!
  • 剩下来的孩子

    剩下来的孩子

    6岁的扎克有一个聪慧异于常人的“天才哥哥”安迪,还有美丽优雅的妈妈和温柔顾家的好爸爸,这个幸福美满的家庭羡煞旁人。可这一切都被一场突如其来的校园枪击案摧毁了,安迪在枪击案中不幸丧生,幸存的扎克成了家里“剩下来的孩子。”所有人都承受着巨大的悲痛:妈妈悲伤过度,燃起复仇之意,一心要找凶手的家庭报仇;爸爸在失去爱子之余,还牵扯出一段不为人知的过往恋情,令整个家庭陷入前所未有的绝望。眼看整个家庭几近分崩离析,劫后余生的扎克决定鼓起勇气找回疗愈的力量,他将如何化解家人心中的悲痛与仇恨,如何带他们走出人生绝望,他一个6岁的孩子,真的可以做到吗?这是一个关于悲痛与疗愈、仇恨与原谅的温情疗愈力作。
  • 波西米亚楼

    波西米亚楼

    《波西米亚楼》是作家严歌苓的散文集,收录了目前为止她发表写作的所有散文以及演讲稿。一共有四个部分组成:波西米亚楼、非洲札记、苓珑心语、创作谈。波西米亚楼的部分主要是讲述了严歌苓在海外生活多年,从留学到结婚中间发生的种种故事;非洲札记主要描写的是严歌苓跟随外交官丈夫出使非洲,在非洲的所见所闻;苓珑心语则是严歌苓在创作她的小说时发生的一些故事;而最后一部分创作谈是她在各个大学颁奖礼所作演讲的文字整理。总的来说,《波西米亚楼》是严歌苓现实生活的真实写照,时间跨度很大,内容范围涵盖也很广,非常真实展现了严歌苓生活的经历以及方方面面。
  • 斗茶

    斗茶

    西坪古镇的茶行,一到春茶上市,就热闹得跟过年一般。这天一大早,魏饮的徒弟罗文选,便挑了两担新茶样到镇子里的茶行去卖。到茶卖的差不多剩下十斤时,他收拾了扁担,提着这十斤茶走进了“玉萱楼”。一进门,见老板金大头正摇着蒲扇半躺在竹椅中有滋有味地泡着壶茶自酌自饮,便走过去说:“金老板一向可好?文选给您送茶来了。”金大头见是罗文选,忙笑眯眯地招呼着:“文选侄,你们魏溪乡魏老头,可是很久没往我这里送好茶了!你瞧瞧,如今我这玉萱楼,打着你们乡魏饮女儿的旗号经营的,可是陈家庄的茗茶乌龙。”
  • 最强宠婚:亿万小妻很抢手

    最强宠婚:亿万小妻很抢手

    草根女逆袭上位,高冷矜贵的豪门世家子人前高不可攀,人后竟是贪吃不餍的硬汉子!各种虐小三,在他们将步入婚姻殿堂之际,初恋女友强势回归、周密策划,逼得她自爆假死,亡命天涯!硬汉万里追妻,逼死初恋,发誓追回那隐姓埋名的小女人!--情节虚构,请勿模仿
  • 异族录

    异族录

    有时候,坎坷的命运在出生时,便已决定。当逃亡结束时,以为就可以过上平静的日子了。但一个变卦击碎了一切。失去的够多了,不能再这样了。那就站在战场上,握住刀,保护人类剩下的一切。
  • 戏中戏

    戏中戏

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 梦里梨花醉

    梦里梨花醉

    春露,从指尖滑落,洒出一朵绝美的花,留下一行,忧伤的痕迹,梦里!谁在穿行?他们在梦中邂逅,又在现实中相遇,然而她没有他想象中的美好,从而只愿留在梦中,将现实中的她对他的一腔热情抛在脑后………………最后结果他会不会走出来呢???