MEASUREMENTS 191 



neither excited nor depressed beyond its ordinary level, 

 its estimates may closely approximate the measured time. 

 If twenty men in ordinary health were completely isolated 

 from one another and from the external world, like the 

 translators of the Septuagint, or the candidates at a Chinese 

 examination, and were asked at the end of (say) eighteen 

 minutes, to record the exact time that had elapsed, a very 

 large proportion of their answers would be right within a few 

 minutes, though they would have had nothing but their 

 subjective states as a basis for the estimate. 



We may now proceed to apply these considerations to 

 the question of the quantification of pleasures and pains ; 

 and we can hardly make a better beginning than with 

 Mr. RashdalPs example of the bank clerk who was unable 

 to decide between an addition of 50 a year to his salary 

 and a reduction of his day s work by half an hour. It is 

 clear that we are here dealing with a discriminative judge 

 ment of equality, and that there is no measurement. It is 

 also clear that if measurement were possible, the judgement 

 of equality would disappear, and with it the hesitation 

 between the rival advantages. It is most unlikely that 

 the mathematical equivalent of each would be exactly 

 the same, and the clerk, supposing the measurement to be 

 complete, and to cover all the subjective conditions without 

 exception, would necessarily choose the pleasure which 

 was represented by the highest figure, however small the 

 difference might be. But what would really happen is 

 this. Having no measurement to guide him, he would 

 be unable to maintain the same judgement for any length 

 of time. At one moment he will prefer the cash, at another 

 the leisure, but the recollection of his previous contradictory 

 preference will make him hesitate, until impatience, or the 

 fear of losing both, forces a decision ; and he will then 

 select the one that is uppermost at the moment. Our 

 experience of human nature will lead us to expect that, 

 as soon as his decision has become irrevocable, he will repent 

 it. When in health and high spirits, he will think he was 

 right, but when depressed that he was wrong. A friend 



