208 THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. [Chap. 



what they are we cannot learn, nor what the principles of 

 his government, except that ' the higlicst human morality 

 which we are capable of conceiving' does not sanction them; 

 convince me of it, and I will bear my fate as I may. But 

 when I am told that I must believe this, and at the same 

 time call this being by the names which express and allirm 

 the highest human morality, I say in plain terms tliat I will 

 not Whatever power such a being may have over me, 

 there is one thing which he shall not do; he shall not com- 

 pel me to worship him. I will call no being good, who is 

 not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow- 

 creatures ; and if such a being can sentence me to hell for 

 not so calling him, to hell I Avill go." 



This is unquestionably an admirable sentiment on the 

 part of Mr. Mill (with which every absolute moralist will 

 agree), but it contains a complete refutation of his own po- 

 sition, and is a capital instance ' of the vigorous life of 

 moral intuition in one who professes to have eliminated any 

 fundamental distinction between the " right " and the " ex- 

 pedient." For if an action is morally good, and to be done, 

 merely in proportion to the amount of pleasure it secures, 

 and morally bad and to be av^oided as tending to misery, 

 and if it could be jyroved that by calling God good— 

 whether He is so or not, in our sense of the term — we could 

 secure a maximum of pleasure, and by, refusing to do so we 

 should incur endless torment, clearly, on utilitarian princi- 

 ples, the flattery would be good. 



Mr. Mill, of course, must also mean that, in the matter 

 in question, all men would do well to act with him. There- 

 fore, he must mean that it would be well for all to accc[)t 

 (on the hypothesis above given) infuiite and llnal misery 

 for all as the result of the pursuit of happiness as the only 

 end. 



8 I have not the merit of having noticed this inconsistency; it was 

 pointed out to mc by my friend the Rev. W, W. Roberts. 



