THE PRESIDENTS ADDRESS. 
431 
mean the absence of restraint. This is, no doubt, the sense in 
which the word is generally used in popular discussion. It is the 
original sense in respect of bodily liberty, and from this it has been 
extended not only in popular discussion, but in essays and treatises 
of high pretensions to social, and even to intellectual and moral 
liberty. 
It is not surprising that some persons, seeing how inadequate 
a motive is this mere absence of restraint to the enthusiasm which 
the very name of liberty excites, have thought the enthusiasm 
misplaced. Thus Mr. Eitzjames Stephen, in his book on Liberty, 
Equality, and Fraternity, which is in fact a criticism of Mr. Mill's 
Essay, says, " Discussions about liberty are in truth discussions about 
a negation. Attempts to solve the problems of government and 
society by such discussions, are like attempts to discover the nature 
of light and heat by enquiries into darkness and cold." (p. 181.) 
I cannot but think, however, that an enthusiasm so permanent, so 
deep-seated and widespread, must have for its object something 
more than a mere negation. To excite and sustain such an en- 
thusiasm, there must be a perception, — dim perhaps, as popular 
perception often is, but still sure, of something really worth effort, 
of something intelligible, of something positive. 
Is this the true nature of liberty, or is it indeed a mere nega- 
tion ? I am speaking now not of bodily or political liberty, but of 
intellectual liberty, which is in truth the real subject of the greater 
part of Mr. Mill's Essay. Does it consist, as he apparently would 
have it, in entire absence of restraint of " opinion and sentiment 
on all subjects, practical or speculative, scientific, moral, or theo- 
logical"? Assuming this to be the case, Mr. Stephen replies in 
effect that it is not good in itself; that it may be extremely mis- 
chievous ; that it can in no case be a reasonable subject of enthu- 
siasm ; and that we can only say whether it is worth seeking for or 
not when we know who are the people from whom restraint is to 
be removed, and what they intend to do with their liberty when 
they have got it. Mr. Mill, on the other hand, apparently regards 
it, whatever answer may be given to these questions, as "one of 
the leading essentials of well-being." 
Into this controversy it is not necessary for me to enter, as my 
question is, "Whether the definition of intellectual liberty, which is 
implied, I think, in Mr. Mill's Essay, and accepted by Mr. Stephen, 
is the true one? whether it does consist in the mere absence of 
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