Helvetius, who belonged to a family which had migrated from the Palatinate into France, is more refined and more inward. In his life as a farmer of taxes and a property-owner, he always tried, along with his noble-minded wife, to act with kindness and justice as he explains them in his book. It is clear to him that ethics means somehow or other enthusiastic action, that is, action which springs out of feeling._(_18_)_ Society cannot, therefore, force these virtues into the individual; it can only educate him into them, and it does in fact apply all the means and devices which are at its disposal to influence his egoism in their direction. Above all it makes good use of his striving to win recognition and fame. The praise which it pours on that which is “good” in its own sense of the word is for the mass of men the strongest inducement to take up work for its interests. Helvetius would perhaps have offered a less external conception of how ethical action is realized, if he had not, with the best intentions, taken so much trouble to depict morality as something which can be taught. In the view that morality is enthusiastic action to which the individual is roused by society, Bentham agrees entirely with Helvetius, but he carries it through in a much deeper way. Out of the _Romanza_ he makes a hymn. The part played by society in bringing morality into existence cannot, according to Bentham, be emphasized too strongly. In vehement words he opposes the view that the human conscience can decide between good and evil. Nothing can be left to subjective feeling. Man is truly moral only when he receives his ethics at the hand of society and works them out with ardour. But if society is to decide about ethics, it must first bring order into its own ethical views, and therefore, says Bentham, must learn to combine clear and definite notions [pg 078] with its presentation of the general good. That done, it must make up its mind to apply this principle with absolute consistency as a foundation for legislation and the establishment of ethical standards, excluding all considerations of a different character. A “moral arithmetic” should be constructed which allows the calculating in correct utility values of all decisions that have to be made. Dealing in a dry, practical way with all cases of penal legislation, and of establishment of standards by the moral law, Bentham then shows that the principle of the greatest good of the greatest number is applicable in all of them, and guides us safely and accurately in questions of good and evil. “Moral philosophy, in its general meaning, is the theory underlying the art of so directing the actions of men that there is produced the greatest possible amount of happiness.” It is legislation that decides what moral actions the community can order to be performed, and if it is to exert an educative influence it must be humane through and through.