The Fable of the Bees; Or, Private Vices, Public BenefitsMandeville, Bernard
Philosophy
The Fable of the Bees; Or, Private Vices, Public Benefits
Mandeville, Bernard
Charity-schools -- Early works to 1800; Ethics -- Early works to 1800; Virtue -- Early works to 1800
What I have said last must only be understood of man in his savage
state; for, if we examine him as a member of a society, and a taught
animal, we shall find him quite another creature: As soon as his
pride has room to play, and envy, avarice, and ambition begin to
catch hold of him, he is roused from his natural innocence and
stupidity. As his knowledge increases, his desires are enlarged,
and consequently his wants and appetites are multiplied: Hence it
must follow, that he will often be crossed in the pursuit of them,
and meet with abundance more disappointment to stir up his anger in
this than his former condition, and man would in a little time become
the most hurtful and obnoxious creature in the world, if let alone,
whenever he could over-power his adversary, if he had no mischief to
fear but from the person that angered him.
The first care, therefore, of all governments is, by severe punishments
to curb his anger when it does hurt, and so, by increasing his fears,
prevent the mischief it might produce. When various laws to restrain
him from using force are strictly executed, self-preservation must
teach him to be peaceable; and, as it is every body's business to
be as little disturbed as is possible, his fears will be continually
augmented and enlarged as he advances in experience, understanding, and
foresight. The consequence of this must be, that as the provocations
he will receive to anger will be infinite in the civilized state, so
his fears to damp it will be the same, and thus, in a little time,
he will be taught by his fears to destroy his anger, and by art to
consult, in an opposite method, the same self-preservation for which
nature before had furnished him with anger, as well as the rest of
his passions.
The only useful passion, then, that man is possessed of toward the
peace and quiet of a society, is his fear, and the more you work upon
it the more orderly and governable he will be; for how useful soever
anger may be to man, as he is a single creature by himself, yet the
society has no manner of occasion for it: But nature being always the
same, in the formation of animals, produces all creatures as like to
those that beget and bear them, as the place she forms them in, and the
various influences from without, will give her leave; and consequently
all men, whether they are born in courts or forests, are susceptible of
anger. When this passion overcomes (as among all degrees of people it
sometimes does) the whole set of fears man has, he has true courage,
and will fight as boldly as a lion or a tiger, and at no other time;
and I shall endeavour to prove, that whatever is called courage in man,
when he is not angry, is spurious and artificial.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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