REWARDS FOR VIRTUE.Beccaria accuses modern legislator of indifference to this subject.``Punishments'', says he, ``and, in many instances, unduly severe punishments, are provided for crimes; for virtue there are no rewards''.
These complaints, repeated by a multitude of writers, are matter of common-place declamation.So long as they are confined to general terms, the subject presents no difficulty;---but when an attempt is made to remove the ground of complaint, and to frame a code of remuneratory laws for virtue, how great is the difference between what has been asserted to be desirable, and what is possible!
Virtue is sometimes considered as an act, sometimes as a disposition: when it is exhibited by a positive act, it confers a service; when it is considered as a disposition, it is a chance of services.
Apart from this notion of service, it is impossible to tell wherein virtue consists.To form clear ideas concerning it, it must altogether be referred to the principle of utility: utility is its object , as well as its motive.
After having thus far spoken of services to be rewarded---that is, of manifest and public acts which fall not within the line of ordinary actions---it remains to be shown, in relation to virtue ,---1.What cannot be accomplished by general rewards---2.What it is possible to accomplish, either by particular institution, or occasional reward.[1]
1.We may observe, in the first place, that those civil virtues, which are most important to the welfare of society, and to the preservation of the human race, do not consist in striking exploits, which carry their own proof with them, but in a train of daily actions, in an uniform and steady course of conduct, resulting from the habitual disposition of the mind.Hence it is precisely because these virtues are connected with the whole course of our existence, that they are incapable of being made the objects of the rewards of institution.It is impossible to know what particular fact to select, at what period to require the proof, to what particular circumstance to attach the distinction of reward.
2.Add to these difficulties, that of finding a suitable reward which shall be agreeable to those for whom it is designed.
The modesty and delicacy of virtue would be wounded by the formalities necessary to the public proof of its existence.It is fostered by, and perhaps depends upon esteem: but this is a secret which it seeks to hide from itself, and those prizes for virtue which seem to oppose that conscience is bankrupt, would not be accepted by the rich, nor even sought after by the most worthy among the poor.
3.Every virtue produces advantages which are peculiar to itself: probity inspires confidence in all the relations of life; industry leads on to independence and wealth; benevolence is the source of kindly affections;---and though these advantages are not always reaped, they generally follow in the natural course of events.Their effect is much more steady and certain than that of factitious reward; which is necessarily subject to many imperfections.
In the reign of Louis XIV.
a treatise was published---``On the Falsity of Human Virtues''.
What is singular, and what the author probably never suspected is, that by some slight alterations it would be easy to convert this work into a treatise on their reality.The author appears to have considered them as false, because they were founded upon reciprocal interest---because their object is happiness, esteem, security, and the peaceable enjoyment of life---because men in their mutual intercourse settle with each other for their reciprocal services.But without these felicitous effects what would virtue be? In what consists its reality ? What would it have to recommend it? How would it be distinguished from vice? This basis of interest, which to this author appears to have rendered it false , is precisely that which gives it a true and solid, and we may add, an immutable existence; for no other source of happiness can be imagined.[2]
But if the most important class of virtues are already provided with sufficient motives to lead to their performance, either in the sufferings they prevent, or in the advantages to which they give birth, is it not superfluous to add factitious motives? The interference of legislators is useful only in supplying the deficiency of natural motive.
4.What would be our condition were things in a different state?---were it necessary to invite men to labour, honesty, benevolence, and all the duties of their several conditions, by means of factitious reward? Pecuniary rewards, it is evident, it would be impossible to bestow.Honour it is true, remains, but how would it be practicable to create, in the shape of honour, a sufficient fund of reward for the generality of human actions? The value of these rewards consists in their rarity: so soon as they are common, their value is gone.
