On Liberty by John Stuart Mill.

3/5 rating. 128 pages.

Book #65 of 2021. Read November 28, 2021.

This is an essay by the 19th century philosopher about individual liberty.

The ideas that John is talking about seemed very apropos in today’s world. I certainly didn’t agree with all of them, but he has a lot of good points and topics to think about. John talks about the importance of not shutting down speech, even when we believe that one side is so obviously right. He believes that ideas should be able to reign supreme by honest and open discussion even – and probably especially – on topics such as those we feel are obvious. As he says: “there is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides; it is when they attend only to one that errors harden into prejudices.”

John is a proponent of original libertarian thought. As he says:

“Each is the proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily, or mental and spiritual. Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves, than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest.”

This was a worthwhile essay to read about individual freedom and liberty. If you decide to read it, just know you are about to wade through some heavy language that made this essay much more of a hassle to read than it could have been.

Quotes:

“Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough: there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling; against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the development, and, if possible, prevent the formation, of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the model of its own.”

“That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”

“A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them for the injury.”

“Thirdly, from this liberty of each individual, follow the liberty, within the same limits, of combination among individuals; freedom to unite, for any purpose not involving harm to others: the persons combining being supposed to be of full age, and not forced or deceived.”

“But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.”

“Strange that they should imagine that they are not assuming infallibility, when they acknowledge that there should be free discussion on all subjects which can possibly be doubtful, but think that some particular principle or doctrine should be forbidden to be questioned because it is so certain, that is, because they are certain that it is certain.”

“To discover to the world something which deeply concerns it, and of which it was previously ignorant; to prove to it that it had been mistaken on some vital point of temporal or spiritual interest, is as important a service as a human being can render to his fellow creatures”

“But, indeed, the dictum that truth always triumphs over persecution, is one of those pleasant falsehoods which men repeat after one another till they pass into commonplaces, but which all experience refutes.”

“He who knows only his own side of the case, knows little of that.”

“But in the sense of that living belief which regulates conduct, they believe these doctrines just up to the point to which it is usual to act upon them. The doctrines in their integrity are serviceable to pelt adversaries with; and it is understood that they are to be put forward (when possible) as the reasons for whatever people do that they think laudable.”

“I do not mean that they choose what is customary, in preference to what suits their own inclination. It does not occur to them to have any inclination, except what is customary. Thus the mind itself is bowed to the yoke: even in what people do for pleasure, conformity is the first thing thought of; they like in crowds; they exercise choice only among things commonly done; peculiarity of taste, eccentricity of conduct, are shunned equally with crimes: until by dint of not following their own nature, they have no nature to follow: their human capacities are withered and starved: they become incapable of any strong wishes or native pleasures, and generally without either opinions or feelings of home growth, or properly their own.”

“But there is no room for entertaining any such question when a person’s conduct affects the interests of no person’s besides himself, or needs not affect them unless they like”

“with small men no great thing can really be accomplished”

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