Page:History of Freedom.djvu/267

 INTRODUCTION TO IL PRINCIPE 223

hingabe, für den Staat das der Selbstbehauptung. Der Einzelne dient dem Recht; der Staat handhabt, leitet und schafft dasselbe. Der Einzelne ist nur ein flüchtiges Glied in dem sittlichen Ganzen; der Staat ist, wenn nicht dieses Ganze selbst, doch dessen reale, ordnende Macht; er ist unsterblich und sich selbst genug.-Die Erhaltung des Staats rechtfertigt jedes Opfer und steht über jedem Gebot," N efftzer, an Alsatian borderer, says: " Le devoir suprême des individus est de se dévouer, celui des nations est de se conserver, et se con fond par con- séquent avec leur intérêt." Once, in a mood of pantheism, Renan wrote: "L'humanité a tout fait, et, nous voulons Ie croire, tout bien fait." Or, as l\1ichelet abridges the Scienza Nuo'l/a: "L'humanité est son æuvre à elle-même. Dieu agit sur elle, mais par elle." Mr. Leslie Stephen thus lays down the philosophy of history according to Carlyle, U that only succeeds which is based on divine truth, and permanent success therefore proves the right, as the effect proves the cause." Darwin, having met Carlyle, notes that U in his eyes might was right," and adds that he had a narrow and unscientific mind; but 11r. Gold\vin Smith discovers the same lesson: "His- tory, of itself, if observed as science observes the facts of the physical world, can scarcely give man any prin- ciple or any object of allegiance, unless it be success." Dr. Martineau attributes this doctrine to Mill: "Do we ask \vhat determines the moral quality of actions? We are referred, not to their spring, but to their con- sequences," ] eremy Bentham used to relate how he found the greatest happiness principle in 1768, and gave a shilling for it, at the corner of Queen's College. He found it in Priestley, and he might have gone on finding it in Beccaria and Hutcheson, all of whom trace their pedigree to the filalldragola: "10 credo che quello sia bene che facci bene a' più, e che i più se ne conten- tino." This is the centre of unity in all Machiavelli, and gives him touch, not \vith unconscious imitators onlv. but \vith the most conspicuous race of reasoners in the century.