Page:Principia Ethica 1922.djvu/248

214 only evil, has its grossest consequences in misjudgments of value. Not only is the pleasantness of a state not in proportion to its intrinsic worth; it may even add positively to its vileness. We do not think the successful hatred of a villain the less vile and odious, because he takes the keenest delight in it; nor is there the least need, in logic, why we should think so, apart from an unintelligent prejudice in favour of pleasure. In fact it seems to be the case that wherever pleasure is added to an evil state of either of our first two classes, the whole thus formed is always worse than if no pleasure had been there. And similarly with regard to pain. If pain be added to an evil state of either of our first two classes, the whole thus formed is always better, as a whole, than if no pain had been there; though here, if the pain be too intense, since that is a great evil, the state may not be better on the whole. It is in this way that the theory of vindictive punishment may be vindicated. The infliction of pain on a person whose state of mind is bad may, if the pain be not too intense, create a state of things that is better on the whole than if the evil state of mind had existed unpunished. Whether such a state of things can ever constitute a positive good, is another question.

129. II. The consideration of this other question belongs properly to the second topic, which was reserved above for discussion—namely the topic of ‘mixed’ goods. ‘Mixed’ goods were defined above as things, which, though positively good as wholes, nevertheless contain, as essential elements, something intrinsically evil or ugly. And there certainly seem to be such goods. But for the proper consideration of them, it is necessary to take into account a new distinction—the distinction just expressed as being between the value which a thing possesses ‘as a whole,’ and that which it possesses ‘on the whole.’

When ‘mixed’ goods were defined as things positively good as wholes, the expression was ambiguous. It is meant that they were positively good on the whole; but it must now be observed that the value which a thing possesses on the whole may be said to be equivalent to the sum of the value which it possesses as a whole, together with the intrinsic values which may belong to any of its parts. In fact, by the ‘value which