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129 where it is necessary, owes to the State (concerning which I shall have to speak hereafter), I do not esteem it good that the State should compel any one to do anything to gratify the wish or further the interests of another, even though he should receive the amplest compensation. For as everything and every pursuit, from the infinite diversity of human dispositions and desires, confers on each such various and inestimable benefits, and as these benefits may likewise vary infinitely in interest, importance, and necessity, the decision as to which good of the one, and which of the other, should be chosen as equivalent (though its difficulty should not deter us from it), is always attended with something harsh, and seems like passing sentence on the feelings and individuality of another. For this reason, moreover, that we cannot make any exact substitution except where the things in question are exactly of the same kind, real compensation is often utterly impossible, and can scarcely even be determined by a general rule.

In addition to these injurious consequences of the best of laws of this kind, there is always, moreover, an implied facility of possible abuse.

Further, the consideration of security (which alone rightly prescribes the sphere of State agency) does not render such regulations generally necessary, since every case in which this necessity occurs must be strictly exceptional: men, moreover, become more kindly disposed towards each other, and more prompt to render mutual assistance, the less they feel their self-love and sense of freedom to be wounded by an actual right of coercion on the part of others; and even though the mere humour and wholly groundless obstinacy of a man may happen to thwart an excellent undertaking, such an event is not sufficient to require that the power of the State should be thrown into the contest. In the physical world, it does not shatter