of proceeding. Or suppose some one recommends you a man as steward, as
a man to whom you can blindly trust all your affairs; and, in order to
inspire you with confidence, extols him as a prudent man who
thoroughly understands his own interest, and is so indefatigably
active that he lets slip no opportunity of advancing it; lastly,
lest you should be afraid of finding a vulgar selfishness in him,
praises the good taste with which he lives; not seeking his pleasure
in money-making, or in coarse wantonness, but in the enlargement of
his knowledge, in instructive intercourse with a select circle, and
even in relieving the needy; while as to the means (which, of
course, derive all their value from the end), he is not particular,
and is ready to use other people's money for the purpose as if it were
his own, provided only he knows that he can do so safely, and
without discovery; you would either believe that the recommender was
mocking you, or that he had lost his senses. So sharply and clearly
marked are the boundaries of morality and self-love that even the
commonest eye cannot fail to distinguish whether a thing belongs to
the one or the other. The few remarks that follow may appear
superfluous where the truth is so plain, but at least they may serve
to give a little more distinctness to the judgement of common sense.

{BOOK_1|CHAPTER_1 ^paragraph 95}

The principle of happiness may, indeed, furnish maxims, but never
such as would be competent to be laws of the will, even if universal
happiness were made the object. For since the knowledge of this
rests on mere empirical data, since every man's judgement on it
depends very much on his particular point of view, which is itself
moreover very variable, it can supply only general rules, not
universal; that is, it can give rules which on the average will most