Principles of Morals and

156/Jeremy Bentham
appear to be of use: this is, where, although the offender has been justly
punished, yet on account of some good behaviour of his, displayed at a
time subsequent to that of the commencement of the punishment, it may
seem expedient to remit a part of it. But this it can scarcely be, if the
proportion of the punishment is, in other respects, what it ought to be.
The purpose of example is the more important object, in comparison of
that of reformation. It is not very likely, that less punishment should be
required for the former purpose than for the latter. For it must be rather
an extraordinary case, if a punishment, which is sufficient to deter a
man who has only thought of it for a few moments, should not be suffi-
cient to deter a man who has been feeling it all the time. Whatever, then,
is required for the purpose of example, must abide at all events: it is not
any reformation on the part of the offender, that can warrant the remit-
ting of any part of it: if it could, a man would have nothing to do but to
reform immediately, and so free himself from the greatest part of that
punishment which was deemed necessary. In order, then, to warrant the
remitting of any part of a punishment upon this ground, it must first be
supposed that the punishment at first appointed was more than was
necessary for the purpose of example, and consequently that a part of it
was needless upon the whole. This, indeed, is apt enough to be the case,
under the imperfect systems that are as yet on foot: and therefore, dur-
ing the continuance of those systems,the property of remissibility may,
on this second ground likewise, as well as on the former, be deemed a
useful one. But this would not be the case in any new-constructed sys-
tem, in which the rules of proportion above laid down should be ob-
served. In such a system, therefore, the utility of this property would
rest solely on the former ground.
XXVI. Upon taking a survey of the various possible modes of pun-
ishment, it will appear evidently, that there is not any one of them that
possesses all the above properties in perfection. To do the best that can
be done in the way of punishment, it will therefore be necessary, upon
most occasions, to compound them, and make them into complex lots,
each consisting of a number of different modes of punishment put to-
gether: the nature and proportions of the constituent parts of each lot
being different, according to the nature of the offence which it is de-
signed to combat.
XXVII. It may not be amiss to bring together, and exhibit in one
view, the eleven properties above established. They are as follows:
Two of them are concerned in establishing a proper proportion be-

---

Principles of Morals and Legislation/157
tween a single offense and its punishment; viz.,
1. Variability.
2. Equability.
One, in establishing a proportion, between more offences than one,
and more punishments than one; viz.,
3. Commensurability.
A fourth contributes to place the punishment in that situation in
which alone it can be efficacious; and at the same time to be bestowing
on it the two farther properties of exemplarity and popularity; viz.,
4. Characteristicalness.
Two others are concerned in excluding all useless punishment; the
one indirectly, by heightening the efficacy of what is useful; the other in
a direct way; viz.,
5. Exemplarity.
6. Frugality.
Three others contribute severally to the three inferior ends of pun-
ishment; viz.,
7. Subserviency to reformation.
8. Efficacy in disabling.
9. Subserviency to compensation.
Another property tends to exclude a collateral mischief, which a
particular mode of punishment is liable accidentally to produce; viz.,
10. Popularity.
The remaining property tends to palliate a mischief, which all pun-
ishment, as such is liable accidentally to produce; viz.,
11. Remissibility.
The properties of commensurability, characteristicalness, exemplar-
ity, subserviency to reformation, and efficacy in disabling, are more
particularly calculated to augment the profit which is to be made by
punishment: frugality, subserviency to compensation, popularity, and
remissibility, to diminish the expense: variability and equability are alike
subservient to both those purposes.
XXVIII. We now come to take a general survey of the system of
offences: that is, of such acts to which, on account of the mischievous
consequences they have a natural tendency to produce, and in the view
of putting a stop to those consequences, it may be proper to annex a
certain artificial consequence, consisting of punishment, to be inflicted
on the authors of such acts according to the principles just established.

---

Chapter XVI: Division of Offenses
§1. 
Classes of Offences
I. It is necessary, at the outset, to make a distinction between such acts
as are or may be, and such as ought to be offences.
Any act may be an offence, which they whom the community of are
in the habit of obeying shall be pleased to make one: that to is, any act
which they shall be pleased to prohibit or to punish. But, upon the prin-
ciple of utility, such acts alone ought to be made offences, as the good of
the community requires should be made so.
II. The good of the community cannot require, that any act should
be made an offence, which is not liable. in some way or other, to be
detrimetal to the community. For in the case of such an act, all punish-
ment is groundless.
III. But if the whole assemblage of any number of individuals be
considered as constituting an imaginary compound body, a community
or political state; any act that is detrimental to any one or more of those
members is, as to so much of its effects, detrimental to the state.
IV. An act cannot be detrimental to a state, but by being detrimental
to some one or more of the individuals that compose it. But these indi-
viduals may either be assignable or unassignable.
V. When there is any assignable individual to whom an offence is
detrimental, that person may either be a person other than the offender,
or the offender himself.
VI. Offences that are detrimental, in the first instance, to assignable
persons other than the offender, may be termed by one common name,
offences against individuals. And of these may be composed the 1st
class of offences. To contrast them with offences of the 2nd and 4th

---