Principles of Morals and

234/Jeremy Bentham
his own happiness, by means of such motives as offer of themselves: the
art of legislation (which may be considered as one branch of the science
of jurisprudence) teaches how a multitude of men, composing a commu-
nity, may be disposed to pursue that course which upon the whole is the
most conducive to the happiness of the whole community, by means of
motives to be applied by the legislator.
We come now to exhibit the limits between penal and civil jurispru-
dence. For this purpose it may be of use to give a distinct though sum-
mary view of the principal branches into which jurisprudence, consid-
ered in its utmost extent, is wont to be divided.
§ 2. 
Jurisprudence, its branches
XXI. Jurisprudence is a fictitious entity: nor can any meaning be found
for the word, but by placing it in company with some word that shall be
significative of a real entity. To know what is meant by jurisprudence,
we must know, for example, what is meant by a book of jurisprudence.
A book of jurisprudence can have but one or the other of two objects: 1.
To ascertain what the law is: 2. to ascertain what it ought to be. In the
former case it may be styled a book of expository jurisprudence; in the
latter, a book of censorial jurisprudence: or, in other words, a book on
the art of legislation.
XXII. A book of expository jurisprudence, is either authoritative
or unauthoritative. It is styled authoritative, when it is composed by
him who, by representing the state of the law to be so and so, causeth it
so to be; that is, of the legislator himself: unauthoritative, when it is the
work of any other person at large.
XXIII. Now law, or the law, taken indefinitely, is an abstract and
collective term; which, when it means any thing, can mean neither more
nor less than the sum total of a number of individual laws taken to-
gether. It follows, that of whatever other modifications the subject of a
book of jurisprudence is susceptible, they must all of them be taken
from some circumstance or other of which such individual laws, or the
assemblages into which they may be sorted, are susceptible. The cir-
cumstances that have given rise to the principal branches of jurispru-
dence we are wont to hear of, seem to be as follows: 1. The extent of the
laws in question in point of dominion. 2. The political quality of the
persons whose conduct they undertake to regulate. 3. The time of their
being in force. 4. The manner in which they are expressed. 5. The con-
cern which they have with the article of punishment.

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Principles of Morals and Legislation/235
XXIV. In the first place, in point of extent, what is delivered con-
cerning the laws in question, may have reference either to the laws of
such or such a nation or nations in particular, or to the laws of all na-
tions whatsoever: in the first case, the book may be said to relate to
local, in the other, to universal jurisprudence.
Now of the infinite variety of nations there are upon the earth, there
are no two which agree exactly in their laws: certainly not in the whole:
perhaps not even in any single article: and let them agree today, they
would disagree to-morrow. This is evident enough with regard to the
substance of the laws: and it would be still more extraordinary if they
agreed in point of form; that is, if they were conceived in precisely the
same strings of words. What is more, as the languages of nations are
commonly different, as well as their laws, it is seldom that, strictly speak-
ing, they have so much as a single word in common. However, among
the words that are appropriated to the subject of law, there are some that
in all languages are pretty exactly correspondent to one another: which
comes to the same thing nearly as if they were the same. Of this stamp,
for example, are those which correspond to the words power, right,
obligation, liberty, and many others.
It follows, that if there are any books which can, properly speaking,
be styled books of universal jurisprudence, they must be looked for within
very narrow limits. Among such as are expository, there can be none
that are authoritative: nor even, as far as the substance of the laws is
concerned, any that are unauthoritative. To be susceptible of an univer-
sal application, all that a book of the expository kind can have to treat
of, is the import of words: to be, strictly speaking, universal, it must
confine itself to terminology. Accordingly the definitions which there
has been occasion here and there to intersperse in the course of the
present work, and particularly the definition hereafter given of the word
law, may be considered as matter belonging to the head of universal
jurisprudence. Thus far in strictness of speech: though in point of usage,
where a man, in laying down what he apprehends to be the law, extends
his views to a few of the nations with which his own is most connected,
it is common enough to consider what he writes as relating to universal
jurisprudence.
It is in the censorial line that there is the greatest room for disquisi-
tions that apply to the circumstances of all nations alike: and in this line
what regards the substance of the laws in question is as susceptible of
an universal application, as what regards the words. That the laws of all

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236/Jeremy Bentham
nations, or even of any two nations, should coincide in all points, would
be as ineligible as it is impossible: some leading points, however, there
seem to be, in respect of which the laws of all civilized nations might,
without inconvenience, be the same. To mark out some of these points
will, as far as it goes, be the business of the body of this work.
XXV. In the second place, with regard to the political quality of the
persons whose conduct is the object of the law. These may, on any given
occasion, be considered either as members of the same state, or as mem-
bers of different states: in the first ease, the law may be referred to the
head of internal, in the second case, to that of international jurispru-
dence.
Now as to any transactions which may take place between individu-
als who are subjects of different states, these are regulated by the inter-
nal laws, and decided upon by the internal tribunals, of the one or the
other of those states: the case is the same where the sovereign of the one
has any immediate transactions with a private member of the other: the
sovereign reducing himself, pro re natâ, to the condition of a private
person, as often as he submits his cause to either tribunal; whether by
claiming a benefit, or defending himself against a burthen. There re-
main then the mutual transactions between sovereigns, as such, for the
subject of that branch of jurisprudence which may be properly and ex-
clusively termed international.
With what degree of propriety rules for the conduct of persons of
this description can come under the appellation of laws, is a question
that must rest till the nature of the thing called a law shall have been
more particularly unfolded.
It is evident enough, that international jurisprudence may, as well as
internal, be censorial as well as expository, unauthoritative as well as
authoritative.
XXVI. Internal jurisprudence, again, may either concern all the
members of a state indiscriminately, or such of them only as are con-
nected in the way of residence, or otherwise, with a particular district.
Jurisprudence is accordingly sometimes distinguished into national and
provincial. But as the epithet provincial is hardly applicable to districts
so small as many of those which have laws of their own are wont to be,
such as towns, parishes, and manors; the term local (where universal
jurisprudence is plainly out of the question) or the term particular, though
this latter is not very characteristic, might either of them be more com-
modious.

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