Moral Rules and J. S. Mill's Educational Mandate

Abstract Bentham's utilitarianism, although castigated by Marx as a shopkeeper's rhetoric, maintained an invincible sway over its epigones particularly in their argumentations on moral and political matters. With the disappearance of the free market in the classical sense, however, it is rather J. S. Mill's revised hedonism than the orthodox Benthamite doctrine that has provided more interesting issues for moral and political contemplation. The duality of Mill's theoretical character ? liberal as well as authoritarian ? originated from his differentiation of qualities in the essentially quantitative concept of utilitarian ?pleasure?. This paper concerns itself with the negative and unsuccessful aspects of Mill's deliberations. Mill developed a theory of moral rule for the purpose of generalizing high quality pleasures to society at large. Nevertheless, according to this paper, he ended up leaving us with uncertainty regarding how the ignorant mass could be led to higher quality pleasures