CHAPTER VI. Laudatory Personalities. Ad amicitiam. PERSONALITIES of this class are the opposites, and in some respects the counterparts, of vituperative personalities, which will be treated of next in order, at the commencement of the ensuing book. Laudatory personalities are susceptible of the same number of modifications as will be shown to exist in the case of vituperative personalities: but in this case the argument is so much weaker than in the other, that the shades and modifications of it are seldom resorted to, and are therefore not worth a detailed exposition. The object of vituperative personalities is to effect the rejection of a measure, on account of the alleged bad character of those who promote it; and the argument advanced is, "The persons who propose or promote the measure, are bad: therefore the measure is bad, or ought to be rejected." The object of laudatory personalities is to effect the rejection of a measure on account of the alleged good character of those who oppose it; and the arguiment advanced is, "The measure is rendered unnecessary by the virtues of those who are in power,-their opposition is a sufficient authority for the rejection of the measure." The argument indeed is generally confined to persons of this description, and is little else than an extension of the self-trumpeter's fallacy. In both of them, authority derived from the virtues or talents of the persons lauded is brought forward as superseding the necessity of all investigation. "The measure proposed implies a distrust of the members of His Majesty's Government; but so great is their integrity, so complete their disinterestedness, so uniformly do they prefer the public advantage to their own, that such a measure is altogether unnecessary. Their disapproval is sufficient to warrant an opposition; precautions can only be requisite where danger is apprehended; here, the high character of the individuals in question is a sufficient guarantee against any ground of alarm." The panegyric goes on increasing in proportion to the dignity of the functionary thus panegyrized. Subordinates in office are the very models of assiduity, attention, and fidelity to their trust; ministers, the perfection of probity and intelligence: and as for the highest magistrate in the state, no adulation is equal to describe the extent of his various merits. There can be no difficulty in exposing the fallacy of the argument attempted to be deduced from these panegyrics. 1st, They have the common character of being irrelevant to the question under discussion. The measure must have something extraordinary in it, if a right judgment cannot be founded on its merits without first estimating the character of the members of the Govern ment. 2nd, If the goodness of the measure be sufficiently established by direct arguments, the reception given. to it by those who oppose it, will form a better criterion for judging of their character, than their character, (as inferred from the places which they occupy,) for judging of the goodness or badness of the measure. 3rd, If this argument be good in any one case, it is equally good in every other; and the effect of it, if admitted, would be to give to the persons occupying for the time being the situation in question, an absolute and universal negative upon every measure not agreeable to their inclinations. 4th, In every public trust, the legislator should, for the purpose of prevention, suppose the trustee disposed to break the trust in every imaginable way in which it would be possible for him to reap, from the breach of it, any personal advantage. This is the principle on which public institutions ought to be formed; and when it is applied to all men indiscriminately, it is injurious to none. The practical inference is, to oppose to such possible (and what will always be probable) breaches of trust every bar that can be opposed, consistently with the power requisite for the efficient and due discharge of the trust. Indeed, these arguments, drawn from the supposed virtues of men in power, are opposed to the first principles on which all laws proceed. 5th, Such allegations of individual virtue are never supported by specific proof, are scarce ever susceptible of specific disproof; and specific disproof, if offered, could not be admitted: viz. in either house of parliament. If attempted elsewhere, the punishment would fall, not on the unworthy trustee, but on him by whom the unworthiness had been proved. PART THE SECOND. FALLACIES of danger, The subject matter of which is Danger in various shapes, and the object, to repress discussion altogether, by exciting alarm. CHAPTER I. Vituperative Personalities. Ad odium. To this class belongs a cluster of fallacies so intimately connected with each other, that they may first be enumerated and some observations be made upon them in the lump. By seeing their mutual relations to each other, by observing in what circumstances they agree, and in what they differ, a much more correct as well as complete view will be obtained of them, than if they were considered each of them by itself. The fallacies that belong to this cluster may be denominated, 1. Imputation of bad design. |