On Liberty

by John Stuart Mill

the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual.

By liberty, was meant protection against the tyranny of the political rulers.

The rulers were conceived (except in some of the popular governments of Greece) as in a necessarily antagonistic position to the people whom they ruled.

who derived their authority from inheritan...

The aim, therefore, of patriots, was to set limits to the power which the ruler should be suffered to exercise over the community; and this limitation was what they meant by liberty.

was attempted in two ways. First, by obtaining a recognition of certain immunities, called political liberties or rights, which it was to be regarded as a breach of duty in the ruler to infringe, and which if he did infringe, specific resistance, or general rebellion, was held to be justifiable. A second, and generally a later expedient, was the establishment of constitutional checks; by which the consent of the community, or of a body of some sort, supposed to represent its interests, was made a necessary condition to some of the more important acts of the governing power.

to attain it more completely, became everywhere the principal object of the lovers of liberty.

A time, however, came, in the progress of human affairs, when men ceased to think it a necessity of nature that their governors should be an independent power, opposed in interest to themselves. It appeared to them much better that the various magistrates of the State should be their tenants or delegates, revocable at their pleasure.

this new demand for elective and temporary rulers became the prominent object of the exertions of the popular party, wherever any such party existed;

some persons began to think that too much importance had been attached to the limitation of the power itself.

What was now wanted was, that the rulers should be identified with the people; that their interest and will should be the interest and will of the nation.

The nation did not need to be protected against its own will.

There was no fear of its tyrannizing over itself. Let the rulers be effectually responsible to it, promptly removable by it, and it could afford to trust them with power of w...

Their power was but the nation’s own power, concentrated, and in a form c...

But, in political and philosophical theories, as well as in persons, success discloses faults and infirmities which failure might have concealed from observation.

temporary aberrations as those of the French Revolution,

The “people” who exercise the power, are not always the same people with those over whom it is exercised; and the “self-government” spoken of, is not the government of each by himself, but of each by all the rest.

The will of the people, moreover, practically means, the will of the most numerous or the most active part of the people;

Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough: there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling;

against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them;

to fetter the development, and, if possible, prevent the formation, of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fas...

Some rules of conduct, therefore, must be imposed, by law in the first place, and by opinion on many things which are not fit subjects for the operation of law.

What these rules should be, is the principal question in human affairs;

No two ages, and scarcely any two countries, have decided it alike;

and the decision of one age or country is a wonder to another.

The rules which obtain among themselves appear to them self-evident and self-justifying. This all but universal illusion is one of the examples of the magical influence of custom,

People are accustomed to believe,

that their feelings, on subjects of this nature, are better than reasons, and render reasons unnecessary.

The practical principle which guides them to their opinions on the regulation of human conduct, is the feeling in each person’s mind that everybody should be required to act as he, and thos...

and if the reasons, when given, are a mere appeal to a similar preference felt by other people, it is still only many people’s liking instead of one.

To an ordinary man, however, his own preference, thus supported, is not only a perfectly satisfactory reason, but the only one he generally has

but most commonly, their desires or fears for themselves—their

Wherever there is an ascendant class, a large portion of the morality of the country emanates from its class interests, and its feelings of class superiority.

Where, on the other hand, a class, formerly ascendant, has lost its ascendancy, or where its ascendancy is unpopular, the prevailing moral sentiments frequently bear the impress of an impatient dislike of superiority.

Another grand determining principle of the rules of conduct, both in act and forbearance, which have been enforced by law or opinion, has been the servility of mankind towards the supposed preferences or aversions of their temporal masters, or of their gods.

it made men burn magicians and heretics.

The likings and dislikings of society, or of some powerful portion of it, are thus the main thing which has practically determined the rules laid down for general observance, under the penalties of law or opinion.

They preferred endeavouring to alter the feelings of mankind on the particular points on which they were themselves heretical, rather than make common cause in defense of freedom,

The only case in which the higher ground has been taken on principle and maintained with consistency, by any but an individual here and there, is that of religious belief:

Those who first broke the yoke of what called itself the Universal Church, were in general as little willing to permit difference of religious opinion as that church itself.

minorities, seeing that they had no chance of becoming majorities, were under the necessity of pleading to those whom they could not convert, for permission to differ.

It is accordingly on this battle-field, almost solely, that the rights of the individual against society have been asserted on broad grounds of principle, and the claim of society to exercise authority over dissentients, openly controverted.

Yet so natural to mankind is intolerance in whatever they really care about, that religious freedom has hardly anywhere been practically realized,

Wherever the sentiment of the majority is still genuine and intense, it is found to have abated little of its claim to be obeyed.

The majority have not yet learnt to feel the power of the government their power, or its opinions their opinions.

When they do so, individual liberty will probably be as much exposed to invasion from the government, as it already is from public opinion.

People decide according to their personal preferences. Some, whenever they see any good to be done, or evil to be remedied, would willingly instigate the government to undertake the business; while others prefer to bear almost any amount of social evil, rather than add one to the departments of human interests amenable to governmental control.

And men range themselves on one or the other side in any particular case, according to this general direction of their sentiments;

or according to the degree of interest which they feel in the particular thing which it is proposed t...

The object of this Essay is to assert one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual