laws of motion, so is the moral world to those of interest. All men
alike strive after their own happiness. It is the diversity of passions
and tastes, some of which are in accordance with the public interest and
others in opposition to it, which form our virtues and our vices. We
should, therefore, not despise the wicked, but pity them, and thank
heaven that it has given us none of those tastes and passions which
would have obliged us to seek our happiness in other people's
misfortunes. This opinion, although extravagantly stated, was, as we
have seen, but the caricature of the doctrine of utility, as taught by
Locke and held by his followers.

Helvetius took great pains to make the treatment of his theme
interesting. He labored long over every chapter. His pages overflow with
anecdotes, with sneers at monks, and with excuses for lust. They show
the belief in the omnipotence of legislation which was common in his
day. A large space is devoted to minimizing the natural inequality of
mankind, and attributing the differences observable among men to chance
or to education. If Galileo had not happened to be walking in a garden
in Florence where certain workmen asked him a question about a pump, he
would not, according to Helvetius, have discovered the weight of the
atmosphere. It was the fall of the apple which gave Newton his theory of
gravitation. Such puerilities as these disgust us in the book; yet the
theory that greatness is but the result of an inconsiderable accident,
was not unnatural in one who had probably hit on an idea which struck
him as telling, and believed that he had thereby achieved greatness.
[Footnote: Helvetius, i. 130, 183; ii. 7, and passim. For Helvetius, see
Nouvelle Biographie universelle. Morley, Diderot, ii. 141. Grimm, iv.
80. Morellet, i. 71, 140. Morellet represents himself as a tame cat in
Helvetius's house. Marmontel, ii. 115 (liv. vi.) an excellent
description. Compare Locke, i. 261, ii. 97. The doctrine of utility is