ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the group of theories which hold, in the first place, that actions are to be judged as right or wrong according to their consequences; and in the second, that in assessing those consequences pleasure or happiness is the only thing which can properly be regarded as valuable. In addition to the doctrine, Mill adopted a peculiar psychological view with regard to the nature of pleasure. The best means of disproving it is to look into one’s own consciousness and to find out whether one is in fact actuated by desire for pleasure, either present pleasure or pleasure in the long run in every action one undertakes. The judgment of value which the Utilitarian theory makes, is that in assessing the consequences by which the rightness or wrongness of actions are to be established, only pleasure or happiness is of value.
