IIIMischievousness of Reward latent---Exemplifications When a reward is groundless, it may be so either simply groundless, or positively mischievous: the act, which it is employed to produce, may be either simply useless, or pernicious.
It would be a nugatory lesson to say, that reward should not be applied to produce any act, of which the tendency is acknowledged to be pernicious; and this whether such act have been aggregated to the number of offences or not.The only cases which it can be of any use, in this point of view, to mention, are those in which the mischievousness of the act, or the tendency of the reward to produce it, is apt to lie concealed.
To begin with the cases which come under the former of these descriptions---those in which the mischievousness of the act is apt to lie concealed.One great class of public services, for which rewards have been or might be offered, are those which consist in the extension of knowledge, or, according to the more common, though obscure and imposing phrase, the discovery and propagation of truth.Now there is one way in which rewards offered for the propagation of truth (that is of what is looked upon, or professed to be looked upon, as truth) cannot but have a pernicious tendency; and that of whatever nature be the proposed truth.A point being proposed, concerning which men in general are thought to he ignorant or divided, if a man sincerely desired that the truth relative to that point should be ascertained, and in consequence of that desire is content to furnish the expense of a reward, the natural course is---to invite men to the inquiry.``How stands the matter? Which of the two contradictory propositions is the true one?'' To a question of some such form as this, he requires an answer.The service, then, to which he annexes his reward, is the giving an answer to a question---such an answer as upon examination shall appear to be a true one, or to come nearest to the truth.The tendency of a reward thus offered, to produce the discovery of the truth, is obvious:
the tendency of it will at least be to produce the discovery of what to him, who puts in for the reward, shall appear to be truth.What else should it tend to produce? My aim being to establish what to you shall appear to be the truth, what other means have I of doing this, but by advancing what appears to me to be so? Accordingly, thus to apply the reward, is to promote a sincere and impartial inquiry, and to pursue the best, and indeed the only course that by means of artificial reward can be pursued for promoting real knowledge.
Another course, which has been sometimes taken, is_to assume the truth of the one of two contradictory propositions that may be framed concerning any object of inquiry,---and to make the demonstration of the truth of that proposition the condition of the reward.In this course, the tendency of the reward is pernicious.The habit of veracity is one of the great supports of human society---a virtue which in point of utility ought to be, and in point of fact is, enforced in the highest degree by the moral sanction.To undermine that habit, is to undermine one of the principal supports of human society.The tendency of a reward thus offered is to undermine this virtuous habit, and to introduce the opposite vicious one.The tendency of it may he to produce what is called logical truth, or not, as may happen; but it is, at any rate, to produce ethical falsehood:
it may tend to promote knowledge or error, as it may happen; but it tends, at any rate, to promote mendacity.The proposition either is true or it is false: and, be that as it may, men are either agreed about its being true, or they are not.In as far as they are agreed, the reward is useless; in as far as they are not, it tends to make them act as if they were, and is pernicious.
It may be said---No; all that it tends to do, at least all that it is designed to do, is to call forth such, and such only, whose opinion is really in favour of the proposition, and to put them upon giving their reasons for it: it is not to corrupt their veracity, but to overcome their indolence.But whatever may be the design, the former is in fact its tendency.On the one side, they have reward to urge them; on the other, they have impunity to permit them.For, when a man declares that his opinions on a given subject are so and so, who can say that they are otherwise?---who can say with certainty, what are a man's private opinions?
And if the effect be bad, what signifies the intention? Or how indeed can the intention be pure if it be seen that the effect is likely to be a bad one?
Thus would it stand, were it doubtful whether there are any persons or no, whose unbiassed opinions are on the opposite side to that on which the demonstration is sought to be procured.But the case always is, that it is clear there are such persons; that it is the very persuasion of there being such, that is the cause of offering the reward; and that the more numerous they are, the more likely it is to be offered, and the greater it is likely to be.Such, then, is the danger of promoting mendacity: to avoid which danger, it may be laid down in short terms, as a general rule, that reward should be given --- not for demonstration, but for inquiry.
More than this, a reward thus applied tends always, in a certain degree, to frustrate its own purpose; and is so far, not only inefficacious, but efficacious on the other side.It does as good as tell mankind, that, in the opinion of him at least by whom the reward is offered, the probability is that men's opinions are most likely on the opposite side; and in so far gives them reason to think that the truth is also on the opposite side.``People in general'', a man will naturally say to himself, ``are not of this way of thinking: if they were, what need of all this pains to make them so?'' This, then, affords another reason why reward should he given---not for demonstration, but for inquiry.
