John Stuart Mill

He who does any­thing be­cause it is the cus­tom, makes no choice. He gains no prac­tice either in dis­cern­ing or in de­sir­ing what is best. The men­tal and moral, like the mus­cu­lar powers, are im­proved only by be­ing used. The fac­ulties are called into no ex­er­cise by do­ing a thing merely be­cause oth­ers do it, no more than by be­liev­ing a thing only be­cause oth­ers be­lieve it. If the grounds of an opin­ion are not con­clus­ive to the per­son’s own reason, his reason can­not be strengthened, but is likely to be weakened by his ad­opt­ing it: and if the in­duce­ments to an act are not such as are con­sentan­eous to his own feel­ings and char­ac­ter (where af­fec­tion, or the rights of oth­ers, are not con­cerned), it is so much done to­wards ren­der­ing his feel­ings and char­ac­ter in­ert and tor­pid, in­stead of act­ive and en­er­getic.

He who lets the world, or his own por­tion of it, choose his plan of life for him, has no need of any other fac­ulty than the ape­like one of im­it­a­tion. He who chooses his plan for him­self, em­ploys all his fac­ulties. He must use ob­ser­va­tion to see, reas­on­ing and judg­ment to fore­see, activ­ity to gather ma­ter­i­als for de­cision, dis­crim­in­a­tion to de­cide, and when he has de­cided, firm­ness and self-con­trol to hold to his de­lib­er­ate de­cision.

To be held to ri­gid rules of justice for the sake of oth­ers, de­vel­ops the feel­ings and ca­pa­cit­ies which have the good of oth­ers for their ob­ject. But to be re­strained in things not af­fect­ing their good, by their mere dis­pleas­ure, de­vel­ops noth­ing valu­able, ex­cept such force of char­ac­ter as may un­fold it­self in res­ist­ing the re­straint. If ac­qui­esced in, it dulls and blunts the whole nature. To give any fair-play to the nature of each, it is es­sen­tial that dif­fer­ent per­sons should be al­lowed to lead dif­fer­ent lives.

per­son who shows rash­ness, ob­stin­acy, self-con­ceit—who can­not live within mod­er­ate means—who can­not re­strain him­self from hurt­ful in­dul­gences—who pur­sues an­imal pleas­ures at the ex­pense of those of feel­ing and in­tel­lect—must ex­pect to be lowered in the opin­ion of oth­ers, and to have a less share of their fa­vour­able sen­ti­ments; but of this he has no right to com­plain, un­less he has mer­ited their fa­vour by spe­cial ex­cel­lence in his so­cial re­la­tions, and has thus es­tab­lished a title to their good of­fices, which is not af­fected by his de­mer­its to­wards him­self.

The mis­chief be­gins when, in­stead of call­ing forth the activ­ity and powers of in­di­vidu­als and bod­ies, it sub­sti­tutes its own activ­ity for theirs; when, in­stead of in­form­ing, ad­vising, and, upon oc­ca­sion, de­noun­cing, it makes them work in fet­ters, or bids them stand aside and does their work in­stead of them

Design must be proved before a designer can be inferred. The matter in controversy is the existence of design in the Universe, and it is not permitted to assume the contested premises and thence infer the matter in dispute.

The belief of an infinity of creative and created Gods, each more eminently requiring an intelligent author of his being than the foregoing, is a direct consequence of the premises, which you have stated. The assumption that the Universe is a design, leads to a conclusion that there are infinity of creative and created Gods, which is absurd

To suppose some existence beyond, or above them, is to invent a second and superfluous hypothesis to account for what has already been accounted for by the laws of motion and the properties of matter. I admit that the nature of these laws is incomprehensible, but the hypothesis of a Deity adds a gratuitous difficulty, which so far from alleviating those that it is adduced to explain, requires new hypotheses for the elucidation of its own inherent contradictions

. The criteria of order and disorder are as various as those beings from whose opinions and feelings they result.

It is manifest that we cannot reason with respect to the universal system from that which only exists in relation to our own perceptions.

it requires, indeed, a mind considerably tinctured with science, and enlarged by cultivation to contemplate itself, not as the centre and model of the Universe, but as one of the infinitely various multitude of beings of which it is actually composed.