Historical Context - Industrial Revolution & Utilitarianism Hard Times by Charles Dickens and North and South by Elisabeth Gaskell
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Hard Times
Historical Context for the Industrial Revolution
Includes:
Jeremy Bentham’s Utilitarianism
Thomas Carlyle & Utilitarianism
Education in 19th Century Britain
Workhouses & The Poor
Women in the Victorian Period
Religion in the 19th Century
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Essay answer to: How does DIckens make this a dramatic and poignant moment in the novel?
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Alhena Kasem
Hard Times & North and South Context
Philosopher’s in Light of 19C Society and The Industrial Revolution
Jeremy Bentham’s Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism is a philosophy to which an action (or type of action) is right if it tends to
promote happiness or pleasure and wrong if it tends to produce unhappiness or pain—not just for
the performer of the action but also for everyone else affected by it.
Jeremy Bentham, the founder of utilitarianism, described utility as:
"That property in any object, whereby it tends to produce benefit, advantage, pleasure, good, or
happiness … [or] to prevent the happening of mischief, pain, evil, or unhappiness to the party whose
interest is considered."
Utilitarianism is a version of consequentialism, which states that the consequences of any action are
the only standard of right and wrong. Unlike other forms of consequentialism, such as egoism and
altruism, utilitarianism considers the interests of all humans equally.
Thomas Carlyle & Utilitarianism
Thomas Carlyle had called Bentham's utilitarianism “a philosophy fit for swine,” contending that it
encouraged people to live like pigs, pursuing pleasure by any means possible. If the only good is
feeling good, Carlyle had argued, human beings are no better than pigs.
Thomas Carlyle was an acerbic conservative social thinker, given to assuming the fundamental
legitimacy of social and political hierarchies and hostile to democracy.
The Condition-of-England question was a debate in the Victorian era over the issue of the English
working-class during the Industrial Revolution. It was first proposed by Thomas Carlyle in his essay
Chartism.
He criticised the ethos of the Industrial Revolution, which, he believed, was destroying human
individuality. He expressed his distrust of the spirit of the "mechanical age", which was manifested
not only in the technical progress of English society but also in an overwhelming feeling of lack of
mental or spiritual vigour and enthusiasm:
In "Signs of the Times", Carlyle warned that the Industrial Revolution was turning people into
mechanical automatons devoid of individuality and spirituality. For Carlyle, machine and
mechanisation had double meaning: they meant literally new technical devices, but also
metaphorically mechanistic thought that suppresses human freedom. Carlyle strongly criticised the
mechanisation of the human spirit and indicated the high moral costs of industrial change.
In this essay, Carlyle led a crusade against scientific materialism, Utilitarianism and the laissez-faire
system. He believed that the freedom of the emerging mechanical society in England was a delusion
because it made workers into greater slaves than their ancient counterparts had been and because
mechanization of society threatened the human ability to think and act creatively.
In "Signs of the Times", Carlyle tried to reshape public opinion about the present Condition of
England, which he found unbearable. His criticism of the "mechanical society" produced a
, memorable narrative in Charles Dickens's novel Hard Times, whose subtitle For These Times is
indebted to Carlyle's essay.
Mill & Utilitarianism
Mill was an advocate of individual rights, progressive social policies, and utilitarianism (which
promotes actions that do "the greatest good for the greatest number").
Mill defines utilitarianism as a theory based on the principle that "actions are right in proportion as
they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness." Mill
defines happiness as pleasure and the absence of pain.
Mill's most important contributions as a philosopher and economist was his advocacy for mandatory
and widespread education for all citizens, including the poor, as a way to provide a fair start in what
he called the "race of life" for all people so that everyone would have the opportunity to prosper.
Education in 19C Britain
Teaching was mainly by rote, with children learning things by simply repeating and memorizing what
was said by their teachers. There was little room for creativity or developing talents; an emphasis
was placed on learning to read and write.
In early Victorian England, most children never went to school at all and grew up unable to read or
write. Instead they were sent out to work to earn money for their families. Only the upper and
middle class children went to school.
They learned reading, writing, math, geography, and history. Teachers would call a group of students
to the front of the classroom for their lesson, while other grades worked at their seats. Sometimes
older kids helped teach the younger pupils.
In the 19th century, study was for around 50 days less, with lessons commonly starting at 9 a.m. and
finishing in the afternoon, with five hours being more typical. This type of arrangement was needed
because students may have had to work and couldn't balance education and work otherwise.
Millions of people moved during the Industrial Revolution. Some simply moved from a village to a
town in the hope of finding work whilst others moved from one country to another in search of a
better way of life. Some had no choice; being relocated within the country was a punishment for
some crimes.
The main reason for migrating during the 19th century was to find work. On one hand this involved
migration from the countryside to the growing industrial cities, on the other it involved movement
from one country, in this case Britain, to another. Poor working conditions, housing and sanitation
led to many people opting to emigrate.
Crowded and filthy streets such as these were typical of the homes found in ‘slum’ areas in Cities.
These were the homes of the bulk of the working classes during the Industrial Revolution. Poor
people often lived in small houses in cramped streets. These homes would share toilet facilities,
have open sewers (initially at least) and would be susceptible to damp. Conditions did improve
during the 19th century as a number of public health acts were introduced covering things such as
sewage, sanitation and imposing some restrictions upon the construction of homes.
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