John Stuart Mill

Abstract

John Stuart Mill was born in 1806, in London. He was the son of James Mill, a friend of Jeremy Bentham’s who shared many of his principles. James intended that his son carry on the radical utilitarian empiricist tradition, and this was reflected in his upbringing: John learned Greek and arithmetic at 3, and helped to edit his father’s book (the History of India) at 11. Mill was influenced by the thought of both Jeremy Bentham and political economist David Ricardo (another friend of his father’s), and himself committed to utilitarianism after reading Bentham’s Traités de Legislation.