Utility

"False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils except destruction."
--Cesare Beccaria(1735-1794) [Bonesana, Marchese di] Italian nobleman, criminologist, and penal reformerSource: Dei delitti e delle pene, [On Crimes and Punishments] ch.38 (1764)

Translation is as quoted by Thomas Jefferson in his _Commonplace Book_, 314 (G. Chinard ed. 1926), which was "the source book and repertory of Jefferson's ideas on government." Id. at 4.