previous century, viewing sociability as a mere mask for vanity and pride. On the other, he was a "materialist" who helped found modern economics. He tried to demonstrate the universality of human appetites for corporeal pleasures. He argued that the efforts of self-seeking entrepreneurs are the basis of emerging commercial and industrial society, a line of thought that influenced Adam Smith and 19th-century Utilitarianism. A tension arose between these two approaches concerning the relative power of norms and interests, the relationship between motives and behaviour, and the historical variability of human cultures. From around 1750 to 1850, Whig aristocrats in England boasted of their special benevolence for the common people. They claimed to be guiding and counselling reform initiatives to prevent the outbreaks of popular discontent that caused instability and revolution across Europe. However Tory and radical critics accused the Whigs of hypocrisy—alleging they were deliberately using the slogans of reform and democracy to boost themselves into power while preserving their precious aristocratic exclusiveness. Historian L.G. Mitchell defends the Whigs, pointing out that thanks to them radicals always had friends at the centre of the political elite, and thus did not feel as marginalised as in most of Europe. He points out that the debates on the 1832 Reform Bill showed that reformers would indeed receive a hearing at parliamentary level with a good chance of success. Meanwhile, a steady stream of observers from the Continent commented on the English political culture. Liberal and radical observers noted the servility of the English lower classes in the early 19th century, the obsession everyone had with rank and title, the extravagance of the aristocracy, and a pervasive hypocrisy that extended into such areas as social reform. There were not so many conservative visitors. They praised the stability of English society, its ancient constitution, and reverence for the past; they ignored the negative effects of industrialisation. Historians have explored crimes and vices of England's upper classes, especially duelling, suicide, adultery and gambling. They were tolerated by the same courts that executed thousands of poor men and boys for lesser offenses. No aristocrat was punished for killing someone in a duel. However the emerging popular press specialized in sensationalistic stories about upper-class vice, which led the middle classes to focus their critiques on a decadent aristocracy that had much more money, but much less morality than the middle class. Warfare and finance From 1700