 Conservatives reject the liberal’s concept of abstract, ahistorical and universal rights, derived from the nature of human agency and autonomy, and possessed even when unrecognised, for instance by slaves in Ancient Greece (on abstract rights, see for instance Gewirth 1983). For conservatives, a priori claims such as L.T. Hobhouse’s “The proper end of government is the uncovering of civil liberties”, are doubly mistaken (Hobhouse 1964 [1911]: 19); government does not have such ends, and “uncovering civil liberties” is particularly disruptive. However, while Hobhouse, Rawls and Dworkin defend abstract and universal rights, liberals such as Mill are more historically-sensitive—through the influence of Coleridge, he drew on aspects of conservative thought. Mill’s abstract utility principle becomes conservative in operation, through his emphasis on the malleability and educability of character; our preferences, desires, and tastes arise from existing institutions, and so any abstract institutional blueprint fails to maximise utility. For Mill, a nation’s history and society decide the best apparatus of government, and he locates Coleridgean “Ideas” in “organic” historical institutions—their original purpose and meaning. However, Mill’s perfectionism contrasts with conservative pessimism about human nature, and he rejected what he called “intuitionism”, which fosters conservatism by assuring people that anything they believe deeply enough must be true; rather, he holds that inveterate beliefs must be justified by reason (Mill, Autobiography, CW, I: 233; Skorupski 2010: 24). Despite the influence of Coleridge, therefore, Mill remained a liberal and not a conservative, who valued reason above Burkean prejudice.