and bodily sufferings worse than mental. Still, every pleasant feeling (dvrábela), whether it be physical or spiritual, is pleasure. Every pleasure as such is a good. But some pleasures are bought with great pain and are to be avoided. A man

should exercise his judgment, be prudent in the choice of his pleasures. "The best thing," says Aristippus, "is to possess pleasures without being their slave, not to be devoid of pleasures."

Theodorus, a member of the same school, declares that, since you cannot always enjoy, you should try to reach a happy frame of mind (xapá). Prudence will enable a man to obtain the pleasant and avoid the unpleasant. Pleasure, then, is the end; prudence or insight or reflection (Þpóvŋois), the means of getting the most pleasure out of life.

Hegesias, called Teσiávaтos (persuader to die), the pessimist, admits that we all desire happiness, but holds that complete happiness cannot exist. Hence the chief good is to be free from all trouble and pain, and this end is best attained by those who look upon the efficient causes of pleasure as indifferent. Indeed, death is preferable to life, for death takes us out of the reach of pain.1 Anniceris, too, considers pleasure as the chief good, and the deprivation of it as an evil. Still, a man has natural feelings of benevolence, and ought therefore to submit voluntarily to this deprivation out of regard for his friends and his country.

1 See Cicero, Tusc., 34.

4. Epicurus. According to Epicurus, a later advocate of hedonism, pleasure is the highest good, pain the greatest evil,2 not, however, the positive or active pleasure of the Cyrenaics, pleasure in motion (ἡδονὴ κινητική), but quiet pleasure (ἡδονὴ καταστημатiкń), repose of spirit (arapağía), freedom from pain (àπovía). The latter pleasures, which Epicurus calls pleasures of the soul, are greater than the former, those of the body; just as the pains of the soul are worse than those of the body. For the flesh is only sensible to present joy and affliction, but the soul feels the past, the present, and the future. Physical pleasure does not last as such; only the recollection of it endures. Hence, mental pleasure, i.e., the remembrance of bodily pleasure, which is free from the pains accompanying physical enjoyment, is higher than physical pleasure.

Now how shall we reach the chief good? Although no pleasure is intrinsically bad, we do not choose every pleasure, for many pleasures are followed by greater pains, and many pains are followed by greater pleasures. We must exercise our judgment, we must have prudence or insight (póvnois) to

1 340-270 B.C. Diogenes Laertius, X; Cicero, De finibus, I; Lucretius, De rerum natura; Sextus Empiricus, Adv. math., XI; Ritter and Preller, pp. 373 ff. See my translation of Weber, History of Philosophy, p. 134, note 1.

2They say that there are two passions, pleasure and pain, which affect everything alive, and that the one is natural, and the other foreign to our nature; with reference to which all objects of choice and avoidance are judged of." Diogenes Laertius, English translation, p. 436; see also p. 470.

guide us in our choice of pleasures and in our avoidance of pains. "When therefore we say that pleasure is a chief good, we are not speaking of the pleasures of the debauched man, or those who lie in sensual enjoyment, as some think who are ignorant, and who do not entertain our opinions, or else interpret them perversely; but we mean the freedom of the body from pain, and of the soul from confusion. For it is not continued drinkings and revels, or the enjoyment of female society, or feasts of fish and other such things as a costly table supplies, that make life pleasant, but sober contemplation, which examines the reasons for all choice and avoidance, and which puts to flight the vain opinions from which the greater part of the confusion arises which troubles the soul." "The wise man, the man of insight, understands the causes of things, and will, therefore, be free from prejudice, superstition, fear of death, all of which render one unhappy and hinder the attainment of peace of mind."

In order to be happy, then, you must be prudent, honest, and just. "It is not possible to live pleasantly unless one also lives prudently, and honorably, and justly; and one cannot live prudently, and honestly, and justly, without living pleasantly; for the virtues are connate with living agreeably, and living agreeably is inseparable from the virtues."1

We see how this school develops from a crass hedonism to a somewhat more refined form of it.

1 D. L., pp. 471 f.

M

At first it makes active pleasure, pleasure of a positive sort, the goal, then gradually diminishes its intensity until it becomes painlessness, repose of spirit, peace of mind, in Hegesias and Epicurus. Again, at first it is the pleasure of the moment which is sought after, then the pleasure of a lifetime is conceived as the highest good. Forethought, or prudence, is also insisted on in the course of time as a necessary means of realizing the goal.

5. Democritus.-All these ideas, however, had been advanced by Democritus,1 of Abdera, the materialistic philosopher, long before the appearance of the Cyrenaics. Though this thinker is the first consistent hedonist among the ancients, and the intellectual father of Epicurus, I have placed him at the end of the exposition of ancient hedonism, because his teachings seem to me to be more matured than those of his followers.

According to Democritus, the end of life is pleasure or happiness (εὐέστω, εὐθυμία, ἀθαυμασία, ἀθαμβία, αταραξία, ἁρμονία, ξυμμετρία, εὐδαιμονία), by which he means an inner state of satisfaction, an inner harmony, fearlessness.2 This feeling does not depend upon external goods, on health or sensuous pleasures. In order to attain it man must use his reason. He must be moderate in his desires, because the less he desires, the less apt he is to be disap

1 Bibliography in Weber, p. 55, note 3. See especially Münz, Vorsokratische Ethik.

2 Fragments, 1, 2, 5, 7.

3 Ib., 15, 16.

pointed. He must also distinguish carefully between the different kinds of enjoyment, and select such as preserve and promote health. He must be temperate, for excess defeats itself. Again, sensuous pleasures are of short duration and require repetition, which disturbs one's peace of mind.1 We should seek to obtain the pleasures produced by reflection and the contemplation of beautiful acts. Indeed, the best way to reach the goal is to exercise the mental powers.

All other virtues are valuable in so far as they realize the highest good, pleasure. Justice and benevolence are chief means of doing this. Envy, jealousy, and enmity create discord, which injures everybody. We should be virtuous, for only through virtue.can we reach happiness.2 But we should not only do the right from fear of punishment, since enforced virtue is likely to become secret vice. It is not enough to refrain from doing evil; we should not even desire to do it. Only by doing the right from conviction and because you desire it, can you subserve the ends of virtue and be happy. Happiness, then, is the end; virtue the means of reaching it. 6. Locke. Let us now look at a few pronounced modern representatives of this school. We have already seen that, according to John Locke, every

1 Fragments, 47, 50.

2 Ib., 45, 20, 21, 26, 36.

8 Ib, 117: μὴ διὰ φόβον, ἀλλὰ διὰ τὸν δέον χρεὼν ἀπέχεσθαι ἁμαρτημάτων.

4 Chap. ii, § 6 (2).