Part 12 (1/2)

However, let us return to the consideration of past goods. And if you were to utter such maxims as might be capable of consoling Caius Marius, and enabling him when banished, indigent, and up to his neck in a marsh, to relieve his anguish by the recollection of his past trophies, I would listen to you, and approve of all you could say. Nor, indeed, can the happiness of a philosopher be complete or continue to the end, if all the admirable discoveries which he has made, and all his virtuous actions, are to be lost by his own forgetfulness. But, in your case, you a.s.sert that the recollection of pleasures which have been felt makes life happy, and of such pleasures too, as affect the body. For if there are any other pleasures, then it is incorrect to say that all the pleasures of the mind originate in its connexion with the body.

But if pleasures felt by the body, even when they are past, can give pleasure, then I do not understand why Aristotle should turn the inscription on the tomb of Sardanapalus into so much ridicule; in which the king of a.s.syria boasts that he has taken with him all his lascivious pleasures. For, says Aristotle, how could those things which even while he was alive he could not feel a moment longer than while he was actually enjoying them, possibly remain to him after he was dead? The pleasure, then, of the body is lost, and flies away at the first moment, and oftener leaves behind reasons for repenting of it than for recollecting it.

Therefore, Africa.n.u.s is happier when addressing his country in this manner-

Cease, Rome, to dread your foes....

And in the rest of his admirable boast-

For you have trophies by my labour raised.

He is rejoicing here in his labours which are past. But you would bid him exult in past pleasures. He traces back his feelings to things which had never had any reference to his body. You cling to the body to the exclusion of everything else.

x.x.xIII. But how can that proposition possibly be maintained which you urge, namely, that all the pleasures and pains of the mind are connected inseparably with the pleasures and pains of the body? Is there, then, nothing which ever delights you, (I know whom I am addressing,) is there nothing, O Torquatus, which ever delights you for its own sake? I say nothing about dignity, honourableness, the beauty of virtue, which I have mentioned before. I will put all these things aside as of less consequence. But is there anything when you are writing, or reading a poem, or an oration, when you are investigating the history of exploits or countries, or anything in a statue, or picture, or pleasant place; in sports, in hunting, or in a villa of Lucullus, (for if I were to say of your own, you would have a loophole to escape through, saying that that had connexion with your body,) is there any of all these things, I say, which you can refer to your body, or do they not please you, if they please you at all, for their own sake?

You must either be the most obstinate of men, if you persist in referring these things, which I have just mentioned, to the body, or else you must abandon Epicurus's whole theory of pleasure, if you admit that they have no connexion with it.

But as for your argument, that the pleasures and pains of the mind are greater than those of the body, because the mind is a partaker of three times,(42) but nothing but what is present is felt by the body; how can it possibly be allowed that a man who rejoices for my sake rejoices more than I do myself? The pleasure of the mind originates in the pleasure of the body, and the pleasure of the mind is greater than that of the body. The result, then, is, that the party who congratulates the other is more rejoiced than he whom he congratulates. But while you are trying to make out the wise man to be happy, because he is sensible of the greatest pleasures in his mind, and, indeed, of pleasures which are in all their parts greater than those which he is sensible of in his body, you do not see what really happens. For he will also feel the pains of the mind to be in every respect greater than those of the body. And so he must occasionally be miserable, whom you endeavour to represent as being always happy. Nor, indeed, will it be possible for you ever to fill up the idea of perfect and uninterrupted happiness while you refer everything to pleasure and pain.

On which account, O Torquatus, we must find out something else which is the chief good of man. Let us grant pleasure to the beasts, to whom you often appeal as witnesses on the subject of the chief good. What will you say, if even the beasts do many things under the guidance of their various natures, partly out of indulgence to other beasts, and at the cost of their own labour, as, for instance, it is very visible in bringing forth and rearing their young, that they have some other object in view besides their own pleasure? and partly, too, when they rejoice in running about and travelling; and some a.s.semble in herds, in such a manner as to imitate in some degree a human state. In some species of birds we see certain indications of affection, knowledge, and memory; in many we see what even looks like a regular system of action. Shall there, then, be in beasts some images of human virtues, quite unconnected with pleasure, and shall there be no virtue in man except for the sake of pleasure? and though he is as superior as can be to all the other animals, shall we still affirm that he has no peculiar attributes given to him by nature?

x.x.xIV. But we, if indeed all things depend on pleasure, are greatly surpa.s.sed by beasts, for which the earth, of her own accord, produces various sorts of food, in every kind of abundance, without their taking any trouble about it; while the same necessaries are scarcely (sometimes I may even use stronger language still) supplied to us, when we seek them with great labour. Nor is it possible that I should ever think that the chief good was the same in the case of a beast and a man. For what can be the use of having so many means and appliances for the carrying out of the most excellent arts,-what can be the use of such an a.s.semblage of most honourable pursuits, of such a crowd of virtues, if they are all got together for no other end but pleasure? As if, when Xerxes, with such vast fleets, such countless troops of both cavalry and infantry, had bridged over the h.e.l.lespont and dug through Mount Athos, had walked across the sea, and sailed(43) over the land, if, when he had invaded Greece with such irresistible violence, any one had asked him for the cause of collecting so vast an army, and waging so formidable a war, and he had replied that he wished to get some honey from Hymettus, certainly he would have been thought to have undertaken such an enterprise for an insufficient cause. And in like manner, if we were to say that a wise man, furnished and provided with numerous and important virtues and accomplishments, not, indeed, travelling like him over sea on foot, and over mountains with his fleet, but embracing the whole heaven, all the earth, and the universal sea with his mind, had nothing in view but pleasure, we might say that he, too, was taking a great deal of trouble for a little honey.

Believe me, Torquatus, we were born for more lofty and n.o.ble ends; and you may see this, not only by considering the parts of the mind, in which there is the recollection of a countless number of things, (and from thence proceed infinite conjectures as to the consequences of them, not very far differing from divination; there is also in them shame, which is the regulator of desire, and the faithful guardians.h.i.+p of justice, so necessary to human society, and a firm enduring contempt for pain and death, shown in the enduring of labours and the encountering of dangers.) All these things, I say, are in the mind. But I would have you consider also the limbs and the senses, which, like the other parts of the body, will appear to you to be not only the companions of the virtues, but also their slaves. What will you say, if many things in the body itself appear to deserve to be preferred to pleasure? such as strength, health, activity, beauty? And if this is the case, how many qualities of the mind will likewise seem so? For in the mind, the old philosophers-those most learned men-thought that there was something heavenly and divine. But if the chief good consisted in pleasure, as you say, then it would be natural that we should wish to live day and night in the midst of pleasure, without any interval or interruption, while all our senses were, as it were, steeped in and influenced wholly by pleasure. But who is there, who is worthy of the name of a man, who would like to spend even the whole of one day in that kind of pleasure? The Cyrenaic philosophers, indeed, would not object. Your sect is more modest in this respect, though their's is perhaps the more sincere.

However, let us contemplate with our minds, not, indeed, these most important arts, which are so valuable, that those who were ignorant of them were accounted useless by our ancestors; but I ask you whether you think that (I will not say Homer, or Archilochus, or Pindar, but) Phidias, or Polycletus, or Zeuxis directed the whole of their skill to cause more pleasure. Shall, then, an artist propose to himself a higher aim, with reference to the beauty of figures, than a virtuous citizen with reference to the n.o.bleness of action? But what other cause can there be for such a blunder being so widely and extensively diffused, except that he who determines that pleasure is the chief good, deliberates not with that part of his mind in which reason and wisdom dwell, but with his desires, that is to say, with the most trifling portion of his mind. For I put the question to you yourself, if there are G.o.ds, as you think that there are, how have they the power of being happy, when they are not able to feel any pleasure in their bodies? or if they are happy, though dest.i.tute of that kind of pleasure, why do you refuse to recognize the possibility of a similar exertion of intellect on the part of a wise man?

x.x.xV. Read, O Torquatus, the panegyrics, not of those men who have been praised by Homer, not the encomiums pa.s.sed on Cyrus, or Agesilaus, or Aristides, or Themistocles, or Philip, or Alexander; but read the praises of our own fellow-countrymen, of the heroes of your own family. You will not find any one praised on the ground of having been a cunning contriver, or procurer, of pleasure. The eulogies on their monuments signify no such thing; like this one which is at one of our gates, ”In whose favour many nations unanimously agree that he was the n.o.blest man of the nation.” Do we think that many nations judged of Calatinus, that he was the n.o.blest man of the nation, because he was the most skilful in the devising of pleasures? Shall we, then, say that there is great hope and an excellent disposition in those young men whom we think likely to consult their own advantage, and to see what will be profitable to themselves? Do we not see what a great confusion of everything would ensue? what great disorder?

Such a doctrine puts an end to all beneficence, to all grat.i.tude, which are the great bonds of agreement. For if you do good to any one for your own sake, that is not to be considered a kindness, but only usury; nor does any grat.i.tude appear due to the man who has benefited another for his own sake.

But if pleasure is the dominant power, it is inevitable that all the virtues must be trampled under foot. For there are many kinds of base conduct, which, unless honourableness is naturally to have the most influence, must, or at least it is not easy to explain why they should not, overcome a wise man; and, not to go hunting for too many instances, it is quite clear, that virtue deservedly praised, must cut off all the approaches of pleasure.

Do not, now, expect any more arguments from me. Look, Torquatus, yourself, into your own mind; turn the question over in all your thoughts; examine yourself, whether you would prefer to pa.s.s your life in the enjoyment of perpetual pleasure, in that tranquillity which you have often felt, free from all pain, with the addition also of that blessing which you often speak of as an addition, but which is, in fact, an impossible one, the absence of all fear; or, while deserving well of all nations, and bearing a.s.sistance and safety to all who are in need of it, to encounter even the distresses of Hercules. For so our ancestors, even in the case of a G.o.d, called labours which were unavoidable by the most melancholy name, distresses.(44) I would require you, and compel you to answer me, if I were not afraid that you might say that Hercules himself performed those exploits, which he performed with the greatest labour for the safety of nations, for the sake of pleasure.

And when I had said this,-I know, said Torquatus, who it is that I have to thank for this; and although I might be able to do something myself, yet I am still more glad to find my friends better prepared than I am.

I suppose you mean Syro and Philodemus, excellent citizens and most learned men. You are right, said he. Come, then, said I. But it would be more fair for Triarius to give some opinion on this discussion of ours.

Indeed, said he smiling, it would be very unfair, at least on this subject: for you manage the question more gently; but this man attacks us after the fas.h.i.+on of the Stoics. Then Triarius said, Hereafter I will speak more boldly still: for I shall have all these arguments which I have just heard ready to my hand; and I will not begin before I see you equipped by those philosophers whom you mention.

And when this had been said, we made an end both of our walk and of our discussion.

Third Book Of The Treatise On The Chief Good And Evil.

I. I think, Brutus, that Pleasure, if she were to speak for herself, and had not such pertinacious advocates, would yield to Virtue, as having been vanquished in the preceding book. In truth, she would be dest.i.tute of shame if she were to resist Virtue any longer, or persist in preferring what is pleasant to what is honourable, or were to contend that a tickling pleasure, as it were, of the body, and the joy arising out of it, is of more importance than dignity of mind and consistency. So that we may dismiss Pleasure, and desire her to confine herself within her own boundaries, so that the strictness of our discussions may not be hindered by her allurements and blandishments. For we have now to inquire what that chief good is which we are anxious to discover; since pleasure is quite unconnected with it, and since nearly the same arguments can be urged against those who have considered freedom from pain as the greatest of goods.

Nor, indeed, can anything be admitted to be the chief good which is dest.i.tute of virtue, to which nothing can be superior. Therefore, although in that discourse which was held with Torquatus we were not remiss, still we have now a much sharper contest before us with the Stoics. For the statements which are made about pleasure are not expressed with any great acuteness or refinement. For they who defend it are not skilful in arguing, nor have those who take the opposite side a very difficult cause to oppose. Even Epicurus himself says, that one ought not even to argue about pleasure, because the decision respecting it depends on the sensations, so that it is sufficient for us to be warned respecting it, and quite unnecessary for us to be instructed. And on this account, that previous discussion of ours was a simple one on both sides; for there was nothing involved or intricate in the discourse of Torquatus, and my own language, as it seems to me, was very clear. But you are not ignorant what a subtle, or I might rather say, th.o.r.n.y kind of arguing it is which is employed by the Stoics. And if it is so among the Greeks, much more so is it among us, who are forced even to invent words, and to give new names to new things. And this is what no one who is even moderately learned will wonder at, when he considers that in every art which is not in common and ordinary use, there is a great variety of new names, as appellations are forced to be given to everything about which each art is conversant.

Therefore, both dialecticians and natural philosophers use those words which are not common in the ordinary conversation of the Greeks; and geometricians, musicians, and grammarians, all speak after a peculiar fas.h.i.+on of their own. And even the rhetoricians, whose art is a forensic one, and wholly directed to the people, still in giving their lessons use words which are, as it were, their peculiar private property.

II. And, without dwelling on the case of these liberal and gentlemanly professions, even artisans would not be capable of exercising their trades properly if they did not use technical words, which are not understood by us, though in common use among them. Agriculture, also, which is as distant as can be from all polite refinement, still marks those matters with which it is conversant by new names. And much more is this course allowable in a philosopher; for philosophy is the art of life, and a man who is discussing that cannot borrow his language from the forum,-although there is no school of philosophers which has made so many innovations as the Stoics. Zeno too, their chief, was not so much a discoverer of new things as of new words. But if, even in that language which most people consider richer than our own, Greece has permitted the most learned men to use words not in ordinary use about subjects which are equally unusual, how much more ought the same licence to be granted to us, who are now venturing to be the very first of our countrymen to touch on such matters?