116 See Republic, ix. pp. 581-582, where he compares the pleasures of the three different lives. 1. Ὁ φιλόσοφος or φιλομαθής. 2. Ὁ φιλύτιμος. 3. Ὁ φιλοκερδής.

Again in the Phædon, he tells us that we are not to weigh pleasures against pleasures, or pains against pains, but all of them against φρόνησις or Intelligence (p. 69 A-B). This appears distinctly to contradict what Sokrates affirms in the Protagoras. But when we turn to another passage of the Phædon (p. 114 E), we find Sokrates recognising a class of pleasures attached to the exercise of Intelligence, and declaring them to be more valuable than the pleasures of sense, or any others. This is a very different proposition: but in both passages Plato had probably the same comparison in his mind.

Sydenham, in a note to his translation of the Philêbus (pp. 42-43), observes — “if Protarchus, when he took on himself to be an advocate for pleasure, had included, in his meaning of the word, all such pleasures as are purely mental, his opinion, fairly and rightly understood, could not have been different in the main, from what Sokrates here professes — That in every particular case, to discern what is best in action, and to perceive what is true in speculation, is the chief good of man; unless, indeed, it should afterwards come into question which of the two kinds of pleasure, the sensual or the mental, was to be preferred. For if it should appear that in this point they were both of the same mind, the controversy between them would be found a mere logomachy, or contention about words (as between Epicureans and Stoics), of the same kind as that would be between two persons, one of whom asserted that to a musical ear the proper and true good was Harmony, while the other contended that the good lay not in the Harmony itself, but in the pleasure which the musical ear felt from hearing it: or like a controversy among three persons, one of whom having asserted that to all animals living under the northern frigid zone, the Sun in Cancer was the greatest blessing; and another having asserted that not the Sun was that chief blessing to those northern animals, but the warmth which he afforded them; the third should imagine that he corrected or amended the two former by saying — That those animals were thus highly blest neither by the Sun, nor by the warmth which his rays afforded them, but by the joy or pleasure which they felt from the return of the Sun and warmth.”

117 Plato, in Philêbus, p. 63 C-D, denounces and discards the vehement pleasures because they disturb the right exercise of Reason and Intelligence. Aristotle, after alluding to this doctrine, presents the same fact under a different point of view, as one case of a general law. Each variety of pleasure belongs to, and is consequent on, a certain ἐνέργεια of the system. Each variety of pleasure promotes and consummates its own ἐνέργεια, but impedes or arrests other different ἐνεργείας. Thus the pleasures of hunting, of gymnastic contest, of hearing or playing music — cause each of these ἐνεργεῖαι, upon which each pleasure respectively depends, to be more completely developed; but are unfavourable to different ἐνεργεῖαι, such as learning by heart, or solving a geometrical problem. The pleasure belonging to these latter, again, is unfavourable to the performance of the former ἐνεργεῖαι. Study often hurts health or good management of property; but if a man has pleasure in study, he will perform that work with better fruit and result.

This is a juster view of ἡδονὴ than what we read in the Philêbus. The illogical antithesis of Pleasure in genere, against Intelligence, finds no countenance from Aristotle.

See Ethic. Nikom. vii. 13, 1153, a. 20; x. 5, p. 1175; also Ethic. Magna, ii. p. 1206, a. 3.

118 Plato, Philêbus, p. 44 B.

119 Among the arguments employed by Sokrates in the Philêbus to disprove the identity between ἡδονὴ and ἀγαθόν, one is, that ἡδονὴ is a γένεσις, and is therefore essentially a process of imperfection or transition into some ulterior οὐσία, for the sake of which alone it existed (Philêbus, pp. 53-55); whereas Good is essentially an οὐσία — perfect, complete, all-sufficient — and must not be confounded with the process whereby it is brought about. He illustrates this by telling us that the species of γένεσις called ship-building exists only for the sake of the ship — the οὐσία in which it terminates; but that the fabricating process, and the result in which it ends, are not to be confounded together.

The doctrine that pleasure is a γένεσις, Plato cites as laid down by others: certain κομψοί, whom he does not name, but whom the critics suppose to be Aristippus and the Kyrenaici. Aristotle (in the seventh and tenth books of Ethic. Nik.) also criticises and impugns the doctrine that pleasure is a γένεσις: but he too omits to name the persons by whom it was propounded.

Possibly Aristippus may have been the author of it: but we can hardly tell what he meant, or how he defended it. Plato derides him for his inconsistency in calling pleasure a γένεσις, while he at the same time maintained it to be the Good: but the derision is founded upon an assumption which Aristippus would have denied. Aristippus would not have admitted that all γένεσις existed only for the sake of οὐσία: and he would have replied to Plato’s argument, illustrated by the example of ship-building, by saying that the οὐσία called a ship existed only for the sake of the services which it was destined to render in transporting persons and goods: that if γένεσις existed for the sake of οὐσία, it was no less true that οὐσία existed for the sake of γένεσις. Plato therefore had no good foundation for the sarcasm which he throws out against Aristippus.

The reasoning of Aristotle (E. N. x. 3-4; compare Eth. Magn. ii. 1204-1205) against the doctrine, that pleasure is γένεσις or κίνησις, is drawn from a different point of view, and is quite as unfavourable to the opinions of Plato as to those of Aristippus. His language however in the Rhetoric is somewhat different (i. p. 1370, b. 33).

Aristippus is said to have defined pleasure as λεία κίνησις, and pain as τραχεῖα κίνησις (Diog. L. ii. 86-89). The word κίνησις is so vague, that one can hardly say what it means, without some words of context: but I doubt whether he meant anything more than “a marked change of consciousness”. The word γένεσις is also very obscure: and we are not sure that Aristippus employed it.

120 Plato, Philêbus, p. 47 B.

121 I have already remarked that Eudoxus is characterised by Aristotle as being διαφερόντως σώφρων (Ethic. Nikom. x. 2). The strong interest which he felt in scientific pursuits is marked by a story in Plutarch (Non Posse Suaviter Vivi; see Epicur. p. 1094 A).

122 The equivocal sense of the word Pleasure is the same as that which Plato notes in the Symposion to attach to Eros or Love (p. 205). When employed in philosophical discussion, it sometimes is used (and always ought to be used) in its full extent of generic comprehension: sometimes in a narrower sense, so as to include only a few of the more intense pleasures, chiefly the physical, and especially the sexual; sometimes in a sense still more peculiar, partly as opposed to duty, partly as opposed to business, work, utility, &c. Opponents of the Hedonists took advantage of the unfavourable associations attached to the word in these narrower and special senses, to make objections tell against the theory which employed the word in its widest generic sense.

123 See the beautiful lines of Lucretius, Book ii. init. When we read the three acrimonious treatises in which Plutarch attacks the Epikureans (Non Posse Suaviter Vivi, adv. Koloten, De Latenter Vivendo), we find him complaining, not that Epikurus thought too much about pleasures, or that he thought too much about the intense pleasures, but quite the reverse. Epikurus (he says) made out too poor a catalogue of pleasures: he was too easily satisfied with a small amount and variety of pleasures: he dwelt too much upon the absence of pain, as being, when combined with a very little pleasure, as much as man ought to look for: he renounced all the most vehement and delicious pleasures, those of political activity and contemplative study, which constitute the great charms of life (1097 F-1098 E-1092 E-1093-1094). Plutarch attacks Epikurus upon grounds really Hedonistic.

124 Sokrates in the Gorgias insists upon the constant intermixture of pleasure with pain, as an argument to prove that pleasure cannot be identical with good: pleasure and pain (he says) go together but good and evil cannot go together: therefore pleasure cannot be good, pain cannot be evil (Gorgias, pp. 496-497). But he distinguishes pleasures into the good and the bad; not into the true and the false, as they are distinguished in the Philêbus and the Republic (ix. pp. 583-585).

125 Plato, Philêbus, p. 58 B-D-E. Οὐ τοῦτο ἕγωγε ἐζήτουν πω, τίς τέχνη ἢ τίς ἐπιστήμη πασῶν διαφέρει τῷ μεγίστη καὶ ἀρίστη καὶ πλεῖστα ὠφελοῦσα ἡμᾶς, ἀλλὰ τίς ποτε τὸ σαφὲς καὶ τἀκριβὲς καὶ τὸ ἀληθέστατον ἐπισκοπεῖ, κἂν εἰ σμικρὰ καὶ σμικρὰ ὀνίνασα … Ἀλλ’ ὅρα· οὐδὲ γὰρ ἀπεχθήσει Γοργίᾳ, τῇ μὲν ἐκείνου ὑπερέχειν τέχνῃ διδοὺς πρὸς χρείαν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις, πρὸς ἀκριβείαν δὲ ᾖ εἶπον ἐγὼ νῦν πραγματείᾳ … μήτ’ εἴς τινας ὠφελείας ἐπιστημῶν βλέψαντες μήτε τινὰς εὐδοκιμίας, ἀλλ’ εἴ τις πέφυκε τῆς ψυχῆς ἡμῶν δύναμις ἐρᾷν τε τοῦ ἀληθοῦς καὶ πάντα ἕνεκα τούτου πράττειν.

Here, as elsewhere, I translate the substance of the passage, adopting the amendments of Dr. Badham and Mr. Poste (see Mr. Poste’s note), which appear to me valuable improvements of a confused text.

It seems probable enough that what is here said, conceding so large a measure of credit to Gorgias and his art, may be intended expressly as a mitigation of the bitter polemic assigned to Sokrates in the Gorgias. This is, however, altogether conjecture.

126 Plato, Republ. v. 473 D.

127 Aristotel. Metaphys. A. p. 983, a. 25, b. 10.

128 Plato, Philêb. pp. 57-58. Compare Republic, vii. pp. 531-532.

129 Plato, Philêbus, pp. 36 C. 38 A.

The various arguments, intended to prove this conclusion, are continued from p. 36 to p. 51. The same doctrine is advocated by Sokrates in the Republic, ix. pp. 583-584.

The doctrine is briefly stated by the Platonist Nemesius, De Natur. Hominis, p. 223. καὶ γὰρ κατὰ Πλάτωνα τῶν ἡδονῶν αἱ μέν εἰσι ψευδεῖς, αἱ δὲ ἀληθεῖς. Ψευδεῖς μέν, ὅσαι μετ’ αἰσθήσεως γίγνονται καὶ δόξης οὐκ ἀληθοῦς, καὶ λύπας ἔχουσι συμπεπλεγμένας· ἀληθεῖς δέ, ὅσαι τῆς ψυχῆς εἰσι μόνης αὐτῆς καθ’ ἑαυτὴν μετ’ ἐπιστήμης καὶ νοῦ καὶ φρονήσεως, καθαραὶ καὶ ἀνεπίμικτοι λύπης, αἶς οὐδεμία μετάνοια παρακολουθεῖ ποτέ.

A brief but clear abstract of the argument will be found in Dr. Badham’s Preface to the Philêbus (pp. viii.-xi.). Compare also Stallbaum’s Prolegg. ch. v. p. 50, seq.

130 This is what Aristotle means when he says:— τῆς ἡδονῆς δ’ ἐν ὁτῳοῦν χρόνῳ τέλειον τὸ εἶδος … τῶν ὅλων τι καὶ τελείων ἡ ἡδονή (Eth. Nik. x. 3, 1174, b. 4).

131 Plato, Philêbus, pp. 43-44; Republic, ix. p. 583.

I copy the following passage from Professor Bain’s work on “The Emotions and the Will,” the fullest and most philosophical account of the emotions that I know (pp. 615-616; 3rd ed., pp. 550 seq.):—

“It is a general law of the mental constitution, more or less recognised by inquirers into the human mind, that change of impression is essential to consciousness in every form.… There are notable examples to show, that one unvarying action upon the senses fails to give any perception whatever. Take the motion of the earth about its axis and through space, whereby we are whirled with immense velocity, but at a uniform pace, being utterly insensible of the circumstance.… It is the change from rest to motion that wakens our sensibility, and, conversely, from motion to rest. A uniform condition, as respects either state, is devoid of any quickening influence on the mind.… We have repeatedly seen pleasures depending for their existence on previous pains, and pains on pleasures experienced or conceived. Such are the contrasting states of Liberty and Restraint, Power and Impotence. Many pleasures owe their effect as such to mere cessation. For example, the pleasures of exercise do not need to be preceded by pain: it is enough that there has been a certain intermission, coupled with the nourishment of the exhausted parts. These are of course our best pleasures. By means of this class, we might have a life of enjoyment without pain: although, in fact, the other is more or less mixed up in every one’s experience. Exercise, Repose, the pleasures of the different Senses and Emotions, might be made to alternate, so as to give a constant succession of pleasure: each being sufficiently dormant during the exercise of the others, to reanimate the consciousness when its turn comes. It also happens that some of those modes of delight are increased, by being preceded by a certain amount of a painful opposite. Thus, confinement adds to the pleasure of exercise, and protracted exertion to that of repose. Fasting increases the enjoyment of meals; and being much chilled prepares us for a higher zest in the accession of warmth. It is not necessary, however, in those cases, that the privation should amount to positive pain, in order to the existence of the pleasure. The enjoyment of food may be experienced, although the previous hunger may not be in any way painful: at all events, with no more pain than the certainty of the coming meal can effectually appease. There is still another class of our delights depending entirely upon previous suffering, as in the sudden cessation of acute pains, or the sudden relief from great depression. Here the rebound from one nervous condition to another is a stimulant of positive pleasure: constituting a small, but altogether inadequate, compensation for the prior misery. The pleasurable sensation of good health presupposes the opposite experience in a still larger measure. Uninterrupted health, though an instrumentality for working out many enjoyments, of itself gives no sensation.”

It appears to me that this passage of Mr. Bain’s work discriminates and sets out what there is of truth in Plato’s doctrine about the pure and painless pleasures. In his first volume (The Senses and the Intellect) Mr. Bain has laid down and explained the great fundamental fact of the system, that it includes spontaneous sources of activity; which, after repose and nourishment, require to be exerted, and afford a certain pleasure in the course of being exerted. There is no antecedent pain to be relieved: but privation (which is only a grade and variety of pain, and sometimes considerable pain) is felt if the exertion be hindered. This doctrine of spontaneous activity, employed by Mr. Bain successfully to explain a large variety of mental phenomena, is an important and valuable extension of that which Aristotle lays down in the Ethics, that pleasure is an accessory or adjunct of ἐνέργεια ἀνεμπόδιστος (ἐνέργεια τῆς κατὰ φύσιν ἕξεως Eth. N. vii. 13, 1153, a. 15), without any view to obtain any separate extraneous pleasure or to relieve any separate extraneous pain (καθ’ αὑτὰς δ’ εἰσὶν αἱρεταί, ἀφ’ ὦν μηδὲν ἐπιζητεῖται παρὰ τὴν ἐνέργειαν, E. N. x. 6, 1176, b. 6).

132 Plato, Philêbus, p. 51 A. πρὸς τὸ τινὰς ἡδονὰς εἶναι δοκούσας, οὔσας δ’ οὐδαμῶς, &c. τὸ φαινόμενον ἀλλ’ οὐκ ὄν, p. 42 C, which last sentence is better explained (I think) in the note of Dr. Badham than in that of Mr. Poste.

Mr. Poste observes justly, in his note on p. 40 C:— “The falsely anticipated pleasure in mistaken Hope may be called, as it is here called, False Pleasure. This is, however, an inaccurate expression. It is not the Pleasure, but the Imagination of it (i.e. the Imagination or Opinion) that is false. Sokrates therefore does not dwell upon this point, though Protarchus allows the expression to pass.” The last phrase of the passage which I have thus transcribed (“Sokrates therefore does not dwell upon this point”) is less accurate than that which precedes: for it seems to imply that the Sokrates of Philêbus admits the inaccuracy of the expression, which seems to me not borne out by the text of the dialogue. Both here and elsewhere in the dialogue, the doctrine, that many pleasures are false, is maintained by Sokrates distinctly — τὸ ἥδεσθαι is put upon the same footing as τὸ δοξάζειν, which may be either ἀληθῶς or ψευδῶς.

When Sokrates (p. 37 B) puts the question, “You admit that δόξα may be either ἀληθὴς or ψευδής: how then can you argue that ἡδονή must be always ἀληθής?” the answer is, that pleasure is not, if we speak correctly, either true or false: neither one predicate nor the other is properly applicable to it: we can only so apply them by a metaphor, altogether misleading in philosophical reasoning. When Sokrates further argues (37 D), “You admit that some qualifying predicates may be applied to pleasures and pain, great or small, durable or transient, &c. You admit that an opinion may be correct or mistaken in its object, and when it is the latter you call it false: why is not the pleasure which accompanies a false opinion to be called false also?” Protarchus refuses distinctly to admit this, saying, “I have already affirmed that on that supposition the opinion is false: but no man will call the pleasure false” (p. 38 A).

133 Plato, Philêbus, p. 51 C. ταῦτα γὰρ οὐκ εἶναι πρός τι καλὰ λέγω, καθάπερ ἄλλα, ἀλλ’ ἀεὶ καλὰ καθ’ αὑτὰ πεφυκέναι, καί τινας ἡδονὰς οἰκείας ἔχειν, οὐδὲν ταῖς τῶν κνήσεων προσφερεῖς.

51 D: τὰς τῶν φωνῶν τὰς λείας καὶ λαμπράς, τὰς ἕν τι καθαρὸν ἱείσας μέλος, οὐ πρὸς ἕτερον καλὰς ἀλλ’ αὐτὰς καθ’ αὑτὰς εἶναι, καὶ τούτων ξυμφύτους ἡδονὰς ἑπομένας.

134 Plato, Philêbus, p. 62 B.

We may illustrate the doctrine of the Philêbus about pleasures and pains, by reference to a dictum of Sokrates quoted in the Xenophontic Memorabilia (iii. 13).

Some person complained to Sokrates that he had lost his appetite — that he no longer ate with any pleasure (ὅτι ἀηδῶς ἔσθιοι) — “The physician Akumenus (so replied Sokrates) teaches us a good remedy in such a case. Leave off eating: after you have left off, you will come back into a more pleasurable, easy, and healthful condition.”

Now let us suppose the like complaint to be addressed to the Platonic Sokrates. What would have been his answer?

The Sokrates of the Protagoras would have regarded the complainant as suffering under a misfortune, and would have tried to suggest some remedy: either the prescription of Akumenus, or any other more promising that he could think of. The Sokrates of the Phædon, on the contrary, would have congratulated him on the improvement in his condition, inasmuch as the misguiding and degrading ascendancy, exercised by his body over his mind, was suppressed in one of its most influential channels: just as Kephalus, in the Republic (i. 329), is made to announce it as one of the blessings of old age, that the sexual appetite has left him. The Sokrates of the Philêbus, also, would have treated the case as one for congratulation, but he would have assigned a different reason. He would have replied: “The pleasures of eating are altogether false. You never really had any pleasure in eating. If you believed yourself to have any, you were under an illusion. You have reason to rejoice that this illusion has now passed away: and to rejoice the more, because you have come a step nearer to the most divine scheme of life.”

Speusippus (the nephew and successor of Plato), if he had been present, would have re-assured the complainant in a manner equally decided. He would have said nothing, however, about the difference between true and false pleasures: he would have acknowledged them all as true, and denounced them all as mischievous. He would have said (see Aul. Gell. ix. 5): “The condition which you describe is one which I greatly envy. Pleasure and Pain are both, alike and equally, forms of Evil. I eat, to relieve the pain of hunger: but unfortunately, I cannot do so without experiencing some pleasure; and I thus incur evil in the other and opposite form. I am ashamed of this, because I am still kept far off from Good, or the point of neutrality: but I cannot help myself. You are more fortunate: you avert one evil, pain, without the least alloy of the other evil, pleasure: what you attain is thus pure Good. I hope your condition may long continue, and I should be glad to come into it myself.”

Not only the sincere pleasure-haters, but also other theorists indicated by Aristotle, would have warmly applauded this pure ethical doctrine of Speusippus; not from real agreement with it, but in order to edify the audience. They would say to one another aside: “This is not true; but we must do all we can to make people believe it. Since every one is too fond of pleasures, and suffers himself to be enslaved by them, we must pull in the contrary direction, in order that we may thereby bring people into the middle line.” (Aristot. Eth. Nikom. x. 1, 1172, a. 30.)

It deserves to be remarked that Aristotle, in alluding to these last theorists, disapproves their scheme of Ethical Fictions, or of falsifying theory in order to work upon men’s minds by edifying imposture; while Plato approves and employs this scheme in the Republic. Aristotle even recognises it as a fault in various persons, that they take too little delight in bodily pleasures — that a man is τοιοῦτος οἷος ἧττον ἢ δεῖ τοῖς σωματικοῖς χαίρων (Ethic. Nikom. vii. 11, 1151, b. 24).