Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 8.djvu/376

 362 HASTINGS RASHDALL : I. Firstly then it is asserted that a sum of pleasures is not a possible object of desire. This position would appear to be maintained upon one of two possible grounds : (a) It may be regarded as a corollary of the still more paradoxical doctrine that we never desire pleasure at alL This may mean that we never desire a pleasure, or that we never desire pleasure in general but always a particular pleasure. Prof. Mackenzie would seem to deny the possi- bility of desiring either a pleasure or pleasure in general. What lies at the bottom of these assertions seems to be the undeniable fact that it is impossible to enjoy pleasure in general or a pleasure taken apart from everything else. What we enjoy is always a particular content a pleasant sound, a pleasant sensation, a pleasant activity, a pleasant idea. A man whose consciousness was at any single minute full of nothing but pleasure would be an impossible variety of lunatic : for he would have to admit that he was pleased at just nothing at all. Pleasure apart from the pleasant something is of course a pure abstraction. When a man is. said to desire pleasure, it is meant undoubtedly that he desires pleasant things, and further that he desires them simply because they are pleasant. Is not this a possible state of mind ? It would seem that there are those who would be prepared to deny even this who would say that even a particular pleasure, i.e. (of course), a particular pleasant content is not a possible object of desire. Such a. doctrine claims the high authority of the present Master of Balliol : " Further, when the desire of pleasure thus arises, it is in us combined with a consciousness for which pleasure cannot be the sole or the ultimate end, a consciousness of which, as universal, pleasure is not an adequate end. This may be shown in various ways, the most obvious of which is to point out that pleasure must be had in some object for which there is a desire independently of the pleasure it brings " (The- Critical Philosophy of Kant, ii., p. 229). Now I should fully admit that many probably most oL our desires are not desires for pleasure but " disinterested'' desires " or " desires for objects," and that in all such cases the satisfaction of the desire gives pleasure because the object has been desired ; it is not desired, or at all events it is not desired solely, because it is calculated that the attain- ment of the given object will bring with it pleasure, and more pleasure than could be attained by the pursuit of any other object then within reach. As to what is commonly ,