Page:The academic questions, treatise de finibus, and Tusculan disputations.djvu/166

 never referred to anything. So far was very well said; and, perhaps, if it had been necessary, you would also have defined the Good itself, and told us what that was; making it to be that which is desirable by nature, or that which is profitable, or that which is useful, or that which is pleasant: and now, since you have no general objections to giving definitions, and do it when you please, if it is not too much trouble, I should be glad if you would define what is pleasure, for that is what all this discussion relates to.

As if, said he, there were any one who is ignorant what pleasure is, or who is in need of any definition to enable him to understand it better.

I should say, I replied, that I myself am such a man, if I did not seem to myself to have a thorough acquaintance with, and an accurate idea and notion of, pleasure firmly implanted in my mind. But, at present, I say that Epicurus himself does not know, and that he is greatly in error on this subject; and that he who mentions the subject so often ought to explain carefully what the meaning of the words he uses is, but that he sometimes does not understand what the meaning of this word pleasure is, that is to say, what the idea is which is contained under this word.

III. Then he laughed, and said,—This is a capital idea, indeed, that he who says that pleasure is the end of all things which are to be desired, the very extreme point and limit of Good, should be ignorant of what it is, and of what is its character. But, I replied, either Epicurus is ignorant of what pleasure is, or else all the rest of the world are. How so? said he.

Because all men feel that this is pleasure which moves the senses when they receive it, and which has a certain agreeableness pervading it throughout. What then, said he, is Epicurus ignorant of that kind of pleasure? Not always, I replied; for sometimes he is even too well acquainted with it, inasmuch as he declares that he is unable even to understand where it is, or what any good is, except that which is enjoyed by the instrumentality of meat or drink, or the pleasure of the ears, or sensual enjoyment: is not this what he says? As if, said he, I were ashamed of these things, or as if I were unable to explain in what sense these things are said. I do not doubt, I replied, that you can do so easily; nor is there any reason why you need be ashamed of arguing with a wise