“Because of the very fact that pleasure is our primary and congenital good we do not select every pleasure; there are times when we forgo certain pleasures, particularly when they are followed by too much unpleasantness.

Furthermore, we regard certain states of pain as preferable to pleasures, particularly when greater satisfaction results from our having submitted to discomforts for a long period of time.

Thus every pleasure is a good by reason of its having a nature akin to our own, but not every pleasure is desirable. In like manner every state of pain is an evil, but not all pains are uniformly to be rejected.

At any rate, it is our duty to judge all such cases by measuring pleasures against pains, with a view to their respective assets and liabilities, inasmuch as we do experience the good as being bad at times and, contrariwise, the bad as being good.”

(Letter to Menoeceus, II)

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“Let us go back again to the good being sought, whatever it might be. For it appears to be one thing in one action or art, another in another: it is a different thing in medicine and in generalship, and so on with the rest. What, then, is the good in each of these? Or is it that for the sake of which everything else is done? In medicine, this is health; in generalship, victory; in house building, a house; and in another, it would be something else. But in every action and choice, it is the end involved, since it is for the sake of this that all people do everything else. As a result, if there is some end of all actions, this would be the good related to action; and if there are several, then it would be these. …

Happiness above all seems to be of this character, for we always choose it on account of itself and never on account of something else. Yet honor, pleasure, intellect, and every virtue we choose on their own account—for even if nothing resulted from them, we would choose each of them—but we choose them also for the sake of happiness, because we suppose that, through them, we will be happy. But nobody chooses happiness for the sake of these things, or, more generally, on account of anything else.”

(Nicomachean Ethics, 1.7)

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“It should be recognized that within the category of desire certain desires are natural, certain others unnecessary and trivial; that in the case of the natural desires certain ones are necessary, certain others merely natural; and that in the case of necessary desires certain ones are necessary for happiness, others to promote freedom from bodily discomfort, others for the maintenance of life itself.”

(Letter to Menoeceus, 2)

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“For a rational being, the only unbearable thing is unreasonableness, but anything reasonable is bearable. Being beaten isn’t in itself unbearable.

‘What do you mean?’

Look at it this way: the Spartans submit to being flogged once they’ve realized that it’s a reasonable thing to do.

‘But being hanged is unbearable, isn’t it?’

Except that when a person feels that it’s a reasonable thing to do, he’ll go and hang himself.

In short, if we look carefully, we’ll find that nothing distresses a rational being as much as what is unreasonable and, conversely, that nothing attracts it as much as what is reasonable.

But people’s views of what’s reasonable and unreasonable differ, just as their views of good and bad do, and what is or is not expedient.

This, above all, is why we need education, so that we learn how to adjust our preconceptions of what’s reasonable and unreasonable until they fit particular instances in a way that conforms with nature.”

“Who is there, then, that does not lament the loss of his friends, principally from imagining them deprived of the conveniences of life? Take away this opinion, and you remove with it all grief; for no one is afflicted merely on account of a loss sustained by himself.

Perhaps we may be sorry, and grieve a little; but that bitter lamentation and those mournful tears have their origin in our apprehensions that he whom we loved is deprived of all the advantages of life, and is sensible of his loss. …

Shall the industrious husbandman plant trees the fruit of which he shall never see? And shall not the great man found laws, institutions, and a republic? What does the procreation of children imply, and our care to continue our names, and our adoptions, and our scrupulous exactness in drawing up wills, and the inscriptions on monuments, and panegyrics, but that our thoughts run on futurity?”

(Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, I.13-14)

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“SOCRATES: And when you make a judgement about military matters, do you judge in virtue of your skill in generalship, or in virtue of the skill that makes you a good rhapsode?

ION: There’s no difference, so far as I can see.

SOCRATES: No difference? How on earth can you say that? Are you saying that the skill of a rhapsode and the skill of a general are one skill, or two?

ION: One, I think.

SOCRATES: So, anyone who’s a good rhapsode is in fact a good general too?

ION: Certainly, Socrates. …

SOCRATES: Now then, are you, as a rhapsode, the best among the Greeks?

ION: By a long chalk, Socrates.

SOCRATES: So, as a general too, are you the best among the Greeks?

ION: Have no doubt of it, Socrates; that too I learnt from the works of Homer.”

(Plato, Ion, 540e-541b)

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“On the basis of the lives they lead, the many … seem to suppose, not unreasonably, that the good and happiness are pleasure. And thus they cherish the life of enjoyment.

The especially prominent ways of life are three: the one just mentioned, the political, and, third, the contemplative. …

The refined and active … choose honor, for this is pretty much the end of the political life. But it appears to be more superficial than what is being sought, for honor seems to reside more with those who bestow it than with him who receives it; and we divine that the good is something of one’s own and a thing not easily taken away. …

Third is the contemplative life, about which we will make an investigation in what will follow.

The moneymaking life is characterized by a certain constraint, and it is clear that wealth is not the good being sought, for it is a useful thing and for the sake of something else.

Thus someone might suppose that the previously mentioned things are ends to a greater degree than is money, for at least they are cherished for their own sakes.”

(Nicomachean Ethics, I.5)

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“You should do and practice all the things I constantly recommended to you, with the knowledge that they are the fundamentals of the good life.

First of all, you should think of deity as imperishable and blessed being, … and you should not attribute to it anything foreign to its immortality or inconsistent with its blessedness.

The gods do indeed exist, since our knowledge of them is a matter of clear and distinct perception; but they are not like what the masses suppose them to be. …

The masses, by assimilating the gods in every respect to their own moral qualities, accept deities similar to themselves and regard anything not of this sort as alien.

Second, you should accustom yourself to believing that death means nothing to us, since every good and every evil lies in sensation; but death is the privation of sensation.

Hence a correct comprehension of the fact that death means nothing to us makes the mortal aspect of life pleasurable, not by conferring on us a boundless period of time but by removing the yearning for deathlessness. …

This, the most horrifying of evils, means nothing to us, then, because so long as we are existent death is not present and whenever it is present we are nonexistent. …

The sophisticated person neither begs off from living nor dreads not living. …

As in the case of food he prefers the most savory dish to merely the larger portion, so in the case of time he garners to himself the most agreeable moments rather than the longest span. …

Much worse off is the person who says it were well not to have been born ‘but once born to pass Hades’ portals as swiftly as may be.’

Now if he says such a thing from inner persuasion why does he not withdraw from life? Everything is in readiness for him once he has firmly resolved on this course.

But if he speaks facetiously he is a trifler standing in the midst of men who do not welcome him.”

(Letter to Menoeceus, I.1)

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“What was it that Agrippinus used to say?

‘I’m not going to make obstacles for myself.’

He was informed that his case was being heard in the Senate.

‘That’s as it may be. But it’s the fifth hour now’—this was when it was his custom to exercise and take a cold bath—‘so let’s go and exercise.’

Afterward, someone came up to him and said, ‘You’ve been condemned.’

‘To exile,’ says he, ‘or death?’

‘Exile.’

‘What about my property?”

“It’s not been seized.’

‘So let’s go to Aricia and have breakfast there.’

That’s what it’s like to have trained oneself properly, to have made desire immune to impediment, and aversion immune to encountering what it wants to avoid.

I am condemned to death. If it happens straightaway, I die. If after a short delay, I eat first, since the time has come for it, and then I’ll die later.

How? As is proper for someone who’s giving back what was not their own.”

(Epictetus, Discourses, I.1.28-32)

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“SOCRATES: This fine speaking of yours about Homer, as I was saying a moment ago, is not a skill at all. What moves you is a divine power. …

For all good epic poets recite all that splendid poetry not by virtue of a skill, but in a state of inspiration and possession. The same is true of good lyric poets as well. … Or don’t you think I’ve got it right, Ion?

ION: By Zeus, I think you have. Somehow or other your words touch my soul, Socrates, and I do believe good poets interpret these messages from the gods for us by divine dispensation.

SOCRATES: So you rhapsodes in turn interpret the words of the poets, don’t you?

ION: You’re right in that, too.

SOCRATES: So your role is to be interpreters of interpreters?

ION: Surely.”

(Plato, Ion, 533b-535a)

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