great deal of pain after it; for
they think it the maddest thing in the world to pursue virtue, that is a
sour and difficult thing, and not only to renounce the pleasures of life,
but willingly to undergo much pain and trouble, if a man has no prospect
of a reward. And what reward can there be for one that has passed his
whole life, not only without pleasure, but in pain, if there is nothing
to be expected after death? Yet they do not place happiness in all sorts
of pleasures, but only in those that in themselves are good and honest.
There is a party among them who place happiness in bare virtue; others
think that our natures are conducted by virtue to happiness, as that
which is the chief good of man. They define virtue thus--that it is a
living according to Nature, and think that we are made by God for that
end; they believe that a man then follows the dictates of Nature when he
pursues or avoids things according to the direction of reason. They say
that the first dictate of reason is the kindling in us a love and
reverence for the Divine Majesty, to whom we owe both all that we have
and, all that we can ever hope for. In the next place, reason directs us
to keep our minds as free from passion and as cheerful as we can, and
that we should consider ourselves as bound by the ties of good-nature and
humanity to use our utmost endeavours to help forward the happiness of
all other persons; for there never was any man such a morose and severe
pursuer of virtue, such an enemy to pleasure, that though he set hard
rules for men to undergo, much pain, many watchings, and other rigors,
yet did not at the same time advise them to do all they could in order to
relieve and ease the miserable, and who did not represent gentleness and
good-nature as amiable dispositions. And from thence they infer that if
a man ought to advance the welfare and comfort of the rest of mankind
(there being no virtue more proper and peculiar to our nature than to
ease the miseries of others, to free from trouble and anxiety, in
furnishing them with the comforts of life, in which pleasure consists)
Nature much more vigorously leads them to do all this for himself. A
life of pleasure is either a real evil, and in that case we ought not to
assist others in their pursuit of it, but, on the contrary, to keep them
from it all we can, as from that which is most hurtful and deadly; or if
it is a good thing, so that we not only may but ought to help others t