al opinion of mankind, is happiness;
yet men, for the most part, fail in the pursuit of this end, either
because they do not form a right idea of the nature of happiness, or
because they do not make use of proper means to attain it. Since it is
every man's interest to be happy through the whole of life, it is the
wisdom of every one to employ philosophy in the search of felicity
without delay; and there cannot be a greater folly, than to be always
beginning to live.

"The happiness which belongs to man, is that state in which he enjoys
as many of the good things, and suffers as few of the evils incident
to human nature as possible; passing his days in a smooth course of
permanent tranquillity. A wise man, though deprived of sight or hearing,
may experience happiness in the enjoyment of the good things which
yet remain; and when suffering torture, or laboring under some painful
disease, can mitigate the anguish by patience, and can enjoy, in
bis afflictions, the consciousness of bis own constancy. But it is
impossible that perfect happiness can be possessed without the pleasure
which attends freedom from pain, and the enjoyment of the good things of
life. Pleasure is in its nature good, as pain is in its nature evil; the
one is, therefore, to be pursued, and the other to be avoided, for its
own sake.--Pleasure, or pain, is not only good, or evil, in itself,
but the measure of what is good or evil, in every object of desire or
aversion; for the ultimate reason why we pursue one thing, and avoid
another, is because we expect pleasure from the former, and apprehend
pain from the latter. If we sometimes decline a present pleasure, it is
not because we are averse to pleasure itself, but because we conceive,
that in the present instance, it will be necessarily connected with a
greater pain. In like manner, if we sometimes voluntarily submit to a
present pain, it is because we judge that it is necessarily connected
with a greater pleasure.--Although all pleasure is essentially good, and
all pain essentially evil, it doth not thence necessarily follow, that
in every single instance the one ought to be pursued, and the other to
be avoided; but reason is to be employed in distinguishing and comparing
the nature and degrees of each, that the result may be a wise choice of
that which shall appear to be, upon the whole, good. That pleasure is
the first good, appears from the inclination which every animal, from
its first birth, disco