Note (return) — Chapter XIII

Now, whilst "no pleasure is intrinsically bad," 776 prudence (φρόνησις), or practical wisdom, would teach us to choose the highest and most perfect happiness. Morality is therefore the application of reason to the conduct of life, and virtue is wisdom. The office of reason is to "determine our choices"--to take account of the duration of pleasures, to estimate their consequences, and to regard the happiness of a whole lifetime, and not the enjoyment of a single hour. Without wisdom men will choose the momentary excitements of passion, and follow after agitating pleasures, which are succeeded by pain; they will consequently lose "tranquillity of mind." "It is not possible," says Epicurus, "to live pleasantly without living prudently and honorably and justly." 777 The difference, then, between the philosopher and the ordinary man is this--that while both seek pleasure, the former knows how to forego certain indulgences which cause pain and vexation hereafter, whereas the ordinary man seeks only immediate enjoyment. Epicurus does not dispense with virtue, but he simply employs it as a means to an end, namely, the securing of happiness. 778