Note 36 — LA METTRIE’S RELATION TO HIS PREDECESSORS AND TO HIS SUCCESSORS.
Gertrude Carman Bussey translation
La Mettrie and Helvetius resemble each other in ethical doctrine. Both make pleasure and pain the ruling motives of man’s conduct. They claim that all the emotions are merely modifications of corporeal pleasure and pain, and that therefore the only principle of action in man is the desire for pleasure and the fear of pain.36