Good pleasure

“ Pleasure is Nature's test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, we are not always happy." ”

“ That pleasure is the first good, appears from the inclination which every animal, from its first birth, discovers to pursue pleasure and avoid pain; and is confirmed by the universal experience of mankind, who are incited to action by no other principle, than the desire of avoiding pain, or obtaining pleasure. ”

“ More remarkable is the farther assertion that Pleasure is only present or realized consciousness; the memory of pleasures past, and the idea of pleasures to come, are not to be counted; the painful accompaniments of desire, hope, and fear, are sufficient to neutralize any enjoyment that may arise from ideal bliss, Consequently, the happiness of a life means the sum total of these moments of realized or present pleasure. He recognized pleasures of the mind, as well as of the body; sympathy with the good fortunes of friends or country gives a thrill of genuine and lively joy. ”

“ Many, indeed, love and win notoriety, but such as they need not detain us here. A lower race of youth, in whom the blood is warmer than the [Pg 11] soul, think pleasure life's best gift, and are content to let occasion die, while they revel in the elysium of the senses. But to make pleasure an end is to thwart one's purpose, for joy is good only when it comes unbidden. The pleasure we seek begins already to pall. ”

“ What the good man thinks is pleasure will be pleasure; what he delights in will be truly pleasant. Those pleasures which perfect the activity of the perfect and truly happy man may be called in the truest sense the pleasures of a man. ”

“ Not that I agree with that moral, although it comes from very high authority;—there is a great deal of happiness in this world, if you knew how to extract it; or rather, I should say, of pleasure: there is a pleasure in doing good; there is a pleasure, unfortunately, in doing wrong; there is a pleasure in looking forward, ay, and in looking backward also; there is pleasure in loving and being loved, in eating, in drinking, and though last, not least, in smoking. ”

“ Pleasure must succeed to pleasure, else past pleasure turns to pain,
And this first life claims a second, else I count its good no gain?"—
Much less have I heart to palter when the matter to decide
Now becomes "Was ending ending once and always, when you died?" ”

“ It is the pleasure felt in tending towards the good that reveals the good to the conscious agent: that is, taking pleasure in its wide sense as the feeling of well-being, of satisfaction with one's whole condition, activities and environment. Hence it is the anticipated pleasure, connected by past association with a certain line of action, that stimulates the conscious being to act in that way again. ”

“ But the pleasures of Imagination, as they heighten and refine the very pleasures of Sense, so they are of larger extent, and longer duration. And if the most sensual Man will confess there is a Pleasure in Pleasing, He must likewise allow, there is Good to a Man's Self, in doing Good to others ”

“ We may affirm, then, that practically all our experience has an affective tone. It is either pleasant or unpleasant, either agreeable or disagreeable.
It is obviously important to consider what attitude we ought to adopt towards pleasure. Is pleasure good or evil? Ought we to seek pleasure or shun it? ”

“ In spite of occasional merry-making, pleasure-seeking is rare. They have no great sensibility or expression of joy, but a composed satisfaction, a kind of phlegmatic good humor, marks the boundary of their happiness. ”

“ Pleasure therefore, or delight, is the appearance or sense of good; and molestation or displeasure, the appearance or sense of evil. ”

“ And yet considering that they be very good lessons for auoyding like inconueniences, and apt examples for continuacion of good and honest life, they are the better to be borne with, and may with lesse astonnishment be read and marked. They that follow, be mitigated and sweetened with pleasure, not altogether so sower as the former be. ”

“ This entreaty still rings in my ears, and leads me so to use any influence I may now have over parents.
Is it not true that the strongest delight the human being ever has is in well-doing? Is it not true that this pleasure, like the pleasures of the eye and ear, the pleasures of benevolence, the pleasures of the understanding and the imagination, will seek its own continuance and gratification, if it have fair play? ”

“ What is meant by prejudices?”
“Pleasure is the actual enjoyment of our senses; it is a complete satisfaction given to all our natural and sensual appetites; and, when our worn-out senses want repose, either to have breathing time, or to recover strength, pleasure comes from the imagination, which finds enjoyment in thinking of the happiness afforded by rest. ”

“ They defined ‘pleasure’ as ‘every emotion or state of body or mind in which nature leads us to take delight.’ And from reason they deduced, as modern utilitarians do, that not merely the pleasure of the moment must be regarded as the object of life, but what will produce the greatest amount and highest kind of pleasure in the long run; that, e.g. a greater pleasure must not be sacrificed to a lesser one, or a pleasure pursued which will be followed by pain. ”

“ I am very fond of pleasure; I will therefore give myself wholly up to gratify my senses, to lead a voluptuous life, to have the spectacle follow the feast, debauchery the spectacle, and so on; but I will never take the least pains to secure that fullness of joy which is at God’s right hand, that river of pleasure whereof he gives to drink to those who put their trust under the shadow of his wings. ”

“ Fly the pleasure that bites to-morrow.—George Herbert.
Look upon pleasures not upon that side that is next the sun, or where they look beauteously, that is, as they come towards you to be enjoyed, for then they paint and smile, and dress themselves up in tinsel, and glass gems, and counterfeit imagery.—Jeremy Taylor.
Pleasure has its time; so, too, has wisdom. Make love in thy youth, and in old age attend to thy salvation.—Voltaire.
A man of pleasure is a man of pains.—Young.
Pleasure is very seldom found where it is sought. ”

“ He who has not left something sad behind him, and reawoke in the sunshine to feel the golden elixir of health and happiness moving in his veins anew, may take it that he has at least one pleasure yet unspent. ”

“ Men and women read, and wanted more. These garden letters began to blossom every week; and many hands were glad to gather pleasure from them. A sign it was of wisdom. In our feverish days it is a sign of health or of convalescence that men love gentle pleasure, and enjoyments that do not rush or roar, but distill as the dew. ”

“ The faculties from which we are capable of these pleasures, and the pleasures themselves, are as natural, and as much to be accounted for, as any sensual appetite whatever, and the pleasure from its gratification. ”

“ The very pain this reflection causes weans her away from pleasure. She judges, and judges rightly, that a small enjoyment neglected for so high a motive, will bring a higher and better happiness. We all know this in every-day affairs. ”

“ It is enough for us to know that ‘pleased’ does mean ‘having the sensation of pleasure,’ and though pleasure is absolutely indefinable, though pleasure is pleasure and nothing else whatever, yet we feel no difficulty in saying that we are pleased. ”

“ Or, to put it to the common sense of mankind, is the gratification of affection a pleasure or a pain? Surely a pleasure. So that whether the motive which leads us to perform an action is the love of our neighbour, or the love of God, it is undeniable that pleasure enters into that motive. ”

“ As we were giving then a few moments of pause to the delectation of the senses, in dwelling with the highest relish on this intimatest point of re-union, and chewing the cud of enjoyment, the impatience natural to the pleasure soon drove us into action. Then began the driving tumult on his side, and the responsive heaves on mine, which kept me up to him: whilst as our joys grew too mighty for utterance, the organs of our voice, voluptuously intermixing, became organs of the touch: And, oh, that touch, how delicious! ”

“ I think we shall derive some assistance in discussing this question, by attempting to resolve the conception of happiness into its constituent elements.
Pleasure has been defined to consist in the satisfaction of any of man's natural wants. The variety of our pleasures corresponds to the diversity of our wants.
Food to the hungry, rest to the weary, are sources of pleasure. To feel on some cold wintry day the genial warmth of true hearth fire creeping into our blood, and the frozen limbs relaxing their stiffness, is pleasure. All men admire the beautiful and delight in adornment. ”

“ Of two pleasures, if there be one to which all or almost all who have experience of both give a decided preference, irrespective of any feeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is the more desirable pleasure. ”

“ The delight we had in the gratification of the appetite, inflames the imagination, and makes us, with avidity, search for the same gratification in whatever other object it can be found. And thus frequency and uniformity in gratifying the same passion upon different objects, produceth at the longrun a habit. In this manner, a man acquires an habitual delight in high and poignant sauces, rich dress, fine equipage, crowds of company, and in whatever is commonly termed pleasure. ”

“ For we are not at present pursuing that pleasure alone which moves nature itself by a certain sweetness, and which is perceived by the senses with a certain pleasurable feeling; but we consider that the greatest of all pleasures which is felt when all pain is removed. For since, when we are free from pain, we rejoice in that very freedom itself, and in the absence of all annoyance,—but everything which is a cause of our rejoicing is pleasure, just as everything that gives us offence is pain,—accordingly, the absence of all pain is rightly denominated pleasure. ”

“ The smallest, the most trifling pleasure that is conveniently within my reach, tempts me more than all the joys of paradise. I must except, however, those pleasures which are necessarily followed by pain; I only love those enjoyments which are unadulterated, which can never be the case where we are conscious they must be followed by repentance. ”

“ But, conveyed as ideal and generic, they produce this supernatural pleasure or happiness, which is not to be compared with normal pleasure, just as the joy of the contemplation of the absolute is not to be described as pleasure in the ordinary sense. ”

“ He is even able, through some fine choice of words, to convey to us the precise degree and quality of pleasure which they yield him, and which he wins us to share, not by exhortations or reproaches, but gently, with alluring smiles, and hinted promises of reward. ”

“ "I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? I have searched for pleasure." ”

“ It has therefore only the name of pleasure.
But not such are the pleasures enjoyed by us; they are truly delightful, they do not agitate nor inflame. They leave the soul free, and cheer and expand it. ”

“ Does not the charge hold true of the pleasure hunter? As a condiment, as a relaxation, pleasure seeking, if of the right sort, is not only allowable but commendable. He who gave life intended it to be a joy. ”

“ Many of you have learnt, I feel sure of it, to feel during these your school days, the satisfaction of living here a true and worthy life; you have tasted of that pleasure which the careless, the indifferent, and the sinful hardly taste at all, the pleasure that dwells with the consciousness of earnest effort and sincere striving after the best things within us. ”

“ For whatever there is of beauty or of pleasure in wealth, in descendants, or in sovereign command, the highest summit of human enjoyment, or in those objects of desire which we endeavour to chase into the toils of love; whatever delight, or whatever solace is granted by the celestials, to soften our fatigues, in thy presence, thou parent of happiness, all those joys spread out and flourish; in thy presence blooms the spring of pleasure, and without thee no man is happy. ”

“ An excellent proof of my proposition, and one very easily encountered, lies in the fact that wherever life is simple and sane, true pleasure accompanies it as fragrance does uncultivated flowers. Be this life hard, hampered, devoid of all things ordinarily [84] considered as the very conditions of pleasure, the rare and delicate plant, joy, flourishes there. ”

“ How should he withstand the passionate crying of the flesh or believe that through pleasure comes satiety and the loss of that in the spirit whereby alone pleasure can be enjoyed? For his gift was that he could win all hearts. ”

“ It is part of my nature that pleasure has an exhilarating effect on me; it leaves sunshine behind, and becomes a part of my inner being. The interval which parts one ecstasy from another is like the short night which marks off our long summer days. ”

“ It is, therefore, a satisfaction which is not directly felt; at most, we can become conscious of it only when we reflect upon our condition. But that which checks or arrests the will is something positive; it proclaims its own presence. All pleasure consists in merely removing this check—in other words, in freeing us from its action; and hence pleasure is a state which can never last very long. ”

“ On the other hand I have missed indescribable pleasures because the power to enjoy and to give delight is keenest early in life, while the understanding both of how to give and how to receive pleasure comes much later, when the faculties are already on the decline. ”

“ Pleasure, a life of pleasure.... Other lives, to be livable, must contain more pleasure than pain; and we know, as a fact, that all healthy work is pleasurable to healthy creatures. Intelligent converse with one's friends, study, sympathy, all give pleasure; and art is, in a way, the very type of pleasure. Yet we know that none of all that is meant in the expression: a life of pleasure. ”