diversified, and each man follows the diversity that is suitable to his own inclination—­music, study, &c.  Each has its accessory and consummating mode of pleasure; and to say that all men desire pleasure, is the same as saying that all men desire life.  It is no real question to ask—­Do we choose life for the sake of pleasure, or pleasure for the sake of life?  The truth is, that the two are implicated and inseparable (IV.).

As our acts or exercises differ from each other specifically, so also the pleasures that are accessory to them differ specifically.  Exercises intellectual differ from exercises perceptive, and under each head there are varieties differing from each other.  The pleasures accessory and consummating to each, are diversified accordingly.  Each pleasure contributes to invigorate and intensify the particular exercise that it is attached to; the geometer who studies his science with pleasure becomes more acute and successful in prosecuting it.  On the other hand, the pleasures attached to one exercise impede the mind in regard to other exercises; thus men fond of the flute cannot listen to a speaker with attention, if any one is playing the flute near them.  What we delight in doing, we are more likely to do well; what we feel pain in doing, we are not likely to do well.  And thus each variety of exercise is alike impeded by the pains attached to itself, and by the pleasures attached to other varieties.

Among these exercises or acts, some are morally good, others morally bad; the desires of the good are also praise-worthy, the desires of the bad are blameable; but if so, much more are the pleasures attached to the good exercises, good pleasures—­and the pleasures attached to the bad exercises, bad pleasures.  For the pleasures attached to an exercise are more intimately identified with that exercise than the desire of it can be.  The pleasure of the exercise, and the exercise itself, are indeed so closely identified one with the other, that to many they appear the same.  Sight, hearing, and smell, differ in purity from touch and taste; and the pleasures attached to each differ in like manner.  The pleasures of intellect differ from those of sense, as these two exercises differ from one another.  Every animal has its own peculiar pleasures, as it has also its own peculiar manifestation and exercises.  Among the human race, the same things give pleasure to one individual and pain to another.  The things that appear sweet to the strong and healthy man, do not appear sweet to one suffering from fever, or weakly.  Now, amidst this discrepancy, what appears to the virtuous and intelligent man, really is.  His pleasures are the true and real pleasures.  Excellence, and the good man quatenus good, are to be taken as the standard.  If what he abhors appears pleasurable to some persons, we must not be surprised, since there are many depravations of individuals, in one way or another; but these things are not pleasures really, they are only pleasures to these depraved mortals (V.).