Reply Obj. 2:  Prodigality is an excessive spending, which is unnatural:  wherefore prodigality is said to be contrary to nature.

Reply Obj. 3:  To overcome, to contradict, and to punish, give pleasure, not as tending to another’s ill, but as pertaining to one’s own good, which man loves more than he hates another’s ill.  For it is naturally pleasant to overcome, inasmuch as it makes a man to appreciate his own superiority.  Wherefore all those games in which there is a striving for the mastery, and a possibility of winning it, afford the greatest pleasure:  and speaking generally all contests, in so far as they admit hope of victory.  To contradict and to scold can give pleasure in two ways.  First, as making man imagine himself to be wise and excellent; since it belongs to wise men and elders to reprove and to scold.  Secondly, in so far as by scolding and reproving, one does good to another:  for this gives one pleasure, as stated above.  It is pleasant to an angry man to punish, in so far as he thinks himself to be removing an apparent slight, which seems to be due to a previous hurt:  for when a man is hurt by another, he seems to be slighted thereby; and therefore he wishes to be quit of this slight by paying back the hurt.  And thus it is clear that doing good to another may be of itself pleasant:  whereas doing evil to another is not pleasant, except in so far as it seems to affect one’s own good. ________________________

SEVENTH ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 32, Art. 7]

Whether Likeness Is a Cause of Pleasure?

Objection 1:  It would seem that likeness is not a cause of pleasure.  Because ruling and presiding seem to imply a certain unlikeness.  But “it is natural to take pleasure in ruling and presiding,” as stated in Rhetor. i, 11.  Therefore unlikeness, rather than likeness, is a cause of pleasure.

Obj. 2:  Further, nothing is more unlike pleasure than sorrow.  But those who are burdened by sorrow are most inclined to seek pleasures, as the Philosopher says (Ethic. vii, 14).  Therefore unlikeness, rather than likeness, is a cause of pleasure.

Obj. 3:  Further, those who are satiated with certain delights, derive not pleasure but disgust from them; as when one is satiated with food.  Therefore likeness is not a cause of pleasure.

On the contrary, Likeness is a cause of love, as above stated (Q. 27, A. 3):  and love is the cause of pleasure.  Therefore likeness is a cause of pleasure.

I answer that, Likeness is a kind of unity; hence that which is like us, as being one with us, causes pleasure; just at it causes love, as stated above (Q. 27, A. 3).  And if that which is like us does not hurt our own good, but increase it, it is pleasurable simply; for instance one man in respect of another, one youth in relation to another.  But if it be hurtful to our own good, thus accidentally it causes disgust or sadness, not as being like and one with us, but as hurtful to that which is yet more one with us.