women, nor by fish and the other items on an expensive menu, but by sober reasoning'. Secondly,
Epicurus has an idiosyncratic account of the nature of pleasure. 'When we say that pleasure is the goal, we
mean ... being neither pained in the body nor troubled in the soul.' Pleasure is construed negatively, as the
absence of pain, and 'the limit to the magnitude of pleasures is the removal of everything that pains us'.
Thus the pleasures of a sensualist are inferior to those of a sober reasoner: the sensualist's pleasures are
followed by pain, and in any case the sensualist can never achieve more than that total freedom from pain
which is equally within the grasp of the reasoner. 'True pleasure is a serious business', as the Stoic Seneca
put it.
An Epicurean hedonist is virtuous as well as sober. For 'it is not possible to live pleasurably without living
sensibly and nobly and justly'. 'A just man', for example, 'is least troubled but an unjust man is loaded
with troubles', for 'up to the time of his death it is not known if he will go undetected'. Epicurus' invitation
to Anaxarchus was disingenuous: an Epicurean will pursue virtue, and he 'revels in the pleasure of the
body - on a diet of bread and water'.
Nature led Epicurus to pleasure, the Stoics to virtue. According to the Old Stoa, 'the goal is to live in
agreement with nature - which is the same as to live in accordance with virtue, since it is virtue to which
nature leads us'. But the road along which nature directs us is long and difficult to follow.
We are led first to ourselves. Chrysippus insists that 'the first thing congenial to any animal is its own
constitution and its awareness of that'. But an initial egocentricity naturally develops into altruism: as a
later writer puts it, man 'is a social animal and requires others. That is why we live in cities; for every man
is part of a city. Again, we readily form friendships ...' Thus we come to do what is 'appropriate' for us
(kathekon). 'An appropriate act is one which, being consistent with the agent's mode of life, can be
reasonably defended.' The reference to reason is not casual: indeed, it can be said that 'appropriate acts are
those which reason selects - for example, honouring parents, brothers, country; consorting with friends'.
The performance of appropriate acts is a sign of progress, but it is not a mark of success. According to
Chrysippus, 'a man who is progressing to the summit certainly performs all appropriate acts and omits
none; but his life is not yet a flourishing one'. For he has not yet achieved virtue, and 'a flourishing life is
found only in a life in accordance with virtue'. Virtues are mental states or dispositions - indeed, they are
cognitive states. The 'perfect' virtues (i.e. the four 'primary' virtues of good sense, justice, courage, and
temperance, together with the virtues subordinate to them) are forms of knowledge and 'consist of
theorems'. An appropriate act, when it is performed virtuously, is perfect; and perfect acts are
'successes' (katorthomata). The good life, according to the Stoics, is a sequence of successes, of
appropriate acts virtuously performed, of acts in conformity to nature performed in full knowledge of their
conformity.
Stoic ethics forms a rich and complex system. It is sometimes decried as being paradoxical and grim. That
it was paradoxical the Stoics themselves allowed, and they revelled in remarking that 'all mistakes are
equally bad' or 'only a wise man is rich'. Yet on inspection the paradoxes turn out to be verbal rather than
real. As for grimness, the Stoics certainly deny that pleasure is a good thing; but they give a welcome to
what they call joy: 'they say that joy is the contrary of pleasure, being rational elation'. In fact, we are told