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actionsV For happiness arises because of prudence, and prudence resides
in correct [morally perfect] actions, and a correct [morally perfect] action
is that which, having been done, has a reasonable defence. Therefore,
he who adheres to reasonableness will act correctly and will be happy.
- This is the [argument] of Arcesilaus. Carneades marshalled his
arguments concerning the criterion not only against the Stoics but against
all those who came before him as well. His first argument actually applies
to them all, according to which he shows that there is unqualifiedly no
criterion of truth, neither reasoning nor sense-perception nor presentation
nor any other thing, for all of these together deceive us. 160. His second
argument is that according to which he shows that even if there is a
criterion, this does not exist separately from the experience [or state]
produced by the clarity [of that which is perceived]. For since an animal
differs from inanimate things by its perceptual power, it is certainly
through this that it will become capable of grasping itself and things
external to it. But sense-perception, if it is unmoved, unaffected, and
unchanged, is neither [actual] sense-perception, nor can it grasp anything; - rather, when it is changed and somehow affected in the respect in
which it experiences clear [perceptual objects], only then does it indicate
things. Therefore, the criterion should be sought for in the experience
[or state] of the soul arising from a clear [perception]. But this experience
[or state] ought to be indicative of itself and of the phenomenon which
produces it, and this experience [or state] is nothing other than the
presentation. 162. For this reason, one should say that a presentation is
a certain experience [or state] in the animal which reveals itself and the
other object. For example, Antiochus says, when we look at something
we are put into a certain condition with respect to our power of vision
and we do not have our power of vision in the same condition as we did
before we looked. In this sort of alteration we are aware of two things,
one being the alteration itself [i.e., the presentation], the second being the
object which causes this alteration [i.e., the visible thing]. And similarly in
the case of the other senses. 163. So, just as light reveals both itself and
everything in it, in this way the presentation too, being the starting point
of the animal's knowledge, like light, ought to make apparent both itself
and the clear thing which makes it be indicative. But since it does not
always indicate the truth, but frequently deceives us and disagrees with
the things which send it [to us] like bad messengers, it necessarily follows - It is important that Arcesilaus, as reported by Sextus, is here using a Stoic technical
term, katorthoma, in a non-Stoic sense, although the Stoic meaning (given in square brackets)
is, we think, supposed to be in the reader's mind.