Kitap 10
3
Again, (c) why should not pleasure be like health, which is definite although it admits of degrees? For health is not constituted by the same proportion of elements in all persons; nor yet by one particular proportion in the same person always, but when it is in process of dissolution it still lasts for a certain time, and therefore it varies in degree. It is possible therefore that the same may be the case with pleasure.
4
Again, they postulatePlat. Phileb. 53c-54d. that the Good is perfect, whereas a motion or process of generation is imperfect, and then they attempt to prove that pleasure is a motion or process. This appears to be a mistake. (a) It would seem that pleasure is not a motion; for we hold it to be a property of all motion to be quick or slow—if (as with the motionThis motion being uniform, it can only be spoken of as quick or slow in comparison with some other motion. not absolutely, i.e. in comparison with itself at some other time. of the firmament) not absolutely, then relatively to some other moving body. But pleasure possesses neither absolute nor relative velocity. You can become pleased quickly, just as you can get angry quickly: but you cannot be pleased quickly, nor yet more quickly than somebody else, as you can walk, grow, etc., more quickly than somebody else. It is possible to pass into a pleasurable state quickly or slowly, but not to function in that state—i.e. to feel pleasure—quickly.
5
And (b) in what sense can pleasure be a process of generation? We do not think that any chance thing can be generated from any other chance thing, but that a thing at its dissolution is resolved into that from which it is generated; and if pleasure is the generation of something, pain is the destruction of that thing.
