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Full Idea
Since having a virtue does not reduce to performing certain kinds of acts, the Epicurean will achieve pleasure only by aiming at being a certain kind of person.
Gist of Idea
Epicureans achieve pleasure through character development
Source
Julia Annas (The Morality of Happiness [1993], 2.4)
Book Ref
Annas,Julia: 'The Morality of Happiness' [OUP 1995], p.86
A Reaction
No Epicurean would want to merely possess virtues, without enacting them. I assume that virtues are sought as guides to finding the finest pleasures (such as friendship).
| 381 | We feel pleasure when we approach our natural state of harmony [Plato] |
| 2156 | There are three types of pleasure, for reason, for spirit and for appetite [Plato] |
| 5256 | Some things are not naturally pleasant, but become so through disease or depravity [Aristotle] |
| 5258 | While replenishing we even enjoy unpleasant things, but only absolute pleasures when we are replenished [Aristotle] |
| 520 | The great pleasures come from the contemplation of noble works [Democritus (attr)] |
| 522 | Moderation brings more pleasures, and so increases pleasure [Democritus (attr)] |
| 6236 | People more obviously enjoy social pleasures than they do eating and drinking [Shaftesbury] |
| 3547 | Epicureans achieve pleasure through character development [Annas] |
| 4907 | The 'locus coeruleus' is one of several candidates for the brain's 'pleasure centre' [Carter,R] |