The Good would thus be reduced to no more than sensation, or the
actualization of the sense-life. In this case, to possess it, it is
sufficient to perceive irrespective of the content of that perception.
Other persons might assert that goodness results from the union of
these two things: of the state of the soul, and of the knowledge
the soul has of it. If then the Good consist in the perception of
some particular state, we shall have to ask how elements which, by
themselves, are indifferent could, by their union, constitute the
good. Other theories are that the Good consists in some particular
state, or in possession of some particular disposition, and conscious
enjoyment of the presence of the Good. These would, however, still have
to answer the question whether, for good living, it be sufficient that
the being knows he possesses this state; or must he know not only that
this state is pleasant, but also that it is the Good? If then it be
necessary to realize that it is the Good, the matter is one no longer
of the function of sensation, but of a faculty higher than the senses.
To live well, in this case, it will no longer be sufficient to possess
pleasure, but we shall have to know that pleasure is the Good. The
cause of happiness will not be the presence of pleasure itself, but
the power of judging that pleasure is a good. Now judgment is superior
to affection; it is reason or intelligence, while pleasure is only an
affection, and what is irrational could not be superior to reason. How
would reason forget itself to recognize as superior what is posited
in a genus opposed to it? These men who deny happiness to plants,
who explain it as some form of sensation, seems to us, in spite of
themselves, to be really seeking happiness of a higher nature, and to
consider it as this better thing which is found only in a completer
life.