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I call Pleasure, every sensation perception that a
man had rather feel at that instant than
feel none.

I call Pain every sensation that a man
had rather feel none than feel.

"I call Pleasure," says Maupertuis a celebrated French Philosopher,
Maupertuis Essai de Philosophie Moral Oeuvres Tome I.Ch.I Lyon 1756 p.194
"every sensation The word is "Perception" — it makes no difference. that a man had rather feel than not feel .

I call Pain, continues he, that every sensation
that a man had rather not feel
than feel.

"Every sensation", he says be again, .... "during
which a man would neither wish to
sleep, nor to pass on to any other sensation
every such A sensation is a pleasure. The
time which such A sensation lasts is what
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I call the happy moment. I hope thus much is enough to make an end of this Philosophical Roman of which the Moral is Go hang yourself. "Abi cito suspende te."

A moment He might call it: a moment nor after this we need we
not be surprized at reading in the for at the
/at the/ the head of his next chapter - "That in common
life is the sum of evil surpasses that of good."
A melancholy conclusion this: it must be confessed: and happily
as ill-founded as it is melancholy. According
to his definitions, especially the last of them, no man should be deemed
to have a fortune, but Crassus - No
man to have heighth, but Goliah, or the tallest
of the Patagonians - No woman beauty,
but Venus - No pleasure in short is a
pleasure, but the highest a man knows of.
He goes on, as one might imagine, (for
tho' unfortunate in this and some other instances
Maupertuis was a mathematician, and if he
cured it was with method and precision) -
he goes on, and says, Every sensation ....
during which a man would wish to sleep, or to pass on to
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any other, every such sensation is a Pain.

NOTE

I thought I had made a sort of discovery,
when it had occurred to me that the quantity
of Happiness or Unhappiness in any given
subject was to be calculated upon these
dimensions; and had drawn up a few propositions axioms
upon that principle. I had hit upon this method of analysis for analyzing our perceptions. The idea of these two dimensions, when it first occurred, seemed new to me: I thought I had made a sort of discovery when I thought of [...?] it up as a model to analyze all our sensations by. I was much surprized
upon turning looking over the works of that ingenious
Philosopher to find the idea anticipated.
Beyond these two dimensions indeed he does not go He goes however no further than NOTE
NOTE of these two dimensions andThe tract book Essay on Moral Philosophy in
which it occurrs, for all the useful and original fundamental
hints it contains isbut very little
known in this country: it has not I believe that I
know of been translated into our language.
The truth is the positions in it are for the most part as false as they are
uncomfortable: which may serve to account for
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the little notice that has been taken of it.
The fundamental errors seem to be are - this that I have
been taking notice of: and another which I shall
have occasion to mention presently. had occasion to take notice of mention before.

Yes, says Maupertuis, "the pleasures that a
man finds in increasing his riches and his powers
(pleasures of possession and expectation
as I call them, are pleasures, but they are pleasures
of the body - How so? because they
originate in the body - they suppose the
existence of the pleasures of the body which a man proposes, by means of his riches or his power, to procure without
which they would be themselves as pleasures. ib. p.212They are nothing else than but pleasures of the body seen as a distance. Then you make no pleasures of the mind? - Oh, Yes says he, but I do.
There are just two [sorts] of them; I
will tell you what they are. One is, the
practice of Justice. The other is, the view

Maupertuis

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Box	096	Main Headings	legislation
Folio number	128	Info in main headings field	maupertuis i
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