But in order that you may see whence all this born error of those who accuse pleasure and praise pain, I will open the whole matter, and explain the very things which were said by that discoverer of truth and as it were the architect of a happy life. For no one despises or hates or runs away from pleasure because it is pleasure, but because great pains result to those who do not know how to follow pleasure with reason. Nor, moreover, is there any one who, because he loves pain, pursues it, wants to gain it, but because such times never occur when he seeks some great pleasure through labor and pain. For to come to the smallest detail, which one of us undertakes any physical exercise that is laborious, except in order to derive some benefit from it? But who can rightfully criticize him who wants to be in that pleasure which results in no discomfort, or he who avoids that pain in which no pleasure is produced?
Nor, moreover, is there anyone who feels pain itself because it is pain
