Chapter III: Hedonism.
§ 46.
Well, then, we
now proceed to discuss Intuitionistic Hedonism. And the beginning of this
discussion marks, it is to be observed, a turning-point in my ethical method.
The point I have been labouring hitherto, the point that good is
indefinable,
and that to deny this involves a fallacy, is a point capable of
strict proof: for to deny it involves contradictions. But now we are coming to
the question, for the sake of answering which Ethics exists, the question what
things or qualities are good. Of any answer to this question no direct
proof is possible, and that, just because of our former answer, as to the
meaning of good, direct proof was possible. We are now confined to the
hope of what Mill calls indirect proof,
the hope of determining one
another’s intellect; and we are now so confined, just because, in the matter of
the former question we are not so confined. Here, then, is an intuition to be
submitted to our verdict—the intuition that pleasure alone is good as an
end—good in and for itself.
(§ 46 ¶ 1)