{BOOK_1|CHAPTER_1 ^paragraph 30}



It is surprising that men, otherwise acute, can think it possible to
distinguish between higher and lower desires, according as the ideas
which are connected with the feeling of pleasure have their origin
in the senses or in the understanding; for when we inquire what are
the determining grounds of desire, and place them in some expected
pleasantness, it is of no consequence whence the idea of this pleasing
object is derived, but only how much it pleases. Whether an idea has
its seat and source in the understanding or not, if it can only
determine the choice by presupposing a feeling of pleasure in the
subject, it follows that its capability of determining the choice
depends altogether on the nature of the inner sense, namely, that this
can be agreeably affected by it. However dissimilar ideas of objects
may be, though they be ideas of the understanding, or even of the
reason in contrast to ideas of sense, yet the feeling of pleasure,
by means of which they constitute the determining principle of the
will (the expected satisfaction which impels the activity to the
production of the object), is of one and the same kind, not only
inasmuch as it can only be known empirically, but also inasmuch as
it affects one and the same vital force which manifests itself in
the faculty of desire, and in this respect can only differ in degree
from every other ground of determination. Otherwise, how could we
compare in respect of magnitude two principles of determination, the
ideas of which depend upon different faculties, so as to prefer that
which affects the faculty of desire in the highest degree. The same
man may return unread an instructive book which he cannot again
obtain, in order not to miss a hunt; he may depart in the midst of a