CHAPTER  II
 

           THEORY  OF PLEASURE AND PAIN



          Pleasure and Pain as Quantities.

Proceeding to consider how pleasure and pain can be

estimated as magnitudes, we must undoubtedly accept

what Bentham has  laid down upon this subject.   " To*

a person," he says,1 " considered by himself, the value

of a  pleasure  or pain,  considered by itself,  will be

greater or less according to the  four following circum¬

stances :—

        (1)  Its  intensity.

        (2)  Its  duration.

        (3)  Its  certainty or uncertainty.

        (4)  Its propinquity or remoteness.

These are  the  circumstances which are to  be con¬

sidered in estimating a pleasure or a pain considered

each of them by itself."

   1  An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, 2d

ed.,  1823,  vol. i.  p. 49.   The earliest writer  who, so far  as I

know,  has  treated Pleasure and Pain  in a definitely quantitative

manner, is Francis Hutcheson, in his Essay on the Nature and Conduct

of the Passions and Affections, 1728, pp. 34-43, 126, etc.