at we spoke of as
bestiality is more horrible than vice or incontinence, as being inhuman;
but it does less harm. Incontinence means transgressing the ordinary
standards in respect of pleasure and pain. Such transgression, when of
set purpose, and not followed by repentance--consequently, incurable--is
the moral vice of intemperance; which, being characterised by the
absence of violent desire, is worse than incontinence. The latter is
open, and is curable. The confusion between the two is due to their
issuing in like acts; the passionate impulse is temporary; it is not a
formed habit of wrong choice.

Continence is acting on conviction in resistance to passion; not merely
sticking to any and every opinion, which is really rather more like
incontinence. The other extreme, of actual apathy, is rare. Continence
differs from temperance, as implying resistance to strong desires;
whereas temperance implies that such desires are not active.
Prudence--but not the acuteness which is sometimes confused with
prudence--is incompatible with incontinence, which is least curable when
the outcome of weakness.

Here it becomes necessary to make some inquiry as to Pleasure and Pain.
Some maintain that pleasure is never good, some that it is partly good
and partly not; some that it is good, but not the best But it cannot be
bad _per se_, since it may be defined as the unimpeded activity of a
formed faculty. Pleasure, as such, is not a hindrance to any activity,
but its fulfilment; _e.g.,_ the pleasure of speculative inquiry does not
hinder it. As a matter of fact, everyone does pursue pleasure; the
denial that it is good results from thinking of it as meaning only
bodily pleasures. And even they are not evil, but only the excessive
pursuit of them. As to pleasure being fleeting, that is only because
circumstances vary. The pleasure of the unchanging would be permanent.

_V.--FRIENDSHIP_

A quality rendered as "Friendship"--though the Greek and English terms
are not identical in content--now comes under examination. It is a
relation to some other person or persons without which life is hardly
worth living. Some account for it on the principle of "like to like,"
others on the opposite theory. Now, lovableness comes of goodness, or
pleasantness, or usefulness. Love is not bestowed on the inanimate, and
it must be mutual; it is to be distinguished from goodwill or devotion,
which need not be reciprocated.

Genuine friendship must be