You are seeking Happiness...
But what Happiness are you seeking?
 
 

Every one wants to be happy:  We know this is true for ourselves and we can also observe it in others.  In what does happiness consist if not in a certain delight; but whose delight and in what?

What are the various possibilities of Happiness offered to us?
I) Riches, money, material goods.
By our work, family, or a stroke of luck, one can become the owner of a car, a house, a yacht or have a large well filled bank account, important connections, etc.  These things however pass away either through the passage of time, through robbery, fire or other things, such as wisdom, which they cannot give.

Rich people occasionally commit suicide which is the proof that they are not happy.  A little bit of life’s good things suffices then for us to live happily.

II) Glory, honours, power.
Glory is defined as being "a regular fame accompanied by praises" (Cicero, II De Invent. cap. LV, 166).  But "honour is felt to depend more on those who confer than on him who receives it" (Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics, I, 1095 b 24).  How many scientists or artists have lived in poverty because their talents were not recognised during their life, for instance  Van Gogh, Cezanne, etc.  When fame has been obtained, can it not be lost through the smallest unfavourable rumour?  Even power cannot guarantee happiness: the horrible deaths of Hitler and Mussolini are there to prove it.  Can he really be described as happy who surrounds himself with a personal guard and who fears the very people he himself terrifies?

III) Physical health, beauty.
As early as our conception, we can suffer illness; there are hospitals for every stage of life: for children, grown-ups, the elderly.  Each part of our body has its own illness: heart-attacks, pneumonia, etc.  In spite of all the progress accomplished, neither science nor insurance companies can keep us in good health all the time.  Why then seek happiness in health?  Even beauty, more the fruit of chance than anything else can be lost at the slightest accident; old age will destroy it eventually.

IV) Pleasures of the flesh and of the table.
There pleasures are caused by eating, drinking and sexual relations.  To put all one's energy in pursuing them means to use them and soon to abuse them; to abuse them to the extent of endangering one's health: obesity, cirrhosis or aids are waiting just around the corner.  Is it not sad to see the obese person unable to get about, the drunkard unable to behave as a human being, the sexual pervert who cannot see higher than his belt?  This threefold pleasure is not unique to man, it is also found in animals.  Therefore, the happiness which is specifically human cannot be found at this level.

But then, what is happiness?
Happiness is the possession of virtue and a "kind of virtuous activity" (Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics, I, 1099 b 26).  Why such a definition? Thus defined, happiness becomes available to everyone because everyone can practice virtue.  It enables one to profit of the above goods: riches, honours, health, pleasures and so on, but in moderation!  A certain joy flows from it, making us masters of ourselves, of our faculties, of our acts, of our goods, of our future...  Whatever event takes place in our life.  Virtue will enable us to endure everything with an equal calmness of soul.  By its stability and its solidity, it prevents the human being from becoming, when making a decision, a kind of weathercock but in practice it will help him to adapt himself to all possible situations.  It produces continuity in projects, peace of soul, a behaviour and work according to reason, leaving the door open to originality.

Happiness consisting in virtue, what a strange thought!  Yes, but .... have you ever tried it even once in your life?  For those who practice it constantly, it produces a certain delight.  Above all however it has as its result, "the things that eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him" (St Paul: I Cor. 2, 9).
 
 

 
 
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