Perhaps it is even necessary, if each disposition has unimpeded
activities, that, whether the activity (if unimpeded) of all our
dispositions or that of some one of them is happiness, this should
be the thing most worthy of our choice; and this activity is pleasure.
Thus the chief good would be some pleasure, though most pleasures
might perhaps be bad without qualification. And for this reason all
men think that the happy life is pleasant and weave pleasure into
their ideal of happiness-and reasonably too; for no activity is
perfect when it is impeded, and happiness is a perfect thing; this
is why the happy man needs the goods of the body and external goods,
i.e. those of fortune, viz. in order that he may not be impeded in
these ways. Those who say that the victim on the rack or the man who
falls into great misfortunes is happy if he is good, are, whether they
mean to or not, talking nonsense. Now because we need fortune as
well as other things, some people think good fortune the same thing as
happiness; but it is not that, for even good fortune itself when in
excess is an impediment, and perhaps should then be no longer called
good fortune; for its limit is fixed by reference to happiness.
And indeed the fact that all things, both brutes and men, pursue
pleasure is an indication of its being somehow the chief good:
No voice is wholly lost that many peoples.
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