Page:Ethics (Moore 1912).djvu/74

it asserts that any whole which contains an excess of pleasure over pain is intrinsically good, no matter how much else it may contain besides; and similarly that any whole which contains an excess of pain over pleasure is intrinsically bad. This distinction between the conception expressed by “ultimately good” or “good for its own sake,” on the one hand, and that expressed by “intrinsically good,” on the other, is not commonly made; and yet obviously we must make it, if we are to say that our theory does assert that pleasure is the only ultimate good, and pain the only ultimate evil. The two conceptions, if used in this way, have one important point in common, namely, that both of them will only apply to things whose existence would be good, even if they existed quite alone. Whether we assert that a thing is “ultimately good” or “good for its own sake” or “intrinsically good,” we are always asserting that it would be good, even if it existed quite alone. But the two conceptions differ in respect of the fact that, whereas a whole which is “intrinsically good” may contain parts which