One trusts the senses, and one doubts of all.
[1419] Sceptics.—Pope.
Pyrrho and his followers held that we can only know things as they appear, and not as they are. Thence they maintained that appearances must be absolutely indifferent, and that we could be equally happy in all conditions,—in sickness, for instance, Cicero, Fin. ii. 13, as in health. The one reality which Pyrrho admitted was virtue, and this he said (Cicero, Fin. iv. 16), was the supreme good which he who possessed had nothing left to desire.
[1420] Pope's complaint, that the directions of the ancient moralists amounted to no more than that "happiness is happiness," arose from his ignorance of their tenets. The stoics and sceptics placed the supreme good in unconditional virtue, and the epicureans taught the precise doctrine of Pope himself, that pleasure is the goal, and virtue the road. The admonition, "take nature's path," which Pope would substitute for the teaching of these sects, was the maxim on which they all insisted.
[1421] Pope has here adopted the sentiments of the Grecian sage who said, "That if we live according to nature we shall never be poor, and if we live according to opinion we shall never be rich."—Ruffhead.
For opinion creates the fantastic wants of fashion and luxury.
[1422] He means that happiness does not "dwell" in any "extreme" of wealth, rank, talent, etc., but that all "states," or classes of men "can reach it."
[1423] MS.:
True happiness, 'tis sacred truth I tell,
Lies but in thinking, &c.
The man who always "thinks right" is infallible in wisdom, and if he always "means well" he must act in obedience to his infallible convictions, when he will also be impeccable. There needs but this, says Pope, to secure happiness. He scoffs at the vague definitions of philosophers, and substitutes the luminous direction that we should be infallible in our views, and impeccable in our conduct.