Pavia was a lively center of humanists, and it may have been here that Valla heard the discussions of ancient ethics that prompted him to write the earliest of his extant works, the dialogue generally known under the title "On Pleasure" (Valla actually called it "On the True Good"). Several versions of this dialogue appeared, with the speeches variously assigned to different contemporaries of Valla. Contrary to a widespread impression, Valla does not directly endorse Epicurean ethics in the work; he permits speakers to present Stoic and Epicurean ethics and then, in the person of a third speaker, criticizes their views from a Christian standpoint. This third speaker clearly represents the convictions of Valla himself. The Stoic spokesman presents a defense of Stoic
honestas or virtue, together with a quite un-Stoic complaint against nature, "which has made men so prone to vice." An Epicurean replies, at much greater length, in defense of nature and "utility." Utility is equated with pleasure and described as a mistress among her handmaidens, the virtues, rather than as a harlot among honest matrons.
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