Epicureanism

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Pleasure and happiness, sensuality and desire, friendship and free will, these are among a few of the central themes behind this philosophy. Epicureanism is an ethical and moralistic doctrine that is concerned with justice and virtue, in a psychological sense. Reason responsibility and the mechanics of freedom are ethical and moral principles of this epistemology.
Epicureanism introduces the view that pleasure is the ultimate good in life. This Philosophy was described by Epicurus as "the art of making life happy”. The purpose of life, according to Epicurus, is personal happiness and by happiness he means not that state of well being and perfection of which the consciousness is accompanied by pleasure, but pleasure itself.
In addition this pleasure is sensuous for it is such only as is achievable in this life. This pleasure is the immediate purpose of every action. The pleasure of Epicurus is a state, "the absence of pain and anxiety".
The magnitude of pleasure reaches its limit in the removal of all pain. When such pleasure is present, so long as it is uninterrupted there is no pain either of body or of mind or of both together.
Conceiving the highest good to be happiness, and happiness to be found in pleasure, to which the natural impulses of every being are directed. But the aim is not with him, as it is with the Cyrenaics, the pleasure of the moment, but the enduring condition of pleasure, which, in its essence, is freedom from the greatest of evils, pain. Pleasures and pains are, however, distinguished not merely in degree, but in kind. The renunciation of a pleasure or endurance of a pain is often a means to a greater pleasure; and since pleasures of sense are subordinate to the pleasures of the soul, the undisturbed peace of the soul is a higher good than the freedom of the body from pain.
Virtue is desirable not for itself, but for the sake of pleasure of soul, which it secures by freeing men from troub...