On Pleasure . . .

I just finished a book written by C.S. Lewis. Out of the Silent Planet is the first in a science fiction trilogy, first published in 1938. Not his best work, by any means. But it contains some interesting philosophical discussions on the nature of man and his relationships with other beings (whether human or otherwise).

Here is a quote from the book which I found particularly striking. In this passage, an alien creature is counseling the main character (who is human) on the experience of "pleasure:"

A pleasure is full grown only when it is remembered. You are speaking as if the pleasure were one thing and the memory another. It is all one thing. . . What you call remembering is the last part of the pleasure . . . When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing. Now it is growing something as we remember it. But still we know very little about it. What it will be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then - that is the real meeting. The other is only the beginning of it.