Commentary on Epicurus’ “Letter to Menoeceus”

Some time back I posted Epicurus’s Letter to Menoeceus. You should read that post if you would like to familiarize yourself with it in its entirety. Here, I’ve broken the letter up into segments (the headings are mine) and added commentary to each section. This translation of the letter is by Peter Saint-Andre (2011) and is licensed Creative Commons CCO (public domain).

If you are unfamiliar with Epicurus, or just want some more information, you can start with his Wikipedia page.

(continues below)

Following you will find Epicurus’ letter in its entirety. It has been broken into topical sections with commentary following each one.

Epicurus Letter to Menoeceus (with commentary)

Who Should Study Philosophy

Epicurus writes

Let no one put off the love and practice of wisdom when young, nor grow tired of it when old. For it is never too early or too late for the health of the soul. Someone who says that the time to love and practice wisdom has not yet come or has passed is like someone who says that the time for happiness has not yet come or has passed. Young or old, it is necessary to love and practice wisdom, so that in old age you can be youthful by taking joy in the good things you remember, and likewise in youth you can be mature by not fearing what will come. Reflect on what brings happiness, because if you have that you have everything, but if not you will do everything to attain it.

Do and practice, then, the things I have always recommended to you, holding them to be the stairway to a beautiful life

Commentary

Here Epicurus answers the question, “when is the time to study wisdom?” The resounding answer is, now. It also must be noted that Epicurus does not prod us to study wisdom, he urges us to love and practice it. To love wisdom is to give it a high value. Learning—particularly of the sort that helps us live a better life—is to be sought after. However, he doesn’t let us stop there. No, he wants us to not only love wisdom, but to practice wisdom. That is, Epicurus wants us to live wisely. We live wisely by studying and then applying what we learn to the events that make up our day.

While it is not specifically touched upon in this letter, Epicurus writes elsewhere that friends are the largest reward of practicing wisdom.

Of all the things that wisdom provides for the complete happiness of one’s entire life, by far the greatest is friendship.
Principal Doctrine 27

For Epicurus, friends are important in that they bring us steady happiness, but they also offer security against the vagaries of life. Good friends are like an insurance policy against adversity.

Epicurus informs us that the love and practice of wisdom will provide happiness. If we can determine what will truly bring us happiness we will have everything. Later in this work we will discuss vain desires; for now let it be said that if we lack the knowledge of what will bring us happiness, we will spend a lifetime chasing vain desires in a failing attempt to achieve it.

The Epicurean Garden was the only school in Athens that, not only admitted women, but that gave them equal standing with the men. While in this letter, Epicurus only mentions the young, the old, and by inference the in-between; we also know that both sexes and all professions (at least those not precipitated by vain desires) are included.

This section ends with Epicurus urging us to “do and practice” his teachings, the rest of the letter reviews those teachings.

Don’t fear god

Epicurus Writes

First, believe that god is a blissful, immortal being, as is commonly held. Do not ascribe to god anything that is inconsistent with immortality and blissfulness; instead, believe about god everything that can support immortality and blissfulness. For gods there are: our knowledge of them is clear. Yet they are not such as most people believe; indeed most people are not even consistent in what they believe. It is not impious to deny the gods that most people believe in, but to ascribe to the gods what most people believe. The things that most people say about the gods are based on false assumptions, not a firm grasp of the facts, because they say that the greatest goods and the greatest harms come from the gods. For since they are at home with what is best about themselves, they accept that which is similar and consider alien that which is different.

Commentary

While modern atheists claim Epicurus as one of their own, it is clear from this passage that he was not an atheist. Epicurus does not reject the notion that there is a god—or even gods. Instead, he rejects the common conceptions of what god is. Epicurus viewed god as the grand creator, an eternal and blissful being who did not take part in the lives of men let alone any individual. Epicurus held up the pagan gods, not as saviors or punishers, but as models that could be held up as examples of virtuous behavior.

Epicurus was a materialist, only matter and the void exist. As such, even the gods are material. Epicurus’ view of religion is that the gods exist but they take no part in human affairs, perhaps we can label it as deistic polytheism.

This section of the letter brings to mind a quote attributed to Epicurus by a 3^rd century Christian author, known as the Epicurean Paradox. It reads:

God, [Epicurus] says, either wishes to take away evils, and is unable; or He is able, and is unwilling; or He is neither willing nor able, or He is both willing and able. If He is willing and is unable, He is feeble, which is not in accordance with the character of God; if He is able and unwilling, He is envious, which is equally at variance with God; if He is neither willing nor able, He is both envious and feeble, and therefore not God; if He is both willing and able, which alone is suitable to God, from what source then are evils? Or why does He not remove them?

Whether this quote originated from Epicurus is unknown. However, if it is based on something that he wrote or said, we should view it as a condemnation of the popular view of god, not as a denial of the existence of god or gods.

Death is nothing to us

Epicurus writes

Second, train yourself to hold that death is nothing to us, because good and evil consist in sensation, and death is the removal of sensation. A correct understanding that death is nothing to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable — not because it gives you an unbounded span of time, but because it removes the desire for immortality. There is nothing terrifying in life to someone who truly understands that there is nothing terrifying in the absence of life.

Only a fool says that he fears death because it causes pain ahead of time, not because it will cause pain when it comes. For something that causes no trouble when present causes only a groundless pain when merely expected. So death, the most terrifying of evils, is nothing to us, because as long as we exist death is not present, whereas when death is present we do not exist. It is nothing to those who live (since to them it does not exist) and it is nothing to those who have died (since they no longer exist).

Most people shrink from death as the greatest of evils, or else extol it as a release from the evils of life. Yet the wise man does not dishonor life (since he is not set against it) and he is not afraid to stop living (since he does not consider that to be a bad thing). Just as he does not choose the greatest amount of food but the most pleasing food, so he savors not the longest time but the span of time that brings the greatest joy. It is simpleminded to advise a young person to live well and an old person to die well, not only because life is so welcome but also because it is through the very same practices that one both lives well and dies well. It is even worse to say that it is good to never have been born, or: Having been born, to pass through the gates of Hades as soon as possible.
If he believes what he says, why doesn’t he depart from life? It is easily done, if he has truly decided. But if he is joking, it is a worthless remark to those who don’t accept it. Remember that what will be is not completely within our control nor completely outside our control, so that we will not completely expect it to happen nor be completely disappointed if it does not happen.

Commentary

Easing the fear of death is one of the primary objectives of Epicurean teaching. It is impossible to live a life of happiness if you are in constant despair about the afterlife. The second paragraph of this section contains one of Epicurus’ best known maxims. To paraphrase, “Death is nothing to us. Where death is, we are not. Where we are, death is not.”

It should be noted that this section begins, “Train yourself…” Once again highlighting the fact that Epicurus taught a practical philosophy, one that was meant to be both studied and lived. It is a familiar refrain for Epicurus to guide us toward action. Epicurus is often prescriptive in his exhortations, he is quoted by a 3^rd century Neo-Platonist as having compared a philosopher to a doctor:

A philosopher’s words are empty if they do not heal the suffering of mankind. For just as medicine is useless if it does not remove sickness from the body, so philosophy is useless if it does not remove suffering from the soul.

In paragraph three, Epicurus informs us that the art of living well and the art of dying well are one and the same. For once one learns how to live without undue fears, dying is easy. Here Epicurus uses a food analogy, breaking down his teachings to make them more easily understood.

This section ends with another common Epicurean theme, namely, that most things (and the very future itself) are neither wholly within our control nor wholly outside our control. Keeping this in mind eases the disappointment of things not turning out as planned, while still providing the incentive to make positive impact on the world.

Pleasure is the absence of pain

Epicurus writes

Third, keep in mind that some desires are natural whereas others are groundless; that among the natural desires some are natural and necessary whereas others are merely natural; and that among the necessary desires some are necessary for happiness, some for physical health, and some for life itself. The steady contemplation of these facts enables you to understand everything that you accept or reject in terms of the health of the body and the serenity of the soul — since that is the goal of a completely happy life. Our every action is done so that we will not be in pain or fear. As soon as we achieve this, the soul is released from every storm, since an animal has no other need and must seek nothing else to complete the goodness of body and soul. Thus we need pleasure only when we are in pain caused by its absence; but when we are not in pain then we have no need of pleasure.

This is why we say that pleasure is the beginning and the end of a completely happy life. For we recognize it as the primary and innate good, we honor it in everything we accept or reject, and we achieve it if we judge every good thing by the standard of how that thing affects us. And because this is the primary and inborn good, we do not choose every pleasure. Instead, we pass up many pleasures when we will gain more of what we need from doing so. And we consider many pains to be better than pleasures, if we experience a greater pleasure for a long time from having endured those pains. So every pleasure is a good thing because its nature is favorable to us, yet not every pleasure is to be chosen — just as every pain is a bad thing, yet not every pain is always to be shunned. It is proper to make all these decisions through measuring things side by side and looking at both the advantages and disadvantages, for sometimes we treat a good thing as bad and a bad thing as good.

Commentary

This is an important passage and its significance cannot be overstated. Herein Epicurus explains the types of desires. Epicurus explains that these desires can be divided into three categories: 1) natural and necessary, 2) natural but not necessary, and groundless or vain.

Natural and necessary desires are anything that we need to sustain life, happiness, health and/or friendships. These are the most basic of desires; food, shelter, companionship, etc… These desires should be met as soon as they arise as their lack will cause pain. These desires are easily filled and even wild animals are capable of their fulfillment.

Natural but not necessary desires are those which stem from nature but are not necessary for the cessation of pain. Sometimes these desires require thought to see that they may be unnecessary. Examples would be the desire for rich or extravagant food when hungry when a sandwich will sate the pain of hunger just as well. We have the natural and necessary desire of shelter from the elements but the desire becomes unnatural when we add the desire for marble countertops or brass fixtures or even a larger house than necessary for our needs. These desires rely upon judgement to decide if they should be fulfilled. The main criteria of judgement is to ask what effect fulfilling or not fulfilling this desire will have on our natural and necessary desires. For instance, wanting to satisfy midday hunger is a natural and necessary desire; you should, therefore, eat lunch. But should you eat lunch out with your co-workers every day? Wanting lunch is natural, eating out is not necessary.

Desires provide pleasure to the extent that they provide relief from pain. A warm but ragged coat provides as much pleasure (absence of pain from cold) as a fine coat. Once the pain leading to the desire is sated, there is no increase in pleasure; once full you cannot increase the pleasure of contentment by eating more food. The opposite is usually the case with over indulgence in meeting a desire leading to discomfort and pain.

Natural wealth is both limited and easy to acquire, but the riches incited by groundless opinion have no end.
Principal Doctrine 15

Here Epicurus calls the third type of desires groundless, elsewhere they are translated as vain. Vain desires are neither natural nor necessary. They are the superfluous desires such as power, prestige, money or fame. Chasing these desires, and even obtaining them, cause pain in the body and mind. If you have power you must remain in constant fear that it will be lost. A simple and happy life of quietude cannot be obtained while fretting over where you will get more and more money or prestige or any other vain desire. Satisfying these desires is as bad as, or even worse, as trying and failing. It is far better to not desire them at all. Sometimes vain desires cause short term pleasure, the question then becomes at what expense to our future pleasures?

Self-Reliance

Epicurus Writes

Fourth, we hold that self-reliance is a great good — not so that we will always have only a few things but so that if we do not have much we will rejoice in the few things we have, firmly persuaded that those who need luxury the least enjoy it the most, and that everything natural is easily obtained whereas everything groundless is hard to get. So simple flavors bring just as much pleasure as a fancy diet if all pain from true need has been removed, and bread and water give the highest pleasure when someone in need partakes of them. Training yourself to live simply and without luxury brings you complete health, gives you endless energy to face the necessities of life, better prepares you for the occasional luxury, and makes you fearless no matter your fortune in life.

Commentary

Self-reliance comes up repeatedly in the teachings of Epicurus, usually translated as self-sufficiency. Closely tied to self-reliance is voluntary simplicity with the two being inextricable. To paraphrase the opening of this section, Epicurus writes that we should not seek self-sufficiency to be content with a little, but so that when we have a lot we can truly appreciate it. For when you depend on extravagance, it brings but little joy; but one who can be happy with a little will gain immense pleasure when extravagance offers itself. Again, Epicurus brings up “training yourself”, this time in reference to living simply. Training to Epicurus means study and practice, repeated until it becomes your nature.

For the practicing Epicurean, self-reliance is based in prudence and mental balance and is more psychological than physical. Remember that Epicurus put great emphasis on friendship, the self-reliance that he espouses does not mean that we should be rugged individuals struggling against nature. Instead we strive for balance, secure in our friendships and living within the constraints prescribed by nature. For the Epicurean self-sufficiency is about being content with what we have, and not in wishing for what we don’t have. Summing up Epicurus’ view on self-sufficiency, the Roman philosopher, statesman, and dramatist—Seneca—quotes him in a letter:

If you wish to make [a person] rich, do not add to his store of money, but subtract from his desires.

For Epicurus, self-reliance is about self-rule, or autarchy; by which he means self-sufficiency, self-control, independence, and self-sovereignty. In Vatican Saying 77 Epicurus is clear on the benefits of self-sufficiency:

The greatest fruit of self-reliance is freedom.

Without self-reliance, without an equal and mutual contract with friends, we become slaves to the vagaries of our existence, freedom itself becomes unobtainable.

Pleasure

Epicurus writes

So when we say that pleasure is the goal, we do not mean the pleasures of decadent people or the enjoyment of sleep, as is believed by those who are ignorant or who don’t understand us or who are ill-disposed to us, but to be free from bodily pain and mental disturbance. For a pleasant life is produced not by drinking and endless parties and enjoying boys and women and consuming fish and other delicacies of an extravagant table, but by sober reasoning, searching out the cause of everything we accept or reject, and driving out opinions that cause the greatest trouble in the soul.

Commentary

Pleasure, Epicurus defines it, is to be free of bodily pain and mental disturbance. When Epicurus originally declared that pleasure is the goal of life, the repudiation was quick and sure. First the Stoics and neo-Platonists decried and maligned the teachings of Epicurus, soon enough it was the early Christians piling on. When the Stoics were absorbed by the Christians, the last few remaining books by and about Epicurus were all but destroyed. It would be 1000 years before Epicureanism was rediscovered. All of this is to say that the world was not ready to wrap its collective mind around the concept of virtuous hedonism such as that espoused by Epicurus.

Had those persecutors only stopped and read, as you have, this passage from Epicurus’ own hand, they could have seen that Epicurus did not propose hedonistic debauchery as the path to a pleasant life. Epicurus calls out the debased pleasures–drinking, endless parties, sex, rich food, and an extravagant table—as not only being impediments to pleasure, but outright obstacles.

To understand Epicurus’ conception of pleasure, one must first understand that he differentiated between pleasurable states and pleasurable motions. Pleasurable motions are fleeting and caused by outside stimuli. These pleasures include such things as eating decedent food, playing with a puppy, sex, extreme sports, drug induced euphoria, etc… While often intense, these pleasures are fleeting and end as soon as the stimulus ends. When you finish the rich food, not only does the pleasure end, but there is often discomfort of the body and sometimes turmoil of the mind, not dissimilar to the effects of other pleasurable motions. Pleasurable states are pleasures of contentment, they are the absence of pain and discomfort of the mind and body. To be free from worry or not to be cold or hungry. Pleasurable states are the preferred source of pleasure. While not every pleasurable motion causes pain, so many do that they must all be held suspect.

Practical wisdom

Epicurus Writes

Practical wisdom is the foundation of all these things and is the greatest good. Thus practical wisdom is more valuable than philosophy and is the source of every other excellence, teaching us that it is not possible to live joyously without also living wisely and beautifully and rightly, nor to live wisely and beautifully and rightly without living joyously. For the excellences grow up together with the pleasant life, and the pleasant life is inseparable from them.

Commentary

Most translations of this passage use “virtue” in place of “excellence.” Here Epicurus is telling us that wisdom in practice is more valuable than the love of knowledge, and is in fact the source of every virtue. One cannot live happily without also living virtuously, likewise one cannot live virtuously without also living happily. Here Epicurus is informing us that we should live virtuously, not for some future reward, nor as an end in itself; but we must live virtuously as a precondition of the happy life. Wisdom is not something to learn, Epicurus tells us, it is something that must be done. Back in the first section of this letter, Epicurus extolled us “do and practice” these things, this bears repeating here:

Do and practice, then, the things I have always recommended to you, holding them to be the stairway to a beautiful life.

The happy one

Epicurus writes

In short, whom do you consider better than someone who holds pious opinions about the gods, who is always fearless in the face of death, who has reasoned out the natural goal of life, and who has understood that the limit of good things is easy to fulfill and easy to achieve, whereas the limit of bad things is either short-lived or causes little pain? Someone who laughs at destiny, which is asserted by some to be the master of all things? For he holds that we are responsible for what we achieve, even though some things happen by necessity, some by chance, and some by our own power, because although necessity is not accountable he sees that chance is unstable whereas the things that are within our power have no other master, so that naturally praise and blame are inseparably connected to them. Indeed he sees that it would be better even to cleave to the myths about the gods (since that leaves some hope of prevailing upon them through worship) than to be subject to the destiny of the scientists (since that way lies an inexorable necessity). And such a man holds that Fate is not a god (as most people believe) because a god does nothing disorderly, and he holds that Fate is not an uncertain cause because nothing good or bad with respect to a completely happy life is given to men by chance, although it does provide the beginnings of both great goods and great evils. And he considers it better to be rationally unfortunate than irrationally fortunate, since it is better for a beautiful choice to have the wrong results than for an ugly choice to have the right results just by chance.

Commentary

This section begins with Epicurus describing one who is truly happy. The first sentence is an abbreviated version of the Four Part Cure. The Four Part Cure (or Remedy), also called the Tetrapharmakos, is a key component of Epicurean thought, it goes:

Don’t fear god,
Don’t worry about death;
What is good is easy to get,
What is terrible is easy to endure.

The Four Part Cure is a summation of the first four of the Principal Doctrines. This, easily enough to memorize, couplet is not meant to be simply repeated in times of perplexity, it is meant to be ingrained through self-training and practice until it becomes our nature. The Four Part Cure is like a vaccine inoculating us against disease, in this case it helps prevent diseases of the mind. Worry about God, about death, about meeting our needs, or about enduring pain are as harmful to the mind as a cancer is to the body.

Epicurus then articulates that some things happen through necessity, some through chance and some through our own agency. It is those things within our agency that are of import and those who focus on necessity and chance cannot obtain the happy life. Epicurus does concede that it is better to believe in the myths of the gods (chance) than it is to believe in predestiny (necessity).

Go, and practice these things

Epicurus writes

So practice these and similar things day and night, by yourself and with a like-minded friend, and you will never be disturbed whether waking or sleeping, and you will live as a god among men: for a man who lives in the midst of immortal goods is unlike a merely mortal being.

Commentary

Epicurus wraps up the letter with an exhortation to practice these things. He doesn’t say read and remember, or study, but he says do them—every day and every night, alone or with a like-minded one. He promises that if we practice and do these things that we can live a life of bliss, not dissimilar to the gods, for anyone who lives a life of pleasure and joy is not like a mere mortal.

What Epicurus is telling us to do consists of internalizing the Four Part Cure, ending our vain desires while decreasing those desires that are natural but not necessary, giving preference to pleasurable states, and living a life of quiet simplicity amongst friends.

Epilogue

Since hardly anything else survived from the writings of Epicurus, we must have gratitude that this letter is among the surviving remnants. This letter is a treasure trove for exploring Epicurus’ ethics, this present work has barely scratched the surface of all that it contains.

All three of the key Epicurean ethical teachings are present in this work, two directly and one indirectly. The key ethical teachings are: The Four Part Cure, the classification and control of desires, and the preferred type of pleasure.

Epicurus’ ethical thought is also encapsulated in the Principal Doctrines (sometimes translated as Sovran Maxims) and the Vatican Sayings. Both of these works can be found in my book, “Back to the Garden: Epicurus and the Happy Life” which is available from MidMo.US.

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Epicurus: On Desires

After the Tetra Pharmakos (Four Part Cure), the control of desire is one of Epicurus’ main teachings.

Before desires can be controlled they must be recognized and classified. Epicurus wrote of three types of desires. First are those desires which are natural and necessary, food, shelter, companionship, the avoidance of pain, etc… Desires of this type are limited and easily fulfilled.   It is not only safe to fulfill these desires, but it is a necessity to avoid pain and discomfort.

Second are those desires that are natural but not necessary; rich food when a simple meal will do, a new car when the old one is still serviceable. These desires are not to be pursued because they often get in the way of our natural and necessary desires; however, should they present themselves, there is no harm in partaking them in moderation. For example, we all need shelter from the elements, but if you purchase a larger or fancier house then required, you increase the likelihood that you will suffer at least some distress about making payments, repairs, and/or upkeep.

Lastly are those desires that are neither natural or necessary, Epicurus called these vain and empty desires and they include such things as wealth, power, fame, etc… These desires are completely manufactured and can never be adequately sated while offering no positive correlation with a happy life. Most of these desires can be traced to the vain ideal of wanting the approval of others.

Epicurus urged his followers to , as much as they are able, live unnoticed…to live a quiet life away from public scrutiny. For those who thrive on power and fame must of necessity toil to keep it and worry that it will be diminished, making the happy life unobtainable.

Being aware of the type of each desire is the first step in controlling them.

For Epicurus, the happy life demands limiting your desires to those that are both natural and necessary, moderating and never overindulging those desires that are natural but unnecessary, and avoiding those desires that are neither natural or necessary.

“If you wish to make Pythocles rich, do not add to his store of money, but subtract from his desires.”
–Epicurus

Epicurus: Letter to Menoeceus

Letter to Menoeceus

by Epicurus

translated by Peter Saint-Andre (2011)
Creative Commons CCO (public domain)

[Editor’s introductory note: Rarely has a teacher summed up his/her ethical doctrine in such a concise manner as that contained in this letter, saved for posterity by the Latin biographer Diogenes Laertius. Even if this letter is known to the reader, this newish translation may be new.]

Greetings from Epicurus to Menoikos.

Let no one put off the love and practice of wisdom when young, nor grow tired of it when old. For it is never too early or too late for the health of the soul. Someone who says that the time to love and practice wisdom has not yet come or has passed is like someone who says that the time for happiness has not yet come or has passed. Young or old, it is necessary to love and practice wisdom, so that in old age you can be youthful by taking joy in the good things you remember, and likewise in youth you can be mature by not fearing what will come. Reflect on what brings happiness, because if you have that you have everything, but if not you will do everything to attain it.

Do and practice, then, the things I have always recommended to you, holding them to be the stairway to a beautiful life

First, believe that god is a blissful, immortal being, as is commonly held. Do not ascribe to god anything that is inconsistent with immortality and blissfulness; instead, believe about god everything that can support immortality and blissfulness. For gods there are: our knowledge of them is clear. Yet they are not such as most people believe; indeed most people are not even consistent in what they believe. It is not impious to deny the gods that most people believe in, but to ascribe to the gods what most people believe. The things that most people say about the gods are based on false assumptions, not a firm grasp of the facts, because they say that the greatest goods and the greatest harms come from the gods. For since they are at home with what is best about themselves, they accept that which is similar and consider alien that which is different.

Second, train yourself to hold that death is nothing to us, because good and evil consist in sensation, and death is the removal of sensation. A correct understanding that death is nothing to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable — not because it gives you an unbounded span of time, but because it removes the desire for immortality. There is nothing terrifying in life to someone who truly understands that there is nothing terrifying in the absence of life.

Only a fool says that he fears death because it causes pain ahead of time, not because it will cause pain when it comes. For something that causes no trouble when present causes only a groundless pain when merely expected. So death, the most terrifying of evils, is nothing to us, because as long as we exist death is not present, whereas when death is present we do not exist. It is nothing to those who live (since to them it does not exist) and it is nothing to those who have died (since they no longer exist).

Most people shrink from death as the greatest of evils, or else extol it as a release from the evils of life. Yet the wise man does not dishonor life (since he is not set against it) and he is not afraid to stop living (since he does not consider that to be a bad thing). Just as he does not choose the greatest amount of food but the most pleasing food, so he savors not the longest time but the span of time that brings the greatest joy. It is simpleminded to advise a young person to live well and an old person to die well, not only because life is so welcome but also because it is through the very same practices that one both lives well and dies well. It is even worse to say that it is good to never have been born, or:

Having been born, to pass through the gates of Hades as soon as possible.

If he believes what he says, why doesn’t he depart from life? It is easily done, if he has truly decided. But if he is joking, it is a worthless remark to those who don’t accept it. Remember that what will be is not completely within our control nor completely outside our control, so that we will not completely expect it to happen nor be completely disappointed if it does not happen.

Third, keep in mind that some desires are natural whereas others are groundless; that among the natural desires some are natural and necessary whereas others are merely natural; and that among the necessary desires some are necessary for happiness, some for physical health, and some for life itself. The steady contemplation of these facts enables you to understand everything that you accept or reject in terms of the health of the body and the serenity of the soul — since that is the goal of a completely happy life. Our every action is done so that we will not be in pain or fear. As soon as we achieve this, the soul is released from every storm, since an animal has no other need and must seek nothing else to complete the goodness of body and soul. Thus we need pleasure only when we are in pain caused by its absence; but when we are not in pain then we have no need of pleasure.

This is why we say that pleasure is the beginning and the end of a completely happy life. For we recognize it as the primary and innate good, we honor it in everything we accept or reject, and we achieve it if we judge every good thing by the standard of how that thing affects us. And because this is the primary and inborn good, we do not choose every pleasure. Instead, we pass up many pleasures when we will gain more of what we need from doing so. And we consider many pains to be better than pleasures, if we experience a greater pleasure for a long time from having endured those pains. So every pleasure is a good thing because its nature is favorable to us, yet not every pleasure is to be chosen — just as every pain is a bad thing, yet not every pain is always to be shunned. It is proper to make all these decisions through measuring things side by side and looking at both the advantages and disadvantages, for sometimes we treat a good thing as bad and a bad thing as good.

Fourth, we hold that self-reliance is a great good — not so that we will always have only a few things but so that if we do not have much we will rejoice in the few things we have, firmly persuaded that those who need luxury the least enjoy it the most, and that everything natural is easily obtained whereas everything groundless is hard to get. So simple flavors bring just as much pleasure as a fancy diet if all pain from true need has been removed, and bread and water give the highest pleasure when someone in need partakes of them. Training yourself to live simply and without luxury brings you complete health, gives you endless energy to face the necessities of life, better prepares you for the occasional luxury, and makes you fearless no matter your fortune in life.

So when we say that pleasure is the goal, we do not mean the pleasures of decadent people or the enjoyment of sleep, as is believed by those who are ignorant or who don’t understand us or who are ill-disposed to us, but to be free from bodily pain and mental disturbance. For a pleasant life is produced not by drinking and endless parties and enjoying boys and women and consuming fish and other delicacies of an extravagant table, but by sober reasoning, searching out the cause of everything we accept or reject, and driving out opinions that cause the greatest trouble in the soul.

Practical wisdom is the foundation of all these things and is the greatest good. Thus practical wisdom is more valuable than philosophy and is the source of every other excellence, teaching us that it is not possible to live joyously without also living wisely and beautifully and rightly, nor to live wisely and beautifully and rightly without living joyously. For the excellences grow up together with the pleasant life, and the pleasant life is inseparable from them.

In short, whom do you consider better than someone who holds pious opinions about the gods, who is always fearless in the face of death, who has reasoned out the natural goal of life, and who has understood that the limit of good things is easy to fulfill and easy to achieve, whereas the limit of bad things is either short-lived or causes little pain? Someone who laughs at destiny, which is asserted by some to be the master of all things? For he holds that we are responsible for what we achieve, even though some things happen by necessity, some by chance, and some by our own power, because although necessity is not accountable he sees that chance is unstable whereas the things that are within our power have no other master, so that naturally praise and blame are inseparably connected to them.  Indeed he sees that it would be better even to cleave to the myths about the gods (since that leaves some hope of prevailing upon them through worship) than to be subject to the destiny of the scientists (since that way lies an inexorable necessity). And such a man holds that Fate is not a god (as most people believe) because a god does nothing disorderly, and he holds that Fate is not an uncertain cause because nothing good or bad with respect to a completely happy life is given to men by chance, although it does provide the beginnings of both great goods and great evils. And he considers it better to be rationally unfortunate than irrationally fortunate, since it is better for a beautiful choice to have the wrong results than for an ugly choice to have the right results just by chance.

So practice these and similar things day and night, by yourself and with a like-minded friend, and you will never be disturbed whether waking or sleeping, and you will live as a god among men: for a man who lives in the midst of immortal goods is unlike a merely mortal being.

Epicurus: Philosophy for the Millions

This essay first appeared in THE CLASSICAL JOURNAL: Volume 42 Number 4, JANUARY 1947, pages 195-201. I do not believe the copyright was renewed, thus putting it in the public domain.

It is written by Norman W. DeWitt, who later expounded on–and expanded upon–these ideas in a, still insightful and important, 1954 book, Epicurus and His Philosophy.

Epicurus: Philosophy for the Millions
Norman W. DeWitt

Norman W. DeWitt is Professor Emeritus of Latin in Victoria College, University of Toronto. For a number of years his researches have been devoted to Epicurus. The need for a re-interpretation of the work and influence of this truly unknown philosopher can hardly be overestimated, for he belongs to that other classical tradition which was overshadowed by Platonism and Stoicism. Unobserved by humanists, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries there was a renaissance of science which took men back to Hippocrates and Democritus—and upon this renaissance the modern world was built.

THE FASCINATION of ancient Greek civilization is increased when we recognize it as presenting the spectacle of an intelligent race in the process of emerging from the Stone Age. The Stone Age man was no less intelli­gent than his posterity and whether by the spoken word or the dexterous hand he was ca­pable of producing art, but the logic of his thought was confined within the limits marked by myth and magic, oracle and miracle. To open a breach in this mesh of habits and to assert for the first time the birthright of man as a rational being is what is here meant by emerg­ing from the Stone Age. On the material level the change is inaugurated by the metallurgist; on the intellectual level it is begun by the man who for the first time launches an hypothesis to explain the physical world and its wordings. Science marches on from hypothesis to hy­pothesis.

The first fumbling attempts to reason from manifest effects to hidden causes and to present a picture of the inner nature of things were made on the margin of the Greek world; it is around the rim of a vessel that the blinking beads of ferment are first seen to rise. On that restless Greek frontier was born a succession of pioneers of thought. Of their reasoned guesses the majority now seem absurd, but within two centuries their tentative efforts had arrived at an atomic theory of the constitution of matter. This was far from being absurd; it was the borderland of chemistry.

The greatest name in this succession of first researchers was that of Democritus, who became known as the laughing philosopher. In his ethical teaching great store was set by cheerfulness.

Democritus was still living when the new scientific movement suffered a violent re’ verse. It was in Athens, a center of conservatism, that the opposition arose and it was brilliantly headed. The leader was no other than Socrates, who despaired of the possibility of scientific knowledge. Even Aristotle, who pioneered in some branches of science, rejected the atomic theory. Between these two great names came that of Plato, who believed the ultimate realities to be not atoms but triangles, cubes, spheres and the like. By a kind of analogy he extended this doctrine to the realm of abstract thought. If, for example, perfect spheres exist, why should not perfect justice exist also? Convinced that such perfect justice did exist, he sought in his own way to find it. The ten books of his Republic record only part of his searchings of the mind. At the core of all this thinking lies the doctrine that the eternal, unchangeable things are forms, shapes, models, patterns, or, what means the same thing in Greek, “ideas.” All visible things are but changing copies of unchanging forms.

The Epicurean Revival

After the great triumvirate of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle had passed away the scientific tradition was revived with timely amendments by Epicurus. In his time it was the prevalent teaching that the qualities of compound bodies must be explained by the qualities of the ingredients. If the compound body was cold, then it must contain the cold element air, if moist, water, if dry, earth, and if hot, fire. Even Aristotle sanctioned this be­lief in the four elements. Epicurus, on the contrary, maintained that colorless atoms could produce a compound of any color ac­cording to the circumstances of their com­bination. This was the first definite recog­nition of what we now know as chemical change.

The Stoic Reaction

Epicurus was still a young man when Athenian conservatism bred a second reaction to the new science. This was headed by Zeno, the founder of Stoicism. His followers wel­comed a regression more extreme than that of Aristotle in respect to the prime elements. For the source of their physical theories they went back to Heracleitus, who believed that the sole element was fire. This was not a re­turn to the Stone Age but it was a longish way in that direction.

This Heracleitus had been a doleful and eccentric individual and became known, in contrast to the cheerful Democritus, as the weeping philosopher. His gloom was per­petuated in Stoicism, a cheerless creed, of which the founder is described as “the sour and scowling Zeno.” Epicurus, on the con­trary, urged his disciples “to wear a smile while they practised their philosophy.”

Running parallel to these contrasting at­titudes toward life and physical theories was an equally unbroken social divergence. Platonism as a creed was always aristocratic and in favor in royal courts. “I prefer to agree with Plato and be wrong than to agree with those Epicureans and be right,” wrote Cicero, and this snobbish attitude was not peculiar to him. Close to Platonism in point of social ranking stood Stoicism, which steadily extolled virtue, logic and divine providence. This specious front was no less acceptable to hypocrites than to saints. Aptly the poet Horace, describing a pair of high-born hypo­crites, mentions “Stoic tracts strewn among the silken cushions.” Epicureanism, on the contrary, offered no bait to the silk-cushion trade. It eschewed all social distinction. The advice of the founder was to have only so much regard for public opinion as to avoid unfriendly criticism for either sordidness or luxury. This was no fit creed for the socially or politically ambitious.

The Schoolteacher’s Son

Who, then, was this cheerful and friendly Epicurus, this apostle of the unambitious life? He was the son of an Athenian schoolteacher resident on the island of Samos. These items carry no sting today but in Athens it was different. That cradle of democracy was demo­cratic only within limits. Its citizens looked down upon both islanders and school­teachers: upon islanders as small fry, who needed protection from the stronger; upon schoolteachers because, like their own se­cluded women, they spent their time with children. A satirist not only twitted Epicurus with being an islander but also coined a comic name for him, Grammadidaskalides, as if we should have a name “School teacherson.” Of a certain rival Epicurus himself had the following to record: “This upset him so com­pletely that he fell to abusing me and called me a schoolteacher.”

Evidence of the little tempest that swirled for a time about this word is furnished by the fact that from the school of Epicurus it was banned. Not only the head himself but all his assistants were styled “guides” or “leaders.”

It is hardly to be expected that a man so discounted by the upper classes in antiquity, to whom ancient writers for the greater part addressed themselves, should enjoy an un­spotted record with posterity, and to so ex­press it is a euphemism. Much of what may be read concerning Epicurus even in the most recent handbooks consists of traditional misrepresentation, disparagement or plain falsehood. His life, for example, has been called uneventful. This is certainly untrue of his youth. His boyhood fell in the years when every Greek hamlet must have been ringing with the startling reports of Alex­ander’s victories. The time for performing his required military service coincided with the news of Alexander’s tragic end. As a cadet or ephebe he must have witnessed, as it were, the last futile war against Macedon, the reception in Athens of a Macedonian garri­son and the suicide of Demosthenes. Even the forced retirement of Aristotle during the same crisis and his death at Chalcis must have been meaningful enough to one already interested in philosophy.

During this same two-year interval the paternal home in Samos had been broken up and the family expelled from the island. All the Athenian settlers were evicted by the Macedonian general Perdiccas. Some twelve years later Epicurus himself was destined to be forcibly driven from Mytilene. Even after his final settlement in Athens the city endured a painful siege and the beans doled out to the members of the school had to be counted. Such are a few highlights of a life that biographers call “uneventful.”

The Pragmatic Urgency

His stormy cadetship terminated, Epicurus rejoined his father and family in Asia, where a safe refuge had been found in the ancient city of Colophon. There in the course of the ensuing decade a great illumination came to him and the result was a new philosophy in­evitably conditioned by the external events and the intellectual currents of the time. In so far as this new philosophy revived the scientific tradition it was Ionian; in so far as it exalted ethics above physics it was vir­tually Socratic. Yet this similarity is apt to be obscured by more conspicuous differences. The new doctrine divorced ethics from politics, which was heterodoxy in Athens. It allied itself instead with the Ionian tradition of medicine, which was philanthropic and independent of political preferences. Just as all human beings, men, women and children, slave and free, stand in need of health, so all mankind, according to Epicurus, stands in need of guidance toward the happy life. This view of things tinged his philosophy with the color of a gospel and bestowed upon it a pragmatic urgency, which is lacking in Socratic thought. With the leisurely meanderings of dialectic he had no patience. Truth, he believed, must possess immediate relevance to living.

The New Ecumenical Outlook

The nature of the new outlook was placed in a bright light by a comparison that suggested itself to Epicurus. In Athens men practised a weird Corybantic rite of mental healing in which the patient sat solitary upon a throne while the ministrants went dancing around him in riotous music and song. The first reaction to this treatment, should the cure succeed, was bewilderment, the second drowsiness, and the third an ecstatic awakening to joy and health. In this rite Epicurus saw a reversed image of his own program of healing. Instead of a single favored individual surrounded by a ministering multitude he envisaged the vast multitude of humanity in need of healing while a lone personified Philanthropia offered her ministrations: “Love goes dancing round and round the inhabited earth, crying to all men to awake to the blessedness of the happy life.” About the identity of this Love there can be no doubt; it is the Hippocratic love of mankind, which to true members of that craft was inseparable from the love of healing.

In this teaching Epicurus displayed his originality. His new design for living was applicable everywhere, irrespective of country or government. He had emancipated himself from the obsessions of his race, political separatism and the exclusive faith in political action. The whole world was a single parish.

It is mere justice that other original features of the new philosophy should receive recognition. Cicero, a crafty trial lawyer, in his last years employed the tricks of the courts to discredit Epicureanism with his contemporaries and with posterity. Among other false charges he upbraided Epicurus for neglecting methodical partitions of subject matter, classifications and definitions. Yet the pragmatic partition of knowledge that was standard in Cicero’s own day and throughout the greater part of ancient time was the invention of the despised Epicurus. His division was three-headed: The Canon, Physics and Ethics. The Stoics, always great borrowers, changed this partition into Physics, Ethics and Logic. Their Logic was taken from Aristotle, nor did it matter that this was substituted for the Canon. Both the Canon and Logic had for their function the test of truth.

The Canon

The orderliness of Epicurean thought, which Cicero denied, is also exemplified by the Canon. According to this we possess three contacts with the external world: Sensations, Feelings and Anticipations. In our handbooks two of these three are completely misrepresented. It is usual to declare that Epicurus believed “in the infallibility of sensation.” Not even the ancients ventured to go so far as this in misrepresentation. What Epicurus really did believe was that only immediate sensations are true. For example, if the observer sees an ox at a distance of ten feet, he can be sure it is an ox, but if he sees an animal at the distance of a mile, he may be uncertain whether it is an ox or a horse. Moreover, it does not follow that because a sensation is true it is also trustworthy. An oar in the water appears to be bent; the sensation is true but it is false to the facts. Naturally all sensations must be checked by one another and by those of other observers.

The Feelings alone have been rightly reported. By these were meant pleasure and pain. These are instruments of Nature in teaching both brute beasts and human beings the facts of life: honey is sweet, fire hurts.

The third term, Anticipation (Prolepsis), has suffered worst from misinterpretation. Unlike the Sensations and Feelings, the reference of which is chiefly to physical contacts, the Anticipations have to do with social relations and with abstract ideas, such as that of justice. Epicurus rightly observed that both animals and human beings from the moment of birth not only reach out for food and avoid pain but also exhibit soon a predisposition to fall into patterns of behavior agreeable to their respective kinds. In the case of human beings he speaks of this predisposition as an idea faintly sketched on the mind at birth. Since it there exists in advance of experience of life and of conscious reflection it is styled by him an Anticipation or Prolepsis.

Moreover, since a certain pattern of behavior is proper to each race of living things, it follows that in the case of the human race, for example, a definition of justice, to be true, must square itself with the innate idea of justice. It is in this sense that the Anticipations serve as tests of truth and find a place in the Canon. Truth must square with Nature.

The error of the handbooks on this point is fundamental. They have confused general concepts, such as that of a horse, with abstract ideas, such as those of justice, piety or friendship.

These three, then, Sensations, Feelings and Anticipations, constituted the Epicurean tripod of truth. Through the first we come to know the physical world; through the second we learn the pleasures and pains of living; by the third we are guided aright to the recognition of abstract truth.

The New Physics

The orderliness of Epicurean thought is admirably exemplified also in the Physics. In a textbook entitled the Twelve Abridgements Epicurus furnished his disciples with the only coherent and complete summary of the general principles of physics ever promulgated in the ancient world. A few specimens will suffice for illustration: 1. Matter is indestructible. 2. Matter is uncreatable. 3. The universe consists of atoms and space. 4. The universe is infinite. 5. Bodies are either simple or compound.

The rest of the principles deal with the qualities of atoms, their hardly imaginable speed in space, their vibrations in compounds, their capacity to form compounds possessing qualities not possessed by themselves, such as color or plasticity, and their proneness to form filmy images of things, called idols, which explain the sensation of vision.

Especially important was the doctrine that in the motions of the atoms there existed a sufficient degree of free play to permit the exercise of free will in animals and man. This is known as “the doctrine of the swerve.”

The New Freedom

Epicurus was the first Greek philosopher to expressly sponsor a doctrine of free will. His predecessors had recognised three forces as incompatible with the freedom of the individual. First, certain physicists, Democritus among them, had posited the supremacy of the inviolable laws of Nature. This was known as Necessity. Second, the Greeks in general had thought of man as helpless before the will of the gods. This was called either Fate or Necessity. Third, the Greeks generally conceded to Fortune the ability to make or mar the happiness of men.

Like the modern pragmatist, Epicurus stressed the power of man to control his experience. The Necessity of the physicists he eliminated by his doctrine of a certain freedom of play in the atoms. The Necessity of Fate he expunged by denying any form of divine interference in the affairs of men. Fortune he taught his disciples to defy on the ground that the caprices of chance could be all but completely forestalled by rational planning. These teachings nullified the importance of Greek poets as moral teachers. Homer and the tragic drama went overboard. Epicurus styled their moral teachings a hodgepodge.

This new freedom signified the privilege of being continuously happy. This too was new, because Plato and most other teachers had assumed the existence of peaks of pleasure alternating with intervals void of pleasure. Continuous pleasure Epicurus made conceivable and feasible by defining pleasure as a healthy mind in a healthy body, mens sana in corpore sano. The limit of it was freedom from pain of body and distress of mind. Pleasure, he said, was normal, just as health is normal; pain was abnormal, just as sickness is abnormal. By living the right kind of life and by limiting the desires he declared that continuity of happiness could be achieved. The control of experience was to him a categorical imperative.

Pleasure Not the Greatest Good

In spite of this teaching it was not the doctrine of Epicurus that pleasure was the greatest good. To his thinking the greatest good was life itself. This was a logical deduction from the denial of immortality. Without the afterlife this present life becomes the concentration of all values. Pleasure, or hap­piness, has its place as the end, goal or fulfilment of living.

It was the Stoics and Cicero who concocted and publicized the false report that Epicurus counted pleasure as the greatest good. This is mistakenly asserted in all our handbooks.

The New Psychology

Just as the belief in immortality leads to the exaltation of the soul and the depreciation of the body, so the belief in mortality presumes a certain parity of importance between soul and body. To Epicurus the soul is of similar structure to the body, differing only in the fineness and mobility of the component atoms. Body and soul work as a team. The soul bestows sensitivity upon the body and the body in turn bestows it upon the soul. This results in “cosensitivity,” as Epicurus calls it. Sensation itself, he claimed, is irrational. Thus the tongue by physical contact receives the stimulus of sweetness, but it is the intelligence, part of the soul, that recognizes this stimulus and issues the pronouncement, “This is honey.” This interdependence of soul and body extends to all activities. Responses to stimuli are total, not separate; they are “psychosomatic,” to use a term of modern psychiatry. Epicurus scorned all philosophy that failed to regard psychiatry as its function.

Persecution by the Platonists

At the age of thirty Epicurus migrated from Colophon to Mytilene and began to promulgate these heterodoxies as a public teacher. In that city the Platonists were dominant. Within the space of a few months he seems to have had them about his ears. Within a year their enmity had aroused the authorities and so incited the populace that he was forced to take ship in the winter season and in danger of shipwreck or capture by pirates. Never afterward did he venture like other philosophers to teach in public places.

In Lampsacus on the Hellespont .he found a refuge, gained the favor of the authorities, assembled a strong school and obtained financial support. After four years he felt strong enough to carry the war into Africa, as is said in Roman history, and removed to Athens, locating himself on the same street as Plato’s Academy and not far from it.

The New Procedures

Persecution had not changed his doctrines but it did revolutionize his procedures. Public appearances were avoided; instruction was confined to his own house and the garden he had purchased. Outside of the school he instituted a method of disseminating his new doctrine by personal contacts. Each convert was urged to win over the members of his own household, his friends and neighbors, “never slackening in spreading by every means the doctrines of the true philosophy.” Prospective converts were plied with books and tracts. Epicurus himself, like John Wesley, became a busy compiler of textbooks, and specific instructions were written for the proper use of them. He made outlines of doctrine for those who were unable to live in residence. The allegiance of disciples living in other cities was retained by epistles painstakingly composed. Thus the new school was transformed into a self-propagating sect.

Within two centuries this self-extending gospel of the tranquil life had spread to most parts of the Graeco-Roman world. “It took Italy by storm,” as Cicero reluctantly records. At the same time the forces of opposition were growing in like proportion. The campaigns of the Stoics became so notorious that modern scholars have all but overlooked the original battle with the Platonists, whose acrid criticisms were refurbished by Plutarch under the early Empire. By that time the Christian writers had joined the chorus of the opposition and at last, in the stormy fourth century, the friendly sect seems to have been finally silenced. For some centuries afterward all that survived was a trickle of untruth. Men still knew something of epicurism but nothing of Epicureanism.

Yet when the study of natural science was at last reborn, it was the once rejected atomic theory that furnished a starting point for modern chemistry, and when modern thinkers began to see evolutionary processes in human institutions, it was observed that long ago Epicurus that blazed that path of enquiry. Erring with Plato had its pleasure and its profit but also its price, the postponement of scientific progress. Platonic thought had some close affinities with the Stone Age.

Near Final Draft, Back to the Garden

I’ve written and compiled a short book on Epicureanism, “Back to the Garden of Epicurus.” You can download it for free at MidMo.US in either epub (most e-readers) or mobi (kindle) formats.

Here is the preface:

Epicureanism, much maligned and often criticized from its founding to the present for its “godless hedonism”, perhaps the most misunderstood of ethical doctrines. Synonymous with fancy wine, food, and the high life; the popular definition of Epicureanism could not be further from its roots. This book is about classical Epicureanism which is based upon the doctrines passed down by Epicurus. Epicurus taught a doctrine with an emphasis upon ending any fear of god and leading a private and simple life amongst friends. This brought his doctrine into conflict with the rulers of his day, the competing doctrine of Stoicism, and latter Christians. The practitioners of Epicureanism were scorned, their doctrines were mocked, and their writings were destroyed. This assault nearly ended Epicureanism.

Were it not for the biographer Diogenes Laertius (3^rd Century) and the poet philosopher Titus Lucretius Carus (1^st Century BC) the teachings of Epicurus would have been completely forgotten. As it is, Lucretius’ summation of Epicurean principles was lost for centuries and was only discovered in the 15^th Century. Some credit this (re)discovery as the cause of the Renaissance.* This (re)discovery certainly played a large role in the Age of Reason,** from which modern democracy sprung. With this historical perspective in mind, we cannot feel anything but fortunate for the teachings and continued existence of the ideas of Epicurus.

There is currently a resurgence of interest in Epicureanism. It may be that the pendulum of historical thought has made this resurgence possible or it may be that this era is particularly fertile for the growth of Epicurean ideas. Only the passage of time will tell. This work before you is part of that resurgence.

Epicurus (341-270 BC) divided philosophy into three sections: 1) Canonic, includes what we would call logic and theory of knowledge, 2) Physics, like the present day conception addresses the nature of the universe, and 3) Ethics, practical knowledge for how we should live. This book addresses all three areas of knowledge but with emphasis on ethics.

Section 1 is a brief introduction to Epicurus and his teachings. Chapter 1 explains the difference between Epicurean Hedonism and the hedonism of the present based in greed and gluttony. In chapter 2 we take a look at Epicurean doctrine in outline format, the reader may wish to consult this chapter as they read further in the book. Chapter 3 wraps up the first section with a very brief biography of Epicurus and a short sketch of his teachings.

Section 2, the heart and meat of the book, contains primary sources for learning of Epicureanism. Chapter 4 contains two letters written by Epicurus giving the outline of his philosophy, the first on physics and the second on ethics.. Chapter 5 contains Principal Doctrines, 40 maxims collected by Diogenes Laertius. A collection of another 81 maxims found at the Vatican and referred to as Vatican Sayings make up Chapter 6. Finishing up this section is chapter 7 containing fragments of Epicurus’ thought drawn from various sources.

The final section contains only Chapter 8, Getting Back to the Garden. This is an attempt to draw together the ethical teachings of Epicurus and gives suggestions on making his teachings practical for our time. The book concludes with a timeline, a glossary of terms, and suggestions for further reading.

It is this author’s sincere wish that you, the reader, will find in this work a small something that will encourage further inquiry into the teachings of Epicurus, this most fascinating of teachers.

*See “The Swerve: How the World Became Modern” by Stephen Greenblatt.

**See Thomas Jefferson’s letter to William Short.

Epicureanism as a Way of Life

Those who know me know that I have long been intrigued by the Hellenistic philosophies of Stoicism and Epicureanism.  In the last two years I have been drawn away from Stoicism and have developed a deep attachment to the teachings of Epicurus.

I’ve always enjoyed the way that the Buddhists numbered everything…the three practices, the four noble truths, the eightfold path, etc…

In my notebook I’ve been attempting to do something similar for Epicureanism.  Since it has been so long since I posted anything here, I thought I would share them.

(keep in mind that I invented none of these, I simply drew them from disparate sources, I would have kept source links had I known that I would share them)

Ten Epicurean Values

1-5 have to do with ourselves)

1) Prudence
2) Self-management
3) Self-sufficiency
4) Serenity
5) Simplicity

6-10 have to do with our relationship with others)

6) Friendliness
7) Honesty
8) Generosity
9) Cheerfulness
10) Gentleness

Eight Epicurean Counsels

1) Don’t fear God.
2) Don’t worry about death.
3) Don’t fear pain.
4) Live simply.
5) Pursue pleasure wisely.
6) Make friends and be a good friend.
7) Be honest in your business and private life.
8) Avoid fame and political ambition.

The Epicurean Paradox

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

Four Part Cure

Don’t fear god,
Don’t worry about death;
What is good is easy to get, and
What is terrible is easy to endure.

Types of Desires

1.  Natural and necessary (always OK)
2. Natural but unnecessary (OK if no greater harm is caused)
3. Unnatural and unnecessary (Never OK)

 The Three Goods

1. Friendship
2. Analysed Life
3. Autarchy

Principal Doctrines

1A blessed and eternal being has no trouble itself and brings no trouble upon any other being; hence it is exempt from movements of anger and favour, for every such movement implies weakness.

2Death is nothing to us; for the body, when it has been resolved into its elements, has no feeling, and that which has no feeling is nothing to us.

3The magnitude of pleasures is limited by the removal of all pain. Wherever there is pleasure, so long as it is present, there is no pain either of body or of mind or both.

4Continuous pain does not last long in the flesh, and pain, if extreme, is present a very short time, and even that degree of pain which barely outweighs pleasure in the flesh does not occur for many days together. Illnesses of long duration even permit of an excess of pleasure over pain in the flesh.

5It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly, and it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living pleasantly. Whenever any one of these is lacking, when, for instance, the man does not live wisely, though he lives well and justly, it is impossible for him to live a pleasant life.

6As far as concerns protection from other men, any means of procuring this was a natural good.

7Some men sought to become famous and renowned, thinking that thus they would make themselves secure against their fellow-men. If, then, the life of such persons really was secure, they attained natural good; if, however, it was insecure, they have not attained the end which by nature’s own promptings they originally sought.

8No pleasure is in itself evil, but the things which produce certain pleasures entail annoyances many times greater than the pleasures themselves.

9If all pleasure had been capable of accumulation, if this had gone on not only in time, but all over the frame or, at any rate, the principal parts of man’s nature, there would not have been any difference between one pleasure and another as, in fact, there now is.

10If the objects which are productive of pleasures to profligate persons really freed them from fears of the mind—the fears, I mean, inspired by celestial and atmospheric phenomena, the fear of death, the fear of pain—if, further, they taught them to limit their desires, we should not have any reason to censure such persons, for they would then be filled with pleasure to overflowing on all sides and would be exempt from all pain, whether of body or mind, that is, from all evil.

11If we had never been molested by alarms at celestial and atmospheric phenomena, nor by the misgiving that death somehow affects us, nor by neglect of the proper limits of pains and desires, we should have had no need to study natural science.

12It would be impossible to banish fear on matters of the highest importance if a man did not know the nature of the whole universe but lived in dread of what the legends tell us. Hence, without the study of nature there was no enjoyment of unmixed pleasures.

13There would be no advantage in providing security against our fellow-men so long as we were alarmed by occurrences over our heads or beneath the earth, or in general by whatever happens in the infinite void.

14When tolerable security against our fellow-men is attained, then on a basis of power arises most genuine bliss, to wit, the security of a private life withdrawn from the multitude.

15Nature’s wealth has its bounds and is easy to procure, but the wealth of vain fancies recedes to an infinite distance.

16Fortune but slightly crosses the wise man’s path; his greatest and highest interests are directed by reason throughout the course of life.

17The just man enjoys the greatest peace of mind, the unjust is full of the utmost disquietude.

18Pleasure in the flesh admits no increase when once the pain of want has been removed; after that it only admits of variation. The limit of pleasure in the mind is obtained by calculating the pleasures themselves and the contrary pains, which cause the mind the greatest alarms.

19Infinite time and finite time hold an equal amount of pleasure, if we measure the limits of that pleasure by reason.

20The flesh assumes the limits of pleasure to be infinite, and only infinite time would satisfy it. But the mind, grasping in thought what the end and limit of the flesh is, and banishing the terrors of futurity, procures a complete and perfect life and has no longer any need of infinite time. Nevertheless, it does not shun pleasure, and even in the hour of death, when ushered out of existence by circumstances, the mind does not fail to enjoy the best life.

21He who understands the limits of life knows how easy it is to procure enough to remove the pain of want and make the whole of life complete and perfect. Hence he has no longer any need of things which are not to be won save by conflict and struggle.

22We must take into account as the end all that really exists and all clear evidence of sense to which we refer our opinions; for otherwise everything will be full of uncertainty and confusion.

23If you fight against all your sensations you will have no standard to which to refer, and thus no means of judging even those sensations which you pronounce false.

24If you reject absolutely any single sensation without stopping to discriminate between that which is matter of opinion and awaits further confirmation and that which is already present, whether in sensation or in feeling or in any mental apprehension, you will throw into confusion even the rest of your sensations by your groundless belief, so as to reject the truth altogether. If you hastily affirm as true all that awaits confirmation in ideas based on opinion, as well as that which does not, you will not escape error, as you will be taking sides in every question involving truth and error.

25If you do not on every separate occasion refer each of your actions to the chief end of nature, but if instead of this in the act of choice or avoidance you swerve aside to some other end, your acts will not be consistent with your theories.

26Some desires lead to no pain when they remain ungratified. All such desires are unnecessary, and the longing is easily got rid of when the thing desired is difficult to procure or when the desires seem likely to produce harm.

27Of all the means which are procured by wisdom to insure happiness throughout the whole of life, by far the most important is the acquisition of friends.

28The same conviction, which inspires confidence that nothing we have to fear is eternal or even of long duration, also enables us to see that even in our limited life nothing enhances our security so much as friendship.

29Of our desires, some are natural and necessary; others are natural, but not necessary; others, again, are neither natural nor necessary, but are due to groundless opinion.

30Some natural desires, again, entail no pain when not gratified, though the objects are vehemently pursued. These desires also are due to groundless opinion, and when they are not got rid of, it is not because of their own nature, but because of the man’s groundless opinion.

31Natural justice is a contract of expediency, to prevent one man from harming or being harmed by another.

32Those animals which were incapable of making compacts with one another, to the end that they might neither inflict nor suffer harm, are without either justice or injustice. Similarly those tribes which either could not or would not form mutual covenants to the same end are in the like case.

33There never was an absolute justice, but only a convention made in mutual intercourse, in whatever region, from time to time, providing against the infliction or suffering of harm.

34Injustice is not in itself an evil, but only in its consequence, viz., the terror which is excited by apprehension that those appointed to punish such offences will discover the injustice.

35It is impossible for the man who secretly violates any article of the social compact to feel confident that he will remain undiscovered, even if he has already escaped ten thousand times; for until his death he is never sure he will not be detected.

36Taken generally, justice is the same for all, but in its application to particular cases of territory or the like, it varies under different circumstances.

37Whatever in conventional law is attested to be expedient in the needs arising out of mutual intercourse is by its nature just, whether the same for all or not, and in case any law is made and does not prove suitable to the expediency of mutual intercourse, then this is no longer just. And should the expediency which is expressed by the law vary and only for a time correspond with the notion of justice, nevertheless, for the time being, it was just, so long as we do not trouble ourselves about empty terms but look broadly at facts.

38Where without any change in circumstances the conventional laws when judged by their consequences were seen not to correspond with the notion of justice, such laws were not really just; but wherever the laws have ceased to be expedient in consequence of a change in circumstances, in that case the laws were for the time being just, when they were expedient for the mutual intercourse of the citizens, and ceased subsequently to be just when they ceased to be expedient.

39He who best insured safety from external foes made into one nation all the folk capable of uniting together, and those incapable of such union he assuredly did not treat as aliens; if there were any whom he could not even on such terms incorporate, he excluded them from intercourse whenever this suited with his own interests.

40Those who could best insure the confidence that they would be safe from their neighbours, being thus in possession of the surest guarantee, passed the most agreeable life in each other’s society, and their enjoyment of the fullest intimacy was such that, if one of them died before his time, the survivors did not lament his death as if it called for pity.

Vatican Sayings

1(PD 1)A blessed and indestructible being has no trouble himself and brings no trouble upon any other being; so he is free from anger and partiality, for all such things imply weakness.

2(PD 2)Death is nothing to us; for that which has been dissolved into its elements experiences no sensations, and that which has no sensation is nothing to us.

3(PD 4)Continuous bodily pain does not last long; instead, pain, if extreme, is present a very short time, and even that degree of pain which slightly exceeds bodily pleasure does not last for many days at once. Diseases of long duration allow an excess of bodily pleasure over pain.

4Every pain is easy to disregard; for that which is intense is of brief duration, and those bodily pains that last long are mild.

5(PD 5)It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and honorably and justly, and it is impossible to live wisely and honorably and justly without living pleasantly. Whenever any one of these is lacking, when, for instance, the man is not able to live wisely, though he lives honorably and justly, it is impossible for him to live a pleasant life.

6(PD 35)It is impossible for a man who secretly violates the terms of the agreement not to harm or be harmed to feel confident that he will remain undiscovered, even if he has already escaped ten thousand times; for until his death he is never sure that he will not be detected.

7For an aggressor to be undetected is difficult; and for him to be confident that his concealment will continue is impossible.

8(PD 15)The wealth required by nature is limited and is easy to procure; but the wealth required by vain ideals extends to infinity.

9Necessity is an evil; but there is no necessity for continuing to live with necessity.

10Remember that you are mortal and have a limited time to live and have devoted yourself to discussions on nature for all time and eternity and have seen “things that are now and are to me come and have been.”

11Most men are insensible when they rest, and mad when they act.

12(PD 17) The just man is most free from disturbance, while the unjust is full of the utmost disturbance.

13(PD 37) Among the things held to be just by law, whatever is proved to be of advantage in men’s dealings has the stamp of justice, whether or not it be the same for all; but if a man makes a law and it does not prove to be mutually advantageous, then this is no longer just. And if what is mutually advantageous varies and only for a time corresponds to our concept of justice, nevertheless for that time it is just for those who do not trouble themselves about empty words, but look simply at the facts.

14We have been born once and cannot be born a second time; for all eternity we shall no longer exist. But you, although you are not in control of tomorrow, are postponing your happiness. Life is wasted by delaying, and each one of us dies without enjoying leisure.

15We place a high value on our characters as if they were our own possessions whether or not we are virtuous and praised by other men. So, too, we must regard the characters of those around us if they are our friends.

16No one chooses a thing seeing that it is evil; but being lured by it when it appears good in comparison to a greater evil, he is caught.

17We should not view the young man as happy, but rather the old man whose life has been fortunate. The young man at the height of his powers is often befuddled by chance and driven from his course; but the old man has dropped anchor in old age as in a harbor, since he secures in sure and thankful memory goods for which he was once scarcely confident of.

18If sight, association, and intercourse are removed, the passion of love is ended.

19He has become an old man on the day on which he forgot his past blessings.

20(PD 29) Of our desires some are natural and necessary, others are natural but not necessary; and others are neither natural nor necessary, but are due to groundless opinion.

21We must not force Nature but persuade her. We shall persuade her if we satisfy the necessary desires and also those bodily desires that do not harm us while sternly rejecting those that are harmful.

22(PD 19) Unlimited time and limited time afford an equal amount of pleasure, if we measure the limits of that pleasure by reason.

23Every friendship in itself is to be desired; but the initial cause of friendship is from its advantages.

24Dreams have neither a divine nature nor a prophetic power, but they are the result of images that impact on us.

25Poverty, if measured by the natural end, is great wealth; but wealth, if not limited, is great poverty.

26One must presume that long and short arguments contribute to the same end.

27The benefits of other activities come only to those who have already become, with great difficulty, complete masters of such pursuits, but in the study of philosophy pleasure accompanies growing knowledge; for pleasure does not follow learning; rather, learning and pleasure advance side by side.

28Those who are overly eager to make friends are not to be approved; nor yet should you approve those who avoid friendship, for risks must be run for its sake.

29To speak frankly as I study nature I would prefer to speak in oracles that which is of advantage to all men even though it be understood by none, rather than to conform to popular opinion and thus gain the constant praise that comes from the many.

30Some men spend their whole life furnishing for themselves the things proper to life without realizing that at our birth each of us was poured a mortal brew to drink.

31It is possible to provide security against other things, but as far as death is concerned, we men all live in a city without walls.

32The honor paid to a wise man is itself a great good for those who honor him.

33The cry of the flesh is not to be hungry, thirsty, or cold; for he who is free of these and is confident of remain so might vie even with Zeus for happiness.

34We do not so much need the assistance of our friends as we do the confidence of their assistance in need.

35Don’t spoil what you have by desiring what you don’t have; but remember that what you now have was once among the things only hoped for.

36Epicurus’s life when compared to that of other men with respect to gentleness and self-sufficiency might be thought a mere legend.

37When confronted by evil nature is weak, but not when faced with good; for pleasures make it secure but pains ruin it.

38He is of very small account for whom there are many good reasons for ending his life.

39Neither he who is always seeking material aid from his friends nor he who never considers such aid is a true friend; for one engages in petty trade, taking a favor instead of gratitude, and the other deprives himself of hope for the future.

40He who asserts that everything happens by necessity can hardly find fault with one who denies that everything happens by necessity; by his own theory this very argument is voiced by necessity.

41At one and the same time we must philosophize, laugh, and manage our household and other business, while never ceasing to proclaim the words of true philosophy.

42The same time produces both the beginning of the greatest good and the dissolution of the evil.

43The love of money, if unjustly gained, is impious, and, if justly, shameful; for it is inappropriate to be miserly even with justice on one’s side.

44The wise man who has become accustomed to necessities knows better how to share with others than how to take from them, so great a treasure of self-sufficiency has he found.

45The study of nature does not create men who are fond of boasting and chattering or who show off the culture that impresses the many, but rather men who are strong and self-sufficient, and who take pride in their own personal qualities not in those that depend on external circumstances.

46Let us completely rid ourselves of our bad habits as if they were evil men who have done us long and grievous harm.

47I have anticipated you, Fortune, and entrenched myself against all your secret attacks. And we will not give ourselves up as captives to you or to any other circumstance; but when it is time for us to go, spitting contempt on life and on those who here vainly cling to it, we will leave life crying aloud in a glorious triumph-song that we have lived well.

48While we are on the road, we must try to make what is before us better than what is past; when we come to the road’s end, we feel a smooth contentment.

49(PD 12) It is impossible for someone to dispel his fears about the most important matters if he doesn’t know the nature of the universe but still gives some credence to myths. So without the study of nature there is no enjoyment of pure pleasure.

50(PD 8) No pleasure is a bad thing in itself, but the things which produce certain pleasures entail disturbances many times greater than the pleasures themselves.

51[addressing a young man] I understand from you that your natural disposition is too much inclined toward sexual passion. Follow your inclination as you will, provided only that you neither violate the laws, disturb well-established customs, harm any one of your neighbors, injure your own body, nor waste your possessions. That you be not checked by one or more of these provisos is impossible; for a man never gets any good from sexual passion, and he is fortunate if he does not receive harm.

52Friendship dances around the world bidding us all to awaken to the recognition of happiness.

53We must envy no one; for the good do not deserve envy and as for the bad, the more they prosper, the more they ruin it for themselves.

54It is not the pretense but the real pursuit of philosophy that is needed; for we do not need the semblance of health but rather true health.

55We should find solace for misfortune in the happy memory of what has been and in the knowledge that what has been cannot be undone.

56–57The wise man feels no more pain when being tortured himself than when his friend tortured, and will die for him; for if he betrays his friend, his whole life will be confounded by distrust and completely upset.

58We must free ourselves from the prison of public education and politics.

59What cannot be satisfied is not a man’s stomach, as most men think, but rather the false opinion that the stomach requires unlimited filling.

60Every man passes out of life as if he had just been born.

61Most beautiful is the sight of those close to us, when our original contact makes us of one mind or produces a great incitement to this end.

62If the anger of parents against their children is justified, it is quite pointless for the children to resist it and to fail to ask forgiveness. If the anger is not justified but is unreasonable, it is folly for an irrational child to appeal to someone deaf to appeals and not to try to turn it aside in other directions by a display of good will.

63There is also a limit in simple living, and he who fails to understand this falls into an error as great as that of the man who gives way to extravagance.

64We should welcome praise from others if it comes unsought, but we should be concerned with healing ourselves.

65It is pointless for a man to pray to the gods for that which he has the power to obtain by himself.

66We show our feeling for our friends’ suffering, not with laments, but with thoughtful concern.

67Since the attainment of great wealth can scarcely be accomplished without slavery to crowds or to politicians, a free life cannot obtain much wealth; but such a life already possesses everything in unfailing supply. Should such a life happen to achieve great wealth, this too it can share so as to gain the good will of one’s neighbors.

68Nothing is enough to someone for whom what is enough is little.

69The thankless nature of the soul makes the creature endlessly greedy for variations in its lifestyle.

70Do nothing in your life that will cause you to fear if it is discovered by your neighbor.

71Question each of your desires: “What will happen to me if that which this desire seeks is achieved, and what if it is not?”

72(PD 13) There is no advantage to obtaining protection from other men so long as we are alarmed by events above or below the earth or in general by whatever happens in the boundless universe.

73That we have suffered certain bodily pains aids us in preventing others like them.

74In a philosophical dispute, he gains most who is defeated, since he learns the most.

75The saying, “look to the end of a long life,” shows small thanks for past good fortune.

76As you grow old you are such as I urge you to be, and you have recognized the difference between studying philosophy for yourself and studying it for Greece. I rejoice with you.

77Freedom is the greatest fruit of self-sufficiency.

78The noble man is chiefly concerned with wisdom and friendship; of these, the former is a mortal good, the latter an immortal one.

79He who is calm disturbs neither himself nor another.

80The first step towards salvation is to attend to one’s youth and guard against that which defiles everything through maddening desires.

81The soul neither rids itself of disturbance nor gains a worthwhile joy through the possession of greatest wealth, nor by the honor and admiration bestowed by the crowd, or through any of the other things sought by unlimited desire.

Alain de Botton

Alain de Botton, a Swiss born philosopher, author and presenter first came to my attention in the early oughts when I happened across his Consolations of Philosophy.  I had at some time earlier read Boethius’ work of the same name, so my interest was piqued.  de Botton’s work did not disappoint.  I was immediately taken in by his ability to make complex ideas simple to understand.  And he accomplishes this not by watering the ideas down, but by its inverse, a process of distillation.  A rare trick indeed.  It was this same ability to distill ideas into a super concentrate that led me to devour Tolstoy’s religious writings.

de Botton has resurfaced due to his newest work, Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion.  Full disclosure, I haven’t yet read it.  Unfortunately, life’s situation being what it is, I can’t spare the $17.  Watching him interviewed on his latest work, it seems that he has become a much needed antidote to the fundamentalist atheism of Dawkins, Harris, etc.  I find fundamentalism to be disquieting and off-setting, irregardless of whatever belief system being espoused.  So it has been added to my reading list.

Learning that he had a new book out, I googled him to find what information was available.  I discovered there is a wealth of both audio and video available for free on the web.  I am writing this post to point out a few of the more interesting/enlightening pieces that I came across.

First a 20 minute Ted Talk on Atheism 2.0, then a list of links.

More Ted Talks are available here.

BBC has a dozen 10 minute audio clips.

An hour long video on fora.tv focusing on ideas from his book: The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work.

There is a 35 minute “sermon” on vimeo published by de Botton’s School of Life, this one On Religion for Atheists.

Alain de Botton On Religion for Atheists from The School of Life on Vimeo.

A simple search of vimeo or youtube also turns up a host of videos.

Try to get away from the latest Reality TV for even one evening per month (or better, one evening per week), there are worse choices than choosing to spend some of that time taking in the simple (yet profound) ideas that Alain de Botton has to offer.

Edit: It would be remiss to not offer a link to de Botton’s personal site and his School of Life.

Also a 6 part TV series based on Consolations of Philosophy. (The order is off…it should be Socrates, Epicurus, Seneca, Montaigne, Schopenhauer, and Nietzche.)