The Things Which Bring Happiness
by Joan Lansberry
July 25, 2003
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Carpe Diem!
Ask not - we cannot know - what end the gods have set for you, for me; nor attempt the Babylonian reckonings Leuconoë. How much better to endure whatever comes, whether Jupiter grants us additional winters or whether this is our last, which now wears out the Tuscan Sea upon the barrier of the cliffs! Be wise, strain the wine; and since life is brief, prune back far-reaching hopes! Even while we speak, envious time has passed: pluck the day, putting as little trust as possible in tomorrow!
Quintus Horatius Flaccus
Tu ne quaesieris - scire nefas - quem mihi, quem tibi
finem di dederint, Leuconoë, nec Babylonios
temptaris numeros. ut melius, quicquid erit, pati!
seu plures hiemes, seu tribuit Iuppiter ultimam,
quae nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare
Tyrhenum. Sapias, vina liques, et spatio brevi
spem longam reseces. dum loquimur, fugerit invida
aetas: carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.
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I rejoice to discover a foe of austere abstinence and lover of life with all its pleasures who formed a school of philosophy in ancient Greece. Epicurus (c. 341-271 BCE) is one of the major philosophers in the Hellenistic period. He taught his students in his privately owned Garden groves. Communities of Epicureans flourished for centuries after his death, yet his philosophy has been criticised as "hedonistic and materialistic".
To Epicurus, the chief good in life is pleasure:
''Beauty and virtue and the like are to be honored, if they give pleasure; but if they do not give pleasure, we must bid them farewell.''
Epicurus celebrated the goodness of sensuality, as he stated:
''I do not know how I can conceive the good, if I withdraw the pleasures of taste, withdraw the pleasures of love, withdraw the pleasures of hearing, and withdraw the pleasurable emotions caused by the sight of a beautiful form.''
He exhorts:
''Do not think it unnatural that when the flesh cries out, the soul cries too. The flesh cries out to be saved from hunger, thirst, and cold. It is hard for the soul to repress these cries, and dangerous for it to disregard nature’s summons, because the soul accustomed to independence day by day.''
Yet these desires of the flesh must have reason applied to them:
''LXXI. Evaluate each of your desires by this question: "What will happen to me if that which this desire seeks is attained, and what if it is not?"''
''All desires that do not lead to pain when they remain unsatisfied are unnecessary, but such desires are easily discarded when the thing desired is difficult to obtain or the desires seem likely to produce harm.''
''The man who follows nature and not groundless opinions is independent of all things. For in reference to what is enough for nature, every possession is riches - but in reference to unlimited desires, even the greatest wealth <is not riches but poverty.>
''No pleasure is a bad thing in itself: but the means which produce some pleasures bring with them disturbances many times greater than the pleasures themselves.
''He who understands the limits of life knows that it is easy to obtain that which removes the pain of want and makes the whole of life complete and perfect. Thus he has no longer any need of things which are troublesome to attain.''
Desiring things as great wealth and fame are the vain desires which can never be satisfied, for once we have a little, we always want more.
But Epicurus doesn't advocate effacing oneself:
''LXIV. We should welcome praise from others if it comes unsought, but we should also be engaged in improving ourselves.''
It is far better then, rather than concerning ourselves with thoughts of possible fame, but to what actions we can pursue that are worthy of fame. Here, too, is the meaning behind the Egyptian phrase 'Kheper', 'conscious willed evolution'.
Epicurus points to the reason why the philosophy of consciousness worshipping is desirable, for the practice of it produces great pleasure.
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At the beginning of Epicurus' Letter to Menoeceus:
"Let no one be slow to seek wisdom when he is young nor weary in the search of it when he has grown old. For no age is too early or too late for the health of the soul. And to say that the season for studying philosophy has not yet come, or that it is past and gone, is like saying that the season for happiness is not yet or that it is now no more. Therefore, both old and young alike ought to seek wisdom, the former in order that, as age comes over him, he may be young in good things because of the grace of what has been, and the latter in order that, while he is young, he may at the same time be old, because he has no fear of the things which are to come. So we must exercise ourselves in the things which bring happiness, since, if that be present, we have everything, and, if that be absent, all our actions are directed towards attaining it."
At the end of Epicurus' Letter to Menoeceus:
"Exercise yourself in these and related precepts day and night, both by yourself and with one who is like-minded; then never, either in waking or in dream, will you be disturbed, but will live as a god among men."
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It is quite enlightening to learn that from earliest times there has been an alternative to the
stoical ascetic systems which deny pleasure seeking for stern duty's sake. Such 'black and white' systems, allowing for no gradations between 'good' and 'evil', have infested most of today's popular moral systems.
As the study of Epicureanism proves,
It wasn't always this way!
And then the deeper look: What Is 'The Most Exalted State'?
And another deeper look: More Than Matter - Epicurus Revisited
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