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EPICURUS (342–270 B.C.)
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See also:EPICURUS (342–270 B.C.) , See also:Greek philosopher, was See also:born in See also:Samos in the end of 342 or the beginning of 341 B.C., seven years after the See also:death of See also:Plato. His See also:father Neocles, a native of Gargettos, a small See also:village of See also:Attica, had settled in Samos, not later than 352, as one of the cleruchs sent out after the victory of Timotheusin 366–365. At the See also:age of eighteen he went to See also:Athens,. where the Platonic school was flourishing under the See also:lead of See also:Xenocrates. A See also:year later, however, See also:Antipater banished some 12,000 of the poorer citizens, and Epicurus joined his father, who was now living at See also:Colophon. It seems possible that he had listened to the lectures of Nausiphanes,a Democritean philosopher, and See also:Pamphilus the Platonist, but he was probably, like his father, merely an See also:ordinary teacher. Stimulated, however, by the perusal of some writings of See also:Democritus, he began to formulate a See also:doctrine of his own; and at Mitylene, Colophon and See also:Lampsacus, he gradually gathered See also:round him several enthusiastic disciples. In 307 he returned to Athens, which had just been restored to a nominal See also:independence by See also:Demetrius Poliorcetes, and there he lived for the See also:rest of his See also:life. The See also:scene of his teaching was a See also:garden which he bought for about £300 (8o mince). There he passed his days as the loved and venerated See also:head of a remarkable, and up to that See also:time unique, society of men and See also:women. Amongst the number were See also:Metrodorus (d. 277), his See also:brother Timocrates, and his wife Leontion (formerly a hetaera), See also:Polyaenus, Hermarchus, who succeeded Epicurus as See also:chief of the school, Leonteus and his wife Themista, and See also:Idomeneus, whose wife was a See also:sister of Metrodorus. It is possible that the relations between the sexes—in this prototype of See also:Rabelais's See also:Abbey of Theleme—were not entirely what is termed Platonic. But there is on the other See also:hand scarcely a doubt that the tales of licentiousness circulated by opponents are groundless. The stories of the See also:Stoics, who sought to refute the views of Epicurus by an See also:appeal to his alleged antecedents and habits, were no doubt in the See also:main;, as See also:Diogenes Laertius says, the stories of maniacs. The See also:general charges, which they endeavoured to substantiate by forged letters, need not See also:count for much, and in many cases they only exaggerated what, if true, was not so heinous as they suggested. Against them trustworthy authorities testified to his general and remark-able considerateness, pointing to the statues which the See also:city had raised in his See also:honour, and to the See also:numbers of his See also:friends, who were many enough to fill whole cities.
The mode of life in his community was See also:plain. The general drink was See also:water and the See also:food See also:barley See also:bread; See also:half a See also:pint of See also:wine was held an ample See also:allowance. " Send me," says Epicurus to a correspondent, " send me some Cythnian See also:cheese, so that, should I choose, I may fare sumptuously." There was no community of See also:property, which, as Epicurus said, would imply distrust of their own and others' See also:good resolutions. The See also:company was held in unity by the charms of his See also:personality, and by the See also:free inter-course which he inculcated and exemplified. Though he seems
to have had a warm See also:affection for his countrymen, it was as human beings brought into contact with him, and not as members of a See also:political See also:body, that he preferred to regard them. He never entered public life. His kindliness extended even to his slaves, one of whom, named See also:Mouse, was a brother in See also:philosophy.
Epicurus died of See also: He See also:left his property, consisting of the garden (Kij7roi 'E7ruKoi pov), a See also:house in Melite (the See also:south-See also:west See also:quarter of Athens), and apparently some funds besides, to two trustees on behalf of his society, and for the See also:special See also:interest of some youthful members. The garden was set apart for the use of the school; the house became the house of Hermarchus and his See also:fellow-philosophers during his lifetime. The surplus proceeds of the property were further to be applied to maintain a yearly offering in See also:commemoration of his departed father, See also:mother and See also:brothers, to pay the expenses incurred in celebrating his own birthday every year on the 7th of the See also:month Gamelion, and for a social gathering of the See also:sect on the loth of every month in honour of himself and Metrodorus. Besides similar tributes in honour of his brothers and Polyaenus, he directed the trustees to be guardians of the son of Polyaenus and the son of Metrodorus; whilst the daughter of the last mentioned was to be married by the guardians to some member of the society who should be approved of by Hermarchus. His four slaves, three men and one woman, were left their freedom. His books passed to Hermarchus. Philosophy.—The Epicurean philosophy is traditionally divided into the three branches of See also:logic, physics and See also:ethics. It is, however, only as a basis of facts and principles for his theory of life that logical and See also:physical inquiries find a See also:place at all. Epicurus himself had not apparently shared in any large or liberal culture, and his See also:influence was certainly thrown on the See also:side of those who depreciated purely scientific pursuits as one-sided and misleading. "See also:Steer clear of all culture" was his See also:advice to a See also:young See also:disciple. In this aversion to a purely or mainly intellectual training may be traced a recoil from the systematic See also:metaphysics of Plato and See also:Aristotle, whose tendency was to sub-See also:ordinate the See also:practical See also:man to the philosopher. Ethics had been based upon logic and metaphysics. But experience showed that systematic knowledge of truth is not synonymous with right See also:action. Hence, in the second place, Plato and Aristotle had assumed a perfect See also:state with See also:laws to See also:guide the individual aright. It was thus comparatively easy to show how the individual could learn to apprehend and embody the moral See also:law in his own conduct. But experience had in the time of Epicurus shown the temporary and artificial See also:character of the civic See also:form of social life. It was necessary, therefore, for Epicurus to go back to nature to find a more enduring and a wider See also:foundation for ethical doctrine, to go back from words to realities, to give up reasonings and get at feelings, to test conceptions and arguments by a final reference to the only touchstone of truth—to sensation. There, and there only, one seems to find a See also:common and a satisfactory ground, supposing always that all men's feelings give the same See also:answer. Logic must go, but so also must the state, as a specially-privileged and eternal See also:order of things, as anything more than a contrivance serving certain purposes of general utility. To the Epicureans the elaborate logic of the Stoics was a superfluity. In place of logic we find canonic, the theory of the three tests of truth and reality. (I) The only ultimate See also:canon of reality is sensation; whatever we feel, whatever we perceive by any sense, that we know on the most certain See also:evidence we can have to be real, and in proportion as our feeling is clear, distinct and vivid, in that proportion are we sure of the reality of its See also:object. But in what that vividness (ivapyeta) consists is a question which Epicurus does not raise, and which he would no doubt have deemed superfluous quibbling over a See also:matter sufficiently settled by common sense. (2) Besides our sensations, we learn truth and reality by our preconceptions or ideas (7rpoXi4€is). These are the fainter images produced by repeated sensations, the " ideas " resulting from previous " impressions "—sensations at second-hand as it were, which are stored up in memory, and which a general name serves to recall. These See also:bear See also:witness to reality, not because we feel anything now, but becausewe See also:felt it once; they are sensations registered in See also:language, and again, if need be, translatable into immediate sensations or See also:groups of sensation. (3) Lastly, reality is vouched for by the imaginative apprehensions of the mind (4avravrLKai i7rt0oXai), immediate feelings of which the mind is conscious as produced by some action of its own. This last canon, however, was of dubious validity. Epicureanism generally was content to affirm that whatever we effectively feel in consciousness is real; in which sense they allow reality to the fancies of the insane, the dreams of a See also:sleeper, and those feelings by which we imagine the existence of beings of perfect blessedness and endless life. Similarly, just because fear, See also:hope and remembrance add to the intensity of consciousness; the Epicurean can hold that bodily See also:pain and See also:pleasure is a less durable and important thing than pain and pleasure of mind. Whatever we feel to affect us does affect us, and is therefore real. See also:Error can arise only because we mix up our opinions and sup-positions with what we actually feel. The Epicurean canon is a rejection of logic; it sticks fast to the one point that " sensation is sensation," and there is no more to be made of it. Sensation, it says, is unreasoning (aXo'yor); it must be accepted, and not criticized. Reasoning can come in only to put sensations together, and to point out how they severally contribute to human welfare; it does not make them, and cannot alter them. Physics.—In the Epicurean physics there are two parts—a general metaphysic and See also:psychology, and a special explanation of particular phenomena of nature. The method of Epicurus is the See also:argument of See also:analogy. It is an See also:attempt to make the phenomena of nature intelligible to us by regarding them as instances on a See also:grand See also:scale of that with which we are already See also:familiar on a small scale. This is what Epicurus calls explaining what we do not see by what we do see. In physics Epicurus founded upon Democritus, and his chief object was to abolish the See also:dualism between mind and matter which is so essential a point in the systems of Plato and Aristotle. All that exists, says Epicurus, is corporeal (To 7rav iare a&pa); the intangible is non-existent, or empty space. If a thing exists it must be felt, and to be felt it must exert resistance. But not all things are intangible which our senses are not subtle enough to detect. We must indeed accept our feelings; but we must also believe much which is not directly testified by sensation, if only it serves to explain phenomena and does not contravene our sensations. The fundamental postulates of Epicureanism are atoms and the void (aroµa Kai KevOv). Space is See also:infinite, and there is an illimitable multitude of indestructible, indivisible and absolutely compact atoms in perpetual See also:motion in this illimitable space. These atoms, differing only in See also:size, figure and See also:weight, are perpetually moving with equal velocities, but at a See also:rate far surpassing our conceptions; as they move, they are for ever giving rise to new worlds; and these worlds are perpetually tending towards See also:dissolution, and towards a fresh See also:series of creations. This universe of ours is only one See also:section out of the innumerable worlds in infinite space; other worlds may See also:present systems very different from that of our own. The soul of man is only a finer See also:species of body, spread throughout the whole See also:aggregation which we See also:term his bodily See also:frame. Like a warm breath, it pervades the human structure and See also:works with it; nor could it See also:act as it does in See also:perception unless it were corporeal. The various processes of sense, notably See also:vision, are explained on the principles of See also:materialism. From the surfaces of all See also:objects there are continually flowing thin filmy images exactly copying the solid body whence they originate; and these images by See also:direct impact on the organism produce (we need not care to ask how) the phenomena of vision. Epicurus in this way explains vision by substituting for the apparent action of a body at a distance a direct contact of See also:image and See also:organ. But without following the explanation into the details in which it See also:revels, it may be enough to say that the whole See also:hypothesis is but an attempt to exclude the occult conception of action at a distance, and substitute a familiar phenomenon. The Gods.—This aspect of the Epicurean physics becomes clearer when we look at his mode of rendering particular phenomena intelligible. His purpose is to eliminate the common See also:idea of divine interference. That there are gods Epicurus never dreams of denying. But these gods have not on their shoulders the See also:burden of upholding and governing the See also:world. They are them-selves the products of the order of nature—a higher species than humanity, but not the rulers of man, neither the makers nor the upholders of the world. Man should See also:worship them, but his worship is the reverence due to the ideals of perfect blessedness; it ought not to be inspired either by hope or by fear. To prevent all reference of the more potent phenomena of nature to divine action Epicurus rationalizes the processes of the cosmos. He imagines all possible plans or hypotheses, not actually contradicted by our experience of familiar events, which will represent in an intelligible way the processes of See also:astronomy and See also:meteorology. When two or more modes of accounting for a phenomena are equally admissible as not directly contradicted by known phenomena, it seems to Epicurus almost a return to the old mythological See also:habit of mind when a savant asserts that the real cause is one and only one. " See also:Thunder," he says, " may be explained in many other ways; only let us have no myths of divine action. To assign only a single cause for these phenomena, when the facts familiar to us suggest several, is insane, and is just the absurd conduct to be expected from See also:people who dabble in the vanities of astronomy." We need not be too curious to inquire how these See also:celestial phenomena actually do come about; we can learn how they might have been produced, and to go further is to See also:trench on ground beyond the limits of human knowledge. Thus, if Epicurus objects to the doctrine of See also:mythology, he objects no less to the doctrine of an inevitable See also:fate, a necessary order of things unchangeable and supreme over the human will. The Stoic doctrine of See also:Fatalism seemed to Epicurus no less deadly a foe of man's true welfare than popular superstition. Even in the See also:movement of the atoms he introduces a sudden See also:change of direction, which is supposed to render their aggregation easier, and to break the even law of destiny. So, in the See also:sphere of human action, Epicurus would allow of no absolutely controlling See also:necessity. In fact, it is only when we assume for man this in-dependence of the gods and of fatality that the Epicurean theory of life becomes possible. It assumes that man can, like the gods, withdraw himself out of reach of all See also:external influences, and thus, as a See also:sage, " live like a See also:god among men, seeing that the man is in no See also:wise like a mortal creature who lives in undying blessedness." And this present life is the only one. With one consent Epicureanism preaches that the death of the body is the end of everything for man, and hence the other world has lost all its terrors as well as all its hopes. The attitude of Epicurus in this whole matter is antagonistic to See also:science. The idea of a systematic enchainment of phenomena, in which each is conditioned by every other, and none can be taken in See also:isolation and explained apart from the rest, was See also:foreign to his mind. So little was the scientific conception of the See also:solar See also:system familiar to Epicurus that he could reproach the astronomers, because their See also:account of an See also:eclipse represented things otherwise than as they appear to the senses, and could declare that the See also:sun and stars were just as large as they seemed to us. Ethics.—The moral philosophy of Epicurus is a qualified See also:hedonism, the See also:heir of the Cyrenaic doctrine that pleasure is the good thing in life. Neither sect, it may be added, advocated sensuality pure and unfeigned—the Epicurean least of all. By pleasure Epicurus meant both more and less than the See also:Cyrenaics. To the Cyrenaics pleasure was of moments; to Epicurus it extended as a habit of mind through life. To the Cyrenaics pleasure was something active and See also:positive; to Epicurus it was rather negative—tranquillity more than vigorous enjoyment. The test of true pleasure, according to Epicurus, is the removal and absorption of all that gives pain; it implies freedom from pain of body and from trouble of mind. The happiness of the Epicurean was, it might almost seem, a See also:grave and See also:solemn pleasure—a quiet unobtrusive ease of See also:heart, but not exuberance and excitement. The sage of Epicureanism is a rational and reflective seeker for happiness, who balances the claims of each pleasure against the evils that may possibly ensue, and treadsthe path of enjoyment cautiously. Prudence is, therefore, the only real guide to happiness; it is thus the chief excellence, and the foundation of all the virtues. It is, in fact, says Epicurus—in language which contrasts strongly with that of Aristotle on the same topic—" a more See also:precious See also:power than philosophy." The See also:reason or See also:intellect is introduced to See also:balance possible pleasures and pains, and to construct a See also:scheme in which pleasures are the materials of a happy life. Feeling, which Epicurus declared to be the means of determining what is good, is subordinated to a reason which adjudicates between competing pleasures with the view of securing tranquillity of mind and body. " We cannot live pleasantly without living wisely and nobly and righteously." Virtue is at least a means of happiness, though apart from that it is no good in itself, any more than See also:mere sensual enjoyments, which are good only because they may sometimes serve to secure See also:health of body and tranquillity of mind. (See further ETHICS.) The Epicurean School.—Even in the lifetime of Epicurus we hear of the vast numbers of his friends, not merely in See also:Greece, but in See also:Asia and See also:Egypt. The crowds of Epicureans were a See also:standing See also:enigma to the adherents of less popular sects. See also:Cicero pondered over the fact; See also:Arcesilaus explained the See also:secession to the Epicurean See also:camp, compared with the fact that no Epicurean was ever known to have abandoned his school, by saying that, though it was possible for a man to be turned into a See also:eunuch, no eunuch could ever become a man. But the phenomenon was not obscure. The doctrine has many truths, and is attractive to many in virtue of its simplicity and its immediate relation to life. The dogmas of Epicurus became to his followers a creed embodying the truths on which salvation depended; and they passed on from one See also:generation to another with scarcely a change or addition. The immediate disciples of Epicurus have been already mentioned, with the exception of Colotes of Lampsacus, a See also:great favourite of Epicurus, who wrote a See also:work arguing " that it was impossible even to live according to the doctrines of the other philosophers." In the 2nd and 1st centuries B.C. See also:Apollodorus, nicknamed ropror6pavvos (" See also:Lord of the Garden "), and See also:Zeno of See also:Sidon (who describes See also:Socrates as " the See also:Attic buffoon ": Cic. De nat. deor. i. 21, 33, 34) taught at Athens. About 150'B.C. Epicureanism established itself at See also:Rome. Beginning with C. Amafinius or Amafanius (Cic. Acad. i. 2, Tusc. iv. 3), we find the names of See also:Phaedrus (who became scholarch at Athens c. 70 B.C.) and See also:Philodemus (originally of See also:Gadara in See also:Palestine) as distinguished Epicureans in the time of Cicero. But the greatest of its See also:Roman names was See also:Lucretius, whose De rerum natura embodies the main teaching of Epicurus with great exactness, and with a beauty which the subject seemed scarcely to allow. Lucretius is a See also:proof, if any were needed, that Epicureanism is compatible with See also:nobility of soul. In the 1st See also:century of the See also:Christian era, the nature of the time, with its active political struggles, naturally called Stoicism more into the foreground, yet See also:Seneca, though nominally a Stoic, draws nearly all his suavity and much of his paternal See also:wisdom from the writings of Epicurus. The position of Epicureanism as a recognized school in the 2nd century is best seen in the fact that it was one of the four See also:schools (the others were the Stoic, Platonist, and Peripatetic) which were placed on a footing of equal endowment when See also:Marcus Aurelius founded chairs of philosophy at Athens. The evidence of Diogenes proves that it still subsisted as a school a century later, but its spirit lasted longer than its formal organization as a school. A great See also:deal of the best of the See also:Renaissance was founded on Epicureanism, and in more See also:recent times a great number of prominent thinkers have been Epicureans in a greater or less degree. Among these may be mentioned See also:Pierre Gassendi, who revived and codified the doctrine in the 17th century; See also:Moliere, the See also:comte de See also:Gramont, See also: His works, we learn, were full of repetition, and critics speak of vulgarities of language and faults of style. None the less his writings were committed to memory and remained the See also:text-books of Epicureanism to the last. His chief work was a See also:treatise on See also:nattier' Stlepi c/uaews), in See also:thirty-seven books, of which fragments fioin about nine books have been found in the rolls discover See also:fat at See also:Herculaneum, along with considerable See also:treatises by severat of his followers, and most notably Philodemus. An See also:epitome of his doctrine is contained in three letters preserved by Diogenes. AurxoRIriEs.—The chief See also:ancient accounts of Epicurus are in the tenth See also:book of Diogenes Laertius, in Lucretius, and in several treatises of Cicero and See also:Plutarch. Gassendi, in his De vita, moribus, et doctrina Epicuri (See also:Lyons, 1647), and his Syntagma philosophiae Epicuri, systematized the doctrine. The Volumina Herculanensia (1st and 2nd series) contain fragments of treatises by Epicurus and members of his school. See also H. Usener, Epicurea (See also:Leipzig, 1887) and Epicuri recogniti specimen (See also:Bonn, 188o) ; Epicuri physica et meteorologica (ed. J. G. See also:Schneider, Leipzig, 1813) ; Th. See also:Gomperz in his Herkulanische Studien, and in contributions to the See also:Vienna See also:Academy (Monatsberichte), has tried to evolve from the fragments more approximation to See also:modern See also:empiricism than they seem to contain. For See also:criticism see W. See also:Wallace, Epicureanism (See also:London, 1880), and Epicurus; A Lecture (London, 1896) ; G. Trezza, Epicuro e l' Epicureismo (See also:Florence, 1877; ed. 1\vlilan, 1885) ; E. See also:Zeller, Philosophy of the Stoics, Epicureans and Sceptics (Eng. trans. O. J. Reichel, 187o; ed. 188o) ; See also:Sir See also: Goedeckemeyer, Epikurs Verhaltnis zu Demokrit in der Naturphil. (See also:Strassburg, 1897) ; See also:Paul von Gizycki, Uber das Leben and See also:die Moralphilos. See also:des Epikur (See also:Halle, 1879), and Einleitende Bemerkungen zu einer Untersuchung fiber den See also:Werth der Naturphilos. des Epikur (See also:Berlin, 1884) ; P. See also:Cassel, Epikur der Philosoph (Berlin, 1892) ; M. Guyau, La Morale d'Epicure et ses See also:rap ports avec See also:les doctrines contemporaines (See also:Paris, 1878 ; revised and enlarged, 1881) ; F. Picavet, De Epicuro novae religionis sectatore (Paris, 1889) ; H. See also:Sidgwick, See also:History of Ethics (5th ed., 1902). (W. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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