Epicurus

Qu'est-ce que l'Absolu ? Dieu existe-t-il ?

The gods exist, happy and indifferent: they neither made the world nor govern it

Pas de Dieu créateurIl le dit expressément

Epicurus is no atheist: in the Letter to Menoeceus he affirms that the gods exist and that knowledge of them is evident, and he defines them as incorruptible and happy beings. But precisely for that reason they cannot concern themselves with the world: the first Principal Doctrine says that the happy and incorruptible being neither has troubles nor causes them, and is subject neither to anger nor to favour. The cosmos is not their work but that of atoms combining in the void, and celestial phenomena must not be ascribed to their government. Human happiness therefore depends on no God: freedom from fear of the gods is one of the first remedies of his philosophy.

Qui suis-je ? Existe-t-il un vrai soi ?

The soul is a compound of atoms that disperses with the body

Il n'y a pas de soi permanentIl le dit expressément

In the Letter to Herodotus Epicurus describes the soul as a body of fine parts spread throughout the organism, resembling breath with an admixture of heat, and adds that it cannot feel apart from the body's covering: when the body dissolves, its atoms scatter and it ceases to exist. To call the soul incorporeal, he says, is to speak idly. There is therefore no permanent self surviving the composition that forms it. Ethics rests on this physics: fear of death arises from imagining that we will still be there to suffer it, and vanishes once one understands that, the compound dissolved, nobody remains to be affected.

Pourquoi souffrons-nous ?

Empty desires and groundless fears disturb us

Le désir et l'attachementIl le dit expressément

Epicurus identifies the good with pleasure, understood above all as absence of pain in the body and of disturbance in the soul, and explains unhappiness by two causes. The first is ill-ordered desires: some are natural and necessary, others natural and unnecessary, and others empty, like those for wealth or glory, which have no limit and are therefore never sated. The second is false opinions that breed fear, above all of the gods and of death. The Letter to Menoeceus teaches how to classify desires and weigh pleasures and pains, and physics dissolves the fears. We suffer by desiring what we do not need and fearing what should not be feared.

Que se passe-t-il après la mort ?

Death is nothing to us: where it is, we are not

La mort est la fin de la personneIl le dit expressément

Epicurus keeps no reserve: he states with confidence that death is the dissolution of the compound of atoms we are and that no one remains to undergo it. Hence his most famous argument, in the Letter to Menoeceus: good and evil lie in sensation, and death is the privation of sensation; so when we are, death is not, and when death is, we are no longer. The second Principal Doctrine reduces it to one line. The fear of death is thus an error, and its remedy is not a hope but physics properly understood. What matters is the quality of present life, not its length.

Comment atteint-on la libération ou le salut ?

Meditating day and night on the truths that heal the soul

Par une pratique disciplinéeIl le dit expressément

For Epicurus philosophy is medicine for the soul, and its goal, ataraxia, is reached by sustained work. The Letter to Menoeceus begins by saying that no one is too young or too old to philosophise and ends with a watchword: meditate on these things day and night, by oneself and with someone like oneself, so as to live like a god among humans. The content of that meditation is fixed: the gods are not to be feared, death is nothing, the good is easy to obtain and pain easy to endure. The Principal Doctrines and the epitomes were written to be memorised. To this is added the study of nature, without which fears are not dissolved.

Faut-il un maître ?

The Garden: learning among friends, with someone like oneself

La communauté et la traditionIl le dit expressément

Epicurus presented himself as self-taught and denied owing anything to his teachers, but the way he proposed is communal. In the Garden at Athens men and women, free and slave, lived together, united by friendship, which according to Principal Doctrine XXVII is the greatest thing wisdom provides for happiness. The Letter to Menoeceus recommends meditating on the doctrine alone and with someone like oneself, and the school cultivated the founder's memory with feasts and portraits. Seneca transmits an Epicurean counsel: choose a good man and keep him always before your eyes, acting as if he saw you. One learns in a community of friends and with its texts.

Le monde est-il réel ?

Atoms and void: infinite worlds that arise and dissolve without design

Un ordre naturel en transformationIl le dit expressément

In the Letter to Herodotus Epicurus sets out an atomist physics: nothing comes from nothing nor is destroyed into nothing; the whole consists of bodies and void, and compound bodies result from indivisible and indestructible atoms in perpetual motion. There are infinite worlds, like and unlike ours, which form by aggregation and dissolve over time, without the gods' intervention or any purpose. The senses are reliable: they are the final criterion of truth, and what is not perceived is inferred from what is. The world is real, material and changing; knowing its natural causes is what frees from fears.

Qu'est-ce que l'amour ?

Friendship, the greatest good wisdom provides; falling in love, a risk

Une bienveillance ordonnéeIl le dit expressément

Epicurus carefully distinguishes erotic love from friendship. The first he distrusts: the sage will not fall in love, because love is not sent by the gods and usually brings more disturbance than pleasure. Friendship, by contrast, is at the centre of his ethics: of all that wisdom provides for happiness, by far the greatest is the possession of friendship. One Vatican Saying states that every friendship is desirable in itself, though it began in utility; another, that friendship dances around the inhabited world announcing to all to wake up to happiness. It is an affection cultivated with measure, among equals, sustaining the life of the Garden.

Sommes-nous libres ou tout est-il déterminé ?

What depends on us has no master: better myth than fate

Un libre arbitre réelIl le dit expressément

Epicurus is the first philosopher to state clearly the risk that a deterministic physics might cancel responsibility. In the Letter to Menoeceus he describes the sage as one who laughs at the fate some present as master of all, knows that some things happen by necessity, others by chance and others depend on us, and that what depends on us has no master, so that blame and praise follow from it. He adds that it would be better to follow the myths about the gods than to be enslaved to the fate of the natural philosophers. The doctrine of the swerve of atoms, known chiefly through Lucretius, was devised to save that freedom.

Pourquoi méditer ou prier ?

Honouring the gods without fear and repeating daily the truths that calm

Le rite et la culture de soiCela se déduit de sa doctrine

Epicurus did not pray to the gods to obtain favours, because they do not intervene in the world, but neither did he abandon cult. According to Philodemus, he took part in civic festivals and the mysteries, and honoured the gods for their perfection, as models of an undisturbed happiness. His characteristic practice is another: the repetition of doctrine. The Letter to Menoeceus asks one to meditate on his teachings day and night, alone and with a friend; the epitomes and Principal Doctrines were composed to be memorised. Thus the truths that free from fear are fixed in the soul. Serene rite, repeated study and daily conduct make up the life of the Garden.

La raison peut-elle connaître l'ultime ?

No one is too young or too old to study nature

L'étude et le savoirIl le dit expressément

For Epicurus reason, resting on the senses, can know the ultimate constitution of things: atoms and void. His theory of knowledge, set out in the Canon, takes sensations, preconceptions and feelings as criteria of truth; what is not directly perceived is inferred from what is evident, provided nothing contradicts it. Philosophy is a lifelong task: no one is too young or too old to philosophise, begins the Letter to Menoeceus. And study has a practical aim: without knowing the nature of the universe it is impossible to dissolve fear about the most important matters. Learning is the way to serenity.

Se retirer du monde ou le transformer ?

Live unnoticed: the sage will not engage in politics, unless needed

Se retirer pour trouverIl le dit expressément

Epicurus advised standing apart from public life. The maxim “live unnoticed”, transmitted by Plutarch, who attacked it in a whole essay, sums up his position; Diogenes Laertius adds that the sage will not engage in politics, and a Vatican Saying urges freeing oneself from the prison of business and politics. The reason is that ambition for fame and power brings disturbance, and the security that truly matters comes from the quiet life and withdrawal from the crowd. But that withdrawal is not solitude: Epicurus founded the Garden, a community of friends living together on the outskirts of Athens. It is about withdrawing from the city in order to live with friends.