Aristotle
themselves, and pregnant with perversion and misery as regards the
hopes and fears of mankind. Epikurus believed sincerely in the gods;
reverenced them as beings at once perfectly happy, immortal, and
unchangeable; and took delight in the public religious festivals and
ceremonies. But it was inconsistent with these attributes, and
repulsive to his feelings of reverence, to conceive them as agents.
The idea of agency is derived from human experience: we, as agents,
act with a view to supply some want, to fulfil some obligation, to
acquire some pleasure, to accomplish some object desired but not yet
attained--in short, to fill up one or other of the many gaps in our
imperfect happiness: the gods already _have_ all that agents strive
to get, and more than agents ever do get; their condition is one not
of agency, but of tranquil, self-sustaining, fruition. Accordingly,
Epikurus thought (as Aristotle[1] had thought before him) that the
perfect, eternal, and imperturbable well-being and felicity of the
gods excluded the supposition of their being agents. He looked upon
them as types of that unmolested safety and unalloyed satisfaction
which was what he understood by pleasure or happiness, as objects of
reverential envy, whose sympathy he was likely to obtain by
assimilating his own temper and condition to theirs as far as human
circumstances allowed.
[Footnote 1: Aristot. De Coelo, II. xii. p. 292, a. 22-b. 7: [Greek:
e)/oike ga\r tô=| me\n a)/rista e)/chonti u(pa/rchein to\ eu)= a)/neu
pra/xeôs, tô=| d' e)ggu/tata dia\ o)li/gês kai\ mia=s, toi=s de\
por)r(ôta/tô dia\ pleio/nôn,--tô=| d' ô(s a)/rista e)/chonti ou)the\n
dei= pra/xeôs; e)/sti ga\r au)to\ to\ ou(= e(/neka, ê( de\ pra=xis
a)ei/ e)stin e)n dusi/n, o(/tan kai\ ou(= e(/neka ê)=| kai\ to\
tou/tou e(/neka.] &c. Ibid. iii. p. 286, a. 9: [Greek: theou= d'
e)ne/rgeia a)thanasi/a; tou=to d' e)sti\ zôê\ a)i+/dos], &c.
In the Ethica, Aristotle assigns theorizing contemplation to the
gods, as the only process worthy of their exalted dignity and supreme
felicity.]
These theological views were placed by Epikurus in the foreground of
his ethical philosophy, as the only means of dispelling **those fears
of the gods that the current fables instilled into every one, and
that did so much to destroy human comfort and security. He proclaimed
that beings in immortal felicity neither suffered vexation in
themselves nor caused vexation to others; neither showed anger nor
favour to particular persons. The doctrine that they were the working
managers in the affairs of the Kosmos, celestial and terrestrial,
human and extra-human, he not only repudiated as incompatible with
their attributes, but declared to be impious, considering the
disorder, sufferings, and violence, everywhere visible. He disallowed
all prophecy, divination, and oracular inspiration, by which the
public around him believed that the gods were perpetually
communicating special revelations to individuals, and for which
Sokrates had felt so peculiarly thankful.
It is remarkable that Stoics and Epikureans, in spite of their marked
opposition in dogma or theory, agreed so far in practical results,
that both declared these two modes of uneasiness (fear of the gods
and fear of death) to be the great torments of human existence, and
both strove to remove or counterbalance them.
So far the teaching of Epikurus appears confined to the separate
happiness of each individual, as dependent upon his own prudence,
sobriety, and correct views of Nature. But this is not the whole of
the Epikurean Ethics. The system also considered each man as in
companionship with others: the precepts were shaped accordingly,
first as to Justice, next as to Friendship. In both, these, the
foundation whereon Epikurus built was Reciprocity--not pure sacrifice
to others, but partnership with others, beneficial to all. He kept
the ideas of self and of others inseparably knit together in one
complex association: he did not expel or degrade either, in order to
give exclusive ascendancy to the other. The dictate of Natural
Justice was, that no man should hurt another: each was bound to
abstain from doing harm to others; each, on this condition, was
entitled to count on security and relief from the fear that others
would do harm to him. Such double aspect, or reciprocity, was
essential to social companionship: those that could not, or would
not, accept this covenant, were unfit for society. If a man does not
behave justly towards others, he cannot expect that they will behave
justly towards him; to live a life of injustice, and expect that
others will not find it out, is idle. The unjust man cannot enjoy a
moment of security. Epikurus laid it down explicitly, that just and
righteous dealing was the indispensable condition to every one's
comfort, and was the best means of attaining it.
The reciprocity of Justice was valid towards all the world; the
reciprocity of Friendship went much farther: it involved indefinite
and active beneficence, but could reach only to a select few.
Epikurus insisted emphatically on the value of friendship, as a means
of happiness to both the persons so united. He declared that a good
friend was another self, and that friends ought to be prepared, in
case of need, to die for each other. Yet he declined to recommend an
established community of goods among the members of his fraternity,
as prevailed in the Pythagorean brotherhood: for such an institution
(he said) implied mistrust. He recommended efforts to please and to
serve, and a forwardness to give, for the purpose of gaining and
benefiting a friend, and he even declared that there was more
pleasure in conferring favours than in receiving them; but he was no
less strenuous in inculcating an intelligent gratitude on the
receiver. No one except a wise man (he said) knew how to return a
favour properly.[2]
[Footnote 2: Seneca, Epist. p. 81.]
These exhortations to active friendship were not unfruitful. We know,
even by the admission of witnesses adverse to the Epikurean
doctrines, that the harmony among the members of the sect, with
common veneration for the founder, was more marked and more enduring
than that exhibited by any of the other philosophical sects. Epikurus
himself was a man of amiable personal qualities: his testament, still
remaining, shows an affectionate regard both for his surviving
friends, and for the permanent attachment of each to the others as
well as of all to the school. Diogenes Laertius tells us--nearly 200
years after Christ, and 450 years after the death of Epikurus--that
the Epikurean sect still continued its numbers and dignity, having
outlasted its contemporaries and rivals. The harmony among the
Epikureans may be explained, not merely from the temper of the
master, but partly from the doctrines and plan of life that he
recommended. Ambition and love of power were discouraged; rivalry
among the members for success, either political or rhetorical, was at
any rate a rare exception; all were taught to confine themselves to
that privacy of life and love of philosophical communion which alike
required and nourished the mutual sympathies of the brotherhood. In
regard to politics, Epikurus advised quiet submission to established
authority, without active meddling beyond what necessity required.
Virtue and happiness, in the theory of Epikurus, were inseparable. A
man could not be happy until he had surmounted the fear of death and
the fear of gods instilled by the current fables, which disturbed all
tranquillity of mind; until he had banished those factitious desires
that pushed him into contention for wealth, power, or celebrity; nor
unless he behaved with justice to all, and with active devoted
friendship towards a few. Such a mental condition, which he thought
it was in every man's power to acquire by appropriate teaching and
companionship, constituted virtue; and was the sure as well as the
only precursor of genuine happiness. A mind thus undisturbed and
purified was sufficient to itself. The mere satisfaction of the wants
of life, and the conversation of friends, became then felt pleasures:
if more could be had without preponderant mischief, so much the
better; but Nature, disburthened of her corruptions and prejudices,
required no more to be happy. This at least was as much as the
conditions of humanity admitted: a tranquil, undisturbed, innocuous,
non-competitive fruition, which approached most nearly to the perfect
happiness of the Gods.
When we read the explanations given by Epikurus and Lucretius of what
the Epikurean theory really was, and compare them with the numerous
attacks upon it made by opponents, we cannot but remark that the
title and formula of the theory was ill-chosen, and really a
misnomer. What Epikurus meant by Pleasure was not what most people
meant by it, but something very different--a tranquil and comfortable
state of mind and body; much the same as what Demokritus had
expressed before him by the phrase [Greek: eu)thumi/a]. This last
phrase would have expressed what Epikurus aimed at, neither more nor
less. It would at least have preserved his theory from much misplaced
sarcasm and aggressive rhetoric.
The Physics of Epikurus was borrowed in the main from the atomic
theory of Demokritus, but modified by him in a manner subservient and
contributory to his ethical scheme. To that scheme it was essential
that those celestial, atmospheric, or terrestrial phenomena which the
public around him ascribed to agency and purposes of the gods, should
be understood as being produced by physical causes. An eclipse, an
earthquake, a storm, a shipwreck, unusual rain or drought, a good or
a bad harvest--and not merely these, but many other occurrences far
smaller and more unimportant, as we may see by the eighteenth chapter
of the 'Characters' of Theophrastus--were then regarded as
visitations of the gods, requiring to be interpreted by recognized
prophets, and to be appeased by ceremonial expiations. When once a
man became convinced that all these phenomena proceeded from physical
agencies, a host of terrors and anxieties would disappear from the
mind; and this Epikurus asserted to be the beneficent effect and real
recommendation of physical philosophy. He took little or no thought
for scientific curiosity as a motive _per se_, which both Demokritus
and Aristotle put so much in the foreground.
He composed a treatise called 'Kanonicon' (now lost), which seems to
have been a sort of Logic of Physics--a summary of the principles of
evidence. In his system, Psychology was to a great extent a
branch--though a peculiar and distinct branch--of Physics, since the
soul was regarded as a subtle but energetic material compound (air,
vapour, heat, and another nameless ingredient), with its best parts
concentrated in the chest, yet pervading and sustaining the whole
body--still, however, depending for its support on the body, and
incapable of separate or disembodied continuance.
Epikurus recognized, as the primordial basis of the universe, Atoms,
Vacuum, and Motion. The atoms were material solid _minima_, each too
small to be apprehended separately by sense; they had figure,
magnitude, and gravity, but no other qualities. They were infinite in
number, and ever moving in an infinite vacuum. Their motions brought
them into various coalitions and compounds, resulting in the
perceptible bodies of nature; each of which in its combined state
acquired new, specific, different qualities. In regard to the
primordial movements of the atoms, out of which these endowed
compounds grew, Epikurus differed from Demokritus who supposed the
atoms originally to move with an indefinite variety of directions and
velocities, rotatory as well as rectilineal; whereas Epikurus