Episode 216 - Cicero's On Ends - Book Two - Part 23 - Why Does Epicurus Say Length Of Time Does Not Contribute To Pleasure?
Date: 02/27/24
Link: https://www.epicureanfriends.com/thread/3728-episode-216-cicero-s-on-ends-book-two-part-23-why-does-epicurus-say-length-of-ti/
Summary
Section titled “Summary”Continuing De Finibus Book Two, page 66 (Rackham). Cicero attacks Principal Doctrines 18–20: that infinite time contains no greater pleasure than limited time, and that the completeness of pleasure is not increased by duration. The panel traces the philosophical roots of this argument to Plato’s Philebus, where Socrates contends that because pleasure “admits of more and less,” it cannot be the highest good — only a perfect, unlimited thing can be.
Cassius responds that Epicurus is entitled to make the same move Plato makes for virtue: just as virtue is “complete” and not improved by additional time, pleasure in the Epicurean sense — defined as the absence of pain — is also complete and not improved by duration. Introduced here is DeWitt’s subsection “The Unity of Pleasure” (page 232), which frames pleasure, health of mind/body, and freedom from fear/pain as three aspects of a single telos. Joshua quotes Lucretius Book One on Epicurus as the discoverer of nature’s “limits and boundaries,” and uses Shakespeare’s Falstaff (“the better part of valor is discretion”) to parody the absolutist virtue-language Cicero deploys. Callistheni draws on the Letter to Menoeceus passages on self-sufficiency to show that Epicurean philosophy functions as a remedy for all conditions — not a call to asceticism, but a practical guide to finding pleasure whatever one’s resources.
Transcript
Section titled “Transcript”Cassius:
Welcome to Episode 216 of Lucretius Today. This is a podcast dedicated to the poet Lucretius who wrote On the Nature of Things, the most complete presentation of Epicurean philosophy left to us from the ancient world. Each week we walk you through the Epicurean texts and we discuss how Epicurean philosophy can apply to you today. If you find the Epicurean worldview attractive, we invite you to join us in the study of Epicurus at EpicureanFriends.com, where you’ll find a discussion thread for each of our podcast episodes and many other topics.
This week we’re continuing in Book Two of Cicero’s On Ends, which of course, as we know, is dedicated to Cicero’s attack on Epicurean philosophy. And by going through Cicero’s attack we hope to bring you greater insight into what Epicurus did say and how to understand him and defend his positions. This week in the Rackham edition, which we’ve been using in the past, we’re on page 66 at the very bottom. Now last week we spent most of the episode talking about happiness. Cicero had been attacking the Epicurean concept of happiness just above the section we’re reading today.
This week we’re going to get back directly to the text, and the next thing we’re going to run into after happiness here is the closely related but also huge topic — one aspect of pleasure which is very difficult for people to understand — and it’s going to be helpful to us, I think, to look at Cicero’s criticism of what Epicurus is saying about this aspect of pleasure. We may end up spending much of the episode today without going very far, but this is a hugely important question that we need to wrestle with.
So let’s get back to the bottom of page 66 of the Rackham edition. This is what it says: “But I shall be reminded, as you said yourself, Torquatus, that Epicurus will not admit that continuance of time contributes anything to happiness, or that less pleasure is realized in a short period of time than if the pleasure were eternal. These statements are most inconsistent. For while he places his supreme good in pleasure, he refuses to allow that pleasure can reach a greater height in a life of boundless extent than in one limited and moderate in length. He who places good entirely in virtue can say that happiness is consummated by the consummation of virtue, since he denies that time brings additions to his supreme good. But when a man supposes that happiness is caused by pleasure, how are his doctrines to be reconciled if he means to affirm that pleasure is not heightened by duration? In that case, neither is pain. Or, though all the most enduring pains are also the most wretched, does length of time not render pleasure more enviable? What reason then has Epicurus for calling a god, as he does, both happy and eternal? If you take away his eternity, Jupiter will not be a whit happier than Epicurus, since both of them are in the enjoyment of the supreme good which is pleasure.”
Okay, now Cicero will go on, but that’s a good opening presentation of this criticism of Epicurus which we’ve heard many times ourselves. Epicurus says over and over that length of time does not make pleasure better. How can we understand that to be the case? Because as we know Epicurus has talked about this in a number of different places. We can look first to the Principal Doctrines of Epicurus where he says in Principal Doctrine 18: “The pleasure in the flesh is not increased when once the pain due to want is removed, but is only varied.” And if 18 is not good enough on this point, 19 says: “Infinite time contains no greater pleasure than limited time, if one measures by reason the limits of pleasure.” And it’s expanded in Principal Doctrine 20: “The flesh perceives the limits of pleasure as unlimited, and unlimited time is required to supply it. But the mind, having attained a reasoned understanding of the ultimate good of the flesh and its limits, and having dissipated the fears concerning the time to come, supplies us with the complete life, and we have no further need of infinite time. But neither does the mind shun pleasure, nor, when circumstances begin to bring about the departure from life, does it approach its end as though it fell short in any way of the best life.”
So we have that in the Principal Doctrines, and we have references to the same topic in the Letter to Menoikeus, Section 126: “But the many at one moment shun death as the greatest of evils, at another yearn for death as a respite from the evils in life. But the wise man neither seeks to escape life nor fears the cessation of life, for neither does life offend him nor does the absence of life seem to be any evil. And just as with food he does not seek simply the larger share and nothing else, but rather the most pleasant, so he seeks to enjoy not the longest period of time, but the most pleasant.” So there’s a statement right there that the most pleasant experience is not necessarily the experience that has the longest period of time associated with it.
So Cicero’s right that this is a very central doctrine of Epicurus — to deny that it is necessary to have unlimited time in order to experience the pleasure which is our goal. And so we’re going to have to play detective, it seems like, and figure out how to deal with Cicero’s argument because it’s fair to say that we often think of pleasure in terms of the most intense physical sensation.
As we proceed through this, we should also consider Principal Doctrine 9, which reads: “If every pleasure could be intensified so that it lasted and influenced the whole organism or the most essential parts of our nature, pleasures would never differ from one another.” I want to give credit to Godfrey on our forum for pointing out to me the significance of this doctrine, because I think you can pretty easily look at what’s being discussed in Principal Doctrine 9 and see that Epicurus is discussing pleasure in terms of intensity, in terms of the part of the organism that is involved, and also in terms of the time over which it lasts. So he is talking about time as one factor — intensity and the part of the organism that’s involved — in his discussion of pleasure. And while the meaning of Doctrine 9 itself can be debated, he’s saying that if pleasure could be intensified so that these factors were all at their maximum, pleasures would never differ from one another. One way of approaching that is to take the converse and say that those things can’t happen, and so therefore pleasures do differ from one another, and you’re left with the conclusion that Epicurus is thinking in terms of pleasures differing from each other in terms of time, intensity, and the part of the organism that’s involved. So to discuss pleasure in general is not to make a statement as to exactly which part of the organism is involved, or how long the pleasure is going on, or the intensity of the pleasure. Pleasure is a wider concept that embraces all of these individual aspects.
We have at least one other key that I can mention before we start talking about this. The key being that Cicero is contrasting the Epicurean position to the Stoic or the traditional Greek position that virtue is the highest goal. He’s saying that those who place good entirely in virtue can say that happiness is consummated by the consummation of virtue, because they don’t think virtue can be improved by simply existing for a longer period of time. They consider virtue to be an absolute term. If you are courageous or if you are wise, then you’re not going to be more wise by living longer. You’re going to be wise, you’re going to be courageous, you’re going to be honorable — just in the same way, no matter how much time you’re living. Well, from that perspective, it looks like Epicurus is saying, I’ll match you and tell you the same thing about pleasure. And I think that’s the direction in which we begin to unwind Cicero’s criticism. But the idea that length of time does not make pleasure better is something that has to be unwound before it’s obvious. So to someone who is not an expert in Epicurean philosophy, how do we explain this position that length of time does not make pleasure better?
Joshua:
So before we go much further into Cicero here, Cassius, it’s important to contextualize what we’re talking about into the philosophical tradition that Cicero seems to be a part of and seems to place himself in. We’ve talked before about Cicero as the heir to this old Academy tradition of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Theophrastus — much less a Stoic. If, you know, we’re in Book Two of On Ends here, if you go to Book Three you get all of Cicero’s arguments against Stoicism. He favors Stoicism over Epicureanism, that’s certainly true, but his native philosophical leanings are to essentially Platonism and Peripateticism — this old Academy tradition of Plato and Aristotle as the two chief figures.
And Plato had taken up this question as to whether pleasure can be the good or the end, and the way that Plato approached this question in his Philebus dialogue was very much in line with what Cicero is saying here. Cicero is talking about length of time — if you lived longer, would you experience more pleasure? Plato seems to be talking here about something like intensity in the moment — that having wine is pleasurable, but having wine and adding cheese to eat while you’re drinking your wine, that’s more pleasure than if you just had the wine. And wine and cheese are more pleasure than if you didn’t have the wine. So it’s difficult to decide which kind of limit we’re talking about, but Plato is dealing with the problem of limits. His argument essentially is this: pleasure cannot be the best mode of life because pleasure has no limit. And having no limit, the pursuit of limitless pleasure ends in wickedness.
He expresses it here — his interlocutors in this dialogue are Philebus and Protarchus. This is Socrates speaking: “There are countless other things which I pass over, such as health, beauty, and strength of the body, and the many glorious beauties of the soul. For this goddess, my fair Philebus, beholding the violence and universal wickedness which prevailed, since there was no limit of pleasures or of indulgence in them, established law and order which contain a limit. You say she did harm; I say on the contrary she brought salvation.”
And he continues the dialogue by exploring this question of limits. This is Socrates again: “Have pleasure and pain a limit, or do they belong to the class which admits of more and less?” Philebus says: “They belong to the class which admits of more, Socrates, for pleasure would not be perfectly good if she were not infinite in quantity and degree.” So Philebus is taking the position that pleasure is perfectly good, and the reason that pleasure is perfectly good is because it is infinite in quantity and degree. This is a different argument to the argument that Epicurus is making, but we do have an early example of a philosopher here — Philebus — who does think that pleasure is not just the good but perfectly good.
Socrates continues: “Nor would pain, Philebus, be perfectly evil, and therefore the infinite cannot be that element which imparts to pleasure some degree of good. But now, admitting if you like that pleasure is of the nature of the infinite, in which of the aforesaid classes, O Protarchus and Philebus, can we without irreverence place wisdom and knowledge and mind? And let us be careful, for I think that the danger will be very serious if we err on this point.” Philebus responds: “You magnify, Socrates, the importance of your favorite god.” This is an interesting way the conversation is proceeding — Philebus favors Aphrodite, and they’re using the gods as sort of stand-ins for their philosophical positions. Socrates says: “And you, my friend, are also magnifying your favorite goddess, but still I must beg you to answer the question.”
Socrates says: “Whence comes that soul? My dear Protarchus, unless the body of the universe, which contains elements like those in our bodies but in every way fairer, had also a soul, can there be another source?” Protarchus says: “Clearly, Socrates, that is the only source.” And Socrates says: “Why yes, Protarchus, for surely we cannot imagine that of the four classes — the finite, the infinite, the composition of the two, and the cause — the fourth, which enters into all things, giving to our bodies souls and the art of self-management and of healing disease and operating in other ways to heal and organize, having all the attributes of wisdom — we cannot, I say, imagine that whereas the self-same elements exist both in the entire heaven and in great provinces of the heaven, only fairer and purer, this last should not also in that higher sphere have designed the noblest and fairest things.” And Protarchus says: “Such a supposition is quite unreasonable.” And Socrates says: “If this be denied, should we not be wise in adopting the other view and maintaining that there is in the universe a mighty infinite and adequate limit of which we have often spoken, as well as a presiding cause of no mean power which orders and arranges years and seasons and months, and may be justly called wisdom and mind?”
Cassius:
Joshua, yes — at this point in what you’re reading in the Philebus, what I’m thinking is the important point here is that Socrates is challenging the advocates of pleasure with this same question: is pleasure something that can always be improved? Now, because if pleasure is something that can always be made better, then you by definition — by clear meaning of the words that you’re saying — if you’re saying it can be made better by addition of something else to it, then whatever it is you’re talking about is not the best, is not the highest. And so the trap that Socrates appears to be laying here is that if you admit that pleasure can be made better by the addition of more pleasure or something else, then you’re saying that pleasure itself is not the goal, cannot be the highest and complete form of this thing that you’re talking about.
Which of course what we’re talking about is: what is the good? What is the best? And while I would by no means say that my interpretation is the right one or the best one, it looks to me like Philebus thinks that he can defeat Socrates’s argument by saying that pleasure is infinite, and that somehow the infiniteness of pleasure constitutes a limit. And I think where Socrates is going after Philebus makes that allegation is — he’s saying, well, Philebus, infinite is not a limit in the same way that wisdom and the virtues have a limit. Infinite means you can keep going forever and finding new things and doing more. And infinity doesn’t suit the purpose. Philebus says “they belong to the class which admits of more,” for “pleasure would not be perfectly good if she were not infinite in quantity and degree.” And that is a very problematic sentence right there, because he’s saying that pleasure admits of the class of things that can be more or less. Now whether it makes sense that his next statement — “pleasure would not be perfectly good if it were not infinite in quantity and degree” — could be another question. But when you admit that pleasure can be made better by adding more to it, you’ve said that you haven’t reached a completeness, you’ve said you haven’t reached a perfect or best or final measure of pleasure. Which is different than what Plato and Socrates are suggesting about virtue and wisdom itself.
So then what happens here is that Epicurus wanders into this room and says, no, Philebus, you’re wrong. Pleasure does have a limit, and pain does have a limit. And it’s precisely because they have limits that we can attain their completeness or perfection. And it’s because they have limits that — as he says in Principal Doctrine 3 — the limit of the quantity of pleasure is the removal of all pain. So when you reach that point, you’re at the maximum. After that, once you’re there, you have variation in pleasure but you don’t have more pleasure added on.
Joshua:
Yeah, it’s almost like what we were discussing last week in terms of the virtues. Cicero has been arguing that you can’t be a friend unless you’re sort of a complete friend, you can’t be a good person unless you’re completely good. And in the same way, you can argue that you can never attain pleasure unless you have actually grasped the completeness of pleasure. If pleasure were not something that you could consider to be complete, then you would never be able to say that you could, by analogy, hold pleasure in your hand. It would always be slipping through like the vessel that can never be filled, because the nature of what you’re trying to hold is always slipping away from you.
There’s a statement in Diogenes of Oinoanda — one of the fragments says: “Who would seek that which he can never find?” Well, you would never seek something that you knew was not attainable. And if pleasure cannot be fully grasped, then you’re setting yourself an impossible task. I can imagine all sorts of analogies here with the emptiness of certain types of unnecessary and unnatural desires that Epicurus is talking about as well. But what we’re trying to determine is a thing that constitutes a goal, which is something that we can attain and hold. And Epicurus is saying that pleasure, the completeness of pleasure, can come when you have eliminated pain. And so the focus seems to be on this issue of completeness.
Cassius:
And keeping Cicero’s argument in focus — quote: “But if one thinks that happiness is produced by pleasure, how can he consistently deny that pleasure is increased by duration? If it is not, then pain is not increased by duration either.” Those sentences make sense only if pleasure and pain are being considered in a very well-defined sense. And that well-defined sense in Epicurean terms is informed by the idea that there are only two feelings, pleasure and pain, and when you have one you don’t have the other. But when you don’t have the other, you do have the one. So when you consider that if you’re experiencing anything at all you’re experiencing one of the two, then where Epicurus would appear to be going is that when you are not experiencing pain in some part of your body for some period of time, then what you’re experiencing in that part of your body at that part of your time is pleasure — and pleasure in a pure form, a complete form, that is not different in kind by lasting longer.
And we can find the same point being made by Seneca in his Letters to Lucilius, 66.45: “What can be added to that which is perfect? Nothing. Otherwise that was not perfect to which something has been added. Nor can anything be added to virtue either, for if anything can be added there too it must have contained a defect. And of course they contend that virtue is perfect. So again, nor can anything be added to virtue either, for if anything can be added there too it must have contained a defect. Honor also permits of no addition, for it is honorable because of the very qualities which I have mentioned. What then, do you think that propriety, justice, lawfulness, do not also belong to the same type, and that they are kept within fixed limits? The ability to increase is proof that a thing is still imperfect.”
And that would be the key issue that we’re wrestling with here. If pleasure has the ability to increase, then that very attribute means that it is not perfect in itself, and it places it outside of the class of these virtues that Plato and Socrates and the rest are arguing about, because they contend that propriety, justice, lawfulness, honor — all of the things that go along with virtue — are perfect in themselves and cannot be made better. So Cicero is taking this position that you can’t claim, Epicurus, that pleasure fits in the same category which is complete in itself, because your pleasure can always be made better by adding more length of time to it. Now if you accept that argument from a logical position, then you’re going to have to respond to it by looking at pleasure in a way that also cannot be made better by length of time. That would cause us to invoke a definition of pleasure which has a similar status to these other virtues. And the characteristic of these virtues such as justice is that they are by definition perfect. If there’s some minute amount of injustice in a person then that person is not truly just. If there’s some minute amount of dishonor in a person then that person is not truly honorable. You could extend the argument and say: if there is some minute amount of pain in a person then that person is not truly experiencing pleasure.
Joshua:
I think those are all good points, Cassius. Epicurus says in Principal Doctrine 19 that unlimited time and limited time afford an equal amount of pleasure, quote, “if we measure the limits of that pleasure by reason.” Whatever you take “measuring the limits of pleasure by reason” to mean, it’s clear that Epicurus is putting this in a context that is not absolute terms. It’s not absolutely impossible for length of time to add anything to pleasure, but what he’s saying here — I think, and I’m going to get into why I think this is true in a minute — what he’s saying here, I think, is that even if it is possible for length of time to add something to pleasure, we shouldn’t allow that to ruin our lives or our happiness because we’re mortal and we’re going to die.
The reason I bring this up is because I see something very life-defeating about this other approach. What they’re saying is: if it can be increased then it isn’t perfect, and if it isn’t perfect then it isn’t good. Well, life itself obviously admits of more or less, doesn’t it? You could live an extra day or you could live a day less. Are they saying then that life itself isn’t good or perfect or worthwhile? Because if that’s what they’re saying, then I’m not anxious to have Epicurus shunted into that group. That would be an implication of what they’re saying, which is one of the very negative aspects of those opposing philosophers.
Cassius:
Yeah, when Cicero cites Marcus Regulus as the exemplar human being — a guy who served his country and all that — I mean I’m not saying he was a bad person, but to voluntarily return to Carthage to be tortured to death does display a certain apathetic attitude to life. Cicero would say while he’s placing his honor, he holds his honor in higher esteem than his life. He despises his life but values his honor. And while I can see that kind of thing being inspiring in one’s heroes, I think most people don’t want to look on life with contempt. I’m not doing a very good job of articulating this, but you see where I’m going.
I think so, Joshua. And I’m glad you brought up Principal Doctrine 19 again, because when he says “infinite time contains no greater pleasure than limited time if one measures by reason the limits of pleasure” — what’s another obvious statement that’s going on there? We’re not going to measure the limits of pleasure by time. We’re going to measure it by something else — we’re going to measure the limits of pleasure by reason and not by time. Now, that’s on the face of it what 19 is saying: infinite time doesn’t contain any greater pleasure than limited time. Is that just a word game? The point being that Epicurus is telling us to measure the limits of pleasure by reason and not by time. Now, how does reason give us a different measuring stick of pleasure than time does in terms of determining the limit of pleasure?
Well, at the risk of talking in circles, this is kind of what the banquet analogy is for. When you’re alive, you don’t take the largest share and nothing else. You reach for that which is most pleasurable. And you know, if we were immortal you’d love to be at that banquet forever — you’d want that, there’s no reason that you wouldn’t want that. But we’re not immortal. We are going to die, all of us. And when you have to confront that reality, Epicurus relies on this image of the banquet for not only how you should conduct yourself while you’re there but how you should conduct yourself in light of the fact that you know you’re going to have to leave. And he says you should leave the banquet like a guest well satisfied. And a guest who is well satisfied has no more need of additional food at that moment.
You know, maybe it would be productive to try to understand Cicero’s and Plato’s allegations about why virtue is not made better by addition of time. And maybe that would lead us to a different understanding of the analysis of pleasure. Because if someone is courageous, why isn’t it better to be courageous for a year than it is to be courageous for a day? Why doesn’t the additional time add more to courage? Why isn’t it better to be just for a year than to be just for a day? What’s the premise of that kind of argument? Why are Plato and Socrates and Cicero entitled to take the position that that is a brilliant argument — that it’s obvious, that a person who is just for a year is no more just than the person who is just for a day? Why does that make sense? Or does it make sense?
Joshua:
Yeah, I think that’s a great point. I’ve been listening to an audiobook recently called Unruly, and it was written by a British comedian named David Mitchell, and it’s about the kings and queens of England. And certainly there were times when you wish that the wiser or just a ruler could have lived longer, to spare everyone the incompetence of that person’s heir or whatever the situation happens to be. If your valor saves Rome once, wouldn’t it be better to save Rome twice? If you save one life, isn’t it better to save two lives? I see what you’re saying, and of course it sounds compelling to me. But it’s a very interesting question. It’s not the complete argument. It doesn’t just immediately demolish Cicero on its face. But I think it leads us in a direction of trying to understand — well, where are they coming from in the first place? That something can be an absolute good in terms of justice or wisdom or these other virtues? And are they not constructing a paradigm for their alleged goals of life in terms of virtue that they are trying to deny to pleasure? And if you understand the paradigm and understand the presumptions behind their assertions, can you not then make the same assertion as to pleasure itself? And that may be where Epicurus is going. If you once take the position that justice is perfect and you’re going to say that it doesn’t matter how long you are just, then you can do the very same thing with pleasure. If pleasure is complete, if pleasure is the absence of pain, then it doesn’t matter how long you experience pleasure either. From a conceptual level, at that point wisdom is not made better by extension of time, nor is pleasure made better by extension of time.
Yeah, there’s a very famous and in some ways well-loved character from Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part One, and I’ve actually just talked about him recently — Sir John Falstaff. This is the drunk, glutton, coward that the young king — he was a prince when he spent time with this man and ran in that circle, but when he came to the throne he had to put that part of himself away. He had to put away pleasure-seeking and choose virtue. Well, one of the most famous quotes from Falstaff is this. He’s represented here as a coward, and in the middle of a fight he’s laid down on the floor and pretended to be dead so that no one would hurt him, and he says: “To die is to be a counterfeit, for he is but the counterfeit of a man who hath not the life of a man. But to counterfeit dying when a man thereby liveth is to be no counterfeit but the true and perfect image of life indeed. The better part of valor is discretion, in the which better part I have saved my life.” This is the coward lying on the floor, pretending to be dead, convincing himself like Plato or Aristotle that he’s made the wisest and most virtuous and valorous decision because it’s the decision that saved his life. So it’s not hard to parody this kind of language — the language that Cicero and Plato and Philebus and Seneca like to use. It’s not hard to put a different spin on that, and you emerge with a very different conclusion. Not because Falstaff is right that “the better part of valor is discretion,” but because to talk in terms of “the true and perfect image of life” and so forth, and to put everything in terms of limits and perfection, “the consummation of perfection,” “pure reason contemplating absolute truth” — to speak in those terms, you think you’re putting yourself beyond reproach, but usually really it’s not hard to tear down that false image you put up of yourself.
Cassius:
Yeah, I think we talk about this in terms of idealism and associated with Plato in terms of his forms and so forth. But it seems to me that that’s what you’re saying, Joshua — that the error here that Plato and Socrates are committing is that they are idealizing virtue as if it exists in some absolute form in some other dimension. Surely one of the key insights of Epicurus is that we’re dealing with reality and the way things are here on earth for human beings, and we’re not dealing with abstractions that have no connections to our senses, anticipations, and feelings. And in real life we understand that pleasures differ from each other. We understand that pleasures can differ in intensity, they differ in parts of the body that are affected, they differ in terms of length of time. We understand that in our real lives, and so we’re going to live our lives understanding and making decisions, making choices, exercising the will and agency that we have. We’re going to be pursuing those pleasures that we do find that are best for us, considering all these other factors.
But if we wish to measure the limit of pleasure by reason — if we wish to apply the same kind of standard of pleasure that Plato wishes to apply to virtue — then what we would say is that pleasure, if you idealize pleasure for the sake of argument with Plato and Socrates, if you wish to idealize pleasure in the same way you would idealize wisdom or virtue, then you can say that the limit of pleasure is the absence of pain. Because pleasure cannot be made better, in this idealized perspective, than to say that pleasure exists without pain.
Now, the standard of truth in Epicurean philosophy are the senses, anticipations, and feelings — and that’s where you live, that’s where you make your decisions, with reason assisting, as Diogenes Laertius notes. But I think that what we’re talking about now is probably the way to decode this entire argument. Cicero, you can’t have it both ways. If you want to idealize virtue and say that virtue can’t be made better by length of time, then I can do the same thing to pleasure, and I can tell you that pleasure is not made better over length of time either, because pleasure is the absence of pain and pleasure is pleasure. Now, again, we’re discussing this in terms of a philosophical debate about why Cicero is wrong and why Epicurus is not being inconsistent. But that’s an important perspective on life, because if you can’t come to terms with the way your thought process is consistent, then you’re back in the same situation as you might be with religion or with determinism or with skepticism. You’re left — well, I don’t know really whether pleasure is the right thing or not, you don’t have a means of grasping the whole subject. And when you face somebody like Cicero, you’re disarmed and left doubtful as to the right response.
So at least part of where we seem to be going here in answering Cicero is to realize that the standard he’s setting up for virtue — it either makes no sense and therefore you don’t apply it to pleasure, or if you want to say that it does make sense to idealize virtue, then you can idealize pleasure as well and look at it from that same perspective. Either way, you’re able to respond to Cicero’s arguments and see that he’s not making points and proving you wrong.
Joshua:
Yeah, let me point out that in the first book of Lucretius, at the first mention — not of Epicurus’s name, but of Epicurus as a person — Lucretius actually cites this issue of limits and boundaries and benchmarks as an ongoing project of the Epicureans to figure out what these limits really are. So this conversation isn’t foreign to Epicurean philosophy. Epicurus was probably most known for applying this to the physics, and let me read this quote. This is the Rolfe Humphries translation. He says:
“When human life, all too conspicuous, lay foully groveling on earth, weighed down by grim religion looming from the skies, horribly threatening mortal men, a man, a Greek, first raised his mortal eyes bravely against this menace. No report of gods, no lightning flash, no thunder peal made this man cower, but drove him all the more with passionate manliness of mind and will to be the first to spring the tight-barred gates of nature’s hold asunder. So his force — his vital force of mind — a conqueror beyond the flaming ramparts of the world explored the vast immensities of space with wit and wisdom, and came back to us triumphant, bringing news of what can be and what cannot, limits and boundaries, the borderline, the benchmark set forever.”
So this is Epicurus diving into his study of philosophy, of nature, of human life, and emerging with the description of the limits that exist. He had tested limits that other people said existed that didn’t turn out to exist. He had found new limits. So this is a major part of the philosophy — it doesn’t only relate to this question of does pleasure have a limit and does pain have a limit. So it’s probably worth considering this in a broader context in light of everything else he has to say. But as I said before, I think there’s something very, very life-defeating about the approach of some of these other thinkers when they say that only that which is perfect and does not admit of increase is good.
Cassius:
Okay, well, why don’t we begin to come to a conclusion from today’s episode? But the good news for our panel and for our listeners is that we are far from finished with this issue, because we’re going to be coming back to it next week. This is where Cicero is going to continue hammering this point, and that will give us time to discuss it on the forum and see if we can come up with additional ideas on how to respond to this. So Callistheni, your thoughts for today?
Callistheni:
As I was listening, it kind of came to me that perhaps we need to view the whole issue of pleasure as a remedy — similar to the statement when it said “death is nothing to us.” And if we frame it in that same manner, how will that shape the whole understanding of pleasure? If we see it as a remedy, not everyone has the same lifestyle, not everyone has the same resources available to them as they go about their lives. Some people have more money to spend on discretionary things, so we have different levels of resources. So if we look at Epicurean philosophy to embrace all of that, I wanted to read something from the Letter to Menoikeus: “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 a 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.”
It kind of sheds light on this idea of — well, is there a limit to pleasure, do you keep pursuing more and more? Because this brings up the word luxury. Do we need luxury, or are we just going to live some kind of a simple life? But I’m suggesting that we really think of this as a remedy — the whole understanding of the nature of pleasure. If we think of it as a remedy, it’s going to help us when we wish we had resources that we don’t have, and then we realize, well, actually we aren’t in pain and we can enjoy our life and we are in pleasure. So it’s not saying that, oh, let’s just be living an extremely simple life. But if we see this as a remedy — not telling us we should be just eating the most simple of diets all the time — this is just: how do we live in the face of limited resources?
If I had to really just boil it down, it’s kind of like: don’t get uptight about trying to have a good time in life. I think it’s possible that some people get really uptight trying to chase certain things that they think will bring them pleasure, and then they just take it all too seriously. But if you just think about it, just relax and enjoy life — there are natural pleasures that arise, those are not too difficult to find and to enjoy. And I know within philosophy there’s this whole thing where we have Cicero who’s taking things to these conceptual levels trying to find some kind of absolute understanding, but what it really comes down to for philosophy: you need to apply it to your life. What makes sense for me in given situations? And is it helping me? Does it have anything good that I can use that’s going to help me live a happier life?
Cassius:
Callistheni, there’s definitely a big issue about perspective on pleasure going on here that we need to unwind, and those are good thoughts — we’ll be able to continue them next week.
Okay, well, this has been really interesting material today, and material that is really important as well. The material that we’ve read in Cicero today, the material that we’re going to read for the next several weeks, is all largely targeted at this question of chipping away little by little at Epicurus’ view of pleasure and attempting to make Epicurus look ridiculous in the statements that he asserts about pleasure. It is certainly intuitively disconcerting for someone to say that unlimited time contains no greater pleasure than limited time, and to assert such a position requires an explanation. There are important reasons why this debate took place, and important reasons why Cicero thinks this is a vulnerability in Epicurean philosophy that he can use to defeat it. That makes it equally important for us to be able to defend against this attack and to understand why this is not something that Epicurus perceived as a vulnerability, but something that Epicurus perceived as a strength of his perspective.
Over the years of talking to people about Epicurean philosophy, it frequently occurs that people will bring up these issues and sort of say, well, I don’t really understand what Epicurus is saying, but that’s okay because I like pleasure, I like happiness, I’m just going to go ahead and apply some of Epicurus’ advice. And maybe Epicurus is a little impractical in some of the things he’s saying because I really would like to live a little longer than I already have, but Epicurus is just being a philosopher, we can just put those things aside and just take the good parts that we like of Epicurean philosophy about pursuing pleasure and limiting pain, and we can forget about these other things that Epicurus is saying. I think that’s a big, big, big mistake — to ignore a key aspect of Epicurus’ argument. Because if you think that Epicurus is worth taking seriously, then you must think he’s a smart guy. And if a smart guy is spending a lot of time arguing something that may appear on the surface to not make sense to us, then there’s a reason why it on the surface doesn’t make sense, and it’s up to us to dig beneath the surface and find out what’s really going on.
Cicero here in Book Two is giving us a lot of clues that we can follow. Specifically today we’ve been discussing how Cicero is looking at virtue in one way but pleasure in another way. He picked that up from Plato, from Philebus. It carries on to Seneca after Cicero. There’s an argument here that needs to be fully understood by people who want to apply Epicurean philosophy.
Joshua:
There’s a soliloquy in Romeo and Juliet in which the character Friar Lawrence is giving some insight into his work, which includes gathering plants and preparing medicines and so forth. And he quotes — or rather references — imagery that Lucretius had laid out when he says: “The earth, that’s Nature’s mother, is her tomb. What is her burying grave? That is her womb.” That’s very Lucretian imagery. In fact, Lucretius seemed to think that the earth had literal wombs in the surface of it that animals emerged from, which is charming to think of today. But Friar Lawrence continues: “And from her womb children of divers kind we sucking on her natural bosom find, many for many virtues excellent, none but for some, and yet all different. Oh, mickle is the powerful grace that lies in herbs, plants, stones, and their true qualities. For naught so vile that on the earth doth live but to the earth some special good doth give. Nor aught so good but, strained from that fair use, revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse. Virtue itself turns vice being misapplied, and vice sometimes by action dignified.” And he continues by pointing out these attributes in a flower: “Within the infant rind of this small flower poison hath residence and medicine power. For this, being smelt, with that part cheers each part; being tasted, slays all senses with the heart. Two such opposed kings encamp them still in man as well as herbs — grace and rude will. And where the worser is predominant, full soon the canker death eats up that plant.”
The point here is that at some point we’re going to have to take Cicero to task on this question of virtue. We’ve been on the back foot for most of this book and we’re going to continue to be on the back foot as we go through it. Cicero has not invited Torquatus to respond to Cicero’s philosophy and what he thinks is the good. Cicero wants to have a conversation about pleasure and why it’s bad. But we’re going to have to, before too long, have a conversation about virtue. And Cassius, you started us on that project today by saying that not only does Epicurus sort of put pleasure in the camp that virtue and wisdom that Plato puts those in, but you could also question the justice in putting virtue or wisdom in that camp and saying that they are perfect and that they cannot admit of increase.
Friar Lawrence here in the play is proposing a separate problem: even if the motivation to virtue were perfect and good, things don’t always work out that way in reality. You can behave as virtuously as you like, but it’s possible that circumstances will change your behavior to vice, as he says here. Or people who behave viciously, motivated by vicious actions, can end up doing virtuous things. So this issue of virtue is a lot more complex than simply saying that virtue does not admit of increase, it’s perfect, therefore it’s good, and the best life is the life in the consummation of virtue, or however he put that earlier. But most of this stuff actually requires a lot more subtlety and a lot more nuance than some of these old philosophers were willing to apply. And one of the things that I find encouraging in Epicurus and in Lucretius is a willingness to explore some of these questions — and not in a dialectical way in which the answer has already been chosen and we’re just pretending to have a conversation to get to it, which is kind of what Plato is doing there with Socrates.
Cassius:
Joshua, thank you for those comments. And one of the things that stirs in my mind when you talk about the quote from Shakespeare — let me just state it flatly this way. Wisdom does not exist as an independent entity floating here on earth or anywhere else. Wisdom is something that real people do at real times and real places in real circumstances, and it does not have an independent existence. This abstract concept of wisdom does not exist in the same way that real people exist. The same goes for all of the rest of the virtues. And if you want to consider the word pleasure in that same context, the concept of pleasure does not exist separately and independently from real people doing real things at real times and real places.
We in the human mind can conceptualize these ideas of virtue and courage and wisdom and so forth, and we can consider pleasure as a concept as well. But what real people do at real times and places and circumstances is to have actual experiences of pleasure. And the conceptual idea of wisdom has the same hazards and limitations as discussing the conceptual aspects of pleasure. You have to be able to flip back and forth between the two perspectives and realize that your ideal conception of wisdom is not the enemy of the good implementation of wisdom in an actual life. The ideal concept of pleasure is not the enemy of a real, life-good understanding and feeling of pleasure.
And I think we’ll make a lot of headway by keeping these perspectives separate in our minds and pursuing why — if you’re going to take the position that a wise man is not made better by living a year rather than just today — you can’t take the same position and say that a person who is experiencing pleasure is not experiencing more pleasure by living a year than a day. These are complicated questions but really important for understanding Epicurean philosophy. We’ll be coming back next week to examine this further. In the meantime, we invite you to drop by the forum and let us know your questions and comments. Thank you again for your time. We’ll see you next week.