Episode 303 - TD31 - Is It Truly Impossible To Advocate For Epicurus In The Public Sphere?
Date: 10/09/25
Link: https://www.epicureanfriends.com/thread/4753-episode-303-td31-is-it-truly-impossible-to-advocate-for-epicurus-in-the-public-s/
Summary
Section titled “Summary”(Add summary here)
Transcript
Section titled “Transcript”Cassius:
Welcome to Episode 303 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 we discuss this and all of our podcast episodes.
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This week, we’re continuing in part three of Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations, and we’re about to finish a section in which Cicero has been criticizing Epicurus directly. Cicero is now bringing that argument to an end, and as part of that conclusion he is throwing out a challenge which I think is one of the most important ones that we ought to be addressing in all of the work that we do in studying Epicurus and suggesting to other people that the study of Epicurus is worthwhile.
The ultimate practical challenge that Cicero throws down is that you guys may talk a good game, you may think you’re very clever, but you’re not even willing to advocate what you’re saying in public, to the Senate, to the people, to the soldiers, to the courts. All of this may be well and good in private philosophical conversation, but no reputable person is going to take the position that you’re taking in public!
And that’s a very effective argument, if true, and so we’re going to need to address it thoroughly today. Before we do that. The full section twenty one is not long, so Joshua, if you could read that for us, that will remind us of where we are, and then we’ll address this argument.
Joshua:
So we finished section twenty last week, with Cicero saying that it was an improper use of language when speaking of virtue to measure every great evil by pain. And on that point he goes into section twenty-one and expands on his attack and his criticism of Epicureanism. Section twenty-one reads like this:
And indeed the Epicureans those best of men, for there is no order of men more innocent, complain that I take great pains to inveigh against Epicurus. We are rivals. I suppose for some honor or distinction, I place the chief good in the mind he and the body. I in virtue, he in pleasure. And the Epicureans are up in arms and implore the assistance of their neighbors, and many are ready to fly to their aid. But as for my part, I declare that I am very indifferent about the matter, and that I consider the whole discussion which they are so anxious about at an end. For what is the contention about the war on which very subject? Though Marcus Cato and Lucius Lentulus were of different opinions, still there was no difference between them. But these men behave with too much heat, especially as the opinions which they would uphold are no very spirited ones, and such as they dare not plead for, either in the Senate or before the Assembly of the people, or before the army or the censors. But however, I will argue with them another time, and with such a disposition, that no quarrel shall arise between us, for I shall be ready to yield to their opinions when founded on truth. Only I must give them this advice that, were it ever so true that a wise man regards nothing but the body, or to express myself with more decency, never does anything except what is expedient, and views all things with exclusive reference to his own advantage. As such things are not very commendable, they should confine them to their own breast and leave off talking with that parade of them.
Cassius:
Joshua, before we go too much further, I know you’re going to give us a reference where this same argument appears also in Cicero’s “On Ends.” But this is such an important argument that’s probably worth reading in another translation. Let me quickly go through the translation from Hicks in the Loeb edition. Hicks says it this way:
And yet the Epicureans, excellent creatures that they are, for never was a set of beings less artful, complain that I argue against Epicurus like a partisan. Ah, then I suppose the contest between us is one for office or position. To my thinking, the highest good is in the soul. To Epicurus, it is in the body. For me, it is in virtue, for him, it is in pleasure. It’s the Epicureans who fight, yes, and appeal to the loyalty of their neighbors, and there are plenty of them ready to flock in on the instant. It is I who am the one to say that I am not troubling, that I shall look upon what they have settled as settled. For what is at stake? Is it a question of war with Carthage? When Marcus Cato and Lucius Lentulus took different sides upon that question, there was never any heated controversy between them. The Epicureans show an excess of irritation, particularly as the view that they support is not one that inspires a generous enthusiasm, and they would not venture to advocate it in the Senate, at a public meeting, in front of an army, or before the censors. But let us deal with these gentlemen another time, and in any case, with the intention not of entering the lists, but of yielding readily to words of truth. I shall merely drop this hint: If it is perfectly true that the wise man judges everything by the standard of the body, or, to speak, more fittingly, does nothing except what is profitable, or judges everything by the standard of his own advantage, then as such truths are not likely to win applause, let them keep their joy in their own breasts, let them cease to speak so boastfully.
So in each case, it’s a challenge to the Epicureans not to be so upset about the criticisms, because these criticisms from Cisco are not nearly as important as something like the Punic War on which great men like Cato and Lentilus have disagreed without being mad at each other. Cicero is saying, Why are you Epicureans so upset at my criticism? Because I’m just simply seeking after truth! And all I’m telling you is that if you really think that the wise man judges everything by the body rather than the mind, and if he does only what is profitable to himself, then keep that to yourself, because you’re not going to win friends and influence people in public by taking those kind of positions!
So there’s a lot here in this paragraph that we have to deal with. But Joshua, I think you were going to call our attention to the very same argument that Cicero had made previously and own ends.
Joshua:
Yeah, that’s right. In book two of On Ends, Cicero gives his response to the Epicurean Torquatus, in which he takes him to task on every point, including to criticize Epicureanism in much the same terms that he’s doing now. You can’t say this stuff in public, you can’t say this stuff in the senate. And in book two of On Ends, this comes directly on the heels of Cicero pointing out to Torquatus that his own ancestors would be embarrassed to hear him say such things. Cicero says this (and this is the Reid translation):
But I return to our old Torquatus. If it was for the sake of pleasure that he fought his combat with the Gaul on the banks of the Anio when challenged, and if from the spoils of the foe he invested himself at once with the necklet and the title (which is where the word Torquatus comes from - the necklace or circlet around the neck that they wore was called a torque) that when he had invested himself at once with the necklet and the title, if he had done so from any other motive than the feeling that such exploits beseem a man, then I do not regard him as brave. Further, if honor, if loyalty, if chastity, if in a word, temperance - if all these are to be governed by dread of retribution or of disgrace, and are not to sustain themselves by their own inherent purity, what kind of adultery or impurity or passion will not take its heedless and headlong course, if either concealment is promised to it, or freedom from punishment or immunity?
Why Torquatus what a state of things! Does this seem that you, with your name, abilities and distinctions, cannot venture to confess before a public meaning your actions, your thoughts, your aims, your objects, or what that thing is from love of which you desire to carry your undertakings to completion? In fine, what it is that you judge to be the best thing in life? What would you be willing to take on condition that when once you have entered on your office and risen before the assembly — for you know, you must announce what rules you intend to follow in your administration of the law, and perhaps too, if you think it good to do so, you will say something about your own ancestry and yourself, after the custom of our forefathers — well, then what would you take to declare that during your term of office you will do everything with a view to pleasure, and that you have never done anything during life except with a view to pleasure? You say, do you suppose me to be such a madman as to speak before ignorant men in that fashion? But make the same statements in court, or if you are afraid of the crowd, make them in the Senate. You will never do it! Why not unless it be that such speech is disgraceful?Do you suppose then that I and Triarius are fit persons to listen to your disgraceful talk?
And then he goes on to say that the name of pleasure has no prestige. And as I mentioned last week, though the name of pleasure has no prestige, that’s not Cicero’s real complaint. His real complaint is the Epicurean view on pain. And in the subsequent paragraph here in book two of On Ends, he says, this:
State before any public meeting you like that you do everything with a view to avoiding pain.If you think that even this statement cannot be made with proper honor and dignity, say that both during your term of office and your whole life, you intend always to act with an eye to your interest, doing nothing but what is profitable, nothing in fine, except for your own private sake.
And he finishes all of this with a conclusion that is meant to be a challenge to everybody who’s interested in Epicurean philosophy. He says,
Do you mean, then, to follow a system such that you adopt it alone and in the company of your friends, But do not venture to proclaim it or make it public? In reality? When you attend the courts or the Senate, you have always on your lips the language of the Peripatetics and the Stoics. Duty and equity, honor and loyalty, uprightness and morality, everything worthy of the Empire and the Roman people, all kinds of dangers to be faced for the commonwealth, death, for the sake of one’s country. And when you talk in this way, we simpletons are overcome. But you, I suppose, laugh in your sleeve. Verily among these phrases, splendid and noble as they are, no place is found for pleasure, not merely for that pleasure which you philosophers say lies in activity, which all men in town and country, all I say, who speak Latin call pleasure, but even for this stable pleasure, which no one but you entitles pleasure!
Cassius, Cicero is good at his job when he gets going! He’s quite good at a roast or a teardown, because he builds and builds and builds, and he pulls it all together as he’s going. And this is kind of his main challenge to Torquatus, but it’s also his main challenge to Epicureanism. And for that reason it’s of great interest to us how we should answer these questions.
Cassius:
Yes, it sure is. And in terms of exercises to think about how we can internalize Epicurean philosophy, Cicero is really presenting a good dramatization of what we need to be able to do ourselves. We need to think to ourselves that we are about to go into some public assembly and respond to someone like Cicero who has torn down the ideas of Epicurus. What would we say in such a situation, and how would we organize our thoughts?
And as we think about what Torquatus is doing in book one of On Ends, he is giving us an excellent example of what is to be done in responding to those accusations. As we did when we first went through Book One, we could simply just read what Torquatus had to say and repeat it, because Torquatus gives a very extensive and persuasive response to all of this. But we’ve already done that in our prior podcast, and I’ll put a link to those episodes in the show notes for this episode. What we should do today instead is more generally and extemporaneously go through the way to organize a response, almost as Epicurus suggested, by outlining our thoughts to make sure we can go from the general level to the detail and back and forth as a means of understanding as philosophy.
It helps to internalize the philosophy to again think about how to present it to other people who don’t know the background that Cicero himself knows. And as we start off with that, the first thing that would occur to me to say, if I were to stand up in some situation and respond to Cicero, would be to focus on exactly what he has just said in characterizing Epicurean philosophy.
Because the way Cicero attacks it is simply not truthful. At the conclusion of what he said in section twenty one, he basically makes two allegations, the first of which is that the Epicurean is going to judge everything by the standard of the body, the second of which is that the Epicurean is going to do nothing except what is profitable to him alone for his own personal advantage. And again, to repeat, those are simply false allegations.
Epicurus is clear that the standard is not the body, and Epicurus is clear that the standard is not your own advantage.
Epicurus is clear that the standard of action is pleasure, and pleasure includes much much more than the indulgence of the body. It also includes everything that the mind finds to be pleasurable and everything that the body and the mind finds to be healthy. Pleasure is not confined simply to stimulation from the outside for short periods of time as Cicero wants everybody to believe.
Cicero is mischaracterizing what Epicure says about pleasure, and secondly he’s mischaracterizing what Epicure says about doing everything for your own advantage. Epicurus never says that the Epicurean standard is pleasure, and anyone who’s at all familiar with what Epicurus does say knows how much emphasis Epicurus places on his friends and the pleasure of his friends, and how much we value that type of pleasure which comes from engagement in society and working with light minded people. Epicurus is not always looking to his own advantage.
Cicero is the one who seems to be admitting more than he should admit. If Cicero thinks that your own advantage means to exclude other people from consideration, then that means that Cicero thinks that if the world were as Cicero might want it to be, only Cicero’s own advantage would be considered. Epicurus takes a much wider view of what advantage really means. He focuses everything, as he always does, back on pleasure, and he reminds us that pleasure is far more than your own momentary bodily stimulation. It’s your full mental, physical, and healthy, whole-person experience of life that you find agreeable, and as Torquatus himself says, the mental side is frequently more significant to us than the bodily side.
To repeat, for Epicurus pleasure includes everything in life that you find agreeable, and not just the kind of narrow bodily sensation that Cicero wants to characterize this as.
So, Joshua, I don’t know what your first thoughts might be as to how to organize your response, but if I were in court with Cicero and stood up to give an opening statement to the jury, I’d probably begin by pointing out that Cicero has totally mischaracterized Epicurus’s position.
Joshua:
Yeah, as to this mind-body distinction that Cicero brings up here, it’s true, in a sense, that Epicurus was an atomist. He believed that all compound bodies that exist in nature are made of atoms and void. You have the material, and then you have the empty space through which the material moves.
And so, in that sense, from a materialist or physicalist point of view, even when we’re talking about the mind, we are still talking about something connected with the body. And this is Cicero’s chief mistake when it comes to Epicureanism. What I see Cicero doing here is confusing what Epicurus says about pleasure with what Epicurus says about atomic physics. It’s true that we are material beings, and that — although Epicurus himself wouldn’t have put it in these terms, he might have understood it in these terms — that the mind, for example, is an emergent phenomenon which arises as the result of a particular configuration of matter and energy in the body.
But that is not at all to say that in his ethics Epicurus prioritizes the body, or that in his ethics Epicurus says that the pleasures of the body have primacy over pleasures of the mind. Cicero is doing something a bit tricky here when he’s implying that if the mind is rooted not in its own eternal nature, the nature of the soul or whatever, but if it’s rooted in the body, if it has its origin in the body, then any pleasure of the mind is a pleasure of the body that is just referred to the mind. I don’t think there’s any reason for us to be that reductive about this. We can talk about the mind as something separate and apart from the body, even though it’s connected to it, And we can talk about the pleasures of the mind, and indeed the pains of the mind, the suffering of the mind, as different in emphasis and degree and intensity and so on than the pleasures and pains of the body.
And there’s no reason to think from the surviving works of the ancient Epicureans that it was sensory bodily pleasures that they focus all of their attention on. That’s only part of the story. We spent a number of weeks talking about Cicero and his translation from Epicurus’s On The End Goal, where Epicurus says, I do not even know what I should conceive the good to be if I omit the pleasures of sex and food and music and so on, and Cicero reading that is thinking, well, this just confirms everything I’ve already believed about the Epicureans. They’re just interested in the body, in satisfying the stomach or the palette.
But as we’ve tried to explain many times going through these Tusculan Disputations, sensory pleasures are a kind of pleasure, but they are not a total description of everything that Epicurus means when he uses the word pleasure. And indeed, you’ve already mentioned friendship, Cassius, mental pleasures are no less important in all of this. Cicero just doesn’t really want to deal with that point. So when he says, here, Were it ever so true that a wise man regards nothing but the body, never does anything except what is expedient, and views all things with exclusive reference to his own advantage, as such things are not very commendable, they should confine them to their own breasts and leave off talking about them. Well, if indeed that were true, you might have a point, Cicero. But that is not Epicurus’s view, and that is not the view of the ancient Epicureans on this question. They were not exclusively concerned with their own advantage. And Cicero was personally acquainted with several Epicureans in his own day who acted in the public interest, even at great personal cost.
So I think you’re right to say that the first thing we should do is to point out where Cicero’s gone wrong. And unfortunately it’s the same place he keeps going wrong in all of the texts that we’ve been through on this subject. He does not want to really understand what Epicurus has to say in total at pleasure as a whole, and it leads him down a false path. But there’s no reason for us to follow Cicero down that false path.
Cassius:
That’s right, no reason at all.
Now, depending on the forum you’re in, and on how much time you have to respond to these arguments, there’s any number of ways to organize the presentation. But as I think about it, after the initially pointing out that Cicero has misrepresented Epicurus, I think I would next try to move to a more positive explanation of what Epicurus does stand for. And as Torquatus did point out, virtue, which is on everyone’s minds in a public assembly, is what you might want to appeal to, as the audience is familiar with that argument and it is likely going to evoke a positive response from your listeners.
So like Torquatus did, it is very important to point out that virtue is a large part of Epicurean philosophy as well, once you understand what virtue is based on and how you determine what is virtuous in a particular situation.
Cicero is playing to an audience which he thinks he can take advantage of by simply talking about virtue, morality, high sounding themes, as if it is totally self evident what is the right thing to do in any situation.
An Epicurean is going to give the audience more credit than that. An Epicurean is not going to try to take advantage of the audidence’s simplicity. An Epicurean is going to be willing to explain that Cicero is being superficial and even nonsensical. An Epicurean is going to explain that what you always have to do in deciding any question, whether it be the Punic War or how to use the Treasury (as the Gracchi and Frugi were debating) has to be decided by looking to the ultimate results of the course of action. Epicurus is going to be honest with you and tell you that the ultimate goal of human life is happiness, the ultimate goal is not found in complying with the will of some abstract ideal or supernatural god which you can’t see or touch or even know is real.
The best life does not come from giving in to high-sounding ideals that have no reality of their own, as Plato or Aristotle or others might suggest that you should do.
The best life comes from looking at the real consequences of your actions and looking ahead to the kind of life your actions are going to produce.
And in that context, virtue, as Torquatus explains at length, is the tool for achieving the best life. Cicero wants to claim virtue for himself, but as Torquatus says, Epicurus is the one who places virtue on a solid foundation, by pointing out that the reason that you value wisdom, the reason that you value courage, prudence, honesty, or any kind of virtue that everyone understands to be desirable, is not because those virtues are desirable in themselves, but because they lead to pleasure and to the best life possible.
That’s what Epicurus teaches. Whether you’re a soldier in the army, whether you’re a senator, whether you’re a juror in court, or a member of the Assembly of the People, Epicurus is telling you that it’s not your own narrow and immediate bodily pleasure that you should look towards. Epicurus is telling you that your real self interest in life is to live happily, and the best way you live happily is to take all of the consequences of your actions into account. You don’t just look to the immediate pleasures of the moment, because if you’ve made a mistake in judging all the rest of the consequences, by doing so you’re going to bring yourself pains that overwhelm those immediate and narrow pleasures. You’ve got to look at all the consequences of your actions.
That’s how you determine whether an action is virtuous or not. Not by intent, but by result! And when you realize that virtue is a tool for the achievement of the best life, this is an absolutely appropriate approach no matter whether you are a juror, senator, soldier, censor, or anybody else. That’s the analysis that applies to everyone in everything they do. It’s simply ridiculous to use any other kind of analysis, because these alleged ideals and supernatural considerations that Cicero and others are advocating simply do not exist.
What does exist is this real world that we live in. If you follow the faculties that Nature has given you — pleasure and pain, the five senses, your pattern-recognition faculty of anticipation - you can reason through whatever situation confronts you. You will realize that in most decisions there is in fact a “right” way and a “wrong” way to proceed, but the “right” way and the “wrong” way are not found by simply looking up the definitions of “right” and “wrong.” The right way to proceed is always to be found through looking to the results of the particular action that you’re going to take. This Epicurean approach produces a foundation and understanding of virtue that is far stronger than anything you’ll ever hear from the advocates of traditional morality such as Cicero.
Joshua:
Well, we have a lot under discussion today, and I’m hoping we can tie it all together.
Here is something from the Roman poet Horace, who was a late contemporary of Cicero. In one of his letters Horace raises some of the questions that we’re talking about today, but more from a facetious or humorous point of view. In his first book of letters, in letter number six, he says this:
If your lungs or kidneys were attacked by cruel disease, you’d seek relief from the disease. You wish to live well, who does not? If it’s virtue alone achieves it, then be resolute and forego pleasure. But if you consider virtue is only words - a forest only firewood - then beware lest your rivals be the first to dock lest you lose Cyberra’s or Bythenia’s trade. Clear one thousand, and another? Then add a third pile, and round it off with a fourth. Surely wife and dowry, loyalty and friends, birth and beauty too are the gifts of her highness cash, while Venus and charm grace the moneyed classes. Don’t be like Cappadocia’s king, rich in slaves but short of lucre. If wealth alone makes you happy and keep you, so be first to strive for it again and last to leave off.
I’m bringing this up because, as I said, I think Horace is being somewhat facetious, here, but he’s giving voice to an opinion that is not that far off from what Cicero himself is saying in our text for today in section twenty-one. Cicero is saying, You Epicureans do everything that you do because it is expedient, because you have an exclusive interest in serving your own advantage. And Horace is giving voice to a particular financial focus on that question.
But it’s interesting because in this letter Horace does consider other options. He says, if virtue alone is the road to the good life, then be resolute and forego pleasure. But if, like Marcus Junius Brutus, one of the conspirators who killed Julius Caesar, is reported to have said, if virtue is only words, then you have to come up with another foundation for making your decisions.
And that’s kind of where I come down on this, which is — forget everything that has been said about some divine fire that goes through the cosmos, and that living in accordance with the will of god or the logos or something, that this is virtue. We have not been given such a standard because there’s no one to give it to us. A perfect description or understanding of virtue or morality is beyond the reach of us as human beings. We cannot get access to this. Many people think they’ve gotten access to this, and they’ll cite their religious texts, or they’ll argue like Cicero himself was doing earlier talking about Torquatus’s ancestors, when he said, T_orquatus, compare yourself to the ancestor of your name, who fought so well and so bravely, and who won so much for your family by doing so_. And that’s virtue. But we have no objective ground upon which to say that one choice is virtuous and another isn’t. What we’re given by nature is not a deep and absolute understanding of virtue or morality.
What we’re given is the stop and go signals of pleasure and pain. Now might it make my job easier if I were to pretend that I did have exclusive knowledge and exclusive access to understanding moral truth? Yes - definitely. I see people who claim to be able to do just that, who claim to have this or that knowledge as to how to live, and I see the arguments they’re able to make at the court or at the Senate, and I see how persuasive that language can be. But I cannot lie to myself about this. We were not given this; nature does not equip us with it.
And for that reason, any defense of virtue or morality that claims to be absolute is in the end going to be revealed to be mere words. And so you’re left with a situation where you don’t have a full and proven understanding of what is morally right, or what is honest, or what is honorable, or what is just or what is virtuous. You have to have some other ground for making your decisions, a ground that is based on something that you were equipped with by nature.
And I see people making moral arguments and arguments about virtue in conflict with each other. Who is to arbitrate in this dispute? Because they’re both claiming that they have a grasp on some kind of moral truth. But obviously it can’t be the case that they’re both right, or that they’re all right all these competing claims.
So the honest thing for us to do is to realize that we don’t have all the knowledge that we would like to have. We don’t have the perfect ability to judge and to weigh what is moral and what is not, or what is virtuous and what is not. And so we say that pleasure is the beginning and the end of the best mode of life, as Epicurus says in the letter to Menoeceus. I think what Epicurus says there is true, whether we want it to be true or not, because we’re not left with any other option. There’s nothing else that fills that hole. There’s nothing else that fits into that slot, because nature hasn’t equipped us with it.
And so we can certainly talk about virtue, and I think it’s fruitful to do so. We can certainly have discussions about ethics and morality, and I think that it is important that we continue to do that. But to pretend that our particular conception of virtuous or moral behavior is in line with nature, that we’re living according to nature when we live just the way it says to do so in our Holy Book, or the way our parents or our ancestors told us to do so, would be to be grossly misled about the state of things. Because the real state of things is that you were born into nature, you were equipped with pleasure and pain as your guides, and you’ve got to find a way, as you navigate through life, to come to terms with the fact that you don’t have all the answers, and that you never will — that you are not omniscient on the subject of ethics and morality, and you never will be. And you don’t have recourse to an ominiscient mind or a book that was written by a mind that is omniscient on the subject of ethics and morality, on the subject of virtue. And so, while I don’t advocate Horace’s response, which is let’s cut down the sacred grove and file one dollar on top of another and spend the rest of our life trying to amass as much wealth as we can, I do think that a life devoted to pleasure, friendship, and the study of nature is the best we can do.
And certainly discussions on virtue and morality are a part of that conversation, but they’re not the foundation of that conversation. They can’t be because they don’t have that level of primacy, because they don’t come from nature. This is not a faculty that we were equipped with. We have a conscience, which causes us pain when we do something shady, but we don’t have a list of ten things that you shall or shall not do in all situations. There is no list. And moreover, there’s no one who is equipped with the authority or the power to make such a list and to ensure that everybody lives by it.
Cassius:
Yeah, Joshua, let me emphasize what you’ve just said by pointing out that in what we’re doing now, we’re talking organizing an effective response to Cicero as opposed to actually giving that response. What you’ve just pointed out evokes in my mind that what Cicero is giving here is really a very modern argument.
You’ve been talking about that we’re not omniscient and we don’t have the authority to state what is universally moral for everybody all the time every place. In the same way, CIcero has not specifically here referred to religion or the gods in saying that Epicureans can’t speak to the public assembly. Cicero is giving an almost modern argument, like we — at least in the United States — often see, We don’t generally confront in our public assemblies explicit religious arguments. We certainly hear references to what God would want and so forth, but ultimately the appeal that Cicero is making, and that we should be most concerned about even today, is this idea that there is an absolute good and evil.
It doesn’t really make any difference whether you attribute that absolute good and evil to a supernatural god or not. The important point that has to be overcome in Cicero’s argument is this idea that there is an absolute right and wrong that applies to everyone all the time in every situation. That’s the problem with Cicero’s view of virtue, in that that type of virtue simply does not exist. What does exist is a practical virtue that looks at the circumstances of each situation and wisely and prudently acts in response to the circumstances to produce happiness in the people that are involved in that situation.
That leads to another point that I would include in a general outline of a response to Cicero. When you’re talking to the soldiers, or to the senate, or to the assembly of the people, most often you are talking to practical minded people about what they should actually do, not necessarily what they should think. And in this part of the conversation, I know that there are certain people who, even when they first see the title of this podcast, will say, You don’t need to be concerned about what to say to the Senate or the people or the courts, because you’re an Epicurean. You have no business being in front of the Senate or the Assembly of the people or the courts in the first place! You’re supposed to be living in your garden, off in isolation, eating bread and water, not caring what goes on in the world!
And as part of this discussion, I would like to argue that attitude is as much a false view of Epicurus as anything that Cicero himself has said.
One of the interviews we did in a past episode of this podcast was with Marcello Boeri, who recently published, along with another author, a book entitled Theory and Practice in Epicurean Political Philosophy, Security, Justice and Tranquility (which was written by Javier Aoz and Marcello Boeri). As part of the description of that book, those authors gave this summary of what they were writing. They wrote, “The opponents of Epicureanism in antiquity, including Cicero, Plutarch, and Lactantius, succeeded in establishing a famous cliche: the theoretical and practical disinterest of Epicurus and the Epicureans in political communities. However, this anti-Epicurean literature did not provide considerations of Epicurean political theory or the testimonies about Epicurean lifestyle. The purpose of this book is to shed light on the contribution of Epicurean thought to political life in the ancient world. Incorporating the most up to date material, including papyri which has been recovered from Herculaneum, this volume will bring to the foreground new testimonies surrounding the public activities of the Epicureans. In this way, the reader will learn that Epicurean political theory is in fact a crucial ingredient of its philosophy.”
We don’t have time to go into all the different examples that that book brings to the argument, but here’s something important: We all know about Epicurean philosophy in the first place, because the ancient Epicureans were not isolated in their gardens, but they were spending their time writing books and letters, writing poems, writing an inscription in Oenoander, explaining their position to the outside world and how it in fact brings happier living to everyone, and is not something to internalize and then hide away in your own cave. We can cite numerous famous people throughout history even after the Epicurean period, starting as a good example in our American context of Thomas Jefferson, who were far from being hermits and engaged in public life on Epicurean principles.
So there are many famous men of the past who have rejected the idea that Epicurean philosophy leads you to become a hermit. That famous phrase live unknown is something that we have from Plutarch, who was attacking Epicurus, and not from Epicurus himself. In fact, even here in these arguments by Cicero, you can see that “living unknown” is far from the truth.
Cicero is not attacking Epicurus because Epicurus hid in his cave and wrote books to himself that he did not want other people to know about. Cicero is attacking the Epicureans because they were spreading their ideas to other people, and those ideas were effectively “taking Italy by storm.” Cicero was complaining because Epicurean philosophy is in fact a practical philosophy of life that does lend itself to explaining itself in public to other people. Cicero would not be complaining about something that was not being widely and publicly adopted by the average middle class type person that Cicero was looking down upon and complaining, how can they understand Epicurus when I don’t seem to be able to? Epicurean philosophy is a practical philosophy of life that is perfectly suited to soldiers, courts, and the assembly of the people.
So adding on to the general observation that Cicero is totally mischaracterizing Epicurean ethics, and that Cicero is totally turning on its head the fact that Epicurean philosophy places virtue on a stronger foundation than does the virtue ethics of Plato or religion, it certainly is possible to explain the background and application of Epicurean philosophy to active people. It is definitely possible to point out that vigorous leaders of the past have seen through these false arguments that people like Cicero and Plutarch and Lactantius have made, and to show that Epicurean philosophy is something to be proud of and not something to hide or to be embarrassed about.
Joshua:
So in relation to Cicero’s challenge that you can’t say these things in the Senate, you can’t say these things to the army, you can’t and won’t make this particular case in a court of law, there is an interesting incident in Cicero’s own life there is relevant. One of the most celebrated moments of Cicero’s career as an orator and as a lawyer involved how Cicero dealt with what is known as the Cataline conspiracy. In that incident we find that Julius Caesar in sixty three BC made an argument that has significant commonality with Epicurus’s own point of view. Unfortunately, I am not as well versed as I’d like to be in the background of all of this, but let me read from the record of Caesar’s oration on this point. Caesar is recorded to have said something like this:
I am indeed of the opinion that the utmost degree of torture is inadequate to the punishment of the crimes of the conspirators. … Mankind dwells on that which happens last, and in the case of malefactors, forgets their guilt and talks only of their punishment, should that punishment have been inordinately severe. … Decimus Silanus, a man of spirit and resolution, made the suggestions which he offered [the death penalty] from zeal for the state, and he had no view in so important a matter to favor or to enmity. Such I know to be his character, and yet his proposal appears to me, I will not say cruel, for what can be cruel that is directed against such people? - but foreign to our policy, for assuredly, Solanas, either your fears or their treason must have induced you to propose this new kind of punishment of fear. It is unnecessary to speak when, by the prompt activity of that distinguished man, our consul, such numerous forces are under arms.
And as to the punishment, we may say, what is indeed the truth, that in trouble and distress, death is a relief from suffering and not a torment, that it puts an end to all human woes, and that beyond it there is no place either for sorrow or for joy. … But why in the name of the immortal gods did you not add to your proposal Solanus that before they were put to death, they should be punished with the scourge? Was it because the law forbids it, but other laws forbid condemned citizens to be deprived of life and allow them to go into exile? Or was it because scourging is a severer penalty than death? Yet what can be too severe or too harsh toward men convicted of such offense? But if scourging be a milder punishment than death, how is it consistent to observe the laws as to the smaller point when you disregard it as to the greater? … Within our own memory, when the victorious Sulla ordered his enemy and others of similar character who had risen by distressing their country to be put to death, who did not commend the preceding? All exclaimed that wicked and factious men who had troubled the state with their seditious practices had justly forfeited their lives. Yet this proceeding was the commencement of great bloodshed. For whenever anyone coveted, did the mansion, villa, or even the plate or the apparel of another, he exerted his influence to have him numbered among the proscribed. Thus, they to whom the death of their enemy had been a subject of joy, were soon after dragged to death themselves. Nor was there any cessation of slaughter until Sula had glutted all his partisans with riches such excesses.
Indeed, I do not fear from Marcus Tullius or in these times. But in a large state there may arise men of various dispositions. At some other period, and under another consul, who, like the present, may have an army at his command, some false accusations may be credited as true. And when with our example for a precedent, the consul shall have drawn the sword on the authority of the Senate, who shall stay its progress or moderate its fury?
So his criticism of the death penalty in this particular case is twofold. One is the practical point that in bringing this punishment against your enemies, you are making a rod for your own back, because it’s going to be used against you when someone else is in power. The second point is Caesar’s claim that death is the end of all human suffering. There is no trouble, there is no woe, there is no pain after death. And Caesar was quite willing to make this case in the court of law, even at such a time when a allegedly seditious, traitorous conspiracy was at the heart of the Roman Republic and causing all of these problems. He’s quite ready to get up there and say that there is no pain after death, there is no suffering after death. I think this is one example that we can point to, and there are surely others like it, where this isn’t just hypothetical where we are dealing with real cases.
Cassius do you have a response to that? I realize I’m being somewhat spotty and the way I’m setting it up.
Cassius:
Yes, Joshua, there you are citing one of the most famous examples that is used to point out the fact that Julius Caesar, who’s hardly a retiring wallflower,, is in fact out there making an Epicurean argument to the Senate, to the people, and to the soldiers. In fact, in regard to the soldiers, it’s well known that there was, as people call it, an Epicurean revival of sorts among the lieutenants of Caesar in his army in Gaul. That’s where Cassius Longinus converted and became an Epicurean, and there are other examples of Roman generals who converted to Epicurean philosophy that can be cited as well.
This is an episode that’s discussed in the Boeri book, and there is also an article by Katerina Volk entitled Caesar the Epicurean A Matter of Life and Death.
The basic point is, as you said, that Caesar is stating that executing someone brings an end to their suffering, and that if you really want to make someone suffer more, you will exile them or imprison them indefinitely and give them time to think about their crimes, rather than execute them. The point again being that Caesar making two Epicurean points: First, Caesar is evaluating the situation in a practical, long range way. He’s telling Cicero and the other senators to think about the repercussions in the future of what they’re about to do, and not simply consider what the law is or might not be at a particular moment, but to look to the practical results of their decisions before making them. The second point, a we just cited, is that in death you are not feeling punishment, but nothing at all.
So the episode you’re talking about is an example of exactly what Cicero says is impossible - taking Epicurean theory and employing it in public argument. There are letters between Cassius and Cicero after the death of Julius Caesar, where Cassius tells Cicero that it is his Epicurean views motivate him, and not some concern for abstract virtue. The happiness and pleasure of life is what really matters, and not a virtue that is supposedly something to strive for as an end in itself, but which does not really exist.
It is the result of virtue that matters, and not the abstraction that counts. So yes, that’s a good example of what we’ve been talking about that Cicero says is impossible to do. And while we’ll have to leave off until the future making examples of such arguments in full, I think what we’ve already discussed today brings home these issues in a way that amply points out that Cicero’s argument here is flawed.
Cicero has it exactly wrong. Epicurus is not somebody to be embarrassed about. He’s not a self indulgent reprobate, as Cicero would have him characterized. Epicurus was in fact, a moral reformer who was leading a campaign to spread his ideas to bring happier living to everybody who was willing to listen. Epicurus doesn’t teach that we should go off and live in a cave on your own, but instead to take to others ideas that are perfectly appropriate to talk about in the Senate, the Assembly, the courts, or even in front of an army.
We’re spent all of today’s episode on this relatively short part twenty-one. From this point in book three, Cicero is going to remove his focus from Epicurus and start talking about other philosophers. When we come back next week, we’ll move much more quickly to keep the focus on Epicurus. But this very practical challenge by Cicero is one to keep in mind, and to explore in our own thoughts how we would force fully and confidently bring Epicurean arguments to other people, even to public assemblies.
Okay, we’re about out of time for today. As always, we invite everyone to drop by the Epicureanfriends,com forum and let us know if you have any thoughts or comments on this or any of our other discussions of Epicurus. Thanks for your time today. We’ll be back again soon. See you then - bye!
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