Iris: Journal of the Classical Association of Victoria, Volume 22 (2009)
Abstract
The first thing to understand is that there is no other purpose in gaining knowledge of meteorological phenomena, whether in conjunction with other doctrines or in isolation, than peace of mind and firm conviction, just as with all the rest.
~ Epicurus Letter to Pythocles 85
The Greek philosopher Epicurus established his school in Athens in 306 BCE. He was a prolific writer; the one biography that survives, that of Diogenes Laertius, claims that the full body of his writings occupied around 300 books (i.e. papyrus rolls) ‘without a single citation from other authors’—well, so Diogenes said, but Diogenes was a fan;3 Epicurus’ detractors accused him of plagiarising heavily from the fifth-century philosopher Democritus, for reasons which will become obvious. Diogenes’ selection of Epicurus’ greatest hits at 10.27-28 comprises 41 titles occupying 87 books, including the monumental 37-book treatise entitled On Nature, the content of which is summarised in the surviving Letter to Herodotus.
This enormous output was reduced by one of his followers, the first century BCE philosopher and poet Philodemus of Gadara, himself a prolific writer on Epicurus and his philosophy, to four basic propositions, the so-called Tetrapharmakos or ‘medicine with four active ingredients’: God is nothing to be afraid of, death is nothing to be worried about, the good is easy to get, the dreadful is easy to endure. There are two important points that this raises. The first is that Epicureanism sees its primary purpose not as pushing the boundaries of human knowledge for its own sake but as putting human beings on the road to achieving peace of mind; it is a cure for what Epicurus saw as an all-pervasive spiritual malaise. The second is that Epicurus and his followers were well aware that the path to gaining adherents did not lie in bombarding them with gross information overload but in producing readily comprehensible and uplifting summaries which conveyed the essence of the Epicurean philosophical message. The long treatises are for the intellectual heavyweights.
John Penwill
Iris: Journal of the Classical Association of Victoria, Volume 22 (2009)
Abstract
The first thing to understand is that there is no other purpose in gaining knowledge of meteorological phenomena, whether in conjunction with other doctrines or in isolation, than peace of mind and firm conviction, just as with all the rest.
~ Epicurus Letter to Pythocles 85
The Greek philosopher Epicurus established his school in Athens in 306 BCE. He was a prolific writer; the one biography that survives, that of Diogenes Laertius, claims that the full body of his writings occupied around 300 books (i.e. papyrus rolls) ‘without a single citation from other authors’—well, so Diogenes said, but Diogenes was a fan;3 Epicurus’ detractors accused him of plagiarising heavily from the fifth-century philosopher Democritus, for reasons which will become obvious. Diogenes’ selection of Epicurus’ greatest hits at 10.27-28 comprises 41 titles occupying 87 books, including the monumental 37-book treatise entitled On Nature, the content of which is summarised in the surviving Letter to Herodotus.
This enormous output was reduced by one of his followers, the first century BCE philosopher and poet Philodemus of Gadara, himself a prolific writer on Epicurus and his philosophy, to four basic propositions, the so-called Tetrapharmakos or ‘medicine with four active ingredients’: God is nothing to be afraid of, death is nothing to be worried about, the good is easy to get, the dreadful is easy to endure. There are two important points that this raises. The first is that Epicureanism sees its primary purpose not as pushing the boundaries of human knowledge for its own sake but as putting human beings on the road to achieving peace of mind; it is a cure for what Epicurus saw as an all-pervasive spiritual malaise. The second is that Epicurus and his followers were well aware that the path to gaining adherents did not lie in bombarding them with gross information overload but in producing readily comprehensible and uplifting summaries which conveyed the essence of the Epicurean philosophical message. The long treatises are for the intellectual heavyweights.
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