Posts by Cassius

Quote from Peter Konstans

t seems clear to me that Epicurus considered visions and hallucinations (and therefore the existence of the gods as the sources of those visions) to be true.

Quote from Peter Konstans

The fundamental epistemological requirement is that every aisthesis should be true, i.e. that whatever seems to be the case should in some sense or other actually be the case.

As to post 119, virtually all of it, if I read it correctly, is dealt with by DeWitt's explanation that "true" has multiple meanings, in which "true to the facts" is only one meaning, while "reported honestly without injection of opinion" is the meaning often intended by Epicurus. If the Epicureans had in fact held that all sensations are "true to the fact" then Lucretius would not have spent so much time in Book Four dealing with the topic of illusions.

This issue is dealt with at length in DeWitt's Chapter 8, which includes the sentence: "To assume that Epicurus was unaware of these plain truths, as one must if belief in the infallibility of sensation is imputed to him, is absurd."

Quote

The example of the tower will serve as a transition from the topic of ambiguity to that of confusion. When modern scholars seize upon the saying "all sensations are true," which appears nowhere in the extant writings of Epicurus, and stretch it to mean that all sensations are reliable or trustworthy or "that the senses cannot be deceived," they are confusing the concept of truth with the concept of value.¹⁷ They overlook the fact that even a truthful witness may fall short of delivering the whole truth or may even give false evidence. The distant view of the square tower is quite true relative to the distance but it fails to reveal the whole truth about the tower.

To assume that Epicurus was unaware of these plain truths, as one must if belief in the infallibility of sensation is imputed to him, is absurd. It is because he was aware that the value of sensations, apart from their truth, varied all the way from totality to zero, that he exhorted beginners "under all circumstances to watch the sensations and especially the immediate perceptions whether of the intellect or any of the criteria whatsoever." ¹⁸ Obviously, so far from thinking the sensations infallible, he was keenly aware of the possibility of error and drew sharp attention to the superior values of immediate sensations.

Quote from Don

So, by definition, IF the gods live in the space between cosmoi, they, by the definition of intermundia "between world-systems", they have no world to stand on nor stars to see.

Quote from Don

So, by definition, IF the gods live in the space between cosmoi, they, by the definition of intermundia "between world-systems", they have no world to stand on nor stars to see. There's obviously some matter in that space between worlds but not enough to have a world, otherwise the gods would be *in a cosmos*.

Just to weigh in here, for the reasons stated by Bryan in post 118 I personally would not reach these conclusions myself. I don't see why a boundary area has to be essentially sharply defined or without width. They might not have their own "world" but that doesn't mean to me that they don't have plenty of room within which to be living.

To quip a little, if they have quasi-bodies filled with quasi-blood, they could be standing on quasi-land.

Quote from Peter Konstans

The Epicurean acceptance of the existence of the gods didn't just rely on abstract theories but also on the idea that the existence of the gods is an empirically verifiable fact because of visions or images of them streaming into our mind. So Epicurus is basically telling us that we know gods exist because many people have actually seen them.

I don't think that (which is the foundation for the rest of the post) is correct at all. The weight of the evidence as I understand the sources is that the images of the gods are not perceived by the eyes, but by the mind.

As DeWitt begins his chapter on the Knowledge of the Gods:

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KNOWLEDGE OF THE GODS

An inveterate tendency to classify Epicurus as an empiricist has resulted in the conclusion that according to his thinking knowledge of the gods comes by vision. The absurdity of this view will become clear as abundant items of evidence are assembled against it.

According to these evidences the sources of knowledge are multiple. The Prolepsis apprises men of the blissfulness and incorruptibility of the gods. The Feelings, that is, fears and worries, serve to inform the individual of the true nature of the divine through the distress that follows upon "false opinions." Reason, by deductive inferences from the Twelve Elementary Principles, informs men of the existence of gods, of their corporeal nature, their number, their gradation in kind and their abode. By the method of analogy, that is, progression from similars to similars, reason also produces confirmatory evidence concerning their form, by a chain argument concerning their nature, and by a disjunctive syllogism concerning the kind of life they lead.

And I would in no way or form equate the Epicurean view of the gods with mass hallucinations.

This is a fairly elementary-level video on Epicurean physics, submitted to the Facebook group. Some might find it useful, at least as an inspiration to do something similar while speaking a little more quickly.

And hey - at least the first ten minutes doesn't focus on mangling Epicurean ethics - he waits til around the 11:00 minute mark to start repeating the conventional views of that, and then he skips through that pretty quickly to other basic issues (death, etc).

Update: Actually a good reminder that Epicurus discussed conceptually the "parts of the atom" (around the 10 minute mark.)

Thanks Don! I will also add a link to the Usener at Epicurism and Attalus.

This is a thread for discussing what is available in terms of a Modern Online Public Domain Expanded version of Usener's collection of Epicurean fragments.

Is anyone aware of any individual or institutional efforts to create such a resource?

If not, how could such a project be started to allow maximum ease of contributions and maximum public domain status so as to allow others to expand and modify it?

This is the discussion thread for the FAQ entry of the same name. Feel free to add comments here or to add them to the threads linked in the FAQ itself.

Bryan those are great quotes but not ones I have a command over finding.

Are these collected in Usener as well?

We've got to find a way to bring together our own source of key quotes like this to make them more accessible.

Nowadays it is not so hard to come up with a jointly-editable wiki or database where each entry can be tagged by author and topic. In the past and still today I presume one of the biggest hurdles is that everyone wants their own database and has different ideas on how to organize it, but it seems to me that we ought to now be at the point where the system could be so simple (and therefore so easily adaptable by anyone that everyone is willing to contribute to the same raw data) with everything GPL public domain, that it ought to be doable.

Surely some one or institution has already made a start toward that. Anyone aware of such a thing? It would be logical to name such an online Usener after Usener himself.

I know we have some threads on this topic already. I will collect some of them and make them more easily findable here:

Where Can I Find The Best List of Fragments of Epicurean Texts? - Epicureanfriends.com

www.epicureanfriends.com

If someone wants to discuss this topic, rather than hijacking this thread further, let's post those comments here:

Thread

What is the Best Source of Fragments of Epicurean Texts?

This is the discussion thread for the FAQ entry of the same name. Feel free to add comments here or to add them to the threads linked in the FAQ itself.

Cassius

March 24, 2024 at 5:43 AM

Quote from Godfrey

you do a better job of clarifying isonomy than DeWitt does

i am not sure "clarifying" is the right word, because i am just speculating too. But like DeWitt generally does, i think we should look for ways to reconcile apparent inconsistencies by going back to the more basic fundamentals and working forward again to see if there is a logical way to fit all the pieces together. I think that it's generally possible to think we can retrace Epicurus' own steps by doing so. DeWitt generally seems to do that except....

Quote from Godfrey

Perhaps DeWitt's conclusions were colored by his interest in Christianity....

Yes this may be the problem. However I don't think we've ever really pinned down that DeWitt himself was a strong Christian. We know for sure that he had a personal interest in the linkage, but interestingly to me i've never (or very rarely) seen him cross the line into outright endorsement of Christianity as the superior system. Most Christian or religious writers (even the "humanist" writers) are to my observation much more overt in specifically endorsing or denouncing particular moral theories of Epicurus. I have to admit that your suggest there Godfrey is the most likely one, but even at this point in reading him over and over I am not convinced I know exactly what DeWitt truly believed himself.

Godfrey I would also draw an analogy to what DeWitt discusses (disapprovingly) here:

DeWitt talks several times about "faith in doctrine" as if he thinks Epicurus had gone too far in several cases. I think DeWitt is on the right course in observing that this kind of thing is exactly what Epicurus was doing, but DeWitt is wrong in his analysis of the result, because Epicurus' position is much stronger than DeWitt's assessment of it. I do think DeWitt's right in talking about it in terms of "faith," (confidence is probably a better word) but the "faith" issue is really more like: "I'm never going to know everything I'd like to know, so where do I place my confidence? Do I place it in Epicurean reasoning based on things I do observe, or do I allow any and all speculation, even that which has absolutely no evidence to support it?" Epicurus chose to place his "faith" about things that are unseen in reasoning based on things that are seen. To me that's a decision I can fully agree with.

Observing that pain is short if intense but manageable if long also seems like going too far when we think of how bad pain can be, but the best way to look at this seems to me to be that we NOT consider it "clinical medical advice," but as a philosophic statement that addresses the bigger philosophical issue, which is: While continuous pleasure is available to those who can figure the problem out, continuous pain can never hold us in its grip forever (we have death as an ultimate cure for that).

Seems to me Epicurus is frequently taking this kind of approach, he's using logical reasoning to explain the big picture to us as a way of organizing our lives, while also reminding us that there's no god or fate to magically solve all our problems, and that we have to work our way through them as best we can.

I might as well go ahead and observe that I see myself making this observation over and over in multiple discussions, probably not convincing many people, but becoming more confident of it myself:

In my view, Epicurus needs to be understood as first and foremost a philosopher attacking the big issues who wants to know the truth about them. Epicurus wants the truth more than he wants happiness, because he's convinced that happiness depends on having a logically consistent understanding of nature. That means Epicurus is committed to talking about everything in a rigorously logical way, and he embraces big-picture logical reasoning, so long as it is based on evidence. That's the starting point for understanding Epicurus, not seeing him as a modern psychologist who throws logic out the window in favor of looking haphazardly for whatever seems to work at the moment. A modern clinician is going to want to dissect "pleasure" into thousand different components, but for Epicurus the first step in making practical use of the issue is to observe the big picture and gain the confidence that comes from the highest level logical analysis, that comes from observing reality and then concluding that is is reasonable to classify all pleasures *as being by definition* the absence of pain.

Godfrey I would suspect that if there is a logical inconsistency here, it would be in DeWitt's description of "perfection" rather than in Epicurus' theory. Surely you are right that in fighting Plato's ideals, Epicurus would not then turn around and adopt the same problem in a new form.

No doubt there's a lot more investigation to be done into the background of the isonomia discussion, but I would expect this reasoning to be of the "nature never makes only a single thing of a kind" variety that is clearly described by Lucretius.

In that other case, it seems they were taking from the observation that here on earth there is nothing absolutely unique, but that everything belongs to a class of similars, and extrapolating that to the universe as a whole. That's a reasonable procedure it seems to me, and the burden of proof to refute a theory based on what we see here on earth is on someone who asserts that there IS something that is absolutely unique but which cannot be observed (a burden which cannot be met by observation) rather than on Epicurus' position, which rests deductions from what we do in fact observe.

We'd have to dive into whether in fact Epicurus was talking about "perfection" as a concept, but I would suspect more that he was (1) starting with the observation that there is nothing unique, all belonging to a class of similars, and then proceeding to (2) that within any class of similars, it is possible for us (probably by process related to preconception) to "rank" those similars in terms of varying characteristics.

Happiness and length of life being characteristics of the class of "living beings," it makes logical sense to conclude from the examples we observe that happiness and length of life exist on a spectrum from less happy to completely happy, and from short life to much longer life. Given that we see such spectrums of characteristics here on earth, it is logical to believe that in a universe that is eternally old and boundlessly wide, there exist examples within those classes that extend out in both directions (greater toward total happiness; longer life toward deathlessness).

We could probably compare what Philodemus is saying in "On Signs," but it does seem that the Epicureans were taking the canonical position that it is legitimate to reason in that way, from things that we observe here on earth to how those things might occur in wider variety in an infinite number of places.

Remember too, that the purpose of scientific investigation is not to latch onto a single true theory of everything, which is essentially impossible, but to determine what is both consistent with what we observe and not contradicted by that which we observe. Then, using sound reasoning, we then consider what is possible to be a real possibility, while "waiting" to reduce the number of possibilities if any new evidence arrives to contradict one of more of them.

This is very different, and in my view superior, to the modern arbitrary speculations that sometimes seems to be "if I can't see if for myself here then it didn't and doesn't happen," or that accept some theory that has absolutely no evidential proof behind it, but which makes sense in some logic-only analysis.

So I see this as an area where DeWitt has generally pointed in the right direction, but further research needs to follow his path and extend his observations more precisely.

And yes it's definitely a process that has limitations, but I see this as very similar to logically dividing all experiences of life into pleasure and pain, and then logically observing that the presence of one is the absence of the other. Epicurus wasn't willing to use logical processes to work with Platonic ideals that have no evidence in reality to support them, but he was willing to use logical processes to work with the evidence that the senses provide to us, and Epicurus seems to have been just as sharp a logician as any of his enemies, carrying his reasoning to its logical conclusions.

Quote from Twentier

Epicureanism is my religion, and there's not a goddamn thing anyone can do about it.

You know, when I combine my thoughts after reading that section of DeWitt on "Isonomy and the Gods," with our friend Twentier's statement, I have to comment that if ever in the future there is a resurgence of Epicureanism as a "religion," Norman DeWitt deserves a special place its "Hall of Apostles." No one else I know of is anywhere close to DeWitt in bringing the implications of the various texts out into the open for us to discuss.

1. The gods are not immortal, just deathless.
2. Isonomia
3. The principle that nature never creates only a single thing of a kind.
4. Prolepsis, as much or more so than images, as the basis of Epicurus' belief in the gods.
5. The importance of the implications of infinity.

All of these things are right there in the various texts, but the writers for laymen rarely seem interested in their significance. Laymen themselves don't have nearly the depth of reading to recognize how they fit together without some of DeWitt's training to bring them together. We'd never be able to bring all these to bear in our discussions here, and if we listened to most modern theorists, who seem to frown on "infinity" and "eternality," we'd never even get started.

Dewitt:

Quote

ISONOMY AND THE GODS

In spite of a supercilious opinion to the contrary, Epicurus was not a muddled thinker but a very systematic one. He enunciated his Twelve Elementary Principles and adhered to them closely. Two of these, the fifth and sixth, asserted the infinity of the universe in respect of matter and space. To this idea of infinity he ascribed fundamental importance. He exhorted the young Pythocles to study it as one of those master principles which would render easy the recognition of causation in details.⁶⁸ Cicero must have been recalling some similar exhortation when he wrote: "But of the very greatest importance is the significance of infinity and in the highest degree deserving of intense and diligent contemplation." ⁶⁹ He was quoting Epicurus.

It was from this principle that Epicurus deduced his chief theoretical confirmation of belief in the existence of gods. It was from this that he arrived at knowledge of their number and by secondary deduction at knowledge of their abode. He so interpreted the significance of infinity as to extend it from matter and space to the sphere of values, that is, to perfection and imperfection. In brief, if the universe were thought to be imperfect throughout its infinite extent, it could no longer be called infinite. This necessity of thought impelled him to promulgate a subsidiary principle, which he called isonomia, a sort of cosmic justice, according to which the imperfection in particular parts of the universe is offset by the perfection of the whole. Cicero rendered it aequabilis tributio, "equitable apportionment." ⁷⁰ The mistake of rendering it as "equilibrium" must be avoided.

The term isonomia itself, which may be anglicized as isonomy, deserves a note. That it is lacking in extant Epicurean texts, all of them elementary, and is transmitted only by Cicero is evidence of its belonging to higher doctrine and advanced studies. Epicurus switched its meaning slightly, as he did that of the word prolepsis. To the Greeks it signified equality of all before the law, a boast of Athenians in particular. It was a mate to eunomia, government by law, as opposed to barbaric despotism, a boast of Greeks in general. That Epicurus thought to make capital of this happy connotation may be considered certain. He was vindicating for Nature a sort of justice, the bad being overbalanced by the good. It is also possible that he was remotely influenced by the teachings of Zoroaster, well known in his day through the conquests of Alexander, according to whom good and evil, as represented by Ormazd and Ahriman, battled for the upper hand in mundane affairs.

Whatever may be the facts concerning this influence, Epicurus discovered a reasonable way of allowing for the triumph of good in the universe, which seemed impossible under atomic materialism. Thus in his system of thought isonomy plays a part comparable to that of teleology with Plato and Aristotle. Teleology was inferred from the evidences of design, and design presumes agencies of benevolence, whether natural or divine. Epicurus was bound to reject design because the world seemed filled with imperfections, which he listed, but by extending the doctrine of infinity to apply to values he was able, however curiously, to discover room for perfection along with imperfection.

That he employed isonomy as theoretical proof of the existence of gods is well documented. For example, Lactantius, who may have been an Epicurean before his conversion to Christianity, quotes Epicurus as arguing "that the divine exists because there is bound to be something surpassing, superlative and blessed."⁷¹ The necessity here appealed to is a necessity of thought, which becomes a necessity of existence. The existence of the imperfect in an infinite universe demands belief in the existence of the perfect. Cicero employs very similar language: "It is his doctrine that there are gods, because there is bound to be some surpassing being than which nothing is better." ⁷² Like the statement of Lactantius, this recognizes a necessity of existence arising from a necessity of thought; the order of Nature cannot be imperfect throughout its whole extent; it is bound to culminate in something superior, that is, in gods.

It is possible to attain more precision in the exposition. Cicero, though brutally brief, exhibits some precision of statement. The infinity of the universe, as usual, serves as a major premise. This being assumed, Cicero declares: "The nature of the universe must be such that all similars correspond to all similars." ⁷³ One class of similars is obviously taken to be human beings, all belonging to the same grade of existence in the order of Nature. As Philodemus expresses it in a book about logic, entitled On Evidences, "It is impossible to think of Epicurus as man and Metrodorus as non-man." ⁷⁴ Another class of similars is the gods. This being understood, the truth of Cicero's next statement follows logically: "If it be granted that the number of mortals is such and such, the number of immortals is not less." ⁷⁵ This reasoning calls for no exegesis, but two points are worthy of mention: first, Cicero is not precise in calling the gods immortals; according to strict doctrine they are not deathless, only incorruptible of body; the second point is that Epicurus is more polytheistic in belief than his own countrymen.

The next item, however, calls for close scrutiny. Just as human beings constitute one set of similars and the gods another, so the forces that preserve constitute one set and the forces that destroy constitute another.

At this point a sign of warning is to be raised. There is also another pair of forces that are opposed to each other, those that create and those that destroy.⁷⁶ The difference is that the latter operate in each of the innumerable worlds, while the former hold sway in the universe at large. For example, in a world such as our own, which is one of many, the forces of creation have the upper hand during its youthful vigor. At long last, however, the forces of destruction gradually gain the superiority and eventually the world is dissolved into its elements.⁷⁷

In the universe at large, on the contrary, the situation is different and the forces opposed to each other are not those that destroy and those that create but those that destroy and those that preserve. Moreover, a new aspect of infinity is invoked, the infinity of time. The universe is eternal and unchanging. Matter can neither be created nor destroyed. The sum of things is always the same, as Lucretius says. This truth is contained in the first two of the Twelve Elementary Principles. In combination they are made to read: "The universe has always been the same as it now is and always will be the same." ⁷⁸ This can be true only on the principle that the forces that preserve are at all times superior to the forces that destroy.

It follows that Cicero was writing strictly by the book when he made his spokesman draw the following conclusion from the doctrine of isonomy: "And if the forces that destroy are innumerable, the forces that preserve must by the same token be infinite."⁷⁹ This doctrine, it is essential to repeat, holds only for the universe at large. It is not applicable to the individual world and it does not mean that the prevalence of elephants in India is balanced by the prevalence of wolves in Russia. Isonomy does not mean "equal distribution" but "equitable apportionment." It does not denote balance or equilibrium. No two sets of similar forces are in balance; in the individual world the forces of destruction always prevail at last, and in the universe at large the forces of preservation prevail at all times.

By this time three aspects of the principles of isonomy have been brought forward: first, that in an infinite universe perfection is bound to exist as well as imperfection; that is, "that there must be some surpassing being, than which nothing is better"; second, that the number of these beings, the gods, cannot be less than the number of mortals; and third, that in the universe at large the forces of preservation always prevail over the forces of destruction.

All three of these are direct inferences from the infinity and eternity of the universe. There remains to be drawn an indirect inference of primary importance. Since in the individual worlds the forces of destruction always prevail in the end, it follows that the incorruptible gods can have their dwelling place only outside of the individual worlds, that is, in the free spaces between the worlds, the so-called intermundia, where the forces of preservation are always superior. There is more to be said on this topic in the section that follows.

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Let's see where is the observation that nature never makes only a single thing of a kind...... that might be in Lucretius rather than On The Nature of the Gods....

I would say this eliminates a "single god" from Epicurean consideration as well:

Lucretius 2:1077 -

[1077] This there is too that in the universe there is nothing single, nothing born unique and growing unique and alone, but it is always of some tribe, and there are many things in the same race. First of all turn your mind to living creatures; you will find that in this wise is begotten the race of wild beasts that haunts the mountains, in this wise the stock of men, in this wise again the dumb herds of scaly fishes, and all the bodies of flying fowls. Wherefore you must confess in the same way that sky and earth and sun, moon, sea, and all else that exists, are not unique, but rather of number numberless; inasmuch as the deep-fixed boundary-stone of life awaits these as surely, and they are just as much of a body that has birth, as every race which is here on earth, abounding in things after its kind.

[1090] And if you learn this surely, and cling to it, nature is seen, free at once, and quit of her proud rulers, doing all things of her own accord alone, without control of gods. For by the holy hearts of the gods, which in their tranquil peace pass placid years, and a life of calm, who can avail to rule the whole sum of the boundless, who to hold in his guiding hand the mighty reins of the deep, who to turn round all firmaments at once, and warm all fruitful lands with heavenly fires, or to be at all times present in all places, so as to make darkness with clouds, and shake the calm tracts of heaven with thunder, and then shoot thunderbolts, and often make havoc of his own temples, or moving away into deserts rage furiously there, plying the bolt, which often passes by the guilty and does to death the innocent and undeserving?

Quote from Godfrey

Isonomia would also explain why there can't be just one god.

Probably also the rule that "nature never creates only one thing of a kind," which is probably related but probably separate.

On the Nature of the Gods:

“Moreover there is the supremely potent principle of infinity, which claims the closest and most careful study; we must understand that it has in the sum of things everything has its exact match and counterpart. This property is termed by Epicurus isonomia, or the principle of uniform distribution. From this principle it follows that if the whole number of mortals be so many, there must exist no less a number of immortals, and if the causes of destruction are beyond count, the causes of conservation also are bound to be infinite."

On the "necessity" issue I think we would need to consider the issue of insomnia about which so little is left but which is mentioned by Velleius. It appears that there was some interesting deductive reasoning going on with that topic.

Yes thanks for the spelling correction Don -- "Isonomia" not "insomnia!"

These two questions about the gods are closely related, but we've already had a lot of discussion on them, and that will continue into the future. So from here on out, to the extent that people start new threads focusing on one aspect or the other, let's divide the posts this way:

1 - Questions regarding whether the gods exist, and their nature, and how we know about them, to this subsection of the "Physics" forum:

Nature Has No Gods Over Her - The Nature And Existence of Gods

2 - Questions regarding Epicurus' ethical advice as to how to think about the gods, and our attitude toward them, including questions of "religion," to this section of the "Ethics" forum:

The Proper Attitude Toward Divinity - Piety and "Religion"

I have already done some sorting of existing threads into the two divisions, and if other administrators see obvious candidates for switching threads between them, please do.

There's no doubt that threads in each section will blur into the other aspect, so we'll have cross-links from one forum to the other in the forum description. But at people will be looking for discussions of both issues in both contexts, so hopefully this will help.

Quote from Don

The god avoids anything that would go against its nature.

And I would say that "avoids" = "acting to avoid" and acting is what they have to do to maintain their deathlessness.

Quote from Don

The idea of a god floating in the intermundia with no world for it to stand on like some preserved specimen floating in a jar of formaldehyde holds no fascination for me

I'd say quite likely that's why we see the discussions of the gods having quasi-bodies, and speaking Greek, etc.

I think Epicurus would completely disagree with contentions that he did not have good evidence or reasoning to support his positions on the gods. My reading is that he was as confident on the basics of this subject as he was on atoms, which we also cannot perceive directly either, but about which we can make confident deductions based on things that we do perceive.

I don't know that I have any significant additional thoughts to add to comments such as those of Tau Phi that he doesn't find Epicurean theology valuable other than to emphasize Don's comments: Regardless of what some of us may think ourselves, Epicurus and the leading Epicureans found it valuable. Given that they clearly thought so, the theology is definitely an important part of the philosophy that someone studying the subject needs to know about if they want to understand Epicurus' conclusions before forming their own. "Epicurean philosophy without the theology" is not fully Epicurean philosophy.

To me, i think Epicurus saw this theology as essential for at least two major reasons beyond those discussed already in the thread above:

1 - As inoculation against the idea that humans are alone in the universe, and that we therefore occupy some kind of special and supernatural focus of existence. For most ordinary people who think that we are alone in the universe, that's a prescription for a slippery slide toward all sorts of mysticism.

2 - As important for understanding that while "pleasure is pleasure" from a conceptual point of view, there are important questions to be answered as to which pleasures to pursue in life. Contemplation of the nature of a truly blessed existence - one which even though "godlike" must act to sustain itself - is similar to Epicurus' views of reverence for men wiser than ourselves. It's an important aspect of our own drive to use our lives in the most pleasurable way, and not to settle for less than what we are capable of obtaining.

Lucretius Today Podcast Episode 219 - Cicero's On Ends - Book Two - Part 26 - "Cicero Continues His Attack On Epicurus' Position On Pain" Is Now Available -