Selected texts from B. Inwood and L. P. Gerson, The Epicurus Reader: Selected Writings and Testimonia. Hackett Publishing Company. (1994).
Diogenes Laertius 10.136–138
136. He (Epicurus) disagrees with the Cyrenaics on the question of pleasure. For they do not admit katastematic pleasure, but only kinetic pleasure, and he admits both types in both the body and the soul, . . . And Epicurus, in his On Choices, says this: “For freedom from disturbance and freedom from suffering are katastem-atic pleasures; and joy and delight are viewed as kinetic and active.”
137. Further, he disagrees with the Cyrenaics [thus]. For they (the Cyrenaics) think that bodily pains are worse than those of the soul, since people who err are punished with bodily [pain], while he (Epicurus) thinks that pains of the soul are worse, since the flesh is only troubled by the present, but the soul is troubled by the past and the present and the future. In the same way, then, the soul also has greater pleasures. And he uses as a proof that the goal is pleasure the fact that animals, as soon as they are born are satisfied with it but are in conflict with suffering by nature and apart from reason. So it is by our experience all on its own that we avoid pain . . .
138. The virtues too are chosen because of pleasure, and not for their own sakes, just as medicine is chosen because of health …And Epicurus says that only virtue is inseparable from pleasure, and that the other things, such as food, may be separated [from pleasure].
Letter to Menoeceus: Diogenes Laertius 10.121–135
And this is why we say that pleasure is the starting-point and goal of living blessedly. 129. For we recognized this as our first innate good, and this is our starting point for every choice and avoidance and we come to this by judging every good by the criterion of feeling. And it is just because this is the first innate good that we do not choose every pleasure; but sometimes we pass up many pleasures when we get a larger amount of what is uncongenial from them. And we believe many pains to be better than pleasures when a greater pleasure follows for a long while if we endure the pains. So every pleasure is a good thing, since it has a nature congenial [to us], but not every one is to be chosen. Just as every pain too is a bad thing, but not every one is such as to be always avoided.
130. It is, however, appropriate to make all these decisions by comparative measurement and an examination of the advantages and disadvantages. For at some times we treat the good thing as bad and, conversely, the bad thing as good. And we believe that self-sufficiency is a great good, not in order that we might make do with few things under all circumstances, but so that if we do not have a lot we can make do with few, being genuinely convinced that those who least need extravagance enjoy it most; and that everything natural is easy to obtain and whatever is groundless is hard to obtain; and that simple flavours provide a pleasure equal to that of an extravagant life-style when all pain from want is removed,
131. and barley cakes and water provide the highest pleasure when someone in want takes them. Therefore, becoming accustomed to simple, not extravagant, ways of life makes one completely healthy, makes man unhesitant in the face of life’s necessary duties, puts us in a better condition for the times of extravagance which occasionally come along, and makes us fearless in the face of chance.
For it is not drinking bouts and continuous partying and enjoying boys and women, or consuming fish and the other dainties of an extravagant table, which produce the pleasant life, but sober calculation which searches out the reasons for every choice and avoidance and drives out the opinions which are the source of the greatest turmoil for men’s souls.
The Principal Doctrines: Diogenes Laertius 10.139–154
III. The removal of all feeling of pain is the limit of the magnitude of pleasures. Wherever a pleasurable feeling is present, for as long as it is present, there is neither a feeling of pain nor a feeling of distress, nor both together.
V. It is impossible to live pleasantly without living prudently, honourably, and justly and impossible to live prudently, honourably, and justly without living pleasantly. And whoever lacks this cannot live pleasantly.
VIII. No pleasure is a bad thing in itself. But the things which produce certain pleasures bring troubles many times greater than the pleasures.
X. If the things which produce the pleasures of profligate men dissolved the intellect’s fears about the phenomena of the heavens and about death and pains and, moreover, if they taught us the limit of our desires, then we would not have reason to criticize them, since they would be filled with pleasures from every source and would contain no feeling of pain or distress from any source—and that is what is bad.
XVIII. As soon as the feeling of pain produced by want is removed, pleasure in the flesh will not increase but is only varied. But the limit of mental pleasures is produced by a reasoning out of these very pleasures [of the flesh] and of the things related to these, which used to cause the greatest fears in the intellect.
Questions for Further Thought…
- Can a hedonist consistently say that it would be against her own interest to spend tonight doing something more enjoyable than studying for tomorrow’s chemistry midterm?
- Can a hedonist consistently forgo the enjoyment of a certain pleasure on the grounds that pursuing it would conflict a moral duty (for instance, because he has made a promise to a spouse that he will not have sexual relationships with other people)?
- Can you think of anything besides pleasure that you seek out and desire purely for its own sake?
- Hedonists are committed to the view that every pleasurable experience makes a positive contribution to the quality of a person’s life – even those that weren’t worth what they “cost” the person in the long run and those that were obtained at the price of immorality. Do you agree?