Spiritual exercises are required for the healing of the soul. Like the Stoics, the Epicureans advise us to meditate upon and assimilate, "day and night,"
brief aphorisms or summaries which will allow us to keep the fundamental dogmas "at hand." 64 .For instance, there is the well-known tetrapharmakos, or four-fold healing formula: "God presents no fears, death no worries. And while good is readily attainable, evil is readily endurable. " 65 The abundance of collections of Epicurean aphorisms is a response to the demands of the spiritual exercise of meditation.66 As with the Stoics, however, the study of the dogmatic treatises of the school's great founders was also an exercise intended to provide material for meditation,67 so as more thoroughly to impregnate the soul with the fundamental intuitions of Epicureanism.
The study of physics is a particularly important spiritual exercise: "we i;hould not think that any other end is served by knowledge of celestial l'henomena . . . thnn freedom from disturbance and firm confidence, just as in 1 hc other licldN of Nludy . " "" Cont emplation of the physical world and
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Spiritual Exercises
imagination of the infinite are important elements of Epicurean physics. Both can bring about a complete change in our way of looking at things. The closed universe is infinitely dilated, and we derive from this spectacle a unique spiritual pleasure:
the walls of the world open out, I see action going on throughout the whole void, . . . Thereupon from all these things a sort of divine delight gets hold upon me and a shuddering, because nature thus by your power (i.e. Epicurus') has been so manifestly laid open and unveiled in every part.69
Meditation, however, be it simple or erudite, is not the only Epicurean spiritual exercise. To cure the soul, it is not necessary, as the Stoics would have it, to train it to stretch itself tight, but rather to train it to relax. Instead of picturing misfortunes in advance, so as to be prepared to bear them, we must rather, say the Epicureans, detach our thought from the vision of painful things, and fix our eyes on pleasurable ones. We arc to relive memories of past pleasures, and enjoy the pleasures of the present, recognizing how intense and agreeable these present pleasures are.70 We have here a quite distinctive spiritual exercise, different from the constant vigilance of the Stoic, with his constant readiness to safeguard his moral liberty at each instant. Instead, Epicureanism preaches the deliberate, continually renewed choice of relaxation and serenity, combined with a profound gratitude71 toward nature and life,72 which constantly offer us joy and pleasure, if only we know how to find them.
By the same token, the spiritual exercise of trying to live in the present moment is very different for Stoics and Epicureans. For the former, it means mental tension and constant wakefulness of the moral conscience; for the latter, it is, as we have seen, an invitation to relaxation and serenity. Worry, which tears us in the direction of the future, hides from us the incomparable value of the simple fact of existing: "We are born once, and cannot be born twice, but for all time must be no more. But you, who are not master of tomorrow, postpone your happiness: life is wasted in procrastination and each one of us dies overwhelmed with cares." 7J This is the doctrine contained in Horace's famous saying: carpe diem.
Life ebbs as I speak:
so seize each day, and grant the next no credit.74
For the Epicureans, in the last analysis, pleasure is a spiritual exercise. Not pleasure in the form of mere sensual gratification, but the intellectual 1>le11surc derived from contemplating nature, the thought of pleasurc11 past nnd prc11cnt , and lastly the pleasure o f fricnd11hip. I n Epicurc1m conununit ic11, fritmd11hi1111
Spiritual Exercises
89
also had its spiritual exercises, carried out in a joyous, relaxed atmosphere.
These include the public confession of one's faults;76 m)itual correction, carried out in a fraternal spirit; and examining one's conscience.n Above all, friendship itself was, as it were, the spiritual exercise par excellence: "Each person was to tend towards creating the atmosphere in which hearts could flourish. The main goal was to be happy, and mutual affection and the confidence with which they relied upon each other contributed more than anything else to this happiness." 78
2 Learning to Dialogue
The practice of spiritual exercises is likely to be rooted in traditions going back to immemorial timcs.79 It is, however, the figure of Socrates that causes them to emerge into Western consciousness, for this figure was, and has remained, the living call to awaken our moral consciousness.80 We ought not to forget that this call sounded forth within a specific form: that of dialogue.
In the "Socratic" HI dialogue, the question truly at stake is not what is being talked about, but who is doing the talking.
anyone who is close to Socrates and enters into conversation with him is liable to be drawn into an argument, and whatever subject he may start, he will be continually carried round and round by him, until at last he finds that he has to give an account both of his present and past life, and when he is once entangled, Socrates will not let him go until he has completely and thoroughly sifted him . . . And I think there is no harm in being reminded of any wrong thing which we are, or have been, doing; he who does not run away from criticism will be sure to take more heed of his afterlife.82
In a "Socratic" dialogue, Socrates' interlocutor docs not learn anything, and Socrates has no intention of teaching him anything. He repeats, moreover, to all who are willing to listen, that the only thing he knows is that he docs not know anything.HJ Y ct, like an indefatigable horsefly,IH Socrates harassed his interlocutors with questions which put themselves into question, forcing them to pay attention to and take care of themselves.85
My very good friend , you are an Athenian, and belong to a city which is the greatest and most famous in the world for its wisdom and Nlrcngth. Arc you not ashamed that you give your attention to acquiring 1111 much money as possible, and similarly with reputation and honour, 1111d l(ive no nttenl ion or thought to truth f aletht•ia I or thought fphronesis]
or the perfection of your 1mul I p.�)1c/1t'j? Ki•
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Spiritual Exercises
Socrates' mission consisted in inviting his contemporaries to examine their conscience, and to take care for their inner progress: I did not care for the things that most people care about - making money, having a comfortable home, high military or civil rank, and all the other activities, political appointments, secret societies, party organizations, which go on in our city I set myself to do you - each one
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of you, individually and in private - what I hold to be the greatest possible service. I tried to persuade each one of you to concern himself less with what lie has than with what he is, so as to render himself as excellent and as rational as possible.87
In Plato's Symposium, Alcibiades describes the effect made on him by dialogues with Socrates in the following terms: "this latter-day Marsyas, here, has often left me in such a state of mind that I've felt I simply couldn't go on living the way I did . . . He makes me admit that while I'm spending my time on politics, I am neglecting all the things that are crying for attention in myself." 88