We have now returned to the contemporary period and our initial point of departure, the lines by G. Friedmann we quoted at the beginning of this study. We have tried to reply to those who, like Friedmann, ask themselves the question: how is it possible to practice spiritual exercises in the twentieth century? We have tried to do so by recalling the existence of a highly rich and varied Western tradition. There can be no question, of course, of mechanically imitating stereotyped schemas. After all, did not Socrates and Plato urge their disciples to find the solutions they needed by themselves? And yet, we cannot afford to ignore such a valuable quantity of experience, accumulated over millennia. To mention but one example, Stoicism and Epicureanism do seem to correspond to two opposite but inseparable poles of our inner life: tension and relaxation, duty and serenity, moral conscience and the joy of existence.1K3
Vauvenargues said, "A truly new and truly original book would be one which made people love old truths."1"" It is my hope that I have been "truly new and truly original" in this sense, since my goal has indeed been to make people love a few old truths. Old truths: . . . there are some truths whose meaning will never be exhausted by the generations of man . It is not that they are difficult; on the contrary, they are often extremely simple.m Often, they even appear to be banal. Yet for their meaning to be understood, these truths must be lived, and constantly re-experienced. Each generation must take up, from scratch, the task of learning to read and to re-read these "old truths."
We spend our lives "reading," that is, carrying out exegeses, and sometimes even exegeses of exegeses. Epictetus tells us what he thinks of such activities:
"Come and listen to me read my commentaries . . . I will explain Chrysippus to you like no one else can, and I'll provide a complete analysis of his entire text . . . If necessary, I can even add the views of Antipater and Archedcmos" . So it's for this, is it, thnt young men
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arc to leave their fatherlands and their own pnrcntt•: to l'Olllc nnd liKl t!ll to you explain words? Triflinl( lil l lc wcmh1? IM
Spiritual Exercises
109
And yet we have forgotten how to read: how to pause, liberate ourselves from our worries, return into ourselves, and leave aside our searc)J for subtlety and originality, in order to meditate calmly, ruminate, and let the texts speak to us. This, too, is a spiritual exercise, and one of the most difficult. As Goethe said: "Ordinary people don't know how much time and effort it takes to learn how to read. I've spent eighty years at it, and I still can't say that I've reached my goal." IB7
NOTES
Georges Friedmann, La P11issance et la Sagesse, Paris 1 970, p. 359. On June 30, 1 977, shortly before his death, Friedmann was kind enough to write me to tell me how much he had been "moved" by my reaction to his book. In the same letter, he referred me to the final remarks he had presented at the close of the Colloquium organdies by the CNRS [National Centre of Scientific Research], 3-5 May, 1977, to commemorate the tricentenary of the death of Spinoza.
There, apropos of a passage from Spinoza's Ethics, he spoke of the Stoicism of the ancients. Cf. Georges Friedmann, "Le Sage et notre siecle," Revue de SJmtlitse 99 ( 1 978), p. 288.
2 Friedmann, la P11issance, pp. 1 83-284.
3 Epictetus, Disco11rses, 3, 22, 20: "From now on my mind [tlianoia] is the material with which I have to work, as the carpenter has his timbers, the shoemaker his hides."
4 [Ignatius of Loyola (ca. 1 49 1 - 1 556), founder of the Jesuit Order, wrote his handbook entitled Spirit11nl E.\·ercises beginning in 1 522. The goal of the work was to purify its reader from sin and lead him to God, via a four-stage meditation: beginning with meditation on sin, the reader progresses to considering the kingdom of Christ, the passion, and finally the risen and glorified Lord. - Trans.]
5 In Latin literature, cf. , for example, Rufinus, History of the Monks [written ca. AD 403], ch. 29, PL 2 1 , 4100: "Cum quadraginta annis fuisset in excrcitiis spiritualibus conversatus" ["After he had become t.-onversant with spiritual exercises for forty years" - Trans.], and ch. 29 (ibid., col. 4530): "Ad acriora semetipsum spiritalis vitae cxtendit exercitia" ["He exerted himself to the more zealous exercises of the spiritual life." - Trans.].
In the Greek world, we find this terminology already in Oement of Alexandria, Stromata, 4, 6, 27, I. Cf. J. Leclercq, "Exercices spirituels," in Dictiormaire tie Spiritualite, vol. 4, cols 1 902-8.
{> In his very important work Seelenfiihrung. Methodik der E:A.·erzitien in der Antike, Munich 1 954, Paul Rabbow situated Ignatius of Loyola's Exercitia spiritualia back within the ancient tradition .
7 There have been relatively few studies devoted to this subject. The fundamental work is th11r of Rabbow, Seelerljuhrrmlf, cf. also the review of Rabbow's work by (i, l .uck, Gmmum 28 ( 1 95<>), pp. 2(18 71 ; H.-L. Hijmans jr AIKEIIi, Notes 011
l1'plt:ttt11.1 ' li'i/11111li111111/ ,\)1s1tm, A11Nct1 l 1J51T;' A.C. Vnn Geytcnbeck, M1mmi11s R1di1.<
1 10
Spiritual Exercises
and Greek Diatribes, Assen 1 963; W. Schmid, "Epikur," in Reallexikon for Antike und Christentum, vol. S, 1 962, cols 73S-40; I. Hadot "Epicure et l'enseignement philosophique hellenistique et romain," in Actes du VJ/le Co11gres Bude, Paris 1 969; H.-G. lngenkamp, Plutarchs Schriften iiber die Heilung der See/e, Gottingen 1 97 1 ; V. Goldschmidt, Le systeme stoi"cien et l'idee de temps, 4th edn, Paris 1 98S.
8 Pseudo-Galen, Philosophical History, S, in H. Diels, ed., Doxographi Graeci, p. 602, 1 8; Pseudo-Plutarch, Placita, I, 2, ibid, p. 273, 14. The idea originates with the Cynics; cf. Diogenes Laertius, 6, 70-1 , and now the important work of M.-0. Goulet-Cazi:, L 'Ascese cynique. Un commentaire de Diogene Lairce, VI, 70, 71, Paris 1986. Lucian ( Toxaris, 27; Vitarum auctio, 7) uses the word askesis to designate philosophical sects themselves. On the need for philosophical exercises, cf. Epictetus, Discourses, 2, 9, 13; 2, 1 8, 26; 3, 8, I; 3, 1 2, 1 -7; 4, 6, 1 6; 4, 1 2, 1 3; Musonius Rufus, p. 22, 9ff Hense; Seneca, Letter, 90, 46.
9 Seneca, Letter, 20, 2: "Philosophy teaches us how to act, not how to talk."
10 Epictetus, Discourses, I, 4, 1 4ff: spiritual progress does not consist in learning how to explain Chrysippus better, but in transforming one's own freedom; cf. 2, 1 6, 34.
1 1 Epictetus, Discourses, I, I S, 2: "The subject-matter of the art of living (i .e. philosophy) is the life of every individual;" cf. I, 26, 7. Plutarch, Table-talk, I, 2, 623B: "Since philosophy is the art of living, it should not be kept apart from any pastime."
12 Galen, Galen On the Passio11s and Errors of the Soul, I, 4, p. 1 1 , 4 Marquardt:
"make yourself better."
13 On conversion, cf. Arthur Darby Nock, Conversion, Oxford 1 933, pp. 1 64-86; Pierre Hadot "Epistrophe et Metanoia dans l'historie de la philosophic," in Actes du lie Congres International de Philosophie 1 2, Brussels 19S3, pp. 3 1 -6; Pierre Hadot, "Conversio," in Historiches Wiirterbuch der Pl1ilosophie, vol. 1, cols 1033-6, 1 97 1 .
1 4 Seneca, Letter, 6, l : " I feel, my dear Lucilius, that I am being not only reformed, but transformed . . I
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therefore wish to impart to you this sudden change in myself."