Seems to me that this statement by Atticus, included in Cicero's "On The Law" is a good citation to support the observation that the feeling of pleasure is personal to he who feels it, and not something universally "objective." It's also useful for combating the allegation that there was no freedom of thought in the Epicurean school (an absurd suggestion but one you sometime hear):
Subjectivity And Freedom To Find Pleasure In Various Things
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On subjectivity generally:
Plutarch, Against Kōlṓtēs, 1110B: Accordingly, Epicurus himself in the second book of his Reply to Theóphrastos, when he says that "colors are not intrinsic to bodies – but a result of certain arrangements and positions relative to the eye" is asserting by this reasoning that body is no more colorless than colored.
Plutarch, Against Kōlṓtēs, 1109E: Observe what, regarding the heat of the wine in the Symposium, Epicurus has [portrayed] Polýainos conversing with him, as he says "Do you deny, Epicurus, the thorough heating effect caused by wine?" (Someone interrupts) "it is not a universal fact that wine seems fully warming." (And a little later) "For the universal fact does not seem to be that 'wine is warming' – but that a certain quantity for a certain person may be said to be warming."
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Cassius That statement by Atticus according to Cicero could indicate a later development. We know that in Epicurus' will in Diogenes Laertius Book X, that Epicurus asked that Metrodorus and Epicurus' brothers be commemorated, not just himself (...or this could be part of a rhetorical ploy by Cicero).
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this could be part of a rhetorical ploy by Cicero
That would be my vote.
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Cassius
August 23, 2024 at 2:31 PM
