Friday, June 27, 2014

 

Epicurus, Fragment 200 Usener

Porphyry, To Marcella 30 (tr. Alice Zimmern):
Do not think it unnatural that when the flesh cries out for anything, the soul should cry out too. The cry of the flesh is, "Let me not hunger, or thirst, or shiver," and 'tis hard for the soul to restrain these desires. 'Tis hard, too, by help of its own natural self-sufficing to disregard day by day the exhortations of nature, and to teach her to esteem the concerns of life as of little account.

ἀφυσιολόγητον μηδὲν ἡγοῦ βοώσης τῆς σαρκὸς βοᾶν τὴν ψυχὴν. σαρκὸς δὲ φωνή· μὴ πεινῆν, μὴ διψῆν, μὴ ῥιγοῦν. καὶ ταῦτα τὴν ψυχὴν χαλεπὸν μὲν κωλῦσαι, ἐπισφαλὲς δὲ παρακοῦσαι τῆς παραγγειλάσης φύσεως αὐτῇ διὰ τῆς προσφυοῦς αὑτῇ αὐταρκείας καθʼ ἡμέραν.
Seneca, Letters to Lucilius 4.10 (tr. Richard M. Gummere):
Do you know what limits that law of nature ordains for us? Merely to avert hunger, thirst, and cold.

lex autem illa naturae scis quos nobis terminos statuat? non esurire, non sitire, non algere.
Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 2.21 (tr. William Wilson):
Epicurus, in placing happiness in not being hungry, or thirsty, or cold...

Ἐπίκουρος δέ ἐν τῷ μὴ πεινῆν μηδὲ διψῆν μηδὲ ῥιγοῦν τὴν εὐδαιμονίαν τιθέμενος...
Cf. Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 5.35.102 (tr. J.E. King):
...and nature herself teaches us daily how few, how small her needs are, how cheaply satisfied.

et cotidie nos ipsa natura admonet, quam paucis, quam parvis rebus egeat, quam vilibus.
The citations come from Hermann Usener, Epicurea (Leipzig: B.G. Teubner, 1887), p. 161. Usener doesn't cite Lucian, The Parasite 38 (tr. A.M. Harmon), which may allude to this fragment:
Furthermore, if happiness lies in not hungering or thirsting or shivering, nobody has this in his power except the parasite. Consequently you can find many cold and hungry philosophers, but never a parasite; otherwise he would not be a parasite, but an unfortunate beggar fellow, resembling a philosopher.

καὶ μέντοι εἰ ἔστιν εὔδαιμον τὸ μὴ πεινῆν μηδὲ διψῆν μηδὲ ῥιγοῦν, ταῦτα οὐδενὶ ἄλλῳ ὑπάρχει ἢ παρασίτῳ. ὥστε φιλοσόφους μὲν ἄν τις πολλοὺς καὶ ῥιγοῦντας καὶ πεινῶντας εὕροι, παράσιτον δὲ οὔ· ἢ οὐκ ἂν εἴη παράσιτος, ἀλλὰ δυστυχής τις καὶ πτωχὸς ἄνθρωπος καὶ φιλοσόφῳ ὅμοιος.
Note the similarity between Clement of Alexandria (ἐν τῷ μὴ πεινῆν μηδὲ διψῆν μηδὲ ῥιγοῦν τὴν εὐδαιμονίαν τιθέμενος) and Lucian (ἔστιν εὔδαιμον τὸ μὴ πεινῆν μηδὲ διψῆν μηδὲ ῥιγοῦν).



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