FREE ESSAY ON EPICURUS

EPICURUS

Epicurus' Letter to Menoeceus is about life and explains it from a philosopher's point of
view. In it he discusses pleasure, pain, death, fear, judgment, destiny, ignorance and
many other debatable issues that humans experience. The one idea that struck my attention
is from a passage about pleasure and morals. He doesn't use the word moral but rather
implies that morals are connected to pleasure. The passage states, "Pleasure is our first
and kindred good. It is the starting-point of every choice and of every aversion, and to
it we come back, inasmuch as we make feeling the rule by which to judge of every good
thing."
Epicurus simply indicates "Pleasure" which means that it could be anyone's pleasure. By
simply stating "pleasure" in a general term it could mean that pleasure of another person
may bring pleasure to oneself. One could make a sacrifice in order to please another
person (or people) which ultimately pleases oneself. For example, a man or woman who is
willing to give up their life for their country would be pleasing himself or herself as
well as the country. That is a huge sacrifice that one may make in order to fulfill their
desire to do something good. Epicurus suggests that pleasure is our first thought that is
good. So in order for something to be good it must be pleasurable to anyone including
yourself.
He also states that pleasure is our first and kindred good. This suggests that from the
time that we are born we associate good as something pleasing. Infants learn that eating,
sleeping, being changed to be more comfortable, cuddling, having a blanket for warmth,
and any other physical needs are all good or pleasing to the baby. As we grow our
pleasure comes from our emotions as well as our physical desires. The parent of a child
receives his or her pleasure from the caring and nurturing of the child. 
According to Epicurus, our choices are based on pleasure. As we age our form of pleasure
transfers from a physical need to our emotional needs. When we evaluate a situation we
tend to think about what would be best or the most pleasing to us. An example of this is
that I choose to go to school because it makes me happy to have an education and so I can
feel secure in my future. My choice was made from an evaluation of how pleasing it would
be for me, had it not been pleasing I would have altered my choice. Both the feelings of
security and happiness were evaluated before I made my decision. 
Epicurus also mentions feelings and how they effect our judgment of good. Since our
choices are based on pleasure they effect our morals or our judgment. When a person
considers another person's feelings over their own is a value that is instilled in their
morals when they are young. For example people that have children place their pleasure on
the happiness of their child. From this the child is learning the pleasure of pleasing
others and that it is good.
Epicurus entwines the idea that pleasure is connected to our judgment of everything that
is "good". He began by talking about pleasure and how it is the first thing that we
learn. He then says that we consider the amount of pleasure something will bring us
before we make our decisions about things. Then he brings in the idea of how pleasure is
a feeling and that we make feelings our basis for determining if something is good. From
all these feelings and judgments we are given our morals. So if we didn't have feelings
would it be possible to have "good" morals?