THE PROBLEM OF HAPPINESS 



of philosophy. He had striven to know in full measure 

 the joys of living, but it had been his explicit avowal 

 that "we cannot live pleasantly without living pru- 

 dently and honorably and justly; for virtues are con- 

 note with living agreeably, and living agreeably is 

 inseparable from the virtues." 



Yet by a cruel, though not unusual, perversion of 

 the verdicts of history, the name of this philosopher 

 has come to be a synonym for the pursuit of sensual 

 pleasures. The word " epicure " and its allies in all 

 the modern languages of Europe, connotes a peculiar 

 regard for the pleasures of the palate. Yet it is on 

 record that Epicurus himself and his immediate fol- 

 lowers lived habitually on the most abstemious diet, 

 the staples of which were water and barley bread. 

 Wine was the habitual drink of the Greeks of that day, 

 and was so little a luxury that ten gallons cost about 

 'the equivalent of six cents; yet the disciples of Epicurus 

 considered a few ounces a day a sufficiency of this uni- 

 versal beverage. To their contemporaries, their moder- 

 ation must have seemed actual asceticism. And as to 

 luxurious foods, it is recorded that Epicurus himself, 

 writing to a friend, said, "Send me a Cytherean cheese, 

 that if I wish to have a feast I may have the means." 

 Scarcely an epicurean banquet that, in the modern sense. 



Such misjudgment as this has more than once been 

 the penalty of frankness. An ever critical world seizes 

 upon the most tangible feature of a half understood 

 philosophy, and, stubborn as always in its verdicts, 

 refuses to render justice. So epicureanism has been 

 looked at askance. Yet, according to a truer analysis, 



