Today’s letter is an excerpt from our course on Epicureanism in the Stoa app. To access the full course, download the Stoa app.
What happens when we die? Do we receive punishment or rewards for how we’ve lived? Do we get to see the ones we’ve lost? Or is it just a void, oblivion, nothingness?
Death is terrifying. It is a great unknown, and the end of life. For Epicureanism, it is one of the foundational fears that causes distress and disturbance in our life. And the fear of death permeates many parts of our lives. It is not just the dread we feel at a funeral, or the pit in our stomachs when we go to the doctor.
It is also the fact that we can’t enjoy getting older - knowing that it represents getting closer to the end of our lives. Or that we feel an anxious energy to move, get busy, do something - as if our accomplishments or legacy could overpower death and the end it promises.
We don’t just fear death, we crave immortality. Which is a desire that cannot be satisfied.
The solution to this fear, Epicurus argued, is to realize that death cannot even happen to us. He said:
“Death, the most frightening of bad things, is nothing to us; since when we exist, death is not yet present, and when death is present, then we do not exist.”- Letter to Menoeceus, 125
Epicurus’ point is that death is scary because we cease to exist. But if we do not exist, then we cannot be harmed. This is a simple argument, but hard to digest fully.
Fortunately, Epicurus’ life shows us what this looks like to put into practice.
One of the few remaining biographical sources we have from Epicurus is a letter from his death bed. In it, he describes being happy. He is in extreme physical pain from the illness about to take his life, but that pain is outweighed by the joy of his memories, and the calmness of his mind.
He describes reminiscing about time spent with friends and loved ones, and how the pleasure of those memories is stronger than any physical pain.
Many die in total fear and anxiety, afraid of what is next - or losing what they have now. But in his final moments Epicurus showed how pleasurable dying can be if we can defeat these fears.
Someone dying without the fear of death is just experiencing physical pain - and with a calm mind that is manageable. As Epicurus wrote on his deathbed, his cheerful mind counterbalanced all his physical afflictions.
The Stoics took this exercise seriously as well. Memento Mori was a significant exercise for them - remember that you will die so that you can grow accustomed to this fact.
The goal is to be like Epicurus. We will die, but we do not have to die mournful or anxious. We will age, but aging doesn’t have to be unpleasant. It doesn’t have to be this thing we fight against, just because it reminds us of our own mortality. We do not have to let these facts influence our lives negatively.
In Rome, there was a famous Epicurean epitaph, the phrase written on tombstones. It goes “I was not. I was. I am not. I do not care.”
This is the key point for having fun: When you are not, you will not care. So enjoy what you have and don’t worry about what happens when you are gone.
No one over 50 fears death.
Of fear and courage
I feared suffering
and I feared death.
And I did not like myself fearful.
So, I decided to live without fear.
I read and examined Epicurus;
Epicurus preserved by Diogenes Laërtius in his Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers.
Epicurus said that
no harm was eternal
and that death meant nothing.
I thought of my grandmother,
who suffered before she died;
she suffered from other things during her life and was cured.
Her suffering is over.
Can she still suffer now?
Without a body—
and this world, I add—,
no.
Things happened the same way with my grandfather.
The way things happened to my grandparents,
they happened to other people,
and they can happen to me too.
We can only suffer as long as we are alive.
That was the reading,
and that was the examination.
So, Epicurus did not speak against the truth,
and he gave me the knowledge I needed
to stop being afraid
and start being brave;
only the wise can help you with his wisdom.
By the same means, you can lose fear,
you can also gain courage:
wisdom, like that of Epicurus.
PS Death does not destroy you, but separates you from your body and the world you lived in—as a result, any possible suffering of that world ceases for you. (If you had died in the pandemic and because of it, COVID-19 could no longer affect you.) Moreover, other suffering does not become possible for you—being without your body and the world. (There is no COVID-19 for the soul.)
Treat Inferno like Dante Alighieri: it is just a comedy.
Do not abandon hope, all you who are alive. All harm will pass, and death is nothing to be afraid of.