Epicuriousity

1) It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly.
AND
2) It is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life.

Epicurus rocked. He still does. He rocks both in the figurative sense AND the literal sense (since there are busts of him...haha..). I love Epicurean ethics, and if everyone followed them, there would be no need for laws.

Unfortunately for Epicurus (as well as Marx, the late USSR, and Adam and Eve), temptation awaits us. It lurks and wears black trenchcoats with the collar turned up. It hides its hair with a black fedora, so all that is shown is a pair of beady, darting eyes. It also smells like musty couches.

And by temptation, I don't just mean the attractive secretary or the loaded gun in your hand, I mean all tempting situations. These situations lead us to break Epicurus' idea of a social contract as a ruler for justice. Cutting someone off in traffic, slander, being nosy; most of the hobbies and pasttimes of the human race are essentially trouncing and ripping and wiping one's bottom on that all to essential social contract.

I wonder what Epicurus would have said if a person were to call him on his slip-ups. I hope he was humble enought to admit mistakes (albeit in Greek, so we'd need a translator, and I'd probably need a time machine before then....maybe I could learn greek in the time it takes to invent a time machine!). I'd like to think he was quick to forgive too.

I hope that forgiveness is written into the social contract of justice. Everyone makes mistakes, even the most pious question their faith (Mother Teresa, more beautiful for her doubt and true faith), it is part of the human condition.

I just wish there was more of a vital urge to live that wise, well and just life.