A free life makes it harder to acquire riches for this is not easy to do without becoming servile to mobs or kings.
– Epicurus
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Samizdata quote of the daySeptember 7th, 2010 |
 17 comments to Samizdata quote of the day |
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They didn’t have copyright or patents in his day, and only a fuzzy understanding of property rights, so, for his time and place, Epicurus was right. However, evidence shows that they also had another problem- slaves. The Greeks could have become a machine-loving culture, if only slave labour hadn’t been around! Plenty of them seem to have realised the potential of steam power to turn things, but there would have been no market for an expensive machine, when you could use slaves instead. Thus slavery impeded capitalism and free enterprise, both of which make it easier to acquire wealth and live apart from mobs and kings.
All fascinating and maybe even true but it really has very little to do with the point the quote is making Nuke 🙂
But I also think copyright and particularly patents are far from clearly indispensable pillars of property rights.
However I think the point Epicurus is making is that it is much easier to be a rent seeker and live off the coercion of others via Kings (states) or mobs (such as democratic states)… and this is clearly still true.
Is ‘servile’ the right word, I wonder? All trade of any sort involves being nice and polite to your clients or customers. Was Eppi a happy man, or a proud man, disdainful of commoners? Being ‘servile’ to the mob of customers is how great corporations become rich in the first place! So did ha just dislike trade?
I don’t read Greek (let alone ancient Greek), so I can’t speak to the quality of the translation. In English, “servile” carries a negative connotation, but perhaps that wasn’t really the meaning Epicurus had in mind. For that matter, he might not even have meant “harder” to be a bad thing. Difficult to say. Can anyone around here read Epicurus in the original and comment?
1. Having or showing an excessive willingness to serve or please others.
2. Of or characteristic of a slave or slaves.
Perry, is that a more accurate translation from the original Greek, or is it merely a definition of “servile”? (If the latter, it’s both unresponsive to my question and unhelpful.)
Does it really matter what a long-dead Greek guy really meant? I think that what really counts is how you understand the “quote” as it is, and what do you make of it from a philosophical/practical point of view.
Are you trying to put translators out of a job, Alisa? Or are you trying to create jobs for philosophers? Or are you trying to have a bob each way?
Of course it matters, Alisa, or there’s no point to the quotation. Before I can agree or disagree with it I want to know that it is a fair representation the belief of Epicurus himself, and not merely that of some unnamed translator. Otherwise I’m just agreeing or disagreeing with myself, neither of which is particularly satisfying.
Laird, I agree that it is at least interesting, if not enlightening, to find out what the person quoted really thought. It is also interesting to find out whether he was misquoted/mistranslated. But, my larger goal in life is first and foremost to
agreeto “be of the same mind” with myself (note that this does not at all mean that my opinions must remain constant – quite the opposite), and then find other people who are of the same mind as me, regardless of their being philosophers or translators. Towards that end, live people take precedence over dead ones.If the translation is right across the cultures and the years, then he might have had the french system in mind, where the highest ambition of gifted people is to become a bureaucrat, and work for the state. Could this be why the French are not known as great inventors or innovators?
Being servile to “Kings” (i.e. to rulers – whether they be called kings or not) is a bad thing, for you are after subsidies (which are paid for by robbing the taxpayer).
But being “servile to the mob” is not the alternative – offering good service to customers (the people – the “mob”) is not being “servile”. I resent that – I resent it because it is not true.
Offering the best goods or services you can (and offering them in a polite and helpful way) is not being “servile”.
Even in the time of Epicurus most people were not slaves – they were farmers or free craftsmen or traders. A farmer who (perhaps over generations) builds up his farm to a great estate, a craftsman who builds up a great enterprise (for example the production of jars for olive oil) a trader (in honourable products – not slaves) who risks his fortune and his life on the high seas (under threat of storms and of criminals) these are not servile men – these are great men.
Turning to France:
There are two Frances.
There is the France of the universities (and the rest of the education system), the government administration (and government supported companies) and the “intellectuals” – but there is also the other France.
The France of traditional society (in both country and town and city), church going, family centered, and working in or running family owned business enterprises (or companies – for not all French companies are subsidized) some of which go back centuries.
When we think of France we must not forget the “other” (the conservative) France. After all most of the products that even the left love about France (such as the food) are the products of this “other” France.
You really do not understand Epicurus then Paul. His background was Athenian and the mobs he is referring to are not “customers”, they are the mobs who cast the Ostracon, the mobs whose favour the politicians curry to gain political power.
What he is saying is that to be free you cannot be in the thrall of Kings… or be a political leader yourself and hence be in the thrall of the mob and the seekers of patronage… in short, you must avoid politics. But it is harder to be wealthy without the use of politics to tilt things in your favour.
As true now as then.
In which case, Perry, did he have any good advice to pass on to us? such as, live in the country, far from centers of power?
Yes Perry – but Epicurus did not say political office, he said “riches”. True the two things are often connected – but not always (even then).
Still if the question is “would you rather be a guest in the garden of Epicurus, or trying to win over the Athenian mob by promising them the money of other cities (the robbery of the League) or the money of the rich” – then of course I would rather be a guest of Epicurus.
Of course “riches” in Athens might well refer to the silver mines – and these public mines were considered horrific even by the standards of the ancient world.
He is saying the road to riches is harder *without* being in the service of Kings or The Mob. Virtue is rarely the path of least resistance
Paul, would that “other” France be the one where the people riot when it is proposed that the retirement age be increased to 62, or agricultural subsidies are threatened, or to demand a higher minimum wage? Methinks you are romanticizing the “France of traditional society”.