Philosophy as a way of life

be attempted, starting out from the lived experience of the concrete, living, and perceiving subject, under the triple form defined, as we saw above, by Marcus Aurelius:

1 as an effort to practice objectivity of judgment; 2 as an effort to live according to justice, in the service of the human community; and

3 as an effort to become aware of our situation as a part of the universe. Such an exercise of wisdom will thus be an attempt to render oneself open to the universal.

More specifically, I think modern man can practice the spiritual exercises of antiquity, at the same time separating them from the philosophical or mythic discourse which came along with them. The same spiritual exercise can, in fact, be justified by extremely diverse philosophical discourses. These latter are nothing but clumsy attempts, coming after the fact, to describe and justify inner experiences whose existential density is not, in the last analysis, susceptible of any attempt at theorization or systemati7.ation. Stoics and Epicureans, for example -

for completely different reasons - urged their disciples to concentrate their attention on the present moment, and free themselves from worries about the future as well as the burden of the past Whoever concretely practices this exercise, however, sees the universe with new eyes, as if he were seeing it for the first time. In the enjoyment of the pure present, he discovers the mystery and splendor of existence. At such moments, as Nietzsche said,20 we say yes "not only to ourselves, but to all existence." It is therefore not necessary, in order to practice these exercises, to believe in the Stoics' nature or universal reason. Rather, as one practices them, one lives concretely according to reason. In the words of Marcus Aurelius:21 "Although everything happens at random, don't you, too, act at random." In this way, we <.-an accede concretely to the universality of the cosmic perspective, and the wonderful mystery of the presence of the universe.

NOTES

M. Foucault, The Care of tl1e Self (= History of Sexuali�y, vol. 3), trans. Robert Hurley, New York 1 986. [References are to the French edition, Le Souci de soi, Paris 1984 - Trans.]

2 Am1uaire de la 5' Section de /'Ecole pratique des Hautes Etudes, 1975-6.

3 Foucault, Souci, pp. 83--4.