Epicurean Philosophy

The well known story, "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" tells about a little mouse who continually demands more from his human friend. Once he receives his cookie, he craves a glass of milk, and then after he wants a nap...so on and so forth. The story illustrates Epicurean philosophy because the mouse is always wanting more, instead of enjoying what he has at the moment. Epicurius taught to live in the moment, because as mortals, we never know which day may be our last. As a teenage girl, I'm familiar with the saying "Live everyday as if it's your last" and as cliche as it sounds, it directly relates back to Epicurian philosophy and the idea of Carpe Diem. Epicurius also believed that pain is composed of unnecessary desires, which basically sums up the mouse in a nutshell. All of his requests were unnecessary, because he did not need the cookie/milk/or nap.
This is also demonstrated in the story "Cookies" by Arnold Lobel, where Frog and Toad continued to devour delicious cookies, though they knew they shouldn't. After trying to prevent consumption by tieing the box of cookies with a string and putting it on the highest shelf possible, the friends resorted to feeding the cookies to birds, to exemplify their "willpower." The idea of eating more than necessary exemplifies gluttony, considered one of the seven deadly sins. Furthermore, once again the idea of unnecessary desires, leads to pain, which was part of the Epicurean philosophy. Another point is that pleasure should be attained and enjoyed in moderation, and kept in balance to pain, neither in excess.
Another story written by Arnold Lobel, depicts the story of Frog and Toad, where Toad's "List of Things To Do Today" gets blown away by the wind. Toad then faces the problem of not being able to remember any of the events on his list/not being able to run after the list because it was not part of the list. The basic idea of Epicurean philosophy behind this story revolves around the notion of Carpe Diem, once again. Toad's goal of following his "To Do" list constricts life to a piece of paper. Epicurius believed in mortality of humans; unaware of when life is going to end should push one to accomplish what he wants to do as he wishes and "seize the day" as part of his Carpe Diem philosophy.