Apuleius’ Cupid and Psyche may be read as an allegorical tale of the union between Soul and Desire, producing Pleasure. This happens literally and metaphorically. Cupid and Psyche, the manifestations of desire and the soul, actually do get married and give birth to a child named Pleasure. This isn’t all that happens, however. This story really stands for when the soul (that thing which makes human beings alive and able to feel emotions) receives their true desire (whatever really makes them happy), true pleasure is felt. Pleasure is that feeling of joy or bliss that can only be accomplished when one has attained their genuine desire. Psyche, the human soul, goes through much toil and trouble to get her lover. Cupid goes through many pains in the heavens to receive his lover. Both, after hard and diligent work, legitimately and eternally get their true pleasure when they’re given their daughter, Pleasure. According to Epicurean philosophy, true hedonis (pleasure) can only be reached through the leveling out of pleasure and pain, with pleasure outweighing pain.
Psyche does go through many a misfortune to achieve her maximum happiness, voluptas. She goes through much anxiety dreading being taken away by some monster, falls in love but again goes into terrible anxiety thinking her lover is a beast, tries to kill herself but fails, is sent on three crazy and impossible missions by Venus in order to be able to see Cupid, and finally is almost left to die after opening Proserpina’s box. Psyche goes through the pain and the trouble so that she may be with her lover. After many dangers and being on the verge of death, she does get her voluptas, her baby named Pleasure, the summit of happiness in Epicurean philosophy.
Cupid does the same. He knows what destruction will come if Psyche is convinced by her sisters to look upon his face and is tortured by the anxiety but relents and allows Psyche to see them, is deeply hurt to wake up to Psyche looking upon his face and kissing him (meaning she sees him, clearly), is forced to leave her, comes to save her, then goes on trial in the heavens in order to marry her. After this trouble and pursuit of happiness, though, she is made immortal, they are married, and given voluptas, their daughter Pleasure, that peak of Epicurean philosophy most sought after.
Therefore, Apuleius’ Cupid and Psyche is an allegorical tale of the soul marrying desire and receiving voluptas. As in Epicurean philosophy, true pleasure is reached through constant trying and effort, and that is exactly what Cupid and Psyche do. In the end, as Epicurean philosophy would permit after such hard work, they birth their daughter Pleasure, and so reach their true happiness; they experience true hedonis and voluptas. Once the soul gets their desire, according to Epicurean philosophy, true happiness and 'pleasure' is experienced. It's all about balancing pleasure and pain, as Epicurean philosophy says. You can't constantly have temporary pleasures without putting the effort in to have some pain, because that's not true happiness; but at the same time going through so much pain and torture without any pleasure isn't happines either. You have to have balance, like Cupid and Psyche, and then you can get your hedonis, that true Voluptas.
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