Epicurus

"Epicure" redirects here. For the Australian rock group, see Epicure (band).

Έπίκουρος Epikouros
Era	Ancient philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
School	Epicureanism
Main interests	Atomism, Hedonism

Epicurus (Greek Έπίκουρος) (341 BC, Samos – 270 BC, Athens) was an ancient Greek philosopher, the founder of Epicureanism, a popular school of thought in Hellenistic Philosophy that flourished for about 600 years. Of his over 300 written works only a few fragments and letters survive; much of what we know about Epicureanism comes from later followers or commentators.

For Epicurus, the purpose of philosophy was to attain the happy, tranquil life, characterized by the absence of pain and fear, and by living a self-sufficient life surrounded by friends. He taught that pleasure and pain are the measures of what is good and bad, that death is the end of the body and the soul and not to be feared, that the gods do not reward or punish humans, that the universe is infinite and eternal, and that events in the world are ultimately based on the motions and interactions of atoms moving in empty space.

Epicurus was often vilified as favoring the uninhibited pursuit of pleasure (hedonism), however he invariably counseled restraint and temperance with respect to physical desires.

Biography

His parents, Neocles and Chaerestrate, both Athenian citizens, had emigrated to the Athenian settlement on the Aegean island of Samos about 10 years before Epicurus was born. According to Apollodorus (reported by Diogenes Laertius), he was born on the seventh day of the month Gamelion in the third year of the 109th Olympiad, in the archonship of Sosigenes (about February 341 BCE).

As a boy he studied philosophy under the Platonist teacher Pamphilus for about four years. At the age of 18 he went to Athens for his two-year term of military service. The playwright Menander served in the same age-class of the ephebes as Epicurus.

After the death of Alexander the Great, Perdiccas expelled the Athenian settlers on Samos to Colophon, and Epicurus joined his family there after the completion of his military service. He studied under Nausiphanes, who followed the teachings of Democritus. In 311/310 BCE he taught in Mytilene but caused strife and was forced to leave. He then founded a school in Lampsacus before returning to Athens in 306 BCE. There he founded The Garden, a school named for the garden he owned about halfway between the Stoa and the Academy that served as the school's meeting place.

Even though many of his teachings were heavily influenced by earlier thinkers, especially by Democritus. However, he differed in a significant way with Democritus on determinism. Epicurus would often deny this influence, denounce other philosophers as confused, and claim to be "self-taught".

Epicurus never married and we don't know of any children. He died in the second year of the 127th Olympiad, in the archonship of Pytharatus (270 BCE), at the age of 72. He reportedly suffered from kidney stones, and despite the prolonged pain involved, he wrote to Idomeneus:

I have written this letter to you on a happy day to me, which is also the last day of my life. For I have been attacked by a painful inability to urinate, and also dysentery, so violent that nothing can be added to the violence of my sufferings. But the cheerfulness of my mind, which comes from the recollection of all my philosophical contemplation, counterbalances all these afflictions. And I beg you to take care of the children of Metrodorus, in a manner worthy of the devotion shown by the young man to me, and to philosophy.

The School

Epicurus' school had a small but devoted following in his lifetime. The primary members were Hermarchus, the financier Idomeneus, Leonteus and his wife Themista, the satirist Colotes, the mathematician Polyaenus of Lampsacus, and Metrodorus of Lampsacus, the most famous popularizer of Epicureanism. His school was the first of the ancient Greek philosophical schools to admit women. The original school was based in Epicurus' home and garden. An inscription on the gate to the garden is recorded by Seneca in his Epistle XXI:

Stranger, here you will do well to tarry; here our highest good is pleasure.

Epicurus emphasized friendship as an important ingredient of happiness, and the school resembled in many ways a community of friends living together. However, he also instituted a hierarchical system of levels among his followers, and had them swear an oath on his core tenets.

The school's popularity grew and it became, along with Stoicism and Skepticism, one of the three dominant schools of Hellenistic Philosophy, lasting strongly through the later Roman Empire. In Rome, Lucretius was the school's greatest proponent, composing On the Nature of Things, an epic poem, in six books, designed to recruit new members. The poem mainly deals with Epicurean philosophy of nature. Another major source of information is the Roman politician and amateur philosopher Cicero, although he was highly critical, denouncing the Epicureans as unbridled hedonists, devoid of a sense of virtue and duty, and guilty of withdrawing from public life. Another ancient source is Diogenes of Oenoanda, who composed a large inscription at Oenoanda in Lycia.

A library, dubbed the Villa of the Papyri, in Herculaneum, owned by Julius Caesar's father-in-law, Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, was preserved by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, and was found to contain a large number of works by Philodemus, a late Hellenistic Epicurean, and Epicurus himself, attesting to the school's enduring popularity. The task of unrolling and deciphering the charred papyrus scrolls continues today.

After the official approval of Christianity by Constantine, Epicureanism was repressed. Epicurus' materialist, theories that the gods were physical beings composed of atoms who were unconcerned with human affairs and had not created the universe, and the non- dualist idea that the human soul was mortal, were essentially irreconcilable with Christian teachings. The school endured a long period of obscurity and decline.

The early Christian writer Lactantius criticizes Epicurus at several points throughout his Divine Institutes. In Dante's Divine Comedy, the Epicureans are depicted as heretics suffering in the sixth circle of hell. The word for a heretic in the Talmudic literature is "Apikoros", and Epicurus is titled in Modern Greek idiom as the "Dark Philosopher".

By the 16th century, the works of Lucretius and Diogenes Laertius were being printed in Europe. In the 17th century the French Franciscan priest, scientist and philosopher Pierre Gassendi wrote two books forcefully reviving Epicureanism. Shortly thereafter, and clearly influenced by Gassendi, Walter Charleton published several works on Epicureanism in English. Attacks by Christians continued, most forcefully by the Cambridge Platonists.

In the following times, there was a resurgence of Epicurean philosophy: in the Modern Age, scientists adopted atomist theories, while materialist philosophers embraced Epicurus' hedonist ethics and restated his objections to natural teleology.

Teachings

Main article: Epicureanism

Bust of Epicurus leaning against his disciple Metrodorus in the Louvre Museum

Epicurus played an important part in what is known as the "Greek miracle": when men first tried to explain the nature of the world, not with the aid of myths or religion, but with material principles. He is a key figure in the development of science and the scientific method because of his insistence that nothing should be believed except that which was tested through direct observation and logical deduction. Many of his ideas about nature and physics presaged important scientific concepts of our time. He was a key figure in the Axial Age, the period from 800 BCE to 200 BCE, during which similarly revolutionary thinking appeared in China, India, Iran, the Near East, and Ancient Greece. His statement of the Ethic of Reciprocity as the foundation of ethics is the earliest in Ancient Greece, and differs from the usual formulation by emphasizing the minimization of harm to oneself and others as the way to maximize happiness.

Questions posed by Epicurus some three hundred and seventy-five years before the composition of the New Testament and over one hundred years before the composition of the latest books of the Hebrew Bible remain unanswered today. As observed by David Hume in the 18th Century:

Is he [God] willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then is he impotent.
Is he able but not willing? Then is he malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Whence then is evil?

Epicurus's teachings represented a departure from the other major Greek thinkers of his period, and before, but was nevertheless founded on many of the same principles as Democritus. Like Democritus, he was an atomist, believing that the fundamental constituents of the world were uncuttable little bits of matter (atoms, Greek atomos, uncuttable) flying through empty space (khaos). Everything that occurs is the result of the atoms colliding, rebounding, and becoming entangled with one another, with no purpose or plan behind their motions. (Compare this with the modern study of particle physics.) His theory differs from the earlier atomism of Democritus because he admits that atoms do not always follow straight lines but their direction of motion may occasionally exhibit a 'swerve' (clinamen). This allowed him to avoid the determinism implicit in the earlier atomism and to affirm free will. (Compare this with the modern theory of quantum physics, which postulates a non-deterministic random motion of fundamental particles.)

He admitted women and slaves into his school and was the only philosopher to do so, introducing the new concept of fundamental human egalitarianism into Greek thought, and was one of the first Greeks to break from the god-fearing and god-worshipping tradition common at the time, even while affirming that religious activities are useful as a way to contemplate the gods and to use them as an example of the pleasant life. Epicurus participated in the activities of traditional Greek religion, but taught that one should avoid holding false opinions about the gods. The gods are immortal and blessed and men who ascribe any additional qualities that are alien to immortality and blessedness are, according to Epicurus, impious. The gods do not punish the bad and reward the good as the common man believes. The opinion of the crowd is, Epicurus claims, that the gods "send great evils to the wicked and great blessings to the righteous who model themselves after the gods.", when in reality the gods do not concern themselves at all with human beings.

Epicurus' philosophy is based on the theory that all good and bad derive from the sensations of pleasure and pain. What is good is what is pleasurable, and what is bad is what is painful. Pleasure and pain were ultimately, for Epicurus, the basis for the moral distinction between good and bad. If pain is chosen over pleasure in some cases it is only because it leads to a greater pleasure. Moral reasoning is a matter of calculating the benefits and costs in terms of pleasure and pain. Although Epicurus has been commonly misunderstood to advocate the rampant pursuit of pleasure, (primarily through the influence of Christian polemics) what he was really after was the absence of pain (both physical and mental, i.e., anxiety) - a state of satiation and tranquility that was free of the fear of death and the retribution of the gods. When we do not suffer pain, we are no longer in need of pleasure, and we enter a state of 'perfect mental peace' (ataraxia).

Epicurus explicitly warned against overindulgence because it often leads to pain. For instance, in what might be described as a "hangover" theory, Epicurus warned against pursuing love too ardently. However, having a circle of friends you can trust is one of the most important means for securing a tranquil life.

Epicurus also believed (as opposed to Aristotle) that death was not to be feared. When a man dies, he does not feel the pain of death because he no longer is and he therefore feels nothing. Therefore, as Epicurus famously said, "death is nothing to us." When we exist death is not, and when death exists we are not. All sensation and consciousness ends with death and therefore in death there is neither pleasure nor pain. The fear of death arises from the false belief that in death there is awareness.

In his epistemology he emphasized the senses, and his Principle of Multiple Explanations is an early contribution to the philosophy of science: if several theories are consistent with the observed data, retain them all.

There are also some things for which it is not enough to state a single cause, but several, of which one, however, is the case. Just as if you were to see the lifeless corpse of a man lying far away, it would be fitting to list all the causes of death in order make sure that the single cause of this death may be stated. For you would not be able to establish conclusively that he died by the sword or of cold or of illness or perhaps by poison, but we know that there is something of this kind that happened to him.

In contrast to the Stoics, Epicureans showed little interest in participating in the politics of the day, since doing so leads to trouble. He instead advocated seclusion. His garden can be compared to present-day communes. This principle is epitomized by the phrase lathe biōsas λάθε βιώσας (Plutarchus De latenter vivendo 1128c; Flavius Philostratus Vita Apollonii 8.28.12), meaning "live secretly", "get through life without drawing attention to yourself", i. e. live without pursuing glory or wealth or power, but anonymously, enjoying little things like food, the company of friends, etc.

Beliefs about religion

The Epicurean paradox is a famous argument against the existence of an all-powerful and providential God. The paradox is quoted as this:

God either wants to eliminate bad things and cannot, or can but does not want to, or neither wishes to nor can, or both wants to and can. If he wants to and cannot, he is weak -- and this does not apply to God. If he can but does not want to, then he is spiteful -- which is equally foreign to God's nature. If he neither wants to nor can, he is both weak and spiteful and so not a god. If he wants to and can, which is the only thing fitting for a god, where then do bad things come from? Or why does he not eliminate them?

Epicurus did not, however, deny the existence of gods, but he did not think of them along the lines that lead to this paradox, but rather as blissful and immortal beings inhabiting the metakosmia, empty spaces between worlds in the vastness of infinite space.

Ethics

Epicurus was an early thinker to develop the notion of justice as a social contract. He defined justice as an agreement "neither to harm nor be harmed." The point of living in a society with laws and punishments is to be protected from harm so that one is free to pursue happiness. Because of this, laws that do not help contribute to promoting human happiness are not just. He gave his own version of the Ethic of Reciprocity:

It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly (agreeing 'neither to harm nor be harmed'). And it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life.

Epistemology - Method for determining facts - On the Criteria

According to Epicurus, the basic means for our understanding of things are the ‘sensations’ (aestheses), 'concepts' (prolepsis), ‘emotions’ (pathe) and the ‘focusing of thought into an impression’ (phantastikes epiboles tes dianoias).

Epicureans reject dialectic as confusing (parelkousa) because for the physical philosophers is sufficient to use the correct words which refer to the concepts of the world. Epicurus then, in his work On the Canon, says that the criteria of truth are the senses, the preconceptions and the feelings. Epicureans add to these the focusing of thought into an impression. He himself is referring to those in his Epitome to Herodotus and in Principal Doctrines.

The senses are the first criterion of truth, since they create the first impressions and testify the existence of the external world. Sensory input is neither subjective nor deceitful, but the misunderstanding comes when the mind adds to or subtracts something from these impressions through our preconceived notions. Therefore, our sensory input alone cannot lead us to inaccuracy, only the concepts and opinions that come from our interpretations of our sensory input can. Therefore our sensory data is the only truly accurate thing which we have to rely for our understanding of the world around us.

And whatever image we receive by direct understanding by our mind or through our sensory organs of the shape or the essential properties that are the true form of the solid object, since it is created by the constant repetition of the image or the impression it has left behind. There is always inaccuracy and error involved in bringing into a judgment an element that is additional to sensory impressions, either to confirm [what we sensed] or deny it.

Epicurus said that all the tangible things are real and each impression comes from existing objects and is determined by the object that causes the sensations.

Therefore all the impressions are real, while the preconceived notions are not real and can be modified.

If you battle with all your sensations, you will be unable to form a standard for judging which of them are incorrect.

The concepts are the categories which have formed mentally according to our sensory input, for example the concepts "man", "warm", and "sweet", etc. These concepts are directly related to memory and can be recalled at any time, only by the use of the respective word. (Compare the anthropological Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Epicurus also calls them "the meanings that underlie the words" (hypotetagmena tois phthongois: semantic substance of the words) in his letter to Herodotus. The feelings or emotions (pathe) are related to the senses and the concepts. They are the inner impulses that make us feel like or dislike about certain external objects, which we perceive through the senses, and are associated with the preconceptions that are recalled.

In this moment that the word "man" is spoken, immediately due to the concept [or category of the idea] an image is projected in the mind which is related to the sensory input data.

First of all Herodotus, we must understand the meanings that underlie the words, so that by referring to them, we may be able to reach judgments about our opinions, matters of inquiry, or problems and leave everything undecided as we can argue endlessly or use words that have no clearly defined meaning.

Apart from these there is the assumption (hypolepsis), which is either the hypothesis or the opinion about something (matter or action), and which can be correct or incorrect. The assumptions are created by our sensations, concepts and emotions. Since they are produced automatically without any rational analysis and verification (see the modern idea of the subconscious) of whether they are correct or not, they need to be confirmed (epimarteresis: confirmation), a process which must follow each assumption.

For beleiefs they [the Epicureans] use the word hepolepsis which they claim can be correct or incorrect.

Referring to the "focusing of thought into an impression" or else "intuitive understandings of the mind", they are the impressions made on the mind that come from our sensations, concepts and emotions and form the basis of our assumptions and beliefs. All this unity (sensation – concept or category – emotion – focusing of thought into an impression) leads to the formation of a certain assumption or belief (hepolepsis). (Compare the modern anthropological concept of a "worldview".) Following the lead of Aristotle, Epicurus also refers to impressions in the form of mental images which are projected on the mind. The "correct use of impressions" was something adopted later by the Stoics. Our assumptions and beliefs have to be ’confirmed', which actually proves if our opinions are either accurate or inaccurate. This verification and confirmation (epimarteresis) can only be done by means of the "evident reason" (henargeia), which means what is self-evident and obvious through our sensory input. An example is when we see somebody approaching us, first through the sense of eyesight, we perceive that an object is coming closer to us, then through our preconceptions we understand that it is a human being, afterwards through that assumption we can recognize that he is someone we know, for example Theaetetus. This assumption is associated with pleasant or unpleasant emotions accompanied by the respective mental images and impressions (the focusing of our thoughts into an impression), which are related to our feelings toward each other. When he gets close to us, we can confirm (verify) that he is Socrates and not Theaetetus through through the proof of our eyesight. Therefore, we have to use the same method to understand everything, even things which are not observable and obvious (adela, imperceptible), that is to say the confirmation through the evident reason (henargeia). In the same way we have to reduce (reductionism) each assumption and belief to something that can be proved through the self-evident reason (empirically verified). Verification theory and reductionism have been adopted, as we know, by the modern philosophy of science. In this way, one can get rid of the incorrect assumptions and beliefs (biases) and finally settle on the real (confirmed) facts.

Consequently the confirmation and lack of disagreement is the criterion of accuracy of something, while non-confirmation and disagreement is the criterion of its inaccuracy. The basis and foundation of [understanding] everything are the obvious and self-evident [facts].

All the above mentioned criteria of knowledge form the basic principles of the [scientific] method, that Epicurus followed in order to find the truth. He described this method in his work On the Canon or On the Criteria.

If you reject any sensation and you do not distinguish between the opinion based on what awaits confirmation and evidence already available based on the senses, the feelings and every intuitive faculty of the mind, you will send the remaining sensations into a turmoil with your foolish opinions, thus getting rid of every standard for judging. And if among the perceptions based on beliefs things that are verified and things that are not, you are guaranteed to be in error since you have kept everything that leads uncertainty concerning the correct and incorrect.

Tetrapharmakos

Main article: Tetrapharmakos.

Tetrapharmakos, or, "The four-part cure," is Epicurus' overall statement of how to live the happiest possible life. This poetic doctrine was handed down by an anonymous Epicurean who summed up Epicurus' philosophy on happiness in four simple lines:

Don't fear god,
Don't worry about death;
What is good is easy to get, and
What is terrible is easy to endure.
(Philodemus, Herculaneum Papyrus, 1005, 4.9-14)

Early Physics: Epicurean Physics

Epicurus' philosophy of the physical world is found in Letter to Herodotus: Diogenes Laertius 10.34-83. Below is its paraphrase.

If a limited form lives within an unlimited void, the form could only wander aimlessly about, because what is unlimited is ungraspable; meaning, the limited form would travel forever, for it does not have any obstacles. The void would have to be limited in quality and the form of an unlimited quality, for an unlimited form can oscillate and seemingly grasp—practically, but not literally—an unlimited number of spots within the limited void. So therefore all living things on Earth are unlimited, and the Earth on which they live and the universe around it, is limited. [Compare the concept of the finite universe in modern cosmology.]

Forms can change, but not their inherent qualities, for change can only affect their shape. Some things can be changed and some things cannot be changed because forms that are unchangeable cannot be destroyed if certain attributes can be removed; for attributes not only have the intention of altering an unchangeable form, but also the inevitable possibility of becoming—in relation to the form’s disposition to its present environment—both an armor and a vulnerability to the its stability.

Further proof that there are unchangeable forms and their inability to be destroyed, is the concept of the “non-evident.” A form cannot come into being from the void—which is nothing; it would be as if all forms come into being spontaneously, needless of reproduction. The implied meaning of “destroying” something is to undo its existence, to make it not there anymore, and this cannot be so: if the void is that which does not exist, and if this void is the implied destination of the destroyed, then the thing in reality cannot be destroyed, for the thing (and all things) could not have existed in the first place (as Lucretius said, ex nihilo nihil fit: nothing comes from nothing). This totality of forms is eternal and unchangeable. [Compare the modern Law of Conservation of Mass-Energy.]

Atoms move, in the appropriate way, constantly and for all time. [Compare the modern theory of particle physics.] Forms first come to us in images or “projections”--outlines of their true selves. For an image to be perceived by the human eye, the “atoms” of the image must cross a great distance at enormous speed and must not encounter any conflicting atoms along the way. [Compare the modern theory of light as being composed of subatomic particles called photons.] The presence of atomic resistance equal atomic slowness; whereas, if the path is deficient of atomic resistance, the traversal rate is much faster (and clearer). [Compare the modern concept of the speed of light and refraction.] Because of resistance, forms must be unlimited (unchangeable and able to grasp any point within the void) because, if they weren't, a form's image would not come from a single place, but fragmented and from several places. This confirms that a single form cannot be at multiple places at the same time. [Compare Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle.]

And the senses warrant us other means of perception: hearing and smelling. As in the same way an image traverses through the air, the atoms of sound and smell traverse the same way. This perceptive experience is itself the flow of the moving atoms; and like the changeable and unchangeable forms, the form from which the flow traverses is shed and shattered into even smaller atoms, atoms of which still represent the original form, but they are slightly disconnected and of diverse magnitudes. This flow, like that of an echo, reverberates (off one's senses) and goes back to its start; meaning, one’s sensory perception happens in the coming, going, or arch, of the flow; and when the flow retreats back to its starting position, the atomic image is back together again [Compare the modern theory of sound.]: thus when one smells something one has the ability to see it too [because atoms reach the one who smells or sees from the object.]

And this leads to the question of how atomic speed and motion works. Epicurus says that there are two kinds of motion: the straight motion and the curved motion, and its motion traverse as fast as the speed of thought. [Compare the theory of the speed of light.]

Epicurus proposed the idea of 'the space between worlds' (metakosmia) the relatively empty spaces in the infinite void where worlds had not been formed by the joining together of the atoms through their endless motion. [Compare the modern concepts of interstellar and intergalactic space.]

Legacy

Elements of Epicurean philosophy have resonated and resurfaced in various diverse thinkers and movements throughout Western intellectual history.

His emphasis minimizing harm and maximizing happiness in his formulation of the [[Ethic of Reciprocity] was later picked up by the democratic thinkers of the French Revolution, and others, like John Locke, who wrote that people had a right to "life, liberty, and property." To Locke, one's own body was part of their property, and thus one's right to property would theoretically guarantee safety for their persons, as well as their possessions.

This triad was carried forward into the American freedom movement and Declaration of Independence, by American founding father, Thomas Jefferson, as "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

Karl Marx's doctoral thesis was on "The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature." [1]

Epicurus was also a significant source of inspiration and interest for Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche cites his affinities to Epicurus in a number of his works, including The Gay Science, Beyond Good and Evil, and his private letters to Peter Gast. Nietzsche was attracted to, among other things, Epicurus' ability to maintain a cheerful philosophical outlook in the face of painful physical ailments. Nietzsche also suffered from a number of sicknesses during his lifetime. However, he thought that Epicurus' conception of happiness as freedom from anxiety was too passive and negative.

Sam Harris, in his bestselling work, The End of Faith: (Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason), elaborates on Epicurus' concept that the fear and worship of [the] God[s] is not a valid activity based on reason, and also creates an ethical standard by judging actions not only on the basis of the Ethic of Reciprocity, but whether these actions increase the happiness of others. He also speculates on a possible scientific basis for a state of "mental peace" found through the practice of various spiritual disciplines, and the value of the attainment of this state to mankind.

Works

The only surviving complete works by Epicurus are three letters, which are to be found in book X of Diogenes Laertius' Lives of Eminent Philosophers, and two groups of quotes: the Principal Doctrines, reported as well in Diogenes' book X, and the Vatican Sayings, preserved in a manuscript from the Vatican Library.

• Letter to Herodotus
• Letter to Pythocles
• Letter to Menoeceus
• Principal Doctrines
• Vatican Sayings

Further reading

• Bailey C. (1928) The Greek Atomists and Epicurus, Oxford.
• Bakalis Nikolaos (2005) Handbook of Greek Philosophy: From Thales to the Stoics Analysis and Fragments, Trafford Publishing, ISBN 1-4120-4843-5
• Digireads.com The Works of Epicurus, January 2004.
• Eugene O’ Connor The Essential Epicurus, Prometheus Books, New York 1993.
• Edelstein Epicureanism, Two Collections of Fragments and Studies Garland Publ. March 1987
• Farrington, Benjamin. Science and Politics in the Ancient World, 2nd ed. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1965. A Marxist interpretation of Epicurus, the Epicurean movement, and its opponents.
• Gottlieb, Anthony. The Dream of Reason: A History of Western Philosophy from the Greeks to the Renaissance. London: Penguin, 2001. ISBN 0-14-025274-6
• Inwood, Brian, tr. The Epicurus Reader, Hackett Publishing Co, March 1994.
• Oates Whitney Jenning, The Stoic and Epicurean philosophers, The Complete Extant Writings of Epicurus, Epictetus, Lucretius and Marcus Aurelius, Random House, 9th printing 1940.
• Panicha, George A. Epicurus, Twayne Publishers, 1967
• Prometheus Books, Epicurus Fragments, August 1992.
• Russel M. Geer Letters, Principal Doctrines, Vatican Sayings, Bobbs-Merrill Co, January 1964.
• Diogenes of Oinoanda. The Epicurean Inscription, edited with Introduction, Translation and Notes by Martin Ferguson Smith, Bibliopolis, Naples 1993.

External links

• Epicurus.info - Epicurean Philosophy Online: features classical e-texts & photos of Epicurean artifacts.
• Epicurus.net - Epicurus and Epicurean Philosophy
• Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Entry for "Epicurus"
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Entry for "Epicurus"
• Epicurus & Lucretius - Small article by "P. Dionysius Mus"
• The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature - Karl Marx’s doctoral thesis.