HKB
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Often appears with: will, choice, and freedom · fate, destiny, and necessity · doubt, skepticism, and certainty · will controlling atoms · the passions and the emotions · the nature and attributes of God · the fear of death · stoic fate · soul and body theories · providence and divine governance · possible vs necessary · pleasure, pain, and the good life
Usually: crisis of belief (4) · reflection (3) · skepticism (3) · argument (2) · censure (2) · speech or oration (1) · curiosity (1) · detachment (1) · praise (1) · reverence (1)
“This terror then, this darkness of the mind, Not sunrise with its flaring spokes of light, Nor glittering arrows of morning can disperse, But only nature's aspect and her law.” Titus Lucretius Carus, On the Nature of Things · insight
He reviews Epicurus and Stoic debates about possible but non-occurring future events, including the claim that determinism makes all propositions necessary, and argues that such reasoning confuses certain with necessary.
recourse to such answers. Yet we shall see that M. Bayle himself confused the certain with the necessary, when he maintained that the choice of the best rendered things necessary. 170. Let us come now to the possibility of things that do not happen, and I will give the very words of M. Bayle, albeit they are somewhat discursive. This is what he says on the matter in his *Dictionary* (article 'Chrysippus', let. S, p.…
Leibniz quotes Marchetti’s Lucretius verse to show Epicurus’s paradox: even after discarding gods and incorporeal substances, Epicurus still makes the will of atoms divert their paths without explanation.
a true philosopher can say something thereof. One can attain to that happy state, and it is one of the principal means the soul can use to strengthen its dominion. 330. If the Scotists and the Molinists appear to favour vague indifference (appear, I say, for I doubt whether they do so in reality, once they have learnt to know it), the Thomists and the disciples of Augustine are for predetermination. For one must hav…
He contrasts Epicurus and Carneades, saying Carneades locates vague indifference in the soul by an analogous absurdity, and that Cicero and Bayle wrongly criticize Epicurus while overlooking irrationality.
Nevertheless it has need of impulsion, even as the soul needs to be acted upon by the objects of the senses, and receives this impression according to its own constitution. 333. Cicero considers that Chrysippus becomes so confused that, whether he will or no, he confirms the necessity of fate. M. Bayle is almost of the same opinion (*Dictionary*, art. 'Chrysippus', lit. H). He says that this philosopher does not get…
In the proem of Book VI, Lucretius praises Athens as the source of laws and learning, credits Epicurus with teaching the “vessel” of mind, and argues that nature’s law alone dispels the fear that causes religious dread.
PROEM 'Twas Athens first, the glorious in name, That whilom gave to hapless sons of men The sheaves of harvest, and re-ordered life, And decreed laws; and she the first that gave Life its sweet solaces, when she begat A man of heart so wise, who whilom poured All wisdom forth from his truth-speaking mouth; The glory of whom, though dead, is yet to-day, Because of those discove…
Philo presses further by noting mortal human generation and sex differences, suggesting a theology could become fully embodied like ancient Epicurean and Cicero-ridiculed anthropomorphism; he concludes finite design allows wildly speculative theology.
vast power and capacity as is necessary to produce the universe, or, to speak in the language of ancient philosophy, so prodigious an animal exceeds all analogy, and even comprehension. But further, CLEANTHES: men are mortal, and renew their species by generation; and this is common to all living creatures. The two great sexes of male and female, says MILTON, animate the world. Why must this circumstance, so univers…
Rolleston summarizes Epicurus’s doctrine that pleasure is the end, clarifies it as tranquil and non-voluptuous, and explains how Epicureans practiced simple lives and expected gods to dwell apart.
unanxious temperament, with leisure for contemplation, ends not attainable by the criminal who lives in constant fear of detection, or the luxurious liver in whom satiety produces disgust and weariness. Certain bodily conditions were, however, regarded as objects in themselves, and partaking of the nature of the absolutely good; and all entanglement in human relationships was discountenanced for the disturbance and …