LUCRETIUS 19 



" Sitting aloof, holding no form of creed, but 

 contemplating all," Lucretius surveyed the pain- 

 ful panorama of life. He saw that the pride of 

 Roman imperialism was false and foolish : he saw 

 that wealth and power were as dust under the feet 

 of Death. 



"All that nature demands is freedom from 

 care and fear ; but neither wealth nor power will 

 deliver thee from these, nor yet from sickness 

 .... What avails it all unless, then, thou findest 

 that superstitious fears are scared away, and fly 

 panic-stricken from thy mind. Nor does it avail 

 thee ought to see thy fleet swarm forth, and 

 spread far and wide over the sea, unless then the 

 fear of death leaves thy breast untenanted and free 

 from care.'* 



How, then, Lucretius asked, are men to escape 

 from fear and care ? In the gods he could find no 

 hope. If gods there were, they were cruel and 

 careless to allow such a world — to allow vice and 

 disease, and these six thousand slaves rotting on 

 the crosses. Far better no gods than such gods, 

 he maintained ; far better believe that the world 

 was the creation of blind atoms, than the plaything 

 of capricious deities. And so he tried to prove 

 that man was at the mercy of lawful atoms, and 

 not of lawless powers, and that death ended all. 

 It was a pessimistic creed, and yet his genius gave 



