Lucretius

Titus Lucretius Carus (98? - 55 BC) was a Roman poet and philosopher; his contribution was to free men's minds of superstition and fear of death. He focussed more on the law than did earlier Epicureans, but persuasively transmitted their physics and psychology. He was the first Epicurean to write in Latin.

Lucretius's epic poem "On the Nature of Things[?]"(De Rerum Natura) attempts to present a total Epicurean worldview. Ranging from the nature of matter to sex, politics, and death, the poem is almost encyclopedic in tone, and is one of the masterpieces of Latin verse.

We know very little about Lucretius' life; one source of information (generally considered unreliable) is St. Jerome, who mentions Lucretius in the Chronica Eusebia[?]. According to Jerome, much of Lucretius's work was written under the influence of drugs, and he died after drinking a love-potion. These claims have been discredited for two main reasons: firstly, the Epicurean philosophy expounded by Lucretius sets great store on reason and discourages romantic attachments; and secondly, it seems likely that Jerome, as one of the early church fathers[?], would have wanted to discredit Lucretius's philosophy, which includes disbelief in any kind of life after death and in any divinity concerned with man's welfare.