On the Nature of Things (Dodo Press)

Titus Lucretius Carus (99 BC-55 BC) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the epic philosophical poem De Rerum Natura, On the Nature of Things. Very little is known about Lucretius' life. One source of information is found in a letter Cicero wrote to his brother Quintus in February 54 BC. He wrote: "The poems of Lucretius exhibit many flashes of genius, and yet show great mastership. His poem De Rerum Natura transmits the ideas of Epicurean physics, which includes Atomism, and psychology. " The main purpose of the work was to free men's minds of superstition and the fear of death. The fear of death is banished by showing that death is the dissipation of a being's material mind, and so, death can be neither good nor bad for this being. Stylistically, most scholars attribute the full blossoming of Latin hexameter to Virgil. De Rerum Natura however, is of indisputable importance for the part it played in naturalizing Greek philosophical ideas and discourse in the Latin language and its influence on Virgil and other later poets.