SOURCE: E. Zeller, "The Moral Science of the Epicureans: General Principles" and "The Epicurean Ethics Continued: Special Points," in The Stoics, Epicureans and Sceptics, Russell & Russell, Inc., 1962, pp. 472-93.

A professor at the University of Heidelberg, Zeller first published his landmark work on Epicurus in German. The following excerpt presents an overview of Epicureanism as a meeting of scientific and moral thought.

The Moral Science of the Epicureans. General Principles

Natural science is intended to overcome the prejudices which stand in the way of happiness; moral science to give positive instructions as to the nature and means of attaining to happiness. The speculative parts of the Epicurean system had already worked out the idea that reality belongs only to individual things, and that all general order must be referred to the accidental harmony of individual forces. The same idea is now met with in the sphere of morals...