Epicurus Teaching Natural Physics

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Epicurus Teaching Natural Physics

Epicurus teaching natural physics -- We must now consider the things which are imperceptible to the senses. First, that nothing is created out of that which does not exist: for if it were, everything would be created out of everything with no need of seeds.

From text of Letter to Herodotus, Bailey translation:

"...we must now consider things imperceptible to the senses. First of all, that nothing is created out of that which does not exist: for if it were, everything would be created out of everything with no need of seeds.

And again, if that which disappears were destroyed into that which did not exist, all things would have perished, since that into which they were dissolved would not exist. Furthermore, the universe always was such as it is now, and always will be the same. For there is nothing into which it changes: for outside the universe there is nothing which could come into it and bring about the change.

Moreover, the universe is bodies and space: for that bodies exist, sense itself witnesses in the experience of all men, and in accordance with the evidence of sense we must of necessity judge of the imperceptible by reasoning, as I have already said."

Comments 1

September 2, 2026 at 7:41 AM

Corresponding excerpt from Eikadistes' translation on twentiers.com:

Nothing from Nothing

It is necessary to understand these [conjectures] were already determined on account of the unseen: first indeed, that nothing is being generated out of that which is not existing. For everything would have been generating [everything] out of everywhere, therein no seed¹ is being needed [to explain existence in that myth].

¹ ΣΠEΡΜΑ or σπερμά (spermá) refers to infinite, countless, endless, uncuttable, indivisible “seeds“ of matter.

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