The Conception of Atomism in Greek  and Latin Philosophy

Titus Lucretius Carus was a Roman poet and philosopher.
Lucretius left one work, the De Rerum Natura, a didactic poem in six books containing nearly 7,500 hexameter lines. The purpose of the poem is to set forth the Epicurean system of philosophy, particularly those portions dealing with the origin of the world and the operations of natural forces.

The poet's aim in writing was, as he tells us, to free men's minds from the baneful influence of superstition and of the belief in the hereafter, to which he attributed the greater portion of the fears and troubles of life. He tried to explain how, without the direction or intervention of supernatural agencies in any degree, all natural phenomena may be accounted for.

In Book I, he lays down as fundamental truths the propositions that nothing can come from nothing, and that to nothing no one returns. The universe is made up of matter and void, or space. It has no center; for matter exists in infinite quantity, and space is without limit. Matter is composed of atoms, which are inconceivably minute, perfectly solid, and indestructible. Book II is devoted to an elaborate discussion of the atoms, treating their movements, shapes, and combinations. Sensation and feeling are declared to be an accident of atomic combination, a result of the coming together of atoms of certain shapes in certain ways.

Lucretius succeeded not only in presenting the main features of Epicurean physics and psychology with admirable clearness, but even in clothing them with a highly poetic form.