nces; his father was a schoolmaster, and his mother,
Chaerestrata, acted as a kind of priestess, curing diseases, exorcising
ghosts, and exercising other fabulous powers. Epicurus has been charged
with sorcery, because he wrote several songs for his mother's solemn
rites. Until eighteen, he remained at Samos and the neighboring isle of
Teos; from whence he removed to Athens, where he resided until the death
of Alexander, when, disturbances arising, he fled to Colophon. This
place, Mitylene, and Lampsacus, formed the philosopher's residence until
he was thirty-six years of age; at which time he founded a school in the
neighborhood of Athens. He purchased a pleasant garden, where he taught
his disciples until the time of his death.

We are told by Laertius, "That those disciples who were regularly
admitted into the school of Epicurus, lived together, not in the manner
of the Pythagoreans, who cast their possessions into a common stock; for
this, in his opinion, implied mutual distrust rather than friendship;
but upon such a footing of friendly attachment, that each individual
cheerfully supplied the necessities of his brother."

The habits of the philosopher and his followers were temperate and
exceedingly frugal, and formed a strong contrast to the luxurious,
although refined, manners of the Athenians. At the entrance of the
garden, the visitor of Epicurus found the following inscription:--"The
hospitable keeper of this mansion, where you will find pleasure the
highest good, will present you with barley cakes and water from the
spring. These gardens will not provoke your appetite by artificial
dainties, but satisfy it with natural supplies. Will you not, then, be
well entertained?" And yet the owner of the garden, over the gate
of which these words were placed, has been called "a glutton" and "a
stomach worshipper!"

From the age of thirty-six until his decease, he does not seem to have
quitted Athens, except temporarily. When Demetrius besieged Athens, the
Epicureans were driven into great difficulties for want of food; and it
is said that Epicurus and his friends subsisted on a small quantity of
beans which he possessed, and which he shared equally with them.

The better to prosecute his studies, Epicurus lived a life of celibacy.
Temperate and continent himself, he taught his followers to be so
likewise, both by example and precept. He died 273 B. C, in the
seventy-third year of his age; and, at that time, his warm