Note 40 — Chapter XIV · THE STOIC PHILOSOPHY AS A WHOLE AND ITS HISTORICAL POSITION.

Towards the close of the second century Apollodorus, one of the most voluminous writers on philosophy, taught at Athens.40 His pupil, Zeno of Sidon, the most important among the Epicureans of that age, laboured for a long time successfully, both orally and in writing.41 About the same time Phædrus is heard of in Rome and Athens,42 and at a little later period Philodemus,43 and Syro or Sciro in Rome,44 and Patro,45 the successor of Phædrus, in Athens. The number of Epicureans at Rome, known to us chiefly from Cicero’s writings,46 is not small. No one of them has obtained a higher repute than T. Lucretius Carus.47 His poem, carefully reproducing the Epicurean notions on natural science, is one of the most valuable sources for the knowledge of their system. Contemporary with Lucretius was the celebrated physician Asclepiades of Bithynia,48 who resided at Rome, but to judge by the views on nature attributed to him, he was no genuine Epicurean, although connected with the Epicurean School.49