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Updated: June 27, 2025
Diogenes Laertius tells us that when Zeno consulted the oracle as to what he should do in order to attain happiness in life, the deity replied that he should assimilate himself with the dead. Having understood, he applied himself exclusively to the study of books. Thus speaks Laertius, in the translation of Don Jose Ortiz y Sanz. I confess that I should not have understood the oracle.
The chase took us inland, until, after walking through the fragrant, earthy lanes, we turned aside into dewy meadows, where each blade of grass sparkled with a gem of purest water. Again the necessity of going barefoot. Breakfast was late on these mornings, my mother whiling away the hours of waiting with a volume of Diogenes Laertius in the bow-window.
Annius super eundem. Touching their vsages many things are written by Aristotle, Socion, Plinie, Laertius, Bodinus, and others: which I will gather in briefe, and set downe as followeth. Tullie writeth, that partlie by tokens, and partlie by surmises, they would foretell things to come.
There were several copies of wills in Diogenes Laertius, as those of Aristotle, Lycon, and Theophrastus; whence it appears they had a common form, beginning with a wish for life and health.
Diogenes Laertius tells us nearly 200 years after Christ, and 450 years after the death of Epicurus that the Epicurean sect still continued its numbers and dignity, having outlasted its contemporaries and rivals. The harmony among the Epicureans may be explained, not merely from the temper of the master, but partly from the doctrines and plan of life that he recommended.
He wrote three books, which were extant in the time of Diogenes Laertius, one on Education, one on Politics, and one on Natural Philosophy. He also wrote an epic poem on the universe, to which he gave the name of Kosmos.
There is a curious resemblance in this to the opening verses of Genesis, "The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep." Nor is the next step in his philosophy without its resemblance to that in the Biblical record. As summarised by Diogenes Laertius it takes this form, "All things were as one: then cometh Mind, and by division brought all things into order."
Indeed I am not a little grieved that we have not a dozen of Laertius, or that he is not more knowne, or better understood; for I am no lesse curious to know the fortunes and lives of these great masters of the world than to understand the diversitie of their decrees and conceits.
He retired from Crotona to Metapontum. But the hostility which had broken out in the former city, followed him there. He took refuge in the Temple of the Muses. But he was held so closely besieged that no provisions could be conveyed to him; and he finally perished with hunger, after, according to Laertius, forty days' abstinence.
All that was left to him was Diogenes Laertius. He put this unique copy under his arm, and went out. It was the 4th of June, 1832; he went to the Porte Saint-Jacques, to Royal's successor, and returned with one hundred francs. He laid the pile of five-franc pieces on the old serving-woman's nightstand, and returned to his chamber without saying a word.
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