The first volume of the collected works of Karl Marx, which is being issued by the Marx-Engels Institute of Moscow, opens with a dissertation entitled 'Über die Differenz der demokritischen und epikureischen Naturphilosophie' [Da Diferença entre a Filosofia da Natureza de Demócrito e Epicuro], which he presented for his doctorate at the University of Jena in 1841. It is interesting to find one who was afterwards to win fame in very different fields starting his career with an enthusiastic tract on Greek philosophy, which he evidently intended to make his work for years to come; for not only does he tell us in his introduction that this thesis is a prelude to a comprehensive study of Epicureanism, Stoicism, and Scepticism, 'the philosophical basis of Roman life and character', but appended to the dissertation are some seventy pages of preliminary notes for the larger work, which range over such varied subjects as 'The Immanent Dialectic of the Epicurean Philosophy', 'The Idea of the "Wise Man" in Greek Philosophy', and 'Parallels between the Epicureans, and the Pietists and Supernaturalists'.
Looking back on his work now it is almost astonishing to see how far he got considering the materials then available. He knew, of course, the main ancient authorities for Epicureanism, and the work shows a careful study of Diogenes Laertius, the Epicurean treatises of Plutarch, Cicero's dialogues, and portions of Clement of Alexandria and Sextus Empiricus. He had read Gassendi, but thought that his attempt to reconcile Epicureanism with Church tradition vitiated all his work — Marx's anti-theological bias is prominent throughout the treatise. Hegel had, as he says, published the great work 'from which dates the history of philosophy', and Ritter in 1829, unaccompanied as yet by Preller, had issued the first part of the History of Philosophy in Ancient Times. But there was no Diels, no Usener, and the whole wealth of material collected from casual references was as yet unavailable, except in so far as an individual inquirer might have come across it.
Yet Marx shows a penetrating acquaintance with the two philosophers, and produces in his notes a considerable array of illustrative passages, drawn nearly entirely from the main authorities. Almost as a pioneer he rejects the ancient tradition, repeated glibly in the histories of his time, that Epicurus adopted the Atomism of Democritus wholesale, changing it here and there for the worse. He sees rightly that, although the details of the theory have not undergone a great change, except in certain important points, the real difference between the two thinkers lies in their underlying 'theory of knowledge', and the consequent divergence of attitude in their conception of the relation of phenomena to reality. [...]
Like a true Hegelian, having once got his fundamental principle, he attempts to apply it in its workings throughout the theories of the two philosophers. And here, from a modern point of view, is the weakness of the thesis. An a priori theory, couched in the terms of contemporary philosophy, is forced upon ancient thinkers who really approached their problems in a far simpler frame of mind. We are told that Epicurus was always conscious of the contradiction involved in his theory between the abstract conception of the atom as the ' ultimate thing 'and its concrete workings as the foundation of phenomena [...].
But though to-day Marx's conclusions could hardly be accepted in detail, his thesis is of real interest to a modern student of Epicureanism, firstly because it exhibits the workings of a subtle and ingenious mind in the presence of a very difficult problem, and secondly because it does call attention in a very arresting way to the real difference between Democritus and Epicurus, and to the genuine originality of the later thinker. But perhaps it is most instructive because it shows how difficult it is for a critic to approach the ancient writers except in the atmosphere of his own time, how hard to resist the temptation of reading into them his own thought and that of his contemporaries. The thesis was well worth inclusion in the volume, and any student of Epicureanism who reads it must carry away some illuminating ideas.
Cyril Bailey (1928), "Karl Marx on Greek Athomism", The Classical Quaterly 22, 3/4: 205-206.
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