In view of all these contrary authorities, how can the question be decided? Shall I say that Epicurus was a corruptor of good morals, on the faith of a jealous philosopher, of a disgruntled disciple, who would have been delighted, in his resentment, to go to the length of inflicting a personal injury? Moreover, had Epicurus intended to destroy the idea of Providence and the immortality of the soul, is it not reasonable to suppose that the world would have revolted against so scandalous a doctrine, and that the life of the philosopher would have been attacked to discredit his opinions more easily? If, therefore, I find it difficult to believe what his enemies and the envious have published against him, I should also easily credit what his partisans have urged in his defence. I do not believe that Epicurus desired to broach a voluptuousness harsher than the virtue of the Stoics. Such a jealousy of austerity would appear to me extraordinary in a voluptuary philosopher, from whatever point of view that word may be considered. A fine secret that, to declaim against a virtue which destroys sentiment in a sage, and establishes one that admits of no operation. The sage, according to the Stoics, is a man of insensible virtue; that of the Epicureans, an immovable voluptuary. The former suffers pain without having any pain; the latter enjoys voluptuousness without being voluptuous--a pleasure without pleasure. With what object in view, could a philosopher who denied the immortality of the soul, mortify the senses? Why divorce the two parties composed of the same elements, whose sole advantage is in a concert of union for their mutual pleasure? I pardon our religious devotees, who diet on herbs, in the hope that they will obtain an eternal felicity, but that a philosopher, who knows no other good than that to be found in this world, that a doctor of voluptuousness should diet on bread and water, to reach sovereign happiness in this life, is something my intelligence refuses to contemplate. I am surprised that the voluptuousness of such an Epicurean is not founded upon the idea of death, for, considering the miseries of life, his sovereign good must be at the end of it. Believe me, if Horace and Petronius had viewed it as painted, they would never have accepted Epicurus as their master in the science of pleasure. The piety for the gods attributed to him, is no less ridiculous than the mortification of the senses. These slothful gods, of whom there was nothing to be hoped or feared; these impotent gods who did not deserve the labor and fatigue attendant upon their worship! Let no one say that worshipers went to the temple through fear of displeasing the magistrates, and of scandalizing the people, for they would have scandalized them less by refusing to assist in their worship, than shocked them by writings which destroyed the established gods, or at least ruined the confidence of the people in their protection.