But what to the Greeks was a speculative principle to be drawn out by argument to its logical conclusions, to the Romans was a practical maxim to be realized in life. The Romans did not understand the love of abstract truth, or the charm of abstract reasoning employed for its own sake without any ulterior end. To profess the doctrines of stoicism, and live a life of self-indulgence, was to be false to one's convictions; to embrace Epicurus's system without making it subservient to enjoyment, was equally foreign to a consistent character. In Athens the daily life of an Epicurean and a Stoic would not present any marked difference; in discussion they would be widely divergent, but the contrast ended there. In Rome, on the contrary, it was the mode of life which made the chief distinction. Men who laboured for the state as jurists or senators, who were grave and studious, generally, if not always, adopted the tenets of Zeno; if they were orators, they naturally turned rather to the Academy, which offered that balancing of opinions so congenial to the tone of mind of an advocate. Among public men of the highest character, very few espoused Epicurus's doctrines. The mere assertion that pleasure was the _summum bonum_ for man was so repugnant to the old Roman views that it could hardly have been made the basis of a self-sacrificing political activity. Accordingly we find in the period before Cicero only men of the second rank representing epicurean views. AMAFINIUS is stated to have been the first who popularised them. [18] He wrote some years before Cicero, and from his lucid and simple treatment immediately obtained a wide circulation for his books. The multitude (says Cicero), hurried to adopt his precepts, [19] finding them easy to understand, and in harmony with their own inclinations. The second writer of mark seems to have been RABIRIUS. He also wrote on the physical theory of Epicurus in a superficial way. He neither divided his subject methodically, nor attempted exact definitions, and all his arguments were drawn from the world of visible things. In fact, his system seems to have been a crude and ordinary materialism, such as the vulgar are in all ages prone to, and beyond which their minds cannot go. The refined Catulus was also an adherent of epicureanism, though he also attached himself to the Academy. Among Greeks resident at Rome the best known teachers were Phaedrus and Zeno; a book by the former on the gods was largely used by Cicero in the first book of his _De Natura Deorum_. A little later Philodemus of Gadara, parts of whose writings are still extant, seems to have risen to the first place. In the time of Cicero this system obtained more disciples among the foremost men. Both statesmen and poets cultivated it, and gained it a legitimate place among the genuine philosophical creeds. [20]