For the present, the divorce of science and philosophy was complete. The Stoics and the Epicureans had both, indeed, a scientific system, but their philosophy was in no sense based upon it. The attitude of Epicurus to science is particularly well marked. He took no interest in it whatever as such, but he used it as an instrument to free men from the religious fear to which he attributed human unhappiness. For that purpose, the science of the Academy, which had led up to a theology, was obviously unsuitable, and, like a true eastern Ionian as he was, Epicurus harked back to the atomic theory of Democritus, adding to it, however, certain things which really made nonsense of it, such, for instance, as the theory of absolute weight and lightness, which Aristotle had unfortunately taught. The Stoics too were corporealists, and found such science as they required in the system of Heraclitus, though they also adopted for polemical purposes much of Aristotle's Logic, taking pains, however, to alter his terminology. Both these schools, in fact, while remaining faithful to the idea of philosophy as conversion, forgot that it had always been based on science in its best days. It was this, no doubt, which chiefly commended Stoicism and Epicureanism to the Romans, who were never really interested in science. Both Stoicism and Epicureanism made a practical appeal, though of a different kind, and that served to gain credit for them at Rome. The Academy which Plato had founded still continued to exist, though it was diverted from its original purpose not more than a generation after Plato's death. Mathematics, we have seen, had made itself independent, and the most pressing necessity of the time was certainly the criticism of the new dogmatism which the Stoics had introduced. That was really carrying on one side of Platonism and not the least important. It is true indeed that the Academy appears to us at this distance of time mainly as a school of scepticism, but we must remember that its scepticism was directed entirely to the sensible world, as to which the attitude of Plato himself was not fundamentally different. The real sceptics always refused to admit that the Academics were sceptics in the proper sense of the word, and it is possible that the tradition of Platonism proper was never wholly broken. At any rate, by the first century B. C., we begin to notice that Stoicism tends to become more and more Platonic. The study of Plato's _Timaeus_ came into favour again, and the commentary which Posidonius (_c._ 100 B. C.) wrote upon it had great influence on the development of philosophy down to the end of the Middle Ages. It is this period of eclecticism which is reflected for us in the philosophical writings of Cicero. It had great importance for the history of civilization, but it is far removed from the spirit of genuine Greek philosophy. That was dead for the present, and it did not