Ethical doctrine.Since the main purpose of the poem is to free men from religion and the fear of death by showing that all things, including the soul, came into being and are to pass away without any action of the gods, ethical doctrines are not systematically treated. Lucretius accepts, however, the Epicurean dogma that pleasure is the chief good, “the guide of life,”[23] but the pleasure he has in mind is not the common physical pleasure, but the calm repose of the philosopher:
Oh wretched minds of men, oh blinded hearts!
Within what shades of life and dangers great
Is passed whate’er of age we have! Dost thou
Not see that nature makes demand for naught
Save this, that pain be absent from our frame,
That she, removed from care at once and fear,
May have her pleasure in the joys of mind?[24]
Again, in the splendid praise of Epicurus, which opens the fifth book, he says that we may live without grain or wine,
But well one can not live without pure heart.[25]