“At this stage you must admit that whatever is seen to be sentient is nevertheless composed of atoms that are insentient. The phenomena open to our observation do not contradict this conclusion or conflict with it. Rather they lead us by the hand and compel us to believe that the animate is born, as I maintain, of the insentient”

“You see that stones are worn away by time,Rocks rot, and twoers topple, even the shrinesAnd images of the gods grow very tired,Develop crack or wrinkles, their holy willsUnable to extend their fated term,To litigate against the Laws of Nature.And don't we see the monuments of menCollapse, as if to ask us, "Are not weAs frail as those whom we commemorate?"?Boulders come plunging down from the mountain heights,Poor weaklings with no power to resistThe thrust that says to them, Your time has come!But they would be rooted in steadfastnessHad they endured from time beyond all time,As far back as infinity. Look about you!Whatever it is that holds in its embraceAll earth, if it projects, as some men say,All things out of itself, and takes them backWhen they have perished, must itself consistOf mortal elements. The parts must addUp to the sum. Whatever gives awayMust lose in the procedure, and gain againWhenever it takes back.”

“Visible objects therefore do not perish utterly, since nature repairs one thing from another and allows nothing to be born without the aid of another's death.”

“fear in sooth holds so in check all mortals, becasue thay see many operations go on in earth and heaven, the causes of which they can in no way understand, believing them therefore to be done by power divine. for these reasons when we shall have seen that nothing can be produced from nothing, we shall then more correctly ascertain that which we are seeking, both the elements out of which every thing can be produced and the manner in which every thing can be produced in which all things are done without the hands of the gods.”

“Nature repairs one thing from another and allows nothing to be born without the aid of another's death.”

“Burning fevers flee no swifter from your body if you toss under figured counterpanes and coverlets of crimson than if you must lie in rude homespun.”

“The supply of matter in the universe was never more tightly packed than it is now, or more widely spread out. For nothing is ever added to it or subtracted from it. It follows that the movement of atoms today is no different from what it was in bygone ages and always will be. So the things that have regularly come into being will continue to come into being in the same manner; they will be and grow and flourish so far as each is allowed by the laws of nature.”