Editing Epicureanism (section)

===Letters of Epicurus===
Three letters of Epicurus are preserved by Diogenes Laertius.

====Letter to Herodotus====
Epicurus' ''Letter to Herodotus'' (not the historian)<ref>{{cite web |last1=Naragon |first1=S |title=Letter to Herodotus |url=https://users.manchester.edu/Facstaff/SSNaragon/Online/texts/316/Epicurus,%20LetterHerodotus.pdf |website=manchester.edu |publisher=Manchester University, Indiana |access-date=13 June 2021}}</ref> was written as an introduction to [[Epicurean]] philosophy and method of studying nature. It included the most complete detail of the ancient conversations that led to the development of atomist theory, a doctrine of innumerable worlds, and an explanation of the phenomenon of time that posits an early form of relativism.<ref>{{citation |title=Review: The Letter to Herodotus  |author=A. A. Long |journal=[[The Classical Review]] |volume=24 |year= 1974 |pages=46–48 |doi=10.1017/S0009840X00241723 |jstor=709864 |s2cid=161797217 }}</ref> Epicurus' ''[[Letter to Herodotus]]'' appears to be a summary of ''On Nature'', books I–XIII.<ref>{{cite book|last=Sedley |first= David| contribution=Theophrastus and Epicurean Physics|editor1-last=van Ophuijsen|editor1-first=J. M.|editor2-last=van Raalte|editor2-first= Marlein | title=Theophrastus: Reappraising the sources |publisher=Transaction Publishers | year=1998 | isbn=1560003286 | page=346 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mcfVtYsaGmIC&pg=PA346 }}</ref>

====Letter to Pythocles====
Epicurus' ''Letter to Pythocles'' is the second letter preserved by [[Diogenes Laertius]] in The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Yonge |first1=Charles Duke |title=Letter to Pythocles |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/57342/57342-h/57342-h.htm#Page_455 |website=Gutenberg.org |publisher=G. BELL AND SONS, LTD. |access-date=27 September 2023}}</ref> In Letter to Pythocles, Epicurus treats the things for which there is uncertainty in how they occur. His train of thought is explicated through meteorological phenomena: various weather events as well as celestial phenomena in space such as asteroids, the creation and destruction of cosmoi, and the paths of planetary bodies through space. In Epicurus' time, long before any modern technological advances such as microscopes or telescopes which allow us to establish greater knowledge of these phenomena, these were all examples of things that, as far as the limits of human knowledge extended, it was impossible to establish certainty with regards to their causes, or how they occurred. Epicurus elaborates on how one may reason regarding such things so as to come to reasonable conclusions without undue certainty, so as to maintain [[Ataraxia]].

====Letter to Menoeceus====
Epicurus' ''Letter to Menoeceus'' is a summary of his ethical teachings written in the epistolary literary style, and addressed to a student. It addresses theology, the hierarchies of desires, how to carry choices and avoidances in order to achieve net pleasure, and other aspects of [[Epicurean]] [[ethics]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.the-philosophy.com/epicurus-letter-menoeceus-summary|title=Epicurus: Letter to Menoeceus (Summary)|work=The-Philosophy|date=21 May 2012 |accessdate=2018-12-21}}</ref>