DEMOC'RITUS (Gk. ..1Thu6Kptros% Demokri los). An illustrious Greek philosopher, often popularly spoken of in both ancient and modern times as 'the Laughing Philosopher,' just as lleraelitus was styled 'the Weeping Philoso pher.' Ile was born at _thilera, in Thrace.
about n.c. 470 or id°. Of his life little is known. The statement that he was first in spired with a desire for philosophic knowl edge by certain Magi and whom Xerxes had left at Alidera. on his Grevian expe dition, is ac untrustworthy as that which repre s•nts him as continually laughing at the follies mankind. His extensive travels. however, through a great portion of the East, prove his zeal for knowledge, as does also his ceaseless in dustry in collecting: the works of other phi losopher:. was by far the most learned thinker of his age. Ile had also a high reputation for moral worth, and appears to have left a strong impression of his disinterestedness, modesty. and simplicity on the mind of the emn munity, for even Tinton the Seoller, who spared no one else, praised him. The period of his death is uncertain. lie lived, however. to a great age. Only a few fragments of his limner ous physical, mathematical. ethical, and gram matical wiirk, are extant. These have been col lected by MuHach (Berlin. 1s43). Consult also Ritter and PreIler, 1/isto•ii• Gracee (7th ed., Gotha, ISSS).
Dem•ritus's system of philosophy is known as the Atomic System. Its essence in the attempt to explain the different phenomena of nature, not—like the earlier Ionic philosophers —by maintaining, that the original character istics of matter were qualitative, but that they were quantitative. Ile assume., as
the ultimate elementary ground of nature, an infinite multitude 01 indivisible corporeal par ticles, atoms (,see ATOM), and attributes to these a primary motion derived from no higher prin ciple. Tins motion brings the atoms into eon tact with each other. and from the multitudinous combinations that they form springs that vast and varying aggregate called Nature, which is ioresented to our eyes. Democritus did not acknowledge the presence of design in nature, but he admitted that of law. He believed strict ly in secondary or physical causes, but not in a primal y immaterial cause. Life. consciousness, thought were, according to him, derived from the finest atoms: tho-e images of the sensuous phenomena surrounding us which we call mental representations were to him only material im pressions, caused by the more delicate atoms streaming through the pores of our organs. De mocritus boldly applied his theory to the gods themselves, whom he affirmed to be aggregates of atoms, only mightier and more powerful than men. The ethies of Demoeritus set happiness as the aim, and by this he understands serenity of 'Min], undisturbed by fear or passions: hence temperance, uprightness, and noble actions are to be cultivated. The physical philosophy of Demoeritus was made the base of the system of Epicurus. who reared upon it a structure of ethi cal doctrine, See Emeritus: LI•HETIUS. sult Zeller. Philosophic der G•iechen, vol. i.
(Leipzig, 1893).