Certainly it was no design of the atoms to place themselves in a particular order, nor did they decide what motions each should have. But atoms were struck with blows in many ways and carried along by their own weight from infinite times up to the present. They have been accustomed to move and to meet in all manner of ways. For this reason, it came to pass that being spread abroad through a vast time and trying every sort of combination and motion, at length those come together that produce great things, like earth and sea and sky and the generation of living creatures.

Human life lay foul before men's eyes, crushed to the dust beneath religion's weight.

Victory puts us on a level with heaven.

To ask for power is forcing uphill a stone which after all rolls back again from the summit and seeks in headlong haste the levels of the plain.

Even if I knew nothing of the atoms, I would venture to assert on the evidence of the celestial phenomena themselves, supported by many other arguments, that the universe was certainly not created for us by divine power: it is so full of imperfections.

From the very fountain of enchantment there arises a taste of bitterness to spread anguish amongst the flowers.

Though the dungeon, the scourge, and the executioner be absent, the guilty mind can apply the goad and scorch with blows.