The New International Encyclopædia/Diogenes Laërtius

​DIOGENES, Laërtius. A Greek writer, a native of Laërte, in Cilicia. He flourished apparently about the beginning of the third century A.D. The details of his life are not known to us. His chief work, Lives of Philosophers, in ten books, is a history of Greek philosophy from its beginnings. Diogenes, however, lacked the ability to handle his subject, and his interest lay rather in collecting biographical anecdotes and selecting passages from the works of his predecessors than in undertaking a critical account of the development of philosophic thought. Furthermore, he drew, not from original works, but from compendia and histories, especially from the writings of Diocles, Nicias, and Favorinus. Yet his work has preserved many valuable facts of which otherwise we should be ignorant. Especially interesting are the three letters of Epicurus to Herodotus, Pythocles, and Menœceus, quoted in book 10. The authenticity of the second letter, however, is questioned. Diogenes also composed epigrams, some of which are quoted in his larger work. The Lives are edited by Cobet (Paris, 1850, 1862).