Dreaming Lucretius : Diderot, Le Rêve de d'Alembert and the On the Nature of Things

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Diderot appreciated Lucretius’poem which was an early introduction for him to the ancient atomists’philosophy. He probably intended the Rêve de d’Alembert to be a modern De rerum natura, positing the most daring hypotheses of his own philosophy of nature. However, the way the Encyclopedist was influenced by his model appears to be a complex one. If he clearly contradicts certain atomist theses, notably as they concerned the origin of living beings, this is doubtless due to his fidelity to a profound epicurean principle, that of the complete autonomy of natural forces, which, in his opinion, needs to be defended on new grounds. Beyond its literal statements, one can thus follow in the Rêve the principal intelligible frameworks characteristic of the DRN, as well as a poetic mode of writing inspired by Lucretius intended to arouse the speculative imagination.