a sect of ancient philosophers, so called from their founder Aristippus of Cyrene, a disciple of Socrates.

The great principle of their doctrine was, that the supreme good of man in this life is pleasure; whereby they not only meant a privation of pain, and a tranquillity of mind, but an assemblage of all mental and sensual pleasures, particularly the last.

Cicero makes frequent mention of Aristippus's school, and speaks of it as yielding debauchees. Three disciples of Aristippus, after his death, divided the sect into three branches; under which division it languished and sunk: the first called the Hegesiac school; the second the Annicerian; and the third the Theodorian; from the names of their authors.