Epicureanism is a version of VIRTUE ETHICS in which the good life is stressed and the development of good human character is essential.

Epicurus, like other virtue theorists, held the position that what we seek is the good, and in particular the good life.  But unlike someone who might claim that the good life is the seeking and attainment of sensual pleasure and would mean that we should seek to maximize pleasure by feeling it more intensely, Epicurus' position was that we should seek pleasure as ATARAXIA.  Ataraxia is a state of tranquility where pleasure is an absence of pain as a lack of anxiety.

For Epicurus, people worry too much about things over which they have no control, and most especially in this regard, they worry about death.  Epicurus seeks to describe a life, and exhort others to become adherents to a sort of life, in which pleasure as ataraxia is the goal.

First principles of a good life:
    1.  Believe that god is a being immortal and blessed.
    2.  Remember that death is nothing to us.  Everything that is either good or evil is associated with sensation.  Since death is the absence of sensation, there is nothing either good or evil in death. Death is nothing to us, and recognizing that, we can make the mortality of life enjoyable.  There is nothing terrible in life to the person who understands that there is nothing terrible in not living.  Death does not concern either the living or the dead because for the living there is no death (because they are alive); and for the dead there is no concern with death because they are not living and do not exist.
    3.  Be free of disturbance.  This is the aim of a life of blessedness.  We always act to avoid pain and fear.  We recognize pleasure as the first good and judge everything by the good.
    4.  Grow accustomed to simple things, not luxurious things.  Simple foods alleviate hunger just as well as extravagant ones.  In fact, the simple foods are better:  they do not cause pain from excess.
 

It is absolutely necessary to know the principles of natural science.  We are naturally troubled by our suspicions and wonder about things of the universe, and about death.  For Epicurus, a person cannot dispel fears about the universe without science, so we must seek understanding rather than remain in mystery and ignorance.  Without natural science, it is impossible to attain our pleasures.

XXVII.  Friendship is the greatest possession a person can have in the quest for blessedness.