WednesdaySep 16, 2026
Quotes: 53419 Authors: 9969
A man should inure himself to voluntary labor, and not give up to indulgence and pleasure, as they beget no good constitution of body nor knowledge of mind.
Well I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite conscious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know.
Virtue does not come from wealth, but ... wealth, and every other good thing which men have ... comes from virtue.
An unexamined life is not worth living.
Often when looking at a mass of things for sale, he would say to himself, How many things I have no need of!
Where there is reverence there is fear, but there is not reverence everywhere that there is fear, because fear presumably has a wider extension than reverence.
I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good.
When desire, having rejected reason and overpowered judgment which leads to right, is set in the direction of the pleasure which beauty can inspire, and when again under the influence of its kindred desires it is moved with violent motion towards the beauty of corporeal forms, it acquires a surname from this very violent motion, and is called love.
Crito, I owe a cock to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt?
The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways I go to die, and you to live. Which is the better, God only knows.
There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.
We are in fact convinced that if we are ever to have pure knowledge of anything, we must get rid of the body and contemplate things by themselves with the soul by itself. It seems, to judge from the argument, that the wisdom which we desire and upon which we profess to have set our hearts will be attainable only when we are dead and not in our lifetime.
True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.
The only true knowledge, consists in knowing, that we know nothing,
And in knowing that you know nothing, that makes you the smartest of all.
As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.
I thought to myself, 'I am wiser than this man: neither of us knows anything that is really worthwhile, but he thinks he has knowledge when he has not, while I, having no knowledge, do not think that I have. I seem, at any rate, to be a little wiser than he is on this point: I do not think that I know what I do not know.
The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.
My belief is that to have no wants is divine.
Having the fewest wants, I am nearest to the gods.
Not life, but good life, is to be chiefly valued.
My divine sign indicates the future to me.
Death may be the greatest of all human blessings. To fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise, without being wise: for it is to think that we know what we do not know. For anything that men can tell, death may be the greatest good that can happen to them: but they fear it as if they knew quite well that it was the greatest of evils. And what is this but that shameful ignorance of thinking that we know what we do not know?
Give me beauty in the inward soul; may the outward and the inward man be at one.
Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.
He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.
I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.
Only the extremely ignorant or the extremely intelligent can resist change.
Socrates is charged with corrupting the youth of the city, and with rejecting the gods of Athens and introducing new divinities.
He is not only idle who does nothing, but he is idle who might be better employed.
If all the misfortunes of mankind were cast into a public stack in order to be equally distributed among the whole species, those who now think themselves the most unhappy would prefer the share they are already possessed of before that which would fall to them by such a division.
You think that upon the score of fore-knowledge and divining I am infinitely inferior to the swans. When they perceive approaching death they sing more merrily than before, because of the joy they have in going to the God they serve.
If a rich man is proud of his wealth, he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it.
The shortest and surest way to live with honor in the world is to be in reality what we would appear to be; and if we observe, we shall find that all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice and experience of them.
In every one of us there are two ruling and directing principles, whose guidance we follow wherever they may lead; the one being an innate desire of pleasure; the other, an acquired judgment which aspires after excellence.
Could I climb the highest place in Athens, I would lift my voice and proclaim, 'Fellow citizens, why do you turn and scrape every stone to gather wealth and take so little care of your children to whom one day you must relinquish it all?'
I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.
By all means marry; if you get a good wife youll become happy; if you get a bad one youll become a philosopher.
Employ your time in improving yourself by other mens writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for.
I know that I am intelligent, because I know that I know nothing.
And I say let a man be of good cheer about his soul. When the soul has been arrayed in her own proper jewels temperance and justice, and courage, and nobility and truth she is ready to go on her journey when the hour comes.
Bad men live to eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink in order to live.
Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions, but those who kindly reprove thy faults.
If you can do only a little. Do what you can. What you cannot enforce, do not command.
I am quite ready to acknowledge ... that I ought to be grieved at death, if I were not persuaded that I am going to other gods who are wise and good (of this I am as certain as I can be of any such matters), and to men departed who are better than those whom I leave behind. And therefore I do not grieve as I might have done, for I have good hope that there is yet something remaining for the dead.
Be of good cheer about death, and know this of a truth, that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.
Children today are tyrants. They contradict their parents, gobble their food, and tyrannize their teachers.
To gain a good reputation, endeavor to be what you desire to appear.
The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.
Contentment is natural wealth; luxury, artificial poverty.
Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.
Fame is the perfume of heroic deeds.
Happiness is unrepented pleasure.
He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth of nature.
If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.
Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.
The shortest and surest way to live with honor in the world, is to be in reality what we would appear to be; all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice And experience of them.
Be slow to fall into friendship; but when thou art in, continue firm and constant.
The end of life is to be like God, and the soul following God will be like him.
The Ancient oracle said I was the wisest of all the Greeks. It is because I alone, of all the Greeks, know that I know nothing.
See one promontory, one mountain, one sea, one river, and see all.
Our prayers should be for blessings in general, for God knows best what is good for us.
Man, know thyself.
Let him that would move the world, first move himself.
If thou continuest to take delight in idle argumentation thou mayest be qualified to combat with the sophists, but will never know how to live with men.
The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear.
All men's souls are immortal, But the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.
Be of good hope in the face of death. Believe in this one truth for certain, that no evil can befall a good man either in life or death, and that his fate is not a matter of indifference to the gods.
As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take which course he will, he will be sure to repent.
Virtue is the beauty, and vice the deformity, of the soul.
I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.
My advice to you is get married: if you find a good wife you'll be happy; if not, you'll become a philosopher.
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