To enjoy the things we ought and to hate the things we ought has the greatest bearing on excellence of character.

It is better for a city to be governed by a good man than by good laws.

Dissimilarity of habit tends more than anything to destroy affection.

Laws, when good, should be supreme; and that the magistrate or magistrates should regulate those matters only on which the laws are unable to speak with precision owing to the difficulty of any general principle embracing all particulars.

Since the whole city has one end, it is manifest that education should be one and the same for all, and that it should be public, and not private - not as at present, when every one looks after his own children separately, and gives them separate instruction of the sort which he thinks best; the training in things which are of common interest should be the same for all. Neither must we suppose that any one of the citizens belongs to himself, for they all belong to the state, and are each of them a part of the state, and the care of each part is inseparable from the care of the whole.

He who confers a benefit on anyone loves him better than he is beloved.

The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.