Plato Quotes

That man is wisest who, like Socrates, realizes that his wisdom is worthless

When the music changes, the walls of the city shake.

I know too well that these arguments from probabilities are imposters, and unless great caution is observed in the use of them, they are apt to be deceptive.

Integrity is your destiny-it is the light that guides your way.

Too much attention to health is a hindrance to learning, to invention, and to studies of any kind, for we are always feeling suspicious shootings and swimmings in our heads, and we are prone to blame studies from them.

He, O men, is the wisest, who, like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing.

Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back.

Let us affirm what seems to be the truth, that, whether one is or is not, one and the others in relation to themselves and one another, all of them, in every way, are and are not, and appear to be and appear not to be.

Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly.

To do injustice is more disgraceful than to suffer it.

All well bred men should have mastered the art of singing and dancing.

'But the man who is ready to taste every form of knowledge, is glad to learn and never satisfied - he's the man who deserves to be called a philosopher, isn't he?'

To honor with hymns and panegyrics those who are still alive is not safe; a man should run his course and make a fair ending, and then we will praise him; and let praise be given equally to women as well as men who have been distinguished in virtue.

Let men of all ranks whether they are successful, or unsuccessful, whether they triumph or not; let them do their duty, and rest satisfied.

It is a common saying, and in everybody's mouth, that life is but a sojourn.

You are mistaken, my friend, if you think that a man who is worth anything ought to spend his time weighing up the prospects of life and death. He has only one thing to consider in performing any action - that is, whether he is acting rightly or wrongly, like a good man or a bad one.

Whereas the truth is that the State in which the rulers are most reluctant to govern is always the best and most quietly governed, and the State in which they are most eager, the worst.

As it is, the lover of inquiry must follow his beloved wherever it may lead him.

All soul is immortal. For that which is always in movement is immortal; that which moves something else, and is moved by something else, in ceasing from movement ceases from living. So only that which moves itself, because it does not abandon itself, never stops moving. But it is also source and first principle of movement for the other things which move.

They ought to be gentle to their friends and dangerous to their enemies.

He who wishes to serve his country must have not only the power to think, but the will to act

There must always remain something that is antagonistic to good.

For neither birth, nor wealth, nor honors, can awaken in the minds of men the principles which should guide those who from their youth aspire to an honorable and excellent life, as Love awakens them

The worst form of injustice is pretended justice.

The life which is not examined is not worth living.

There is no harm in repeating a good thing.

This world is indeed a living being endowed with a soul and intelligence ... a single visible living entity containing all other living entities, which by their nature are all related.

Socrates said that, from above, the Earth looks like one of those twelve-patched leathern balls.

Reality is created by the mind, we can change our reality by changing our mind.

You cannot conceive the many without the one.

What is honored in a country will be cultivated there.

And what shall he suffer who slays him who of all men, as they say, is his own best friend? I mean the suicide, who deprives himself by violence of his appointed share of life. Not because the law of the state requires him. Nor yet under the compulsion of some painful and inevitable misfortune which has come upon him. Nor because he has had to suffer from irremediable and intolerable shame, but who from sloth or want of manliness imposes upon himself an unjust penalty.

For a man to conquer himself is the first and noblest of all victories... The first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself; to be conquered by yourself is of all things most shameful and vile.

The natural function of the wing is to soar upwards and carry that which is heavy up to the place where dwells the race of gods. More than any other thing that pertains to the body it partakes of the nature of the divine.

The blame is his who chooses: God is blameless.

In order to seek one's own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life.

For all good and evil, whether in the body or in human nature, originates ... in the soul, and overflows from thence, as from the head into the eyes.

Everything that deceives does so by casting a spell.

Excellent things are rare.

The true runner comes to the finish and receives the prize and is crowned.

The doctors will treat those of your citizens whose physical and psychological constitution is good: as for the others, they will leave the unhealthy to die and those whose psychological constitution is incurably warped they will be put to death.

As it is, lovers of inquiry must follow their beloved wherever it may lead.

Love is born into every human being; it calls back the halves of our original nature together; it tries to make one out of two and heal the wound of human nature.

Only those who do not seek power are qualified to hold it.

God is not the author of all things, but of good only.

An old man is twice a child, and so is a drunken man.

...the Gods too love a joke.

The punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is to live under the government of worse men.