Quotes from Plato

And he who mingles music with gymnastic in the fairest proportions, and best attempers them to the soul, may be rightly called the true musician and harmonist in a far higher sense than the tuner of the strings. You are quite right, Socrates. And such a presiding genius will be always required in our State if the government is to last. Yes

He's garbage, he cares about nothing but the truth.

And such men, you know, before finding out in what way something they desire can exist, put that question aside so they won't grow weary deliberating about what's possible and not.

I mean this: we were right to agree that good men must be beneficent, and that this could not be otherwise.

No man who is not an utter fool and coward is afraid of death itself, but he is afraid of doing wrong. For to go to the world below having one's soul full of injustice is the last and worst of all evils.

Oratory is the art of enchanting the soul, and therefore he who would be an orator has to learn the differences of human souls--they are so many and of such a nature, and from them come the differences between man and man.

Yes," he said. "But what is the character of the regime? And what are the mistakes which we were saying it contains?" "First," I said, "the very thing that defines the regime is one. Reflect: if a man were to choose pilots of ships in that way—on the basis of property assessments—and wouldn't entrust one to a poor man, even if he were a more skilled pilot—" "They would make a poor sailing," he said.

May not 'the wolf,' as the proverb says, 'claim a hearing'?

the good are not so by nature...For if they were, this would follow: if the good were so by nature, we would have people who knew which among the young were good by nature; we would take those whom they had pointed out and guard them in the Acropolis, sealing them up there much more carefully than gold so that no one could corrupt them, and when they reached maturity they would be useful to their cities.

If life doesn't seem livable with the body's nature corrupted, not even with every sort of food and drink and every sort of wealth and every sort of rule, will it then be livable when the nature of that very thing by which we live is confused and corrupted, even if a man does whatever else he might want except that which will rid him of vice and injustice and will enable him to acquire justice and virtue?

That I learn of others, I replied, is quite true; but that I am ungrateful I wholly deny. Money I have none, and therefore I pay in praise, which is all I have; and how ready I am to praise any one who appears to me to speak well you will very soon find out when you answer; for I expect that you will answer well. Listen

he will find people there who, seeing the want, undertake the office of salesmen. In well-ordered states they are commonly those who are the weakest in bodily strength, and therefore of little use for any other purpose;

Tell us what complaint you have to make against us which justifies you in attempting to destroy us and the State? In the first place did we not bring you into existence? …[S]ince you were brought into the world and nurtured and educated by us, can you deny in the first place that you are our child and slave, as your fathers were before you?

justice is nothing else than the interest of the stronger.

a man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong—acting the part of a good man or of a bad.

Now actions vary according to the manner of their performance. Take, for example, that which we are now doing, drinking, singing and talking - these actions are not in themselves either good or evil, but they turn out in this or that way according to the mode of performing them; and when well done they are good, and when wrongly done they are evil; and in like manner not every love, but only that which has a noble purpose, is noble and worthy of praise.

Consider, too, how great is the encouragement which all the world gives to the lover; neither is he supposed to be doing anything dishonourable; but if he succeeds he is praised, and if he fail he is blamed.

And the love, more especially, which is concerned with the good, and which is perfected in company with temperance and justice, whether among gods or men, has the greatest power, and is the source of all our happiness and harmony, and makes us friends with the gods who are above us, and with one another.

You wouldn't know him if I told you the name. HIPPIAS: But I know right now he's an ignoramus.

the makers of fortunes have a second love of money as a creation of their own, resembling the affection of authors for their own poems, or of parents for their children, besides that natural love of it for the sake of use and profit which is common to them and all men. And hence they are very bad company, for they can talk about nothing but the praises of wealth.

For, let me tell you that the more the pleasures of the body fade away, the greater to me are the pleasure and charm of conversation.

The great enemy of Plato is the world, not exactly in the theological sense, yet in one not wholly different--the world as the hater of truth and lover of appearance, occupied in the pursuit of gain and pleasure rather than of knowledge, banded together against the few good and wise men, and devoid of true education.

If a painter, then, paints a picture of an ideally beautiful man, complete to the last detail, is he any the worse painter because he cannot show that such a man could really exist?

I can't refute you, Socrates, Agathon said, so I dare say you're right. No, said Socrates, it's the truth you can't refute, my dear Agathon. Socrates is a pushover.