Quotes About Socrates

S]ome of the opinions which people entertain should be respected, and others should not.

I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good.

W]e must not let it enter our minds that there may be no validity in argument. On the contrary we should recognize that we ourselves are still intellectual invalids; but that we must brace ourselves and do our best to become healthy... No greater misfortune could happen to anyone than that of developing a dislike for argument.

Craindre la mort, Athéniens, ce n'est autre chose que se croire sage sans l'être, car c'est croire connaître ce que l'on ne connaît point.

I]n any inquiry you are likely to attain more nearly to knowledge of your object in proportion to the care and accuracy with which you have prepared yourself to understand that object in itself[.]

There is the explanation that is put in the language of the mysteries, that we men are in a kind of prison, and that one must not free oneself or run away. That seems to me an impressive doctrine and one not easy to understand fully. However, Cebes, this seems to me well expressed, that the gods are our guardians and that men are one of their possessions. Or do you not think so?

It looks as if I was cleverer than Daedalus in using my skill, my friend, insofar as he could only cause to move the things he made himself, but I can make other people's move as well as my own. And the smartest part of my skill is that I am clever without wanting to be, for I would rather have your statements to me remain unmoved than possess the wealth of Tantalus as well as the cleverness of Daedalus

SOCRATES: That since beautiful is the opposite of ugly, they are two things. GLAUCON: Of course. SOCRATES: And since they are two things, each of them is also one? GLAUCON: That's true too.

He is only a philosopher in the manner of Socrates, whom he revered above all others because he left behind no dogma, no teachings, no law, no system, only an example: the man who seeks himself in all and who seeks all in himself.

All I would ask you to be thinking of is the truth and not Socrates.

Socrates, who was a perfect model in all great qualities, ... hit on a body and face so ugly and so incongruous with the beauty of his soul, he who was so madly in love with beauty.

I collected men with interesting names. I already knew a Socrates. He was tall and ugly and intellectual and the son of some big Greek movie producer in Hollywood, but also a Catholic, which ruined it for both of us.

Socrates believed that true knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.

Socrates, Plato's teacher, had been condemned to death, as an incredulous corrupter of youth. Plato wrote several dialogues in his defense, and by the first century Socrates was considered one of the greatest sages of antiquity.

I came to philosophy first through Plato. I was very interested in Plato, the person and his works. [The] Republic is a much larger work. I was fascinated particularly by his Symposium. It is a beautiful work with Plato's signature dialogues and the speech on Socrates, Aristophanes and others. I read the history of western philosophy and eventually moved to Indian philosophy.

Poetry, it is often said and loudly so, is life's true mirror. But a monkey looking into a work of literature looks in vain for Socrates.

Socrates "was asked why seawater had become salty. He replied: If you can indicate to me the use that will come to you from knowing the answer to this question, I shall give you the reason." And Diogenes, "seeing a youth with a lamp, said to him: Do you know where this - fire comes from? The youth replied: If you can tell me where it goes to, I shall tell you where it comes from, thus effectively silencing Diogenes, something nobody else had been able to do.

Since nothing I can say would be able to pierce your delusions, let the fact that I make no arguments stand as ultimate proof that I am right. As Plato once said that his friend Socrates once said, "I know that I'm right because I'm the only person humble enough to admit that I'm not." Or something like that. I

Socrates was a funny little Greek man best known for forgetting to write things down and for screaming, "Look, I'm a philosopher!" in the middle of a No Philosophy zone. (He was later forced to eat his words. Along with some poison.)

The injunction to know oneself can be found in many traditions, including the Western philosophical tradition that goes back to Socrates. According to Zen, however, to truly discover what the self is, we need a more direct path than mere intellectual reasoning.

Socrates pointed out that we carry on as though death were the greatest of all calamities—yet, for all we know, it might be the greatest of all blessings.

To tolerate Socrates would be to say to him that we care so little for our way of life that we are willing to let you challenge and impugn it every day.

Death is inevitable: does it matter when it comes? When Socrates was told that the Thirty Tyrants had condemned him to death, he retorted, 'And nature, them!'. How absurd to anguish over our passing into freedom from all anguish.

Estas empanadas de lugares comunes con que tantas personas economizan su estudio, apenas sirven para asuntos comunes, y solo para mostrarnos, no para conducirnos: fruto ridículo de la ciencia, que Sócrates censura tan graciosamente en Eutidemo. Yo