Socrates Quotes
Best 65 Quotes by Socrates – Page 1 of 3
“As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take which course he will, he will be sure to repent.”
“Be as you wish to seem.”
“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”
“Be slow to fall into friendship; but when thou art in, continue firm and constant.”
“Be true to thine own self.”
“Beware the barrenness of a busy life.”
“By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you’ll become happy; if you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.”
“Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.”
“Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.”
“Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.”
“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.”
“Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.”
“Envy is the ulcer of the soul.”
“Every action has its pleasures and its price.”
“Everyone wants to tell you what to do and what’s good for you. They don’t want you to find your own answers, they want you to believe theirs.”
“From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.”
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“But there is a tension between the respect for diversity or individuality and the recognition of natural right. When liberals became impatient of the absolute limits to diversity or individuality that are imposed even by the most liberal version of natural right, they had to make a choice between natural right and the uninhibited cultivation of individuality. They chose the latter. Once this step was taken, tolerance appeared as one value or ideal among many, and not intrinsically superior to its opposite. In other words, intolerance appeared as a value equal in dignity to tolerance. But it is practically impossible to leave it at the equality of all preferences or choices. If the unequal rank of choices cannot be traced to the unequal rank of their objectives, it must be traced to the unequal rank of the acts of choosing; and this means eventually that genuine choice, as distinguished from spurious or despicable choice, is nothing but resolute or deadly serious decision. Such a decision, however, is akin to intolerance rather than to tolerance. Liberal relativism has its roots in the natural right tradition of tolerance or in the notion that everyone has a natural right to the pursuit of happiness as he understands happiness; but in itself it is a seminary of intolerance.”
“He is rich who is content with the least; for contentment is the wealth of nature.”
“He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.”
“He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.”
“How many things can I do without?”
“I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.”
“I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think.”
“I know you won't believe me, but the highest form of human excellence is to question oneself and others.”
“If you don't get what you want, you suffer; if you get what you don't want, you suffer; even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it forever. Your mind is your predicament. It wants to be free of change. Free of pain, free of the obligations of life and death. But change is law and no amount of pretending will alter that reality.”
“If you want to be a good saddler, saddle the worst horse; for if you can tame one, you can tame all.”
“Intelligent individuals learn from every thing and every one; average people, from their experiences. The stupid already have all the answers.”
“It is better to change an opinion than to persist in a wrong one.”
“Know thyself.”
“Let him who would move the world first move himself.”
“Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get your heart’s desire; the other is to get it.”
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“The most difficult thing in life is to know yourself.”
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