Socrates

“Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.”

“I honor and love you: but why do you who are citizens of the great and mighty nation care so much about laying up the greatest amount of money and honor And reputation, and so little amount wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul? Re you not ashamed of these?... I do nothing but go about persuading you all, not to take thought for your persons and your properties, but first and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by more, but that from virtue comes money and every other good of man. ”

“Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.”

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

“There is no greater evil one can suffer than to hate reasonable discourse.”

“The greatest blessing granted to mankind come by way of madness, which is a divine gift.”

“Well, then, let’s not just trust the likelihood based on painting.”

“I did not care for the things that most people care about– making money, having a comfortable home, high military or civil rank, and all the other activities, political appointments, secret societies, party organizations, which go on in our city . . . I set myself to do you– each one of you, individually and in private– what I hold to be the greatest possible service. I tried to persuade each one of you to concern himself less with what he has than with what he is, so as to render himself as excellent and as rational as possible.”

“If a man comes to the door of poetry untouched by the madness of the Muses, believing that technique alone will make him a good poet, he and his sane compositions never reach perfection, but are utterly eclipsed by the performances of the inspired madman.”

“Beware the barrenness of a busy life.”

“The really important thing is not to live, but to live well. And to live well meant, along with more enjoyable things in life, to live according to your principles.”

“Be slow to fall into friendship, but when you are in, continue firm and constant.”

“Conocerse a uno mismo, ese es el principio fundamental de la verdadera sabiduría Humana.”

“If you want to be a good saddler, saddle the worst horse; for if you can tame one, you can tame all.”

“To express oneself badly is not only faulty as far as the language goes, but does some harm to the soul.”

“…money and honour have no attraction for them; good men do not wish to be openly demanding payment for governing and so to get the name of hirelings, nor by secretly helping themselves out of the public revenues to get the name of thieves. And not being ambitious they do not care about honour. Wherefore necessity must be laid upon them, and they must be induced to serve from the fear of punishment. And this, as I imagine, is the reason why the forwardness to take office, instead of waiting to be compelled, has been deemed dishonourable. Now the worst part of the punishment is that he who refuses to rule is liable to be ruled by one who is worse than himself. And the fear of this, as I conceive, induces the good to take office, not because they would, but because they cannot help — not under the idea that they are going to have any benefit or enjoyment themselves, but as a necessity, and because they are not able to commit the task of ruling to any one who is better than themselves, or indeed as good. For there is reason to think that if a city were composed entirely of good men, then to avoid office would be as much an object of contention as to obtain office is at present…”

“Wen das Wort nicht schlägt, den schlägt auch der Stock nicht.”

“Envy is the ulcer of the soul.”

“We cannot live better than in seeking to become better.”

“I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think”

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.”

“Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions; but those who kindly reprove thy faults.”

“Be of good cheer about death, and know this of a truth, that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.”

“He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.”

“He is not only idle who does nothing, but he is idle who might be better employed.”

“The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.”

“Children nowadays are tyrants. They contradict their parents, gobble their food, and tyrannise their teachers.”

“The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our separate ways, I to die, and you to live. Which of these two is better only God knows.”

“Semper Ubi Sub Ubi”

“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.”

“Every action has its pleasures and its price.”

“If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be content to take their own and depart.”

“I examined the poets, and I look on them as people whose talent overawes both themselves and others, people who present themselves as wise men and are taken as such, when they are nothing of the sort.From poets, I moved to artists. No one was more ignorant about the arts than I; no one was more convinced that artists possessed really beautiful secrets. However, I noticed that their condition was no better than that of the poets and that both of them have the same misconceptions. Because the most skillful among them excel in their specialty, they look upon themselves as the wisest of men. In my eyes, this presumption completely tarnished their knowledge. As a result, putting myself in the place of the oracle and asking myself what I would prefer to be — what I was or what they were, to know what they have learned or to know that I know nothing — I replied to myself and to the god: I wish to remain who I am.We do not know — neither the sophists, nor the orators, nor the artists, nor I— what the True, the Good, and the Beautiful are. But there is this difference between us: although these people know nothing, they all believe they know something; whereas, I, if I know nothing, at least have no doubts about it. As a result, all this superiority in wisdom which the oracle has attributed to me reduces itself to the single point that I am strongly convinced that I am ignorant of what I do not know.”

“Know thyself.”

“I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world."[As quoted in Plutarch's Of Banishment]”

“To find yourself, think for yourself.”

“Let him who would move the world first move himself.”

“And therefore if the head and the body are to be well, you must begin by curing the soul; that is the first and essential thing. And the care of the soul, my dear youth, has to be effected by the use of certain charms, and these charms are fair words; and by them temperance is implanted in the soul, and where temperance comes and stays, there health is speedily imparted, not only to the head, but to the whole body.”

“There is no solution; seek it lovingly ”

“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.”

“Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.”

“The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.”

“Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.”

“Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.”

“Well, although I do not suppose that either of us know anything really beautiful & good, I am better off than he is- for he knows nothing & thinks that he knows; I neither know nor think that I know.”

“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”

“Esteemed friend, citizen of Athens, the greatest city in the world, so outstanding in both intelligence and power, aren't you ashamed to care so much to make all the money you can, and to advance your reputation and prestige--while for truth and wisdom and the improvement of your soul you have no care or worry?”

“Prefer knowledge to wealth, for the one is transitory, the other perpetual.”

“Wonder is the beginning of wisdom.”

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”