Plato Quotes
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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.
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Music then is simply the result of the effects of Love on rhythm and harmony.
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There are three arts which are concerned with all things: one which uses, another which makes, and a third which imitates them.
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They would be subject to no one, neither to lawful ruler nor to the reign of law, but would be altogether and absolutely free. That is the way they got their tyrants, for either servitude or freedom, when it goes to extremes, is an utter bane, while either in due measure is altogether a boon.
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When you admonish a wrongdoer, do so gently, that it may not lead to hostility.
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No town can live peacefully whatever its laws when its citizens do nothing but feast and drink and tire themselves out in the cares of love.
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When the mind is thinking it is talking to itself.
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Is it not true that the clever rogue is like the runner who runs well for the first half of the course, but flags before reaching the goal: he is quick off the mark, but ends in disgrace and slinks away crestfallen and uncrowned. The crown is the prize of the really good runner who perseveres to the end.
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Seek truth while you are young, for if you do not, it will later escape your grasp.
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Some thoughtlessly proclaim the Muses nine: A tenth is Sappho, maid divine.
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Music is moral law. It is the essence of order and leads to all that is good, true and beautiful.
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The science [geometry] is pursued for the sake of the knowledge of what eternally exists, and not of what comes for a moment into existence, and then perishes.
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Of all the Gods, Love is the best friend of humankind, the helper and healer of all ills that stand in the way of human happiness.
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Let nobody speak mischief of anybody.
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For good nurture and education implant good constitutions.
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That politician who curries favor with the citizens and indulges them and fawns upon them and has a presentiment of their wishes, and is skillful in gratifying them, he is esteemed a great statesman.
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The wisest have the most authority.
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For not by art does the poet sing, but by power divine. Had he learned by rules of art, he would have known how to speak not of one theme only, but of all; and therefore God takes away the minds of poets, and uses them as his ministers, as he also uses diviners and holy prophets, in order that we who hear them may know them to be speaking not of themselves who utter these priceless words in a state of unconsciousness, but that God himself is the speaker, and that through them he is conversing with us.
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Observe that open loves are held to be more honourable than secret ones, and that the love of the noblest and highest, even if their persons are less beautiful than others, is especially honourable.
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Few men are so obstinate in their atheism, that a pressing danger will not compel them to acknowledgment of a divine power.
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Experience proves that anyone who has studied geometry is infinitely quicker to grasp difficult subjects than one who has not.
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And the true order of going, or being led by another, to the things of love, is to begin from the beauties of earth and mount upwards for the sake of that other beauty, using these steps only, and from one going on to two, and from two to all fair forms to fair practices, and from fair practices to fair notions, until from fair notions he arrives at the notion of absolute beauty, and at last knows what the essence of beauty is.
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All knowledge is but remembrance.
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The most important part of education is proper training in the nursery.