Plato Quotes
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I would have you imagine, then, that there exists in the mind of man a block of wax... and that we remember and know what is imprinted as long as the image lasts; but when the image is effaced, or cannot be taken, then we forget or do not know.
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Do not train children to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds.
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Many men are loved by their enemies, and hated by their friends, and are the friends of their enemies, and the enemies of their friends.
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Is what is moral commanded by God because it is moral, or is it moral because it is commanded by God?
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Music then is simply the result of the effects of Love on rhythm and harmony.
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Take charge of your thoughts. You can do what you will with them.
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The choice of souls was in most cases based on their own experience of a previous life... Knowledge easily acquired is that which the enduing self had in an earlier life, so that it flows back easily.
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There is far greater peril in buying knowledge than in buying meat and drink.
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Fields and trees are not willing to teach me anything; but this can be effected by men residing in the city.
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Just as it would be madness to settle on medical treatment for the body of a person by taking an opinion poll of the neighbors, so it is irrational to prescribe for the body politic by polling the opinions of the people at large.
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All the gold upon the earth and all the gold beneath it, does not compensate for lack of virtue.
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Was not this ... what we spoke of as the great advantage of wisdom -- to know what is known and what is unknown to us?
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Then not only an old man, but also a drunkard, becomes a second time a child.
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...that not life, but a good life, is to be chiefly valued.
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We must, if we are to be consistent, and if we re to have a real pedigree herd, mate the best of our men with the best of our women as often as possible, and the inferior men with the inferior women as seldom as possible, and keep only the offspring of the best.
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The most beautiful motion is that which accomplishes the greatest results with the least amount of effort.
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The purpose of education is to give to the body and to the soul all the beauty and all the perfection of which they are capable.
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The souls of people, on their way to Earth-life, pass through a room full of lights; each takes a taper - often only a spark - to guide it in the dim country of this world. But some souls, by rare fortune, are detained longer - have time to grasp a handful of tapers, which they weave into a torch. These are the torch-bearers of humanity - its poets, seers and saints, who lead and lift the race out of darkness, toward the light. They are the law-givers and saviors, the light-bringers, way-showers and truth-tellers, and without them, humanity would lose its way in the dark.
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Much more wretched than lackof health inthe body, it is to dwell with a soul that is not healthy, but corrupt.
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Everywhere there is one principle of justice, which is the interest of the stronger.
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No one knows whether death is really the greatest blessing a man can have, but they fear it is the greatest curse, as if they knew well.
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It gives me great pleasure to converse with the aged. They have been over the road that all of us must travel, and know where it is rough and difficult and where it is level and easy.
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Nothing ever is, everything is becoming.
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Poets do not compose their poems with knowledge, but by some inborn talent and by inspiration, like seers and prophets who also say many fine things without any understanding of what they say.