Plato Quotes
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Mathematics is like draughts in being suitable for the young, not too difficult, amusing, and without peril to the state.
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You cannot conceive the many without the one.
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No one punishes the evil-doer under the notion, or for the reason, that he has done wrong -- only the unreasonable fury of a beast acts in that way. But he who desires to inflict rational punishment does not retaliate for a past wrong, for that which is done cannot be undone, but he has regard to the future, and is desirous that the man who is punished, and he who sees him punished, may be deterred from doing wrong again.
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In order to seek one's own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life.
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Wonder is the beginning of the desire to know the beautiful and the good.
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To be curious about that which is not one's concern while still in ignorance of oneself is ridiculous.
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And among the other honours and rewards our young men can win for distinguished service in war and in other activities, will be more frequent opportunities to sleep with a woman; this will give us a pretext for ensuring that most of our children are born of that parent.
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Love' is the name for our pursuit of wholeness, for our desire to be complete.
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If the head and the body are to be well, you must begin by curing the soul.
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Art has no end but its own perfection.
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Let us describe the education of our men. What then is the education to be? Perhaps we could hardly find a better than that which the experience of the past has already discovered, which consists, I believe, in gymnastic, for the body, and music for the mind.
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To conquer oneself is the best and noblest victory; to be vanquished by one's own nature is the worst and most ignoble defeat.
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Music is a more potent instrument than any other for education.
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Being well satisfied that, for a man who thinks himself to be somebody, there is nothing more disgraceful than to hold himself up as honored, not on his own account, but for the sake of his forefathers. Yet hereditary honors are a noble and splendid treasure to descendants.
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No attempt of curing the body should be made without curing the soul.
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I never did anything worth doing by accident, nor did any of my inventions come by accident; they came by work.
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. . . Then anyone who leaves behind him a written manual, and likewise anyone who receives it, in the belief that such writing will be clear and certain, must be exceedingly simple-minded. . . .
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The disposition of noble dogs is to be gentle with people they know and the opposite with those they don't know...How, then, can the dog be anything other than a lover of learning since it defines what's its own and what's alien.
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Do not expect justice where might is right.
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True opinions are a fine thing and do all sorts of good so long as they stay in their place; but they will not stay long. They run away from a man's mind, so they are not worth much until you tether them by working out the reason. Once they are tied down, they become knowledge, and are stable.
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I do believe that there are gods, and in a far higher sense than that in which any of my accusers believe in them.
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It behooves those who take the young to task to leave them room for excuse, lest they drive them to be hardened by too much rebuke.
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A house that has a library in it has a soul.
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Since those who rule in the city do so because they own a lot, I suppose they're unwilling to enact laws to prevent young people who've had no discipline from spending and wasting their wealth, so that by making loans to them, secured by the young people's property, and then calling those loans in, they themselves become even richer and more honored.