Plato Quotes
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The qualities of number appear to lead to the apprehension of truth.
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The human race will have no respite from evils until those who are really philosophers acquire political power or until, through some divine dispensation, those who rule and have political authority in the cities become real philosophers.
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Harmony sinks deep into the recesses of the soul and takes its strongest hold there, bringing grace also to the body & mind as well. Music is a moral law. It gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, a charm to sadness, and life to everything. It is the essence of order.
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When a Benefit is wrongly conferred, the author of the Benefit may often be said to injure.
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And all knowledge, when separated from justice and virtue, is seen to be cunning and not wisdom; wherefore make this your first and last and constant and all-absorbing aim, to exceed, if possible, not only us but all your ancestors in virtue; and know that to excel you in virtue only brings us shame, but that to be excelled by you is a source of happiness to us.
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As long as I draw breath and am able, I won't give up practicing philosophy.
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Music gives a soul to the universe.
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Any city, however small, is in fact divided into two, one the city of the poor, the other of the rich; these are at war with one another.
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What then is the right way to live? Life should be lived as play.
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Excellence" is not a gift, but a skill that takes practice. We do not act "rightly" because we are "excellent", in fact we achieve "excellence" by acting "rightly".
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Misanthropy ariseth from a man trusting another without having sufficient knowledge of his character, and, thinking him to be truthful, sincere, and honourable, finds a little afterwards that he is wicked, faithless, and then he meets with another of the same character. When a man experiences this often, and more particularly from those whom he considered his most dear and best friends, at last, having frequently made a slip, he hates the whole world, and thinks that there is nothing sound at all in any of them.
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Who are the true philosophers? Those whose passion is to love the truth.
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Whatever deceives men seems to produce a magical enchantment.
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The direction in which education starts a man will determine his future life.
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Music is a defining element of character.
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Seven years of silent inquiry are needful for a man to learn the truth, but fourteen in order to learn how to make it known to his fellow-men.
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We will be better men, braver and less idle, if we believe that one must search for the things one does not know, rather than if we believe that it is not possible to find out what we do not know and that we must not look for it.
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Herein is the evil of ignorance, that he who is neither good nor wise is nevertheless satisfied with himself: he had no desire for that of which he feels no want.
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I fear this is not the right exchange to attain virtue, to exchange pleasures for pleasures, pains for pains and fears for fears, the greater for the less like coins, but that the only valid currency for which all these things should be exchanged is wisdom.
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Take a look around, then, and see that none of the uninitiated are listening. Now by the uninitiated I mean the people who believe in nothing but what they can grasp in their hands, and who will not allow that action or generation or anything invisible can have real existence.
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One should turn towards the main ocean of the-beautiful-in-the-world so that one may by, contemplation of this Form, bring forth in all their splendor many fair fruits of discourse and meditation in a plenteous crop of philosophy.
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Man never legislates, but destinies and accidents, happening in all sorts of ways, legislate in all sorts of ways.
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It seems to me that whatever else is beautiful apart from asbsolute beauty is beautiful because it partakes of that absolute beauty, and for no other reason. Do you accept this kind of causality?
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... our purpose in founding our state was not to promote the happiness of a single class, but, so far as possible, of the whole community. Our idea was that we were most likely to justice in such a community, and so be able to decide the question we are trying to answer. We are therefore at the moment trying to construct what we think is a happy community by securing the happiness not of a select minority, but of a whole.