Plato Quotes
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By education I mean that training in excellence from youth upward which makes a man passionately desire to be a perfect citizen, and teaches him to rule, and to obey, with justice. This is the only education which deserves the name.
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A house that has a library in it has a soul.
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Socrates said that, from above, the Earth looks like one of those twelve-patched leathern balls.
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Μίμησιν μὲν γὰρ δὴ καὶ ἀπεικασίαν τὰ παρὰ πάντων ἡμῶν ῥηθέντα χρεών που γενέσθαι.
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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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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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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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Let him know how to choose the mean and avoid the extremes on either side, as far as possible. . . . For this is the way of happiness.
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He is unworthy of the name of man who is ignorant of the fact that the diagonal of a square is incommensurable with its side.
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There should be no element of slavery in learning. Enforced exercise does no harm to the body, but enforced learning will not stay in the mind. So avoid compulsion, and let your children's lessons take the form of play.
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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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Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history.
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He who without the Muse's madness in his soul comes knocking at the door of poesy and thinks that art will make him anything fit to be called a poet, finds that the poetry which he indites in his sober senses is beaten hollow by the poetry of madmen.
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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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The direction in which education starts a man will determine his future life.
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For every man who has learned to fight in arms will desire to learn the proper arrangement of an army, which is the sequel of the lesson.
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And we must beg Homer and the other poets not to be angry if we strike out these and similar passages, not because they are unpoetical, or unattractive to the popular ear, but because the greater the poetical charm in them, the less are they meet for the ears of boys and men who are meant to be free, and who should fear slavery more than death.
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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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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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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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If the head and the body are to be well, you must begin by curing the soul.
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Man is a prisoner who has no right to open the door of his prison and run away... A man should wait, and not take his own life until God summons him.
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The god, O men, seems to me to be really wise; and by his oracle to mean this, that the wisdom of this world is foolishness and of none effect.