Plato Quotes
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Through obedience learn to command.
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Until philosophers are kings, or the kings and princes of this world have the spirit and power of philosophy, and political greatness and wisdom meet in one, and those commoner natures who pursue either to the exclusion of the other are compelled to stand aside, cities will never have rest from their evils - no, nor the human race, as I believe - and then only will this our State have a possibility of life and behold the light of day.
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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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... 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.
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Courage is knowing what to fear.
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Violent pleasures which reach the soul through the body are generally of this sort-they are reliefs of pain.
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No intelligent man will ever be so bold as to put into language those things which his reason has contemplated.
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The true lover of learning then must his earliest youth, as far as in him lies, desire all truth.... He whose desires are drawn toward knowledge in every form will be absorbed in the pleasures of the soul, and will hardly feel bodily pleasures I mean, if he be a true philosopher and not a sham one ... Then how can he who has the magnificence of mind and is the spectator of all times and all existence, think much of human life He cannot. Or can such a one account death fearful No indeed.
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Time on its back bears all things far away - Full many a challenge is wrought by many a day - Shape, fortune, name, and nature all decay.
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Love is of something, and that which love desires is not that which love is or has; for no man desires that which he is or has. And love is of the beautiful, and therefore has not the beautiful. And the beautiful is the good, and therefore, in wanting and desiring the beautiful, love also wants and desires the good.
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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 hiom.
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The most effective kind of education is that a child should play amongst lovely things.
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[The Cretans have] more wit than words.
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The prison of lust is just that very one of which the soul shuts the doors upon herself; for each act of indulgence is the shooting of a fresh bolt.
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Can any man be courageous who has the fear of death in him?
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Each man is capable of doing one thing well. If he attempts several, he will fail to achieve distinction in any.
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I should not like to say ... that any kind of knowledge is not to be learned; for all knowledge appears to be a good.
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What essence is to generation, that truth is to belief.
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...that in our state one man was to do one job, and the job he was naturally most suited for .. And further, we have often heard and often said that justice consists of minding your own business and not interfering with other people.
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Musical innovation is full of danger to the State, for when modes of music change, the laws of the State always change with them.
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The mortal nature is seeking as far as is possible to be everlasting and immortal: and this is only to be attained by generation, because the new is always left in the place of the old.
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The like is not the friend of the like in as far as he is like; still the good may be the friend of the good in as far as he is good.
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When anything is in the presence of evil, but is not as yet evil, the presence of good arouses the desire of good in that thing; but the presence of evil, which makes a thing evil, takes away the desire and friendship of the good; for that which was once both good and evil has now become evil only, and the good has no friendship with evil.
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To think truly is noble and to be deceived is base.