Socrates Quotes
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Why should we pay so much attention to what the majority thinks?
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Wars and revolutions and battles are due simply and solely to the body and its desires. All wars are undertaken for the acquisition of wealth; and the reason why we have to acquire wealth is the body, because we are slaves in its service.
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For this fear of death is indeed the pretense of wisdom, and not real wisdom, being the appearance of knowing the unknown; since no one knows whether death, which they in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good.
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A painter will paint a cobbler, carpenter, or any other artist, though he knows nothing of their arts; and, if he is a good artist, he may deceive children or simple persons, when he shows them his picture of a carpenter from a distance, and they will fancy that they are looking at a real carpenter.
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Whenever a number of individuals have a common name, we assume them to have also a corresponding idea or form.
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Just as you ought not to attempt to cure eyes without head or head without body, so you should not treat body without soul.
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If the whole world depends on today's youth, I can't see the world lasting another 100 years.
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To use words and phrases in an easygoing manner without scrutinizing them too curiously is not in general a mark of ill-breeding. On the contrary, there is something low-bred in being too precise. But sometimes there is no help for it.
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Do not grieve over someone who changes all of the sudden. It might be that he has given up acting and returned to his true self.
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They are not only idle who do nothing, but they are idle also who might be better employed.
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If a man comes to the door of poetry untouched by the madness of the Muses, believing that technique alone will make him a good poet, he and his sane compositions never reach perfection, but are utterly eclipsed by the performances of the inspired madman.
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May I consider the wise man rich, and may I have such wealth as only the self-restrained man can bear or endure.
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We are in fact convinced that if we are ever to have pure knowledge of anything, we must get rid of the body and contemplate things by themselves with the soul by itself. It seems, to judge from the argument, that the wisdom which we desire and upon which we profess to have set our hearts will be attainable only when we are dead and not in our lifetime.
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If you would seek health, look first to the spine.
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There is no illness of the body except for the mind.
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Are you not ashamed of your eagerness to possess as much wealth, reputation, and honors as possible, while you do not care for nor give thought to wisdom or truth, or the best possible state of your soul?
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Regard your good name as the richest jewel you can possibly be possessed of - for credit is like fire; when once you have kindled it you may easily preserve it, but if you once extinguish it, you will find it an arduous task to rekindle it again. The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear.
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Whatever authority I may have rests solely on knowing how little I know.
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You think that upon the score of fore-knowledge and divining I am infinitely inferior to the swans. When they perceive approaching death they sing more merrily than before, because of the joy they have in going to the God they serve.
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Do it because it's in your heart. Not because you want something in return. Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for.
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To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge. For a man who claims to have knowledge, while actually knowing nothing, is less smarter than you, who claim to know nothing.
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There are beds and tables in the world - plenty of them, are there not? But there are only two ideas or forms of them - one the idea of a bed, the other of a table.
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Beauty comes first. Victory is secondary. What matters is joy.
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I was afraid that by observing objects with my eyes and trying to comprehend them with each of my other senses I might blind my soul altogether.