Plato Quotes

If you do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you are doomed to live under the rule of fools.

Reality is created by the mind, we can change our reality by changing our mind.

No one is more hated than he who speaks the truth.

A wise man speaks because he has something to say; a fool because he has to say something.

Be kind. Every person you meet is fighting a difficult battle.

Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws.

The right question is usually more important than the right answer.

Don't force your children into your ways, for they were created for a time different from your own.

The first and the best victory is to conquer self.

Human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and knowledge.

Mankind will never see an end of trouble until lovers of wisdom come to hold political power, or the holders of power become lovers of wisdom

I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing.

The worst form of injustice is pretended justice.

Just as bees make honey from thyme, the strongest and driest of herbs, so do the wise profit from the most difficult of experiences.

Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber.

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".

Opinion is the medium between knowledge and ignorance.

The one who learns and learns and doesn't practice is like the one who plows and plows and never plants.

To begin is the most important part of any quest and by far the most courageous.

Enjoy life. There's plenty of time to be dead. Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.

Poverty doesn't come because of the decrease of wealth but because of the increase of desires.

When you feel grateful, you become great, and eventually attract great things.

The measure of a man is what he does with power.

One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.

Knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.

Music is to the mind as air is to the body.

Maximize the power of the beliefs that strengthen you and neutralize those that weaken you.

Atheism is a disease of the soul before it becomes an error of understanding.

Better a good enemy than a bad friend.

The wrong use of a thing is far worse than the non-use.

If you think your child's academic studies are more important than the arts, think again.

Complacent ignorance is the most lethal sickness of the soul

I know nothing more worthy of a man's ambition than that his son be the best of men.

Democracy leads to anarchy, which is mob rule.

A nation will prosper to the degree that it honors it's teachers.

In an honest man there is always something of a child.

I fast for greater physical and mental efficiency

The three wishes of every man: to be healthy, to be rich by honest means, and to be beautiful.

To win over your bad self is the grandest and foremost of victories.

No evil can happen to a good man either in life or after death.

All knowledge is but remembrance.

Nothing ever is, everything is becoming.

To do injustice is the greatest of all evils.

Don't quarrel with your parents even if you are on the right.

More will be accomplished, and better, and with more ease, if every man does what he is best fitted to do, and nothing else.

If a man neglects education, he walks lame to the end of his life.

Knowledge of the soul is the only universal truth and the only wisdom - all other knowledge is transient.

All learning is in the learner, not the teacher.

Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.

A house that has a library in it has a soul.

The highest form of pure thought is in mathematics.

Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul

Better to complete a small task well, than to do much imperfectly.

Better to be unborn than untaught, for ignorance is the root of all misfortune.

A grateful mind is a great mind which eventually attracts to itself great things.

Money-makers are tiresome company, as they have no standard but cash value.

Ignorance, the root and the stem of every evil.

People too smart to get involved in politics are doomed to live in societies run by people who aren't.

A good decision is based on knowledge, and not on numbers.

True friendship can exist only between equals.

Life should be lived as play.

There are three classes of men; lovers of wisdom, lovers of honor, and lovers of gain.

Knowledge is the rediscovering of our own insight.

Where love reigns, there's no need for laws.

Rhetoric is the art of ruling the minds of men.

The wise man will want to be ever with him who is better than himself.

The unexamined life is not worth living for a human being.

The most effective kind of education is that a child should play amongst lovely things.

The noblest of all studies is the study of what man is and of what life he should live.

At the touch of love, everyone is a poet.

Justice means minding one's own business and not meddling with other men's concerns.

Love is a serious mental disease.

The essence of knowledge is self-knowledge.

In order to seek one's own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life.

Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly.

Each man is capable of doing one thing well. If he attempts several, he will fail to achieve distinction in any.

The good man is the only excellent musician, because he gives forth a perfect harmony not with a lyre or other instrument but with the whole of his life.

Wonder is the beginning of the desire to know the beautiful and the good.

Music is the movement of sound to reach the soul for the education of its virtue.

Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being

The most important part of education is proper training in the nursery.

Man is a being in search of meaning.

All thought begins with the recognition that something is out of place.

Pleasure is the greatest incentive to evil.

I prefer nothing, unless it is true.

The most beautiful motion is that which accomplishes the greatest results with the least amount of effort.

A wise ignorance is an essential part of knowledge.

Courage is a kind of salvation.

Wonder is the feeling of the philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.

My plainness of speech makes people hate me, and what is their hatred but a proof that I am speaking the truth.

And what, Socrates, is the food of the soul? Surely, I said, knowledge is the food of the soul.

The more the pleasures of the body fade away, the greater to me is the pleasure and charm of conversation.

Avoid compulsion and let early education be a matter of amusement. Young children learn by games; compulsory education cannot remain in the soul.

The good is the beautiful.

Man was not made for himself alone

Each citizen should play his part in the community according to his individual gifts.

Anything worth knowing is already known and must be remembered and reclaimed by the soul.

To love rightly is to love what is orderly and beautiful in an educated and disciplined way.

Men of sound sense have Law for their god, but men without sense Pleasure.

The seen is the changing, the unseen is the unchanging.