Quotes by Socrates




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"A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true."

Socrates on morality    Share


"See one promontory, one mountain, one sea, one river and see all."

Socrates on nature    Share

"Ordinary people seem not to realize that those who really apply themselves in the right way to philosophy are directly and of their own accord preparing themselves for dying and death."

Socrates on philosophers and philosophy    Share

"I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live."

Socrates on politics
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"How many are the things I can do without!"

Socrates on possessions
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"I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good."

Socrates on potential    Share

"Our prayers should be for blessings in general, for God knows best what is good for us."

Socrates on prayer
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"They are not only idle who do nothing, but they are idle also who might be better employed."

Socrates on purpose
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"The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear."

Socrates on reputation    Share

"Where there is reverence there is fear, but there is not reverence everywhere that there is fear, because fear presumably has a wider extension than reverence."

Socrates on respectability    Share

"If a man is proud of his wealth, he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it."

Socrates on riches
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"He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have."

Socrates on riches
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"Know thyself."

Socrates on knowledge
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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."

Socrates on senses
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"Slanderers do not hurt me because they do not hit me."

Socrates on slander
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"Beauty is a short-lived tyranny."

Socrates on beauty    Share

"A multitude of books distracts the mind."

Socrates on books - reading    Share

"Remember, no human condition is ever permanent. Then you will not be overjoyed in good fortune nor too scornful in misfortune."

Socrates on change
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"I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think."

Socrates on teacher
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"To find yourself, think for yourself."

Socrates on thoughts and thinking
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"What a lot of things there are a man can do without."

Socrates on wealth    Share

"The beginning of wisdom is a definition of terms."

Socrates on wisdom
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"True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us."

Socrates on wisdom
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"Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for."

Socrates on writers and writing    Share

"He is rich who is content with the least; for contentment is the wealth of nature."

Socrates on contentment
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"Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty."

Socrates on contentment
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"Give me beauty in the inward soul; may the outward and the inward man be at one."

Socrates on control    Share

"Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions, but those who kindly reprove thy faults."

Socrates on correction    Share

"Other men live to eat, while I eat to live."

Socrates on    Share

"Do not be angry with me if I tell you the truth"

Socrates on truth
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"Naturam rerum cognoscere primum. "First know the nature of things" or "Get your facts straight first"."

Socrates on
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"Sidere mens eadum mutato. "The stars may be different, but the spirit is the same.""

Socrates on    Share

"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing."

Socrates on knowledge    Share

"An unexamined life is not worth living."

Socrates on    Share

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