1. “All men's souls are immortal, but the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.”
2. "A multitude of books distracts the mind."
3. “And in knowing that you know nothing, that makes you the smartest of all.”
4. "An education obtained with money is worse than no education at all"
5. “An unexamined life is not worth living.”
6. “As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.”
7. "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."
8. “Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.”
9. “Be as you wish to seem.”
10. “Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.”
11. “Be of good hope in the face of death. Believe in this one truth for certain, that no evil can befall a good man either in life or death, and that his fate is not a matter of indifference to the gods.”
12. “Be slow to fall into friendship; but when thou art in, continue firm and constant.”
13. “Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.”
14. “By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you'll be happy; if you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher.”
15. “Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.”
16. "Death may be the greatest of all human blessings."
17. “Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for.”
18. "Enjoy yourself -- it's later than you think."
19. “False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.”
20. “Fame is the perfume of heroic deeds.”
21. “For to fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise without really being wise, for it is to think that we know what we do not know. For no one knows whether death may not be the greatest good that can happen to man. But men fear it as if they knew quite well that it was the greatest of evils.”
22. “From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.”
23. ”Get not your friends by bare compliments, but by giving them sensible tokens of your love.”
24. "Happiness is unrepentant pleasure."
25. “Having the fewest wants, I am nearest to the gods.”
26. "He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have."
27. “How singular is the thing called pleasure, and how curiously related to pain, which might be thought to be the opposite of it; for they are never present to a man at the same instant, and yet he who pursues either is generally compelled to take the other; their bodies are two, but they are joined by a single head. And I cannot help thinking that if Aesop had remembered them, he would have made a fable about God trying to reconcile their strife, and how, when he could not, he fastened their heads together; and this is the reason why when one comes the other follows: as I know by my own experience now, when after the pain in my leg which was caused by the chain pleasure appears to succeed.”
28. “I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.”
29. “I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing.”
30. “I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.”
31. "I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled [poets] to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean."
32. “I do nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought for your persons or your properties, but and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue comes money and every other good of man, public as well as private. This is my teaching, and if this is the doctrine which corrupts the youth, I am a mischievous person.”
33. “If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own.”
34. "If I tell you that I would be disobeying the god and on that account it is impossible for me to keep quiet, you won't be persuaded by me, taking it that I am ionizing. And if I tell you that it is the greatest good for a human being to have discussions every day about virtue and the other things you hear me talking about, examining myself and others, and that the unexamined life is not livable for a human being, you will be even less persuaded."
35. “I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.”
36. "I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think."
37. "In childhood be modest, in youth temperate, in adulthood just, and in old age prudent."
38. "I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good."
39. "I pray Thee, O God, that I may be beautiful within."
40. “I thought to myself, 'I am wiser than this man: neither of us knows anything that is really worthwhile, but he thinks he has knowledge when he has not, while I, having no knowledge, do not think that I have. I seem, at any rate, to be a little wiser than he is on this point: I do not think that I know what I do not know.”
41. "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."
42. “I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.”
43. “Let him that would move the world first move himself.”
44. "Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get your heart's desire; the other is to get it."
45. “Man's life is like a drop of dew on a leaf.”
46. "Nature has given us two ears, two eyes, and but one tongue-to the end that we should hear and see more than we speak."
47. "No evil can befall a good man either in life or death."
48. "Nothing is to be preferred before justice."
49. “O beloved Pan, and all ye other gods of this place, grant me to become beautiful in the inner man.”
50. “Often when looking at a mass of things for sale, he would say to himself, "How many things I have no need of!"
51. ”Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior.”
52. "One thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing."
53. “Only the extremely ignorant or the extremely intelligent can resist change.”
54. “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.”
55. “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.”
56. "Remember, no human condition is ever permanent. Then you will not be overjoyed in good fortune nor too scornful in misfortune."
57. “Remember that there is nothing stable in human affairs; therefore avoid undue elation in prosperity, or undue depression in adversity.”
58. “Prefer knowledge to wealth, for the one is transitory, the other perpetual.”
59. “See one promontory, one mountain, one sea, one river, and see all.”
60. "Slanderers do not hurt me because they do not hit me."
61. “The ancient oracle said that I was the wisest of all the Greeks. It is because I alone, of all the Greeks, know that I know nothing.”
62. “The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms.”
63. "The comic and the tragic lie inseparably close, like light and shadow."
64. “The fewer our wants the more we resemble the Gods.”
65. "The hour of departure has arrived and we go our ways; I to die, and you to live. Which is better? Only God knows."
66. "The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance."
67. "The perfect human being is all human beings put together, it is a collective, it is all of us together that make perfection."
68. “There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.”
69. “The shortest and surest way to live with honor in the world is to be in reality what we would appear to be; all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice and experience of them.”
70. “The unexamined life is not worth living.”
71. "The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear."
72. “The misuse of language induces evil in the soul.”
73. "They are not only idle who do nothing, but they are idle also who might be better employed."
74. "Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions, but those who kindly reprove thy faults."
75. “To do is to be.”
76. “To fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise, without being wise: for it is to think that we know what we do not know. For anything that men can tell, death may be the greatest good that can happen to them: but they fear it as if they know quite well that it was the greatest of evils. And what is this but that shameful ignorance of thinking that we know what we do not know?”
77. "To find yourself, think for yourself."
78. ”Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.”
79. “To fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise, without being wise: for it is to think that we know what we do not know. For anything that men can tell, death may be the greatest good that can happen to them: but they fear it as if they know quite well that it was the greatest of evils. And what is this but that shameful ignorance of thinking that we know what we do not know?”
80. “To find yourself, think for yourself.”
81. “True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing. And in knowing that you know nothing, that makes you the smartest of all.”
82. "True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us."
83. ”Virtue does not come from wealth, but. . . wealth, and every other good thing which men have. . . comes from virtue.”
84. "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."
85. “Well I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite concious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know.”
86. "What a lot of things there are a man can do without."
87. "When desire, having rejected reason and overpowered judgment which leads to right, is set in the direction of the pleasure which beauty can inspire, and when again under the influence of its kindred desires it is moved with violent motion towards the beauty of corporeal forms, it acquires a surname from this very violent motion, and is called love."
88. "Whenever, therefore, people are deceived and form opinions wide of the truth, it is clear that the error has slid into their minds through the medium of certain resemblances to that truth."
89. ”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.”
90. "Whom do I call educated? First, those who manage well the circumstances they encounter day by day. Next, those who are decent and honorable in their intercourse with all men, bearing easily and good naturedly what is offensive in others and being as agreeable and reasonable to their associates as is humanly possible to be... those who hold their pleasures always under control and are not ultimately overcome by their misfortunes... those who are not spoiled by their successes, who do not desert their true selves but hold their ground steadfastly as wise and sober -- minded men."
91. "Wisdom begins in wonder."
92. “Wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.”
93. "Worthless people love only to eat and drink; people of worth eat and drink only to live."
