One thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing.
– Socrates
My advice to you is to get married. If you find a good wife, you’ll be happy; if not, you’ll
become a philosopher.
– Socrates
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
If a man would move the world, he must first move himself.
– Socrates
Be slow to fall into friendship; but when thou art in, continue firm and constant.
– Socrates
They are not only idle who do nothing, but they are idle also who might be better employed.
– Socrates
All men’s souls are immortal, but the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.
– Socrates
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.
– Socrates
A multitude of books distracts the mind.
– Socrates
Worthless people live only to eat and drink; people of worth eat and drink only to live.
– Socrates
To find yourself, think for yourself.
– Socrates
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
How many are the things I can do without!
– Socrates
False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.
– Socrates
Remember – no human condition is ever permanent. Then you will not be overjoyed in good
fortune nor too scornful in misfortune.
– Socrates
Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior.
– Socrates
Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.
– Socrates
Enjoy yourself – it’s later than you think.
– Socrates
I am not an Athenian, nor a Greek, but a citizen of the world.
– Socrates
The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.
– Socrates
Let him that would move the world, first move himself.
– Socrates
Are you not ashamed of caring so much for the making of money and for fame and prestige,
when you neither think nor care about wisdom and truth and the improvement of your soul?
– Socrates
Fame is the perfume of heroic deeds.
– Socrates
The unexamined life is not worth living.
– Socrates
Call no man unhappy until he is married.
– Socrates
Our youth now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show
disrespect for their elders and love chatter in place of exercise; they no longer rise when elders
enter the room; they contradict their parents, chatter before company; gobble up their food
and tyrannize their teachers.
– Socrates
Envy is the ulcer of the soul.
– Socrates
Force is of no use to make or preserve a friend, who is an animal that is never caught nor
tamed but by kindness and pleasure.
– Socrates
If all misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion,
most people would be contented to take their own and depart.
– Socrates
I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might
have an unlimited power for doing good.
– Socrates
When you want wisdom and insight as badly as you want to breathe, it is then you shall have
it.
– Socrates
Every action has its pleasures and its price.
– Socrates
He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like
to have.
– Socrates
If you want to be a good saddler, saddle the worst horse; for if you can tame one, you can
tame all.
– Socrates
The easiest and noblest way is not to be crushing others, but to be improving yourselves.
– Socrates
There is no greater evil one can suffer than to hate reasonable discourse.
– Socrates
The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the
new.
– Socrates
Nothing is to be preferred before justice.
– Socrates
In childhood be modest, in youth temperate, in adulthood just, and in old age prudent.
– Socrates
Strong minds discuss ideas,
average minds discuss events,
weak minds discuss people.
– Socrates
Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.
– Socrates
He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like
to have.
– Socrates
I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.
– Socrates
The hour of departure has arrived and we go our ways; I to die, and you to live. Which is
better? Only God knows.
– Socrates
If a man is proud of his wealth, he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it.
– Socrates
As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.
– Socrates
He is richest who is content with the least, for content is the wealth of nature.
– Socrates
I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.
– Socrates
The fewer our wants the more we resemble the gods.
– Socrates
No man undertakes a trade he has not learned, even the meanest; yet everyone thinks
himself sufficiently qualified for the hardest of all trades, that of government.
– Socrates
The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear.
– Socrates
Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get your heart’s desire; the other is to get it.
– Socrates
Beauty is a short-lived tyranny.
– Socrates
The end of life is to be like God, and the soul following God will be like Him.
– Socrates
True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life,
ourselves, and the world around us.
– Socrates
Only the extremely ignorant or the extremely intelligent can resist change.
– Socrates
The shortest and surest way to live with honour 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.
– Socrates
Happiness is unrepentant pleasure.
– Socrates
When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser.
– Socrates
Be nicer than necessary to everyone you meet. Everyone is fighting some kind of battle.
– Socrates
The really important thing is not to live, but to live well. And to live well meant, along with
more enjoyable things in life, to live according to your principles.
– Socrates
Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.
– Socrates
The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity
to enjoy less.
– Socrates
If you don’t get what you want, you suffer; if you get what you don’t want, you suffer; even
when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can’t hold on to it forever.
Your mind is your predicament. It wants to be free of change, free of pain, free of the
obligations of life and death. But change is law and no amount of pretending will alter that
reality.
– Socrates
From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.
– Socrates
To express oneself badly is not only faulty as far as the language goes, but does some harm
to the soul.
– Socrates
One should never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any man, no matter how one has been
mistreated by him.
– Socrates
As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take which course he will, he will be sure to repent.
– Socrates
No man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. It is a shame for a
man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.
– Socrates
Sometimes you put walls up not to keep people out, but to see who cares enough to break
them down.
– Socrates
The highest realms of thought are impossible to reach without first attaining an understanding
of compassion.
– Socrates
Prefer knowledge to wealth, for the one is transitory, the other perpetual.
– Socrates