60 Famous Quotes On Life From Socrates

Socrates was Greek philosopher whose way of life, character, and thought exerted a profound influence on ancient and modern philosophy.

The most interesting and influential thinker in the fifth century was Socrates, whose dedication to careful reasoning transformed the entire enterprise. Since he sought genuine knowledge rather than mere victory over an opponent, Socrates employed the same logical tricks developed by the Sophists to a new purpose, the pursuit of truth. Thus, his willingness to call everything into question and his determination to accept nothing less than an adequate account of the nature of things make him the first clear exponent of critical philosophy.

He is portrayed in these works as a man of great insight, integrity, self-mastery, and argumentative skill. The impact of his life was all the greater because of the way in which it ended: at age 70, he was brought to trial on a charge of impiety and sentenced to death by poisoning by a jury of his fellow citizens.

It’s pity not to be inspired by the words he quoted. Here are the 44 famous quotes on life by the all-time famous Greek philosopher.

1. “The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”

2. “The un-examined life is not worth living.”

3. “There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.”

4. “I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think”

5. “Wonder is the beginning of wisdom.”

6. “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

7. “To find yourself, think for yourself.”

8. “Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people.”

9. “By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you’ll become happy; if you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.”

10. “Be slow to fall into friendship, but when you are in, continue firm and constant.”

11. “Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.”

12. “He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.”

13. “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.”

14. “Sometimes you put walls up not to keep people out, but to see who cares enough to break them down.”

15. “The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.”

16. “Let him who would move the world first move himself.”

17. “The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.”

18. “Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.”

19. “Every action has its pleasures and its price.”

20. “Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.”

21. “I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.”

22. “Employ your time in improving yourself by other men’s writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.”

23. “The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”

24. “We cannot live better than in seeking to become better.”

25. “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.”

26. “Understanding a question is half an answer”

27. “Beware the barrenness of a busy life.”

28. “Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.”

29. “From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.”

30. “Be as you wish to seem.”

31. “I know that I am intelligent, because I know that I know nothing.”

32. “If you want to be a good saddler, saddle the worst horse; for if you can tame one, you can tame all.”

33. “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.”

34. “True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.”

35. “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.”

36. “One should never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any man, no matter how one has been mistreated by him.”

37. “The easiest and noblest way is not to be crushing others, but to be improving yourselves. ”

38. “The greatest blessing granted to mankind come by way of madness, which is a divine gift.”

39. “Be of good cheer about death, and know this of a truth, that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.”

40. “Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions; but those who kindly reprove thy faults.”

41. “Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get your heart’s desire; the other is to get it.”

42. “To fear death, gentlemen, is no other than to think oneself wise when one is not, to think one knows what one does not know. No one knows whether death may not be the greatest of all blessings for a man, yet men fear it as if they knew that it is the greatest of evils.”

43. “All men’s souls are immortal, but the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.”

44. “My friend…care for your psyche…know thyself, for once we know ourselves, we may learn how to care for ourselves” -Socrates”

45. “Virtue does not come from wealth, but. . . wealth, and every other good thing which men have. . . comes from virtue.”

46. “The highest realms of thought are impossible to reach without first attaining an understanding of compassion.”

47. “Not life, but good life, is to be chiefly valued. ”

48. “To be is to do”

49. “To move the world we must move ourselves.”

50. “Living well and beautifully and justly are all one thing.”

51. “There is no solution; seek it lovingly ”

52. “The misuse of language induces evil in the soul”

53. “Give me beauty in the inward soul; may the outward and the inward man be at one.”

54. “When you want wisdom and insight as badly as you want to breathe, it is then you shall have it.”

55. “He is not only idle who does nothing, but he is idle who might be better employed.”

56. “It is better to change an opinion than to persist in a wrong one.”

57. “Those who are hardest to love need it the most.”

58. “An unconsidered life is not one worth living.”

59. “I desire only to know the truth and to live as well as I can… And, to the utmost of my power, I exhort all other men to do the same… I exhort you also to take part in the great combat, which is the combat of life, and greater than every other earthly conflict.”

60. “And so they grow richer and richer, and the more they think of making a fortune the less they think of virtue; for when riches and virtue are placed together in the scales of the balance, the one always rises as the other falls.”