41 Quotes Tagged: plato

Must we forsake the love of excellence, then, till every citizen feels it alike? I did not fight, Anytos, to be crowned where I have not run; but for a City where I can know who my equals really are, and my betters, to do them honour; where a man’s daily life is his own business; and where no one will force a lie on me because it is expedient, or some other man’s will.” The words seemed, as I spoke, to be my own thoughts that I owed to no one, only to some memory in my soul; but when I looked beyond the Stadium, to where they were kindling the lights on the High City in the falling dark, I saw the lamps of Samos shine through a doorway, and the wine-cup standing on the table of scoured wood. Then the pain of loss leaped out on me, like a knife in the night when one has been on one’s guard all day. The world grew hollow, a place of shadows; yet none would hold out the cup of Lethe to let me drink.

Is there not one true coin for which all things ought to exchange?- and that is wisdom; and only in exchange for this, and in company with this, is anything truly bought or sold, whether courage, temperance or justice. And is not all true virtue the companion of wisdom, no matter what fears or pleasures or other similar goods or evils may or may not attend her? But the virtue which is made up of these goods, when they are severed from wisdom and exchanged with one another, is a shadow of virtue only, nor is there any freedom or health or truth in her; but in the true exchange there is a purging away of all these things, and temperance, and justice, and courage, and wisdom herself, are a purgation of them.

For he (Cato) gives his opinion as if he were in Plato's Republic, not in Romulus' cesspool.

Πάντα ῥεῖ καὶ οὐδὲν μένει
(All is flux, and nothing abides)

No civilization, including Plato's, has ever been destroyed because its citizens learned too much.

There is a remarkable sentence of Pascal according to which we know too little to be dogmatists and too much to be skeptics, which expresses beautifully what Plato conveys through his dialogues.

If they [Plato and Aristotle] wrote about politics it was as if to lay down rules for a madhouse.

And if they pretended to treat it as something really important it was because they knew that the madmen they were talking to believed themselves to be kings and emperors. They humoured these beliefs in order to calm down their madness with as little harm as possible.

Diogenes, filthily attired, paced across the splendid carpets in Plato's dwelling. Thus, said he, do I trample on the pride of Plato. Yes, Plato replied, but only with another kind of pride.

In Darwins post-platonische werelds is de variatie de fundamentele werkelijkheid en veranderen berekende gemiddelden in abstracties. We blijven echter de voorkeur geven aan het oudere en tegengestelde standpunt: we zien variatie nog steeds als een massa onlogische toevalligheden, die hoofdzakelijk van waarde is omdat zo'n spreiding te gebruiken is voor de berekening van een gemiddelde, hetgeen we dan beschouwen als iets wat een essentie nog het best benadert.

Plato says that the unexamined life is not worth living. But what if the examined life turns out to be a clunker as well?

Philosophy as such is nothing but genuine awareness of the problems, i.e., of the fundamental and comprehensive problems. It is impossible to think about these problems without becoming inclined toward a solution, toward one or the other of the very few typical solutions. Yet as long as there is no wisdom but only quest for wisdom, the evidence of all solutions is necessarily smaller than the evidence of the problems. Therefore the philosopher ceases to be a philosopher at the moment at which the 'subjective certainty' [quoting M. Alexandre Kojève] of a solution becomes stronger than his awareness of the problematic character of that solution. At that moment the sectarian is born. The danger of succumbing to the attraction of solutions is essential to philosophy which, without incurring this danger, would degenerate into playing with the problems. But the philosopher does not necessarily succumb to this danger, as is shown by Socrates, who never belonged to a sect and never founded one. And even if the philosophic friends are compelled to be members of a sect or to found one, they are not necessarily members of one and the same sect: Amicus Plato.

Encontrar a Fedro guiando a Sócrates casi al mismo sitio, quizá lo era, le había impresionado profundamente. El árbol de amplia copa, la verde ladera en que recostarse, el agua fría al pie; sólo faltaban las ofrendas votivas y el santuario. «Concededme ser hermoso por dentro — había suplicado Sócrates — y haced que las cosas exteriores e interiores se reconcilien».

Alcohol makes other people less tedious, and food less bland, and can help provide what the Greeks called entheos, or the slight buzz of inspiration when reading or writing. The only worthwhile miracle in the New Testament — the transmutation of water into wine during the wedding at Cana — is a tribute to the persistence of Hellenism in an otherwise austere Judaea. The same applies to the seder at Passover, which is obviously modeled on the Platonic symposium: questions are asked (especially of the young) while wine is circulated. No better form of sodality has ever been devised: at Oxford one was positively expected to take wine during tutorials. The tongue must be untied. It's not a coincidence that Omar Khayyam, rebuking and ridiculing the stone-faced Iranian mullahs of his time, pointed to the value of the grape as a mockery of their joyless and sterile regime. Visiting today's Iran, I was delighted to find that citizens made a point of defying the clerical ban on booze, keeping it in their homes for visitors even if they didn't particularly take to it themselves, and bootlegging it with great brio and ingenuity. These small revolutions affirm the human.

Men are not born equal in themselves, so I think it beneath a man to postulate that they are. If I thought myself as good as Sokrates I should be a fool; and if, not really believing it, I asked you to make me happy by assuring me of it, you would rightly despise me. So why should I insult my fellow-citizens by treating them as fools and cowards? A man who thinks himself as good as everyone else will be at no pains to grow better. On the other hand, I might think myself as good as Sokrates, and even persuade other fools to agree with me; but under a democracy, Sokrates is there in the Agora to prove me wrong. I want a city where I can find my equals and respect my betters, whoever they are; and where no one can tell me to swallow a lie because it is expedient, or some other man's will.

[...] y así les ocurre a los seguidores de los demás dioses. Cada hombre se esfuerza por honrar e imitar en su vida al dios a cuyo coro pertenecía, mientras permanece incorrupto en su primera encarnación; y en la manera que ha aprendido se muestra ante su amado y ante los demás.

Así, cada uno escoge de entre los hermosos un amor que corresponde a su índole; y entonces, como si su elegido fuera su dios, lo eleva y lo viste para la adoración [...] y esta ansia por descubrir la esencia de su propio dios en sí mismos es recompensada, pues están obligados a mirar al dios sin vacilación, y cuando la memoria lo retiene, su respiración los inspira y comparten sus atributos y su vida, en la medida en que un hombre puede participar de la divinidad. Y por estas bendiciones dan gracias al amado y lo aman todavía más [...] y llena el alma del amado [...]

Por lo tanto está enamorado, pero no sabe de quién; no sabe qué le ha sucedido, no lo entiende. Se ve en su amante como en un espejo, sin saber a quién ve. Y cuando están juntos también él se ve liberado del dolor, y cuando están separados añora como él es añorado; pues reflejada en su corazón está la imagen del amor, que es la respuesta del amor. Pero lo llama y lo considera no amor sino amistad [...]