“To one commending an orator for his skill in amplifying petty matters, Agesilaus said, "I do not think that shoemaker a good workman that makes a great shoe for a little foot."”

—  Plutarch

Of Agesilaus the Great
Laconic Apophthegms

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "To one commending an orator for his skill in amplifying petty matters, Agesilaus said, "I do not think that shoemaker a…" by Plutarch?
Plutarch photo
Plutarch 251
ancient Greek historian and philosopher 46–127

Related quotes

Martin Luther photo
Quintilian photo

“Let the orator whom I propose to form, then, be such a one as is characterized by the definition of Marcus Cato, a good man skilled in speaking. But the requisite which Cato has placed first in this definition—that an orator should be a good man—is naturally of more estimation and importance than the other.”
Sit ergo nobis orator quem constituimus is qui a M. Catone finitur vir bonus dicendi peritus, verum, id quod et ille posuit prius et ipsa natura potius ac maius est, utique vir bonus.

Quintilian (35–96) ancient Roman rhetor

Book XII, Chapter I, 1; translation by Rev. John Selby Watson
De Institutione Oratoria (c. 95 AD)

Mark Zuckerberg photo
Peter Beckford photo
Wilhelm Reich photo

“Every physician, shoemaker, mechanic or educator must know his shortcomings if he is to do his work and make his living.”

Listen, Little Man! (1948)
Context: Every physician, shoemaker, mechanic or educator must know his shortcomings if he is to do his work and make his living. For some decades, you have begun to play a governing role on this earth. It is on your thinking and your actions that the future of humanity depends. But your teachers and masters do not tell you how you really think and are; nobody dares to voice the one criticism of you which could make you capable of governing your own fate. You are "free" only in one sense: free from education in governing your life yourself, free from self-criticism.

Alastair Reynolds photo
Philip Massinger photo

“Like a rough orator, that brings more truth
Than rhetoric, to make good his accusation.”

Philip Massinger (1583–1640) English writer

Great Duke of Florence (1627).

John Heywood photo

“Who is wurs shod, than the shoemakers wyfe,
With shops full of shoes all hir lyfe?”

John Heywood (1497–1580) English writer known for plays, poems and a collection of proverbs

Who is worse shod, than the shoemakers wife,
With shops full of shoes all her life?
Part I, chapter 11.
Proverbs (1546)

“In this world of gossip, a good listener is rarer than a great orator.”

Christopher Pike (1954) American author Kevin Christopher McFadden

Source: Black Blood

Related topics