“For what sense or understanding have they? They follow minstrels and take the multitude for a teacher, not knowing that many are bad and few good. For the best men choose one thing above all – immortal glory among mortals; but the masses stuff themselves like cattle.”
G.T.W. Patrick, 1889 http://www.classicpersuasion.org/pw/heraclitus/herpatu.htm <br class="br">Variant: For what sense or understanding have they? They follow minstrels and take the multitude for a teacher, not knowing that many are bad and few good. For the best men choose one thing above all – immortal glory among mortals; but the masses stuff themselves like cattle.
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Heraclitus46
pre-Socratic Greek philosopher -535Related quotes
T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author
Choruses from The Rock (1934)
Context: There came one who spoke of the shame of Jerusalem
And the holy places defiled;
Peter the Hermit, scourging with words.
And among his hearers were a few good men,
Many who were evil,
And most who were neither,
Like all men in all places.
Aristotle book Metaphysics
Book I, 980a.21: Opening paragraph of Metaphysics
The first sentence is in the Oxford Dictionary of Scientific Quotations (2005), 21:10
Metaphysics
Variant: All men by nature desire knowledge.
Adam Smith (1723–1790) Scottish moral philosopher and political economist
Source: (1776), Book V, Chapter II, Part II, p. 896.
Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)
Quote in his letter to brother Theo, from environment of Paris, Summer 1887; as quoted in Vincent van Gogh, edited Alfred H. Barr; Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1935 https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_1996_300061887.pdf, (letter 462) p. 22 <br class="br">1880s, 1887