Sokrates cytaty

strona 4

„Najmądrzejszy jest, który wie, czego nie wie.”

„Nigdy nie zestarzeje się serce, które kocha.”

„Takie czasy nastały, że jak chcesz z kim mądrym pogadać, musisz rozmawiać sam ze sobą.”

„Szczęście jest przyjemnością wolną od wyrzutów sumienia.”

„Długie szaty krępują ciało, a bogactwo – duszę.”

„Wszelka dusza jest nieśmiertelna.”

„Jeśli ktoś z nas pragnie poznać coś w sposób czysty, musi się od ciała wyzwolić i samą tylko duszą oglądać rzeczywistość.”

„Głód jest najlepszym kucharzem.”

„Piękno jest jedyną rzeczą boską i widzialną jednocześnie.”

„Weź tyle, ile potrzebujesz, daj tyle, ile możesz.”

„Strzeż się ludzi, którzy są pewni tego, że mają rację.”

„Puste worki nadyma wiatr, bezmyślnych ludzi – próżność.”

„Wiem, że nic nie wiem.”

„Człowiek nie jest nigdy zły dobrowolnie.”

„Tyle tu rzeczy, których mi nie potrzeba!”

„Jeżeli język nie jest poprawny, to, co powiedziano, nie jest tym, co zamierzano powiedzieć. Jeżeli to, co powiedziano, nie jest tym, co zamierzano powiedzieć, nie zostanie zrobione to, co być powinno.”

„Tam, gdzie chodzi o to, co sprawiedliwe, piękne i dobre nie powinniśmy troszczyć się o opinie ogółu.”

„Ci, których najtrudniej jest kochać, potrzebują tego najbardziej.”

„W całym życiu szanuj prawdę tak, by twoje słowa były bardziej wiarygodne od przyrzeczeń innych.”

„Pragnie się tego, czego się nie ma, nie można przecież czegoś chcieć, kiedy się już to ma – skoro więc filozof pragnie mądrości, to nie może być mądry.”

„Kritonie, myśmy winni koguta Asklepiosowi. Oddajcież go, a nie zapomnijcie!”

„Jeśli znajdziesz dobrą żonę, będziesz szczęśliwy, jeśli złą – zostaniesz filozofem.”

„Tymczasem ja ani przedtem nie uważałem za stosowne robić niczego podłego z uwagi na niebezpieczeństwo, ani mi teraz żal, żem się w ten sposób bronił; wolę zginąć po takiej obronie, niż tamtym sposobem żyć.”

„Jak większe jest szczęście być zdrowym niż bogatym, tak mniejszym jest nieszczęściem ubóstwo niż choroba.”

„Błąd jest przywilejem filozofów, tylko głupcy nie mylą się nigdy.”

„A złota obym miał tyle, ile ani unieść, ani uciągnąć nie potrafi nikt inny, tylko ten, co zna miarę we wszystkim.”

„Wszystko w miarę.”

„Dla cierpiących najmniejsza radość jest szczęściem.”

„Wolałabyś [Ksantypo], żebym umierał z wyroku sprawiedliwego?”

„Nieprawdaż, że czasem, kiedy wiatr wieje jeden i ten sam, to jeden z nas marznie, a drugi nie? I jeden marznie lekko, a drugi mocno?”

„Ateny są jak ospały koń, a ja jak giez, który próbuje go ożywić.”

„Poznaj samego siebie.”

„Niezbadane życie nie jest warte życia.”

„Zimą potrzebne jest ciepłe okrycie, w starości - brak zmartwień.”

„Nie może człowiek poddawać się i ulegać pragnieniom i pożądaniom ciała, ale zawsze należy postępować zgodnie z rozumem, który jest najlepszym doradcą.”

„Kto będzie miał dobrą żonę, ten będzie szczęśliwy, kto będzie miał złą, zostanie filozofem.”

„Nikogo i niczego nie umiem słuchać jak tylko argumentu, który mi się po rozwadze wyda najstosowniejszy.”

„Drzewa na wsi niczego mnie nie nauczą.”

„Wypoczynek to największe z dóbr.”

„Bóg z maszyny (teatralnej).”

„Bać się śmierci jest tym samym, co mieć się za mądrego, nim nie będąc.”

„Nie nauczą mnie niczego kwiatki, czy drzewa, lecz tylko drugi człowiek.”

„Sprawiedliwość jest odmianą mądrości.”

„Znajdujesz to, czego szukasz, umyka ci to, co zaniedbujesz.”

„Człowiek nie żyje, aby jadł, ale je, aby żył.”

“If death had only been the end of all, the wicked would have had a good bargain in dying, for they would have been happily quit not only of their body, but of their own evil together with their souls. But now, as the soul plainly appears to be immortal, there is no release or salvation from evil except the attainment of the highest virtue and wisdom. For the soul when on her progress to the world below takes nothing with her but nurture and education…”

“And now that the hour of departure is appointed to me, this is the hope with which I depart, and not I only, but every man that believes that he has his mind purified.”

“But when returning into herself she [the soul] reflects; then she passes into the realm of purity, and eternity, and immortality, and unchangeableness, which are her kindred, and with them she ever lives, when she is by herself and is not let or hindered; then she ceases from her erring ways, and being in communion with the unchanging is unchanging. And this state of the soul is called wisdom.”

“When I was young, Cebes, I had a prodigious desire to know the department of philosophy which is called Natural Science; this appeared to me to have lofty aims, as being the science which has to do with the causes of things, and which teaches why a thing is, and is created and destroyed; and I always agitated myself with the consideration of such questions as these… I went on to examine the decay of them, and then to the study of the heaven and earth, and at last I concluded that I was wholly incapable of these inquiries… There was a time when I thought that I understood the meaning of greater and less pretty well… that ten is more than eight, and that two cubits are more than one, because two is twice one. I should be far from imagining… that I knew the cause of any of them, indeed I should, for I cannot satisfy myself that when one is added to one, the one to which the addition is made becomes two… nor can I understand how the division of one is the way to make two; for then a different cause would produce the same effect.”

“Those also who are remarkable for having led holy lives are released from this earthly prison, and go to their pure home which is above, and dwell in the purer earth; and those who have duly purified themselves with philosophy live henceforth altogether without the body, in mansions fairer far than these…”

“Not that this confusion signifies to them who never care to think about the matter at all, for they have the wit to be well pleased with themselves, however great the turmoil of their ideas. But you, if you are a philosopher, will, I believe, do as I say.”

“And thus one man makes a vortex all round and steadies the earth by the heaven; another gives the air as support for the earth, which is sort of a broad trough. Any power which in disposing them as they are disposes them for the best never enters into their minds, not do they imagine that there is any superhuman strength in that; they rather expect to find another Atlas of the world who is stronger and more everlasting and more containing than the good is, and are clearly of the opinion that the obligatory and containing power of the good is as nothing; and yet this is the principle which I would fain learn if anyone would teach me. But as I have failed either to discover myself or to learn of anyone else, the nature of the best, I will exhibit to you, if you like, what I have found to be the second best mode of inquiring into the cause.”

“So now, Athenian men, more than on my own behalf must I defend myself, as some may think, but on your behalf, so that you may not make a mistake concerning the gift of god by condemning me. For if you kill me, you will not easily find another such person at all, even if to say in a ludicrous way, attached on the city by the god, like on a large and well-bred horse, by its size and laziness both needing arousing by some gadfly; in this way the god seems to have fastened me on the city, some such one who arousing and persuading and reproaching each one of you I do not stop the whole day settling down all over. Thus such another will not easily come to you, men, but if you believe me, you will spare me; but perhaps you might possibly be offended, like the sleeping who are awakened, striking me, believing Anytus, you might easily kill, then the rest of your lives you might continue sleeping, unless the god caring for you should send you another.”

“I shall never cease from the practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet after my manner, and convincing him, saying: O my friend, why do you who are a citizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens, care so much about laying up the greatest amount of money and honor and reputation, and so little about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul, which you never regard or heed at all? Are you not ashamed of this? And if the person with whom I am arguing says: Yes, but I do care: I do not depart or let him go at once; I interrogate and examine and cross-examine him, and if I think that he has no virtue, but only says that he has, I reproach him with overvaluing the greater, and undervaluing the less. …For this is the command of God, as I would have you know…”

“If the knowledge which we acquired before birth was lost to us at birth, and afterwords by the use of the senses we recovered that which we previously knew, will not that which we call learning be a process of recovering our knowledge, and may not this be rightly termed recollection by us? …Then, Simmias, our souls must have existed before they were in the form of man—without bodies, and must have had intelligence.”

“Someone will say: And are you not ashamed, Socrates, of a course of life which is likely to bring you to an untimely end? To him I may fairly answer: There you are mistaken: a man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong — acting the part of a good man or a bad. …For wherever a man's place is, whether the place he has chosen or that where he has been placed by a commander. there he ought to remain in the hour of danger; he should not think of death or of anything, but of disgrace.”

“Each of these private teachers who work for pay … inculcates nothing else than these opinions of the multitude which they opine when they are assembled and calls this knowledge wisdom.”

“And when you see a man who is repining at the approach of death, is not his reluctance a sufficient proof that he is not a lover of wisdom, but a lover of the body, and probably at the same time a lover of either money or power, or both?”

“The inexperienced in wisdom and virtue, ever occupied with feasting and such, are carried downward, and there, as is fitting, they wander their whole life long, neither ever looking upward to the truth above them nor rising toward it, nor tasting pure and lasting pleasures. Like cattle, always looking downward with their heads bent toward the ground and the banquet tables, they feed, fatten, and fornicate. In order to increase their possessions they kick and butt with horns and hoofs of steel and kill each other, insatiable as they are.”

“The true disciple of philosophy is likely to be misunderstood by other men; they do not perceive that he is ever pursuing death and dying; and if this is true, why, having had the desire of death all his life long, should he repine at that which he has always been pursuing and desiring?”

“Socrates having heard Plato read the Lysis, said, "O Hercules! what a number of lies the young man has told about me." For he had set down a great many things as sayings of Socrates which he never said.”

“Order and discipline are the most important things in an army, and without them it is impossible to have any other service of the troops than of a confused heap of stones, bricks, timber, and tiles; but when everything is in its due place, as in a building, when the foundations and the covering are made of materials that will not grow rotten, and which no wet can damage, such as are stones and tiles, and when the bricks and timber are employed in their due places in the body of the edifice, they altogether make a house, which we value among our most considerable enjoyments.”

“What do you say about making a libation out of this cup to any god? …I may and I must pray to the gods to prosper my journey from this to that other world—may this, then, which is my prayer, be granted to me. [Then holding the cup to his lips, quite readily and cheerfully he drank off the poison. And hitherto most of us had been able to control their sorrow; but now, when we saw him drinking, and saw too, that he had finished the draft, we could no longer forbear, and in spite of myself my own tears were flowing fast; so that I covered my face and wept over myself, for certainly I was not weeping over him, but at my own calamity at having lost such a companion. Nor was I the first, for Crito, when he found himself unable to restrain his tears, had got up, and moved away, and I followed; and at that moment, Apollodorus, who had been weeping all the time, broke out in a loud cry which made cowards of us all. Socrates alone retained his calmness:] What is this strange outcry? …I sent away the women mainly in order that they might not offend in this way, for I have heard that a man should die in peace. Be quiet then, and have patience.”

“There is a virtue, Simmias, which is named courage. Is not that a special attribute of the philosopher? …Again, there is temperance. Is not the calm, and control, and disdain of the passions which even the many call temperance, a quality belonging only to those who despise the body and live in philosophy?”

“If you kill such a one as I am, you will injure yourselves more than you will injure me. Meletus and Anytus will not injure me: they cannot; for it is not in the nature of things that a bad man should injure one better than himself. I do not deny that he may, perhaps, kill him, or drive him into exile, or deprive him of civil rights; and he may imagine, and others may imagine, that he is doing him a great injury: but in that I do not agree with him; for the evil of doing what Anytus is doing — of unjustly taking away another man's life — is greater far.”

“I would not have him sorrow at my hard lot, or say at the burial, Thus we lay out Socrates, or, Thus we follow him to the grave or bury him; for false words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil. Be of good cheer then, my good Crito, and say that you are burying my body only, and do with that as is usual, and as you think best.”

“How grievously I was disappointed! …I found my philosopher altogether forsaking mind and any other principle of order, but having recourse to air, and ether, and water, and other eccentricities. I might compare him to a person that began by maintaining generally that mind is the cause of the actions of Socrates, but who, when endeavored to explain the causes of my several actions in detail, went on to show that I sit here because my body is made up of bones and muscles; and the bones he would say, are hard and have ligaments which divide them, and the muscles are elastic, and they cover the bones, which also have a covering or environment of flesh and skin which contains them; and as the bones are lifted at their joints by the contraction or relaxation of the muscles, I am able to bend my limbs, and this is why I an sitting here in a curved posture… and he would have a similar explanation of my talking to you, which he would attribute to sound, and air, and hearing, and he would assign ten thousand other causes of the same sort, forgetting to mention the true cause, which is that Athenians have thought fit to condemn me, and accordingly I have thought it better and more right to remain here and undergo my sentence; for I am inclined to think that these muscles and bones of mine would have gone off to Megara or Boeotia… if they had been guided only by their idea of what was best, and if I had not chosen as the better and nobler part… to undergo any punishment that the State inflicts.”

“Socrates: Shall we set down astronomy among the objects of study? Glaucon: I think so, to know something about the seasons, the months and the years is of use for military purposes, as well as for agriculture and for navigation. Socrates: It amuses me to see how afraid you are, lest the common herd of people should accuse you of recommending useless studies.”

“They who have a care of their souls, and do not merely live in the fashions of the body, say farewell to all this; they will not walk in the ways of the blind: and when philosophy offers them purification and release from evil, they feel that they ought not resist her influence, and to her they incline, and whither she leads they follow her.”

“Really, Ischomachus, I am disposed to ask: "Does teaching consist in putting questions?" Indeed, the secret of your system has just this instant dawned upon me. I seem to see the principle in which you put your questions. You lead me through the field of my own knowledge, and then by pointing out analogies to what I know, persuade me that I really know some things which hitherto, as I believed, I had no knowledge of.”

“Let us… be careful of admitting into our souls the notion that there is no truth or health or soundness in any arguments at all; but let us rather say that there is as yet no health in us, and that we must quit ourselves like men and do our best to gain health—you and all other men with a view to the whole of your future life, and I myself with a view to death.”

“As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.”

“When a simple man who has no skill in dialectics believes an argument to be true which he afterwards imagines to be false, whether really false or not, and then another and another, he no longer has any faith left, and great disputers, as you know, come to think, at last that they have grown to be the wisest of mankind; for they alone perceive the utter unsoundness and instability of all arguments, or, indeed, of all things, which like the currents in the Euripus, are going up and down in never-ceasing ebb and flow.”

“And how is not this the most reprehensible ignorance, to think that one knows what one does not know? But I, O Athenians! in this, perhaps, differ from most men; and if I should say that I am in any thing wiser than another, it would be in this, that not having a competent knowledge of the things in Hades, I also think that I have not such knowledge.”