"I neither know nor think that I know"

"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."

"I examined the poets, and I look on them as people whose talent overawes both themselves and others, people who present themselves as wise men and are taken as such, when they are nothing of the sort. From poets, I moved to artists. No one was more ignorant about the arts than I; no one was more convinced that artists possessed really beautiful secrets. However, I noticed that their condition was no better than that of the poets and that both of them have the same misconceptions. Because the most skillful among them excel in their specialty, they look upon themselves as the wisest of men. In my eyes, this presumption completely tarnished their knowledge. As a result, putting myself in the place of the oracle and asking myself what I would prefer to be — what I was or what they were, to know what they have learned or to know that I know nothing — I replied to myself and to the god: I wish to remain who I am."

"Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people."

"To be is to do."

"Neither in war nor yet at law ought any man to use every way of escaping death. For often in battle there is no doubt that if a man will throw away his arms, and fall on his knees before his pursuers, he may escape death; and in other dangers there are other ways of escaping death, if a man is willing to say and do anything. The difficulty, my friends, is not in avoiding death, but in avoiding unrighteousness; for that runs faster than death."

"To be is to do."

"Be nicer than necessary to everyone you meet. Everyone is fighting some kind of battle."

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

"As for me, all I know is that I know nothing, for when I don't know what justice is, I'll hardly know whether it is a kind of virtue or not, or whether a person who has it is happy or unhappy."

"He who is not contended with what he has would not be contended with what he would like to have."

"I know you won't believe me, but the highest form of Human Excellence is to question oneself and others."

"Every action has its pleasures and its price."

"Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior."

"The answer I gave myself and the oracle was that it was to my advantage to be as I am."

"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."

"And a thing is not seen because it is visible, but; conversely, visible because it is seen; nor is a thing led because; it is in the state of being led, or carried because it is in the; state of being carried, but the converse of this. And now I think, Euthyphro, that my meaning will be intelligible; and my; meaning is, that any state of action or passion implies previous; action or passion. It does not become because it is becoming, but it is in a state of becoming because it becomes; neither; does it suffer because it is in a state of suffering, but it is in a; state of suffering because it suffers. Do you not agree?"

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

"I thought that as I had failed in the contemplation of true existence, I ought to be careful that I did not lose the eye of my soul; as people may injure their bodily eye by observing and gazing on the sun during an eclipse, unless they take the precaution of looking at the image reflected in the water, or in some similar medium. ...I was afraid that my soul might be blinded altogether if I looked at things with my eyes or tried by the help of my senses to apprehend them. And I thought that I had better had recourse to ideas, and seek in them truth in existence. I dare to say that the simile is not perfect--for I am far from admitting that he who contemplates existence through the medium of ideas, sees them only "through a glass darkly," any more than he who sees them in their working and effects."

"The misuse of language induces evil in the soul"