Greek Philosopher Quotes

Nothing exists; even if something exists, nothing can be known about it; and even if something can be known about it, knowledge about it can't be communicated to others. ~ Gorgias

Demon comes from daimon, which means 'intelligence' or 'individual destiny', whereas angel means messenger. Originally daimones were always perceived as being positive entities. The Greek philosopher Plato introduced the division between kakodaemons and eudaemons, or benevolent and malevolent daimons, in the fourth century BCE. Seven centuries later in the third century CE, the Neo-Platonic philosopher Porphyry made an interesting distinction, this being essentially that the good daimones were the ones who governed their emotions and being, whereas bad daimones were governed by them. ~ Stephen Skinner

Well I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite conscious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know. ~ Socrates

Be as you wish to seem. ~ Socrates

I have often regretted my speech, never my silence. ~ Simonides

She soars on her own wings. ~ Socrates

A Greek philosopher said, 'All men think it is only the other man who is mortal'. The way we scurry about accumulating things is testimony to our unspoken doctrine that we are exceptions to the law of death. The events of September 11, 2001, were a shocking reminder to millions of Americans of something we should have already understood - our mortality. ~ Randy Alcorn

The ancient Greek philosopher Epictetus taught his students that what happens to them is not as important as what they believe happens to them. In this engaging and provocative book, Eldon Taylor provides his readers with specific ways in which their beliefs can lead to success or failure in their life undertakings. Each chapter provides nuggets of wisdom as well as road maps for guiding them toward greater self-understanding, balance, responsibility, and compassion. ~ Stanley Krippner

If you wish to be a writer; write!
Send quote to a friend
Epictetus (50-120) Greek philosopher. ~ Epictetus

No man undertakes a trade he has not learned, even the meanest; yet everyone thinks himself sufficiently qualified for the hardest of all trades, that of government. ~ Socrates

The bourgeois thinkers of the eighteenth century thus turned Aristotle's formula on its head: satisfactions which the Greek philosopher had identified with leisure were now transposed to the sphere of work, while tasks lacking in any financial reward were drained of all significance and left to the haphazard attentions of decadent dilettantes. It now seemed as impossible that one could be happy and unproductive as it had once seemed unlikely that one could work and be human. ~ Alain De Botton

You get most out of walking by going along briskly, swinging the arms and breathing deeply. It also helps promote the circulation of blood to the brain. The Greek philosophers promenaded as they philosophized. ~ Paul Dudley White

Epictetus, a Greek philosopher, once wrote, Circumstances do not make the man. They merely reveal him to himself. ~ Brian Tracy

Professors of Greek forget or are unaware that Thomas Aquinas, who did not know Greek, was a better interpreter of Aristotle than any of them have proved to be, not only because he was smarter but because he took Aristotle more seriously. ~ Allan Bloom

People who want to understand democracy should spend less time in the library with Aristotle and more time on the buses and in the subway. ~ Simeon Strunsky

There is indeed a fundamental beauty in mathematical abstractions. They so attracted the Greek philosopher Plato that he declared that all those things that we can see and touch are, in fact, mere shadows of the true reality and that the real things of this universe can be found only through the use of pure reason. Plato's knowledge of mathematics was relatively naive, and many of the cherished purities of Greek mathematics have been shown to be flawed. ~ David Salsburg

It was precisely this notion of infinite series which in the sixth century BC led the Greek philosopher Zeno to conclude that since an arrow shot towards a target first had to cover half the distance, and then half the remainder, and then half the remainder after that, and so on ad infinitum, the result was, as I will now demonstrate, that though an arrow is always approaching its target, it never quite gets there, and Saint Sebastian died of fright. ~ Tom Stoppard

Paul indeed wanted to reveal the unknown God to the philosophers and then affirms of Him, that no human intellect can conceive Him. Therefore, God is revealed therein, that one knows that every intellect is too small to make itself a figuration or concept of Him. However, he names him God, or in Greek, theos. ~ Nicholas Of Cusa

If evil be spoken of you and it be true, correct yourself, if it be a lie, laugh at it. ~ Epictetus

If you do not expect the unexpected you will not find it, for it is not to be reached by search or trail. ~ Heraclitus

If measure and symmetry are absent from any composition in any degree, ruin awaits both the ingredients and the composition ... Measure and symmetry are beauty and virtue the world over. ~ Socrates

Aristotle is the last Greek philosopher who faces the world cheerfully; after him, all have, in one form or another, a philosophy of retreat. The world is bad; let us learn to be independent of it. External goods are precarious; they are the gift of fortune, not the reward of our own efforts. Only subjective goods - virtue, or contentment through resignation - are secure, and these alone, therefore, will be valued by the wise man. Diogenes personally was a man full of vigour, but his doctrine, like all those of the Hellenistic age, was one to appeal to weary men, in whom disappointment had destroyed natural zest. And it was certainly not a doctrine calculated to promote art or science or statesmanship, or any useful activity except one of protest against powerful evil. ~ Anonymous

The ancient Greeks, poets, authors and philosophers all puzzled over the question but nobody really knows what love is - including me. Longing for another person is an exciting mental experience. ~ Nicole Kidman

Once we face our fear, once we treat our anxiety itself as a thing, we can then choose otherwise. Instead of filling the unknown in our minds with expectations of the tragic, we can choose to fill the void with a different expectation – the expectation of adventure.
For example, Seneca, the Greek philosopher, refused to be afraid of what he did not know. When asked if he was afraid of dying, he replied, "Absolutely not, why should I be afraid of something I know nothing about." His orientation toward the unknown of death was not to fill the gap in his understanding with horror but potential. ~ David W. Jones

The pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Parmenides taught that the only things that are real are things which never change ... and the pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Heraclitus taught that everything changes. If you superimpose their two views, you get this result: Nothing is real. ~ Philip K. Dick

Like many of the ideas that mattered in the American Revolution, extraterrestrials got their start in antiquity. The Greek philosopher Epicurus speculated that the universe must be infinite, eternal and abounding in 'worlds' just like our own. ~ Matthew Stewart

Giving importance to what we think because we thought it, taking our own selves not only (to quote the Greek philosopher) as the measure of all things but as their norm or standard, we create in ourselves, if not an interpretation, at least a criticism of the universe, which we don't even know and therefore cannot criticize. The giddiest, most weak-minded of us then promote that criticism to an interpretation that's superimposed, like a hallucination; induced rather than deduced. It's a hallucination in the strict sense, being an illusion based on something only dimly seen. ~ Fernando Pessoa

Those whose hearts are fixed on Reality itself deserve the title of Philosophers. ~ Plato

Epicurus (341-270 B.C.) was the last major Greek philosopher of the classical era to make significant original contributions to the study of language, developing a socio-anthropological theory of the origin of language. ~ Richard E. McDorman

Practice yourself, for heaven's sake in little things, and then proceed to greater. ~ Epictetus

Those who assert that the mathematical sciences say nothing of the beautiful or the good are in error. For these sciences say and prove a great deal about them; if they do not expressly mention them, but prove attributes which are their results or definitions, it is not true that they tell us nothing about them. The chief forms of beauty are order and symmetry and definiteness, which the mathematical sciences demonstrate in a special degree. ~ Aristotle.

There is no possession more valuable than a good and faithful friend. ~ Socrates

Get not your friends by bare compliments but by giving them sensible tokens of your love. ~ Socrates

It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly. And it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life. ~ Epicurus

A good man will take care of his horses and dogs, not only while they are young, but also when they are old and past service. ~ Plutarch

In Ancient Greek literature male poets tend not simply to portray women as lecherous but to attribute to them a species of lust different from that of males: a subhuman and automatic reflex, an animalistic urge. Sappho is important because she gives a fulle human voice to female desire for the first time in Western history. Since she defiantly chooses the quintessential love-object Helen of Troy as her freethinking agent, she seems fully conscious of the revolutionary claim she is making. ~ Sappho

He had murdered any illlusion of Alex Remington. The golden pendant had been replaced by a spiked dog collar, and he was wearing a black T-shirt that hugged his form and showed off the many designs on his arms: Fenris on the right wrist, and Echidna, the greek mother of monsters, high on his left arm. The norse world serpent was wrapped around his left wrist, and a new design had recently been added: Cerberus, the three-headed dog who guarded the gates of Hades. The world serpent was partially obscurred by a black leather knife sheath, which held a silver knife Aubrey had taken from a vampire hunter a few thousand years earlier.
His hair was slightly touseled, as if he'd been running, and a few strands fell across his face.
Looking at him now, Jessica couldn't imagine how she had ever mistaken him for a human. But illusion was Aubrey's art. And it was simple to fool people who expected nothing else.
For the moment, Aubrey appeared to be exactly what he was: stunning, michievous, and completely deadly all at once ~ Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

I have been told, that in some public discourses of mine my reverence for the intellect has made me unjustly cold to the personalrelations. But now I almost shrink at the remembrance of such disparaging words. For persons are love's world, and the coldest philosopher cannot recount the debt of the young soul wandering here in nature to the power of love, without being tempted to unsay, as treasonable to nature, aught derogatory to the social instincts. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

I dislike the word mythology because of its secondary definition meaning "something untrue." Myth is a Greek word that simply means "story," and mythologies are collections of ancient stories explaining the order of the universe or a society's ideals and customs. ~ Alaric Albertsson

I love using unique names, so I go to a baby names site on the Internet and use the unique names. Sometimes my names have meanings such as 'strong', 'fire', and Phoenix which means dark red and is Greek. It's fun to think of a name meaning and matching it with a name. Even Frances means Victory. ~ Franny Armstrong

It is a monstrous thing to force a child to learn Latin or Greek or mathematics on the ground that they are an indispensable gymnastic for the mental powers. It would be monstrous even if it were true. ~ George Bernard Shaw

It seems to me that we all look at Nature too much, and live with her too little. I discern great sanity in the Greek attitude. They never chattered about sunsets, or discussed whether the shadows on the grass were really mauve or not. But they saw that the sea was for the swimmer, and the sand for the feet of the runner. They loved the trees for the shadow that they cast, and the forest for its silence at noon. ~ Oscar Wilde

Cold completely introspective logic places a philosopher on the road to the abstract. Out of this empty, artificial act of thinking there can result, of course, nothing which bears on the relation of man to himself, and to the universe. ~ Albert Schweitzer

Society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. ~ Anonymous Greek Proverb

Galileo essentially started out from where Archimedes left off, proceeding in the same direction as defined by his Greek predecessor. This is true not only of Galileo but also of the other great figures of the so-called "scientific revolution," such as Leibniz, Huygens, Fermat, Descartes, and Newton. All of them were Archimedes' children. With Newton, the science of the scientific revolution reached its perfection in a perfectly Archimedean form. Based on pure, elegant first principles and applying pure geometry, Newton deduced the rules governing the universe. All of later science is a consequence of the desire to generalize Newtonian, that is, Archimedean methods. ~ Reviel Netz

Philosopher: A lover of wisdom, which is to say, Truth. ~ Voltaire

Here was a man some twenty thousand miles from home, by the way of Cape Horn, that is - which was the only way he could get there - thrown among people as strange to him as though he were in the planet Jupiter; and yet he seemed entirely at his ease; preserving the utmost serenity; content with his own companionship; always equal to himself. Surely his was a touch of fine philosophy; though no doubt he had never heard there was such a thing as that. But, perhaps, to be a true philosopher, we mortals should not be conscious of so living or so striving. So soon as I hear that such or such a man gives himself out for a philosopher, I conclude that, like the dyspeptic old woman, he must have 'broken his digester. ~ Herman Melville

The Dark Ages gradually ended six centuries ago with the Renaissance, which seeded new ideas for a different world. The Renaissance ideal dominated our culture until three centuries ago, from the 14th to the 18th century, when it was superseded by modernism. Not surprisingly, this human ideal has almost been forgotten in our culture. The Renaissance, literally "re-birth", was a revival and rediscovery of classical Greek and Roman culture following the decline of culture, trade, and technology during the Dark Ages. ~ Jacob Lund Fisker

Sameron adion aso
I shall sing a sweeter song tomorrow ~ Theocritus

The verdict of the Greek people renders the troika a thing of the past for our common European framework. ~ Alexis Tsipras

To us it seems incredible that the Greek philosophers should have scanned so deeply into right and wrong and yet never noticed the immorality of slavery. Perhaps 3000 years from now it will seem equally incredible that we do not notice the immorality of our own oppression of animals. ~ Brigid Brophy

I'm most impressed by the Russian writers, so I love reading the works of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Another author who has informed the way I think is the French philosopher, Blaise Pascal. ~ Andrea Bocelli

It is funny,' she said, 'That even after all this time, you still believe you should be rewarded, just because you have been obedient. I thought you would have learned that lesson in your father's halls. None shrank and simpered as you did, and yet the great Helios stepped on you all the faster, because you were already crouched at his feet.' She was leaning forward, her golden hair loose, embroidering the sheets around her. 'Let me tell you the truth about Helios and all the rest. They do not care if you are good. They barely care if you are wicked. The only thing that makes them listen is power. ~ Madeline Miller

And what is a friend? More than a father, more than a brother: a traveling companion, with him, you can conquer the impossible, even if you must lose it later. Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing. It is a friend that you communicate the awakening of a desire, the birth of a vision or a terror, the anguish of seeing the sun disappear or of finding that order and justice are no more. That's what you can talk about with a friend. Is the soul immortal, and if so why are we afraid to die? If God exists, how can we lay claim to freedom, since He is its beginning and its end? What is death, when you come down to it? The closing of a parenthesis, and nothing more? And what about life? In the mouth of a philosopher, these questions may have a false ring, but asked during adolescence or friendship, they have the power to change being: a look burns and ordinary gestures tend to transcend themselves. What is a friend? Someone who for the first time makes you aware of your loneliness and his, and helps you to escape so you in turn can help him. Thanks to him who you can hold your tongue without shame and talk freely without risk. That's it. ~ Elie Wiesel

The 7 Secrets of Happiness

1. Think positively.
2. Do work you love.
3. Avoid anger.
4. Give generously.
5. Be grateful.
6. Overcome negativity.
7. Develop thick skin. ~ Matshona Dhliwayo

Refuse to come out of the lockdown being the same.
Its either you will appreciate things, people, your job and life more.
Its either you would have acquired new or more skills, knowledge ,information or you have improved in them.
Its either you saw what you were doing wrong, what is important in life and what you should focus on.
Its either your saw which people to be with or which ones to avoid.
This lockdown has enough me time to help you to get your life together. Refuse to come out of it being the same. ~ De Philosopher DJ Kyos

Whoever heard of such a mixture of languages in one army, since there were French, Flemings, Frisians, Gauls, Sayonards, Lotharingians, Allemani, Bavarians, Normans, English, Scots, Aquitanians, Italians, Danes, Apulians, Iberians, Bretons, Greeks and Armenians. ~ Fulcher Of Chartres

A philosopher has the moderate love for wisdom and the courage to act according to wisdom. Wisdom is knowledge about the Good or the right relations between all that exists. Wherein ~ Plato

I intend Deaths in Venice to contribute both to literary criticism and to philosophy. But it's not "strict philosophy" in the sense of arguing for specific theses. As I remark, there's a style of philosophy - present in writers from Plato to Rawls - that invites readers to consider a certain class of phenomena in a new way. In the book, I associate this, in particular, with my good friend, the eminent philosopher of science, Nancy Cartwright, who practices it extremely skilfully. ~ Philip Kitcher

Chaler, who had finished his ale, left the cup where it was, making no effort to procure more, indicating that he was capable of what the natural philosopher calls "learning behaviour," which turn of phrase pleases us so much that we cannot resist making use of it. ~ Steven Brust

Mathematics may be the only exception in the sciences that leaves no room for skepicism. But, if mathematical results are exact as no empirical law can ever be, philosophers have discovered that they are not absolutely novel - instead, they are tautological. ~ Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza

The universe appeals to your sense, not your senselessness;
your understanding, not your shallowness;
your discernment, not your blindness;
your intellect, not your nonsense;
your rationale, not your recklessness;
your knowledge, not your ignorance;
your wisdom, not your imprudence;
your insight, not your brainlessness;
and your enlightenment, not your foolishness.

The universe also appeals to your enjoyment, not your sadness;
your courage, not your fearfulness;
your hope, not your bitterness;
your humility, not your arrogance;
your honesty, not your deceitfulness;
your mercy, not your ruthlessness;
your charity, not your stinginess;
your strength, not your weakness;
and your love, not your hatefulness. ~ Matshona Dhliwayo

a quotation from the Spanish philosopher Ortega y Gasset as an epigraph for Stoner: "A hero is one who wants to be himself." In ~ John Williams

The world will not change by our position in the Universe. Actions change when beliefs change; collective actions and beliefs change the world. ~ Matthew A. Petti

I especially love watching Marcus Aurelius fighting his perfectionism in order to get back to work on his writing, regardless of the results. "Get a move on," he writes to himself, "and don't worry whether anyone will give you credit for it. And don't go expecting Plato's 'Republic;' be satisfied with even the smallest progress, and treat the outcome of it all as unimportant." Please tell me I'm not the only one who finds it endearing and encouraging that a legendary Roman philosopher had to reassure himself that it's okay not to be Plato. Really, Marcus, it's okay! Just keep working. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

This is a very special Greek kind of socialist, all the social democratic parties in Europe are against this idea and I think that the dividing line today in the Greek political system is not the centre right or socialist, the real dividing line is between those parties and those political forces who really believe that Greece should stay in the Eurozone and make the efforts and change, and make the reforms and change the old and Mr Tsipras who is really resisting any kind of change in Greece. ~ Dora Bakoyannis

O sweet spontaneous earth how often have the doting fingers of prurient philosophers pinched and poked thee ,has the naughty thumb of science prodded thy beauty .how often have religions taken thee upon their scraggy knees squeezing and buffeting thee that thou mightest conceive gods (but true to the incomparable couch of death thy rhythmic lover thou answerest them only with spring) ~ E. E. Cummings

…like the Greeks, I suppose. They made a big thing of hoodwinking the Germans, until recently, of course. The Germans suddenly turned round and told the poor Greeks that the game was up. Oh dear. … I can just imagine the mythical parallel. There are all the Greek gods on Mount Olympus, or wherever they liked to cavort - cavorting away and having a great time on borrowed funds from those northern gods - Thor, Odin and so on - who of course inhabit northern forests and mountains. Anyway, the Greek gods have a great time and then Thor and Freya and so on get all sniffy and tell them that they have to cut the whole thing out and move down the mountain and get a job, or whatever. A terrible row ensues, with thunderbolts being hurled. ~ Alexander McCall Smith

Nature Boy

I was just a boy when I sat down
To watch the news on TV
I saw some ordinary slaughter
I saw some routine atrocity
My father said, don't look away
You got to be strong, you got to be bold, now
He said, that in the end it is beauty
That is going to save the world, now

And she moves among the sparrows
And she floats upon the breeze
She moves among the flowers
She moves something deep inside of me

I was walking around the flower show like a leper
Coming down with some kind of nervous hysteria
When I saw you standing there, green eyes, black hair
Up against the pink and purple wisteria
You said, hey, nature boy, are you looking at me
With some unrighteous intention?
My knees went weak,
I couldn't speak, I was having thoughts
That were not in my best interests to mention

And she moves among the flowers
And she floats upon the smoke
She moves among the shadows
She moves me with just one little look

You took me back to your place
And dressed me up in a deep sea diver's suit
You played the patriot, you raised the flag
And I stood at full salute
Later on we smoked a pipe that struck me dumb
And made it impossible to speak
As you closed in, in slow motion,
Quoting Sappho, in the original Greek

She moves among the shadows
She floats upon the breeze
She moves among ~ Nick Cave

16For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, [5] as it is written, ~ Anonymous

No one really knew the sciences except the Lord Robert, Bishop of Lincoln, by reason of his length of life and experience, as well as of his studiousness and zeal. He knew mathematics and perspective, and there was nothing which he was unable to know; and at the same time he was sufficiently acquainted with languages to be able to understand the saints and the philosophers and the wise men of antiquity but his knowledge of languages was not such as to enable him to effect translations until the latter portion of his life ... ~ Roger Bacon

The true lover of learning then must his earliest youth, as far as in him lies, desire all truth ... He whose desires are drawn toward knowledge in every form will be absorbed in the pleasures of the soul, and will hardly feel bodily pleasures I mean, if he be a true philosopher and not a sham one ... Then how can he who has the magnificence of mind and is the spectator of all times and all existence, think much of human life He cannot. Or can such a one account death fearful No indeed. ~ Plato

When a philosopher, scientist, or psychologist discusses the discrepancy between the actual and the ideal, he or she attempts to convince us with the tools of discursive thought ... An artist does it differently ... their primary approach is different, even though both groups, if you will, are investigating the actual, the ideal, and the discrepancy in between. ~ Stephen Dobyns

If you read Herodotus, the first Greek historian 2,500 years ago, he was talking about that - about people mixing with other people. Sometimes it produces great societies. Sometimes it triggers war. But, we're not going to change that. I don't think so. We're living in nations that are state nations and countries. ~ Philippe Falardeau

Moral philosophy is very largely a branch of fiction. Despite this, a philosopher has yet to write a great novel. The fact should not be surprising. In philosophy the truth about human life is of no interest ~ John N. Gray

Everything in New Orleans is a good idea. Bijou temple-type cottages and lyric cathedrals side by side. Houses and mansions, structures of wild grace. Italianate, Gothic, Romanesque, Greek Revival standing in a long line in the rain. Roman Catholic art. Sweeping front porches, turrets, cast-iron balconies, colonnades- 30-foot columns, gloriously beautiful- double pitched roofs, all the architecture of the whole wide world and it doesn't move. ~ Bob Dylan

Genetically, I'm pure Greek. Psychologically, environmentally, culturally, by choice, I'm a member of the black community. ~ Johnny Otis

The sea is intriguing and exciting. It always reinforces in me a sense of belonging. The waves bring with them a strange kind of peace and calm. The sea has been a silent spectator to many major incidents in my life. The many outings with friends and family; the long walks on the shore with dad, my hero and philosopher; the moments spent with my love, the memories are endless. ~ Jagdish Joghee

For example, it is said that someone at a party once asked the famous philosopher Ly Tin Weedle "Why are you here?" and the reply took three years. ~ Terry Pratchett

Only the free-wheeling artist-explorer, non-academic, scientist-philosopher, mechanic, economist-poet who has never waited for patron-starting and accrediting of his co-ordinate capabilities holds the prime initiative today. ~ R. Buckminster Fuller

Every work turns against its author: the poem will crush the poet, the system the philosopher, the event the man of action. Destruction awaits anyone who, answering to his vocation and fulfilling it, exerts himself within history; only the man who sacrifices every gift and talent escapes: released from his humanity, he may lodge himself in Being. ( ... ) One always perishes by the self one assumes: to bear a name is to claim an exact mode of collapse. ~ Emil Cioran

I am not sure what tomorrow has for me, but I am sure about one thing. Even If I lose it all. God will provide, because I trust in him.

Genesis 22:7-8
Proverb 3:5 ~ De Philosopher DJ Kyos