Socrates was the first moral philosopher and one of the founders of Western Philosophy. He was Greek by the origin and was born around 470BC. He was among the handful of philosophers who took the interpretation of philosophy to another level. He has not written any of his teachings (Philosophy); all information we get about his personal life, and thoughts are second hand (mostly through his students). There are three sources primarily who are considered as his adherents:
There is no testimonial of any information by Socrates to prove its authenticity. While relying on the primary sources mentioned above Socrates is exhibited in Crito, Apology, Symposium, and Phaedo. Most of the reference given is through conversation or dialogues on different occasions.
A trait that remained with Socrates throughout his lifetime was his fearlessness. Plato (Socrates student), states about Socrates that though he was not good looking at all his intellect made him very attractive to his admirers. He emphasized the importance of the mind over the human body. Socrates believed that philosophical theories should be used to build an ethical system in society and it should be based on reasoning rather than theological doctrine.
Giving a lecture was never his style: Socrates used the dialectic method to spread wisdom.
Socrates was the preacher of self-love. According to him, a person who knows and admires himself can lead a happy life. A person who can provide food to his soul can be happy. Happiness has nothing to do with appearance, wealth, or status. For Socrates, happiness is the only objective feature of one’s life. Quality of life matters more than life span for Socrates. His famous quotes on happiness can change your perspective of life. Let’s go through the most Inspirational Quotes on happiness by Socrates.
“Contentment is natural wealth; luxury is artificial poverty.”
“Happiness is unrepentant pleasure.”
“I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good.”
“Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get your heart’s desire; the other is to get it.”
“The nearest way to glory is to strive to be what you wish to be thought to be.”
“He is rich who is content with the least; for contentment is the wealth of nature.”
“I pray Thee, O God, that I may be beautiful within.”
“If a man is proud of his wealth, he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it.”
“Know thyself Self-knowledge.”
“Slanderers do not hurt me because they do not hit me.”
“Think not those faithful who praise all thy words and actions, but those who kindly reprove thy faults.”
“Worthless people love only to eat and drink; people of worth eat and drink only to live.”
“Call no man unhappy until he is married.”
“Give me beauty in the inward soul; may the outward and the inward man be at one.”
“If all misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.”
“The unexamined life is not worth living.”
“Be slow to fall into friendship, but when you are in, continue firm and constant.”
“Sometimes you put walls up not to keep people out, but to see who cares enough to break them down.”
“Employ your time in improving yourself by other men’s writings so that you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.”
“We cannot live better than in seeking to become better.”
“Envy is the ulcer of the soul.”
“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
“I pray Thee, O God, that I may be beautiful within.”
“Those who are hardest to love need it the most.”
“Through your rags I see your vanity.”
“There is no solution; seek it lovingly ”
“I know you won’t believe me, but the highest form of Human Excellence is to question oneself and others.”
“It is better to change an opinion than to persist in a wrong one.”
“Living well and beautifully and justly are all one thing.”
“He is not only idle who does nothing, but he is idle who might be better employed.”
Socrates states that a person should have a habit of questioning oneself to gain knowledge. According to him. a person should question his belief and ideas for finding their authenticity. Blind following is dangerous and a person who spends his life in ignorance is in deceit.
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“By all means marry. If you get a good wife, you’ll be happy. If you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher… and that is a good thing for any man”
“True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.”
“Where there is reverence there is fear, but there is not reverence everywhere that there is fear, because fear presumably has a wider extension than reverence.”
“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”
“The end of life is to be like God, and the soul following God will be like Him.”
“Nature has given us two ears, two eyes, and but one tongue-to the end that we should hear and see more than we speak.”
“The hottest love has the coldest end.”
“The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.”
“False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.”
“I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.”
“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”
“No man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.”
“Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people.”
“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.”
“When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser.”
“Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.”
“Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.”
“I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.”
“Every action has its pleasures and its price.”
“Prefer knowledge to wealth, for the one is transitory, the other perpetual.”
“We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.”
“Beware the barrenness of a busy life.”
“understanding a question is half an answer”
“Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.”
“The greatest blessing granted to mankind come by way of madness, which is a divine gift.”
“Children nowadays are tyrants. They contradict their parents, gobble their food, and tyrannise their teachers.”
“All men’s souls are immortal, but the souls of the righteous are immortal and divine.”
“To be is to do”
“The highest realms of thought are impossible to reach without first attaining an understanding of compassion.”
“The mind is everything; what you think you become”
Socrates believed that justice is not the virtue of the city, it is rather an individual thing. An individual should have morality to not harm anyone. According to him, only the well-ordered soul can practice justice in life. He believed that justice is not needed if the community satisfies the needs of humans. Socrates thought that only a philosopher can inculcate ethics in society and can nourish a soul-full society, so the leadership should be granted to a wise philosopher.
“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.”
“Nothing is to be preferred before justice.”
“It is not the purpose of a juryman’s office to give justice as a favor to whoever seems good to him, but to judge according to law, and this he has sworn to do.”
“And I say let a man be of good cheer about his soul. When the soul has been arrayed in her own proper jewels – temperance and justice, and courage, and nobility and truth – she is ready to go on her journey when the hour comes.”
“A man who really fights for justice must lead a private, not a public, life if he is to survive for even a short time.”
“If I can assign names as well as pictures to objects, the right assignment of them we may call truth, and the wrong assignment of them falsehood.”
“It has been shown that to injure anyone is never just anywhere.”
“Has a philosopher like you failed to discover that our country is more to be valued and higher and holier far than mother or father or any ancestor, and more to be regarded in the eyes of the gods and of men of understanding?”
“If thou continuous to take delight in idle argumentation thou mayest be qualified to combat with the sophists, but will never know how to live with men.”
“Not I, but the city teaches.”
Socrates was a fearless man, and he advises his youth to Question which was not acceptable to gods of the state. Socrates admired democracy, and his vision of philosopher-king was endangering the so-called sanity of the ruler of the time. He was sentenced to death for corrupting the minds of youth.
Check out this fantastic collection of Socrates quotes wallpapers below:
Socrates quotes about Wisdom
Socrates quotes about Wisdom and Honour
Socrates quotes about Wisdom & Wealth
Socrates quotes about Wisdom & Teaching
Socrates quotes about Wisdom & Knowing nothing
Socrates quotes about Wisdom & Human Excellence
Socrates quotes about Love
Socrates quotes about Happiness
Socrates emphasized ethics and individual learning. He believed that life is worth examining, and a person who ignores himself will lead a miserable life. The one who is not happy himself can never spread joy and happiness.
Which is your favorite inspirational quote by Socrates? What do you think of his “Philosopher king” theory? Let us know by commenting below.
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