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Memorable Words of Wisdom


These wisemen lived and died ages ago, but left behind them a wealth of wisdom contained in the following few words:


SOCRATES Greek philosopher in Athens (469 BC - 399 BC - pictured left)

1. True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing


2. I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.


3. 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.


4. Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.

5. The unexamined life is not worth living.

6. Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.

7. Get not your friends by bare compliments, but by giving them sensible tokens of your love.

8. If a man is proud of his wealth, he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it.

9. The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.

10. Thou shouldst eat to live; not live to eat.

11. Bad men live that they may eat and drink, whereas good men eat and drink that they may live.

12. Having the fewest wants, I am nearest to the gods.

13. I do nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought for your persons or your properties, but and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue comes money and every other good of man, public as well as private. This is my teaching, and if this is the doctrine which corrupts the youth, I am a mischievous person
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(Socrates, quoted by Plato, 'The Death of Socrates' )


PLATO Greek author & philosopher in Athens (427 BC - 347 BC)

1. If women are expected to do the same work as men, we must teach them the same things.

2. Ignorance, the root and the stem of every evil.

3. Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.

4. Man...is a tame or civilized animal; never the less, he requires proper instruction and a fortunate nature, and then of all animals he becomes the most divine and most civilized; but if he be insufficiently or ill- educated he is the most savage of earthly creatures.

5. Never discourage anyone... who continually makes progress, no matter how slow.

6. Only the dead have seen the end of war.

7. The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.

8. 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.

9. Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something.

10. No evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.

11. You are young, my son, and, as the years go by, time will change and even reverse many of your present opinions. Refrain therefore awhile from setting yourself up as a judge of the highest matters.

12. Bodily exercise, when compulsory, does no harm to the body; but knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.


13. He who is of calm and happy nature will hardly feel the pressure of age, but to him who is of an opposite disposition youth and age are equally a burden.



CONFUCIUS Chinese philosopher & reformer (551 BC - 479 BC)

1. Be not ashamed of mistakes and thus make them crimes.

2. Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.

3. Everything has its beauty but not everyone sees it.

4. Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses.

5. Ignorance is the night of the mind, but a night without moon and star.

6. It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.

7. Men's natures are alike, it is their habits that carry them far apart.

8. Study the past if you would define the future.

9. The superior man, when resting in safety, does not forget that danger may come. When in a state of security he does not forget the possibility of ruin. When all is orderly, he does not forget that disorder may come. Thus his person is not endangered, and his States and all their clans are preserved.

10. To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage.

11. To see what is right, and not to do it, is want of courage or of principle.

12. What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others.

13. When anger rises, think of the consequences.

14. When we see men of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves.

15. Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart.

16. They must often change who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.

17. Fine words and an insinuating appearance are seldom associated with true virtue.

18. Have no friends not equal to yourself.

19. He who exercises government by means of his virtue may be compared to the north polar star, which keeps its place and all the stars turn towards it.

20. He who speaks without modesty will find it difficult to make his words good.



ARISTOTLE Greek critic, philosopher, physicist, & zoologist (384 BC - 322 BC)

1. A friend is a second self.

2. All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.

3. Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in the consciousness that we deserve them.

4. Education is the best provision for the journey to old age.

5. Happiness depends upon ourselves.

6. It is in justice that the ordering of society is centered.

7. It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

8. Law is mind without reason.

9. Man perfected by society is the best of all animals; he is the most terrible of all when he lives without law, and without justice.

10. Men acquire a particular quality by constantly acting a particular way... you become just by performing just actions, temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave actions.

11. Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.

12. Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.

13. The only stable state is the one in which all men are equal before the law.

14. We are what we repeatedly do.

15. It is not always the same thing to be a good man and a good citizen.

16. Evil brings men together.


AESOP Greek slave & fable author (620 BC - 560 BC)

1. Better be wise by the misfortunes of others than by your own.

2. In critical moments even the very powerful have need of the weakest.

3. Injuries may be forgiven, but not forgotten.

4. It is easy to be brave from a safe distance.

5. It is with our passions, as it is with fire and water, they are good servants but bad masters.

6. Never trust the advice of a man in difficulties.

7. Persuasion is often more effectual than force.

8. The smaller the mind the greater the conceit.

9. United we stand, divided we fall.

10. We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.

11. What a splendid head, yet no brain.

12. The gods help them that help themselves.

13. Be content with your lot; one cannot be first in everything.

14. Union gives strength.

15. Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow.

16. People often grudge others what they cannot enjoy themselves.
The shaft of the arrow had been feathered with one of the eagle's own plumes. We often give our enemies the means of our own destruction.

17. Familiarity breeds contempt.

18. Slow and steady wins the race.

19. It is not only fine feathers that make fine birds.

20. No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.

21. Do not count your chickens before they are hatched.

SOPHOCLES Greek tragic dramatist (496 BC - 406 BC)

1. A short saying oft contains much wisdom.

2. What you cannot enforce, do not command.

3. No man loves life like him that's growing old.

4. Nobody likes the man who brings bad news.

5. Reason is God's crowning gift to man.

6. Wisdom outweighs any wealth.

7. Truly, to tell lies is not honourable; but when the truth entails tremendous ruin, to speak dishonourably is pardonable.


LAO-TZU Chinese philosopher (604 BC - 531 BC)



1. Seek not happiness too greedily, and be not fearful of happiness.

2. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

3. He who knows does not speak; He who speaks does not know.

4. He who knows others is wise; He who knows himself is enlightened.

5. People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge.

6. The best [man] is like water. Water is good; it benefits all things and does not compete with them. It dwells in [lowly] places that all disdain. This is why it is so near to Tao.

7. The more laws and order are made prominent, the more thieves and robbers there will be.

8. The Way of Heaven is to benefit others and not to injure. The Way of the sage is to act but not to compete.

9. To have little is to possess. To have plenty is to be perplexed.

10. To know that you do not know is the best. To pretend to know when you do not know is a disease.


MAHTMA GANDHI Indian political and spiritual leader (1869 - 1948)

1. Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.

2. Freedom is not worth having if it does not connote freedom to err. It passes my comprehension how human beings, be they ever so experienced and able, can delight in depriving other human beings of that precious right.

3. Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.

4. Hate the sin, love the sinner.

5. Honest differences are often a healthy sign of progress.

6. Honest disagreement is often a good sign of progress.

7. I believe in equality for everyone, except reporters and photographers.

8. I cannot teach you violence, as I do not myself believe in it. I can only teach you not to bow your heads before any one even at the cost of your life.

9. I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.

10. I want freedom for the full expression of my personality.

11. It is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of non-violence to cover impotence.

12. It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err.

13. One needs to be slow to form convictions, but once formed they must be defended against the heaviest odds.

14. Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.

15. The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

16. When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won.


17. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it--always.

18. You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.

19. Victory attained by violence is tantamount to a defeat, for it is momentary.


FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS Jewish-Roman historian & turncoat (37 AD - 100 AD)

1. Everyone ought to worship God according to his own inclinations, and not to be constrained by force.


THOMAS JEFERSON 3rd president of US (1743 - 1826)

1. Do not bite at the bait of pleasure till you know there is no hook beneath it.

2. Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.

3. I cannot live without books.

4. In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.

5. Never spend your money before you have it.

6. Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself.

7. Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances.

8. The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.

9. Advertisements... contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper.

10. If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it.

11. An honest man can feel no pleasure in the exercise of power over his fellow citizens.




1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Very wisely selected quoted from the world's wisemen. Congrats!