Socrates

From the deepest desires often come the deadliest hate.

I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance.

Worthless people love only to eat and drink; people of worth eat and drink only to live.

The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.

I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.

The soul is pure when it leaves the body and drags nothing bodily with it, by virtue of having no willing association with the body in life but avoiding it… Practicing philosophy in the right way is a training to die easily.

Natural abilities are like natural plants; they need pruning by study.

A toddling little girl is a center of common feeling which makes the most dissimilar people understand each other.

Girls, like men, want to be petted, pitied, and made much of, when they are diffident, in low spirits, or in unrequited love. These are services which the weak cannot render to the strong and which the strong will not render to the weak, except when there is also a difference of sex.

There is properly no history; only biography.

Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.

Ignorant people think it is the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain’t so; it is the sickening grammar that they use.

Avoid inquisitive persons, for they are sure to be gossips, their ears are open to hear, but they will not keep what is entrusted to them.

All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.

Who shall set a limit to the influence of a human being?

The studious class are their own victims: they are thin and pale, their feet are cold, their heads are hot, the night is without sleep, the day a fear of interruption –pallor, squalor, hunger, and egotism.

The maxim of the British people is Business as usual.

So many objections may be made to everything, that nothing can overcome them but the necessity of doing something.

Vulgarity in a king flatters the majority of the nation.

I cannot pretend to feel impartial about colors. I rejoice with the brilliant ones and am genuinely sorry for the poor browns.

Honor bespeaks worth. Confidence begets trust. Service brings satisfaction. Cooperation proves the quality of leadership.