🏛️ Plato's Best Quotes (Greek Philosopher, 427-347 BCE)

Plato was an Athenian philosopher during the period of ancient Classical Greece. His work created the foundation for Western philosophy, education, and political theory.

🏺 Plato was a student of Socrates and the teacher of Aristotle, forming a cornerstone in the teacher-student relationship that began with Socrates and extended to Alexander the Great.

🏺 He founded the Academy in Athens, one of the earliest higher-education institutions in the Western world.

🏺 Plato’s philosophical ideas are mainly presented through Socrates as a central character, often in the form of dialogues.

👉 Note: Plato’s works include 26 generally accepted dialogues and 13 additional letters of disputed authenticity {Apology, Crito, Euthyphro, Protagoras, Gorgias, Meno, Phaedo, Republic, Symposium, Theaetetus, and Timaeus}

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🔱 Important Plato Quotes:

1) Human behavior derives from three main sources: desire, emotion, and education.

2) The greatest wealth is to be able to live happily with little.

3) Most virtuous people are those who are happy being virtuous without seeking to appear as such.

4) A personal opinion is an intermediate between knowledge and ignorance.

5) All the gold under or over the land is not enough to be exchanged for virtue.

6) Good people do not need laws to act with responsibility, while bad people will always find ways to bypass the law.

7) If a man neglects his education, he walks lame until the end of his life. Ignorance is the root and stem of evil.

8) At a touch of love, everyone becomes a poet.

9) Be kind to other people, because every person you meet is fighting its own hard battle.

10) Better is the little that has been done right, rather than a lot that has been done without perfection.

11) The utter ignorance is not extreme evil. Extreme evil is great intelligence and knowledge when it is accompanied by bad parenting.

12) One of the worst punishments suffered by wise men refusing to take part in the government is to live under the government of worse men.

13) We easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark, but the real tragedy in life is when adults are afraid of the light.

14) You must ensure that the first tales that our kids listen to are tales adjusted in the perfect way to promote virtue.

15) There will be no end to the troubles of the world, or of humanity itself, till philosophers will become kings of the world, and until those now called kings and rulers will become real and true philosophers, so that political power and philosophy will come in the same hands.

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📜 Plato’s Well-Known Works (Dialogues)

Here are Plato’s most well-known works:

🏺 The Republic (GR: Πολιτεία) – Examines the concepts of justice and the role of the philosopher as a ruler in an ideal society.

🏺 Timaeus (GR: Τίμαιος) – Explores the nature of the physical universe and the cosmos.

🏺 Meno (GR: Μένων) – A dialogue about the idea that learning is a process of recalling knowledge.

🏺 The Symposium (GR: Συμπόσιον) – Features speeches discussing the nature of Eros (love), beauty, and desire from different perspectives.

🏺 Phaedrus (GR: Φαῖδρος) – Explores topics such as love, the soul, and the pursuit of truth.

🏺 Apology (GR: Ἀπολογία) – Socrates’ defense speech during his trial, emphasizing the importance of his philosophical mission.

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🗿 Plato's Contribution to Western Thinking

Plato influenced countless Western philosophers, artists, and politicians throughout history:

🏺 Plato envisioned a society governed by philosopher-kings, emphasizing justice and the role of different social classes.

🏺 Plato supported the concept of values beyond the physical world—a realm of perfect, eternal “Forms” or “Ideas.”

🏺 He emphasized reason and knowledge grounded in experience.

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■ Plato Quotes

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📖 Sources: 

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plato
• Plato’s works include 26 generally accepted dialogues and 13 additional letters of disputed authenticity.