The unexamined life is not worth living.
- SocratesPhilosophy
Philosophy always sits awkwardly in a collection of quotations: systems do not compress into a sentence, and that is exactly what is asked of them. Kant's ethics or Nietzsche's critique of morality do not fit into a single line without loss. What survives is the phrasing — often brilliant, but lifted out of the context that gave it weight.
So this theme is best read as a pointer rather than a summary. A line that stops you is usually the tip of something larger, and the best thing to do with it is find where it came from. For most authors here the source is available and readable: Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Epictetus wrote briefly and without jargon, which is why their work has stayed in print for centuries.
Do not weep; do not wax indignant. Understand.
- Baruch SpinozaThe greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.
- Michel de MontaigneA man sees in the world what he carries in his heart.
- Johann Wolfgang von GoetheAll of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.
- Blaise PascalHe who flies high falls low.
- Croatian ProverbOur virtues and our failings are inseparable, like force and matter.
- Nikola TeslaThe heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of.
- Blaise PascalThere are no facts, only interpretations.
- Friedrich NietzscheBy three methods we may learn wisdom: first, by reflection, which is noblest; second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third, by experience, which is the bitterest.
- ConfuciusLoss is nothing else but change, and change is nature's delight.
- Marcus AureliusAll the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.
- William ShakespeareNo price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.
- Friedrich NietzscheCircumstances don't make the man, they only reveal him to himself.
- EpictetusWonder is the beginning of wisdom.
- SocratesIgnorance: the root and stem of every evil.
- PlatoNo man is free who is not master of himself.
- EpictetusThe only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
- SocratesAll that we are is the result of what we have thought.
- BuddhaBecome who you are.
- Friedrich NietzscheHe who has a why to live can bear almost any how.
- Friedrich NietzscheLive the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.
- Rainer Maria RilkeCharacter is destiny.
- HeraclitusThe soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.
- Marcus AureliusWaste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.
- Marcus AureliusAgainst stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain.
- Friedrich SchillerIf it is not right, do not do it; if it is not true, do not say it.
- Marcus AureliusOur deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.
- George EliotNo man ever steps in the same river twice.
- HeraclitusThe whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
- AristotleThere is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.
- Friedrich NietzscheWisdom cannot be imparted. Wisdom that a wise man attempts to impart always sounds like foolishness to someone else.
- Hermann HesseCommon sense is not so common.
- VoltaireNothing is ours, except time.
- SenecaThe flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long.
- Lao TzuWe forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to be like other people.
- Arthur SchopenhauerThe truth is rarely pure and never simple.
- Oscar WildeAccept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together.
- Marcus AureliusDoubt grows with knowledge.
- Johann Wolfgang von GoetheDon't explain your philosophy. Embody it.
- EpictetusThere is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.
- William ShakespeareAnxiety is the dizziness of freedom.
- Søren KierkegaardThe only constant in life is change.
- HeraclitusLife can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.
- Søren Kierkegaard