Quotes · Skopia

633 quotes

Group bySubject Speaker Era Genre

Genre·Philosophical literature✕clear

Classical antiquity188 quotes

Wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder. — Socrates · 400 BC The unexamined life is not worth living. — Socrates · 399 BC Man is the measure of all things. — Protagoras · 420 BC Know thyself. — Thales All men by nature desire to know. — Aristotle · 322 BC Man is by nature a political animal. — Aristotle · 350 BC All 188 quotes →

Age of Enlightenment51 quotes

In such condition there is no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain... And the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. — Thomas Hobbes · 1651 And with the guts of the last priest Let's wring the neck of the last king. — Denis Diderot · 1772 I think, therefore I am. — Rene Descartes · 1637 The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of. — Blaise Pascal · 1662 Man naturally desires, not only to be loved, but to be lovely; or to be that thing which is the natural and proper object of love. — Adam Smith · 1759 Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made. — Immanuel Kant · 1784 All 51 quotes →

Ancient World45 quotes

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. — Lao Tzu · 400 BC Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished. — Lao Tzu · 400 BC When one is at ease with himself, one is near Tao. — Zhuang Zhou · 221 BC Moral force never dwells in solitude; it will always bring neighbors. — Confucius · 221 BC I for my part am not one of those who have innate knowledge. I am simply one who loves the past and who is diligent in investigating it. — Confucius · 221 BC Is Goodness indeed so far away? If we really wanted Goodness, we should find that it was at our very side. — Confucius · 221 BC All 45 quotes →

The Renaissance29 quotes

God is not willing to do everything, and thus take away our free will and that share of glory which belongs to us. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1532 Ancient times were the youth of the world. — Francis Bacon · 1605 Whoever desires to found a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasions for it. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1531 A prince being thus obliged to know well how to act as a beast must imitate the fox and the lion, for the lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1532 The chief foundations of all states, new as well as old or composite, are good laws and good arms; and as there cannot be good laws where the state is not well armed, it follows that where they are well armed they have good laws. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1532 Among other evils which being unarmed brings you, it causes you to be despised. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1532 All 29 quotes →

Middle Ages9 quotes

O happy race of mortals, if your hearts are ruled, as is the universe, by Love! — Boethius · 523 If you expect a physician to help you, you must lay bare your wound. — Boethius · 523 Who hath so entire happiness that he is not in some part offended with the condition of his estate? — Boethius · 524 Nothing is miserable but what is thought so, and contrariwise, every estate is happy if he that bears it be content. — Boethius · 523 Wherefore not without cause has one of your own followers asked, "If God is, whence come evil things? If He is not, whence come good?" — Boethius · 523 You can take comfort in the likelihood that what is now making you miserable will also pass away. — Boethius · 523 All 9 quotes →

Early Christianity3 quotes

A people was a multitude defined by the common objects of their love. — St. Augustine · 426 Hear the other side. — St. Augustine · 391 A law that is not just does not seem to me to be a law. — St. Augustine · 389

Song Dynasty1 quote

No snowflake ever falls in the wrong place. — Yuanwu Keqin · 1125