"To fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise without really being wise, for it is to think that we know what we do not know. For no one knows whether death may not be the greatest good that can happen to man."

"Many men are loved by their enemies, and hated by their friends, and are the friends of their enemies, and the enemies of their friends."

"Either never, or very seldom, do the quiet actions in life appear to be better than the quick and energetic ones."

"Yet even in reaching for the beautiful there is beauty, and also in suffering whatever it is that one suffers en route."

"The true lover of knowledge naturally strives for truth, and is not content with common opinion, but soars with undimmed and unwearied passion till he grasps the essential nature of things."

"No matter how hard you fight the darkness, every light casts a shadow, and the closer you get to the light, the darker that shadow becomes."

"There's no chance of their having a conscious glimpse of the truth as long as they refuse to disturb the things they take for granted and remain incapable of explaining them. For if your starting point is unknown, and your end-point and intermediate stages are woven together out of unknown material, there may be coherence, but knowledge is completely out of the question."

"Wars and revolutions and battles, you see, are due simply and solely to the body and its desires. All wars are undertaken for the acquisition of wealth; and the reason why we have to acquire wealth is the body, because we are slaves in its service."

"The perfect state is one where men weep and rejoice over the same things."

"No one ever teaches well who wants to teach, or governs well who wants to govern."