QuoteProject
No trace of slavery ought to mix with the studies of the freeborn man. No study, pursued under compulsion, remains rooted in the memory.
Plato
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Learning is most effective when it is free and voluntary, not forced.

Plato emphasizes the importance of freedom in education, suggesting that true learning cannot occur under coercion. He argues that studies pursued out of obligation or fear are unlikely to be retained or appreciated, reinforcing the idea that genuine education should be driven by the learner's own will and curiosity.

Themes

EducationLearningFreedomCompulsionMemory

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of student autonomy in education.

More from Plato

Never discourage anyone who continually makes progress, no matter how slow... even if that someone is yourself!
PlatoRead
Not one of them who took up in his youth with this opinion that there are no gods ever continued until old age faithful to his conviction.
PlatoRead
...for the object of education is to teach us to love beauty.
PlatoRead
Pleasure is the greatest incentive to evil.
PlatoRead
Nothing in the affairs of men is worthy of great anxiety.
PlatoRead
Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence.
PlatoRead

Similar quotes

Readers, after all, are making the world with you. You give them the materials, but it's the readers who build that world in their own minds.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
You want to ensure people can do it right 99 percent of time. When we have to fire one of our surgical trainees, it is never because they don't have the physical skills but because they don't have the moral skills - to practise and admit failure.
Atul GawandeRead
He who refuses to learn deserves extinction.
Hillel The ElderRead
Math education has changed over the years. In the 19th century, they taught spherical trigonometry because one of the biggest applications of mathematics was navigating the ocean. This is no longer so relevant.
Terence TaoRead
I read comics and I did science, and never really put them together until I accidentally found myself in the middle of one.
Randall MunroeRead
As long as parents and teachers in general shall fall under the established rule, it is clear that politics and modes of government will educate and infect us all. They poison our minds, before we can resist, or so much as suspect their malignity. Like the barbarous directors of the Eastern seraglios, they deprive us of our vitality, and fit us for their despicable employment from the cradle.
William GodwinRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.