A system of morality that is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception that has nothing sound in it and nothing true.
SocratesRead
True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.
Interpretation
What this quote means
True knowledge is acknowledging the limits of one's understanding.
This quote by Socrates emphasizes the importance of humility in the pursuit of knowledge. It suggests that recognizing our own ignorance is the first step towards true enlightenment and wisdom, implying that those who believe they know everything may actually be the most misguided.
Themes
KnowledgeIgnoranceWisdomHumilityUnderstanding
In practice
Example use cases
In a classroom setting, to encourage students to ask questions and embrace learning.
More from Socrates
All quotes βThe poets are only the interpreters of the gods.
SocratesRead
I am wiser than this man, for neither of us appears to know anything great and good; but he fancies he knows something, although he knows nothing; whereas I, as I do not know anything, so I do not fancy I do. In this trifling particular, then, I appear to be wiser than he, because I do not fancy I know what I do not know.
SocratesRead
The unexamined life is not worth living.
SocratesRead
When I was young, I believed that life might unfold in an orderly way, according to my hopes and expectations. But now I understand that the Way winds like a river, always changing, ever onward.. My journeys revealed that the Way itself creates the warrior; that every path leads to peace, every choice to wisdom. And that life has always been, and will always be, arising in Mystery.
SocratesRead
Not life, but good life, is to be chiefly valued." "It is not living that matters, but living rightly. The unexamined life is not worth living.
SocratesRead
Similar quotes
Keep the extent of your abilities unknown.The wise man does not allow his knowledge and abilities to be sounded to the bottom, if he desires to be honored at all. He allows you to know them but not to comprehend them. No one must know the extent of his abilities, lest he be disappointed. No one ever has an opportunity of fathoming him entirely. For guesses and doubts about the extent of his talents arouse more veneration than accurate knowledge of them, be they ever so great.
Baltasar GracianRead
It is not the possession of truth, but the success which attends the seeking after it, that enriches the seeker and brings happiness to him.
Max PlanckRead
I would always advise young people to follow their star - not my star. They have to live their own life. If they decide they want to go into the investment business, do it, but make it a better business than it is today.
John C. BogleRead
I'm very much a believer in knowing what it is that you love doing so you can do a great deal of it.
Nora EphronRead
It took me forty years of dealing with buddhism to finally realize that actually Buddha's discovery was happiness and bliss.
Robert ThurmanRead
The liberation of the human mind has never been furthered by dunderheads; it has been furthered by gay fellows who heaved dead cats into sanctuaries and then went roistering down the highways of the world, proving to all men that doubt, after all, was safe - that the god in the sanctuary was finite in his power and hence a fraud. One horse-laugh is worth ten thousand syllogisms. It is not only more effective; it is also vastly more intelligent.
H. L. MenckenRead