Heraclitus Quotes

Men who love wisdom should acquaint themselves with a great many particulars.

When men dream, each has his own world. When they are awake, they have a common world.

All things flow, nothing abides. You cannot step into the same river twice, for the waters are continually flowing on. Nothing is permanent except change.

Good character is not formed in a week or a month. It is created little by little, day by day. Protracted and patient effort is needed to develop good character.

How can you hide from what never goes away?

To do the same thing over and over again is not only boredom: it is to be controlled by rather than to control what you do.

Nothing is, everything is becoming.

Knowledge is not intelligence.

And some men are as ignorant of what they do when awake as they are forgetful of what they do when asleep.

No one that encounters prosperity does not also encounter danger.

You can never step in the same river twice.

The results are in great need greater ambition.

The river where you set your foot just now is gone-those waters give way to this, now this.

To get everything you want is not a good thing. Disease makes health seem sweet. Hunger leads to the appreciation of being full-fed. Tiredness creates the enjoyment of resting

Those who love wisdom must investigate many things

The nature of things is in the habit of concealing itself.

It would not be better if things happened to men just as they wish.

Deliberate violence is more to be quenched than a fire

All entities move and nothing remains still.

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.

Ever-newer waters flow on those who step into the same rivers.

What we have caught and what we have killed we have left behind, but what has escaped us we bring with us.

History is a child building a sand-castle by the sea, and that child is the whole majesty of man's power in the world.

Everything changes but change itself. Everything flows and nothing remains the same... You cannot step twice into the same river, for other waters and yet others go flowing ever on.

Everything flows and nothing abides; everything gives way and nothing stays fixed... Cool things become warm, the warm grows cool; the moist dries, the parched becomes moist... It is in changing that things find repose.

Wisdom is the oneness of mind that guides and permeated all things.

The people must fight on behalf of the law as though for the city wall.

For when is death not within our selves? And as Heracleitus says: “Living and dead are the same, and so are awake and asleep, young and old. The former when shifted are the latter, and again the latter when shifted are the former."

The only thing that is constant is change.

May you have plenty of wealth, you men of Ephesus, in order that you may be punished for your evil ways

Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play.

It is wise to listen, not to me but to the Word, and to confess that all things are one.

Things keep their secrets.

Men that love wisdom must be acquainted with very many things indeed.

The waking have one common world, but the sleeping turn aside each into a world of his own

Men who are lovers of wisdom [i.e., philosophers] must be inquirers into many things.

Our envy always lasts longer than the happiness of those we envy.

The best of men choose one thing in preference to all else, immortal glory in preference to mortal good; whereas the masses simply glut themselves like cattle.

What was scattered, gathers.What was gathered, blows away

For those who are awake, the Cosmos is One.

Things of which there is sight, hearing, apprehension, these I prefer.

Of all whose words I have heard, no one attains to this, to know that wisdom is apart from all.

There is harmony in the tension of opposites, as in the case of the bow and lyre.

Bigotry is the sacred disease.

Even sleepers are workers and collaborators on what goes on in the universe.

It is by disease that health is pleasant; by evil that good is pleasant; by hunger, satiety; by weariness, rest.

The fairest order in the world is a heap of random sweepings.

Presumption must be quenched even more than a fire.

To me one man is worth ten thousand if he is first-rate.

The majority of people have no understanding of the things with which they daily meet, nor, when instructed, do they have any right knowledge of them, although to themselves they seem to have.

All men have the capacity of knowing themselves and acting with moderation.

It is harder to fight pleasure than to fight emotion.

Lifetime is a child at play, moving pieces in a game. Kingship belongs to the child.

Nothing endures but change.

To be evenmindedis the greatest virtue.Wisdom is to speakthe truth and actin keeping with its nature.

Learning many things does not teach understanding

Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow.Nothing endures but change.

Not I but the world says it: All is one.

There is nothing permanent except change. [Therefore enjoy what good you have while you have it and endure and outlast what bad you can't cure immediately]

There is but one world common for those who are awake, but when men are asleep, each turns away into a world of his own.