"The light dove, in free flight cutting..." - Quote by Immanuel Kant
The light dove, in free flight cutting through the air the resistance of which it feels, could get the idea that it could do even better in airless space. Likewise, Plato abandoned the world of the senses because it posed so many hindrances for the understanding, and dared to go beyond it on the wings of the ideas, in the empty space of pure understanding.
More by Immanuel Kant
“I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law.”
“Duty is the necessity to act out of reverence for the law.”
“It is presumed that there exists a great unity in nature, in respect of the adequacy of a single cause to account for many different kinds of consequences.”
More on Understanding
“The presence of irony does not necessarily mean that the earnestness is excluded. Only assistant professors assume that.”
“Teach me, dear creature, how to think and speak; Lay open to my earthy-gross conceit, Smother'd in errors, feeble, shallow, weak, The folded meaning of your words' deceit.”
“You think the only people who are people, are the people who look and think like you. But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger, you'll learn things you never knew you never knew.”
More on Plato
“If there were only some way of contriving that a state or an army should be made up of lovers and their beloved, they would be the very best governors of their own city, abstaining from all dishonour, and emulating one another in honour; and when fighting at each other's side, although a mere handful, they would overcome the world. For what lover would not choose rather to be seen by all mankind than by his beloved, either when abandoning his post or throwing away his arms? He would be ready to die a thousand deaths rather than endure this.”
“May I do to others as I would that they should do unto me.”
“Was not this ... what we spoke of as the great advantage of wisdom -- to know what is known and what is unknown to us?”