"In every one of us there are..." - Quote by Socrates
In every one of us there are two ruling and directing principles, whose guidance we follow wherever they may lead; the one being an innate desire of pleasure; the other, an acquired judgment which aspires after excellence.
More by Socrates
“Get married, in any case. If you happen to get a good mate, you will be happy; if a bad one, you will become philosophical, which is a fine thing in itself.”
“Fellow citizens, why do you burn and scrape every stone to gather wealth and take so little care of your children to whom you must one day relinquish all?”
“Understanding a question is half an answer.”
More on Human Nature
“It's curious and ridiculous how much the gaze of a prudish and painfully chaste man touched by love can sometimes express and that precisely at a moment when the man would of course sooner be glad to fall through the earth than to express anything with a word or a look.”
“As soon as we climb higher than those who had at one time admired us, we appear to them as though we have sunken and fallen down:for, in any event, they had at one time supposed that they were with us (even if it were through us) on the heights.”
“Our problem is not that we desire too much but too little.”
More on Desire
“There is no calamity greater than lavish desires. There is no greater guilt than discontent. And there is no greater disaster than greed.”
“Most people spend most of their lives doing neither what they want to be doing nor what they ought to be doing.”
“For without you, I swear, the town Has become like a prison to me. Distraction and the mountain And the desert, all I desire.”