Isocrates Quotes

Regard as your most faithful friends, not those who praise everything you say or do, but those who criticize your mistakes.

Of all our possessions, wisdom alone is immortal.

Always when you are about to say anything, first weigh it in your mind; for with many the tongue outruns the thought.

Be gracious to all men, but choose the best to be your friends.

If you be a lover of instruction, you will be well instructed.

We should not call a city happy because it attracts masses of citizens from everywhere; a fortunate city is one in which the race of the original inhabitants is best preserved.

Guard yourself against accusations, even if they are false; for the multitude are ignorant of the truth and look only to reputation.

Conduct yourself towards your parents as you would have your children conduct themselves towards you.

Spend your leisure time in cultivating an ear attentive to discourse, for in this way you will find that you learn with ease what others have found out with difficulty.

But I marvel when I observe these men setting themselves up as instructors of youth who cannot see that they are applying the analogy of an art with hard and fast rules to a creative process

Oratory is good only if it has the qualities of fitness for the occasion, propriety of style, and originality of treatment, while in the case of letters there is no such need whatsoever.

It is not fitting that the evil produced by men should be imputed to things; let those bear the blame who make an ill use of things in themselves good.

Whetstones are not themselves able to cut, but make iron sharp and capable of cutting.

I maintain, then, that we should make peace, not only with the Chians, the Rhodians, the Byzantines and the Coans, but with all mankind.

It is more important to know where you are going than to get there quickly. Do not mistake activity for achievement.