Plato

"The matter is as it is in all other cases: if it is naturally in you to be a good orator, a notable orator you will be when you have acquired knowledge and practice ..."

"... When someone sees a soul disturbed and unable to see something, he won't laugh mindlessly, but he'll take into consideration whether it has come from a brighter life and is dimmed through not having yet become accustomed to the dark or whether it has come from greater ignorance into greater light and is dazzled by the increased brillance."

"They certainly give very strange names to diseases."

"The tools that would teach men their own use would be beyond price."

"As it is, the lover of inquiry must follow his beloved wherever it may lead him."

"And what, Socrates, is the food of the soul? Surely, I said, knowledge is the food of the soul."

"The punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is to live under the government of worse men."

"The spiritual eyesight improves as the physical eyesight declines."

"Excess generally causes reaction, and produces a change in the opposite direction, whether it be in the seasons, or in individuals, or in governments."

"Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly."

"Excess of liberty, whether it lies in state or individuals, seems only to pass into excess of slavery."

"A poet, you see, is a light thing, and winged and holy, and cannot compose before he gets inspiration and loses control of his senses and his reason has deserted him."