Zitate von Sókratés

„Keiner von uns beiden, so kann man wohl sagen, weiß etwas Schönes und Gutes. Aber dieser glaubt zu wissen und weiß nicht, ich aber, der ich ebensowenig weiß, glaube das nicht. Daher scheine ich um ein weniges weiser zu sein als dieser, da ich nicht glaube zu wissen, was ich nicht weiß.“

—  Sókratés

nach Platon, Apologie des Sokrates, Erste Rede, 21d

„Heirate oder heirate nicht. Du wirst beides bereuen.“

—  Sókratés

„Macht mir kein Getümmel, O Ihr Männer von Athen.“

—  Sókratés

nach Platon, Apologie des Sokrates, Erste Rede, 18
Original griech.: "μὴ θορυβεῖτε, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι"; spr. "Mä torybeite, o andres athenaioi."

„Kriton, wir schulden dem Asklepios einen Hahn. Opfert ihm den und versäume es nicht.“

—  Sókratés

Letzte Worte, 399 v.Chr., zu Freund Kriton, nachdem er den Schierlingsbecher getrunken hatte, gemäß Platon, Phaidon 118a
Original griech.: "Ὦ Κρίτων […] τῷ Ἀσκληπιῷ ὀφείλομεν ἀλεκτρυόνα. ἀλλὰ ἀπόδοτε καὶ μὴ ἀμελήσητε."

„Denn es mag wohl eben keiner von uns beiden etwas Tüchtiges oder Sonderliches wissen; allein dieser doch meint zu wissen, da er nicht weiß, ich aber, wie ich eben nicht weiß, so meine ich es auch nicht. Ich scheine also um dieses wenige doch weiser zu sein als er, daß ich, was ich nicht weiß, auch nicht glaube zu wissen.“

—  Sókratés

Deutsch nach Schleiermacher. http://www.zeno.org/nid/20009262458
Original griech.: "κινδυνεύει μὲν γὰρ ἡμῶν οὐδέτερος οὐδὲν καλὸν κἀγαθὸν εἰδέναι, ἀλλ᾽ οὗτος μὲν οἴεταί τι εἰδέναι οὐκ εἰδώς, ἐγὼ δέ, ὥσπερ οὖν οὐκ οἶδα, οὐδὲ οἴομαι· ἔοικα γοῦν τούτου γε σμικρῷ τινι αὐτῷ τούτῳ σοφώτερος εἶναι, ὅτι ἃ μὴ οἶδα οὐδὲ οἴομαι εἰδέναι·")
Der letzte Teilsatz wird durch Verkürzung zu dem berühmten Zitat "Ich weiß nicht zu wissen." bzw. "Ich weiß, dass ich nicht weiß." ("Οἶδα οὐκ εἰδώς."

„Es ist besser, Unrecht zu leiden als Unrecht zu tun.“

—  Sókratés

nach Platon, Gorgias, 474b
Original griech.: "τὸ ἀδικεῖν τοῦ ἀδικεῖσθαι κάκιον"; spr. "to adikeín tu adikeístai kákion."; wörtl.: „Unrechttun ist schlechter denn Unrechtleiden.“

„Ich bin mir jedenfalls bewusst, dass ich keine Weisheit besitze, weder groß noch klein.“

—  Sókratés

nach Platon, Apologie des Sokrates, Erste Rede, 21b
Original griech.: "ἐγὼ […] δὴ οὔτε μέγα οὔτε σμικρὸν σύνοιδα ἐμαυτῷ σοφὸς ὤν·"; spr. "Egó de oute méga oute smikrón sýnoida emautó sophós ōn."

„If there is anything beautiful other than absolute beauty, that can only be beautiful as far as it partakes of absolute beauty—and this I should say of everything. …by beauty all things become beautiful. …by greatness only great things become great and greater and greater, and by smallness the less becomes less.“

—  Socrates

Plato, Phaedo

„You want to have proven to you that the soul is imperishable and immortal, and you think that the philosopher who is confident in death has but a vain and foolish confidence, if he thinks that he will fare better than one who has led another sort of life, in the world below, unless he can prove this; and you say that the strength and divinity of the soul, and of her existence prior to our becoming men, does not necessarily imply her immortality. …For any man, who is not devoid of natural feeling, has reason to fear, if he has no knowledge or proof of the soul's immortality. That is what I suppose you to say, Cebes, which I designedly repeat, in order that nothing may escape us…“

—  Socrates

Plato, Phaedo

„For after death, as they say, the genius of each individual, to whom he belonged in life, leads him to a certain place in which the dead are gathered together for judgment, whence they go into the world below, following the guide who is appointed to conduct them from this world to the other; and when they have there received their due and remained their time, another guide brings them back again after many revolutions of ages.“

—  Socrates

Plato, Phaedo

„Has a philosopher like you failed to discover that our country is more to be valued and higher and holier far than mother or father or any ancestor, and more to be regarded in the eyes of the gods and of men of understanding?“

—  Socrates

Crito
Plato, Crito

„The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.“

—  Socrates

No findable citation to Socrates. Found ascribed to Socrates in Stephen Covey (1992), Principle Centered Leadership (1990) p. 51 https://books.google.com/books?id=w4zCIPZrniQC&pg=PA51&dq=%22be+what+we+pretend+to+be%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiyvZnCg5HKAhUU5mMKHQIIAIgQ6AEIHTAA#v=onepage&q=%22be%20what%20we%20pretend%20to%20be%22&f=false.
Misattributed

„False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.“

—  Socrates

Phaedo 115e
literally: 'For know well', he said, 'o dearest Kriton, that to not speak well is not only sinful by itself, but lets evil intrude into the soul.'(εὖ γὰρ ἴσθι, ἦ δ᾽ ὅς, ὦ ἄριστε Κρίτων, τὸ μὴ καλῶς λέγειν οὐ μόνον εἰς αὐτὸ τοῦτο πλημμελές, ἀλλὰ καὶ κακόν τι ἐμποιεῖ ταῖς ψυχαῖς.)
Plato, Phaedo

„The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.“

—  Socrates

This is actually a quotation http://books.google.com/books?id=FUIHmRHf8SUC&lpg=PA130&dq=%22not%20on%20fighting%20the%20old%20but%20on%20building%20the%20new%22&pg=PA130#v=onepage&q=%22not%20on%20fighting%20the%20old%20but%20on%20building%20the%20new%22&f=false from a character named Socrates in Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book that Changes Lives http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Way_of_the_Peaceful_Warrior, by Dan Millman.
Misattributed

„If, I say now, when, as I conceive and imagine, God orders me to fulfill the philosopher's mission of searching into myself and other men, I were to desert my post through fear of death, or any other fear; that would indeed be strange, and I might justly be arraigned in court for denying the existence of the gods… then I would be fancying that I was wise when I was not wise. For this fear of death is indeed the pretense of wisdom, and not real wisdom, being the appearance of knowing the unknown; since no one knows whether death, which they in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good. …this is the point in which, as I think, I am superior to men in general, and in which I might perhaps fancy myself wiser than other men — that whereas I know but little of the world below, I do not suppose that I know: but I do know that injustice and disobedience to a better, whether God or man, is evil and dishonorable, and I will never fear or avoid a possible good rather than a certain evil.“

—  Socrates

29a–b
Alternate translation: "To fear death, is nothing else but to believe ourselves to be wise, when we are not; and to fancy that we know what we do not know. In effect, no body knows death; no body can tell, but it may be the greatest benefit of mankind; and yet men are afraid of it, as if they knew certainly that it were the greatest of evils."
Plato, Apology

„Upon the earth are animals and men, some in a middle region, others dwelling about the air as we dwell about the sea; others in islands which the air flows round, near the continent; and in a word, the air is used by them as the water and the sea are by us, and the ether is to them as the air is to us. Moreover, the temperament of their seasons is such that they have no disease, and live much longer than we do, and have sight and hearing and smell, and all the other senses, in far greater perfection, in the same degree that air is purer than water or the ether than air. Also they have temples and sacred places in which the gods really dwell, and they hear their voices and receive their answers and are conscious of them and hold converse with them, and they see the sun, moon, and stars as they really are, and their other blessedness is of a piece with this.“

—  Socrates

Plato, Phaedo

„I shall never cease from the practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet after my manner, and convincing him, saying: O my friend, why do you who are a citizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens, care so much about laying up the greatest amount of money and honor and reputation, and so little about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul, which you never regard or heed at all? Are you not ashamed of this? And if the person with whom I am arguing says: Yes, but I do care: I do not depart or let him go at once; I interrogate and examine and cross-examine him, and if I think that he has no virtue, but only says that he has, I reproach him with overvaluing the greater, and undervaluing the less. …For this is the command of God, as I would have you know…“

—  Socrates

29d–30a
Plato, Apology

„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.“

—  Socrates

Phaedrus
Plato, Phaedrus

„I realized that it was not by wisdom that poets write their poetry, but by a kind of nature or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets; for these also say many beautiful things, but do not know anything of what they say.“

—  Socrates

22c
Plato, Apology