Quotes by philosophers

Great things grow from small beginnings, so start with what is right in front of you. The original says the journey begins “beneath one's feet.”

Latin for “love of fate.” Nietzsche used it for the attitude of wanting your life exactly as it is, hard parts included, instead of merely putting up with it.

Cicero says that being grateful is the most important virtue and the source of the others, because people who remember what they owe are loyal, dutiful and kind.

The popular summary of Socrates' wisdom: he was wiser than others only because he knew the limits of his knowledge. The exact phrase is a later compression of what Plato wrote.

Descartes doubted everything he could, and found one thing he could not doubt: that he was doubting, and therefore thinking, and therefore existed.

Everything flows and changes, so the river is never the same twice, and neither are you. The popular wording is a later paraphrase of Heraclitus's surviving fragments.

Spencer's phrase for natural selection: organisms best suited to their environment survive and reproduce. “Fittest” means best adapted, not strongest.

Education should not just pour facts into students but light their own desire to think and to find the truth.

At his trial, Socrates refuses to stop questioning people about how to live, saying a life without such questioning is not worth living for a human being. He chose death over silence.

Part of Santayana's argument that progress depends on memory. He was writing about how individuals and societies learn, not giving a warning specifically about politics or war.

Steady, useful work protects us from three things that ruin lives: having nothing to do, falling into bad habits, and being poor.