1. Plato, Gorgias, None (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
| 449d. and to be able to make anyone else a rhetorician, tell me with what particular thing rhetoric is concerned: as, for example, weaving is concerned with the manufacture of clothes, is it not? Gorg. Yes. Soc. And music, likewise, with the making of tunes? Gorg. Yes. Soc. Upon my word, Gorgias, I do admire your answers! You make them as brief as they well can be. Gorg. Yes, Socrates, I consider myself a very fair hand at that. Soc. You are right there. Come now, answer me in the same way about rhetoric: with what particular thing is its skill concerned? Gorg. With speech. |
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2. Plato, Phaedrus, None (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
| 230b. Phaedrus. Yes, this is it. Socrates. By Hera, it is a charming resting place. For this plane tree is very spreading and lofty, and the tall and shady willow is very beautiful, and it is in full bloom, so as to make the place most fragrant; then, too, the spring is very pretty as it flows under the plane tree, and its water is very cool, to judge by my foot. And it seems to be a sacred place of some nymphs and of Achelous, judging by |
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3. Xenophon, Memoirs, 1.2.1, 1.2.14, 1.6.10, 4.4.8, 4.5.11, 4.8.11 (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
| 1.2.1. No less wonderful is it to me that some believed the charge brought against Socrates of corrupting the youth. In the first place, apart from what I have said, in control of his own passions and appetites he was the strictest of men; further, in endurance of cold and heat and every kind of toil he was most resolute; and besides, his needs were so schooled to moderation that having very little he was yet very content. 1.2.14. Ambition was the very life-blood of both: no Athenian was ever like them. They were eager to get control of everything and to outstrip every rival in notoriety. They knew that Socrates was living on very little, and yet was wholly independent; that he was strictly moderate in all his pleasures; and that in argument he could do what he liked with any disputant. 1.6.10. You seem, Antiphon, to imagine that happiness consists in luxury and extravagance. But my belief is that to have no wants is divine; Cyropaedia VIII. iii. 40. to have as few as possible comes next to the divine; and as that which is divine is supreme, so that which approaches nearest to its nature is nearest to the supreme. 4.4.8. Upon my word, you mean to say that you have made a great discovery, if jurymen are to cease from voting different ways, citizens from disputing and litigation, and wrangling about the justice of their claims, cities from quarrelling about their rights and making war; and for my part, I don’t see how to tear myself away from you till I have heard about your great discovery. 4.5.11. Socrates, said Euthydemus, I think you mean that he who is at the mercy of the bodily pleasures has no concern whatever with virtue in any form. Yes, Euthydemus; for how can an incontinent man be any better than the dullest beast? How can he who fails to consider the things that matter most, and strives by every means to do the things that are most pleasant, be better than the stupidest of creatures? No, only the self-controlled have power to consider the things that matter most, and, sorting them out after their kind, by word and deed alike to prefer the good and reject the evil. 4.8.11. This was the tenor of his conversation with Hermogenes and with the others. All who knew what manner of man Socrates was and who seek after virtue continue to this day to miss him beyond all others, as the chief of helpers in the quest of virtue. For myself, I have described him as he was: so religious that he did nothing without counsel from the gods; so just that he did no injury, however small, to any man, but conferred the greatest benefits on all who dealt with him; so self-controlled that he never chose the pleasanter rather than the better course; so wise that he was unerring in his judgment of the better and the worse, and needed no counsellor, but relied on himself for his knowledge of them; masterly in expounding and defining such things; no less masterly in putting others to the test, and convincing them of error and exhorting them to follow virtue and gentleness. To me then he seemed to be all that a truly good and happy man must be. But if there is any doubter, let him set the character of other men beside these things; then let him judge. |
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4. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, None (4th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
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5. Philo of Alexandria, On Dreams, 1.124 (1st cent. BCE - missingth cent. CE)
| 1.124. Now no such person as this is a pupil of the sacred word, but those only are the disciples of that who are real genuine men, lovers of temperance, and orderliness, and modesty, men who have laid down continence, and frugality, and fortitude, as a kind of base and foundation for the whole of life; and safe stations for the soul, in which it may anchor without danger and without changeableness: for being superior to money, and pleasure, and glory, they look down upon meats and drinks, and everything of that sort, beyond what is necessary to ward off hunger: being thoroughly ready to undergo hunger, and thirst, and heat, and cold, and all other things, however hard they may be to be borne, for the sake of the acquisition of virtue. And being admirers of whatever is most easily provided, so as to not be ashamed of ever such cheap or shabby clothes, think rather, on the other hand, that sumptuous apparel is a reproach and great scandal to life. |
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6. New Testament, 2 Peter, 1.5-1.6 (1st cent. CE - 1st cent. CE)
| 1.5. Yes, and for this very cause adding on your part all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence; and in moral excellence, knowledge; 1.6. and in knowledge, self-control; and in self-control patience; and in patience godliness; |
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