Explore popular quotes and sayings by a Greek philosopher Heraclitus.
Last updated on November 22, 2024.
Those unmindful when they hear, for all they make of their intelligence, may be regarded as the walking dead.
Eternity is a child playing, playing checkers; the kingdom belongs to a child.
A blow to the head will confuse a man's thinking, a blow to the foot has no such effect, this cannot be the result of an immaterial soul.
It is weariness to keep toiling at the same things so that one becomes ruled by them.
Lifetime is a child at play, moving pieces in a game. Kingship belongs to the child.
To me one man is worth ten thousand if he is first-rate.
The only thing that is constant is change.
Even sleepers are workers and collaborators on what goes on in the universe.
War is the father and king of all: some he has made gods, and some men; some slaves and some free.
Man is on earth as in an egg.
The Sibyl, with frenzied mouth uttering things not to be laughed at, unadorned and unperfumed, yet reaches to a thousand years with her voice by aid of the god.
Unless you expect the unexpected you will never find it, for it is hard to discover and hard to attain.
I am what libraries and librarians have made me, with little assistance from a professor of Greek and poets
It is better to conceal ignorance than to expose it.
Realize that war is common and justice is strife, and that all things come into being and pass away through strife.
Men who love wisdom should acquaint themselves with a great many particulars.
The fairest harmony springs from discord.
Ever-newer waters flow on those who step into the same rivers.
The unexpected connection is more powerful than one that is obvious.
It is wise to agree that all things are one.
He who does not expect will not find out the unexpected, for it is trackless and unexplored
Nothing endures but change. There is nothing permanent except change. All is flux, nothing stays still.
To God all things are fair and good and right, but men hold some things wrong and some right.
Life is a child moving counters in a game.
This universe, which is the same for all, has not been made by any god or man, but it always has been, is, and will be an ever-living fire, kindling itself by regular measures and going out by regular measures.
Knowledge of divine things for the most part is lost to us by incredulity.
Things of which there is sight, hearing, apprehension, these I prefer.
Things keep their secrets.
To God all things are beautiful, good, and right; human beings, on the other hand, deem some things right and others wrong. It would not be better if things happened to people just as they
wish.
The people must fight for their laws as for their walls.
All things come out of the one, and the one out of all things.
Dogs, also, bark at what they do not know.
The world, an entity out of everything, was created by none of the gods or men, but was, is and will be eternally living fire, regularly becoming ignited and reg- ularly becoming extinguished.
There is but one world common for those who are awake, but when men are asleep, each turns away into a world of his own.
Even a soul submerged in sleep
is hard at work and helps
make something of the world.
Everything flows and nothing abides. Everything gives way and nothing stays fixed.
The content of your #? character is your #? choice.
May you have plenty of wealth, you men of Ephesus, in order that you may be punished for your evil ways
The fairest order in the world is a heap of random sweepings.
Deliberate violence is more to be quenched than a fire
Though wisdom is common, yet the many live as if they had a wisdom of their own.
There is harmony in the tension of opposites, as in the case of the bow and lyre.
For when is death not within our selves? And as Heracleitus says: “Living and dead are the same, and so are awake and asleep, young and old. The former when shifted are the latter, and again the latter when shifted are the former."
Of all whose words I have heard, no one attains to this, to know that wisdom is apart from all.
History is a child building a sand-castle by the sea, and that child is the whole majesty of man's power in the world.
Everything changes and nothing stands still.
Dogs bark at a person whom they do not know.
Thinking is a sacred disease and sight is deceptive.
There is exchange of all things for fire and of fire for all things, as there is of wares for gold and of gold for wares.
Wisdom is one thing, to know how to make true judgment, how all things are steered through all things.
Men who are lovers of wisdom [i.e., philosophers] must be inquirers into many things.
The Lord whose oracle is at Delphi neither reveals nor conceals, but gives a sign
The results are in great need greater ambition.
What we have caught and what we have killed we have left behind, but what has escaped us we bring with us.
The awake share a common world, but the asleep turn aside into private worlds.
A drunk man, staggering and mindless, must be led home by his son, so wet is his psyche... Water brings death to the psyche, as earth brings death to water... The psyche lusts to be wet.
For those who are awake, the Cosmos is One.
Most people do not take heed of the things they encounter, nor do they grasp them even when they have learned about them, although they suppose they do.
The only thing constant is change
One must know that war is common, justice is strife, and everything happens according to strife and necessity.