Quotes by Diogenes

“It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours.”

“It is the privilege of the gods to want nothing, and of godlike men to want little.”

“I am a citizen of the world.”

“A philosopher named Aristippus, who had quite willingly sucked up to Dionysus and won himself a spot at his court, saw Diogenes cooking lentils for a meal. "If you would only learn to compliment Di...”

“Dogs and philosophers do the greatest good and get the fewest rewards.”

“Step out of my sunlight.”

“Poverty is a virtue which one can teach oneself.”

“Discourse on virtue and they pass by in droves. Whistle and dance and shimmy, and you've got an audience!”

“Of what use is a philosopher who doesn't hurt anybody's feelings?”

“We are more curious about the meaning of dreams than about things we see when awake.”

“It takes a wise man to discover a wise man.”

“As to the gods, I have no means of knowing either that they exist or do not exist. For many are the obstacles that impede knowledge, both the obscurity of the question and the shortness of human life.”

“The foundation of every state is the education of its youth.”

“Time is the most valuable thing that a man can spend.”

“Blushing is the color of virtue.”

“He also said that he marvelled that among the Greeks, those who were skilful in a thing contend together; but those who have no such skill act as judges of the contest.”

“The only way to gall and fret effectively is for yourself to be a good and honest man.”

“A vine bears three grapes, the first of pleasure, the second of drunkenness, and the third of repentance.”

“The sun, too, shines into cesspools and is not polluted.”

“When I look upon seamen, men of science and philosophers, man is the wisest of all beings; when I look upon priests and prophets nothing is as contemptible as man.”