The disease of the soul is both more common and more deadly than the disease of the body. Just as medicine is the art devoted to healing the body, so philosophy is the art devoted to healing the soul, curing it of improper emotions, false beliefs, and faulty judgments, which are the causes of so much hardship and handicap. To heal the body one turns to the practitioner of the art of healing the body, but to heal the soul there is no doctor to turn to, and each of us is left to become that doctor unto himself. Yet, this need not stop us from exhorting others to imitate us in the godly art, in the forlorn hope that they might transform themselves into better citizens for Athens and better companions for us.
About This Quote
About Neel Burton
Neel Burton was British psychiatrist and author. Neel Burton is a British psychiatrist, philosopher, writer, and educator. He is an author of several books, including Psychiatry (2006), Living with Schizophrenia, The Meaning of Madness (2008), Master your Mind (2009), The Art of Failure – The Anti Self-Help Guide (2010), Growing from Depression: A Self-Help Guide (2010), Hide and Seek: The Psychology of Self-Deception (2012), Heaven and Hell: The Psychology of the Emotions (2015), and Hypersanity: Thinking Beyond Thinking (2019). Read more on Wikipedia →
Themes
- Philosophy — Deep thoughts on existence, knowledge, and the nature of reality