Browse 6 quotations connecting Plato with Courage, with meanings, source notes and related themes.
In the Apology, Socrates describes the need to keep an assigned post even at the risk of death; in Crito, he refuses to escape at the price of abandoning his judgment about what is just. The separate dialogue Laches broadens the inquiry beyond warfare. Laches proposes courage as endurance of the soul, but Socrates asks whether endurance without sound judgment may do harm. Nicias instead associates courage with understanding what to fear or trust; that definition too is challenged. The speakers do not settle a final definition. The six passages therefore show courage as a subject of examination rather than six interchangeable instructions to be fearless. Laches and Nicias are dramatic speakers inside Plato’s text, not direct statements by Plato personally. English wording comes from Benjamin Jowett’s public-domain translation; this ancient discussion is not a clinical or safety recommendation.
Sources represented here include Apology, Laches, Crito.
“I shall obey God rather than you.”
Socrates presents moral and philosophical duty as more binding than compliance with pressure from political authority.
Apology, Jowett translation; Socrates says he would continue practicing philosophy even if acquittal were conditioned on silence.
“The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways—I to die, and you to live.”
The closing sentence accepts the separation between life and death without claiming certainty about which condition is ultimately better.
Apology, final paragraph in Jowett’s translation; Socrates closes after the jury has sentenced him to death.
“I would rather die having spoken after my manner, than speak in your manner and live.”
Preserving truthful speech and character is valued above survival purchased by abandoning one’s principles merely to satisfy an audience.
Apology, Jowett translation; Socrates rejects saving himself through a style of pleading he considers unworthy.
“Ought a man to do what he admits to be right, or ought he to betray the right?”
Socrates asks whether acting on one’s considered judgment about right and wrong should be set aside when the costs are severe. In the prison conversation, the question tests whether escaping a wrongful sentence can be justified under the principles he and Crito have accepted.
Crito, Socrates questioning Crito during the prison discussion after establishing a rule against retaliation; Benjamin Jowett English translation, Project Gutenberg #1657. The sentence begins after Socrates says he will put the next point as a question. The question is not an unqualified defense of obedience to every law; the dialogue stages an argument about obligations to the city.
“I mean to say, Laches, that courage is the knowledge of that which inspires fear or confidence in war, or in anything.”
Nicias suggests that courageous judgment depends on understanding when danger deserves fear and when there is reason for confidence. Laches disputes the link between courage and specialized knowledge, and Socrates presses Nicias on what knowledge of future good or evil entails. It remains a hypothesis under examination, not a definitive philosophical verdict.
Laches, around Stephanus 194e–195a, Benjamin Jowett English, Project Gutenberg #1584. Nicias speaks to Laches after Socrates invites an alternative to Laches’s endurance account; subsequent questioning probes the scope of knowledge about fear and hope and leaves the inquiry unresolved. The local dramatic speaker is Nicias, not Plato personally. The wording occurs in the dialogue body, not Jowett’s introduction.
“I should say that courage is a sort of endurance of the soul, if I am to speak of the universal nature which pervades them all.”
Laches proposes endurance of the soul as a feature shared by different courageous acts, not only by soldiers who hold their ground. Socrates immediately tests this definition and asks whether stubborn endurance without wisdom can be harmful. The dialogue does not endorse endurance alone as a final, sufficient definition of courage.
Laches, roughly Stephanus 192b–c, Benjamin Jowett English, Project Gutenberg #1584. Laches answers Socrates’s attempt to define courage beyond battlefield conduct; Socrates then challenges whether foolish endurance can count as courageous. The local dramatic speaker is Laches, not Socrates or Plato himself. This is a contested proposal inside an unresolved inquiry, not Plato’s stand-alone creed.
