6 quotations linked to The Republic by or associated with Plato, with source notes, explanations and related topics.
Dates represented in this collection: c. 375 BCE · 4th century BCE. Individual quotation notes provide the most specific context for a passage.
The wording shown here follows the represented English edition or translation.
Translations and editions can differ in wording, punctuation and emphasis, so the source attached to each quotation matters when exact phrasing is important.
Use these links when you want to inspect the wording in its wider work or edition.
“The beginning is the most important part of the work.”
Beginnings shape habits and direction, so the first stage of a serious undertaking deserves unusual care.
Source note: Traditional translation; exact wording varies by edition.
“Justice was doing one’s own business, and not being a busybody.”
Justice in the city is connected with people fulfilling appropriate responsibilities rather than constantly interfering in roles that are not theirs.
Source note: The Republic, Book IV; the statement summarizes a definition developed within Socrates’ argument about the ordered city.
“Knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.”
Learning forced without engagement may fail to become durable understanding because the learner has not made the knowledge intellectually their own.
Source note: The Republic, Book VII, Jowett translation; Socrates argues that education should draw the mind rather than rely only on compulsion.
“Beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm depend on simplicity.”
Aesthetic excellence is linked with order and simplicity rather than decorative complexity for its own sake.
Source note: The Republic, Book III, Jowett translation; the passage connects musical and literary form with simplicity of character.
“The direction in which education starts a man, will determine his future life.”
Early education shapes habits of attention and judgment, so its direction can influence the kind of person someone later becomes.
Source note: The Republic, Book IV in Benjamin Jowett’s translation; the line appears during discussion of education and civic character.
“Opinion appears to you to be darker than knowledge, but lighter than ignorance?”
Opinion is treated as an intermediate state: it is not complete ignorance, but it also lacks the clarity and stability of knowledge.
Source note: The Republic, Book V; Socrates places opinion between knowledge and ignorance in the argument about what each apprehends.