Diogenes Quotes

15 Sourced Quotes

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

Diogenes
Plato had defined Man as an animal, biped and featherless, and was applauded. Diogenes plucked a fowl and brought it into the lecture-room with the words, "Here is Plato's man.

Diogenes
He lit a lamp in broad daylight and said, as he went about, "I am looking for a human.

Diogenes
If your cloak was a gift, I appreciate it; if it was a loan, I'm not through with it yet.

Diogenes
Being asked where in Greece he saw good men, he replied, "'Good men nowhere, but good boys at Sparta.

Diogenes
To the question what wine he found pleasant to drink, he replied, "That for which other people pay.

Diogenes
Asked where he came from, he said, "I am a citizen of the world.

Diogenes
Once he saw the officials of a temple leading away some one who had stolen a bowl belonging to the treasurers, and said, "The great thieves are leading away the little thief.

Diogenes
One day, observing a child drinking out of his hands, he cast away the cup from his wallet with the words, "A child has beaten me in plainness of living.

Diogenes
When some one reminded him that the people of Sinope had sentenced him to exile, he said, "And I sentenced them to stay at home.

Diogenes
When some one boasted that at the Pythian games he had vanquished men, Diogenes replied, "Nay, I defeat men, you defeat slaves.

Diogenes
He was breakfasting in the marketplace, and the bystanders gathered round him with cries of " dog." "It is you who are dogs," cried he, "when you stand round and watch me at my breakfast.

Diogenes
People who talk well but do nothing are like musical intruments; the sound is all they have to offer.

Diogenes
He once begged alms of a statue, and, when asked why he did so, replied, "To get practice in being refused.

Diogenes
I pissed on the man who called me a dog. Why was he so surprised?

Diogenes