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Date: c. 501 B.C.

"For souls it is death to become water, and for water death to become earth. Water comes into existence out of earth, and soul out of water."

— Heraklitus (fl. 504-1 BCE)

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Date: c. 501 B.C.

"One would never discover the limits of soul, should one traverse every road--so deep a measure does it possess."

— Heraklitus (fl. 504-1 BCE)

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Date: c. 501 B.C.

"A dry gleam of light is the wisest and best soul."

— Heraklitus (fl. 504-1 BCE)

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Date: 380-360 B.C.

"So this journey which is now ordained for me carries a happy prospect for any other man also who believes that his mind has been prepared by purification."

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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Date: 380-360 B.C.

"Because every pleasure or pain has a sort of rivet with which it fastens the soul to the body and pins it down and makes it corporeal, accepting as true whatever the body certifies."

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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Date: 380-360 B.C.

"[T]here is in every soul an organ or instrument of knowledge that is purified and kindled afresh by such studies when it has been destroyed and blinded by our ordinary pursuits, a faculty whose preservation outweighs ten thousand eyes, for by it only is reality beheld."

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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Date: 380-360 B.C.

"The body is held together at a certain tension between the extremes of hot and cold, and dry and wet, and so on, and our soul is a temperament or adjustment of these same extremes, when they are combined in just the right proportion."

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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Date: c. 370-365 B.C.

"The soul through all her being is immortal, for that which is ever in motion is immortal; but that which moves another and is moved by another, in ceasing to move ceases also to live."

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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Date: c. 370-365 B.C.

"The soul in her totality has the care of inanimate being everywhere, and traverses the whole heaven in divers forms appearing;--when perfect and fully winged she soars upward, and orders the whole world; whereas the imperfect soul, losing her wings and drooping in her flight at last settles on t...

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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Date: c. 370-365 B.C.

"After this their happiness depends upon their self-control; if the better elements of the mind which lead to order and philosophy prevail, then they pass their life here in happiness and harmony--masters of themselves and orderly--enslaving the vicious and emancipating the virtuous elements of t...

— Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

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The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.