Good character is not formed in a week or a month. It is created little by little, day by day. Protracted and patient effort is needed to develop good character.
HeraclitusRead
The fairest order in the world is a heap of random sweepings.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that what appears chaotic or random can possess a unique form of order and beauty.
Heraclitus, an ancient Greek philosopher, implies that the natural world and existence contain a form of order that may not be immediately recognized. This 'heap of random sweepings' suggests that what seems disordered actually reflects the complexity and harmony of life, highlighting the philosophical idea that chaos and order coexist in a dynamic relationship.
Themes
OrderChaosPhilosophyRandomnessBeauty
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion on the complexity of nature in a science class, this quote can illustrate how chaos can lead to discovery.
More from Heraclitus
All quotes βThinking is a sacred disease and sight is deceptive.
HeraclitusRead
Things of which there is sight, hearing, apprehension, these I prefer.
HeraclitusRead
Our envy always lasts longer than the happiness of those we envy.
HeraclitusRead
For when is death not within our selves? And as Heracleitus says: βLiving and dead are the same, and so are awake and asleep, young and old. The former when shifted are the latter, and again the latter when shifted are the former."
HeraclitusRead
Whosoever wishes to know about the world must learn about it in its particular details. Knowledge is not intelligence. In searching for the truth be ready for the unexpected. Change alone is unchanging. The same road goes both up and down. The beginning of a circle is also its end. Not I, but the world says it: all is one. And yet everything comes in season.
HeraclitusRead
Similar quotes
...the only thing that makes the Church endurable is that it is somehow the body of Christ and that on this we are fed. It seems to be a fact that you have to suffer as much from the Church as for it but if you believe in the divinity of Christ, you have to cherish the world at the same time that you struggle to endure it.
Flannery O'ConnorRead
There's only one day at a time here, then it's tonight and then tomorrow will be today again.
Bob DylanRead
The spoken word vanished with the wind. Likewise, the unrecorded life disappears as if it never existed.
Iris ChangRead
Suspicious.- To admit a belief merely because it is a custom - but that means to be dishonest, cowardly, lazy! - And so could dishonesty, cowardice and laziness be the preconditions for morality?
Friedrich NietzscheRead
War is the statesman's game, the priest's delight, the lawyer's jest, the hired assassin's trade.
Percy Bysshe ShelleyRead
Service is the measure of greatness; it always has been true; it is true today, and it always will be true, that he is greatest who does the most of good. Nearly all of our controversies and combats grow out of the fact that we are trying to get something from each other--there will be peace when our aim is to do something for each other. The human measure of a human life is its income; the divine measure of a life is its outgo, its overflow--its contribution to the welfare of all.
William Jennings BryanRead