Anaxagoras quotes

Anaxagoras was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who introduced the concept of Nous, or cosmic mind, into philosophy. His teachings greatly influenced later philosophers and helped shape early scientific thought. He emphasized the importance of reason and argued that everything in the universe is composed of infinitely divisible particles. Here are 13 of his quotes:

The sun provides the moon with its brightness.

Anaxagoras

All things were together, infinite both in number and in smallness; for the small too was infinite.

Anaxagoras

Wrongly do the Greeks suppose that aught begins or ceases to be; for nothing comes into being or is destroyed; but all is an aggregation or secretion of preexisting things; so that all becoming might more correctly be called becoming mixed, and all corruption, becoming separate.

Anaxagoras

Thought is something limitless and independent, and has been mixed with no thing but is alone by itself. ... What was mingled with it would have prevented it from having power over anything in the way in which it does. ... For it is the finest of all things and the purest.

Anaxagoras

Men would live exceedingly quiet if these two words, mine and thine, were taken away.

Anaxagoras

Appearances are but a glimpse of what is hidden.

Anaxagoras

It is not I who have lost the Athenians, but the Athenians who have lost me.

Anaxagoras

Everything has a natural explanation. The moon is not a god, but a great rock, and the sun a hot rock.

Anaxagoras

The Greeks follow a wrong usage in speaking of coming into being and passing away; for nothing comes into being or passes away, but there is mingling and separation of things that are. So they would be right to call coming into being mixture, and passing away separation.

Anaxagoras

Mind is infinite and self-ruled, and is mixed with nothing, but is alone itself by itself.

Anaxagoras

In everything, there is a share of everything.

Anaxagoras