Concerning the Politician:
Well, although i do not suppose that either of us knows anything really beautiful and good, I am better off than he is, --for he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows; I neither know nor think that I know. In this latter particular then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of him.
Concerning the Poets
I went to the poets; tragic, dithyrambic, and all sorts. And there, I said to myself, you will be instantly detected; now you will find out that you are more ignorant than they are. Accordingly I took them some of the most elaborate passages in their own writings, and asked what was the meaning of them-- thinking that they would teach me something. Will you believe me? I am almost ashamed to confess the truth, but i must say that there is hardly a person present who would not have talked better about their poetry than they did themselves. Then I knew that not by wisdom do poets write poetry, but by a sort of genius and inspiration; they are like diviners or soothsayers who also say many fine things, but do not understand the meaning of them. The poets appeared to me to be much in the same case; and I further observed that upon the strength of their poetry they believed themselves to be the wisest of men in other things in which they were not wise. So I departed, conceiving myself to be superior to them for the same reason that i was superior to the politicians.
- Dialogues of Plato
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