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"The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled."

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aesthete8

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Dec 21, 2012, 3:38:42 PM12/21/12
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I have a vague recollection of someone here years ago who asked for
the source of that quote.

It's Plutarch.

Johannes Patruus

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Dec 21, 2012, 4:19:20 PM12/21/12
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See http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Plutarch_quote

Patruus

Ed Cryer

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Dec 21, 2012, 4:56:09 PM12/21/12
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It's from his ΠΕΡΙ ΤΟΥ ΑΚΟΥΕΙΝ (On hearing).
P259 in this English translation;
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Moralia/De_auditu*.html

Ed

Johannes Patruus

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Dec 21, 2012, 5:51:51 PM12/21/12
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Can you pin it down in the parallel Greek-Latin version which starts here? -
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k28221t/f51.image.r=plutarchi%20vitae.langEN

> Ed

Patruus


Ed Cryer

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Dec 21, 2012, 6:39:03 PM12/21/12
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Page 58
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k28221t/f63.image.r=plutarchi%20vitae.langEN
Οὐ γὰρ ὡς ἀγγεῖον ὁ νοῦς ....
Non enim ut vas, ita mens quoque ....

Ed


Johannes Patruus

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Dec 22, 2012, 3:00:19 AM12/22/12
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Thanks. That leads me to discover the following page which has the
sentence in Greek, Latin, English, French, German and Italian -
http://blasonaria.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/plutarco.html

> Ed

Patruus

Ed Cryer

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Dec 22, 2012, 6:00:58 AM12/22/12
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So then, Plutarch didn't subscribe to the "bucket" theory of mind.

Ed

aesthete8

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Jan 13, 2013, 2:02:03 AM1/13/13
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Does the following have anything to do with what Plutarch said?:

- John Dewey saw the role of the teacher, not as a transmitter of a
society's culture to the young, but as an agent of change...

http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2013/01/08/the-role-of-educators-n1482868/page/full/

Ed Cryer

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Jan 13, 2013, 9:16:44 AM1/13/13
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I suppose you could do what Aristotle is said to have done with prince
Alexander of Macedon; inspire him with a love of Greek culture, while
repeating how marvellous it would be to see a Greek army back on Persian
soil after all these years.

Ed

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