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There has been an inversion in the hierarchy of the two principles of antiquity, “Take care of yourself” and “Know yourself.” In Greco-Roman culture, knowledge of oneself appeared as the consequence of the care of the self. In the modern world, knowledge of oneself constitutes the fundamental principle.

— Michel Foucault

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More quotes by Michel Foucault

Is it surprising that prisons resemble factories, schools, barracks, hospitals, which all resemble prisons?

Discipline and Punish (1977)

Maybe the target nowadays is not to discover what we are but to refuse what we are.

The Subject and Power (1982)

The gesture that divides madness is the constitutive one, not the science that grows up in the calm that returns after the division has been made.

History of Madness (1961)

Marxism exists in nineteenth-century thought as a fish exists in water; that is, it ceases to breathe anywhere else.

One should try to locate power at the extreme of its exercise, where it is always less legal in character.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Michel Foucault (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.