Full Idea
Personally I firmly believe, perhaps naively, that it is possible for modern man to live, not as a sage (sophos) - most of the ancients did not hold this to be possible - but as a practitioner of the ever-fragile exercise of wisdom.
Gist of Idea
It is no longer possible to be a sage, but we can practice the exercise of wisdom
Source
Pierre Hadot (Philosophy as a way of life [1987], 7)
Book Reference
Hadot,Pierre: 'Philosophy as a Way of Life', ed/tr. Davidson,Arnold I. [Blackwell 1995], p.211
A Reaction
It seems to me quite plausible that the philosophical life might yet become a widespread ideal, even though philosophers seem to still be sheltering from storms two thousand years after Plato gave us that image.