Aristotle Quotes

“Politicians also have no leisure, because they are always aiming at something beyond political life itself, power and glory, or happiness.”

“Today you can start forming habits for overcoming all obstacles in life... even nicotine cravings”

“It is impossible, or not easy, to alter by argument what has long been absorbed by habit”

“In the perfect state the good man is absolutely the same as the good citizen; whereas in other states the good citizen is only good relatively to his own form of government.”

“Those who have been eminent in philosophy, politics, poetry, and the arts have all had tendencies toward melancholia.”

“Nature does nothing in vain. Therefore, it is imperative for persons to act in accordance with their nature and develop their latent talents, in order to be content and complete.”

“The energy or active exercise of the mind constitutes life.”

“Justice is that virtue of the soul which is distributive according to desert.”

“Where some people are very wealthy and others have nothing, the result will be either extreme democracy or absolute oligarchy, or despotism will come from either of those excesses.”

“The argument of Alcidamas: Everyone honours the wise. Thus the Parians have honoured Archilochus, in spite of his bitter tongue; the Chians Homer, though he was not their countryman; the Mytilenaeans Sappho, though she was a woman; the Lacedaemonians actually made Chilon a member of their senate, though they are the least literary of men; the inhabitants of Lampsacus gave public burial to Anaxagoras, though he was an alien, and honour him even to this day.”

“Friends are an aid to the young, to guard them from error; to the elderly, to attend to their wants and to supplement their failing power of action; to those in the prime of life, to assist them to noble deeds.”

“Truth is a remarkable thing. We cannot miss knowing some of it. But we cannot know it entirely.”

“The duty of rhetoric is to deal with such matters as we deliberate upon without arts or systems to guide us, in the hearing of persons who cannot take in at a glance a complicated argument or follow a long chain of reasoning.”

“Hence both women and children must be educated with an eye to the constitution, if indeed it makes any difference to the virtue of a city-state that its children be virtuous, and its women too. And it must make a difference, since half the free population are women, and from children come those who participate in the constitution.”

“Some animals utter a loud cry. Some are silent, and others have a voice, which in some cases may be expressed by a word; in others, it cannot. There are also noisy animals and silent animals, musical and unmusical kinds, but they are mostly noisy about the breeding season.”

“We must speak first about the division of land and about those who cultivate it: who should they be and what kind of person? We do not agree with those who have said that property should be communally owned, but we do believe that there should be a friendly arrangement for its common use, and that none of the citizens should be without means of support.”

“Every wicked man is in ignorance as to what he ought to do, and from what to abstain, and it is because of error such as this that men become unjust and, in a word, wicked.”

“Different men seek after happiness in different ways and by different means, and so make for themselves different modes of life and forms of government.”

“The most important relationship we can all have is the one you have with yourself, the most important journey you can take is one of self-discovery. To know yourself, you must spend time with yourself, you must not be afraid to be alone. Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”

“Man is the metre of all things, the hand is the instrument of instruments, and the mind is the form of forms.”

“Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.”

“. . . Political society exists for the sake of noble actions, and not of mere companionship.”

“In a democracy the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme.”

“Metaphor is halfway between the unintelligible and the commonplace.”

“The young are permanently in a state resembling intoxication.”