The proof that the state is a creation of nature and prior to the individual is that the individual, when isolated, is not self-sufficing.

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Happiness is the settling of the soul into its most appropriate spot.

Happiness does not consist in amusement. In fact, it would be strange if our end were amusement, and if we were to labor and suffer hardships all our life long merely to amuse ourselves.... The happy life is regarded as a life in conformity with virtue. It is a life which involves effort and is not spent in amusement.

Everybody loves a thing more if it has cost him trouble: for instance those who have made money love money more than those who have inherited it.

Once more: there are three offices according to whose directions the highest magistrates are chosen in certain states - guardians of the law, probuli, councilors - of these, the guardians of the law are an aristocratical, the probuli an oligarchical, the council a democratical institution.

If men think that a ruler is religious and has a reverence for the Gods, they are less afraid of suffering injustice at his hands.