We assume therefore that moral virtue is the quality of acting in the best way in relation to pleasures and pains, and that vice is the opposite.

Of actions some aim at what is necessary and useful, and some at what is honorable. And the preference given to one or the other class of actions must necessarily be like the preference given to one or other part of the soul and its actions over the other; there must be war for the sake of peace, business for the sake of leisure, things useful and necessary for the sake of things honorable.

To enjoy the things we ought and to hate the things we ought has the greatest bearing on excellence of character.

Pleasure causes us to do base actions and pain causes us to abstain from doing noble actions.

Wise people have an inward sense of what is beautiful, and the highest wisdom is to trust this intuition and be guided by it.

My best friend is the man who in wishing me well wishes it for my sake.

A young man is not a proper hearer of lectures on political science; for he is inexperienced in the actions that occur in life, but its discussions start from these and are about these; and, further, since he tends to follow his passions, his study will be vain and unprofitable, because the end that is aimed at is not knowledge but action. And it makes no difference whether he is young in years or youthful in character.