Aristotle Quotes

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

For contemplation is both the highest form of activity (since the intellect is the highest thing in us, and the objects that it apprehends are the highest things that can be known), and also it is the most continuous, because we are more capable of continuous contemplation than we are of any practical activity.

Victory is plesant, not only to those who love to conquer, bot to all; for there is produced an idea of superiority, which all with more or less eagerness desire.

The virtue of justice consists in moderation, as regulated by wisdom.

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

Tragedy is an imitation not only of a complete action, but of events inspiring fear and pity. Such an effect is best produced when the events come on us by surprise; and the effect is heightened when, at the same time, they follow as cause and effect. The tragic wonder will then be great than if they happened of themselves or by accident; for even coincidences are most striking when they have an air of design.

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

Character is that which reveals moral purpose, exposing the class of things a man chooses and avoids.

Have a definite, clear, practical ideal - a goal, an objective.

Nature operates in the shortest way possible.

The body is at its best between the ages of thirty and thirty-five.

A whole is that which has a beginning, a middle and an end.

It is Homer who has chiefly taught other poets the art of telling lies skillfully.

Whereas the law is passionless, passion must ever sway the heart of man.

Art is a higher type of knowledge than experience.

Nature herself, as has been often said, requires that we should be able, not only to work well, but to use leisure well; for, as I must repeat once again, the first principle of all action is leisure. Both are required, but leisure is better than occupation and is its end.

It is likely that unlikely things should happen

Virtue is the golden mean between two vices, the one of excess and the other of deficiency.

A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious. On the other hand, they do less easily move against him, believing that he has the gods on his side.

Happiness, whether consisting in pleasure or virtue, or both, is more often found with those who are highly cultivated in their minds and in their character, and have only a moderate share of external goods, than among those who possess external goods to a useless extent but are deficient in higher qualities.

In general, what is written must be easy to read and easy to speak; which is the same.

Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.

One would have thought that it was even more necessary to limit population than property; and that the limit should be fixed by calculating the chances of mortality in the children, and of sterility in married persons. The neglect of this subject, which in existing states is so common, is a never-failing cause of poverty among the citizens; and poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.

It is just that we should be grateful, not only to those with whose views we may agree, but also to those who have expressed more superficial views; for these also contributed something, by developing before us the powers of thought.

One thing alone not even God can do,To make undone whatever hath been done.

My lectures are published and not published; they will be intelligible to those who heard them, and to none beside.

No state will be well administered unless the middle class holds sway.

Every man should be responsible to others, nor should any one be allowed to do just as he pleases; for where absolute freedom is allowed, there is nothing to restrain the evil which is inherent in every man.

All that we do is done with an eye to something else.

A man is the origin of his action.

The quality of life is determined by its activities.

The coward calls the brave man rash, the rash man calls him a coward.

Boundaries don't protect rivers, people do.

We give up leisure in order that we may have leisure, just as we go to war in order that we may have peace.

Virtue is more clearly shown in the performance of fine ACTIONS than in the non-performance of base ones.

A constitution is the arrangement of magistracies in a state, especially of the highest of all. The government is everywhere sovereign in the state, and the constitution is in fact the government.

Governments which have a regard to the common interest are constituted in accordance with strict principles of justice, and are therefore true forms; but those which regard only the interest of the rulers are all defective and perverted forms, for they are despotic, whereas a state is a community of freemen.

A tragedy is a representation of an action that is whole and complete and of a certain magnitude. A whole is what has a beginning and middle and end.

Misfortune shows those who are not really friends.

It is true, indeed, that the account Plato gives in 'Timaeus' is different from what he says in his so-called 'unwritten teachings.'

God and nature create nothing that does not fulfill a purpose

.. for desire is like a wild beast, and anger perverts rulers and the very best of men. Hence law is intelligence without appetition.

For good is simple, evil manifold.

Even that some people try deceived me many times ... I will not fail to believe that somewhere, someone deserves my trust.

The physician himself, if sick, actually calls in another physician, knowing that he cannot reason correctly if required to judge his own condition while suffering.

Worthless persons appointed to have supreme control of weighty affairs do a lot of damage.

Greatness of spirit is to bear finely both good fourtune and bad, honor and disgrace, and not to think highly of luxury or attention or power or victories in contests, and to possess a certain depth and magnitude of spirit.

There are no experienced young people. Time makes experience.