Aristotle Quotes
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And so long as they were at war, their power was preserved, but when they had attained empire they fell, for of the arts of peace they knew nothing, and had never engaged in any employment higher than war.
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Those who have the command of the arms in a country are masters of the state, and have it in their power to make what revolutions they please. Thus, there is no end to observations on the difference between the measures likely to be pursued by a minister backed by a standing army, and those of a court awed by the fear of an armed people.
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Experience has shown that it is difficult, if not impossible, for a populous state to be run by good laws.
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The citizens begin by giving up some part of the constitution, and so with greater ease the government change something else which is a little more important, until they have undermined the whole fabric of the state.
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It is clearly better that property should be private, but the use of it common; and the special business of the legislator is to create in men this benevolent disposition.
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To say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false, while to say of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not, is true.
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The moral virtues, then, are produced in us neither by nature nor against nature. Nature, indeed, prepares in us the ground for their reception, but their complete formation is the product of habit.
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Laws, when good, should be supreme; and that the magistrate or magistrates should regulate those matters only on which the laws are unable to speak with precision owing to the difficulty of any general principle embracing all particulars.
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Because the rich are generally few in number, while the poor are many, they appear to be antagonistic, and as the one or the other prevails they form the government. Hence arises the common opinion that there are two kinds of government - democracy and oligarchy.
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Nature of man is not what he was born as, but what he is born for.
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The same thing may have all the kinds of causes, e.g. the moving cause of a house is the art or the builder, the final cause is the function it fulfils, the matter is earth and stones, and the form is the definitory formula.
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So that the lover of myths, which are a compact of wonders, is by the same token a lover of wisdom.
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It is not easy to determine the nature of music, or why any one should have a knowledge of it.
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. . . the man is free, we say, who exists for his own sake and not for another's.
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Women should marry when they are about eighteen years of age, and men at seven and thirty; then they are in the prime of life, and the decline in the powers of both will coincide.
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We must as second best, as people say, take the least of the evils.
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The soul consists of two parts, one irrational and the other capable of reason. Whether these two parts are really distinct in the sense that the parts of the body or of any other divisible whole are distinct, or whether though distinguishable in thought as two they are inseparable in reality, like the convex and concave of a curve, is a question of no importance for the matter in hand.
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One can aim at honor both as one ought, and more than one ought, and less than one ought. He whose craving for honor is excessive is said to be ambitious, and he who is deficient in this respect unambitious; while he who observes the mean has no peculiar name.
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Anger is always concerned with individuals, ... whereas hatred is directed also against classes: we all hate any thief and any informer. Moreover, anger can be cured by time; but hatred cannot. The one aims at giving pain to its object, the other at doing him harm; the angry man wants his victim to feel; the hater does not mind whether they feel or not.
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If then it be possible that one contrary should exist, or be called into existence, the other contrary will also appear to be possible.
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No one loves the man whom he fears.
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It is evident that the state is a creation of nature, and that man is by nature a political animal.
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Virtues cannot exist without Prudence. A proof of this is that everyone, even at the present day, in defining Virtue, after saying what disposition it is and specifying the things with which it is concerned, adds that it is a disposition determined by the right principle; and the right principle is the principle determined by Prudence.
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Obstinate people can be divided into the opinionated, the ignorant, and the boorish.