Aristotle Quotes
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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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In the soul one part naturally rules, and the other is subject, and the virtue of the ruler we maintain to be different from that of the subject; the one being the virtue of the rational, and the other of the irrational part. Now, it is obvious that the same principle applies generally, and therefore almost all things rule and are ruled according to nature.
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The virtues [moral excellence] therefore are engendered in us neither by nature nor yet in violation of nature; nature gives us the capacity to receive them, and this capacity is brought to maturity by habit.
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This element, the seat of the appetites and of desire in general, does in a sense participate in principle, as being amenable and obedient to it.
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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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But if nothing but soul, or in soul mind, is qualified to count, it is impossible for there to be time unless there is soul, but only that of which time is an attribute, i.e. if change can exist without soul.
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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 greater the length, the more beautiful will the piece be by reason of its size, provided that the whole be perspicuous.
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No tyrant need fear till men begin to feel confident in each other.
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Happiness seems to require a modicum of external prosperity.
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All things as subsist from nature appear to contain in themselves a principle of motion and permanency; some according to place, others according to increase and diminuation; and others according to change in quality.
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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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The beginning of reform is not so much to equalize property as to train the noble sort of natures not to desire more, and to prevent the lower from getting more.
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All art is concerned with coming into being; for it is concerned neither with things that are, or come into being by necessity, nor with things that do so in accordance with nature.
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Obstinate people can be divided into the opinionated, the ignorant, and the boorish.
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If the poor, for example, because they are more in number, divide among themselves the property of the rich,- is not this unjust? . . this law of confiscation clearly cannot be just.
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Again, it is possible to fail in many ways, while to succeed is possible only in one way; for these reasons also, then, excess and defect are characteristic of vice, and the mean of virtue; For men are good in but one way, but bad in many.
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The young are heated by Nature as drunken men by wine.
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No one loves the man whom he fears.
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Also, that which is desirable in itself is more desirable than what is desirable per accidens.
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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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The attainment of truth is then the function of both the intellectual parts of the soul. Therefore their respective virtues are those dispositions which will best qualify them to attain truth.
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The student of politics therefore as well as the psychologist must study the nature of the soul.
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That the equalization of property exercises an influence on political society was clearly understood even by some of the old legislators. Laws were made by Solon and others prohibiting an individual from possessing as much land as he pleased.