Quotes from Aristotle

Quotes from Aristotle

Quality is not an act, it is a habit.

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

You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.

Anybody can become angry - that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way - that is not within everybody's power and is not easy.

The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.

Well begun is half done.

Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.

Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees the others.

Happiness depends upon ourselves.

In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous.

The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.

A friend to all is a friend to none.

Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god.

The energy of the mind is the essence of life.

Those that know, do. Those that understand, teach.

There is no great genius without some touch of madness.

The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal.

At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.

Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work

The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain.

Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms.

I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self.

The educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living from the dead.

Democracy is when the indigent, and not the men of property, are the rulers.

Hope is a waking dream.

Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.

Good habits formed at youth make all the difference.

Education is an ornament in prosperity and a refuge in adversity.

Wishing to be friends is quick work, but friendship is a slow ripening fruit.

The end of labor is to gain leisure.

Those who educate children well are more to be honored than they who produce them; for these only gave them life, those the art of living well.

Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.

Fear is pain arising from the anticipation of evil.

All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion, desire.

The whole is more than the sum of its parts.

Personal beauty is a greater recommendation than any letter of reference.

Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods.

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.

Education is the best provision for old age.

Youth is easily deceived because it is quick to hope.

The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival.

Wit is educated insolence

In a democracy the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme.

Even when laws have been written down, they ought not always to remain unaltered.

To run away from trouble is a form of cowardice and, while it is true that the suicide braves death, he does it not for some noble object but to escape some ill.

The one exclusive sign of thorough knowledge is the power of teaching.

Change in all things is sweet.

The secret to humor is surprise.

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

The most perfect political community is one in which the middle class is in control, and outnumbers both of the other classes.

We become just by performing just action, temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave action.

The soul never thinks without a picture.

There was never a genius without a tincture of madness

I have gained this from philosophy: that I do without being commanded what others do only from fear of the law.

All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.

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

If liberty and equality, as is thought by some, are chiefly to be found in democracy, they will be best attained when all persons alike share in government to the utmost.

Both oligarch and tyrant mistrust the people, and therefore deprive them of their arms.

Nature does nothing in vain

If one way be better than another, that you may be sure is nature's way.

All men by nature desire knowledge.

The greatest virtues are those which are most useful to other persons.

In making a speech one must study three points: first, the means of producing persuasion; second, the language; third the proper arrangement of the various parts of the speech.

Men acquire a particular quality by constantly acting in a particular way.

He who is to be a good ruler must have first been ruled.

Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.

Misfortune shows those who are not really friends.