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Famous Aristotle Quotes

“Every community is an association of some kind and every community is established with a view to some good; for everyone always acts in order to obtain that which they think good. But, if all communities aim at some good, the state or political community, which is the highest of all, and which embraces all the rest, aims at good in a greater degree than any other, and at the highest good.”

IfsThinkingKindStatesPoliticalOrderPoliticsCommunityViewsGreaterSocietyDegreesHighestAimEmbraceAssociation
Author:Aristotle
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“Rhetoric is useful because the true and the just are naturally superior to their opposites, so that, if decisions are improperly made, they must owe their defeat to their own advocates; which is reprehensible. Further, in dealing with certain persons, even if we possessed the most accurate scientific knowledge, we should not find it easy to persuade them by the employment of such knowledge. For scientific discourse is concerned with instruction, but in the case of such persons instruction is impossible.”

IfsShouldPersonsMadeCertainEasyDecisionCasesImpossibleConcernedOppositesDefeatSuperiorsEmploymentInstructionPossessedAccurateRhetoricDiscourseScientific Knowledge
Book:Aristotle: the art of rhetoric
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“For man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but, when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all; since armed injustice is the more dangerous, and he is equipped at birth with the arms of intelligence and with moral qualities which he may use for the worst ends. Wherefore, if he have not virtue, he is the most unholy and the most savage of animals, and the most full of lust and gluttony. But justice is the bond of men in states, and the administration of justice, which is the determination of what is just, is the principle of order in political society.”

IfsMenMayEndsStatesUseLawPoliticalOrderJusticeAnimalQualityMoralPrinciplesVirtueWorstDangerousArmsBirthDeterminationInjusticeLustAdministrationSavagesGluttonyLaw And JusticeAdministration Of Justice
Book:Aristotle
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“Happiness does not consist in amusement. In fact, it would be strange if our end were amusement, and if we were to labor and suffer hardships all our life long merely to amuse ourselves.... The happy life is regarded as a life in conformity with virtue. It is a life which involves effort and is not spent in amusement.”

IfsLongDoeEndsFactsWould BeLife IsSufferingEffortVirtueOur LivesStrangeLaborHardshipConformityHappy LifeAmusementLong Life
Author:Aristotle
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“Those who assert that the mathematical sciences say nothing of the beautiful or the good are in error. For these sciences say and prove a great deal about them; if they do not expressly mention them, but prove attributes which are their results or definitions, it is not true that they tell us nothing about them. The chief forms of beauty are order and symmetry and definiteness, which the mathematical sciences demonstrate in a special degree.”

IfsBeautifulFormOrderResultsDealsSpecialProveDegreesErrorsDefinitionsChiefsMathematicalAttributesSymmetryMathematical Beauty
Author:Aristotle
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“Yet the true friend of the people should see that they be not too poor, for extreme povery lowers the character of the democracy; measures therefore should be taken which will give them lasting prosperity; and as this is equally the interest of all classes, the proceeds of the public revenues should be accumulated and distributed among its poor, if possible, in such quantities as may enable them to purchase a little farm, or, at any rate, make a beginning in trade or husbandry.”

PeopleIfsGivingShouldMayLittlesCharacterInterestPoorClassDemocracyTakenTradeCharityRateProsperityExtremesLastingFarmsQuantityPhilanthropyRevenueTrue FriendPhilanthropic
Book:Works
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“If there is some end of the things we do, which we desire for its own sake, clearly this must be the good. Will not knowledge of it, then, have a great influence on life? Shall we not, like archers who have a mark to aim at, be more likely to hit upon what we should? If so, we must try, in outline at least, to determine what it is.”

IfsLifeShouldTryingEndsPhilosophyDesireLiteratureKnowledgeInfluenceMarkAimSakeDetermineEducationalGood WillOutlinesArcherNicomachean EthicsGreat Influence
Author:Aristotle
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“Now, the causes being four, it is the business of the student of nature to know about them all, and if he refers his problems back to all of them, he will assign the "why" in the way proper to his science-the matter, the form, the mover, that for the sake of which.”

IfsKnowsWayMatterProblemFormScienceCausesFourStudentsResearchSake
Book:Complete Works of Aristotle, Volume 1: The Revised Oxford Translation
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“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.”

IfsActionCausesWonderHappenedAirEffectsEventsDesignTragedySurpriseAccidentsPityCraftsTragicImitationCoincidenceCause And Effect
Book:The Poetics of Aristotle
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“If there is any kind of animal which is female and has no male separate from it, it is possible that this may generate a young one from itself. No instance of this worthy of any credit has been observed up to the present at any rate, but one case in the class of fishes makes us hesitate. No male of the so-called erythrinus has ever yet been seen, but females, and specimens full of roe, have been seen. Of this, however, we have as yet no proof worthy of credit.”

IfsKindMayHas BeensYoungAnimalClassCasesFemaleMalesRateFishesWorthyCreditProofInstanceYoung Ones
Book:Complete Works of Aristotle, Volume 1: The Revised Oxford Translation
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“Thus it is thought that justice is equality; and so it is, but not for all persons, only for those that are equal. Inequality also is thought to be just; and so it is, but not for all, only for the unequal. We make bad mistakes if we neglect this for whom when we are deciding what is just. The reason is that we are making judgements about ourselves, and people are generally bad judges where their own interests are involved.”

PeopleIfsPersonsReasonPoliticalInterestJusticeMistakeJudgingInvolvedEqualInequalityJudgementNeglectBad Mistake
Author:Aristotle
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“You'll understand what life is if you think about the act of dying. When I die, how will I be different from the way I am right now? In the first moments after death, my body will be scarcely different in physical terms than it was in the last seconds of life, but I will no longer move, no longer sense, nor speak, nor feel, nor care. It's these things that are life. At that moment, the psyche takes flight in the last breath.”

IfsThinkingWayLifeFeelsFirstsDifferentMomentsBodyCareLastsMovingLife IsDiesSpeakTermDyingRight NowBreathsFlightThat MomentSecondsAfter Death
Author:Aristotle
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