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Famous Aristotle Quotes

“If we state the function of man to be a certain kind of life, and this to be an activity or actions of the soul implying a rational principle, and the function of a good man to be the good and noble performance of these, and if any action is well performed when it is performed in accordance with the appropriate excellence human good turns out to be activity of the soul in accordance with virtue, and if there are more than one virtue, in accordance with the best and most complete.”

IfsMenHumansWellsKindSoulStatesActionCertainTurnsPrinciplesVirtueActivityPerformancesFunctionExcellenceNobleRationalAppropriateGood ManImplyingNicomachean Ethics
Author:Aristotle
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“Again, it is possible to fail in many ways (for evil belongs to the class of the unlimited and good to that of the limited), while to succeed is possible only in one way (for which reason also one is easy and the other difficult—to miss the mark easy, to hit it difficult); 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.”

MenWayMeanReasonEvilEasyDifficultClassVirtueFailingMissingSucceedMarkVicesOne WayCharacteristicsExcessUnlimitedDefectsNicomachean Ethics
Book:Complete Works of Aristotle, Volume 2: The Revised Oxford Translation
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“In a word, acts of any kind produce habits or characters of the same kind. Hence we ought to make sure that our acts are of a certain kind; for the resulting character varies as they vary. It makes no small difference, therefore, whether a man be trained in his youth up in this way or that, but a great difference, or rather all the difference.”

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Author:Aristotle
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“The argument of Alcidamas: Everyone honours the wise. Thus the Parians have honoured Archilochus, in spite of his bitter tongue; the Chians Homer, though he was not their countryman; the Mytilenaeans Sappho, though she was a woman; the Lacedaemonians actually made Chilon a member of their senate, though they are the least literary of men; the inhabitants of Lampsacus gave public burial to Anaxagoras, though he was an alien, and honour him even to this day.”

MenMadeWiseMembersArgumentTongueBitterAliensSpiteThis DayHonourSenateCountrymenBurial
Book:Complete Works of Aristotle, Volume 2: The Revised Oxford Translation
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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.”

MenWantGivingFeelsMindDoePainHateIndividualClassObjectsConcernedHatredAngerAimVictimAngryHarmThievesAngry ManInformers
Book:The Works of Aristotle
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“The saying of Protagoras is like the views we have mentioned; he said that man is the measure of all things, meaning simply that that which seems to each man assuredly is. If this is so, it follows that the same thing both is and is not, and is bad and good, and that the contents of all other opposite statements are true, because often a particular thing appears beautiful to some and ugly to others, and that which appears to each man is the measure”

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Book:Metaphysics
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