Aristotle

About Aristotle

Greek critic, philosopher, physicist, & zoologist (384 BC - 322 BC)

Aristotle popular quotes

  1. All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.
  2. It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
  3. Men acquire a particular quality by constantly acting a particular way...you become just by performing just actions, temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave actions.
  4. We are what we repeatedly do.
  5. It is unbecoming for young men to utter maxims.
  6. Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own.
  7. The gods too are fond of a joke
  8. Wit is educated insolence.
  9. Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in the consciousness that we deserve them.
  10. The least deviation from truth will be multiplied later.
  11. Education is the best provision for old age.
  12. It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
  13. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.
  14. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.
  15. Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.
  16. No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.
  17. Humor is the only test of gravity, and gravity of humor; for a subject which will not bear raillery is suspicious, and a jest which will not bear serious examination is false wit.
  18. It is unbecoming for young men to utter maxims.
  19. To love someone is to identify with them.
  20. All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion, and desire.
  21. The only stable state is the one in which all men are equal before the law.
  22. Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.
  23. In the arena of human life the honours and rewards fall to those who show their good qualities.
  24. It is in justice that the ordering of society is centered.
  25. Law is mind without reason.
  26. To perceive is to suffer.
  27. Man perfected by society is the best of all animals; he is the most terrible of all when he lives without law, and without justice.
  28. To give a satisfactory decision as to the truth it is necessary to be rather an arbitrator than a party to the dispute.
  29. He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.
  30. The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.
  31. Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.
  32. Wit is educated insolence.
  33. Youth is easily deceived because it is quick to hope.
  34. There was never a genius without a tincture of madness.
  35. Nature does nothing uselessly.
  36. Both oligarch and tyrant mistrust the people, and therefore deprive them of their arms.
  37. Wit is educated insolence.
  38. To Thales the primary question was not what do we know, but how do we know it.
  39. Happiness depends upon ourselves.
  40. A friend is a second self.
  41. He who cannot be a good follower cannot be a good leader.
  42. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.
  43. Those who educate children well are more to be honored than parents, for these only gave life, those the art of living well.
  44. A flatterer is a friend who is your inferior, or pretends to be so.
  45. All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.
  46. Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in the consciousness that we deserve them.
  47. Education is the best provision for the journey to old age.
  48. it is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
  49. It is the mark of an educated mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision which the nature of the subject admits and not to seek exactness where only an approximation is possible.
  50. Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.
  51. Happiness is a state of activity.
  52. It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
  53. All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.
  54. Humor is the only test of gravity, and gravity of humor; for a subject which will not bear raillery is suspicious, and a jest which will not bear serious examination is false wit.
  55. The gods too are fond of a joke.
  56. Those that know, do. Those that understand, teach.
  57. Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.
  58. It is well to be up before daybreak, for such habits contribute to health, wealth, and wisdom.
  59. Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.
  60. Character is that which reveals moral purpose, exposing the class of things a man chooses or avoids
  61. The ideal man bears the accidents of life with dignity and grace, making the best of circumstances.