Background Image

...

Happiness Is Something Final And Complete In Itself, As Being The Aim And End Of All Practical Activities Whatever .... Happiness Then We Define As The Active Exercise Of The Mind In Conformity With Perfect Goodness Or Virtue.

-Aristotle

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Happiness Is Something Final

Aristotle

...

Happiness Is Something Final And Complete In Itself, As Being The Aim And End Of All Practical Activities Whatever .... Happiness Then We Define As The Active Exercise Of The Mind In Conformity With Perfect Goodness Or Virtue.

Views: 2967

Topic

More From Aristotle

Courage Is A Mean With Regard To Fear And Confidence.

Xenophanes States That The Fire In Lipara Once Failed For Sixteen Years, But Returned In The Seventeenth Year. They Say That The Lava-stream In Etna Is Neither Flaming Nor Continuous, But Returns Only After An Interval Of Many Years.

We Should Behave To Our Friends As We Would Wish Our Friends Behave To Us

We Work To Earn Our Leisure.

Happiness Is Activity.

The Beginning, As The Proverb Says, Is Half The Whole.

Justice Is The Loveliest And Health Is The Best. But The Sweetest To Obtain Is The Heart's Desire.

The Greatest Thing By Far Is To Have A Command Of Metaphor. This Alone Cannot Be Imparted By Another; It Is The Mark Of Genius, For To Make Good Metaphors Implies An Eye For Resemblances.

The Coward Calls The Brave Man Rash, The Rash Man Calls Him A Coward.

A True Friend Is One Soul In Two Bodies.

While Most Of Those Who Hold That The Whole Heaven Is Finite Say That The Earth Lies At The Center, The Philosophers Of Italy, The So-called Pythagoreans, Assert The Contrary. They Say That In The Middle There Is Fire, And That The Earth Is One Of The Stars, And By Its Circular Motion Round The Center Produces Night And Day.

As Our Acts Vary, Our Habits Will Follow In Their Course.

All Men, Or Most Men, Wish What Is Noble But Choose What Is Profitable; And While It Is Noble To Render A Service Not With An Eye To Receiving One In Return, It Is Profitable To Receive One. One Ought Therefore, If One Can, To Return The Equivalent Of Services Received, And To Do So Willingly; For One Ought Not To Make A Man One's Friend If One Is Unwilling To Return His Favors.

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.

Music Has A Power Of Forming The Character, And Should Therefore Be Introduced Into The Education Of The Young.

Equity Is That Idea Of Justice Which Contravenes The Written Law.

A Man Can Make Up His Mind Quickly When He Has Only A Little To Make Up.

All Are Agreed That The Various Moral Qualities Are In A Sense Bestowed By Nature: We Are Just, And Capable Of Temperance, And Brave, And Possessed Of The Other Virtues From The Moment Of Our Birth. But Nevertheless We Expect To Find That True Goodness Is Something Different, And That The Virtues In The True Sense Come To Belong To Us In Another Way. For Even Children And Wild Animals Possess The Natural Dispositions, Yet Without Intelligence These May Manifestly Be Harmful.

A Change In The Shape Of The Body Creates A Change In The State Of The Soul.

Every Great Genius Has An Admixture Of Madness.

What Is Common To Many Is Least Taken Care Of, For All Men Have Greater Regard For What Is Their Own Than What They Possess In Common With Others.

Good Moral Character Is Not Something That We Can Achieve On Our Own. We Need A Culture That Supports The Conditions Under Which Self-love And Friendship Flourish.

Everything That Depends On The Action Of Nature Is By Nature As Good As It Can Be.

Whether We Call It Sacrifice, Or Poetry, Or Adventure, It Is Always The Same Voice That Calls.

For Both Excessive And Insufficient Exercise Destroy One's Strength, And Both Eating And Drinking Too Much Or Too Little Destroy Health, Whereas The Right Quantity Produces, Increases And Preserves It. So It Is The Same With Temperance, Courage And The Other Virtues. This Much Then, Is Clear: In All Our Conduct It Is The Mean That Is To Be Commended.

The Physician Heals, Nature Makes Well.

The Antidote For Fifty Enemies Is One Friend.

Masculine Republics Give Way To Feminine Democracies, And Feminine Democracies Give Way To Tyranny.

If You See A Man Approaching With The Obvious Intent Of Doing You Good, Run For Your Life. Consider Pleasures As They Depart, Not As They Come.

There Is Nothing Grand Or Noble In Having The Use Of A Slave, In So Far As He Is A Slave; Or In Issuing Commands About Necessary Things. But It Is An Error To Suppose That Every Sort Of Rule Is Despotic Like That Of A Master Over Slaves, For There Is As Great A Difference Between The Rule Over Freemen And The Rule Over Slaves As There Is Between Slavery By Nature And Freedom By Nature . .

Either A Beast Or A God.

That Rule Is The Better Which Is Exercised Over Better Subjects.

If They Do Not Share Equally Enjoyments And Toils, Those Who Labor Much And Get Little Will Necessarily Complain Of Those Who Labor Little And Receive Or Consume Much. But Indeed There Is Always A Difficulty In Men Living Together And Having All Human Relations In Common, But Especially In Their Having Common Property.

The First Essential Responsibility Of The State Is Control Of The Market-place: There Must Be Some Official Charged With The Duty Of Seeing That Honest Dealing And Good Order Prevail. For One Of The Well-nigh Essential Activities Of All States Is The Buying And Selling Of Goods To Meet Their Mutual Basic Needs; This Is The Quickest Way To Self-sufficiency, Which Seems To Be What Moves Men To Combine Under A Single Constitution.

All Human Actions Have One Or More Of These Seven Causes: Chance, Nature, Compulsions, Habit, Reason, Passion, Desire.

Those Who Are Not Angry At The Things They Should Be Angry At Are Thought To Be Fools, And So Are Those Who Are Not Angry In The Right Way, At The Right Time, Or With The Right Persons.

Happiness Is An Activity Of The Soul In Accordance With Virtue

Nicomachean Ethics

The Soul Is The Cause Or Source Of The Living Body. The Terms Cause And Source Have Many Senses. But The Soul Is The Cause Of Its Body Alike In All Three Senses Which We Explicitly Recognize. It Is (a) The Source Or Origin Of Movement, It Is (b) The End, It Is (c) The Essence Of The Whole Living Body.

Neither By Nature, Then, Nor Contrary To Nature Do The Virtues Arise In Us; Rather We Are Adapted By Nature To Receive Them, And Are Made Perfect By Habit.

Today, See If You Can Stretch Your Heart And Expand Your Love So That It Touches Not Only Those To Whom You Can Give It Easily, But Also To Those Who Need It So Much.

Youth Loves Honor And Victory More Than Money.

A Good Man May Make The Best Even Of Poverty And Disease, And The Other Ills Of Life; But He Can Only Attain Happiness Under The Opposite Conditions

Education Is The Best Provision For Old Age.

Marriage Is Like Retiring As A Bachelor And Getting A Sexual Pension. You Don't Have To Work For The Sex Any More, But You Only Get 65% As Much.

If The Consequences Are The Same It Is Always Better To Assume The More Limited Antecedent, Since In Things Of Nature The Limited, As Being Better, Is Sure To Be Found, Wherever Possible, Rather Than The Unlimited.

If The Art Of Ship-building Were In The Wood, Ships Would Exist By Nature.

Youth Should Be Kept Strangers To All That Is Bad, And Especially To Things Which Suggest Vice Or Hate. When The Five Years Have Passed Away, During The Two Following Years They Must Look On At The Pursuits Which They Are Hereafter To Learn. There Are Two Periods Of Life With Reference To Which Education Has To Be Divided, From Seven To The Age Of Puberty, And Onwards To The Age Of One And Twenty.

If Happiness Is Activity In Accordance With Excellence, It Is Reasonable That It Should Be In Accordance With The Highest Excellence.

For Any Two Portions Of Fire, Small Or Great, Will Exhibit The Same Ratio Of Solid To Void; But The Upward Movement Of The Greater Is Quicker Than That Of The Less, Just As The Downward Movement Of A Mass Of Gold Or Lead, Or Of Any Other Body Endowed With Weight, Is Quicker In Proportion To Its Size.

Adventure Is Worthwhile.

One Swallow Does Not Make A Spring, Nor Does One Fine Day.

In Painting, The Most Brilliant Colors, Spread At Random And Without Design, Will Give Far Less Pleasure Than The Simplest Outline Of A Figure.

It Has Been Well Said That 'he Who Has Never Learned To Obey Cannot Be A Good Commander.' The Two Are Not The Same, But The Good Citizen Ought To Be Capable Of Both; He Should Know How To Govern Like A Freeman, And How To Obey Like A Freeman - These Are The Virtues Of A Citizen.

Each Human Being Is Bred With A Unique Set Of Potentials That Yearn To Be Fulfilled As Surely As The Acorn Yearns To Become The Oak Within It.

The Rattle Is A Toy Suited To The Infant Mind, And Education Is A Rattle Or Toy For Children Of Larger Growth.

To Give A Satisfactory Decision As To The Truth It Is Necessary To Be Rather An Arbitrator Than A Party To The Dispute.

"i Was Not Alone When I Was In Goofy Hell"

The Proof That You Know Something Is That You Are Able To Teach It

He Who Thus Considers Things In Their First Growth And Origin ... Will Obtain The Clearest View Of Them.

Where The Laws Are Not Supreme, There Demagogues Spring Up.

Prosperity Makes Friends And Adversity Tries Them. A True Friend Is One Soul In Two Bodies

Today You Can Start Forming Habits For Overcoming All Obstacles In Life... Even Nicotine Cravings

Democracy Is The Form Of Government In Which The Free Are Rulers.

The Sun, Moving As It Does, Sets Up Processes Of Change And Becoming And Decay, And By Its Agency The Finest And Sweetest Water Is Every Day Carried Up And Is Dissolved Into Vapour And Rises To The Upper Region, Where It Is Condensed Again By The Cold And So Returns To The Earth. This, As We Have Said Before, Is The Regular Course Of Nature.

A Friend Of Everyone Is A Friend Of No One

No One Who Desires To Become Good Will Become Good Unless He Does Good Things.

A Courageous Person Is One Who Faces Fearful Things As He Ought And As Reason Directs For The Sake Of What Is Noble.

It Is In Justice That The Ordering Of Society Is Centered.

For What Is The Best Choice For Each Individual Is The Highest It Is Possible For Him To Achieve.

Money Is A Guarantee That We May Have What We Want In The Future. Though We Need Nothing At The Moment It Insures The Possibility Of Satisfying A New Desire When It Arises.

Guarantees That

The Best Friend Is He That, When He Wishes A Person's Good, Wishes It For That Person's Own Sake.

I Count Him Braver Who Overcomes His Desires Than Him Who Conquers His Enemies; For The Hardest Victory Is Over Self.

And This Lies In The Nature Of Things: What People Are Potentially Is Revealed In Actuality By What They Produce.

Our Feelings Towards Our Friends Reflect Our Feelings Towards Ourselves.

When Quarrels And Complaints Arise, It Is When People Who Are Equal Have Not Got Equal Shares, Or Vice-versa.

Since We Think We Understand When We Know The Explanation, And There Are Four Types Of Explanation (one, What It Is To Be A Thing; One, That If Certain Things Hold It Is Necessary That This Does; Another, What Initiated The Change; And Fourth, The Aim), All These Are Proved Through The Middle Term.

It Is Evidently Equally Foolish To Accept Probable Reasoning From A Mathematician And To Demand From A Rhetorician Demonstrative Proofs.

When There Is No Middle Class, And The Poor Greatly Exceed In Number, Troubles Arise, And The State Soon Comes To An End.

It Is Easy To Perform A Good Action, But Not Easy To Acquire A Settled Habit Of Performing Such Actions.

Education Is An Ornament In Prosperity And A Refuge In Adversity.

We Are The Sum Of Our Actions, And Therefore Our Habits Make All The Difference.

Nature Creates Nothing Without A Purpose.

Everyone Honors The Wise.

We Ought To Be Able To Persuade On Opposite Sides Of A Question; As Also We Ought In The Case Of Arguing By Syllogism: Not That We Should Practice Both, For It Is Not Right To Persuade To What Is Bad; But In Order That The Bearing Of The Case May Not Escape Us, And That When Another Makes An Unfair Use Of These Reasonings, We May Be Able To Solve Them.

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.

Conscientious And Careful Physicians Allocate Causes Of Disease To Natural Laws, While The Ablest Scientists Go Back To Medicine For Their First Principles.

...we Are All Inclined To ... Direct Our Inquiry Not By The Matter Itself, But By The Views Of Our Opponents; And, Even When Interrogating Oneself, One Pushes The Inquiry Only To The Point At Which One Can No Longer Offer Any Opposition. Hence A Good Inquirer Will Be One Who Is Ready In Bringing Forward The Objections Proper To The Genus, And That He Will Be When He Has Gained An Understanding Of The Differences.

Justice Is Equality...but Equality Of What?

The Ideal Man Takes Joy In Doing Favors For Others.

Shipping Magnate Of The 20th Century If Women Didn't Exist, All The Money In The World Would Have No Meaning.

There Are Still Two Forms Besides Democracy And Oligarchy; One Of Them Is Universally Recognized And Included Among The Four Principal Forms Of Government, Which Are Said To Be (1) Monarchy, (2) Oligarchy, (3) Democracy, And (4) The So-called Aristocracy Or Government Of The Best. But There Is Also A Fifth, Which Retains The Generic Name Of Polity Or Constitutional Government.

All Men Agree That A Just Distribution Must Be According To Merit In Some Sense; They Do Not All Specify The Same Sort Of Merit, But Democrats Identify It With Freemen, Supporters Of Oligarchy With Wealth (or Noble Birth), And Supporters Of Aristocracy With Excellence.

The Unfortunate Need People Who Will Be Kind To Them; The Prosperous Need People To Be Kind To.

God And Nature Create Nothing That Does Not Fulfill A Purpose

A Good Style Must Have An Air Of Novelty, At The Same Time Concealing Its Art.

Whereas Happiness Is The Highest Good, Being A Realization And Perfect Practice Of Virtue, Which Some Can Attain, While Others Have Little Or None Of It, The Various Qualities Of Men Are Clearly The Reason Why There Are Various Kinds Of States And Many Forms Of Government; For Different Men Seek After Happiness In Different Ways And By Different Means, And So Make For Themselves Different Modes Of Life And Forms Of Government.

Suppose, Then, That All Men Were Sick Or Deranged, Save One Or Two Of Them Who Were Healthy And Of Right Mind. It Would Then Be The Latter Two Who Would Be Thought To Be Sick And Deranged And The Former Not!

Now If There Is Any Gift Of The Gods To Men, It Is Reasonable That Happiness Should Be God-given, And Most Surely God-given Of All Human Things Inasmuch As It Is The Best. But This Question Would Perhaps Be More Appropriate To Another Inquiry; Happiness Seems, However, Even If It Is Not God-sent But Comes As A Result Of Virtue And Some Process Of Learning And Training, To Be Among The Most God-like Things; For That Which Is The Prize And End Of Virtue Seems To Be The Best Thing In The World, And Something God-like And Blessed.

All Communication Must Lead To Change

All Proofs Rest On Premises.

There Is No Such Thing As Committing Adultery With The Right Woman, At The Right Time, And In The Right Way, For It Is Simply Wrong.

To Die In Order To Avoid The Pains Of Poverty, Love, Or Anything That Is Disagreeable, Is Not The Part Of A Brave Man, But Of A Coward.

To Appreciate The Beauty Of A Snow Flake, It Is Necessary To Stand Out In The Cold.

The Same Ideas, One Must Believe, Recur In Men's Minds Not Once Or Twice But Again And Again.

All Men Desire By Nature To Know.

Happiness Is The Utilization Of One's Talents Along Lines Of Excellence.

It Is Through Wonder That Men Now Begin And Originally Began To Philosophize; Wondering In The First Place At Obvious Perplexities, And Then By Gradual Progression Raising Questions About The Greater Matters Too.

No Great Mind Has Ever Existed Without A Touch Of Madness.

A Speaker Who Is Attempting To Move People To Thought Or Action Must Concern Himself With Pathos.

God Has Many Names, Though He Is Only One Being.

It Is The Characteristic Of The Magnanimous Man To Ask No Favor But To Be Ready To Do Kindness To Others.

A Period May Be Defined As A Portion Of Speech That Has In Itself A Beginning And An End, Being At The Same Time Not Too Big To Be Taken In At A Glance

Art Is A Higher Type Of Knowledge Than Experience.

Now It Is Evident That The Form Of Government Is Best In Which Every Man, Whoever He Is, Can Act Best And Live Happily.

When Their Adventures Do Not Succeed, However, They Run Away; But It Was The Mark Of A Brave Man To Face Things That Are, And Seem, Terrible For A Man, Because It Is Noble To Do So And Disgraceful Not To Do So.

The Soul Of Animals Is Characterized By Two Faculties, (a) The Faculty Of Discrimination Which Is The Work Of Thought And Sense, And (b) The Faculty Of Originating Local Movement.

What We Expect, That We Find.

Law Of Attraction

Time Is The Measurable Unit Of Movement Concerning A Before And An After.

Time Management

The Senses Are Gateways To The Intelligence. There Is Nothing In The Intelligence Which Did Not First Pass Through The Senses.

Pay Attention To The Young, And Make Them Just As Good As Possible.

He Is His Own Best Friend And Takes Delight In Privacy Whereas The Man Of No Virtue Or Ability Is His Own Worst Enemy And Is Afraid Of Solitude.

A Friend Is Simply One Soul In Two Bodies.

A Flatterer Is A Friend Who Is Your Inferior, Or Pretends To Be So.

The Two Qualities Which Chiefly Inspire Regard And Affection Are That A Thing Is Your Own And That It Is Your Only One.

Not To Get What You Have Set Your Heart On Is Almost As Bad As Getting Nothing At All.

The Male Has More Teeth Than The Female In Mankind, And Sheep And Goats, And Swine. This Has Not Been Observed In Other Animals. Those Persons Which Have The Greatest Number Of Teeth Are The Longest Lived; Those Which Have Them Widely Separated, Smaller, And More Scattered, Are Generally More Short Lived.

Equality Consists In The Same Treatment Of Similar Persons.

Equal Treatment

The Actuality Of Thought Is Life.

Freedom Is Obedience To Self-formulated Rules.

Nicomachean Ethics

The Principle Aim Of Gymnastics Is The Education Of All Youth And Not Simply That Minority Of People Highly Favored By Nature.

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.

And, Speaking Generally, Passion Seems Not To Be Amenable To Reason, But Only To Force.

It Is Not Easy For A Person To Do Any Great Harm When His Tenure Of Office Is Short, Whereas Long Possession Begets Tyranny.

The Greatest Victory Is Over Self.

Greatest Victory

The Best Way To Teach Morality Is To Make It A Habit With Children.

Human Beings Are Curious By Nature.

Selfishness Doesn't Consist In A Love To Yourself, But In A Big Degree Of Such Love.

Men Must Be Able To Engage In Business And Go To War, But Leisure And Peace Are Better; They Must Do What Is Necessary And Indeed What Is Useful, But What Is Honorable Is Better. On Such Principles Children And Persons Of Every Age Which Requires Education Should Be Trained.

We Become Just By The Practice Of Just Actions, Self-controlled By Exercising Self-control, And Courageous By Performing Acts Of Courage.

The Worst Form Of Inequality Is To Try To Make Unequal Things Equal.

Fine Friendship Requires Duration Rather Than Fitful Intensity.

Imagination Is A Sort Of Faint Perception.

In General, What Is Written Must Be Easy To Read And Easy To Speak; Which Is The Same.

Between Friends There Is No Need For Justice, But People Who Are Just Still Need The Quality Of Friendship; And Indeed Friendliness Is Considered To Be Justice In The Fullest Sense.

Peace Is More Difficult Than War.

Irrational Passions Would Seem To Be As Much A Part Of Human Nature As Is Reason.

So The Good Has Been Well Explained As That At Which All Things Aim.

Anyone, Without Any Great Penetration, May Distinguish The Dispositions Consequent On Wealth; For Its Possessors Are Insolent And Overbearing, From Being Tainted In A Certain Way By The Getting Of Their Wealth. For They Are Affected As Though They Possessed Every Good; Since Wealth Is A Sort Of Standard Of The Worth Of Other Things; Whence Every Thing Seems To Be Purchasable By It.

It Is Clear, Then, That Wisdom Is Knowledge Having To Do With Certain Principles And Causes. But Now, Since It Is This Knowledge That We Are Seeking, We Must Consider The Following Point: Of What Kind Of Principles And Of What Kind Of Causes Is Wisdom The Knowledge?

Words Of Wisdom

It Is Not Always The Same Thing To Be A Good Man And A Good Citizen.

It Is More Difficult To Organize A Peace Than To Win A War; But The Fruits Of Victory Will Be Lost If The Peace Is Not Organized.

Every Man Should Be Responsible To Others, Nor Should Anyone Be Allowed To Do Just As He Pleases; For Where Absolute Freedom Is Allowed There Is Nothing To Restrain The Evil Which Is Inherent In Every Man. But The Principle Of Responsibility Secures That Which Is The Greatest Good In States; The Right Persons Rule And Are Prevented From Doing Wrong, And The People Have Their Due. It Is Evident That This Is The Best Kind Of Democracy, And Why? Because The People Are Drawn From A Certain Class.

Happiness Is The Reward Of Virtue.

Virtue Makes Us Aim At The Right End, And Practical Wisdom Makes Us Take The Right Means.

The Same Things Are Best Both For Individuals And For States, And These Are The Things Which The Legislator Ought To Implant In The Minds Of His Citizens.

Neither Old People Nor Sour People Seem To Make Friends Easily; For There Is Little That Is Pleasant In Them.

When The Citizens At Large Administer The State For The Common Interest, The Government Is Called By The Generic Name - A Constitution.

Aristotle Said: "evil Brings Men Together."

Misfortune Shows Those Who Are Not Really Friends.

If The Hammer And The Shuttle Could Move Themselves, Slavery Would Be Unnecessary.

The Ultimate Value Of Life Depends Upon Awareness And The Power Of Contemplation Rather Than Upon Mere Survival.

A Democracy Exists Whenever Those Who Are Free And Are Not Well-off, Being In The Majority, Are In Sovereign Control Of Government, An Oligarchy When Control Lies With The Rich And Better-born, These Being Few.

The Proof That The State Is A Creation Of Nature And Prior To The Individual Is That The Individual, When Isolated, Is Not Self-sufficing.

Two Characteristic Marks Have Above All Others Been Recognized As Distinguishing That Which Has Soul In It From That Which Has Not - Movement And Sensation.

Self-sufficiency Is Both A Good And An Absolute Good.

Greatness Of Spirit Is Accompanied By Simplicity And Sincerity.

Of Governments There Are Said To Be Only Two Forms - Democracy And Oligarchy. For Aristocracy Is Considered To Be A Kind Of Oligarchy, As Being The Rule Of A Few, And The So-called Constitutional Government To Be Really A Democracy.

Quality Is Not An Act, It Is A Habit.

We Should Aim Rather At Leveling Down Our Desires Than Leveling Up Our Means.

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.

When We Look At The Matter From Another Point Of View, Great Caution Would Seem To Be Required. For The Habit Of Lightly Changing The Laws Is An Evil, And, When The Advantage Is Small, Some Errors Both Of Lawgivers And Rulers Had Better Be Left; The Citizen Will Not Gain So Much By Making The Change As He Will Lose By The Habit Of Disobedience.

For Imitation Is Natural To Man From His Infancy. Man Differs From Other Animals Particularly In This, That He Is Imitative, And Acquires His Rudiments Of Knowledge In This Way; Besides, The Delight In It Is Universal.

It Is The Active Exercise Of Our Faculties In Conformity With Virtue That Causes Happiness, And The Opposite Activities Its Opposite.

The Aim Of Art Is To Represent Not The Outward Appearance Of Things, But Their Inward Significance.

The Purpose Of Art Is To Represent The Meaning Of Things. This Represents The True Reality, Not External Aspects.

Also, That Which Is Desirable In Itself Is More Desirable Than What Is Desirable Per Accidens.

When The Looms Spin By Themselves, We'll Have No Need For Slaves.

[i]t Is Rather The Case That We Desire Something Because We Believe It To Be Good Than That We Believe A Thing To Be Good Because We Desire It. It Is The Thought That Starts Things Off.

A Common Danger Unites Even The Bitterest Enemies.

Life Is Only Meaningful When We Are Striving For A Goal .

A Constitution Is The Arrangement Of Magistracies In A State.

That Which Is Common To The Greatest Number Has The Least Care Bestowed Upon It. Every One Thinks Chiefly Of His Own, Hardly At All Of The Common Interest; And Only When He Is Himself Concerned As An Individual. For Besides Other Considerations, Everybody Is More Inclined To Neglect The Duty Which He Expects Another To Fulfill.

Emotions Of Any Kind Are Produced By Melody And Rhythm; Therefore By Music A Man Becomes Accustomed To Feeling The Right Emotions; Music Has Thus The Power To Form Character, And The Various Kinds Of Music Based On Various Modes May Be Distinguished By Their Effects On Character.

... There Must Then Be A Principle Of Such A Kind That Its Substance Is Activity.

Words Of Wisdom

I Say That Habit's But A Long Practice, Friend, And This Becomes Men's Nature In The End.

The Educated Differ From The Uneducated As Much As The Living From The Dead.

Whether If Soul Did Not Exist Time Would Exist Or Not, Is A Question That May Fairly Be Asked; For If There Cannot Be Someone To Count There Cannot Be Anything That Can Be Counted, So That Evidently There Cannot Be Number; For Number Is Either What Has Been, Or What Can Be, Counted.

It Is A Part Of Probability That Many Improbable Things Will Happen.

Between Husband And Wife Friendship Seems To Exist By Nature, For Man Is Naturally Disposed To Pairing.

Nature Does Nothing Without A Purpose. In Children May Be Observed The Traces And Seeds Of What Will One Day Be Settled Psychological Habits, Though Psychologically A Child Hardly Differs For The Time Being From An Animal.

Rhetoric Is Useful Because Truth And Justice Are In Their Nature Stronger Than Their Opposites; So That If Decisions Be Made, Not In Conformity To The Rule Of Propriety, It Must Have Been That They Have Been Got The Better Of Through Fault Of The Advocates Themselves: And This Is Deserving Reprehension.

Love Is Composed Of A Single Soul Inhabiting Two Bodies.

A Friend Is Another I.

While Fiction Is Often Impossible, It Should Not Be Implausible.

Happiness Is A State Of Activity.

The Duty Of Rhetoric Is To Deal With Such Matters As We Deliberate Upon Without Arts Or Systems To Guide Us, In The Hearing Of Persons Who Cannot Take In At A Glance A Complicated Argument Or Follow A Long Chain Of Reasoning.

The First Principle Of All Action Is Leisure.

No One Would Choose A Friendless Existence On Condition Of Having All The Other Things In The World.

They - Young People Have Exalted Notions, Because They Have Not Been Humbled By Life Or Learned Its Necessary Limitations; Moreover, Their Hopeful Disposition Makes Them Think Themselves Equal To Great Things - And That Means Having Exalted Notions. They Would Always Rather Do Noble Deeds Than Useful Ones: Their Lives Are Regulated More By Moral Feeling Than By Reasoning - All Their Mistakes Are In The Direction Of Doing Things Excessively And Vehemently. They Overdo Everything - They Love Too Much, Hate Too Much, And The Same With Everything Else.

Every Rascal Is Not A Thief, But Every Thief Is A Rascal.

Trending Author

Robert Doisneau

Geoffrey Boycott

Jacqueline Bisset

Category