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If, Then, There Is Some End Of The Things We Do, Which We Desire For Its Own Sake (everything Else Being Desired For The Sake Of This), And If We Do Not Choose Everything For The Sake Of Something Else (for At That Rate The Process Would Go On To Infinity, So That Our Desire Would Be Empty And Vain), Clearly This Must Be The Good And The Chief Good.

-Aristotle

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If, Then, There Is

Aristotle

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If, Then, There Is Some End Of The Things We Do, Which We Desire For Its Own Sake (everything Else Being Desired For The Sake Of This), And If We Do Not Choose Everything For The Sake Of Something Else (for At That Rate The Process Would Go On To Infinity, So That Our Desire Would Be Empty And Vain), Clearly This Must Be The Good And The Chief Good.

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

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.

The Activity Of Happiness Must Occupy An Entire Lifetime; For One Swallow Does Not A Summer Make.

We Have Divided The Virtues Of The Soul Into Two Groups, The Virtues Of The Character And The Virtues Of The Intellect.

Purpose Is A Desire For Something In Our Own Power, Coupled With An Investigation Into Its Means.

Beauty Depends On Size As Well As Symmetry. No Very Small Animal Can Be Beautiful, For Looking At It Takes So Small A Portion Of Time That The Impression Of It Will Be Confused. Nor Can Any Very Large One, For A Whole View Of It Cannot Be Had At Once, And So There Will Be No Unity And Completeness.

For Those Who Possess And Can Wield Arms Are In A Position To Decide Whether The Constitution Is To Continue Or Not

The So-called Pythagoreans, Who Were The First To Take Up Mathematics, Not Only Advanced This Subject, But Saturated With It, They Fancied That The Principles Of Mathematics Were The Principles Of All Things.

Every Art And Every Inquiry, And Similarly Every Action And Pursuit, Is Thought To Aim At Some Good; And For This Reason The Good Has Rightly Been Declared To Be That At Which All Things Aim.

It Is Likely That Unlikely Things Should Happen

The Society That Loses Its Grip On The Past Is In Danger, For It Produces Men Who Know Nothing But The Present, And Who Are Not Aware That Life Had Been, And Could Be, Different From What It Is.

Wickedness Is Nourished By Lust.

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.

For Nature By The Same Cause, Provided It Remain In The Same Condition, Always Produces The Same Effect, So That Either Coming-to-be Or Passing-away Will Always Result.

Happiness Seems To Require A Modicum Of External Prosperity.

A Life Of Wealth And Many Belongings Is Only A Means To Happiness. Honor, Power, And Success Cannot Be Happiness Because They Depend On The Whims Of Others, And Happiness Should Be Self-contained, Complete In Itself.

The Energy Of The Mind Is The Essence Of Life.

If, Then, There Is Some End Of The Things We Do, Which We Desire For Its Own Sake (everything Else Being Desired For The Sake Of This), And If We Do Not Choose Everything For The Sake Of Something Else (for At That Rate The Process Would Go On To Infinity, So That Our Desire Would Be Empty And Vain), Clearly This Must Be The Good And The Chief Good.

Of Actions Some Aim At What Is Necessary And Useful, And Some At What Is Honorable. And The Preference Given To One Or The Other Class Of Actions Must Necessarily Be Like The Preference Given To One Or Other Part Of The Soul And Its Actions Over The Other; There Must Be War For The Sake Of Peace, Business For The Sake Of Leisure, Things Useful And Necessary For The Sake Of Things Honorable.

The Good Citizen Need Not Of Necessity Possess The Virtue Which Makes A Good Man.

Both Self-restraint And Unrestraint Are A Matter Of Extremes As Compared With The Character Of The Mass Of Mankind; The Restrained Man Shows More And The Unrestrained Man Less Steadfastness Than Most Men Are Capable Of.

We Have Next To Consider The Formal Definition Of Virtue.

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

Bad People...are In Conflict With Themselves; They Desire One Thing And Will Another, Like The Incontinent Who Choose Harmful Pleasures Instead Of What They Themselves Believe To Be Good.

Why Is It That All Men Who Are Outstanding In Philosophy, Poetry Or The Arts Are Melancholic?

When You Ask A Dumb Question, You Get A Smart Answer.

Something Is Infinite If, Taking It Quantity By Quantity, We Can Always Take Something Outside.

I Call That Law Universal, Which Is Conformable Merely To Dictates Of Nature; For There Does Exist Naturally An Universal Sense Of Right And Wrong, Which, In A Certain Degree, All Intuitively Divine, Even Should No Intercourse With Each Other, Nor Any Compact Have Existed.

Happiness Is An Activity Of The Soul In Accordance With Virtue

Nicomachean Ethics

When Several Villages Are United In A Single Complete Community, Large Enough To Be Nearly Or Quite Self-sufficing, The State Comes Into Existence, Originating In The Bare Needs Of Life, And Continuing In Existence For The Sake Of A Good Life.

True Happiness Flows From The Possession Of Wisdom And Virtue And Not From The Possession Of External Goods.

Any Change Of Government Which Has To Be Introduced Should Be One Which Men, Starting From Their Existing Constitutions, Will Be Both Willing And Able To Adopt, Since There Is Quite As Much Trouble In The Reformation Of An Old Constitution As In The Establishment Of A New One, Just As To Unlearn Is As Hard As To Learn.

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

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

Excellence Is Not An Art. It Is The Habit Of Practice.

Men Create The Gods After Their Own Images.

Patience S Bitter, But It's Fruit Is Sweet.

But If Nothing But Soul, Or In Soul Mind, Is Qualified To Count, It Is Impossible For There To Be Time Unless There Is Soul, But Only That Of Which Time Is An Attribute, I.e. If Change Can Exist Without Soul.

Jealousy Is Both Reasonable And Belongs To Reasonable Men, While Envy Is Base And Belongs To The Base, For The One Makes Himself Get Good Things By Jealousy, While The Other Does Not Allow His Neighbour To Have Them Through Envy.

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.

Money Was Established For Exchange, But Interest Causes It To Be Reproduced By Itself. Therefore This Way Of Earning Money Is Greatly In Conflict With The Natural Law.

The Many Are More Incorruptible Than The Few; They Are Like The Greater Quantity Of Water Which Is Less Easily Corrupted Than A Little.

A State Of The Soul Is Either (1) An Emotion, (2) A Capacity, Or (3) A Disposition; Virtue Therefore Must Be One Of These Three Things.

A True Disciple Shows His Appreciation By Reaching Further Than His Teacher.

We Cannot ... Prove Geometrical Truths By Arithmetic.

The Roots Of Education Are Bitter, But The Fruit Is Sweet.

Indeed, We May Go Further And Assert That Anyone Who Does Not Delight In Fine Actions Is Not Even A Good Man.

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

If Happiness, Then, Is Activity Expressing Virtue, It Is Reasonable For It To Express The Supreme Virtue, Which Will Be The Virtueof The Best Thing.

Man, As An Originator Of Action, Is A Union Of Desire And Intellect.

The Soul Consists Of Two Parts, One Irrational And The Other Capable Of Reason. (whether These Two Parts Are Really Distinct In The Sense That The Parts Of The Body Or Of Any Other Divisible Whole Are Distinct, Or Whether Though Distinguishable In Thought As Two They Are Inseparable In Reality, Like The Convex And Concave Of A Curve, Is A Question Of No Importance For The Matter In Hand.)

He Is Courageous Who Endures And Fears The Right Thing, For The Right Motive, In The Right Way And At The Right Times.

They Should Rule Who Are Able To Rule Best.

A Man's Happiness Consists In The Free Exercise Of His Highest Faculties.

Character Is Determined By Choice, Not Opinion.

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.

It Is The Mark Of An Educated Mind To Expect That Amount Of Exactness Which The Nature Of The Particular Subject Admits. It Is Equally Unreasonable To Accept Merely Probable Conclusions From A Mathematician And To Demand Strict Demonstration From An Orator.

There Is Nothing Unequal As The Equal Treatment Of Unequals.

Equal Treatment

Bad Men Are Full Of Repentance.

Concerning The Generation Of Animals Akin To Them, As Hornets And Wasps, The Facts In All Cases Are Similar To A Certain Extent, But Are Devoid Of The Extraordinary Features Which Characterize Bees; This We Should Expect, For They Have Nothing Divine About Them As The Bees Have.

There Must Be In Prudence Also Some Master Virtue.

... The Good For Man Is An Activity Of The Soul In Accordance With Virtue, Or If There Are More Kinds Of Virtue Than One, In Accordance With The Best And Most Perfect Kind.

Why Do Men Seek Honour? Surely In Order To Confirm The Favorable Opinion They Have Formed Of Themselves.

Metaphor Is Halfway Between The Unintelligible And The Commonplace.

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

For What One Has To Learn To Do, We Learn By Doing.

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 Guest Will Judge Better Of A Feast Than The Cook

We Must As Second Best, As People Say, Take The Least Of The Evils.

It Is Best To Rise From Life As From A Banquet, Neither Thirsty Nor Drunken.

Earthworms Are The Intenstines Of The Soil.

And This Activity Alone Would Seem To Be Loved For Its Own Sake; For Nothing Arises From It Apart From The Contemplating, While From Practical Activities We Gain More Or Less Apart From The Action. And Happiness Is Thought To Depend On Leisure; For We Are Busy That We May Have Leisure, And Make War That We May Live In Peace.

Hippodamus, Son Of Euryphon, A Native Of Miletus, Invented The Art Of Planning And Laid Out The Street Plan Of Piraeus.

Wise People Have An Inward Sense Of What Is Beautiful, And The Highest Wisdom Is To Trust This Intuition And Be Guided By It.

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.

Art Completes What Nature Cannot Bring To Finish. The Artist Gives Us Knowledge Of Nature's Unrealized Ends.

Happiness Is The Meaning And The Purpose Of Life, The Whole Aim And End Of Human Existence.

All That One Gains By Falsehood Is, Not To Be Believed When He Speaks The Truth.

Some Vices Miss What Is Right Because They Are Deficient, Others Because They Are Excessive, In Feelings Or In Actions, While Virtue Finds And Chooses The Mean.

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

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.

Happiness, Then, Is Co-extensive With Contemplation, And The More People Contemplate, The Happier They Are; Not Incidentally, But In Virtue Of Their Contemplation, Because It Is In Itself Precious. Thus Happiness Is A Form Of Contemplation.

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.

Democracies Have

Every Art And Every Inquiry, And Similarly Every Action And Choice, Is Thought To Aim At Some Good; And For This Reason The Good Has Rightly Been Declared To Be That At Which All Things Aim.

When People Are Friends, They Have No Need Of Justice, But When They Are Just, They Need Friendship In Addition.

It Belongs To Small-mindedness To Be Unable To Bear Either Honor Or Dishonor, Either Good Fortune Or Bad, But To Be Filled With Conceit When Honored And Puffed Up By Trifling Good Fortune, And To Be Unable To Bear Even The Smallest Dishonor And To Deem Any Chance Failure A Great Misfortune, And To Be Distressed And Annonyed At Everything. Moreover The Small-minded Man Is The Sort Of Person To Call All Slights An Insult And Dishonor, Even Those That Are Due To Ignorance Or Forgetfulness. Small-mindedness Is Accompanied By Pettiness, Querulousness, Pessimism And Self-abasement.

Business Or Toil Is Merely Utilitarian. It Is Necessary But Does Not Enrich Or Ennoble A Human Life.

He Who Confers A Benefit On Anyone Loves Him Better Than He Is Beloved.

Our Feelings Towards Our Friends Reflect Our Feelings Towards Ourselves.

Saying The Words That Come From Knowledge Is No Sign Of Having It.

He Who Takes His Fill Of Every Pleasure ... Becomes Depraved; While He Who Avoids All Pleasures Alike ... Becomes Insensible.

Friends Are An Aid To The Young, To Guard Them From Error; To The Elderly, To Attend To Their Wants And To Supplement Their Failing Power Of Action; To Those In The Prime Of Life, To Assist Them To Noble Deeds.

Everything That Depends On The Action Of Nature Is By Nature As Good As It Can Be, And Similarly Everything That Depends On Art Or Any Rational Cause, And Especially If It Depends On The Best Of All Causes.

...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.

It Makes No Difference Whether A Good Man Has Defrauded A Bad Man, Or A Bad Man Defrauded A Good Man, Or Whether A Good Or Bad Man Has Committed Adultery: The Law Can Look Only To The Amount Of Damage Done.

The Fool Tells Me His Reason; The Wise Man Persuades Me With My Own.

To Leave The Number Of Births Unrestricted, As Is Done In Most States, Inevitably Causes Poverty Among The Citizens, And Poverty Produces Crime And Faction.

The Quality Of Life Is Determined By Its Activities.

The Complete Man Must Work, Study And Wrestle.

Tragedy Is An Imitation Not Of Men But Of A Life, An Action

Anyone Who Has No Need Of Anybody But Himself Is Either A Beast Or A God.

A Human Being Is A Naturally Political [animal].

We Are What We Repeatedly Do.

Definition Of Tragedy: A Hero Destroyed By The Excess Of His Virtues

If Then It Be Possible That One Contrary Should Exist, Or Be Called Into Existence, The Other Contrary Will Also Appear To Be Possible.

It Has Been Handed Down In Mythical Form From Earliest Times To Posterity, That There Are Gods, And That The Divine (deity) Compasses All Nature. All Beside This Has Been Added, After The Mythical Style, For The Purpose Of Persuading The Multitude, And For The Interests Of The Laws, And The Advantage Of The State.

Should A Man Live Underground, And There Converse With The Works Of Art And Mechanism, And Should Afterwards Be Brought Up Into The Open Day, And See The Several Glories Of The Heaven And Earth, He Would Immediately Pronounce Them The Work Of Such A Being As We Define God To Be.

The Brave Man, If He Be Compared With The Coward, Seems Foolhardy; And, If With The Foolhardy Man, Seems A Coward.

There Are Three Qualifications Required In Those Who Have To Fill The Highest Offices, - (1) First Of All, Loyalty To The Established Constitution; (2) The Greatest Administrative Capacity; (3) Virtue And Justice Of The Kind Proper To Each Form Of Government.

In Inventing A Model We May Assume What We Wish, But Should Avoid Impossibilities.

The High-minded Man Must Care More For The Truth Than For What People Think.

Everybody Loves A Thing More If It Has Cost Him Trouble: For Instance Those Who Have Made Money Love Money More Than Those Who Have Inherited It.

The Happy Life Is Thought To Be One Of Excellence; Now An Excellent Life Requires Exertion, And Does Not Consist In Amusement.

A Line Is Not Made Up Of Points. ... In The Same Way, Time Is Not Made Up Parts Considered As Indivisible 'nows.' Part Of Aristotle's Reply To Zeno's Paradox Concerning Continuity.

The Virtue Of Justice Consists In Moderation, As Regulated By Wisdom.

All Men By Nature Desire Knowledge.

Even When Laws Have Been Written Down, They Ought Not Always To Remain Unaltered.

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.

Such An Event Is Probable In Agathon's Sense Of The Word: 'it Is Probable,' He Says, 'that Many Things Should Happen Contrary To Probability.'

Happiness Is The Reward Of Virtue.

We Must Be Neither Cowardly Nor Rash But Courageous.

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

Of Means Of Persuading By Speaking There Are Three Species: Some Consist In The Character Of The Speaker; Others In The Disposing The Hearer A Certain Way; Others In The Thing Itself Which Is Said, By Reason Of Its Proving, Or Appearing To Prove The Point.

It Is Evident, Then, That There Is A Sort Of Education In Which Parents Should Train Their Sons, Not As Being Useful Or Necessary, But Because It Is Liberal Or Noble.

The High-minded Man Is Fond Of Conferring Benefits, But It Shames Him To Receive Them.

Opinion Involves Belief (for Without Belief In What We Opine We Cannot Have An Opinion), And In The Brutes Though We Often Find Imagination We Never Find Belief.

It Is Of The Nature Of Desire Not To Be Satisfied, And Most Men Live Only For The Gratification Of It.

Some Persons Hold That, While It Is Proper For The Lawgiver To Encourage And Exhort Men To Virtue On Moral Grounds, In The Expectation That Those Who Have Had A Virtuous Moral Upbringing Will Respond, Yet He Is Bound To Impose Chastisement And Penalties On The Disobedient And Ill-conditioned, And To Banish The Incorrigible Out Of The State Altogether. For (they Argue) Although The Virtuous Man, Who Guides His Life By Moral Ideals, Will Be Obedient To Reason, The Base, Whose Desires Are Fixed On Pleasure, Must Be Chastised By Pain, Like A Beast Of Burden.

Nor Was Civil Society Founded Merely To Preserve The Lives Of Its Members; But That They Might Live Well: For Otherwise A State Might Be Composed Of Slaves, Or The Animal Creation... Nor Is It An Alliance Mutually To Defend Each Other From Injuries, Or For A Commercial Intercourse. But Whosoever Endeavors To Establish Wholesome Laws In A State, Attends To The Virtues And Vices Of Each Individual Who Composes It; From Whence It Is Evident, That The First Care Of Him Who Would Found A City, Truly Deserving That Name, And Not Nominally So, Must Be To Have His Citizens Virtuous.

The Most Perfect Political Community Must Be Amongst Those Who Are In The Middle Rank, And Those States Are Best Instituted Wherein These Are A Larger And More Respectable Part, If Possible, Than Both The Other; Or, If That Cannot Be, At Least Than Either Of Them Separate.

The Soul Becomes Prudent By Sitting And Being Quiet.

He Who Has Conferred A Benefit On Anyone From Motives Of Love Or Honor Will Feel Pain, If He Sees That The Benefit Is Received Without Gratitude.

The Antidote For Fifty Enemies Is One Friend.

It Is The Mark Of An Educated Man To Look For Precision In Each Class Of Things Just So Far As The Nature Of The Subject Admits

The Precepts Of The Law May Be Comprehended Under These Three Points: To Live Honestly, To Hurt No Man Willfully, And To Render Every Man His Due Carefully.

Because The Rich Are Generally Few In Number, While The Poor Are Many, They Appear To Be Antagonistic, And As The One Or The Other Prevails They Form The Government. Hence Arises The Common Opinion That There Are Two Kinds Of Government - Democracy And Oligarchy.

A True Friend Is One Soul In Two Bodies.

Prayers And Sacrifices Are Of No Avail.

It Is True, Indeed, That The Account Plato Gives In 'timaeus' Is Different From What He Says In His So-called 'unwritten Teachings.'

A Friend To All Is A Friend To None.

These Virtues Are Formed In Man By His Doing The Actions ... The Good Of Man Is A Working Of The Soul In The Way Of Excellence In A Complete Life.

But Nothing Is Yet Clear On The Subject Of The Intellect And The Contemplative Faculty. However, It Seems To Be Another Kind Of Soul, And This Alone Admits Of Being Separated, As That Which Is Eternal From That Which Is Perishable, While It Is Clear From These Remarks That The Other Parts Of The Soul Are Not Separable, As Some Assert Them To Be, Though It Is Obvious That They Are Conceptually Distinct.

No One Chooses What Does Not Rest With Himself, But Only What He Thinks Can Be Attained By His Own Act.

We Must Not Listen To Those Who Advise Us 'being Men To Think Human Thoughts, And Being Mortal To Think Mortal Thoughts' But Must Put On Immortality As Much As Possible And Strain Every Nerve To Live According To That Best Part Of Us, Which, Being Small In Bulk, Yet Much More In Its Power And Honour Surpasses All Else.

Men Are Swayed More By Fear Than By Reverence.

A Friend Is A Second Self.

Experience Has Shown That It Is Difficult, If Not Impossible, For A Populous State To Be Run By Good Laws.

There Are, Then, Three States Of Mind ... Two Vices--that Of Excess, And That Of Defect; And One Virtue--the Mean; And All These Are In A Certain Sense Opposed To One Another; For The Extremes Are Not Only Opposed To The Mean, But Also To One Another; And The Mean Is Opposed To The Extremes.

Every Effort Therefore Must Be Made To Perpetuate Prosperity. And, Since That Is To The Advantage Of The Rich As Well As The Poor, All That Accrues From The Revenues Should Be Collected Into A Single Fund And Distributed In Block Grants To Those In Need, If Possible In Lump Sums Large Enough For The Acquisition Of A Small Piece Of Land, But If Not, Enough To Start A Business, Or Work In Agriculture. And If That Cannot Be Done For All, The Distribution Might Be By Tribes Or Some Other Division Each In Turn.

A Sense Is What Has The Power Of Receiving Into Itself The Sensible Forms Of Things Without The Matter, In The Way In Which A Piece Of Wax Takes On The Impress Of A Signet-ring Without The Iron Or Gold.

How Strange It Is That Socrates, After Having Made The Children Common, Should Hinder Lovers From Carnal Intercourse Only, But Should Permit Love And Familiarities Between Father And Son Or Between Brother And Brother, Than Which Nothing Can Be More Unseemly, Since Even Without Them Love Of This Sort Is Improper. How Strange, Too, To Forbid Intercourse For No Other Reason Than The Violence Of The Pleasure, As Though The Relationship Of Father And Son Or Of Brothers With One Another Made No Difference.

A Bad Man Can Do A Million Times More Harm Than A Beast.

The Basis Of A Democratic State Is Liberty

Be A Free Thinker And Don't Accept Everything You Hear As Truth. Be Critical And Evaluate What You Believe In.

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.

That Which Most Contributes To The Permanence Of Constitutions Is The Adaptation Of Education To The Form Of Government, And Yet In Our Own Day This Principle Is Universally Neglected. The Best Laws, Though Sanctioned By Every Citizen Of The State, Will Be Of No Avail Unless The Young Are Trained By Habit And Education In The Spirit Of The Constitution.

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.

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

Neither Should We Forget The Mean, Which At The Present Day Is Lost Sight Of In Perverted Forms Of Government; For Many Practices Which Appear To Be Democratical Are The Ruin Of Democracies, . . Those Who Think That All Virtue Is To Be Found In Their Own Party Principles Push Matters To Extremes; They Do Not Consider That Disproportion Destroys A State.

Hope Is A Waking Dream.

Your Happiness Depends On You Alone.

It Is The Repeated Performance Of Just And Temperate Actions That Produces Virtue.

As To Adultery, Let It Be Held Disgraceful, In General, For Any Man Or Woman To Be Found In Any Way Unfaithful When They Are Married, And Called Husband And Wife. If During The Time Of Bearing Children Anything Of The Sort Occur, Let The Guilty Person Be Punished With A Loss Of Privileges In Proportion To The Offense.

Teenagers These Days Are Out Of Control. They Eat Like Pigs, They Are Disrespectful Of Adults, They Interrupt And Contradict Their Parents, And They Terrorize Their Teachers.

So, If We Must Give A General Formula Applicable To All Kinds Of Soul, We Must Describe It As The First Actuality [entelechy] Of Anatural Organized Body.

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

Even When Laws Have Been Written Down, They Ought Not Always To Remain Unaltered. As In Other Sciences, So In Politics, It Is Impossible That All Things Should Be Precisely Set Down In Writing; For Enactments Must Be Universal, But Actions Are Concerned With Particulars. Hence We Infer That Sometimes And In Certain Cases Laws May Be Changed.

For Often, When One Is Asleep, There Is Something In Consciousness Which Declares That What Then Presents Itself Is But A Dream.

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.

Men Come Together In Cities In Order To Live: They Remain Together In Order To Live The Good Life

In Poverty And Other Misfortunes Of Life, True Friends Are A Sure Refuge. The Young They Keep Out Of Mischief; To The Old They Are A Comfort And Aid In Their Weakness, And Those In The Prime Of Life They Incite To Noble Deeds.

Philosophy Is The Science Which Considers Truth.

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 Character Which Results From Wealth Is That Of A Prosperous Fool.

A Brave Man Is Clear In His Discourse, And Keeps Close To Truth.

Worthless Persons Appointed To Have Supreme Control Of Weighty Affairs Do A Lot Of Damage.

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

Since The Branch Of Philosophy On Which We Are At Present Engaged Differs From The Others In Not Being A Subject Of Merely Intellectual Interest — I Mean We Are Not Concerned To Know What Goodness Essentially Is, But How We Are To Become Good Men, For This Alone Gives The Study Its Practical Value — We Must Apply Our Minds To The Solution Of The Problems Of Conduct.

When You Feel Yourself Lacking Something, Send Your Thoughts Towards Your Intimate And Search For The Divinity That Lives Within You.

Lacking Something

Friendship Also Seems To Be The Bond That Hold Communities Together.

Phronimos, Possessing Practical Wisdom . But The Only Virtue Special To A Ruler Is Practical Wisdom; All The Others Must Be Possessed, So It Seems, Both By Rulers And Ruled. The Virtue Of A Person Being Ruled Is Not Practical Wisdom But Correct Opinion; He Is Rather Like A Person Who Makes The Pipes, While The Ruler Is The One Who Can Play Them.

Here And Elsewhere We Shall Not Obtain The Best Insight Into Things Until We Actually See Them Growing From The Beginning.

All Art Is Concerned With Coming Into Being.

Rising Before Daylight Is Also To Be Commended; It Is A Healthy Habit, And Gives More Time For The Management Of The Household As Well As For Liberal Studies.

It Is Just That We Should Be Grateful, Not Only To Those With Whose Views We May Agree, But Also To Those Who Have Expressed More Superficial Views; For These Also Contributed Something, By Developing Before Us The Powers Of Thought.

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

As Often As We Do Good, We Offer Sacrifices To God.

Sacrifice To God

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

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

There Is Always Something New Coming Out Of Africa.

For It Is Not True, As Some Treatise-mongers Lay Down In Their Systems, Of The Probity Of The Speaker, That It Contributes Nothing To Persuasion; But Moral Character Nearly, I May Say, Carries With It The Most Sovereign Efficacy In Making Credible.

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.

Democracies Have

The Aim Of The Wise Is Not To Secure Pleasure, But To Avoid Pain.

Man By Nature Wants To Know.

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

No State Will Be Well Administered Unless The Middle Class Holds Sway.

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.

We Are What We Do. Excellence, Therefore, Is Not An Act, But A Habit.

The Laws Are, And Ought To Be, Relative To The Constitution, And Not The Constitution To The Laws. A Constitution Is The Organization Of Offices In A State, And Determines What Is To Be The Governing Body, And What Is The End Of Each Community. But Laws Are Not To Be Confounded With The Principles Of The Constitution; They Are The Rules According To Which The Magistrates Should Administer The State, And Proceed Against Offenders.

For Just As For A Flute-player, A Sculptor, Or An Artist, And, In General, For All Things That Have A Function Or Activity, The Good And The Well Is Thought To Reside In The Function, So Would It Seem To Be For Man, If He Has A Function.

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Robert Motherwell

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