Popular Quotes by Aristotle

Aristotle was an ancient Greek philosopher as well as scientist. Similar to Plato and Socrates, he laid much of his thoughts of the foundation for western Philosophy. He was a student of Plato and joined his academy. Here is a list of some of the popular thoughts and quotes by Aristotle.

1. “Hope is a waking dream.” - Aristotle
2. “Memory is the scribe of the soul.” - Aristotle
3. “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” - Aristotle
4. “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.” - Aristotle
5. “Man is a goal seeking animal. His life only has meaning if he is reaching out and striving for his goals.” - Aristotle
6. “Happiness depends upon ourselves.” - Aristotle
7. “To write well, express yourself like common people, but think like a wise man. Or, think as wise men do, but speak as the common people do.” - Aristotle
8. “The educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living from the dead.” - Aristotle
9. “Anyone can become angry — that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way — this is not easy.” - Aristotle
10. “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.” - Aristotle
11. “At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.” - Aristotle
12. “Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.” - Aristotle
13. “The energy of the mind is the essence of life.” - Aristotle
14. “The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.” - Aristotle
15. “The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal.” - Aristotle
16. “Man is by nature a political animal.” - Aristotle
17. “First, have a definite, clear practical ideal; a goal, an objective. Second, have the necessary means to achieve your ends; wisdom, money, materials, and methods. Third, adjust all your means to that end.” - Aristotle
18. “Wicked men obey from fear; good men, from love.” - Aristotle
19. “All men by nature desire to know.” - Aristotle
20. “Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.” - Aristotle
21. “Friendship is essentially a partnership.” - Aristotle
22. “What it lies in our power to do, it lies in our power not to do.” - Aristotle
23. “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act by a habit.” - Aristotle
24. “The secret to humor is surprise.” - Aristotle
25. “Education is an ornament in prosperity and a refuge in adversity.” - Aristotle
26. “Happiness is a sort of action.” - Aristotle
27. “The law is reason, free from passion.” - Aristotle
28. “No excellent soul is exempt from a mixture of madness.” - Aristotle
29. “Happiness is activity.” - Aristotle
30. “No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.” - Aristotle
31. “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.” - Aristotle
32. “Cruel is the strife of brothers.” - Aristotle
33. “Education is the best provision for old age.” - Aristotle
34. “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” - Aristotle
35. “Equality consists in the same treatment of similar persons.” - Aristotle
36. “The soul never thinks without a picture. Hope is the dream of a waking man.” - Aristotle
37. “Democracy arose from men’s thinking that if they are equal in any respect, they are equal absolutely.” - Aristotle
38. “It is easy to perform a good action, but not easy to acquire a settled habit of performing such actions.” - Aristotle
39. “The beauty of the soul shines out when a man bears with composure one heavy mischance after another, not because he does not feel them, but because he is a man of high and heroic temper.” - Aristotle
40. “There is no great genius without a mixture of madness.” - Aristotle
41. “Wit is educated insolence.” - Aristotle
42. “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.” - Aristotle
43. “Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.” - Aristotle
44. “The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain.” - Aristotle
45. “We praise a man who feels angry on the right grounds and against the right persons and also in the right manner at the right moment and for the right length of time.” - Aristotle
46. “Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities.” - Aristotle
47. “Well begun is half done.” - Aristotle
48. “Praise invariably implies a reference to a higher standard.” - Aristotle
49. “The ideal man bears the accidents of life with dignity and grace, making the best of circumstances.” - Aristotle
50. “No notice is taken of a little evil, but when it increases it strikes the eye.” - Aristotle
51. “The end of labor is to gain leisure.” - Aristotle
52. “Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.” - Aristotle
53. “To the query, What is a friend? his reply was A single soul dwelling in two bodies.” - Aristotle
54. “I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self.” - Aristotle
55. “All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion, desire.” - Aristotle
56. “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.” - Aristotle
57. “One thing alone not even God can do, To make undone whatever hath been done.” - Aristotle
58. “Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.” - Aristotle
59. “We give up leisure in order that we may have leisure, just as we go to war in order that we may have peace.” - Aristotle
60. “Nature does nothing uselessly.” - Aristotle
61. “Character is that which reveals moral purpose, exposing the class of things a man chooses or avoids.”
62. “Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” - Aristotle
63. “The least initial deviation from the truth is multiplied later a thousand fold.” - Aristotle
64. “Every rascal is not a thief, but every thief is a rascal.” - Aristotle
65. “If happiness is activity in accordance with excellence, it is reasonable that it should be in accordance with the highest excellence.” - Aristotle
66. “Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.” - Aristotle
67. “It is well to be up before daybreak, for such habits contribute to health, wealth, and wisdom.” - Aristotle
68. “The wise man does not expose himself needlessly to danger, since there are few things for which he cares sufficiently; but he is willing, in great crises, to give even his life — knowing that under certain conditions it is not worthwhile to live.” - Aristotle
69. “It was through the feeling of wonder that men now and at first began to philosophize.” - Aristotle
70. “Great men are always of a nature originally melancholy.” - Aristotle
71. “It is Homer who has chiefly taught other poets the art of telling lies skillfully.” - Aristotle
72. “All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.” - Aristotle
73. “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.” - Aristotle
74. “So it is naturally with the male and the female; the one is superior, the other inferior; the one governs, the other is governed; and the same rule must necessarily hold good with respect to all mankind.” - Aristotle
75. “Wishing to be friends is quick work, but friendship is a slow-ripening fruit.” - Aristotle
76. “My best friend is the man who in wishing me well wishes it for my sake.” - Aristotle
77. “It is the mark of an instructed mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision which the nature of the subject admits and not to seek exactness when only an approximation of the truth is possible.” - Aristotle
78. “All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth.” - Aristotle
79. “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.” - Aristotle
80. “This is the reason why mothers are more devoted to their children than fathers: it is that they suffer more in giving them birth and are more certain that they are their own.” - Aristotle

Above are few of the incredible quotes by Aristotle, it you have more of his quotes feel free to share in the comments section.