Aristotle Man Quotations

Man is the only animal capable of reasoning, though many others possess the faculty of memory and instruction in common with him.

The true and the approximately true are apprehended by the same faculty; it may also be noted that men have a sufficient natural instinct for what is true, and usually do arrive at the truth. Hence the man who makes a good guess at truth is likely to make a good guess at probabilities.

Some kinds of animals burrow in the ground; others do not. Some animals are nocturnal, as the owl and the bat; others use the hours of daylight. There are tame animals and wild animals. Man and the mule are always tame; the leopard and the wolf are invariably wild, and others, as the elephant, are easily tamed.

Education and morals make the good man, the good statesman, the good ruler.

The Life of the intellect is the best and pleasantest for man, because the intellect more than anything else is the man. Thus it will be the happiest life as well.

The man who is content to live alone is either a beast or a god.

. . . the man is free, we say, who exists for his own sake and not for another's.

Nature of man is not what he was born as, but what he is born for.

The angry man wishes the object of his anger to suffer in return; hatred wishes its object not to exist.

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.

The good citizen need not of necessity possess the virtue which makes a good man.

A brave man is clear in his discourse, and keeps close to truth.

Indeed, we may go further and assert that anyone who does not delight in fine actions is not even a good man.

Excellence or virtue in a man will be the disposition which renders him a good man and also which will cause him to perform his function well.

The good man is he for whom, because he is virtuous, the things that are absolutely good are good; it is also plain that his use of these goods must be virtuous and in the absolute sense good.

If the state cannot be entirely composed of good men, and yet each citizen is expected to do his own business well, and must therefore have virtue, still inasmuch as all the citizens cannot be alike, the virtue of the citizen and of the good man cannot coincide. All must have the virtue of the good citizen - thus, and thus only, can the state be perfect; but they will not have the virtue of a good man, unless we assume that in the good state all the citizens must be good.

In the perfect state the good man is absolutely the same as the good citizen; whereas in other states the good citizen is only good relatively to his own form of government.

Nor need it cause surprise that things disagreeable to the good man should seem pleasant to some men; for mankind is liable to many corruptions and diseases, and the things in question are not really pleasant, but only pleasant to these particular persons, who are in a condition to think them so.

The virtue of the good man is necessarily the same as the virtue of the citizen of the perfect state.

Wicked men obey out of fear. good men, out of love

Education and morals will be found almost the whole that goes to make a good man.

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

The best friend is the man who in wishing me well wishes it for my sake.

The man who gets angry at the right things and with the right people, and in the right way and at the right time and for the right length of time, is commended.