Aristotle

Greek Philosopher (384-322 B.C.)

Aristotle is often considered the most notable product of the Academy. Born in northern Greece, Aristotle was a pupil of Plato and under his watchful eyes spent twenty years studying until his teacher’s death, when he left to teach the young Alexander the Great. After many years, Aristotle founded his own university at Lyceum (335 BC), and in until his death, he taught, researched and wrote on varying topics. Many of the writings he produced are often considered to have been the most beautiful written expositions ever to have been created. But alas, only fragments of Aristotle’s works are available to us today. His only legacy survives through his lecture notes; which include writings about physics, ethics, biology, etiologic, psychology, logic, reason, philosophy and politics.

Throughout Aristotle’s life he consistently revised his writings. It is due to this that his works are often obscure, inconsistent and foremost lacking cohesion. His greatest piece is called the Organon or logical treatise, and consisted of the premise of a universal method of reasoning to co include the understanding of a reality principle. On Interoperability, Posterior Analytics and Prior Analytics, the principle purpose was to understand and inspect deductive inference and then characterize the system of syllogistic reasoning. Unlike Plato, Aristotle rejected the theory of forms and revised his vision of reality and perception with the existence of substance. His understanding of the soul, which is unlike the modern characteristic of Judaism’s soul’s principle, rather being that all beings have a soul through which life is perceived exhibits the literal values of scientific discovery and the attention to gain perception through reason, a clear juxtaposition to that of yesteryear.

Similarly, in his writing the Politics, Aristotle sought to establish his understanding of the role, origin and possibility to stand against the state while still regarding obligations of the individual citizen and the responsibility of governance to that individual in accordance to civilisation. Tying into his efforts of morality, Aristotle devised several varying moral codes to establishing what he called “the good life”. Eudemian Ethics, Magna Moralia and Nicomachean Ethics all expose humanities desire to attain happiness whilst still illustrates the essence of volition, moral degradation, injustice, pain and the underlying conception of evil.

Quotes:

Happiness depends upon ourselves.

All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.

A friend is a second self.

All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.

Education is the best provision for the journey to old age.

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.

Law is mind without reason.

All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion, and desire.

Evil brings men together.

Young people are in a condition like permanent intoxication, because youth is sweet and they are growing.

Education is the best provision for old age.

It is in justice that the ordering of society is centered.

Liars when they speak the truth are not believed.

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.

Misfortune shows those who are not really friends.

We make war that we may live in peace.

Nature does nothing uselessly.

It is not always the same thing to be a good man and a good citizen.

I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who overcomes his enemies.

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Man is by nature a political animal.

The best political community is formed by citizens of the middle class.

Again, men in general desire the good, and not merely what their fathers had.

One swallow does not make a summer.

Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.

It is simplicity that makes the uneducated more effective than the educated when addressing popular audiences.

To be conscious that we are perceiving or thinking is to be conscious of our own existence.

All men by nature desire knowledge.

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 the government to the utmost.

Piety requires us to honor truth above our friends.

Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in the consciousness that we deserve them.

Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.

To perceive is to suffer.

It is possible to fail in many ways…while to succeed is possible only in one way.

The only stable state is the one in which all men are equal before the law.