Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.
Man is by nature a social animal; an individual who is unsocial naturally and not accidentally is either beneath our notice or more than human. Society is something that precedes the individual. Anyone who either cannot lead the common life or is so self-sufficient as not to need to, and therefore does not partake of society, is either a beast or a god.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Humans are inherently social beings who thrive in communities, and those who reject society are considered unnatural.
Aristotle's quote emphasizes the intrinsic social nature of humans, suggesting that being part of a community is a fundamental aspect of human existence. He argues that individuals who shun society either exhibit a lower level of humanity, akin to beasts, or an elevated state of being, akin to gods. This highlights the importance of social interaction and communal life in shaping one's identity and role within the human experience.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the importance of community involvement, this quote can illustrate the necessity of social connections.
More from Aristotle
All quotes →Those who cannot bravely face danger are the slaves of their attackers.
For often, when one is asleep, there is something in consciousness which declares that what then presents itself is but a dream.
You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.
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.
The whole is more than the sum of its parts.
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Abolitionists believe that, as all men are born free, so all who are now held as slaves in this country were born free, and that they are slaves now is the sin, not of those who introduced the race into this country, but of those, and those alone, who now hold them and have held them in slavery from their birth.
I don't care what is written," Meyer Landsman says. "I don't care what supposedly got promised to some sandal-wearing idiot whose claim to fame is that he was ready to cut his own son's throat for the sake of a hare-brained idea. I don't care about red heifers and patriarchs and locusts. A bunch of old bones in the sand. My homeland is in my hat. It's in my ex-wife's tote bag.
Life may be seen through many windows, none of them necessarily clear or opaque, less or more distorting than any of the others.