Aristotle's testimony about Socrates:
These are almost all the passages in Aristotle which mention Socrates
by name. A few have been left out because they seem to say nothing of
interest about Socrates, but rather either simply use him as an example
for an argument or talk of details about his life (there are a couple
fragments which discuss who were his wives, etc.)
Why should we take Aristotle seriously about Socrates? For one thing,
he is close enough in time to Socrates to have talked to people who
knew Socrates. He lived from 384BCE to 322 BCE, whereas Socrates lived
from 469BCE to 399BCE. So Socrates was dead before Aristotle was born,
but he was only 15 years dead.
On the other hand, Aristotle is also Plato's pupil, and Plato's
dialogues are clearly a major source of his information, which makes it
possible that he is merely reporting what Plato said about Socrates.
Read them with an eye toward what we think we know about Socrates from
Plato, Xenophon, or others.
- Sophistical Refutations:
183b7
- ... for this was why Socrates
used to ask questions and did not
answer them--for he used to confess that he did not know.
- Problems: 953a10ff
- Why is it that all those who have become eminent in philosophy
or politics or poetry or the arts are clearly of an atrabilious
temperament, and some of them to such an extent as to be affected by
diseases caused by black bile...? ... among men of recent times
Empedocles, Plato, and Socrates ....
- Metaphysics I: 987b1
- Socrates, however, was busying
himself about ethical
matters and neglecting the world of nature as a whole but seeking the
universal in these ethical matters, and fixed thought for the first
time on definitions; Plato accepted his teaching, but held that
the
problem applied not to any sensible thing but to entities of another
kind--for this reason, that the common definition could not be a
definition of any sensible thing, as they were always changing. Things
of this other sort, then, he called Ideas....
- Metaphysics XIII:
1078b17
- Socrates occupied himself with
the excellences of character,
and in connection with them became the first to raise the problem of
universal definitions--for of the natural scientists, only
Democritus
touched on the matter and defined, after a fashion, the hot and the
cold; while the Pythagoreans had before this treated of a few things,
whose formulae they connected with numbers--e.g. opportunity, justice,
or marriage. But it was natural that Socrates should seek the essence.
For he was seeking to deduce, and the essence is the starting
point of deductions. For there was as yet none of the dialectical
power which enables people even without knowledge of the essence to
speculate about contraries and inquire whether the same science deals
with contraries. For two things may be fairly ascribed to
Socrates--inductive arguments and universal definition, both of which
are concerned with the starting point of science. But Socrates did not
make the universals or the definitions exist apart; his successors,
however, gave them separate existence and this was the kind of thing
they called Ideas.
- Metaphysics XIII:
1086a38ff
- They thought that the sensible particulars were in a state of
flux and none of them remained, but that the universal was apart from
these and different. And Socrates gave the impulse to this theory, as
we said before, by means of his definitions, but he did not separate
them from the particulars; and in this he thought rightly, in not
separating them. This is plain from ....
- Nicomachean Ethics III:
1116b4
- Experience with regard to particular facts is also thought to
be courage. This is indeed the reason why Socrates thought courage was
knowledge. (Aristotle is saying that professional soldiers who
remain
to fight if they think they are superior and can win but flee if they
think they are inferior and cannot win are not courageous: rather they
simply have accurate knowledge via their experience in battles, etc.
which allows them to calculate whether they are likely to win, and if
they think they are likely to win, they stand their ground and fight:
for real courage, your reason for standing and fighting has to be
because it is noble, the right thing to do).
- Nicomachean Ethics IV:
1127b23
- Mock-modest people, who understate things, seem more attractive
in character; for they are thought to speak not for gain but to avoid
parade; and here too it is qualities which bring reputation that they
disclaim, as Socrates used to do.
- Nicomachean Ethics VII:
1144b14
- Therefore, as in the part of us which forms opinions there are
two types, cleverness and practical wisdom, so too in the moral part
there are two types, natural excellence and excellence in the strict
sense, and of these the latter involves practical wisdom. This is why
some say that all the excellences are forms of practical wisdom, and
why Socrates in one respect was on
the right track while in another he
went astray; in thinking that all the excellences were forms of
practical wisdom he was wrong, but in saying they implied practical
wisdom he was right. This is confirmed by the fact that even now
all
men, when they define excellence, after naming the state and its
objects add 'that (state) which is in accordance with the right
reason'; now the right reason is that which is in accordance with
practical wisdom. All men, then, seem somehow to divine that this kind
of state is excellence, viz. that which is in accordance with practical
wisdom. But we must go a little further. For it is not merely the state
in accordance with right reason, but the state that implies the
presence of right reason, that is excellence; and practical wisdom is
right reason about such matters. Socrates, then, thought the
excellences were forms of reason (for he thought they were, all of
them, forms of knowledge), while we think they involve reason.
- Nicomachean Ethics VII:
1145b22
- Now we may ask what kind of right belief is possessed by the
man who behaves incontinently. That he should behave so when he has
knowledge, some say is impossible; for it
would be strange --so
Socrates thought--if when knowledge was in a man something else could
master it and drag it about like a slave. For Socrates was
entirely
opposed to the view in question, holding that there is no such thing
as incontinence; no one, he said, acts against what he believes is
best--people act so only by reason of ignorance. Now this view
contradicts the plain phenomena, and we must inquire about what happens
to such a man; if he acts by reason of ignorance, what is the manner of
his ignorance? For that a man who behaves incontinently does not,
before he gets into this state, think he ought to act so, is evident.
But there are some who concede certain of Socrates' contentions but not
others; that nothing is stronger than knowledge they admit, but not
that no one acts contrary to what has seemed to him the better course,
and therefore they say that the incontinent man has not knowledge when
he is mastered by his pleasures, but opinion...
- Nicomachean Ethics
1147b6ff
- The Explanation of how the ignorance is dissolved and the
incontinent man regains his knowledge is the same as in the case of the
man drunk or asleep and is not peculiar to this condition; we must go
to the students of natural science for it. Now, the last proposition
both being an opinion about a perceptible object and being what
determines our actions, this a man either has not when he is in the
state of passion, or has it in the sense in which having knowledge did
not mean knowing but only talking, as a drunken man may utter the
verses of Empedocles. And because the last term is not universal nor
equally an object of knowledge with the universal term, the position
that Socrates sought to establish actually seems to result; for it is
not what is thought to be knowledge proper that the passion overcomes
(nor is it this that is dragged about as a result of the passion), but
perceptual knowledge.
- Magna Moralia 1182a15
- After him (Pythagoras) came Socrates, who spoke better and
further about this subject, but even he was not successful. For he used
to make the excellences sciences, and this is impossible. For
the
sciences all involve reason, and reason is to be found in the
intellectual part of the soul. So that all the excellences, according
to him, are to be found in the rational part of the soul. The result is
that in making the excellences sciences he is doing away with the
irrational part of the soul, and is thereby doing away also both with
passion and character; so that he has not been successful in this
respect in his treatment of the excellences.
- Magna Moralia 1183b9
- And Socrates was not right in
making the excellences sciences.
For he used to think that nothing ought to be in vain, but from the
excellences being sciences he met with the result that the excellences
were in vain. How so? Because in the case of the sciences, as soon as
one knows what the science is, it results that one is scientific (for
any one who knows what medicine is is forthwith a physician, and so
with the other sciences. But this result does not follow in the case of
the excellences. For any one who knows what justice is is not forthwith
just, and similarly in the case of the rest. It follows then that the
excellences are actually in vain and that they are not sciences.
- Magna Moralia 1187a5
- Since, then, excellence has been spoken of ... we must next
inquire whether it is possible of attainment or is not, but, as
Socrates said, to be good or bad does not rest with us to come about.
For
if, he says, one were to ask any one whatever whether he would wish
to be just or unjust, no one would choose injustice. Similarly in the
case of courage and cowardice, and so on always with the rest of the
excellences. And it is evident that any who are bad will not be bad
voluntarily; so that it is evident that neither will they be
voluntarily good.
- Magna Moralia 1190b21
- These points having been settled, we must inquire, since there
are many ways in which men are brave, which is the brave man. For you
may have a man who is brave from experience, like soldiers. For they
know, owing to experience, that in such a place or time or condition is
it impossible to suffer any damage. But the man who knows these things
and for this reason stands his ground against the enemy is not
brave; for if none of these things is the case, he does not stand
his ground. Hence one ought not to call those brave whose courage is
due to experience. Nor indeed was
Socrates right in asserting that
courage was knowledge. For knowledge becomes knowledge by
getting
experience from custom. But of those whose endurance is due to
experience, we do not say, nor would men in general say, that they are
brave. Courage, therefore, will not consist in knowledge.
- Magna Moralia 1198a10
- Hence Socrates was not
speaking correctly when he said that
excellence was reason thinking that it was no use doing brave
and just
acts, unless one did them from knowledge and rational choice. This was
why he said that excellence was reason. Herein he was not right, but
the men of the present day say better; for they say that excellence is
doing what is good in accordance with right reason.
- Magna Moralia 1200b25
- Now Socrates the elder used
to reject and deny incontinence
altogether, saying that no one would choose evil who knew it to be
such. But the incontinent seems, while knowing things to be bad,
to
choose them all the same, letting himself be led by passion. Owing to
such considerations, he did not think that there was incontinence. But
there he was wrong. For it is absurd that conviction of the truth of
this argument should lead to the rejection of what credibly occurs. For
men do display incontinence, and do things which they themselves know
to be bad.
- Eudemian Ethics 1216b3
- Socrates, then, the elder,
thought the knowledge of excellence
to be the end, and used to inquire what is justice, what bravery and
each of the parts of virtue; and his conduct was reasonable, for he
thought all the excellences to be kinds of knowledge, so that to know
justice and to be just came simultaneously; for the moment that
we have
learned geometry or building we are builders and geometers. Therefore
he inquired what excellence is, not how or from what it arises. This is
correct with regard to theoretical knowledge, for there is no other
part of astronomy or physics or geometry exept knowing and
contemplating the nature of the things which are the sujects of those
sciences; though nothing prevents them from being in an incidental way
useful to us for much that we cannot do without. But the end of
the productive sciences is different from science and knowledge, e.g.
health from medical science, law and order (or something of the sort)
from political science. Now to know anything that is noble is itself
noble; but regarding excellence, at least, not to know what it is, but
to know out of what it arises is most precious. For we do not wish to
know what bravery is but to be brave, nor what justice is but to be
just, just as we wish to be in health rather than to know what being in
health is, and to have our body in good condition rather than to know
what good condition is.
- Eudemian Ethics 12229a12
- There are five kinds of courage,
so named for a certain analogy
between them; for they all endure the same things but not for the same
reasons. One is a civic courage, due to the sense of shame; another is
military, due to experience, and knowledge, not (as Socrates said) of
what is fearful, but of the resources they have to meet what is
fearful. The third kind is due to inexperience and ignorance; it
is
that which makes children and madmen face objects moving toward them
and take hold of snakes. Another kind is due to hope, which makes those
who have often been fortunate, or those who are drunk, face dangers,
for wine makes them sanguine. Another kind is due to irrational
feeling, e.g. love or anger; for a man in love is rather foolhardy than
timid, and faces many dangers, like him who slew the tyrant of
Metapontum or the man of whom stories are told in Crete. ...
- Eudemian Ethics 1230a4
- Similarly, all who face dangers owing to experience are not
really brave; this is what, perhaps, most soldiers do. For the truth is
the exact opposite of what Socrates thought; he held that bravery was
knowledge. But those who know how to ascend masts are confident
not
because they know what is frightening but because they know how to help
themselves in dangers. Nor is all that makes men fight more boldly
courage; for then, as Theognis puts it, strength and wealth would be
bravery--'every man' (he says) ' is daunted by poverty.'
- Eudemian Ethics 1235a35
- Some, again, think that we only regard the useful as a friend,
their proof being that all pursue the
useful, but the useless, even in
themselves, they throw away (as
old Socrates said, citing the case of
our spittle, hairs, and nails), and that we cast off useless parts, and
in the end at death our very body, the corpse being useless; but those
who have a use for it keep it, as in Egypt.
- Politics 1260a19
- Clearly, then, excellence of character belongs to all of them;
but the temperance of a man and of a
woman, or the courage and justice
of a man and of a woman, are not, as Socrates maintained, the same;
the
courage of a man is shown in commanding, of a woman in obeying.
- Politics 1261a1
- But should a well-ordered state have all things, as far as may
be, in common, or some only and not others? For the citizens might
conceivably have wives and children and property in common, as Socrates
proposes in the Republic of
Plato. Which is better, our present condition, or one conforming
to the
law laid down in the Republic?
- Politics 1261b17
- But, even supposing that it were best for the commnity to have
the greatest degree of unity, this unity is by no means proved to
follow from the fact of all men
saying 'mine' and 'not mine' at the
same instant of time, which according to Socrates, is the sign of
perfect unity in a state. For the word 'all' is ambiguous. If
the
meaning be that every individual says 'mine' and 'not mine' at the same
time, then perhaps the result at which Socrates aims may be in some
degree accomplished; each man will call the same person his own son and
the same person his own wife, and so of his property and of all that
falls to his lot. This, however, is not the way in which people woud
speak who had their wives and children in common; they would say
'all' but not 'each'. In like manner their property would be described
as belonging to them, not severally but collectively. ... That all
persons call the same thing mine in the sense in which each does so may
be a fine thing, but it is impracticable; or if the words are taken in
the other sense, such a unity in no way conduces to harmony. ...
- Politics 1262b5
- For friendship we believe to be the greatest good of states and
what best preserves them against revolutions; and Socrates particularly
praises the unity of the state which seems and is said by him to be
created by friendship. But the unity which he commends would be
like
that of the lovers in the Syposium,
who,
as
Aristophanes says, desire to grow together in the excess of
their affection, and from being two to becomme one, in which case one
or both would certainly perish. Whereas in a state having women and
children common, love will be diluted.
- Politics 1263b30
- The error of Socrates must be
attributed ot the false
supposition from which he starts. Unity there should be, both of the
family and of the state, but in some respects only. For there is
a
point at which a state may attain such a degree of unity as to be no
longer a state, or at which, without actually ceasing to exist, it will
become an inferior state, like harmony passing into unison, or rhythm
which has been reduced to a single foot. The state, as I was saying, is
a plurality...
- Politics 1264a12
- But, indeed, Socrates has not
said, nor is it easy to decide,
what in such a community will be the general form of the state.
The
citizens who are not guardians are the majority, and about them nothing
has been determined; are the husbandmen, too, to have their property in
common? Or is each individual to have his own? And are their wives and
children to be individual or common?...
- Politics 1265a12
- The discourses of Socrates are never commonplace; they always
exhibit grace and originality and thought; but perfection in everything
can hardly be expected.
- Politics 1291a10
- Hence we see that this subject, though ingeniously, has not
been satisfactorily treated in the Republic.
Socrates
says that a state is made up of four sorts of people who are
absolutely necessary; these are a weaver, a farmer, a shoemaker, and a
builder; afterwards, finding that they are not enough, he adds a smith,
and again a herdsman, to look after the necessary animals; then a
merchant, and then a retail trader. All these together form the
complement of the first state, as if
a state were established merely to
supply the necessaries of life, rather than for the sake of the good,
or
stood equally in need of shoemakers and of farmers. But he does not
admit into the state a military class until the country has increased
in size, and is beginning to encroach on its neighbour's land,
whereupon they go to war. Yet even amongst his his four original
citizens, or whatever be the number of those whom he associates in the
state, there must be some one who will dispense justice and determine
what is just. And as the soul may be said to be more truly part of an
animal than the body, so the higher parts of states, that is to say,
the warrior class, the class engaged in the administration of justice,
and that engaged in deliberation, which is the special business of
political understanding--these are more essentioal to the state than
the parts which minister to the necessaries of life...
- Politics 1316a1
- In the Republic, of
Plato, Socrates treats of revolutions, but not well, for he mentions no
cause of change which peculiarly affects the first or perfect state. He
only says that the cause is that nothing is abiding, but all
things
change in a certain cycle; and that the origin of the change consists
in those numers 'of which 4 and 3, married with 5, furnish two
harmonies' (he means when the number of this figure becomes solid); he
conceives that nature at certain times produces bad men who will not
submit to education; in which latter particular he may very likely be
not far wrong, for there may well be some men who cannot beducated and
made virtuous. But why is such a cause of change peculiar to his ideal
state, and not rather common to all states, or indeed, to everything
which comes into being at all? And is it by the agency of time, which,
as he declares, makes all things change, that things which did not
begin together, change together?...
- Politics 1316b25
- Finally, although there are many forms of oligarchies and
democracies, Socrates speaks
of their revolutions as though there were
only one form of either of them.
- Politics 1342a33
- The Socrates of the Republic
is wong in retaining the Phrygian mode along with the Dorian,
and the
more so because he rejects the flute; for the Phrygian is to the modes
what the flute is to musical insturmens--both of them are exciting and
emotional.
- Politics 1342b23
- That is why the musicians too
blame Socrates, and with justice,
for rejecting the relaxed modes in education under the idea that they
are intoxicating, not in the ordinary sense of intoxication (for
wine
too rather tends to excite men), but because they have no strength in
them.
- Rhetoric 1367b8
- We must also take into account the nature of our particular
audience when making a speech of praise; for, as Socrates used to say,
it is not difficult to praise the Athenians to an Athenian audience.
- Rhetoric 1390b23
- Being well-born, which means coming of a fine stock, must be
distinguished from nobility, which means being true to the family
nature--a quality not usually found in the well-born, most of whom are
poor creatures. In the generations of men as in the fruits of the
earth, there is a varying yield; now and then, where the stock is good,
exceptional men are produced for a while, and then decadence sets in. A
clever stock will degenerate towards the insane type of character, like
the descendants of Alcibiades or of the elder Dionysius; a steady stock
towards the fatuous and torpid tyoe, like the descendants of Cimon,
Pericles, and Socrates.
- Rhetoric 1393b4
- The illustrative parallel is
the sort of argument Socrates
used: e.g. 'Public officials ought not to be selected by lot.
That is
like using the lot to select athletes, instead of choosing those who
are fit for the contest; or using the lot to select a steersman from
among a ship's crew, as if we ought to take the man on whom the lot
falls, and not the man who knows most about it.'
- Rhetoric 1398a24
- (illustrating a way of arguing that is fallacious) A further
example is to be found in the reason given by Socrates for not going to
the court of Archelaus. He said that 'one is insulted by being unable
to requite benefits, as well as by being unable to requite injuries.'
All the persons mentioned define their term and get at its essential
meaning, and then use the result when reasoning on the point at issue.
- Rhetoric 1415b31
- For it is true, as Socrates
says in the Funeral Speech,
that 'the
difficulty is not to praise the Athenians at Athens but at Sparta.'