Aristotle Quotes

Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties: 1. Those who fear and distrust the people and wish to draw all powers from them into the hands of the higher classes. 2. Those who identify themselves with the people, have confidence in them.... In every country these two parties exist.... Call them, therefore, liberals and serviles, Jacobins and Ultras, Whigs and Tories, republicans and federalists, aristocrats and democrats, or by whatever name you please, they are the same party still and pursue the same object.

The democrat is a young conservative; the conservative is an old democrat. The aristocrat is the democrat ripe and gone to seed.

By birth Mr. Roosevelt is an aristocrat. An unfeigned interest in the lives of his fellow millions has made a democrat of him, and through both channels he draws that social understanding …. But partly from the consciousness of a lack of sympathy for his "class," and partly from the inevitable sense that his lot is cast with the multitude, it is the democrat in him which has gained the permanent ascendency.

Aristocrats need not be rich, but they must be free, and in the modern world freedom grows rarer the more we prate about it.

The rich and the well-born, according to the Federalist Papers, was greatly feared by the founders.

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic.

Aristocracy is naturally abhorrent to me, and adored equality is my idol.

My friends Sir Roger de Coverly and Sir Andrew Freeport are of different principles, the first of them inclined to the landed and the other to the moneyed interest.

There is no distinction of persons among them, and deference is shown to merit rather than to noble blood.

There is no society, however free and democratic, where wealth will not create an aristocracy.

What is Aristocracy? A corporation of the best, the bravest.

Our nation has in 300 years grown apart from even the democratic ideals of other peoples. In some of them class government still lingers; in others, democracy is little better than oligarchy.

The appellation of Aristocrats and Democrats is the true one expressing the essence of all [political] parties.

Chile is still at the whim of powerful, traditional elites who sit as a higher societal authority than the elected government.

The surface of American society is covered with a layer of democratic paint, but from time to time one can see the old aristocratic colors breaking through.

The art of government is the organization of idolatry. The bureaucracy consists of functionaries; the aristocracy, of idols; the democracy, of idolaters. The populace cannot understand the bureaucracy: it can only worship the national idols.

The landed men are the true owners of our political vessel, the moneyed men are no more than passengers in it.

Because the rich are generally few in number, while the poor are many, they appear to be antagonistic, and as the one or the other prevails they form the government. Hence arises the common opinion that there are two kinds of government - democracy and oligarchy.

Harold Wilson is a petty bourgeois and will remain so in spirit even if they make him a Viscount.

Aristocracy's only an admission that certain traits which we call fine - courage and honor and beauty and all that sort of thing - can best be developed in a favorable environment, where you don't have the warpings of ignorance and necessity.

We pretend to be a middle class, democratic nation, but in reality we love our blue bloods. ... We love the prep school manners, the aristocratic calm, the Skull and Bones mystery, the dappled lawns stretching before New England summer homes. How else can be explained the Bush vs. Kerry match-up that confronts us this year?

The aristocrat is the democrat ripe, and gone to seed.

Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties: 1. Those who fear and distrust the people, and wish to draw all powers from them into the hands of the higher classes. 2. Those who identify themselves with the people, have confidence in them, cherish and consider them as the most honest and safe, although not the most wise depositary of the public interests. In every country these two parties exist, and in every one where they are free to think, speak, and write, they will declare themselves.

Perhaps propriety is as near a word as any to denote the manners of the gentleman; elegance is necessary to the fine gentleman; dignity is proper to noblemen; and majesty to kings.

To make Democracy work, you need an aristocratic democracy. To make Aristocracy work, you need a democratic aristocracy.