CHAPTER I
ARISTOTLE—LIFE AND WORKS
Aristotle, in my opinion, stands almost alone in philosophy.—Cicero.
Aristotle, Nature's private secretary, dipping his pen in intellect.—Eusebius.
Wherever the divine wisdom of Aristotle has opened its mouth, the wisdom of others, it seems to me, is to be disregarded.—Dante.
I could soon get over Aristotle's prestige, if I could only get over his reasons.—Lessing.
If, now in my quiet days, I had youthful faculties at my command, I should devote myself to Greek, in spite of all the difficulties I know. Nature and Aristotle should be my sole study. It is beyond all conception what that man espied, saw, beheld, remarked, observed. To be sure he was sometimes hasty in his explanations; but are we not so, even to the present day?—Goethe (at 78).
If the proper earnestness prevailed in philosophy, nothing would be more worthy of establishing than a foundation for a special lectureship on Aristotle; for he is, of all the ancients, the most worthy of study.—Hegel.