August 19, 2025 • 8 mins
In this engaging little Blue Book No. 39, renowned author Will Durant explores the life and teachings of Aristotle (384-322 B.C.E.), a brilliant Macedonian thinker who was once a student of Plato and later became the mentor of Alexander the Great. While Alexander set out to conquer the world, Aristotle returned to Athens to establish the Lyceum, where he made groundbreaking contributions to biology, logic, literary theory, ethics, and political science. Rejecting the abstract ideals of his teacher Plato, Aristotle focused on the natural world, famously studying the development of the chick embryo. He viewed the universe as a dynamic interplay of matter in motion, with God as its initial driving force. Contrary to the belief that social evils stem from private property, Aristotle argued they arise from the inherent flaws of human nature. He believed that while we find catharsis in tragic theater, real life necessitates a pursuit of balance, reason, dignity, and the golden mean in all aspects. (Pamela Nagami, M.D.)
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Section eight of the Story of Aristotle's Philosophy by Will Durant.
This librevox recording is in the public domain recording by
Pamela Andagami. Chapter eight Politics, Part one one, Communism and
conservatism to so aristocratic an ethic there naturally follows, or
(00:24):
was the sequence the other way a severely aristocratic political philosophy.
It was not to be expected that the tutor of
an emperor and the husband of a princess would have
any exaggerated attachment to the common people, or even to
the mercantile bourgeoisie. Our philosophy is where our treasure lies.
(00:46):
But further, Aristotle was honestly conservative because of the turmoil
and disaster that had come out of Athenian democracy. Like
a typical scholar, he longed for order, security, and this
he felt was no time for political Extravaganzas radicalism is
(01:07):
a luxury of stability, we may dare to change things
only when things lie steady under our hands. And in general,
says Aristotle, the habit of lightly changing the laws is
an evil. And when the advantage of change is small,
some defects, whether in the law or in the ruler,
(01:28):
had better be met. With philosophic toleration, the citizen will
gain less by the change than he will lose by
acquiring the habit of disobedience. The power of the law
to secure observance and therefore to maintain political stability, rests
very largely on custom, and to pass lightly from old
(01:51):
laws to new ones is a certain means of weakening
the inmost essence of all law. Whatever, let us not
disregard quard the experience of ages. Surely in the multitude
of years, these things, if they were good, would not
have remained unknown. These things, of course, means chiefly Plato's
(02:11):
communistic republic. Aristotle fights the realism of Plato about universals
and the idealism of Plato about government. He finds many
dark spots in the picture painted by the Master. He
does not relish the barrack like continuity of contact to
which Plato apparently condemned his guardian philosophers. Conservative though he is,
(02:36):
Aristotle values individual quality, privacy, and liberty above social efficiency
and power. He would not care to call every contemporary
brother or sister, nor every elder person father or mother.
If all are your brother's, none is, and how much
better it is to be the real cousin of somebody
(02:59):
than to be a s sun. After Plato's fashion, in
a state having women and children in common, love will
be watery. Of the two qualities which chiefly inspire regard
and affection, that a thing is your own, and that
it awakens real love in you, neither can exist in
(03:19):
such a state as Plato's. Perhaps there was in the
dim past the communistic society, when the family was the
only state, and pasturage or simple tillage the only form
of life. But in a more divided state of society,
where the division of labor into unequally important functions elicits
(03:39):
and enlarges the natural inequality of men, communism breaks down
because it provides no adequate incentive for the exertion of
superior abilities. The stimulus of gain is necessary to arduous work,
and the stimulus of ownership is necessary to proper industry,
husband and care. When everybody owns everything, nobody will take
(04:05):
care of anything. That which is common to the greatest
number has the least attention bestowed upon it. Every One
thinks chiefly of his own, hardly ever of the public interest,
and there is always a difficulty in living together or
having things in common, but especially in having common property.
(04:27):
The partnerships of fellow travelers, to say nothing of the
arduous communism of marriage, are an example to the point,
for they generally fall out by the way and quarrel
about any trifle that turns up. Men readily listen to
utopias and are easily induced to believe that in some
wonderful manner, everybody will become everybody's friend, especially when someone
(04:52):
is heard denouncing the evils now existing, which are said
to arise out of the possession of private property. These evils, however,
arise from quite another source, the wickedness of human nature.
Political science does not make men, but must take them
as they come from nature, and human nature the human
(05:16):
average is nearer to the beast than to the God.
The great majority of men are natural dunces and sluggards.
In any system, whatever these men will sink to the bottom,
and to help them with state subsidies is like pouring
water into a leaking cask. Such people must be ruled
in politics and directed in industry, with their consent if possible,
(05:40):
without it if necessary. From the hour of their birth,
some are marked out for subjection, and others for command.
For he who can foresee with his mind is by
nature intended to be lord and master, and he who
can work only with his body is by nature a slave.
This slave is to the master what the body is
(06:02):
to the mind. And as the body should be subject
to the mind, so it is better for all inferiors
that they should be under the rule of a master.
The slave is a tool with life in it. The
tool is a lifeless slave. And then our hard hearted philosopher,
with a glimmer of possibilities which the industrial revolution is
(06:24):
open to our hands, writes for a moment, with wistful hope.
If every instrument would accomplish its own work, obeying or
anticipating the will of others, if the shuttle would weave,
or the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to
guide them, then chief workmen would not need assistance, nor
(06:44):
masters slaves. This philosophy typifies the Greek disdain for manual labor.
Such work in Athens had not become so complicated as
it is today, when the intelligence demanded in many manual
trades is at times much greater than that required for
the operations of the lower middle class, and even a
(07:05):
college professor may look upon an automobile mechanic in certain
exigencies as of very god. Manual work was then merely manual,
and Aristotle looked upon it from the heights of philosophy
as belonging to men without minds, as only fit for slaves,
and fitting men only for slavery. Manual labor, he believes,
(07:28):
dulls and deteriorates the mind, and leaves neither time nor
energy for political intelligence. It seems to Aristotle a reasonable
corollary that only persons of some leisure should have a
voice in government. The best form of state will not
admit mechanics to citizenship. At Thebes, there was a law
(07:49):
that no man could hold office who had not retired
from business ten years before. Even merchants and financiers are
classed by Aristotle among slaves. Retail trade is unnatural and
a mode by which men gain from one another. The
most hated sort of such exchange is usury, which makes
(08:10):
a gain out of money itself and not from its
natural use. For money was intended to be an instrument
of exchange and as the mother of interest. This usury tokos,
which means the birth of money from money, is of
all modes of gain the most unnatural footnote. This view
(08:30):
influenced the medieval prohibition of interest and footnote money should
not breed. Hence, the discussion of the theory of finance
is not unworthy of philosophy, but to be engaged in
finance or in money making is unworthy of a free
man and of Section eight
Section eight of the Story of Aristotle's Philosophy by Will Durant.
This librevox recording is in the public domain recording by
Pamela Andagami. Chapter eight Politics, Part one one, Communism and
conservatism to so aristocratic an ethic there naturally follows, or
(00:24):
was the sequence the other way a severely aristocratic political philosophy.
It was not to be expected that the tutor of
an emperor and the husband of a princess would have
any exaggerated attachment to the common people, or even to
the mercantile bourgeoisie. Our philosophy is where our treasure lies.
(00:46):
But further, Aristotle was honestly conservative because of the turmoil
and disaster that had come out of Athenian democracy. Like
a typical scholar, he longed for order, security, and this
he felt was no time for political Extravaganzas radicalism is
(01:07):
a luxury of stability, we may dare to change things
only when things lie steady under our hands. And in general,
says Aristotle, the habit of lightly changing the laws is
an evil. And when the advantage of change is small,
some defects, whether in the law or in the ruler,
(01:28):
had better be met. With philosophic toleration, the citizen will
gain less by the change than he will lose by
acquiring the habit of disobedience. The power of the law
to secure observance and therefore to maintain political stability, rests
very largely on custom, and to pass lightly from old
(01:51):
laws to new ones is a certain means of weakening
the inmost essence of all law. Whatever, let us not
disregard quard the experience of ages. Surely in the multitude
of years, these things, if they were good, would not
have remained unknown. These things, of course, means chiefly Plato's
(02:11):
communistic republic. Aristotle fights the realism of Plato about universals
and the idealism of Plato about government. He finds many
dark spots in the picture painted by the Master. He
does not relish the barrack like continuity of contact to
which Plato apparently condemned his guardian philosophers. Conservative though he is,
(02:36):
Aristotle values individual quality, privacy, and liberty above social efficiency
and power. He would not care to call every contemporary
brother or sister, nor every elder person father or mother.
If all are your brother's, none is, and how much
better it is to be the real cousin of somebody
(02:59):
than to be a s sun. After Plato's fashion, in
a state having women and children in common, love will
be watery. Of the two qualities which chiefly inspire regard
and affection, that a thing is your own, and that
it awakens real love in you, neither can exist in
(03:19):
such a state as Plato's. Perhaps there was in the
dim past the communistic society, when the family was the
only state, and pasturage or simple tillage the only form
of life. But in a more divided state of society,
where the division of labor into unequally important functions elicits
(03:39):
and enlarges the natural inequality of men, communism breaks down
because it provides no adequate incentive for the exertion of
superior abilities. The stimulus of gain is necessary to arduous work,
and the stimulus of ownership is necessary to proper industry,
husband and care. When everybody owns everything, nobody will take
(04:05):
care of anything. That which is common to the greatest
number has the least attention bestowed upon it. Every One
thinks chiefly of his own, hardly ever of the public interest,
and there is always a difficulty in living together or
having things in common, but especially in having common property.
(04:27):
The partnerships of fellow travelers, to say nothing of the
arduous communism of marriage, are an example to the point,
for they generally fall out by the way and quarrel
about any trifle that turns up. Men readily listen to
utopias and are easily induced to believe that in some
wonderful manner, everybody will become everybody's friend, especially when someone
(04:52):
is heard denouncing the evils now existing, which are said
to arise out of the possession of private property. These evils, however,
arise from quite another source, the wickedness of human nature.
Political science does not make men, but must take them
as they come from nature, and human nature the human
(05:16):
average is nearer to the beast than to the God.
The great majority of men are natural dunces and sluggards.
In any system, whatever these men will sink to the bottom,
and to help them with state subsidies is like pouring
water into a leaking cask. Such people must be ruled
in politics and directed in industry, with their consent if possible,
(05:40):
without it if necessary. From the hour of their birth,
some are marked out for subjection, and others for command.
For he who can foresee with his mind is by
nature intended to be lord and master, and he who
can work only with his body is by nature a slave.
This slave is to the master what the body is
(06:02):
to the mind. And as the body should be subject
to the mind, so it is better for all inferiors
that they should be under the rule of a master.
The slave is a tool with life in it. The
tool is a lifeless slave. And then our hard hearted philosopher,
with a glimmer of possibilities which the industrial revolution is
(06:24):
open to our hands, writes for a moment, with wistful hope.
If every instrument would accomplish its own work, obeying or
anticipating the will of others, if the shuttle would weave,
or the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to
guide them, then chief workmen would not need assistance, nor
(06:44):
masters slaves. This philosophy typifies the Greek disdain for manual labor.
Such work in Athens had not become so complicated as
it is today, when the intelligence demanded in many manual
trades is at times much greater than that required for
the operations of the lower middle class, and even a
(07:05):
college professor may look upon an automobile mechanic in certain
exigencies as of very god. Manual work was then merely manual,
and Aristotle looked upon it from the heights of philosophy
as belonging to men without minds, as only fit for slaves,
and fitting men only for slavery. Manual labor, he believes,
(07:28):
dulls and deteriorates the mind, and leaves neither time nor
energy for political intelligence. It seems to Aristotle a reasonable
corollary that only persons of some leisure should have a
voice in government. The best form of state will not
admit mechanics to citizenship. At Thebes, there was a law
(07:49):
that no man could hold office who had not retired
from business ten years before. Even merchants and financiers are
classed by Aristotle among slaves. Retail trade is unnatural and
a mode by which men gain from one another. The
most hated sort of such exchange is usury, which makes
(08:10):
a gain out of money itself and not from its
natural use. For money was intended to be an instrument
of exchange and as the mother of interest. This usury tokos,
which means the birth of money from money, is of
all modes of gain the most unnatural footnote. This view
(08:30):
influenced the medieval prohibition of interest and footnote money should
not breed. Hence, the discussion of the theory of finance
is not unworthy of philosophy, but to be engaged in
finance or in money making is unworthy of a free
man and of Section eight
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