When Plato died in 347, control of the Academy passed to his nephew Speusippus. The Roman philosopher Cicero said that "If Plato's prose was silver, Aristotle's was a flowing river of gold." Plato’s own later writings, in which he softened some earlier positions, likely bear the mark of repeated discussions with his most gifted student.ĭid you know? Aristotle's surviving works were likely meant as lecture notes rather than literature, and his now-lost writings were apparently of much better quality. He spent 20 years as a student and teacher at the school, emerging with both a great respect and a good deal of criticism for his teacher’s theories. At age 17 he was sent to Athens to enroll in Plato's Academy. His parents died while he was young, and he was likely raised at his family’s home in Stagira. Both of his parents were members of traditional medical families, and his father, Nicomachus, served as court physician to King Amyntus III of Macedonia.
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