In Book IX of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle explores a question that remains psychologically urgent today: Can a person be a friend to themselves? He treats this as a foundation for ethics and community. For Aristotle, friendship is built on shared values, reciprocal goodwill, and the capacity to rejoice or grieve together. These qualities must be present not only between individuals, but within a single soul. A person at war with themselves cannot give stability to others. Self-fragmentatio

Aristotle regarded friendship as a central element of human existence and a necessary part of a virtuous life. In the Nicomachean Ethics, he described friendship as a moral bond that reveals the nature of the soul. He identified three kinds of friendship: those based on usefulness, those grounded in pleasure, and those formed through virtue. The highest kind arises when two people recognize goodness in one another and nurture it through shared living. Such friendship is guided by integrity, pati