In "A Guide to the Perplexed" Schumacher quotes Aquinas: "The slenderest knowledge that may be obtained of the highest things is mire desirable than the most certain knowledge obtained of lesser things" and then says that this is more or less paraphrasing Aristotle. I would reckon it's somewhere in the Metaphysics, but can anyone who knows the text better than me tell me exactly where it's from?
There may be something similar in Metaphysics, but I don't recall that text as well.
"But we must not follow those who advise us, being men, to think of human things, and, being mortal, of mortal things, but must, so far as we can, make ourselves immortal, and strain every nerve to live in accordance with the best thing in us; for even if it be small in bulk, much more does it in power and worth surpass everything."
Dear Karl, Thanks for the quotation, which I will follow up in context later. I hadn't thought of the ethical dimension in my inquiry - my focus was more on epistemology. I've tended to keep clear of ethics, in the course of a long career!
So if you, or anyone reading this can help me further with this inquiry, I'd be most grateful - David