"If then the mind is something divine in comparison with man, so is the life of the mind divine in comparison with human life. Nor ought we to obey those who enjoin that a man should have a man’s thoughts and a mortal the thoughts of mortality, but we ought so far as possible to achieve immortality, and do all that a man may to live in accordance with the highest thing in him; for though this be small in bulk, in power and value it surpasses all the rest."
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, X. 8.