“... The powerful emotion of maternal love (in particular) comes from deep within the person of a mother, involving her entire body in their agonies (15:15). The Greek ethical tradition identified a number of factors involved in this attachment. Aristotle treats parental love as a kind of friendship, finding that “parents love their children as themselves (one’s offspring being as it were another self—other because separate)” (Eth. nic. 8.12.3). Aristotle’s definition of a friend as “another self” is well-known, as is his identification of “likeness” as the basis for friendly feelings (Eth. nic. 8.8.5). Aristotle understands the affection of parents to exceed that of their children because of the longer period of time in which parents “love” the child: “parents love their children as soon as they are born, children their parents only when time has elapsed and they have acquired understanding, or at least perception” (Eth. nic. 8.12.3). Plutarch shares the conviction that parental love begins at the earliest moment of the child’s life (Am. prol. 3 [Mor. 496C]). But this factor also explains for Aristotle why mothers experience love for offspring more deeply than fathers, for mothers have nine additional months during which to nurture the feeling of emotional connection with the life growing within them (Eth. nic. 8.12.3) ...”