The Nicomachean Ethics — trans. F. H. Peters (1881)
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The translator’s English as printed (F. H. Peters). The original-language text is not held; names are romanised as the translator printed them.
* i.e. our nature as moral agents, as compounds of reason am desire.
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7, 8-8, 3] CONCLUSION. 341
And indeed this part would even seem to constitute our true self, since it is the sovereign and the better part. / It woidd be strange, then, if a man were to prefer the life of something else to the life of his true self.
Again, we may apply here what we said above — for eveiy being that is best and pleasantest which is naturally proper to it. Since, then, it is the reason that in the truest sense is the man, the life that consists in the exercise of the reason is the best and pleasantest for man — and therefore the happiest
/^. The life that consists in the exercise of the o/thepraeother kind of virtue is happy in a secondary sense ; luippinet* in for the manifestations of moral virtue are emphati- tfnte, and of
. the relation callv human fnot di\dnel. Justice, I mean, and leticeen oe
L -■ . . . tiro. PtoScoiirai:e, and the other moral virtues are displayed in peruy, ko»
<? ' i J far needed.
our relations towards one another by the observance, in every ease, of what is due in contracts and services, and all sorts of outward acts, as well as in om* inward feelings. And all these seem to be emphatically human affairs.
Again, moral virtue seems, in some points, to be actually a result of physical constitution, and in many points to be closely connected with the passions.
Again, prudence is inseparably joined to moral virtue, and moral virtue to prudence, since the moral yirtues determine the principles of prudence,* while prudence determines what is right in morals.
But the moral virtues, being bound up with thep. 342 passions, must belong to our compound nature ; and the virtues of the compound nature are emphatically human. Therefore the life which manifests them, and the happiness which consists in this, must be emphatically human.
* i.e. the principles of morals cannot be proved, bnt are accepted without proof by the man whose desires are properly trained. Cf. tupra, I. 4, 6.
But the happiness which consists in the exercise of the reason is separate from the lower nature. (So much we may be allowed to assert about it : a detailed discussion is beyond our present purpose.) 'Z^ Further, this happiness would seem to need but a small supply of external goods, certainly less than the moral life needs. Both need the necessaries of life to the same extent, let us say ; for though, in fact, the politician takes more care of his person than the philosopher, yet the difference will be quite inconsiderable. But in what they need for their activities there will be a great difference. Wealth will be needed by the liberal man, that he may act liberally ; by the just man, that he may discharge his obligations (for a mere wish cannot be tested, — even unjust people pretend a wish to act justly) ; the courasfeous man will need strength if he is to execute any deed of courage ; and the temperate man liberty of indulgence, — for how else can he, or the possessor of any other virtue, show what he is ?
Again, people dispute whether the purpose or the action be more essential to virtue, virtue being understood to imply both. It is plain, then, that both are necessary to completeness. But many things are needed for action, and the greater and nobler the action, the more is needed.
On the other hand, he who is engaged in specula-
p. 343