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.
affairs, and with matters that admit of deliberation : for the prudent man's special function, as we conceive it, is to deliberate well ; but no one deliberates about what is invariable, or about matters in which there is not some end, in the sense of some realizable good. But a man is said to deliberate well (without any qualifying epithet) when he is able, by a process of reasoning or calculation, to arrive at what is best for man in matters of practice.
Prudence, moreover, does not deal in general propositions only, but implies knowledge of particular facts also ; for it issues in action, and the field of action is the field of particulars.
This is the reason why some men that lack [scientific] knowledge are more efficient in practice than others that have it, especially men of wide experience ; for if you know that light meat is digestible and wholesome, but do not know what meats are light, you will not be able to cure people so well as a man who only knows that chicken is light and wholesome.
But prudence is concerned with practice ; so that it needs knowledge both of general truths and of particular facts, but more especially the latter.
But here also (in the domain of practice) there must be a supreme form of the faculty [which we will now proceed to consider].
Prudence 8. And in fact statesmanship and prudence are the
^^rsTates- same faculty, though they are differently manifested.
ZerfoZf Of this faculty in its application to the state the of knowledge, g^jpygme form is the legislative faculty, but the special form which deals with particular cases is called by7, 7-8, 4.] THE INTELLECTUAL VIRTUES. 193 the generic name statesmanship. The field of the latter is action and deliberation ; for a decree directly concerns action, as the last link in the chain.* And on this account those engaged in this field are alone said to be statesmen, for they alone act like handicraftsmen.
But it is when applied to the individual and to one's own affairs that this faculty is especially regarded as prudence, and this is the form which receives the generic name " prudence " or " practical wisdom" (the other forms being (1) the faculty of managing a household, (2) the legislative faculty, (3) statesmanship [in the narrower sense], which is subdivided into (a) the deliberative, (6) the judicial faculty).
Knowing one's own good, then, would seem to be a kind of knowledge (though it admits of great variety),! and, according to the general opinion, he who knows and attends to his own afi'airs is prudent, while statesmen are busybodies, as Euripides says —
"What ? was I wise, who might without a care
Have lived a unit in the multitude
Like any other unit .-'...
For those who would excel and do great things "
For men generally seek their own good, and fancy that is what they should do ; and from this opinion comes the notion that these men are prudent.
And yet, perhaps, it is not possible for a man to manage his own affairs well without managing a t Varying as the good varies ; cf. supra, 7, 4, and I. 3, 2.
* vpaKrhv us rh effxa^ov, i.e. as the last link in the chain of causes leading to the proposed end — last in the order of deliberation, but first in the order of events : cf. III. 3, 12.
O
194 NICOMACHEAN ETHICS OF AEISTOTLE. [Bk. VI.
household and taking part in the management of a state.
Moreover, how a man is to manage his own affairs is not plain and requires consideration. And this is t attested by the fact that a young man may become proficient in geometry or mathematics and " wise " * in these matters, but cannot possibly, it is thought, become prudent. The reason of this is that prudence deals with particular facts, with which experience alone can familiarize us ; but a young man must be inexperienced, for experience is the fruit of years.
Why again, we may ask, can a lad be a mathema- i tician but not " wise," nor proficient in the knowledge of nature ? And the answer surely is that mathematics is an abstract science, while the principles of "wisdom" and of natural science are only to be derived from a large experience ; f and that thus, though a young man may repeat propositions of the latter kind, he does not really believe them, while he can easily apprehend the meaning of mathematical terms.