The Nicomachean Ethics — trans. F. H. Peters (1881)

* This section (§ 2) seems to me not an alternative to § 1 ; but a correction of it, or rather a remark to the effect that the whole passage (both § 1 and the discussion introduced by it) ought to be rewritten, and an indication of the way in which this should be done. Of considerable portions of the Nicomachean Ethics we may safely say that the author could not have regarded them as finished in the form in which we have them. I believe that the author made a rough draft of the whole work, or of the several parts of it, which he kept by him and worked upon, — working some parts up to completion; sometimes rewriting a passage without striking out the original version, or even indicating which was to be retained (e.g. the theory of pleasure) ; more frequently adding an after-thought which required the rewriting of a whole passage, without rewriting it (e.g., to take one instance out of many in Book V., tJ) avTi-irevovOSs is an after-thought which strictly requires that the whole book should be rewritten) ; sometimes (as here) making a note of the way in which a passage should be rewritten. Suppose, if need be, that the work, left in this incomplete state, was edited and perhaps further worked upon by a later hand, and we have enough, I think, to account for the facts.

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in what they really know, of which Heraclitus is an instance.*

But we use the word " know " (liriaTaaOai) in two 5 different senses : he who has knowledo^e which he is not now using is said to know a thing, and also he who is now using his knowledge. Having knowledge, therefore, which is not now present to the mind, about what one ought not to do, will be different from having knowledge which is now present. Only in the latter sense, not in the former, does it seem strange that a man should act against his knowledge.

Again, since these reasonings involve two kinds 6 of premises [a universal proposition for major and a particular for minor], there is nothing to prevent a man from acting contrary to his knowledge though he has both premises, if he is now using the universal only, and not the particular ; for the particular is the thing to be done.

Again, different kinds of universal propositions may be involved : one may concern the agent himself, another the thing ; for instance, you may reason (1) "all men are benefited by dry things, and this is a man ; " and (2) " things of this kind are dry ; " but the second minor, " this thing is of this kind," may be unknown or the knowledge of it may be dormant, t

These distinctions, then, will make a vast difference,

* Alluding to the Heraclitean doctrine, which Aristotle rather nnfairly interprets as a denial of the most fundamental of all first principles, the law of contradiction. Cf. Met. iii. 7, 1012" 24.

t i.e. not now present, ovk iuepytl : but in § 10 ivepye? seems to mean " is effectively present."

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• much so that it does not seem strange that a man -hould act against his knowledge if he knows in one way, though it does seem strange if he knows in another way.

But, again, it is possible for a man to " have knowledge " in yet another way than those just mentioned : we see, I mean, that "having knowledge without using it " includes different modes of having, so that a man may have it in one sense and in another sense not have it ; for instance, a man who is asleep, or mad, or drunk. But people who are under the influence of passion are in a similar state ; for anger, and sexual desire and the like do evidently alter the condition of the body, and in some cases actually i^roduce madness. It is plain, then, that the inintinent man must be allowed to have knowledge lu the same sort of way as those who are asleep, mad, or drunk.*

But to repeat the words of knowledge is no proof that a man really has knowledge [in the full sense of having an effective knowledge] ; for even when they are under the influence of these passions people repeat demonstrations and sajdngs of Empedocles,