|
Book 6
1
Since we have previously said that one ought to choose that which is
intermediate, not the excess nor the defect, and that the intermediate
is determined by the dictates of the right rule, let us discuss the
nature of these dictates. In all the states of character we have
mentioned, as in all other matters, there is a mark to which the man who
has the rule looks, and heightens or relaxes his activity accordingly,
and there is a standard which determines the mean states which we say
are intermediate between excess and defect, being in accordance with the
right rule. But such a statement, though true, is by no means clear; for
not only here but in all other pursuits which are objects of knowledge
it is indeed true to say that we must not exert ourselves nor relax our
efforts too much nor too little, but to an intermediate extent and as
the right rule dictates; but if a man had only this knowledge he would
be none the wiser e.g. we should not know what sort of medicines to
apply to our body if some one were to say 'all those which the medical
art prescribes, and which agree with the practice of one who possesses
the art'. Hence it is necessary with regard to the states of the soul
also not only that this true statement should be made, but also that it
should be determined what is the right rule and what is the standard
that fixes it.
We divided the virtues of the soul and a said that some are virtues of
character and others of intellect. Now we have discussed in detail the
moral virtues; with regard to the others let us express our view as
follows, beginning with some remarks about the soul. We said before that
there are two parts of the soul-that which grasps a rule or rational
principle, and the irrational; let us now draw a similar distinction
within the part which grasps a rational principle. And let it be assumed
that there are two parts which grasp a rational principle-one by which
we contemplate the kind of things whose originative causes are
invariable, and one by which we contemplate variable things; for where
objects differ in kind the part of the soul answering to each of the two
is different in kind, since it is in virtue of a certain likeness and
kinship with their objects that they have the knowledge they have. Let
one of these parts be called the scientific and the other the
calculative; for to deliberate and to calculate are the same thing, but
no one deliberates about the invariable. Therefore the calculative is
one part of the faculty which grasps a rational principle. We must,
then, learn what is the best state of each of these two parts; for this
is the virtue of each.
2
The virtue of a thing is relative to its proper work. Now there are
three things in the soul which control action and truth-sensation,
reason, desire.
Of these sensation originates no action; this is plain from the fact
that the lower animals have sensation but no share in action.
What affirmation and negation are in thinking, pursuit and avoidance are
in desire; so that since moral virtue is a state of character concerned
with choice, and choice is deliberate desire, therefore both the
reasoning must be true and the desire right, if the choice is to be
good, and the latter must pursue just what the former asserts. Now this
kind of intellect and of truth is practical; of the intellect which is
contemplative, not practical nor productive, the good and the bad state
are truth and falsity respectively (for this is the work of everything
intellectual); while of the part which is practical and intellectual the
good state is truth in agreement with right desire.
The origin of action-its efficient, not its final cause-is choice, and
that of choice is desire and reasoning with a view to an end. This is
why choice cannot exist either without reason and intellect or without a
moral state; for good action and its opposite cannot exist without a
combination of intellect and character. Intellect itself, however, moves
nothing, but only the intellect which aims at an end and is practical;
for this rules the productive intellect, as well, since every one who
makes makes for an end, and that which is made is not an end in the
unqualified sense (but only an end in a particular relation, and the end
of a particular operation)-only that which is done is that; for good
action is an end, and desire aims at this. Hence choice is either
desiderative reason or ratiocinative desire, and such an origin of
action is a man. (It is to be noted that nothing that is past is an
object of choice, e.g. no one chooses to have sacked Troy; for no one
deliberates about the past, but about what is future and capable of
being otherwise, while what is past is not capable of not having taken
place; hence Agathon is right in saying
For this alone is lacking even to God,
To make undone things that have once been done.)
The work of both the intellectual parts, then, is truth. Therefore the
states that are most strictly those in respect of which each of these
parts will reach truth are the virtues of the two parts.
3
Let us begin, then, from the beginning, and discuss these states once
more. Let it be assumed that the states by virtue of which the soul
possesses truth by way of affirmation or denial are five in number, i.e.
art, scientific knowledge, practical wisdom, philosophic wisdom,
intuitive reason; we do not include judgement and opinion because in
these we may be mistaken.
Now what scientific knowledge is, if we are to speak exactly and not
follow mere similarities, is plain from what follows. We all suppose
that what we know is not even capable of being otherwise; of things
capable of being otherwise we do not know, when they have passed outside
our observation, whether they exist or not. Therefore the object of
scientific knowledge is of necessity. Therefore it is eternal; for
things that are of necessity in the unqualified sense are all eternal;
and things that are eternal are ungenerated and imperishable. Again,
every science is thought to be capable of being taught, and its object
of being learned. And all teaching starts from what is already known, as
we maintain in the Analytics also; for it proceeds sometimes through
induction and sometimes by syllogism. Now induction is the
starting-point which knowledge even of the universal presupposes, while
syllogism proceeds from universals. There are therefore starting-points
from which syllogism proceeds, which are not reached by syllogism; it is
therefore by induction that they are acquired. Scientific knowledge is,
then, a state of capacity to demonstrate, and has the other limiting
characteristics which we specify in the Analytics, for it is when a man
believes in a certain way and the starting-points are known to him that
he has scientific knowledge, since if they are not better known to him
than the conclusion, he will have his knowledge only incidentally.
Let this, then, be taken as our account of scientific knowledge.
4
In the variable are included both things made and things done; making
and acting are different (for their nature we treat even the discussions
outside our school as reliable); so that the reasoned state of capacity
to act is different from the reasoned state of capacity to make. Hence
too they are not included one in the other; for neither is acting making
nor is making acting. Now since architecture is an art and is
essentially a reasoned state of capacity to make, and there is neither
any art that is not such a state nor any such state that is not an art,
art is identical with a state of capacity to make, involving a true
course of reasoning. All art is concerned with coming into being, i.e.
with contriving and considering how something may come into being which
is capable of either being or not being, and whose origin is in the
maker and not in the thing made; for art is concerned neither with
things that are, or come into being, by necessity, nor with things that
do so in accordance with nature (since these have their origin in
themselves). Making and acting being different, art must be a matter of
making, not of acting. And in a sense chance and art are concerned with
the same objects; as Agathon says, 'art loves chance and chance loves
art'. Art, then, as has been is a state concerned with making, involving
a true course of reasoning, and lack of art on the contrary is a state
concerned with making, involving a false course of reasoning; both are
concerned with the variable.
5
Regarding practical wisdom we shall get at the truth by considering who
are the persons we credit with it. Now it is thought to be the mark of a
man of practical wisdom to be able to deliberate well about what is good
and expedient for himself, not in some particular respect, e.g. about
what sorts of thing conduce to health or to strength, but about what
sorts of thing conduce to the good life in general. This is shown by the
fact that we credit men with practical wisdom in some particular respect
when they have calculated well with a view to some good end which is one
of those that are not the object of any art. It follows that in the
general sense also the man who is capable of deliberating has practical
wisdom. Now no one deliberates about things that are invariable, nor
about things that it is impossible for him to do. Therefore, since
scientific knowledge involves demonstration, but there is no
demonstration of things whose first principles are variable (for all
such things might actually be otherwise), and since it is impossible to
deliberate about things that are of necessity, practical wisdom cannot
be scientific knowledge nor art; not science because that which can be
done is capable of being otherwise, not art because action and making
are different kinds of thing. The remaining alternative, then, is that
it is a true and reasoned state of capacity to act with regard to the
things that are good or bad for man. For while making has an end other
than itself, action cannot; for good action itself is its end. It is for
this reason that we think Pericles and men like him have practical
wisdom, viz. because they can see what is good for themselves and what
is good for men in general; we consider that those can do this who are
good at managing households or states. (This is why we call temperance (sophrosune)
by this name; we imply that it preserves one's practical wisdom (sozousa
tan phronsin). Now what it preserves is a judgement of the kind we have
described. For it is not any and every judgement that pleasant and
painful objects destroy and pervert, e.g. the judgement that the
triangle has or has not its angles equal to two right angles, but only
judgements about what is to be done. For the originating causes of the
things that are done consist in the end at which they are aimed; but the
man who has been ruined by pleasure or pain forthwith fails to see any
such originating cause-to see that for the sake of this or because of
this he ought to choose and do whatever he chooses and does; for vice is
destructive of the originating cause of action.) Practical wisdom, then,
must be a reasoned and true state of capacity to act with regard to
human goods. But further, while there is such a thing as excellence in
art, there is no such thing as excellence in practical wisdom; and in
art he who errs willingly is preferable, but in practical wisdom, as in
the virtues, he is the reverse. Plainly, then, practical wisdom is a
virtue and not an art. There being two parts of the soul that can follow
a course of reasoning, it must be the virtue of one of the two, i.e. of
that part which forms opinions; for opinion is about the variable and so
is practical wisdom. But yet it is not only a reasoned state; this is
shown by the fact that a state of that sort may forgotten but practical
wisdom cannot.
6
Scientific knowledge is judgement about things that are universal and
necessary, and the conclusions of demonstration, and all scientific
knowledge, follow from first principles (for scientific knowledge
involves apprehension of a rational ground). This being so, the first
principle from which what is scientifically known follows cannot be an
object of scientific knowledge, of art, or of practical wisdom; for that
which can be scientifically known can be demonstrated, and art and
practical wisdom deal with things that are variable. Nor are these first
principles the objects of philosophic wisdom, for it is a mark of the
philosopher to have demonstration about some things. If, then, the
states of mind by which we have truth and are never deceived about
things invariable or even variable are scientific knowledge, practical
wisdom, philosophic wisdom, and intuitive reason, and it cannot be any
of the three (i.e. practical wisdom, scientific knowledge, or
philosophic wisdom), the remaining alternative is that it is intuitive
reason that grasps the first principles.
7
Wisdom (1) in the arts we ascribe to their most finished exponents, e.g.
to Phidias as a sculptor and to Polyclitus as a maker of
portrait-statues, and here we mean nothing by wisdom except excellence
in art; but (2) we think that some people are wise in general, not in
some particular field or in any other limited respect, as Homer says in
the Margites,
Him did the gods make neither a digger nor yet a ploughman
Nor wise in anything else. Therefore wisdom must plainly be the most
finished of the forms of knowledge. It follows that the wise man must
not only know what follows from the first principles, but must also
possess truth about the first principles. Therefore wisdom must be
intuitive reason combined with scientific knowledge-scientific knowledge
of the highest objects which has received as it were its proper
completion.
Of the highest objects, we say; for it would be strange to think that
the art of politics, or practical wisdom, is the best knowledge, since
man is not the best thing in the world. Now if what is healthy or good
is different for men and for fishes, but what is white or straight is
always the same, any one would say that what is wise is the same but
what is practically wise is different; for it is to that which observes
well the various matters concerning itself that one ascribes practical
wisdom, and it is to this that one will entrust such matters. This is
why we say that some even of the lower animals have practical wisdom,
viz. those which are found to have a power of foresight with regard to
their own life. It is evident also that philosophic wisdom and the art
of politics cannot be the same; for if the state of mind concerned with
a man's own interests is to be called philosophic wisdom, there will be
many philosophic wisdoms; there will not be one concerned with the good
of all animals (any more than there is one art of medicine for all
existing things), but a different philosophic wisdom about the good of
each species.
But if the argument be that man is the best of the animals, this makes
no difference; for there are other things much more divine in their
nature even than man, e.g., most conspicuously, the bodies of which the
heavens are framed. From what has been said it is plain, then, that
philosophic wisdom is scientific knowledge, combined with intuitive
reason, of the things that are highest by nature. This is why we say
Anaxagoras, Thales, and men like them have philosophic but not practical
wisdom, when we see them ignorant of what is to their own advantage, and
why we say that they know things that are remarkable, admirable,
difficult, and divine, but useless; viz. because it is not human goods
that they seek.
Practical wisdom on the other hand is concerned with things human and
things about which it is possible to deliberate; for we say this is
above all the work of the man of practical wisdom, to deliberate well,
but no one deliberates about things invariable, nor about things which
have not an end, and that a good that can be brought about by action.
The man who is without qualification good at deliberating is the man who
is capable of aiming in accordance with calculation at the best for man
of things attainable by action. Nor is practical wisdom concerned with
universals only-it must also recognize the particulars; for it is
practical, and practice is concerned with particulars. This is why some
who do not know, and especially those who have experience, are more
practical than others who know; for if a man knew that light meats are
digestible and wholesome, but did not know which sorts of meat are
light, he would not produce health, but the man who knows that chicken
is wholesome is more likely to produce health.
Now practical wisdom is concerned with action; therefore one should have
both forms of it, or the latter in preference to the former. But of
practical as of philosophic wisdom there must be a controlling kind.
8
Political wisdom and practical wisdom are the same state of mind, but
their essence is not the same. Of the wisdom concerned with the city,
the practical wisdom which plays a controlling part is legislative
wisdom, while that which is related to this as particulars to their
universal is known by the general name 'political wisdom'; this has to
do with action and deliberation, for a decree is a thing to be carried
out in the form of an individual act. This is why the exponents of this
art are alone said to 'take part in politics'; for these alone 'do
things' as manual labourers 'do things'.
Practical wisdom also is identified especially with that form of it
which is concerned with a man himself-with the individual; and this is
known by the general name 'practical wisdom'; of the other kinds one is
called household management, another legislation, the third politics,
and of the latter one part is called deliberative and the other
judicial. Now knowing what is good for oneself will be one kind of
knowledge, but it is very different from the other kinds; and the man
who knows and concerns himself with his own interests is thought to have
practical wisdom, while politicians are thought to be busybodies; hence
the word of Euripides,
But how could I be wise, who might at ease,
Numbered among the army's multitude,
Have had an equal share?
For those who aim too high and do too much. Those who think thus seek
their own good, and consider that one ought to do so. From this opinion,
then, has come the view that such men have practical wisdom; yet perhaps
one's own good cannot exist without household management, nor without a
form of government. Further, how one should order one's own affairs is
not clear and needs inquiry.
What has been said is confirmed by the fact that while young men become
geometricians and mathematicians and wise in matters like these, it is
thought that a young man of practical wisdom cannot be found. The cause
is that such wisdom is concerned not only with universals but with
particulars, which become familiar from experience, but a young man has
no experience, for it is length of time that gives experience; indeed
one might ask this question too, why a boy may become a mathematician,
but not a philosopher or a physicist. It is because the objects of
mathematics exist by abstraction, while the first principles of these
other subjects come from experience, and because young men have no
conviction about the latter but merely use the proper language, while
the essence of mathematical objects is plain enough to them?
Further, error in deliberation may be either about the universal or
about the particular; we may fall to know either that all water that
weighs heavy is bad, or that this particular water weighs heavy.
That practical wisdom is not scientific knowledge is evident; for it is,
as has been said, concerned with the ultimate particular fact, since the
thing to be done is of this nature. It is opposed, then, to intuitive
reason; for intuitive reason is of the limiting premisses, for which no
reason can be given, while practical wisdom is concerned with the
ultimate particular, which is the object not of scientific knowledge but
of perception-not the perception of qualities peculiar to one sense but
a perception akin to that by which we perceive that the particular
figure before us is a triangle; for in that direction as well as in that
of the major premiss there will be a limit. But this is rather
perception than practical wisdom, though it is another kind of
perception than that of the qualities peculiar to each sense.
9
There is a difference between inquiry and deliberation; for deliberation
is inquiry into a particular kind of thing. We must grasp the nature of
excellence in deliberation as well whether it is a form of scientific
knowledge, or opinion, or skill in conjecture, or some other kind of
thing. Scientific knowledge it is not; for men do not inquire about the
things they know about, but good deliberation is a kind of deliberation,
and he who deliberates inquires and calculates. Nor is it skill in
conjecture; for this both involves no reasoning and is something that is
quick in its operation, while men deliberate a long time, and they say
that one should carry out quickly the conclusions of one's deliberation,
but should deliberate slowly. Again, readiness of mind is different from
excellence in deliberation; it is a sort of skill in conjecture. Nor
again is excellence in deliberation opinion of any sort. But since the
man who deliberates badly makes a mistake, while he who deliberates well
does so correctly, excellence in deliberation is clearly a kind of
correctness, but neither of knowledge nor of opinion; for there is no
such thing as correctness of knowledge (since there is no such thing as
error of knowledge), and correctness of opinion is truth; and at the
same time everything that is an object of opinion is already determined.
But again excellence in deliberation involves reasoning. The remaining
alternative, then, is that it is correctness of thinking; for this is
not yet assertion, since, while even opinion is not inquiry but has
reached the stage of assertion, the man who is deliberating, whether he
does so well or ill, is searching for something and calculating.
But excellence in deliberation is a certain correctness of deliberation;
hence we must first inquire what deliberation is and what it is about.
And, there being more than one kind of correctness, plainly excellence
in deliberation is not any and every kind; for (1) the incontinent man
and the bad man, if he is clever, will reach as a result of his
calculation what he sets before himself, so that he will have
deliberated correctly, but he will have got for himself a great evil.
Now to have deliberated well is thought to be a good thing; for it is
this kind of correctness of deliberation that is excellence in
deliberation, viz. that which tends to attain what is good. But (2) it
is possible to attain even good by a false syllogism, and to attain what
one ought to do but not by the right means, the middle term being false;
so that this too is not yet excellence in deliberation this state in
virtue of which one attains what one ought but not by the right means.
Again (3) it is possible to attain it by long deliberation while another
man attains it quickly. Therefore in the former case we have not yet got
excellence in deliberation, which is rightness with regard to the
expedient-rightness in respect both of the end, the manner, and the
time. (4) Further it is possible to have deliberated well either in the
unqualified sense or with reference to a particular end. Excellence in
deliberation in the unqualified sense, then, is that which succeeds with
reference to what is the end in the unqualified sense, and excellence in
deliberation in a particular sense is that which succeeds relatively to
a particular end. If, then, it is characteristic of men of practical
wisdom to have deliberated well, excellence in deliberation will be
correctness with regard to what conduces to the end of which practical
wisdom is the true apprehension.
10
Understanding, also, and goodness of understanding, in virtue of which
men are said to be men of understanding or of good understanding, are
neither entirely the same as opinion or scientific knowledge (for at
that rate all men would have been men of understanding), nor are they
one of the particular sciences, such as medicine, the science of things
connected with health, or geometry, the science of spatial magnitudes.
For understanding is neither about things that are always and are
unchangeable, nor about any and every one of the things that come into
being, but about things which may become subjects of questioning and
deliberation. Hence it is about the same objects as practical wisdom;
but understanding and practical wisdom are not the same. For practical
wisdom issues commands, since its end is what ought to be done or not to
be done; but understanding only judges. (Understanding is identical with
goodness of understanding, men of understanding with men of good
understanding.) Now understanding is neither the having nor the
acquiring of practical wisdom; but as learning is called understanding
when it means the exercise of the faculty of knowledge, so
'understanding' is applicable to the exercise of the faculty of opinion
for the purpose of judging of what some one else says about matters with
which practical wisdom is concerned-and of judging soundly; for 'well'
and 'soundly' are the same thing. And from this has come the use of the
name 'understanding' in virtue of which men are said to be 'of good
understanding', viz. from the application of the word to the grasping of
scientific truth; for we often call such grasping understanding.
11
What is called judgement, in virtue of which men are said to 'be
sympathetic judges' and to 'have judgement', is the right discrimination
of the equitable. This is shown by the fact that we say the equitable
man is above all others a man of sympathetic judgement, and identify
equity with sympathetic judgement about certain facts. And sympathetic
judgement is judgement which discriminates what is equitable and does so
correctly; and correct judgement is that which judges what is true.
Now all the states we have considered converge, as might be expected, to
the same point; for when we speak of judgement and understanding and
practical wisdom and intuitive reason we credit the same people with
possessing judgement and having reached years of reason and with having
practical wisdom and understanding. For all these faculties deal with
ultimates, i.e. with particulars; and being a man of understanding and
of good or sympathetic judgement consists in being able judge about the
things with which practical wisdom is concerned; for the equities are
common to all good men in relation to other men. Now all things which
have to be done are included among particulars or ultimates; for not
only must the man of practical wisdom know particular facts, but
understanding and judgement are also concerned with things to be done,
and these are ultimates. And intuitive reason is concerned with the
ultimates in both directions; for both the first terms and the last are
objects of intuitive reason and not of argument, and the intuitive
reason which is presupposed by demonstrations grasps the unchangeable
and first terms, while the intuitive reason involved in practical
reasonings grasps the last and variable fact, i.e. the minor premiss.
For these variable facts are the starting-points for the apprehension of
the end, since the universals are reached from the particulars; of these
therefore we must have perception, and this perception is intuitive
reason.
This is why these states are thought to be natural endowments-why, while
no one is thought to be a philosopher by nature, people are thought to
have by nature judgement, understanding, and intuitive reason. This is
shown by the fact that we think our powers correspond to our time of
life, and that a particular age brings with it intuitive reason and
judgement; this implies that nature is the cause. (Hence intuitive
reason is both beginning and end; for demonstrations are from these and
about these.) Therefore we ought to attend to the undemonstrated sayings
and opinions of experienced and older people or of people of practical
wisdom not less than to demonstrations; for because experience has given
them an eye they see aright.
We have stated, then, what practical and philosophic wisdom are, and
with what each of them is concerned, and we have said that each is the
virtue of a different part of the soul.
12
Difficulties might be raised as to the utility of these qualities of
mind. For (1) philosophic wisdom will contemplate none of the things
that will make a man happy (for it is not concerned with any coming into
being), and though practical wisdom has this merit, for what purpose do
we need it? Practical wisdom is the quality of mind concerned with
things just and noble and good for man, but these are the things which
it is the mark of a good man to do, and we are none the more able to act
for knowing them if the virtues are states of character, just as we are
none the better able to act for knowing the things that are healthy and
sound, in the sense not of producing but of issuing from the state of
health; for we are none the more able to act for having the art of
medicine or of gymnastics. But (2) if we are to say that a man should
have practical wisdom not for the sake of knowing moral truths but for
the sake of becoming good, practical wisdom will be of no use to those
who are good; again it is of no use to those who have not virtue; for it
will make no difference whether they have practical wisdom themselves or
obey others who have it, and it would be enough for us to do what we do
in the case of health; though we wish to become healthy, yet we do not
learn the art of medicine. (3) Besides this, it would be thought strange
if practical wisdom, being inferior to philosophic wisdom, is to be put
in authority over it, as seems to be implied by the fact that the art
which produces anything rules and issues commands about that thing.
These, then, are the questions we must discuss; so far we have only
stated the difficulties.
(1) Now first let us say that in themselves these states must be worthy
of choice because they are the virtues of the two parts of the soul
respectively, even if neither of them produce anything.
(2) Secondly, they do produce something, not as the art of medicine
produces health, however, but as health produces health; so does
philosophic wisdom produce happiness; for, being a part of virtue
entire, by being possessed and by actualizing itself it makes a man
happy.
(3) Again, the work of man is achieved only in accordance with practical
wisdom as well as with moral virtue; for virtue makes us aim at the
right mark, and practical wisdom makes us take the right means. (Of the
fourth part of the soul-the nutritive-there is no such virtue; for there
is nothing which it is in its power to do or not to do.)
(4) With regard to our being none the more able to do because of our
practical wisdom what is noble and just, let us begin a little further
back, starting with the following principle. As we say that some people
who do just acts are not necessarily just, i.e. those who do the acts
ordained by the laws either unwillingly or owing to ignorance or for
some other reason and not for the sake of the acts themselves (though,
to be sure, they do what they should and all the things that the good
man ought), so is it, it seems, that in order to be good one must be in
a certain state when one does the several acts, i.e. one must do them as
a result of choice and for the sake of the acts themselves. Now virtue
makes the choice right, but the question of the things which should
naturally be done to carry out our choice belongs not to virtue but to
another faculty. We must devote our attention to these matters and give
a clearer statement about them. There is a faculty which is called
cleverness; and this is such as to be able to do the things that tend
towards the mark we have set before ourselves, and to hit it. Now if the
mark be noble, the cleverness is laudable, but if the mark be bad, the
cleverness is mere smartness; hence we call even men of practical wisdom
clever or smart. Practical wisdom is not the faculty, but it does not
exist without this faculty. And this eye of the soul acquires its formed
state not without the aid of virtue, as has been said and is plain; for
the syllogisms which deal with acts to be done are things which involve
a starting-point, viz. 'since the end, i.e. what is best, is of such and
such a nature', whatever it may be (let it for the sake of argument be
what we please); and this is not evident except to the good man; for
wickedness perverts us and causes us to be deceived about the
starting-points of action. Therefore it is evident that it is impossible
to be practically wise without being good.
13
We must therefore consider virtue also once more; for virtue too is
similarly related; as practical wisdom is to cleverness-not the same,
but like it-so is natural virtue to virtue in the strict sense. For all
men think that each type of character belongs to its possessors in some
sense by nature; for from the very moment of birth we are just or fitted
for self-control or brave or have the other moral qualities; but yet we
seek something else as that which is good in the strict sense-we seek
for the presence of such qualities in another way. For both children and
brutes have the natural dispositions to these qualities, but without
reason these are evidently hurtful. Only we seem to see this much, that,
while one may be led astray by them, as a strong body which moves
without sight may stumble badly because of its lack of sight, still, if
a man once acquires reason, that makes a difference in action; and his
state, while still like what it was, will then be virtue in the strict
sense. Therefore, as in the part of us which forms opinions there are
two types, cleverness and practical wisdom, so too in the moral part
there are two types, natural virtue and virtue in the strict sense, and
of these the latter involves practical wisdom. This is why some say that
all the virtues are forms of practical wisdom, and why Socrates in one
respect was on the right track while in another he went astray; in
thinking that all the virtues were forms of practical wisdom he was
wrong, but in saying they implied practical wisdom he was right. This is
confirmed by the fact that even now all men, when they define virtue,
after naming the state of character and its objects add 'that (state)
which is in accordance with the right rule'; now the right rule is that
which is in accordance with practical wisdom. All men, then, seem
somehow to divine that this kind of state is virtue, viz. that which is
in accordance with practical wisdom. But we must go a little further.
For it is not merely the state in accordance with the right rule, but
the state that implies the presence of the right rule, that is virtue;
and practical wisdom is a right rule about such matters. Socrates, then,
thought the virtues were rules or rational principles (for he thought
they were, all of them, forms of scientific knowledge), while we think
they involve a rational principle.
It is clear, then, from what has been said, that it is not possible to
be good in the strict sense without practical wisdom, nor practically
wise without moral virtue. But in this way we may also refute the
dialectical argument whereby it might be contended that the virtues
exist in separation from each other; the same man, it might be said, is
not best equipped by nature for all the virtues, so that he will have
already acquired one when he has not yet acquired another. This is
possible in respect of the natural virtues, but not in respect of those
in respect of which a man is called without qualification good; for with
the presence of the one quality, practical wisdom, will be given all the
virtues. And it is plain that, even if it were of no practical value, we
should have needed it because it is the virtue of the part of us in
question; plain too that the choice will not be right without practical
wisdom any more than without virtue; for the one deter, mines the end
and the other makes us do the things that lead to the end.
But again it is not supreme over philosophic wisdom, i.e. over the
superior part of us, any more than the art of medicine is over health;
for it does not use it but provides for its coming into being; it issues
orders, then, for its sake, but not to it. Further, to maintain its
supremacy would be like saying that the art of politics rules the gods
because it issues orders about all the affairs of the state.
Go to Next Page
|