[Footnote 145: Aristot. De Generat. Animal. II. iii. p. 736, b. 29:

[Greek: pa/sês me\n ou)=n psuchê=s du/namis e(te/rou sô/matos e)/oike

kekoinônêke/nai kai\ theiote/rou tô=n kaloume/nôn stoichei/ôn; ô(s

de\ diaphe/rousi timio/têti ai( psuchai\ kai\ a)timi/a| a)llê/lôn,

ou(/tô kai\ ê( toiau/tê diaphe/rei phu/sis; pa/ntôn me\n ga\r e)n

tô=| spe/rmati e)nupa/rchei, o(/per poiei= go/nima ei)=nai ta\

spe/rmata, to\ kalou/menon thermo/n.]]

But though all varieties of Soul emanate from the same celestial

source, they possess the divine element in very different degrees,

and are very unequal in comparative worth and dignity. The lowest

variety, or nutritive soul--the only one possessed by plants, among

which there is no separation of sex[146]--is contained potentially in

the seed, and is thus transmitted when that seed is matured into a

new individual. In animals, which possess it along with the sensitive

soul and among which the sexes are separated, it is also contained

potentially in the generative system of the female separately; and

the first commencement of life in the future animal is thus a purely

vegetable life.[147] The sensitive soul, the characteristic of the

complete animal, cannot be superadded except by copulation and the

male semen. The female, being comparatively impotent and having less

animal heat, furnishes only the matter of the future offspring; form,

or the moving, fecundating, cause, is supplied by the male. Through

the two together the new individual animal is completed, having not

merely the nutritive soul, but also the sentient soul along with

it.[148]

[Footnote 146: Ibid. I. xxiii. p. 731, a. 27.]

[Footnote 147: Aristot. De Generat. Animal. II. iii. p. 736, b. 12.]

[Footnote 148: Ibid. I. ii. p. 716, a. 4-17; xix. p. 726, b. 33; xx.

p. 728, a. 17; xxi. p. 729, b. 6-27.]

Both the nutritive and the sentient souls have, each of them

respectively, a special bodily agency and movement belonging to them.

But the Noûs, or the noëtic soul, has no partnership with any similar

bodily agency. There is no special corporeal potentiality (to speak

in Aristotelian language) which it is destined to actualize. It

enters from without, and emanates from a still more exalted influence

of that divine celestial substance from which all psychical or

vitalizing heat proceeds.[149] It is superinduced upon the nutritive

and sentient souls, and introduces itself at an age of the individual

later than both of them. Having no part of the bodily organism

specially appropriated to it, this variety of soul--what is called

the Noûs--stands distinguished from the other two in being perfectly

separable from the body;[150] that is, separable from the organized

body which it is the essential function of the two lower souls to

actualize, and with which both of them are bound up. The Noûs is not

separable from the body altogether; it belongs essentially to the

divine celestial body, and to those luminaries and other divine

beings by whom portions of it are tenanted. Theorizing

contemplation--the perfect, unclouded, unembarrassed, exercise of

the theoretical Noûs--is the single mental activity of these

divinities; contemplation of the formal regularity of the Kosmos,

with its eternal and faultless rotations, and with their own

perfection as participating therein. The celestial body is the body

whereto Noûs, or the noëtic soul, properly belongs;[151] quite apart

from the two other souls, sentient and nutritive, upon which it is

grafted in the animal body; and apart also from all the necessities

of human action, preceded by balanced motives and deliberate

choice.[152]

[Footnote 149: Ibid. II. iii. p. 736, b. 27: [Greek: lei/petai de\

to\n nou=n mo/non thu/rathen e)peisie/nai, kai\ thei=on ei)=nai

mo/non; ou)the\n ga\r au)tou= tê=| e)nergei/a| koinônei= sômatikê\

e)ne/rgeia.] The words [Greek: thei=on ei)=nai _mo/non_] must not be

construed strictly, for in the next following passage he proceeds to

declare that _all_ [Greek: psuchê/, psuchikê\ du/namis] or [Greek:

a)rchê/], partakes of the divine element, and that in this respect

there is only a difference of degree between one [Greek: psuchê\] and

another.]

[Footnote 150: Ibid. p. 737, a. 10: [Greek: o( kalou/menos nou=s]. De

Animâ, II. ii. p. 413, b. 25; iii. p. 415, a. 11.]

[Footnote 151: Respecting [Greek: to\ a)/nô sô=ma], see the copious

citations in Trendelenburg's note ad Aristot. De Animâ, II. vii.;

Comm. p. 373.]

[Footnote 152: Aristot. Ethic. Nikom. X. viii. p. 1178, b. 20:

[Greek: tô=| dê\ zô=nti tou= pra/ttein a)phê|rême/nô|, e)/ti de\

ma=llon tou= poiei=n, ti/ lei/petai plê\n theôri/as? ô(/ste ê( tou=

theou= e)ne/rgeia, makario/têti diaphe/rousa, theôrêtikê\ a)\n

ei)/ê.]--See also Metaphysic. [Greek: L]. v. p. 1074, b. 26-35.]

From this celestial body, a certain influence of Noûs is transferred

to some of the mortal inhabitants of earth, water, and air. Thus a

third or noëtic soul--or rather a third noëtic function--is added to

the two existing functions, sensitive and nutrient, of the animal

soul, which acquires thereby an improved aptitude for, and

correlation with, the Formal and Universal. We have already stated

that the sensitive soul possesses this aptitude to a certain extent;

it receives the impression of sensible forms, without being impressed

by the matter accompanying them. The noëtic function strengthens and

sharpens the aptitude; the soul comes into correlation with those

cogitable or intellective forms which are involved in the sensible

forms;[153] it rises from the lower generalities of the Second

Philosophy, to the higher generalities of the First Philosophy.

[Footnote 153: Aristot. De Animâ, III. viii. p. 432, a. 6: [Greek:

e)n toi=s ei)/desi toi=s ai)sthêtoi=s ta\ noêta/ e)stin.]]

As the sentient or percipient soul is the form or correlate of all

perceivables, and thus identified with them in nature, all of them

having existence only in relation to it,--so the cogitant or

intellective soul is the form or correlate of all cogitables, all of

which exist relatively to it, and only relatively.[154] It is in fact

the highest of all forms--the Form of Forms; the mental or subjective

aspect of all formal reality.

[Footnote 154: Ibid. p. 432, b. 2: [Greek: o( nou=s ei)/dos ei)dô=n

kai\ ê( ai)/sthêsis ei)=dos ai)sthêtô=n.]]

Such at least is the tendency and purpose of that noëtic influence

which the celestial substance imparts to the human soul; but it is

realized only to a very small degree. In its characteristic

theorizing efficacy, the godlike Noûs counts for a small fraction of

the whole soul, though superexcellent in quality.[155] There are but

few men in whom it is tolerably developed, and even in those few it

is countervailed by many other agencies.[156] The noëtic function in

men and animals exists only in companionship with the two other

psychical functions. It is subservient to the limits and conditions

that they impose, as well as to the necessities of individual and

social action; to all that is required for "acting like a man,"

according to the Aristotelian phrase. Man's nature is complex, and

not self-sufficing for a life of theorizing contemplation, such as

that wherein the celestial inmates pass their immortality of

happiness.[157]

[Footnote 155: Aristot. Ethic. Nikom. X. vii. p. 1177, b. 34: [Greek:

ei) ga\r kai\ tô=| o)/gkô| mikro/n e)sti, duna/mei kai\ timio/têti

polu\ ma=llon pa/ntôn u(pere/chei.]

[Footnote 156: Aristot. De Memor. et Remin. i. p. 450, a. **18.]

[Footnote 157: Aristot. Ethic. Nikom. X. vii. p. 1177, b. 26: [Greek:

o( de\ toiou=tos a)\n ei)/ê bi/os krei/ttôn ê)\ kat'

a)/nthrôpon].--viii. p. 1178, b. 6: [Greek: deê/setai ou)=n toiou/tôn

pro\s to\ a)nthrôpeu/esthai.]--ix. p. 1178, b. 33: [Greek: ou)k

au)ta/rkês ê( phu/sis pro\s to\ theôrei=n]. Compare similar

sentiments in Aristot. Metaphys. A. ii. p. 983, a. 1.]

We have thus to study the noëtic function according to the

manifestations of it that we find in man, and to a certain extent in

some other privileged animals. Bees, for example, partake in the

divine gift to a certain extent; being distinguished in this respect

from their analogues--wasps and hornets.[158]

[Footnote 158: Aristot. De Gen. Animal. III. x. p. 760, a. 4: [Greek:

o)/ntos de\ _perittou= tou=_ ge/nous kai\ i)di/ou tou= tô=n

melittô=n].--p. 761, a. 4: [Greek: ou) ga\r e)/chousin] (wasps and

hornets) [Greek: ou)de\n thei=on, ô(/sper to\ ge/nos tô=n melittô=n.]

It is remarkable that [Greek: peritto/s], the epithet here applied by

Aristotle to bees, is the epithet that he also applies to men of

theoretical and speculative activity, as contrasted with men prudent

and judicious in action (see Metaphys. A. ii. p. 983, a. 2; also

Ethic. Nikom. VI. vii. p. 1141, b. 6). Elsewhere he calls bees

[Greek: phro/nima] (Metaphys. A. i. p. 980, b. 22). See a good note

of Torstrick (on Aristot. De Animâ, III. p. 428, a. 10), p. 172 of

his Commentary. Aristotle may possibly have been one among the

philosophers that Virgil had in his mind, in Georgics, iv. 219:--

"His quidam signis, atque hæc exempla secuti,

Esse apibus partem divinæ mentis, et haustus

Æthereos dixere: Deum namque ire per omnes

Terrasque, tractusque maris, coelumque profundum," &c.]

In these and other animals, and in man to a still greater degree, the

theorizing activity exists; but it is either starved, or at least has

to deal with materials obscure, puzzling, conflicting; while, on the

other hand, the practical intellect becomes largely developed,

through the pressure of wants and desires, combined with the teaching

of experience. In Aristotle's view, sensible perception is a separate

source of knowledge, accompanied with judgment and discrimination,

independent of the noëtic function. Occasionally, he refers the

intellectual superiority of man to the properly attempered

combination and antagonism of heat in the heart with cold in the

brain, each strong and pure;[159] all the highly endowed animals (he

says) have greater animal heat, which is the essential condition of a

better soul;[160] he reckons the finer sense of touch possessed by

man as an essential condition of the same intellectual result.[161]

Sensible perception in its five diverse manifestations, together with

its secondary psychical effects--phantasy and memory, accumulates in

the human mind (and in some animals) a greater or less experience of

particular facts; from some of which inferences are drawn as to

others unknown, directing conduct as well as enlarging

knowledge.[162]

[Footnote 159: Aristot. De Generat. Animal. II. vi. p. 744, a. 11-31:

[Greek: dêloi= de\ tê\n eu)krasi/an ê( dia/noia; phronimô/taton ga/r

e)sti tô=n zô=|ôn a)/nthrôpos.] We may remark that Aristotle

considers cold as in some cases a positive property, not simply as

the absence or privation of heat (De Partibus Animal. II. ii. p. 649,

a. 18). The heart is the part wherein the psychical fire (as it were)

is kept burning: [Greek: tê=s psuchê=s ô(/sper e)mpepureume/nês e)n

toi=s mori/ois tou/tois] (Aristot. De Vitâ et Morte, iv. p. 469, b.

16). Virgil, in the beautiful lines of his Second Georgic (483),

laments that he is disqualified for deep philosophical studies by the

want of heat round his heart:--&P "Sin, has ne possim naturæ accedere

partes, Frigidus obstiterit circum præcordia sanguis," &c.]

[Footnote 160: Aristot. De Respirat. xiii. p. 477, a. 16.]

[Footnote 161: Aristot. De Animâ, II. ix. p. 421, a. 21.]

[Footnote 162: Aristot. Metaphys. A. i. pp. 980-1.]

All this process--a perpetual movement of sense and memory--begins

from infancy, and goes on independently of Noûs or the noëtic

function properly so called; which grows up gradually at a later age,

aided by the acquisition of language and by instruction conveyed

through language. The supervening Noûs presupposes and depends upon

what has been thus treasured up by experience. Though, in the

celestial body. Noûs exists separately from human beings, and though

it there operates _proprio motu_ apart from sense, such is not the

case with the human Noûs; which depends upon the co-operation, and is

subject to the restrictions, of the complicated soul and body

wherewith it is domiciled--restrictions differing in each individual

case. Though the noëtic process is distinct from sense, yet without

sense it cannot take place in man. Aristotle expressly says: "You

cannot cogitate without a phantasm or without a continuous image."

Now the phantasm has been already explained as a relic of movements

of sense--or as those movements themselves, looked at in another

point of view.[163] "When we cogitate" (he says), "our mental

affection is the same as when we draw a triangle for geometrical

study; for there, though we do not make use of the fact that the

triangle is determinate in its magnitude, we still draw it of a

determinate magnitude. So in cogitation, even when we are not

cogitating a determinate _quantum_, we nevertheless set before our

eyes a determinate _quantum_, but we do not cogitate it _quatenus_

determinate."[164] We cannot even (he goes on to say) remember the

_cogitabilia_ without "a phantasm or sensible image; so that our

memory of them is only by way of concomitance" (indirect and

secondary).[165] Phantasy is thus absolutely indispensable to

cogitation: first to carrying on the process at all; next to

remembering it after it is past. Without either the visible phantasm

of objects seen and touched, or the audible phantasm of words heard

and remembered, the Noûs in human beings would be a nullity.[166]

[Footnote 163: Aristot. De Somniis, i. p. 459, a. 15; De Animâ, III.

vii. p. 431, a. 17; iii. p. 428, b. 12.]

[Footnote 164: Aristot. De Memor. et Remin. i. p. 449, b. 30: [Greek:

e)pei\ de\ peri\ phantasi/as ei)/rêtai pro/teron e)n toi=s peri\

psuchê=s, kai\ noei=n ou)k e)/stin a)/neu phanta/smatos; sumbai/nei

ga\r to\ au)to\ pa/thos e)n tô=| noei=n o(/per kai\ e)n tô=|

diagra/phein; e)kei= te ga\r ou)the\n proschrô/menoi tô=| to\ poso\n

ô(risme/non ei)=nai to\ trigô/nou, o(/môs gra/phomen ô(risme/non

kata\ to\ poso/n; kai\ o( noô=n ô(sau/tôs, ka)\n mê\ poso\n noê=|,

ti/thetai pro\ o)mma/tôn poso/n, noei= d' ou)ch ê(=| poso/n.]

This passage appears to be as clear a statement of the main doctrine

of Nominalism as can be found in Hobbes or Berkeley. In the sixteenth

section of the Introduction to the Principles of Human Knowledge,

Berkeley says:--"And here it must be acknowledged that a man may

consider a figure merely as triangular, without attending to the

particular qualities of the angles or relations of the sides.--In

like manner we may consider Peter to far forth as man, or so far

forth as animal, without framing the forementioned idea, either of

man or animal, _inasmuch as all that is perceived is not

considered_." Berkeley has not improved upon the statement of

Aristotle.]

[Footnote 165: Aristot. De Memor. et Remin. i. p. 450, a. 13.]

[Footnote 166: About sense and hearing, as the _fundamenta_ of

intellect, see Aristot. De Sensu et Sensili, i. p. 437, a. 1-17.]

We see that, though Aristotle recognizes a general distinction

between phantasy and cogitation, and alludes to many animals as

having the former without attaining to the latter, yet he also

declares that in man, who possesses both, not only is cogitation

dependent upon phantasy, but phantasy passes into cogitation by

gradations almost imperceptible. In regard to the practical

application of Noûs (_i.e._ to animal movements determined either by

appetite or by reason), he finds a great difficulty in keeping the

distinction clearly marked. Substantially, indeed, he lets it drop.

When he speaks of phantasy as being either calculating or perceptive,

we are unable to see in what respect _calculating phantasy_ (which he

states not to belong to other animals) differs from an effort of

cogitation.[167] Indeed, he speaks with some diffidence respecting

any distribution of parts in the same soul, suspecting that such

distribution is not real but logical: you may subdivide as much as

you choose.[168]

[Footnote 167: Aristot. De Animâ, III. x. p. 433, a. 9-b. 30: [Greek:

ei)/ tis tê\n phantasi/an tithei/ê ô(s no/êsi/n tina--phantsi/a de\

pa=sa ê)\ logistikê\ ê)\ ai)sthêtikê/; tau/tês me\n ou)=n kai\ ta\

a)/lla zô=|a mete/chei.] Also vii. p. 431, b. 7.]

[Footnote 168: Ibid. ix. p. 432, a. 23.]

It thus appears clear that Aristotle restricts the Noûs or noëtic

function _in man_ to the matters of sense and experience, physical or

mental, and that he considers the phantasm to be an essential

accompaniment of the cogitative act. Yet this does not at all detract

from his view of the grandeur, importance, and wide range of survey,

belonging to the noëtic function. It is the portion of man's nature

that correlates with the abstract and universal; but it is only a

portion of his nature, and must work in conjunction and harmony with

the rest. The abstract cannot be really separated from the concrete,

nor the universal from one or other of its particulars, nor the

essence from that whereof it is the essence, nor the attribute from

that of which it is the attribute, nor the genus and species from the

individuals comprehended therein; nor, to speak in purely

Aristotelian language, the Form from some Matter, or the Matter from

some Form. In all these cases there is a _notional_ or _logical_

distinction, impressing the mind as the result of various

comparisons, noted by an appropriate term, and remembered afterwards

by means of that term (that is, by means of an audible or visible

phantasm); but real separation there neither is nor can be. This is

the cardinal principle of Aristotle, repeated in almost all his

works--his marked antithesis against Plato. Such logical distinctions

as those here noticed (they might be multiplied without number) it

belongs to Noûs or the noëtic function to cognize. But the real

objects, in reference to which alone the distinctions have a meaning,

are concrete and individual; and the cognizing subject is really the

entire man, employing indeed the noëtic function, but employing it

with the aid of other mental forces, phantasms and remembrances, real

and verbal.

The noëtic soul is called by Aristotle "the place of Forms," "the

potentiality of Forms," "the correlate of things apart from

Matter."[169] It cogitates these Forms in or along with the

phantasms: the cogitable Forms are contained in the sensible Forms;

for there is nothing really existent beyond or apart from visible or

tangible magnitudes, with their properties and affections, and with

the so-called abstractions considered by the geometer. Hence, without

sensible perception, a man can neither learn nor understand anything;

in all his theoretical contemplations, he requires some phantasm to

contemplate along with them.[170]

[Footnote 169: Aristot. De Animâ, III. iv. p. 429, a. 27, b. 22.]

[Footnote 170: Ibid. vii. p. 431, b. 2: [Greek: ta\ me\n ou)=n ei)/dê

to\ noêtiko\n e)n toi=s phanta/smasi noei=.]--viii. p. 432, a. 3:

[Greek: e)pei\ de\ ou)de\ pra=gma ou)the/n e)sti para\ ta\ mege/thê,

ô(s dokei=, ta\ ai)sthêta\ kechôrisme/non, e)n toi=s ei)/desi toi=s

ai)sthêtoi=s ta\ noêta/ e)sti, ta/ te e)n a)phaire/sei lego/mena,

kai\ o(/sa tô=n ai)sthêtô=n e(/xeis kai\ pa/thê; kai\ dia\ tou=to

ou)/te mê\ ai)sthano/menos mêthe\n ou)the\n a)\n ma/thoi ou)de\

xunei/ê; o(/tan de\ theôrê=|, a)na/gkê a(/ma pha/ntasma/ ti

theôrei=n.]]

Herein lies one of the main distinctions between the noëtic and the

sentient souls. The sentient deals with particulars, and correlates

with external bodies; the noëtic apprehends universals, which in a

certain sense are within the soul: hence a man can cogitate whenever

or whatever he chooses, but he can see or touch only what is

present.[171] Another distinction is, that the sentient soul is

embodied in special organs, each with determinate capacities, and

correlating with external objects, themselves alike determinate,

acting only under certain conditions of locality. The possibilities

of sensation are thus from the beginning limited; moreover, a certain

relative proportion must be maintained between the percipient and the

perceivable; for extreme or violent sounds, colours, &c., produce no

sensation; on the contrary, they deaden the sentient organ.[172] But

the noëtic soul (what is called the "Noûs of the soul," to use

Aristotle's language)[173] is nothing at all in actuality before its

noëtic function commences, though it is everything in potentiality.

It is not embodied in any corporeal organ of its own, nor mingled as

a new elementary ingredient with the body; it does not correlate with

any external objects; it is not so specially attached to some

particulars as to make it antipathetic to others. Accordingly its

possibilities of cogitation are unlimited; it apprehends with equal

facility what is most cogitable and what is least cogitable. It is

thoroughly indeterminate in its nature, and is in fact at first a

mere unlimited cogitative potentiality;[174] like a tablet, upon

which no letters have as yet been written, but upon which all or any

letters _may be_ written.[175]

[Footnote 171: Ibid. II. v. p. 417, b. 22.]

[Footnote 172: Aristot. De Animâ, III. iv. p. 429, a. 31.]

[Footnote 173: Ibid. a. 22: [Greek: o( a)/ra kalou/menos tê=s

psuchê=s nou=s (le/gô de\ nou=n ô(=| dianoei=tai kai\ u(polamba/nei

ê( psuchê/) ou)the/n e)stin e)nergei/a| tô=n o)/ntôn pri\n noei=n.]]

[Footnote 174: Ibid. a. 21: [Greek: ô(/ste mêd' au)tou= ei)=nai

phu/sin mêdemi/an a)ll' ê)\ tau/tên, o(/ti dunato/n.]]

[Footnote 175: Ibid. p. 430, a. 1.]

We have already said that the Noûs of the human soul emanates from a

peculiar influence of the celestial body, which is the special region

of Form in the Kosmos. Through it we acquire an enlarged power of

apprehending the abstract and universal; we can ascend above sensible

forms to the cogitable forms contained therein; we can consider all

forms in themselves, without paying attention to the matter wherein

they are embodied. Instead of considering the concrete solid or

liquid before us, we can mentally analyse them, and thus study

solidity in the abstract, fluidity in the abstract. While our senses

judge of water as hot and cold, our noëtic function enables us to

appreciate water in the abstract--to determine its essence, and to

furnish a definition of it.[176] In all these objects, as

combinations of Form with Matter, the cogitable form exists

potentially; and is abstracted or considered abstractedly, by the

cogitant Noûs.[177] Yet this last (as we have already seen) cannot

operate except along with and by aid of phantasms--of impressions

revived or remaining from sense. It is thus immersed in the materials

of sense, and has no others. But it handles them in a way of its own,

and under new points of view; comparing and analysing; recognizing

the abstract in the concrete, and the universal in the particular;

discriminating mentally and logically the one from the other; and

noting the distinction by appropriate terms. Such distinctions are

the _noümena_, generated in the process of cogitation by Noûs itself.

The Noûs, as it exists in any individual, gradually loses its

original character of naked potentiality, and becomes an actual

working force, by means of its own acquired materials.[178] It is an

aggregate of _noümena_, all of them in nature identical with itself;

and, while cogitating them, the Noûs at the same time cogitates

itself. Considered abstractedly, apart from matter, they exist only

in the mind itself; in theoretical speculation, the _cognoscens_ and

the _cognitum_ are identical. But they are not really separable from

matter, and have no reality apart from it.

[Footnote 176: Ibid. p. 429, b. 10.]

[Footnote 177: Ibid. p. 430, a. 2-9.]

[Footnote 178: Aristot. De Animâ, II. v. p. 417, b. 23. Ibid. III.

iv. p. 429, b. 7: [Greek: o(/tan du/nêtai e)nergei=n di' au(tou=.]]

The distinction, yet at the same time correlation, between Form and

Matter, pervades all nature (Aristotle affirms), and will be found in

the Noûs as elsewhere. We must recognize an _Intellectus Agens_ or

constructive, and an _Intellectus Patiens_ or receptive.[179] The

_Agens_ is the great intellectual energy pervading the celestial

body, and acting upon all the animals susceptible of its operation;

analogous to light, which illuminates the diaphanous medium, and

elevates what was mere potential colour into colour actual and

visible.[180] The _Patiens_ is the intellectual receptivity acted

upon in each individual, and capable of being made to cogitate every

thing; anterior to the _Agens_, in time, so far as regards the

individual, yet as a general fact (when we are talking of man as a

species) not anterior even in time, but correlative. Of the two, the

_Intellectus Agens_ is the more venerable; it is pure intellectual

energy, unmixed, unimpressible from without, and separable from all

animal body. It is this, and nothing more, when considered apart from

animal body; but it is then eternal and immortal, while the

_Intellectus Patiens_ perishes with the remaining soul and with the

body. Yet though the _Intellectus Agens_ is thus eternal, and though

_we_ have part in it, we cannot remember any of its operations

anterior to our own maturity; for the concurrence of the _Intellectus

Patiens_, which begins and ends with us, is indispensable both to

remembrance and to thought.[181]

[Footnote 179: Ibid. III. v. p. 430, a. 10.]

[Footnote 180: Ibid. a. 14: [Greek: kai\ e)/stin o( me\n toiou=tos

nou=s tô=| pa/nta gi/nesthai, o( de\ tô=| pa/nta poiei=n, ô(s e(/xis

tis, oi(=on to\ phô=s; tro/pon ga/r tina kai\ to\ phô=s poiei= ta\

duna/mei o)/nta chrô/mata e)nergei/a| chrô/mata.] Aristotle here

illustrates [Greek: nou=s poiêtiko/s] by [Greek: phô=s] and [Greek:

e(/xis]; and we know what view he takes of [Greek: phô=s] (De Animâ,

II. vii. p. 418, b. 9) as the [Greek: e)ne/rgeia] or [Greek: e(/xis

tou= diaphanou=s]--which _diaphanous_ he explains to be a [Greek:

phu/sis tis e)nupa/rchousa e)n a)e/ri kai\ u(/dati kai\ e)n tô=|

a)i+di/ô| tô=| a)/nô sô/mati]. Judging by this illustration, it seems

proper to couple the [Greek: nou=s poiêtiko/s] here with his

declaration in De Generat. Animal. II. p. 736, b. 28: [Greek: to\n

nou=n mo/non thu/rathen e)peise/nai kai\ thei=on ei)=nai mo/non]: he

cannot consider the [Greek: nou=s poiêtiko/s], which is of the nature

of Form, as belonging to each individual man like the [Greek: nou=s

pathêtiko/s].]

[Footnote 181: Aristot. De Animâ, III. v. p. 430, a. 17: [Greek: kai\

ou(=tos o( nou=s] (_i. e._ [Greek: poiêtiko/s) chôristo\s kai\

a)pathê\s kai\ a)migê/s, tê=| ou)si/a| ô)\n e)ne/rgeia; a)ei\ ga\r

timiô/teron to\ poiou=n tou= pa/schontos, kai\ ê( a)rchê\ tê=s

u(/lês.]--Ibid. a. 22: [Greek: chôristhei\s d' e)sti\ mo/non tou=th'

o(/per e)sti/, kai\ tou=to mo/non a)tha/naton kai\ a)i+/dion; ou)

mnêmoneu/omen de/, o(/ti tou=to me\n a)pathe/s, o( de\ pathêtiko\s

nou=s phtharto/s, kai\ a)/neu tou/tou ou)the\n noei=.] In this

obscure and difficult chapter (difficult even to Theophrastus the

friend and pupil of the author), we have given the best meaning that

the words seem to admit.]

We see here the full extent of Aristotle's difference from the

Platonic doctrine, in respect to the immortality of the soul. He had

defined soul as the first actualization of a body having potentiality

of life with a determinate organism. This of course implied, and he

expressly declares it, that soul and body in each individual case

were one and indivisible, so that the soul of Sokrates perished of

necessity with the body of Sokrates.[182] But he accompanied that

declaration with a reserve in favour of Noûs, and especially of the

theorizing Noûs; which he recognized as a different sort of soul, not

dependent on a determinate bodily organism, but capable of being

separated from it, as the eternal is from the perishable.[183] The

present chapter informs us how far such reserve is intended to go.

That the theorizing Noûs is not limited, like the sentient soul, to a

determinate bodily organism, but exists apart from that organism and

eternally--is maintained as incontestable: it is the characteristic

intellectual activity of the eternal celestial body and the divine

inmates thereof. But the distinction of Form and Matter is here

pointed out, as prevailing in Noûs and in Soul generally, not less

than throughout all other Nature. The theorizing Noûs, as it exists

in Sokrates, Plato, Demokritus, Anaxagoras, Empedokles, Xenokrates,

&c., is individualized in each, and individualized differently in

each. It represents the result of the _Intellectus Agens_ or Formal

Noûs, universal and permanent, upon the _Intellectus Patiens_ or

noëtic receptivity peculiar to each individual; the co-operation of

the two is indispensable to sustain the theorizing intellect of any

individual man. But the _Intellectus Patiens_, or _Receptivus_,

perishes along with the individual. Accordingly, the intellectual

life of Sokrates cannot be continued farther. It cannot be prolonged

after his sensitive and nutritive life has ceased; the noëtic

function, as it exists in him, is subject to the same limits of

duration as the other functions of the soul. The intellectual man is

no more immortal than the sentient man.

[Footnote 182: Ibid. II. i. p. 413, a. 3.]

[Footnote 183: Ibid. ii. p. 413, b. 24: [Greek: peri\ de\ tou= nou=

kai\ tê=s theôrêtikê=s duna/meôs ou)de/n pô phanero/n, a)ll' e)/oike

psuchê=s ge/nos e(/teron ei)=nai, kai\ tou=to mo/non e)nde/chetai

chôri/zesthai, katha/per to\ a)i+/dion tou= phthartou=.]]

Such is the opinion here delivered by Aristotle. And it follows

indeed as a distinct corollary from his doctrine respecting animal

and vegetable procreation in general. Individuality (the being _unum

numero_ in a species) and immortality are in his view incompatible

facts; the one excludes the other. In assigning (as he so often does)

a final cause or purpose to the wide-spread fact of procreation of

species by animals and vegetables, he tells us that every individual

living organism, having once attained the advantage of existence,

yearns and aspires to prolong this for ever, and to become immortal.

But this aspiration cannot be realized; Nature has forbidden it, or

is inadequate to it; no individual can be immortal. Being precluded

from separate immortality, the individual approaches as near to it as

is possible, by generating a new individual like itself, and thus

perpetuating the species. Such is the explanation given by Aristotle

of the great fact pervading the sublunary, organized

world[184]--immortal species of plants, animals, and men, through a

succession of individuals each essentially perishable. The general

doctrine applies to Noûs as well as to the other functions of the

soul. Noûs is immortal; but the individual Sokrates, considered as

noëtic or intellectual, can no more be immortal than the same

individual considered as sentient or reminiscent.

[Footnote 184: Aristot. De Generat. Animal. II. i. p. 731, b. 20,

seq.; De Animâ, II. iv. p. 415, a. 26, seq.; OEconomica, I. iii. p.

1343, b. 23.]

We have already stated that Noûs--Intellect--the noëtic function--is

that faculty of the soul that correlates with the abstract and

universal; with Form apart from Matter. Its process is at once

analytical, synthetical, and retentive. Nature presents to us only

concretes and particulars, in a perpetual course of change and

reciprocal action; in these the abstract and universal are immersed,

and out of these they have to be disengaged by logical analysis. That

the abstract is a derivative from the concrete, and the universal

from particulars--is the doctrine of Aristotle. Ascending from

particulars, the analysis is carried so far that at length it can go

no farther. It continues to divide until it comes to _indivisibles_,

or simple notions, the highest abstractions, and the largest

universals. These are the elements out of which universal

propositions are formed, the first premisses or _principia_ of

demonstration. Unphilosophical minds do not reach these indivisibles

at all: but it is the function of the theorizing Noûs to fasten on

them, and combine them into true propositions. In so far as regards

the indivisibles themselves, falsehood is out of the question, and

truth also, since they affirm nothing. The mind either apprehends

them, or it does not apprehend them: there is no other

alternative.[185] But, when combined into affirmative propositions,

they then are true or false, as the case may be. The formal essence

of each object is among these indivisibles, and is apprehended as

such by the intellect; which, while confining itself to such essence,

is unerring, as each sense is in regard to its own appropriate

perceivables.[186] But, when the intellect goes father, and proceeds

to predicate any attribute respecting the essence, then it becomes

liable to error, as sense is when drawing inferences.

[Footnote 185: Aristot. De Animâ, III. vi. p. 430, a. 26: [Greek: ê(

me\n ou)=n tô=n a)diaire/tôn no/êsis e)n tou/tois peri\ a(\ ou)k

e)/sti to\ pseu=dos; e)n oi(=s de\ kai\ to\ pseu=dos kai\ to\

a)lêthe/s, su/nthesi/s tis ê)/dê noêma/tôn ô(/sper e(\n

o)/ntôn.]--Metaphysica, [Greek: Th]. x. p. 1051, b. 31: [Greek:

peri\ tau=ta ou)k e)/stin a)patêthê=nai, a)ll' ê)\ noei=n ê)\ mê/.]]

[Footnote 186: Aristot. De Animâ, III. vi. p. 430, b. 29. This

portion of the treatise is peculiarly confused and difficult to

understand.]

One of the chief functions that Aristotle assigns to Noûs, or the

noëtic function, is that the _principia_ of demonstration and

knowledge belong to it; and not merely the _principia_, but also, in

cases of action preceded by deliberation and balance of motives, the

ultimate application of _principia_ to action. So that he styles Noûs

both beginning and end; also the beginning of the beginning; and,

moreover, he declares it to be always right and unerring--equal to

Science and even more than Science.[187] These are high praises,

conveying little information, and not reconcilable with other

passages wherein he speaks of the exercise of the noëtic function

([Greek: to\ noei=n]) as sometimes right, sometimes wrong.[188] But,

for the question of psychology, the point to be determined is, in

what sense he meant that _principia_ belonged to Noûs. He certainly

did not mean that the first principles of reasoning were novelties

originated, suggested, or introduced into the soul by noëtic

influence. Not only he does not say this, but he takes pains to

impress the exact contrary. In passages cited a few pages back, he

declares that Noûs in entering the soul brings nothing whatever with

it; that it is an universal potentiality--a capacity in regard to

truth, but nothing more;[189] that it is in fact a capacity not

merely for comparing and judging (to both of which he recognizes even

the sentient soul as competent), but also for combining many into

one, and resolving the apparent one into several; for abstracting,

generalizing, and selecting among the phantasms present, which of

them should be attended to, and which should be left out of

attention.[190] Such is his opinion about the noëtic function; and he

states explicitly that the abstract and universal not only arise from

the concrete and particular, but are inseparable from the same

really--separable only logically.

[Footnote 187: Aristot. Ethic. Nikomach. VI. xii. p. 1143, a. 25, b.

10: [Greek: dio\ kai\ a)rchê\ kai\ te/los nou=s].--Analyt. Post. II.

xviii. p. 100, b. 5.]

[Footnote 188: Aristot. De Animâ, III. iii. p. 427, b. 8: [Greek:

a)ll' ou)de\ to\ noei=n, e)n ô(=| e)/sti to\ o)rthô=s kai\ mê\

o)rthô=s--dianoei=sthai d' e)nde/chetai kai\ pseudô=s.]]

[Footnote 189: Ibid. I. ii. p. 404, a. 30, where he censures

Demokritus: [Greek: ou) dê\ chrê=tai tô=| nô=| ô(s duna/mei tini\

peri\ tê\n a)lê/theian, a)lla\ tau)to\ le/gei psuchê\n kai\

nou=n.]--Compare ibid. III. iv. p. 429, a. 21, b. 30.]

[Footnote 190: Aristot. De Animâ, III. vi. p. 430, b. 5: [Greek: to\

de\ e(\n poiou=n, tou=to o( nou=s e(/kaston].--Ibid. xi. p. 434, a.

9.]

He describes, at the end of the Analytica Posteriora and elsewhere,

the steps whereby the mind ascends gradually from sense, memory, and

experience, to general principles. And he indicates a curious

contrast between these and the noëtic functions. Sense, memory,

phantasy, reminiscence, are movements of the body as well as of the

soul; our thoughts and feelings come and go, none of them remaining

long. But the noëtic process is the reverse of this; it is an arrest

of all this mental movement, a detention of the fugitive thoughts, a

subsidence from perturbation--so that the attention dwells steadily

and for some time on the same matters.[191] Analysis, selection, and

concentration of attention, are the real characteristics of the

Aristotelian Noûs. It is not (as some philosophers have thought) a

source of new general truths, let into the soul by a separate door,

and independent of experience as well as transcending experience.

[Footnote 191: Aristot. Physica, VII. iii. p. 247, b. 9: [Greek: ê(

d' e)x a)rchê=s lê=psis tê=s e)pistê/mês ge/nesis ou)k e)/stin; tô=|

ga\r ê)remê=sai kai\ stê=nai tê\n dia/noian e)pi/stasthai kai\

phronei=n le/gomen.]--Also De Animâ, I. iii. p. 407, b. 32, and the

remarkable passage in the Analytica Poster. II. xviii. p. 100,

a. 3-b. 5.]

Passing now to the Emotions, we find that these are not

systematically classified and analysed by Aristotle, as belonging to

a scheme of Psychology; though he treats them incidentally, with

great ability and acuteness, both in his Ethics, where he regards

them as auxiliaries or impediments to a rational plan of life, and in

his Rhetoric, where he touches upon their operation as it bears on

oratorical effect. He introduces however in his Psychology some

answer to the question, What is it that produces local movement in

the animal body? He replies that movement is produced both by Noûs

and by Appetite.

Speaking strictly, we ought to call Appetite alone the direct

producing cause, acted upon by the _appetitum_, which is here the

_Primum Movens Immobile_. But this _appetitum_ cannot act without

coming into the intellectual sphere, as something seen, imagined,

cogitated.[192] In this case the Noûs or Intellect is stimulated

through appetite, and operates in subordination thereto. Such is the

Intellect, considered as Practical, the principle or determining

cause of which is the _appetitum_ or object of desire; the Intellect

manifesting itself only for the sake of some end, to be attained or

avoided. Herein it is distinguished altogether from the Theoretical

Noûs or Intellect, which does not concern itself with any _expetenda_

or _fugienda_ and does not meddle with conduct. The _appetitum_ is

good, real or apparent, in so far as it can be achieved by our

actions. Often we have contradictory appetites; and, in such cases,

the Intellect is active generally as a force resisting the present

and caring for the future. But Appetite or Desire, being an energy

including both soul and body, is the real and appropriate cause that

determines us to local movement, often even against strong opposition

from the Intellect.[193]

[Footnote 192: Aristot. De Animâ, III. x. p. 433, b. 11: [Greek:

prô=ton de\ pa/ntôn to\ o)rekto/n (tou=to ga\r kinei= ou) kinou/menon

tô=| noêthê=nai ê)\ phantasthê=nai).]]

[Footnote 193: Aristot. De Animâ, III. x. p. 433, a. 25, b. 19:

[Greek: dio\ e)n toi=s koinoi=s sô/matos kai\ psuchê=s e)/rgois],

&c.]

Aristotle thus concludes his scheme of Psychology, comprehending all

plants as well as all animals; a scheme differing in this respect, as

well as in others, from the schemes of those that had preceded him,

and founded upon the peculiar principles of his own First Philosophy.

Soul is to organized body as Form to Matter, as Actualizer to the

Potential; not similar or homogeneous, but correlative; the two being

only separable as distinct logical points of view in regard to one

and the same integer or individual. Aristotle recognizes many

different varieties of Soul, or rather many distinct functions of the

same soul, from the lowest or most universal, to the highest or most

peculiar and privileged; but the higher functions presuppose or

depend upon the lower, as conditions; while the same principle of

Relativity pervades them all. He brings this principle prominently

forward, when he is summing up[194] in the third or last book of the

treatise De Animâ:--"The Soul is in a certain way all existent

things; for all of them are either Perceivables or Cogitables; and

the Cogitant Soul is in a certain way the matters cogitated, while

the Percipient Soul is in a certain way the matters perceived." The

Percipient and its _Percepta_--the Cogitant and its _Cogitata_--each

implies and correlates with the other: the Percipient is the highest

Form of all _Percepta_; the Cogitant is the Form of Forms, or the

highest of all Forms, cogitable or perceivable.[195] The Percipient

or Cogitant Subject is thus conceived only in relation to the Objects

perceived or cogitated, while these Objects again are presented as

essentially correlative to the Subject. The realities of Nature are

particulars, exhibiting Form and Matter in one: though, for purposes

of scientific study--of assimilation and distinction--it is necessary

to consider each of the two abstractedly from the other.

[Footnote 194: Ibid. viii. p. 431, b. 20, seq.: [Greek: nu=n de\

peri\ psuchê=s ta\ lechthe/nta sugkephalaiô/santes, ei)/pômen pa/lin

o(/ti ê( psuchê\ ta\ o)/nta pô/s e)sti pa/nta. ê)\ ga\r ai)sthêta\

ta\ o)/nta ê)\ noêta/, e)/sti de\ ê( e)pistê/mê me\n ta\ e)pistêta/

pôs, ê( d' ai)/sthêsis ta\ ai)sthêta/.]]

[Footnote 195: Ibid. p. 432, a. 2: [Greek: o( nou=s ei)=dos ei)dô=n,

kai\ ê( ai)/sthêsis ei)=dos ai)sthêtô=n.]]

CHAPTER XIII.

ETHICA.

I.

The Ethics of Aristotle presuppose certain conditions in the persons

to whom they are addressed, without which they cannot be read with

profit. They presuppose a certain training, both moral and

intellectual, in the pupil.

First, the reason of the pupil must be so far developed, as that he

shall be capable of conceiving the idea of a scheme of life and

action, and of regulating his momentary impulses more or less by a

reference to this standard. He must not live by passion, obeying

without reflection the appetite of the moment, and thinking only of

grasping at this immediate satisfaction. The habit must have been

formed of referring each separate desire to some rational measure,

and of acting or refraining to act according as such a comparison may

dictate. Next, a certain experience must have been acquired

concerning human affairs, and concerning the actions of men with

their causes and consequences. Upon these topics all the reasonings

and all the illustrations contained in every theory of Ethics must

necessarily turn: so that a person thoroughly inexperienced would be

incompetent to understand them.

For both these two reasons, no youthful person, nor any person of

mature years whose mind is still tainted with the defects of youth,

can be a competent learner of Ethics or Politics (Eth. Nic. i. 7.

Compare vii. 8). Such a pupil will neither appreciate the reasonings,

nor obey the precepts (i. 3).

Again, a person cannot receive instruction in Ethics with advantage

unless he has been subjected to a good practical discipline, so as to

have acquired habits of virtuous action, and to have been taught to

feel pleasure and pain on becoming occasions and in reference to

becoming objects. Unless the circumstances by which he has been

surrounded and the treatment which he has received, have been such as

to implant in him a certain vein of sentiment and to give a certain

direction to his factitious pleasures and pains--unless obedience to

right precepts has to a certain degree been made habitual with

him--he will not be able to imbibe, still less to become attached to,

even the _principia_ of ethical reasoning (Eth. Nic. i. 4. 7). The

well-trained man, who has already acquired virtuous habits, has within

himself the [Greek: a)rchê\], or beginning, from which happiness

proceeds: he may do very well, even though the reason on which these

habits were formed should never become known to him: but he will at

least readily apprehend and understand the reason when it is

announced. The [Greek: a)rchai\] or beginnings to which ethical

philosophy points and from whence the conduct which it enjoins is

derived, are obtained only by habituation, not by induction nor by

perception, like other [Greek: a)rchai/]: and we ought in all our

investigations to look after the [Greek: a)rchê\] in the way which

the special nature of the subject requires, and to be very careful to

define it well (i. 4, i. 7).

In considering Aristotle's doctrine respecting the [Greek: a)rchai\]

of ethical and political science, and the way in which they are to be

discovered and made available, we should keep in mind that he

announces the end and object of these sciences to be, not merely the

enlargement of human knowledge, but the determination of human

conduct towards certain objects: not theory, but practice: not to

teach us what virtue is, but to induce us to practise it--"Since then

the present science is not concerned with speculation, _like the

others_. For here we enquire, not in order that we may know what

virtue is, but in order that we may become good, otherwise there

would be no profit in the enquiry" (ii. 2. _See_ also i. 2, i. 5, vi.

5).

The remarks which Aristotle makes about the different ways of finding

out and arriving at [Greek: a)rchai\], are curious. Some principles

or beginnings are obtained by _induction_--others by

_perception_--others by habituation in a certain way--others again in

other ways. Other modes of arriving at [Greek: a)rchai\] are noticed

by the philosopher himself in other places. For example, the [Greek:

a)rchai\] of demonstrative science are said to be discovered by

intellect ([Greek: nou=s])--vi. 6-7. There is a passage however in

vi. 8 in which he seems to say that the [Greek: a)rchai\] of the wise

man ([Greek: so/phos]) and the natural man ([Greek: phusiko\s]) are

derived from experience: which I find it difficult to reconcile with

the preceding chapters, where he calls wisdom a compound of intellect

and science ([Greek: e)pistê/mê]), and where he gives Thales and

Anaxagoras as specimens of wise men. By vi. 6--it seems that wisdom

has reference to matters of demonstrative science: how then can it be

true that a youth may be a mathematician without being a wise man?

Moreover, Aristotle takes much pains, at the commencement of his

treatise on Ethics, to set forth the inherent intricacy and obscurity

of the subject, and to induce the reader to be satisfied with

conclusions not absolutely demonstrative. He repeats this observation

several times--a sufficient proof that the evidence for his own

opinions did not appear to himself altogether satisfactory (Eth. Nic.

i. 3, i. 7, ii. 2). The completeness of the proof (he says) must be

determined by the subject-matter: a man of cultivated mind will not

ask for better proof than the nature of the case admits: and human

action, to which all ethical theory relates, is essentially

fluctuating and uncertain in its consequences, so that every general

proposition which can be affirmed or denied concerning it, is subject

to more or less of exception. If this degree of uncertainty attaches

even to general reasonings on ethical subjects, the particular

applications of these reasonings are still more open to mistake: the

agent must always determine for himself at the moment, according to

the circumstances of the case, without the possibility of sheltering

himself under technical rules of universal application: just as the

physician or the pilot is obliged to do in the course of his

profession. "Now the actions and the interests of men exhibit no

fixed rule, just like the conditions of health. And if this is the

case with the universal theory, still more does the theory that

refers to particular acts present nothing that can be accurately

fixed; for it falls not under any art or any system, but the actors

themselves must always consider what suits the occasion, just as

happens in the physician's and the pilot's art. But though this is

the case with the theory at present, _we must try to give it some

assistance_" ([Greek: peirati/on boêthei=n ]).--Eth. Nic. 2.

The last words cited are remarkable. They seem to indicate, that

Aristotle regarded the successful prosecution of ethical enquiries as

all but desperate. He had previously said (i. 3)--"There is so much

difference of opinion and so much error respecting what is honourable

and just, of which political science treats, that these properties of

human action seem to exist merely by positive legal appointment, and

not by nature. And there is the same sort of error respecting what

things are good, because many persons have sustained injury from

them, some having already been brought to destruction through their

wealth, others through their courage."

One cannot but remark how entirely this is at variance with the

notion of a moral sense or instinct, or an intuitive knowledge of

what is right and wrong. Aristotle most truly observes that the

details of our daily behaviour are subject to such an infinite

variety of modifications, that no pre-established rules can be

delivered to guide them: we must act with reference to the occasion

and the circumstances. Some few rules may indeed be laid down,

admitting of very few exceptions: but the vast majority of our

proceedings cannot be subjected to any rule whatever, except to the

grand and all-comprehensive rule, if we are indeed so to call it, of

conforming to the ultimate standard of morality.

Supposing the conditions above indicated to be realized--supposing a

certain degree of experience in human affairs, of rational

self-government, and of habitual obedience to good rules of action,

to be already established in the pupil's mind, the theory of ethics

may then be unfolded to him with great advantage (i. 3). It is not

meant to be implied that a man must have previously acquired the

perfection of practical reason and virtue before he acquaints himself

with ethical theory; but he must have proceeded a certain way towards

the acquisition.

Ethics, as Aristotle conceives them, are a science closely analogous

to if not a subordinate branch of Politics. (I do not however think

that he employs the word [Greek: Ê)thikê\] in the same distinct and

substantive meaning as [Greek: politikê\ (e)pistê/mê)], although he

several times mentions [Greek: ta\ ê)thika\] and [Greek: ê)thikoi\

lo/goi].) Ethical science is for the individual what political

science is for the community (i. 2).

In every variety of human action, in each separate art and science,

the agents, individual or collective, propose to themselves the

attainment of some _good_ as the end and object of their proceedings.

Ends are multifarious, and good things are multifarious: but good,

under one shape or another, is always the thing desired by every one,

and the determining cause of human action ([Greek: ou(= pa/nta

e)phi/etai])--i. 1.

Sometimes the action itself, or the exercise of the powers implied in

the action, is the end sought, without anything beyond. Sometimes

there is an ulterior end, or substantive business, to be accomplished

by means of the action and lying beyond it. In this latter class of

cases, the ulterior end is the real good: better than the course of

action used to accomplish it--"the external results are naturally

([Greek: pe/phuke]) better than the course of action" (i. 1). Taking

this as a general position, it is subject to many exceptions: but the

word [Greek: pe/phuke] seems to signify only that such is naturally

and ordinarily the case, not that the reverse never occurs.

Again some ends are comprehensive and supreme; others, partial and

subordinate. The subordinate ends are considered with reference to

the supreme, and pursued as means to their accomplishment. Thus the

end of the bridle-maker is subservient to that of the horseman, and

the various operations of war to the general scheme of the commander.

The supreme, or _architectonic_, ends, are superior in eligibility to

the subordinate, or _ministerial_, which, indeed, are pursued only

for the sake of the former.

One end (or one _good_), as subordinate, is thus included in another

end (or another good) as supreme. The same end may be supreme with

regard to one end different from itself, and subordinate with regard

to another. The end of the general is supreme with reference to that

of the soldier or the maker of arms, subordinate with reference to

that of the statesman. In this scale of comprehensiveness of ends

there is no definite limit; we may suppose ends more and more

comprehensive as we please, and we come from thence to form the idea

of one most comprehensive and sovereign end, which includes under it

every other without exception--with reference to which all other ends

stand in the relation either of parts or of means--and which is

itself never in any case pursued for the sake of any other or

independent end. The end thus conceived is the _Sovereign Good of

man_, or _The Good_--_The Summum Bonum_--[Greek: Ta)gatho\n--To\

a)/riston--Ta)nthrô/pinon a)gatho/n] (i. 2).

To comprehend, to define, and to prescribe means for realizing the

Sovereign Good, is the object of _Political Science_, the paramount

and most architectonic Science of all, with regard to which all other

Sciences are simply ministerial. It is the business of the political

ruler to regulate the application of all other Sciences with

reference to the production of this his End--to determine how far

each shall be learnt and in what manner each shall be brought into

practice--to enforce or forbid any system of human action according

as it tends to promote the accomplishment of his supreme purpose--the

Sovereign Good of the Community. Strategical, rhetorical, economical,

science, are all to be applied so far as they conduce to this purpose

and no farther: they are all simply ministerial; political science is

supreme and self-determining (i. 2).

What _Political Science_ is for the community, _Ethical Science_ is

for the individual citizen. By this it is not meant that the

individual is to be abstracted from society or considered as living

apart from society: but simply that human action and human feeling is

to be looked at from the point of view of the individual, mainly and

primarily--and from the point of view of the society, only in a

secondary manner: while in political science, the reverse is the

case--our point of view is, first as regards the society;--next, and

subordinate to that, as regards the individual citizen (_See_ Eth.

Nic. vii. 8).

The object of the Ethical Science is, the Supreme Good of the

individual citizen--the End of all Ends, with reference to his

desires, his actions, and his feelings--the end which he seeks for

itself and without any ulterior aim--the end which comprehends all

his other ends as merely partial or instrumental and determines their

comparative value in his estimation (i. 2, i. 4).

It is evident that this conception of an End of all Ends is what Kant

would call an _Idea_--nothing precisely conformable to it, in its

full extent, can ever exist in reality. No individual has ever been

found, or ever will be found, with a mind so trained as to make every

separate and particular desire subservient to some general

preconceived End however comprehensive. But it is equally certain

that this subordination of Ends one to another is a process performed

to a greater or less degree in every one's mind, even in that of the

rudest savage. No man can blindly and undistinguishingly follow every

immediate impulse: the impulse, whatever it be, when it arises, must

be considered more or less as it bears upon other pursuits and other

objects of desire. This is an indispensable condition even of the

most imperfect form of social existence. In civilized society, we

find the process carried very far indeed in the minds of the greater

number of individuals. Every man has in his view certain leading

Ends, such as the maintenance of his proper position in society, the

acquisition of professional success, the making of his fortune, the

prosecution of his studies, &c., each of which is essentially

paramount and architectonic, and with reference to which a thousand

other ends are simply subordinate and ministerial. Suppose this

process to be pushed farther, and you arrive at the idea of an End

still more comprehensive, embracing every other end which the

individual can aspire to, and forming the central point of an

all-comprehensive scheme of life. Such a maximum, never actually

attainable, but constantly approachable, in reality, forms the Object

of Ethical Science. _Quorsum victuri gignimur_!

What is the Supreme Good--the End of all Ends? How are we to

determine wherein it consists, or by what means it is to be

attained--at least, as nearly attained as the limitations of human

condition permit? Ethical Science professes to point out what the end

ought to be--Ethical precepts are suggestions for making the closest

approaches to it which are practicable. Even to understand what the

end is, is a considerable acquisition: since we thus know the precise

point to aim at, even if we cannot hit it (i. 2).

The approaches which different men make towards forming this idea, of

an End of Ends or of a Supreme Good, differ most essentially:

although there seems a verbal agreement between them. Every man

speaks of _Happiness_ as his End of Ends ([Greek: o)no/mati

o(mologei=tai], i. 4): he wishes to live well or to do well, which he

considers to be the same as being happy. But men disagree exceedingly

in their opinions as to that which constitutes happiness: nay the

same man sometimes places it in one thing, sometimes in another--in

health or in riches, according as he happens to be sick or poor.

There are however three grand divisions, in one or other of which the

opinions of the great majority of mankind may be distributed. Some

think that happiness consists in a life of bodily pleasure ([Greek:

bi/os a)polaustiko/s]): others, in a life of successful political

action or ambition ([Greek: bi/os politiko/s]): others again, in a

life of speculative study and the acquisition of knowledge ([Greek:

bi/os theôrêtiko/s]). He will not consent to number the life of the

([Greek: chrêmatistê\s]) money-maker among them because he attains

his end at the expense of other people and by a force upon their

inclinations (this at least seems the sense of the words--[Greek: o(

ga\r chrêmatistê\s bi/aio/s ti/s e)sti]), and because wealth can

never be the good, seeing that it is merely useful for the sake of

ulterior objects.

(The reason which Aristotle gives for discarding from his catalogue

the life of the _money-seeker_, while he admits that of the

_pleasure-seeker_ and the _honour-seeker_, appears a very

inconclusive one. He believed them to be all equally mistaken in

reference to real happiness: the two last just as much as the first:

and certainly, if we look to prevalence in the world and number of

adherents, the creed of the first is at least equal to that of the

two last.)

The first of the three is the opinion of the mass, countenanced by

many Sovereigns such as Sardanapalus--it is more suitable to animals

than to men, in the judgment of Aristotle (i. 5).

Honour and glory--the reward of political ambition, cannot be the

sovereign good, because it is a possession which the person honoured

can never be sure of retaining: for it depends more upon the persons

by whom he is honoured than upon himself, while the ideas which we

form of the sovereign good suppose it to be something intimately

belonging to us and hard to be withdrawn (i. 5). Moreover those who

aspire to honour, desire it not so much on its own account as in

order that they may have confidence in their own virtue: so that it

seems even in their estimation as if virtue were the higher aim of

the two. But even virtue itself (meaning thereby the simple

possession of virtue as distinguished from the active habitual

exercise of it) cannot be the sovereign good: for the virtuous man

may pass his life in sleep or in inaction--or he may encounter

intolerable suffering and calamity (i. 5).

Besides, Happiness as we conceive it, is an End perfect, final,

comprehensive and all-sufficient--an end which we always seek on its

own account and never with a view to anything ulterior. But neither

honour, nor pleasure, nor intelligence, nor virtue, deserves these

epithets: each is an end special, insufficient, and not final--for

each is sought partly indeed on its own account, but partly also on

account of its tendency to promote what we suppose to be our

happiness (i. 7). The latter is the only end always sought

exclusively for itself: including as it always does and must do, the

happiness of a man's relatives, his children and his countrymen, or

of all with whom he has sympathies; so that if attained, it would

render his life desirable and wanting for nothing--[Greek: o(\

monou/menon, ai(reto\n poiei= to\n bi/on, kai\ mêdeno\s e)ndea=] (i.

7).

The remark which Aristotle here makes in respect to the final aim or

happiness of an individual--viz., that it includes the happiness of

his family and his countrymen and of those with whom he has

sympathies--deserves careful attention. It shows at once the

largeness and the benevolence of his conceptions. We arrive thus at

the same end as that proposed by political science--the happiness of

the community: but we reach it by a different road, starting from the

point of view of the individual citizen.

Having shown that this Happiness, which is "our being's end and aim,"

does not consist in any special acquisition such as pleasure, or

glory, or intelligence, or virtue, Aristotle adopts a different

method to show wherein it does consist. Every artist and every

professional man (he says--i. 7), the painter, the musician, &c., has

his peculiar business to do, and the _Good_ of each artist consists

in doing his business well and appropriately. Each separate portion

of man, the eye, the hand and the foot, has its peculiar function:

and in analogy with both these, man as such has his business and

function, in the complete performance of which human Good consists.

What is the business and peculiar function of Man, as Man? Not simply

Life, for that he has in common with the entire vegetable and animal

world: nor a mere sensitive Life, for that he has in common with all

Animals: it must be something which he has, apart both from plants

and animals--viz., an active life in conformity with reason ([Greek:

praktikê/ tis tou= lo/gon e)/chontos]); or the exercise of Reason as

a directing and superintending force, and the exercise of the

appetites, passions, and capacities, in a manner conformable to

Reason. This is the special and peculiar business of man: it is what

every man performs either well or ill: and the _virtue_ of a man is

that whereby he is enabled to perform it well. The Supreme Good of

humanity, therefore, consisting as it does in the due performance of

this special business of man, is to be found in the virtuous activity

of our rational and appetitive soul: assuming always a life of the

ordinary length, without which no degree of mental perfection would

suffice to attain the object. The full position will then stand

thus--"Happiness, or the highest good of a human being, consists in

the working of the soul and in a course of action, pursuant to reason

and conformable to virtue, throughout the full continuance of life."

(The argument respecting a man's proper business ([Greek: e)/rgon])

and virtue ([Greek: a)retê\]) seems to be borrowed from

Plato--Republic, i. c. 23, p. 352; c. 24, p. 353. Compare also

Xenophon--Memorabilia, iv. 2, 14.)

This explanation is delivered by Aristotle as a mere outline, which

he seems to think that any one may easily fill up (i. 7). And he

warns us not to require a greater degree of precision than the

subject admits of: since we ought to be content with a rough

approximation to the truth, and with conclusions which are not

universally true, but only true in the majority of instances, such

being the nature of the premisses with which we deal (i. 3).

Having determined in this manner what Happiness or the Supreme Good

consists in, Aristotle next shows that the explanation which he gives

of it conforms in a great degree to the opinions previously delivered

by eminent philosophers, and fulfils at least all the requisite

conditions which have ever been supposed to belong to Happiness (i.

8). All philosophers have from very early times agreed in

distributing good things into three classes--_Mental_, _Corporeal_,

and _External_. Now the first of these classes is incomparably the

highest and most essentially _good_ of the three: and the explanation

which Aristotle gives of happiness ranks it in the first class.

Again, various definitions of happiness have been delivered by

eminent authorities more or less ancient ([Greek: polloi\ kai\

palaioi/]). Eudoxus laid down the principle that happiness consists

in pleasure: others have maintained the opinion that it is entirely

independent both of pleasure and pain--that the former is no good,

and the latter no evil (i. 12, vii. 11-13, x. 1. 2). Some have placed

happiness in virtue: others in prudence: others in a certain sort of

wisdom ([Greek: sophi/a tis]): others have added to the definition

this condition, that pleasure or external prosperity should be

coupled with the above-mentioned objects (i. 8). The moral doctrines

propounded by Zeno and Epicurus were therefore in no way new: how far

the reasonings by which these philosophers sustained them were new we

cannot judge accurately, from the loss of the treatises of Eudoxus

and others to which Aristotle makes reference.

Now, in so far as virtue is introduced, the explanation of Happiness

given by Aristotle coincides with these philosophers and improves

upon them by substituting the active exercise of virtuous habits in

place of the mere possession of virtue. And in regard to pleasure,

the man who has once acquired habits of virtuous agency stands in no

need of pleasure from without, as a foreign accessory: for he finds

pleasure in his own behaviour, and he would not be denominated

virtuous unless he did so: "Now (he says) their life stands in no

need of pleasure, like an extraneous appendage, but has pleasure in

itself" (ii. 8). Again, ii. 3, he says that "the symptom of a perfect

habit is the pleasure or pain which ensues upon the performance of

the acts in which the habit consists: for the man who abstains from

bodily pleasures and rejoices in doing so, is temperate, while he who

does it reluctantly and painfully, is intemperate. And the man who

sustains dangers with pleasure, or at least without pain, is

courageous: if with pain, he is a coward. For ethical virtue has

reference to our pleasures and pains: it is on account of pleasure

that we commit vicious acts, and on account of pain that we shrink

from virtuous performances. Wherefore, as Plato directs, we ought to

be trained at once from our infancy by some means or other so as to

feel pleasure and pain from the proper sources: for that is the right

education."

Moreover, the man who is in the active exercise of virtue derives his

pleasure from the performance of that which is the appropriate

business of humanity, so that all his pleasures are _conformable to

the pleasures natural to man_ and therefore consistent with each

other: whereas the pleasures of most people are contradictory and

inconsistent with each other, because they are not conformable to our

nature (i. 8).

It is not easy to understand perfectly what Aristotle means by saying

that the things agreeable to the majority of mankind are not things

agreeable by nature. The construction above put upon this expression

seems the only plausible one--that those pleasures which inhere in

the performance of the appropriate business of man, are to be

considered as our natural pleasures; those which do not so inhere, as

not natural pleasures: inasmuch as they arise out of circumstances

foreign to the performance of our appropriate business.

This however hardly consists with the explanation which Aristotle

gives of [Greek: to\ phu/sei]--in another place and with reference to

another subject. In the Magna Moralia (i. 34, pp. 1194-1195 Bek.), in

distinguishing between _natural_ justice ([Greek: to\ di/kaion

phu/sei]) and _conventional_ justice ([Greek: to\ di/kaion no/mô|]),

he tells us that _the naturally just_ is that which most commonly

remains just. (Similarly Ethic. Eudem. iv. 14, p. 1217 Bek.) That

which exists by nature (he says) may be changed by art and practice;

the left hand may by these means be rendered as strong as the right

in particular cases, but if in the greater number of cases and for

the longer portion of time the left remains left and the right

remains right, this is to be considered as existing by nature.

If we are to consider that arrangement as natural which we find to

prevail in the greatest number of cases and for the greatest length

of time, then undoubtedly the pleasures arising out of virtuous

active behaviour must be regarded as less natural than those other

pleasures which Aristotle admits to form the enjoyment of the

majority of mankind.

But again there is a third passage, respecting nature and natural

arrangements, which appears scarcely reconcilable with either of the

two opinions just noticed. In Eth. Nicom. ii. 1: "Ethical virtue is a

result of habit, whence it is evident that not one of the ethical

virtues exists in us by nature. For none of those things which exist

by nature is altered by habit. For example, the stone which naturally

moves downwards cannot be habituated to move upwards, not even if a

man should endeavour so to habituate it by throwing it upwards ten

thousand times; nor in like manner fire downwards: nor can any other

of the things formed by nature in one way be changed by habit to any

other than that natural way. Virtues therefore are not generated in

us either _by_ nature, or _contrary_ to nature; but we are formed by

nature so as to be capable of receiving them, and we are perfected in

them through the influence of habit."

If it be true that nothing which exists in one manner by nature can

be changed by habit so as to exist in another manner, I do not see

how the assertion contained in the passage above cited out of the

Magna Moralia can be reconciled with it, where we are told--"For even

things which exist _by nature partake of change_. Thus if we all

should practise throwing with the left hand, we should become

ambidextrous: but still it is the left hand by nature, and the right

hand is not the less better by nature than the left, although we

should do everything with the left as we do with the right." (Mag.

Mor. i. 34, _ut sup._) In the one case he illustrates the meaning of

natural properties by the comparative aptitudes of the right and left

hand: in the other by the downward tendency of the stone. The idea is

plainly different in the one case and in the other.

On the other hand, there seems to be not less variance between the

one passage quoted out of the Nicomacheian Ethics and the other. For

in the passage last quoted, we are told that none of the ethical

virtues is generated in us by nature--neither by nature, nor contrary

to nature: nature makes us fit to receive them, habit introduces and

creates them--an observation perfectly true and accurate. But if this

was the sentiment of Aristotle, how could he also believe that the

pleasures arising out of the active manifestation of ethical virtue

were the natural pleasures of man? If ethical virtue does not come by

nature, the pleasures belonging to it cannot come by nature either.

On the whole, these three passages present a variance which I am

unable to reconcile in the meaning which Aristotle annexes to the

very equivocal word--_nature_.

Although Aristotle tells us that the active exercise of the functions

of the soul according to virtue confers happiness, yet he admits that

a certain measure of external comfort and advantages must be

superadded as an indispensable auxiliary and instrument. Disgusting

ugliness, bad health, low birth, loss of friends and relatives or

vicious conduct of friends and relatives, together with many other

misfortunes, are sufficient to sully the blessed condition of the

most virtuous man ([Greek: r(upai/nousi to\ maka/rion]--i. 8)--for

which reason it is that some persons have ranked both virtue and good

fortune as co-ordinate ingredients equally essential to happiness:

and have doubted also whether it can ever be acquired either by

teaching, or by training, or by any other method except chance or

Divine inspiration. To suppose that so magnificent a boon is

conferred by chance, would be an absurdity: it is a boon not unworthy

indeed of the Divine nature to confer; but still the magnificence of

it will appear equally great and equally undeniable, if we suppose it

to be acquired by teaching or training. And this is really the proper

account to give of the way in which Happiness is acquired: for the

grand and primary element in it, is the virtuous agency of the soul,

which is undoubtedly acquired by training: while external advantages,

though indispensable up to a certain limit, are acquired only as

secondary helps and instruments. The creation of these virtuous

habits among the citizens is one of the chief objects of political

science and legislation: when once acquired, they are the most

lasting and ineffaceable of all human possessions: and as they are

created by special training, they may be imparted to every man not

disqualified by some natural defect of organization, and may thus be

widely diffused throughout the community (i. 9).

This is an important property. If happiness be supposed to be derived

from the possession of wealth or honour or power, it can only be

possessed by a small number of persons. For these three considered as

objects of human desire, are essentially comparative. A man does not

think himself rich, or honoured, or powerful, unless he becomes so to

a degree above the multitude of his companions and neighbours.

Aristotle insists most earnestly that the only way of acquiring the

character proper for happiness is by a course of early and incessant

training in virtuous action. Moral teaching, he says, will do little

or nothing, unless it be preceded by, or at least coupled with, moral

training. Motives must be applied sufficient to ensure performance of

what is virtuous and abstinence from what is vicious, until such a

course of conduct becomes habitual, and until a disposition is

created to persevere in them. It is the business of the politician

and the legislator to employ their means of working upon the citizens

for the purpose of enforcing this training. It is not with virtue (he

says) as it is with those faculties which we receive ready-made from

nature, as for example, the external senses. We do not acquire the

faculty of sight by often seeing, but we have it from nature and then

exercise it: whereas with regard to virtue, we obtain our virtues by

means of a previous course of virtuous action, just as we learn other

arts. For those things which we must learn in order to do, we learn

by actually doing: thus by building we become builders, and by

harping we become harpers: by doing just and temperate and courageous

actions, we become just and temperate and courageous. All legislators

try, some in a better and others in a worse manner, to _ethise_

([Greek: e)thi/zontes])--to create habits among--the citizens for the

purpose of making them good. "In one word habits are created by

repeated action, wherefore our actions must be determined in a

suitable way, for according as they differ, so will our habits

differ. Nor is the difference small whether we are _ethised_ in one

way or in another, from our youth upwards: the difference is very

great, or rather it _is everything_" (ii. 1).

Neither an ox, nor a horse, can acquire such habits, and therefore

neither of them can be called happy: even a child cannot be called

so, except from the hope and anticipation of what he will become in

future years.

It may appear somewhat singular that Aristotle characterises a child

as incapable of happiness, since in common language a child when

healthy and well treated is described as peculiarly happy. But

happiness, as Aristotle understands it, is something measured more by

the estimate of the judicious spectator than by the sentiment of the

man in whose bosom it resides. No person is entitled to be called

_happy_, whom the intelligent and reflective observer does not

_macarise_ (or **_eudæmonise_), or whose condition he would

not desire more or less to make his own. Now the life of a child,

even though replete with all the enjoyments belonging to childhood,

is not such as any person in the state of mind of a mature citizen

could bring himself to accept (i. 10, x. 3). The test to which

Aristotle appeals, either tacitly or openly, seems always to be the

judgment of the serious man (i. 8, x. 5). It is no sufficient proof

of happiness that the person who feels it is completely satisfied

with his condition and does not desire anything beyond. Such

self-satisfaction is indeed necessary, but is not by itself

sufficient: it must be farther confirmed by the judgment of persons

without--not of the multitude, who are apt to judge by a wrong

standard--nor of princes, who are equally incompetent, _and who have

never tasted the relish of pure and liberal pleasures_ (x. 6)--but

of the virtuous and worthy, who have arrived at the most perfect

condition attainable by human beings (x. 5, x. 6, x. 8).

The different standard adopted by the many and by the more discerning

few, in estimating human happiness, is again touched upon in

Politica, vii. 1. It is in some respects treated more clearly and

simply in this passage than in the Ethics. Both the Many and the Few

(he says) agree that in order to constitute Happiness, there must be

a coincidence of the three distinct kinds of Good things--The

Mental--The Corporeal--The External. But with respect to the

proportions in which the three ought to be intermingled, a difference

of opinion arises. Most persons are satisfied with a very moderate

portion of mental excellence, while they are immoderate in their

desire for wealth and power ("For of virtue they think that they have

a sufficiency, whatever be the quantity they have; but of wealth and

possessions they seek the excess without bound."--Pol. vii. 1). On

the other hand, the opinion sanctioned by the few of a higher order

of mind, and adopted by Aristotle, was, that Happiness was possessed

in a higher degree by those who were richly set forth with moral and

intellectual excellence and only moderately provided with external

advantages, than by those in regard to whom the proportion was

reversed (_ib._). The same difference of estimate, between the few

and the many, is touched upon Polit. vii. 13, where he says that men

in general esteem external advantages to be the causes of happiness:

which is just as if they were to say that the cause why a musician

played well was his lyre, and not his proficiency in the art.

In this chapter of the Politica (vii. 13), he refers to the Ethica in

a singular manner. Having stated that the point of first importance

is, to determine wherein happiness consists, he proceeds to say--"We

have said also in the Ethics, _if there be any good in that treatise_

([Greek: ei)/ ti tô=n lo/gôn e)kei/nôn o)/phelos]), that it

(happiness) is the active exertion and perfected habit of

virtue."--This is a singular expression--"if there be any good in the

Ethics"--it seems rather to fall in with the several passages in that

treatise in which he insists upon the inherent confusion and darkness

of the subject-matter.

The definition of what happiness really is seems to be one of the

weak points of Aristotle's treatise. In a work addressed to the

public, it is impossible to avoid making the public judges of the

pleasure and pain, the happiness and unhappiness of individuals. A

certain measure of self-esteem on the part of the individual, and a

certain measure of esteem towards him on the part of persons without,

come thus to be regarded as absolutely essential to existence.

Without these, life would appear intolerable to any spectator

without, though the individual himself might be degraded enough to

cling to it. But these are secured by the ordinary morality of the

age and of the locality. The question arises as to degrees of virtue

beyond the ordinary level: Are we sure that such higher excellence

contributes to the happiness of the individual who possesses it?

Assuming that it does so contribute, are we certain that the

accession of happiness which he thereby acquires is greater than he

would have acquired by an increase of his wealth and power, his

virtue remaining still at the ordinary level? These are points which

Aristotle does not establish satisfactorily, although he professes to

have done so: nor do I think that they are capable of being

established. The only ground on which a moralist can inculcate

aspirations after the higher degrees of virtue, is, the gain which

thereby accrues to the happiness of others, not to that of the

individual himself.

Aristotle appeals to God as a proof of the superiority of an internal

source of happiness to an external source--vii. 1, "using God as a

witness who is happy and blessed, yet not through any external good,

but through Himself and from His own nature." Again, vii. 3, "For at

leisure God would be happy, and the whole universe ([Greek:

ko/smos]), who have no external actions except such as are proper to

themselves"--in proof of the superiority of a life of study and

speculation to a life of ambition and political activity. The same

argument is insisted upon in Eth. Nic. x. 8. It is to be observed

that the [Greek: Ko/smos] as well as God is here cited as

experiencing happiness.

The analogy to which Aristotle appeals here is undoubtedly to a

certain extent a just one. The most perfect happiness which we can

conceive--our Idea, to use Kant's phrase, of perfect happiness--is

that of a being who is happy in and for his own nature, with the

least possible aid from external circumstances--a being whose nature

or habits dispose him only to acts, the simple performance of which

confers happiness. But is this true of the perfectly virtuous nature

and habits? Does the simple performance of the acts to which they

dispose us, always confer happiness? Is not the existence of a very

high standard of virtuous exigency in a man's mind, a constant source

of self-dissatisfaction, from the difficulty of acting up to his own

ideas of what is becoming and commendable?

That the most virtuous nature is in itself and essentially the most

happy nature, is a point highly questionable--to say the least of it:

and even if we admit the fact, we must at the same time add that it

cannot appear to be so to ordinary persons without. The internal

pleasures of a highly virtuous man cannot be properly appreciated by

any person not of similar character. So that unless a person be

himself disposed to believe it, you could find no means of proving it

to him. To a man not already virtuous, you cannot bring this argument

persuasively home for the purpose of inducing him to become so.

In regard to prudence and temperance, indeed, qualities in the first

instance beneficial to himself, it is clear that the more perfectly

he possesses them, the greater and more assured will be his

happiness. But in regard to virtuous qualities, beneficial in the

first instance to others and not to himself, it can by no means be

asserted that the person who possesses these qualities in the highest

degree is happier than one who possesses them in a more moderate and

ordinary degree.

Aristotle indeed says that _the being just_ necessarily includes the

having pleasure in such behaviour: for we do not call a man just or

liberal unless he has a pleasure in justice or liberality (Eth. Nic.

i. 8). But this does not refute the supposition, that another man,

less just or liberal than he, may enjoy _greater happiness_ arising

out of other tastes and other conduct.

In order to sustain the conclusion of Aristotle respecting the

superior happiness of the virtuous man, it is necessary to assume

that the pleasures of self-esteem and self-admiration are generically

distinguished from other pleasures and entitled to a preference in

the eyes of every right judging person. And Aristotle does seem to

assume something of this nature. He says--x. 3--"Or that pleasures

differ in kind? For the pleasures arising from the honourable are

different from those arising from the base; and it is not the case

that the unjust man experiences the pleasure of the just, or he that

is unmusical that of the musician." The inherent difference between

various pleasures is again touched upon x. 5--"And since the

functions differ in goodness and badness--some of them being objects

of desire, others of them to be eschewed, and others of them

neither--so is it likewise with the pleasures: for each function has

its own pleasures. The pleasure then that is proper to the function

of good is good, and that which is proper to the function of bad is

bad; for the desires of things honourable are praiseworthy, those of

things base are to be blamed. And the pleasures attaching to them are

more proper to the functions than are the appetencies themselves." In

the next chapter, in that remarkable passage where he touches upon the

predilections of men in power for the society of jesters and amusing

companions ("The many have recourse to the amusements of those that

are accounted happy")--"For it is not in kingly power that you find

either virtue or intellect, on which the higher functions of man

depend. Nay, not if princes _who have never tasted the relish of pure

and liberal pleasure_, have recourse to the pleasures of the body, on

which account these must be thought the more desirable. For children

consider those things to be best that are held in honour among

themselves."

Here we have a marked distinction drawn between the different classes

of pleasures--some being characterised as good, some bad, some

indifferent. The best of all are those which the virtuous man enjoys,

and which _he_ considers the best: the pleasures inseparably annexed

to virtuous agency. These pleasures are thus assumed to be of a purer

and more exalted character, and to deserve a decided preference over

every other class of pleasures. And if this be assumed, the superior

happiness of the virtuous man follows as a matter of course.

I should observe that Aristotle considers happiness to consist in the

exercise of the faculties agreeably to virtue ([Greek: e)ne/rgeia

kat' a)retê\n])--the _pleasure_ ([Greek: ê(donê\]) is something

different from the exercise ([Greek: e)ne/rgeia])--inseparably

attending it, indeed, yet not the same--"conjoined with the functions

([Greek: e)nergei/ais]), and the two are so inseparable as to raise a

question whether the function is not identical with the pleasure" (x.

5). And he says, x. 7--"We think that pleasure should be mixed up

([Greek: paramemi/chthai]) with happiness."

It seems to be in the sense of self-esteem, which constitutes the

distinctive mark of virtuous agency, that Aristotle supposes

happiness to consist: the pleasure he supposes to be an inseparable

concomitant, but yet not the same. The self-esteem is doubtless often

felt in cases where a man is performing a painful duty--where the sum

total of feelings accompanying the performance of the act is the very

reverse of pleasurable. But still the self-esteem, or testimony of an

approving conscience, is _per se_ always pleasurable, and is in fact

the essential pleasure inherent in virtuous behaviour. I do not see

the propriety of the distinction here taken by Aristotle. He puts it

somewhat differently, Polit. vii. 1--"Living happily consists either

in joy or in virtue to men, or in both." And Polit. viii. 5--"For

happiness is a compound of both these (honour and pleasure)." So

Polit. viii. 3.

Happiness (again he says--Polit. vii. 13, p. 440 E. p. 286) consists

in the perfect employment and active exercise of virtue: and that

_absolutely_ (or under the most favourable external conditions)--not

under limitation ([Greek: e)x u(pothe/seôs]) or subject to very

trying and difficult circumstances. For a man of virtue may be so

uncomfortably placed that he has no course open to him except a

choice of evils, and can do nothing but make the best of a bad

position. Such a man will conduct himself under the pressure of want

or misfortune as well as his case admits: but happiness is out of his

reach. (Compare Eth. Nic. i. 10.) To be happy, it is necessary that

he should be so placed as to be capable of aspiring to the

accomplishment of positive good and advantage--he must be admitted to

contend for the great prizes, and to undertake actions which lead to

new honours and to benefits previously unenjoyed: he must be relieved

from the necessity of struggling against overwhelming calamities.

Aristotle tells us in the beginning of the Ethics (Eth. Nic. i.

3)--"But there is so much difference of opinion and so much error

respecting what is honourable and just, of which political science

treats, that these properties of human action seem to exist merely by

positive legal appointment, and not by nature. And there is the same

sort of error respecting what things are good." If there be this

widespread error and dissension among mankind with respect to the

determining of what is good and just, what standard has Aristotle

established for the purpose of correcting it? I do not find that he

has established any standard, nor even that he has thought it

necessary to make the attempt. There are indeed a great number of

observations, and many most admirable observations in his Treatise,

on the various branches of Virtue and Vice: many which tend to

conduct the mind of the reader unconsciously to the proper standard:

but no distinct announcement of any general principle, whereby a

dispute between two dissentient moralists may be settled. When he

places virtue in a certain mediocrity between excess on one side and

defect on the other, this middle point is not in any way marked or

discoverable: it is a point not fixed, but variable according to the

position of the individual agent, and is to be determinable in every

case by right reason and according to the judgment of the prudent

man--"in the mean _with reference to ourselves_, as _it has been

determined by reason_, and _as the prudent man_ ([Greek: o(

phro/nimos]) _would determine it_" (Eth. Nic. ii. 6). But though the

decision is thus vested in the prudent man, no mention is made of the

principle which the appointed arbiter would follow in delivering his

judgment, assuming a dispute to arise.

In a previous part of Chapter II., he defines "the mean with

reference to ourselves" to be "that which neither exceeds, nor falls

short of, _the rule of propriety_ ([Greek: tou= de/ontos]). But this

is not one, nor is it the same to all."

To render this definition sufficient and satisfactory, Aristotle

ought to have pointed out to us how we are to find out that _rule of

propriety_ ([Greek: to\ de/on]) which marks and constitutes the

medium point, of actions and affections, _in relation to

ourselves_--this medium point being in his opinion _virtue_. To

explain what is meant by a medium _in relation to ourselves_, by the

words [Greek: to\ de/on], _the rule of propriety_, is only a change

of language, without any additional information.

Thus the capital problem of moral philosophy still remains unsolved.

It is remarkable that Aristotle in some parts of his treatise states

very distinctly what this problem is, and what are the points

essential to its solution: he speaks as if he were fully aware of

that which was wanting to his own treatise, and as if he were

preparing to supply the defect: but still the promise is never

realized. Take for example the beginning of Book VI. Eth. Nic.

"Since it has been already laid down, that we ought to choose the

middle point and not either the excess or the defect--and since the

middle point is that which right reason determines--let us

distinguish what that is. For in all the mental habits which have

been described, as well as in all others also, there is a certain

aim, by a reference to which the rational being is guided either in

relaxing or in restricting: and there is a certain definite boundary

of those medial points, which we affirm to exist between excess and

defect, determinable according to right reason. To speak thus,

however, is indeed correct enough, but it gives no distinct

information ([Greek: ou)the\n de\ saphe/s]): for in all other modes

of proceeding which are governed by scientific principles it is quite

just to say that you ought neither to work nor to rest more than is

sufficient nor less than is sufficient, but to a degree midway

between the two and agreeably to right reason. But a man who has only

this information would be no wiser than he was before it, any more

than he would know what things he ought to apply to his body, by

being simply told that he must apply such things as medical science

and as the medical practitioner directed. Wherefore, with respect

also to the habits of the soul we must not be content with merely

giving a general statement in correct language, but we must farther

discriminate what right reason is, and what is its definition."

This is a very clear and candid statement of the grand and

fundamental defect in Aristotle's theory of Ethics. He says very

truly that "there is a certain end and aim ([Greek: sko/pos]), to

which a rational being has reference when he either restricts or

relaxes any disposition." It was incumbent on Aristotle to explain

what this [Greek: sko/pos] was; but this he never does, though he

seems so clearly to have felt the want of it. We might have supposed

that after he had pointed out what was required to impart specific

meaning to correct but vague generalities, he would have proceeded at

once to fill up the acknowledged chasm in his theory: but instead of

this, he enters into an analysis of the intellect, speculative and

practical, and explains the varieties of intellectual, as

contradistinguished from moral, excellence. This part of his work is

highly valuable and instructive: but I cannot find that he ever again

touches upon the [Greek: sko/pos], which had been admitted to be as

yet undetermined. In a certain sense, it is indeed true that he

endeavours "to discriminate what right reason is, and what is its

definition:" for he classifies the intellectual functions into

intellect ([Greek: nou=s]), science ([Greek: e)pistê/mê]), wisdom

([Greek: sophi/a]), art ([Greek: te/chnê]), prudence ([Greek:

phro/nêsis]): he states the general nature of each of these

attributes, and the range of subjects to which it applies. He tells

us that intellect and prudence have reference to human conduct--that

prudence is "concerned with things just and honourable and good for

man" (vii. 12)--"with the things of man, and those things regarding

which we deliberate" (vii. 7)--"prudence must needs be a true habit

according to reason, concerned with the good of man" (vii. 5). In

explaining what prudence is, he tells us that it is _according to

reason_: in explaining what is _right reason_, he tells us that it is

_according to prudence_. He thus seems to make use of each as a part

of the definition of the other. But however this may be, certain it

is that he never fulfils the expectation held out in the beginning of

the Sixth Book, nor ever clears up the [Greek: ou)de\n saphe\s] there

acknowledged.

There is one sentence at the beginning of vi. 5, which looks as if it

conveyed additional information upon the difficulty in question--"Now

it seems to belong to the prudent man to be able to deliberate aright

concerning the things that are good and profitable to himself--not in

part, as concerning the things that have a reference to health or

strength--but concerning the things that refer to the whole of

_living well_" ([Greek: pro\s to\ eu)= zê=|n]). But this in point of

fact explains nothing. For _living well_ is the same as _happiness_:

happiness is _the active exercise of the soul according to virtue_:

therefore _virtue_ must be known, before we can know what _living

well_ is.

I think that this [Greek: sko/pos] or end, which Aristotle alludes to

in the beginning of the Sixth Book as not having been yet made clear,

appears to be more distinctly brought out in a previous passage than

it is in any portion of the Treatise after the beginning of the Sixth

Book. In Book IV. 6, Aristotle treats of the virtues and defects

connected with behaviour in social intercourse: the _obsequious_ at

one extreme, the _peevish_ or _quarrelsome_ at the other: and the

becoming medium, though it had no special name, which lay between

them. Speaking of the person who adopts this becoming medium, he

says--"We have said generally, then, that he will associate with

people as he ought; and having, moreover, a constant reference to

what is honourable and what is expedient, he will aim at not giving

pain or at contributing pleasure."

Again in regard to Temperance--iii. 11--he states the [Greek:

sko/pos] of the temperate man--"What things have a reference to

health or vigour, and are agreeable, these he desires in measure and

as he ought; as well as the other agreeable things that are not

opposed to these, either as being contrary to what is honourable or

as being beyond his fortune. For he that desires things agreeable,

which yet are contrary to what is honourable or beyond his fortune,

loves these pleasures more than they are worth. But not so with the

temperate man who lives according to right reason."

These passages are not very distinct, as an explanation of the proper

[Greek: sko/pos]: but I cannot find any passages after the beginning

of the Sixth Book which are more distinct than they: or perhaps,

equally distinct.

In one passage of the Seventh Book, Aristotle refers, though somewhat

obscurely, to the average degree of virtue exhibited by the mass of

mankind as the standard to be consulted when we pronounce upon excess

or defect (vii. 7).

Aristotle seems in some passages to indicate pleasure and pain as the

end with reference to which actions or dispositions are denominated

_good_ and _evil_. He says--vii. 11--"To theorise respecting pleasure

and pain, is the business of the political philosopher: for he is the

architect of that end with reference to which we call each matter

either absolutely good or absolutely evil. Moreover, it is

indispensable to institute an enquiry respecting them: for we have

explained ethical virtue and vice as referring to pleasures and

pains: and most people affirm happiness to be coupled with pleasure:

for which reason they have named [Greek: to\ maka/rion a)po\ tou=

chai/rein]."

In Book VIII. 9-10, the [Greek: sko/pos] is indeed stated very

clearly, but _not as such_--not as if Aristotle intended to make it

serve as such, or thought that it ought to form the basis upon which

our estimate of what is the proper middle point should be found. In

viii. 9-10, he tells us that all justice and benevolence ([Greek: to\

di/kaion kai\ ê( phili/a]) is a consequence and an incident of

established communion among human beings ([Greek: koinôni/a])--that

the grand communion of all, which comprehends all the rest, is the

_Political Communion_--that the end and object of the _Political

Communion_, as well that for which it was originally created as that

for which it subsists and continues, is _the common and lasting

advantage_ ([Greek: to\ koinê=| su/mpheron])--that all other

communions, of relations, friends, fellow-soldiers, neighbours, &c.,

are portions of the all-comprehensive political communion, and aim at

realizing some partial advantage to the constituent members. These

chapters are very clear and very important, and they announce plainly

enough _the common and lasting interest_ as the foundation and

measure of justice as well as of benevolence. But they do not apply

the same measure, to the qualities which had been enumerated in the

Books prior to the Sixth, as a means of ascertaining where the middle

point is to be found which is alleged to constitute virtue.

Nevertheless, Aristotle tells us that it is in the highest degree

difficult to find the middle point which constitutes virtue (ii. 9).

It might seem at first sight not easy for Aristotle, consistently

with the plan of his treatise, to point out any such standard or

measure. For none can be mentioned, with any tolerable pretensions to

admissibility, except that of _tendency to promote happiness_--the

happiness both of the individual agent and of the society to which he

belongs. But as he had begun by introducing the ideas of reason and

virtue as media for explaining what happiness was, there would have

been at least an apparent incongruity in reverting back to the latter

as a means of clearing up what was obscure in the former. I say--_at

least an apparent incongruity_--because after all the incongruity is

more apparent than real. If we carefully preserve the distinction

between the happiness of the individual agent and the happiness of

the Society to which he belongs, it will appear that Aristotle might

without any inconsistency have specified the latter as being the

object to which reason has regard, in regulating and controlling the

various affections of each individual.

Wherein consists the happiness of an individual man? In a course of

active exertion of the soul conformably to virtue: _virtue_ being

understood to consist in a certain mediocrity of our various

affections as determined by _right reason_.

When we next enquire, to what standard does _right reason_ look in

making this determination? it may without inconsistency be

answered--_Right reason_ determines the proper point of mediocrity by

a reference to _happiness generally_--that is, to the happiness of

society at large, including that of the individual agent in

question--in other words, to _the common and lasting advantage_,

which Aristotle describes as the grand object of the statesman. There

is no inconsistency in reverting to happiness, thus explained, as the

standard by which right reason judges in controlling our different

affections.

In all moral enquiries, it is of the greatest importance to keep in

view the happiness of the individual, and the happiness of the

society at large, as two distinct and separate objects--which

coincide indeed [Greek: ô(s e)pi\ to\ polu/], in the majority of

instances and with regard to the majority of individuals--but which

do not coincide necessarily and universally, nor with regard to every

individual. A particular man may be placed in such a position, or

animated with such feelings, that his happiness may be promoted by

doing what is contrary to the happiness of the society. He will under

these circumstances do what is _good_ for himself but _bad_ for

others: he will do what is morally wrong, and will incur the blame of

society. In speaking of _good_ and _evil_ it is always necessary to

keep in mind, that what is _good_ for an individual may be _bad_ for

the society: I mean, understanding the words _good for an individual_

in the most comprehensive sense, as including all that he has to

suffer from the unfavourable sentiments of society. Much confusion

has arisen from moralists speaking of good and evil absolutely,

without specifying whether they meant _good_ for the individual or

for the society: more particularly in the writings of the ancient

philosophers.

From the manner in which Aristotle arrives at his definition of what

constitutes happiness, we might almost suppose that he would have

been led to the indication of the happiness of society at large as

the standard for right reason to appeal to. For in examining what is

the proper business of man in general, he has recourse to the analogy

of the various particular arts and professions--the piper, the

statuary, the carpenter, the carrier, &c. Each has his particular

business and walk of action, and in the performance of that business

consists _the good and the well_ in his case (i. 7). So in like

manner there is a special business for man in general, in the

performance of which we are to seek human good.

Now this analogy of particular artists and professional men might

have conducted Aristotle to the idea of the general happiness of

society as a standard. For the business of every artist or artisan

consists in conducing to the comfort, the protection, or the

gratification of the public, each in his particular walk:

professional excellence for them consists in accomplishing this

object perfectly. For every special profession therefore the

happiness of society at large, under one form or another, is

introduced as the standard by which good and excellence are to be

measured.

Apply this analogy to man in general, taken apart from any particular

craft or profession. If each man, considered simply as such, has his

appropriate business, in the good performance of which happiness for

him consists, the standard of excellence in respect to such

**performance is to be found in its conduciveness to the

happiness of society at large. It can be found nowhere else, if we

are to judge according to the analogy of special arts and

professions.

Until this want of a standard or measure is supplied, it is clear

that the treatise of Aristotle is defective in a most essential

point--a defect which is here admitted by himself in the first

chapter of the Sixth Book. Nor is there any other way of supplying

what is wanting except by reference to the general happiness of

society, the end and object (as he himself tells us) of the

statesman.

"What then," says Aristotle," prevents our calling him happy who is

in the active exercise of his soul agreeably to perfect virtue, and

is sufficiently well furnished with external goods, not for a casual

period but for a complete lifetime?" (i. 10). He thinks himself

obliged to add, however, that this is not quite sufficient--for that

after death a man will still be affected with sympathy for the good

or bad fortunes and conduct of his surviving relatives, affected

however faintly and slightly, so as not to deprive him of the title

to be called _happy_, if on other grounds he deserves it. The

deceased person sees the misfortunes of his surviving friends with

something of the same kind of sympathetic interest, though less in

degree, as is felt by a living person in following the representation

of a tragedy (i. 11). The difference between a misfortune, happening

during a man's life or after his death, is much greater than that

between scenic representation of past calamities and actual reality

(_ib._).

It seems as if Aristotle was reluctantly obliged to make this

admission--that deceased persons were at all concerned in the

calamities of the living--more in deference to the opinions of others

than in consequence of any conviction of his own. His language in the

two chapters wherein he treats of it is more than usually hesitating

and undecided: and in the beginning of Chapter XI., he says--"To have

no interest whatever in the fortunes of their descendants and

friends, seems exceedingly heartless and contrary to what we should

expect"--he then, farther on, states it to be a great matter of doubt

whether the dead experience either good or evil--but if anything of

the kind does penetrate to them, it must be feeble and insignificant,

so as to make no sensible difference to them.

II.

Aristotle distributes _good things_ into three classes--the

_admirable_ or worshipful--the _praiseworthy_--the _potential_.

1. _Good_--as an End: that which is worthy of being honoured and

venerated in itself and from its own nature, without regard to

anything ulterior: that which comes up to our idea of perfection.

2. _Good_--as a means: that which is good, not on its own account nor

in its own nature, but on account of certain ulterior consequences

which flow from it.

3. _Good_--as a means, but not a certain and constant means: that

which produces _generally_, but _not always_, ulterior consequences

finally good: that which, in order to produce consequences in

themselves good, requires to be coupled with certain concomitant

conditions.

1. _Happiness_ belongs to the first of these classes: it is put along

with _the divine_, _the better_, _soul_, _intellect_, _the more

ancient_, _the principle_, _the cause_, &c. (Mag. Moral. i. 2). Such

objects as these, we contemplate with awe and reverence.

2. _Virtue_ belongs to the second of the classes: it is good from the

acts to which it gives birth, and from the end (happiness) which

those acts, when sufficiently long continued, tend to produce.

3. _Wealth_, _power_, _beauty_, _strength_, &c., belong to the third

class: these are generally good because under most circumstances they

tend to produce happiness: but they may be quite otherwise, if a

man's mind be so defectively trained as to dispose him to abuse them.

It is remarkable that this classification is not formally laid down

and explained, but is assumed as already well known and familiar, in

the Nicom. Ethics, i. 12: whereas it is formally stated and explained

in the Magna Moralia, i. 2.

_Praise_, according to Aristotle, "does not belong to the best

things, but only to the second-best. The Gods are to be _macarised_,

not _praised_:" the praise of the Gods must have reference to

ourselves, and must be taken in comparison with ourselves and our

acts and capacities: and this is ridiculously degrading, when we

apply it to the majesty of the Gods. In like manner the most divine

and perfect men deserve to be macarised rather than praised. "No man

praises happiness, as he praises justice, but _macarises_ (_blesses_)

it as something more divine and better."

Happiness is to be numbered amongst the perfect and worshipful

objects--it is the [Greek: a)rchê\] for the sake of which all of us

do everything: and we consider the principle and the cause of all

good things to be something divine and venerable (i. 12).

Since then Happiness is the action of the soul conformably to perfect

virtue, it is necessary to examine what human virtue is: and this is

the most essential mark to which the true politician will direct his

attention (i. 13).

There are two parts of the soul--the rational and the irrational.

Whether these two are divisible in fact, like the parts of the body,

or whether they are inseparable in fact, and merely susceptible of

being separately dealt with in reasoning, like the concavity and

convexity of a circle, is a matter not necessary to be examined in

the present treatise. Aristotle speaks as if he considered this as

really a doubtful point.

Of the irrational soul, one branch is, the nutritive and vegetative

faculty, common to man with animals and plants. The virtue of this

faculty is not special to man, but common to the vegetable and animal

world: it is in fact most energetic during sleep, at the period when

all virtue special to man is for the time dormant (i. 13).

But the irrational soul has also another branch, the appetites,

desires, and passions: which are quite distinct from reason, but may

either resist reason, or obey it, as the case may happen. It may thus

in a certain sense be said to partake of reason, which the vegetative

and nutritive faculty does not in any way. The virtue of this

department of the soul consists in its due obedience to reason, as to

the voice of a parent (i. 13).

Human virtue, then, distributes itself into two grand divisions--1.

The virtue of the rational soul, or Intellectual Virtue. 2. The

virtue of the semi-rational soul, or Ethical Virtue.

Perhaps the word _Excellence_ more exactly corresponds to [Greek:

a)retê\], than _Virtue_.

Intellectual excellence is both generated and augmented by teaching

and experience. Ethical excellence by practical training. The

excellence is not natural to us: but we are susceptible of being

trained, and the training creates it. By training, according as it is

either good or bad, all excellence is either created or destroyed:

just as a man becomes a good or a bad musician, according as he has

been subjected to a good or a bad mode of practice.

It is by doing the same thing many times that we acquire at last the

habit of doing it--"For what things we have to learn to do, these we

learn by doing" (ii. 1): according as the things we are trained to do

are good or bad, we acquire good habits or bad habits. By building we

become builders, by playing on the harp we become harpers--good or

indifferent, according to the way in which we have practised. All

legislators wish and attempt to make their citizens good, by means of

certain habits: some succeed in the attempt, others fail: and this is

the difference between a good and a bad government. It is by being

trained to do acts of justice and courage that we become at last just

and courageous--"In one word, habits are generated by (a succession

of) like operations: for this reason it is the character of the

operations performed which we ought chiefly to attend to: for

according to the difference of these will be the habits which ensue.

It is therefore not a matter of slight difference whether immediately

from our earliest years we are _ethised_ in one way or in another--it

makes a prodigious difference--or rather, it makes the whole

difference" (ii. 1).

Uniform perseverance in action, then, creates a habit: but of what

nature is the required action to be? In every department of our

nature, where any good result is to be produced, we may be

disappointed of our result by two sorts of error: either an excess or

on the side of defect. To work or eat too much, or too little,

prevents the good effects of training upon the health and strength:

so with regard to temperance, courage and the other virtues--the man

who is trained to fear everything and the man who is trained to fear

nothing, will alike fail in acquiring the genuine habit of courage.

The acquisition of the habit makes the performance of the action

easy: by a course of abstinent acts, we acquire the habit of

temperance: and having acquired this habit, we can with the greater

ease perform the act of abstinence (ii. 2).

The symptom which indicates that the habit has been perfectly

acquired, is the facility or satisfaction with which the act comes to

be performed (ii. 3). The man who abstains from bodily pleasures, and

who performs this contentedly ([Greek: au)tô=| tou/tô| chai/rôn]), is

the _temperate_ man: the man who does the same thing but reluctantly

and with vexation ([Greek: a)chtho/nimos]) is _intemperate_: the like

with courage. Ethical excellence, or ethical badness, has reference

to our pleasures and pains: whenever we do any thing mean, or shrink

from any thing honourable, it is some pleasure or some pain which

determines our conduct: for which reason Plato rightly prescribes

that the young shall be educated even from the earliest moment so as

to give a proper direction to their pleasures and pains (ii. 3). By

often pursuing pleasure and pain under circumstances in which we

ought not to do so, we contract bad habits, by a law similar to that

which under a good education would have imparted to us good habits.

Ethical virtue then consists in such a disposition of our pleasures

and pains as leads to performance of the best actions. Some persons

have defined it to consist in apathy and imperturbability of mind:

but this definition is erroneous: the mind ought to be affected under

proper circumstances (ii. 3). (This seems to be the same doctrine

which was afterwards preached by the Stoic school.)

There are three ingredients which determine our choice, _the

honourable_--_the expedient_--_the agreeable_: and as many which

occasion our rejection--_the base_--_the inexpedient_--_the painful_

or _vexatious_. In respect to all these three the good man judges

rightly, the wicked man wrongly, and especially in regard to the

latter. Pleasure and pain are familiar to us from our earliest

childhood, and are ineffaceable from human nature: all men measure

and classify actions ([Greek: kanoni/zomen ta\s pra/xeis]) by

pleasure and pain: some men to a greater degree, others to a less

degree.

All ethical excellence, and all the political science, turns upon

pleasure and pain (ii. 3).

A man becomes just and temperate by doing just and temperate actions,

thus by degrees acquiring the habit. But how (it is asked) can this

be true? for if a man performs just and temperate actions, he must

already start by being just and temperate.

The objection is not well founded. A man may do just and temperate

actions, and yet not be just and temperate. If he does them, knowing

what he does, intending what he does, and intending to do the acts

for their own sake, then indeed he is just and temperate, but not

otherwise. The productions of art carry their own merit along with

them: a work of art is excellent or defective, whatever be the state

of mind of the person who has executed it. But the acts of a man

cannot be said to be justly or temperately done, unless there be a

certain state of mind accompanying their performance by the doer:

they may indeed be called just and temperate acts, meaning thereby

that they are such as a just and temperate man would do, but the man

who does them does not necessarily deserve these epithets. It is only

by frequent doing of acts of this class that a man can acquire the

habit of performing them intentionally and for themselves, in which

consists the just and temperate character. To know what such acts

are, is little or nothing: you must obey the precepts, just as you

follow the prescriptions of a physician. Many men think erroneously

that philosophy will teach them to be virtuous, without any course of

action adopted by themselves (ii. 4).

Aristotle classifies the phenomena of the soul (the non-rational

soul) into three--Passions--Capacities or Faculties--States. The

first are the occasional affections--anger, fear, envy, joy,

aversion--"in short, everything that is accompanied by pleasure or

pain" (ii. 5). The second are, the capacities of being moved by such

affections--the affective faculties, if one may so call them (_ib._

So Eth. Eudem. ii. 2). The third are, those habits according to which

we are said to be well or ill disposed towards this or that

particular affection: to be disposed to violent anger or violent

fear, is a bad habit. Virtues and vices are neither affections, nor

faculties, but habits, either good or bad. This is the genus to which

the virtues belong ([Greek: tô=| ge/nei]--Eth. Nic. ii. 5). Virtue is

that habit from the possession of which a man is called good, and by

which he performs well his appropriate function (ii. 6). It consists

in a certain medium between two extremes, the one of excess, the

other of defect--a medium not positive and absolute, but variable and

having reference to each particular person and each particular

case--neither exceeding nor falling short of what is proper (ii. 6).

All ethical virtue aims at the attainment of this middle point in

respect to our affections and actions--to exhibit each on the proper

occasions, in the proper degree, towards the proper persons, &c. This

middle point is but one, but errors on both sides of it are

numberless: it must be determined by reason and by the judgment of

the prudent man (ii. 6).

Virtue therefore, according to its essence and generic definition

([Greek: kata\ me\n tê\n ousi/an, kai\ to\n lo/gon to\n ti/ ê)n

ei)=nai le/gonta]), is a _certain mediocrity_.

But there are some actions and some affections which do not admit of

mediocrity, and which imply at once in their names evil and

culpability (ii. 6)--such as impudence, envy, theft, &c. Each of

these names implies in its meaning a certain excess and defect, and

does not admit of mediocrity: just as _temperance_ and _courage_

imply in their meaning the idea of mediocrity, and exclude both

excess and defect.

Aristotle then proceeds to apply his general doctrine--that virtue or

excellence consists in a medium between two extremes, both

defects--to various different virtues. He again insists upon the

extreme difficulty of determining where this requisite medium is, in

each individual instance: either excess or defect is the easy and

natural course. In finding and adhering to the middle point consists

the _well_, the _rare_, the _praiseworthy_, the _honourable_ (ii. 9).

The extremes, though both wrong, are not always equally wrong: that

which is the most wrong ought at any rate to be avoided: and we ought

to be specially on our guard against the seductions of pleasure

(_ib._), since our natural inclinations carry us in that direction.