Perhaps, then, the best plan is not to try to have as many friends as possible, but so many as are sufficient for a life in common; and indeed it would be impossible to have an ardent friendship with a great number. Inasmuch, however, as it lay with us to employ or not to employ our faculties in this way, the resulting characters are on that account voluntary. 5, 4shall prescribe. 7, 12But we must observe that what distinguishes the boaster proper from the other kinds of boasters, is not his faculty of boasting, but his preference for boasting: the boaster proper is a boaster by habit, and Edition: current; Page: [130]because that is his character; just as there is on the one hand the liar proper, who delights in falsehood itself, and on the other hand the liar who lies through desire of honour or gain. Peters1893: V. 10, 8We have ascertained, then, what the equitable course is, and have found that it is just, and also better than what is just in a certain sense of the word. 7, 14Moreover, in mere emotions* and in our conduct with regard to them, there are ways of observing the Edition: current; Page: [52]mean; for instance, shame (αἰδώς), is not a virtue, but yet the modest (αἰδήμων) man is praised. 3, 2(But we ought to begin by inquiring whether the species of continence and the species of incontinence of which we are here speaking are to be distinguished from other species by the field of their manifestation or by their form or manner—I mean whether a man is to be called incontinent in this special sense merely because he is incontinent or uncontrolled by reason in certain things, or because he is incontinent in a certain manner, or rather on both grounds; and in connection with this we ought to determine whether or no this incontinence and this continence may be displayed in all things. After all Socrates is right: the incontinent man does not really know; the fact does not come home to him in its true significance: he says it is bad, but says it as an actor might, without feeling it; what he realizes is that it is pleasant. 1, 14Acting through ignorance, however, seems to be different from acting in ignorance. Peters1893: IX. Peters1893: IV. The pleasures of specifically different beings, then, are specifically different; and we might naturally suppose that there would be no specific difference between the pleasures of beings of the same species. But afterwards he claims as much or more in return, regarding what he Peters1893: VIII. Peters1893: VII. for protection), and the way in which it is done (e.g. Peters1893: II. 1, 2From this it is plain that none of the moral excellences or virtues is implanted in us by nature; for that which is by nature cannot be altered by training. vice, incontinence, brutality. Something we hope you'll especially enjoy: FBA items qualify for FREE Shipping and Amazon Prime. 1, 15, note. Survey him point by point and you will find that the notion of a high-minded man that is not a good or excellent man is utterly absurd. And this is the way in which men appear to act: to a wedding they invite their kinsfolk; for they have a share in the family, and therefore in all acts relating thereto: and for the same reason it is held that kinsfolk have more claim than any others to be invited to funerals. 5, 1We have next to inquire what excellence or virtue is. Peters1893: IV. 10, 2And, supposing we have to allow this, do we mean that he actually is happy after he is dead? 1, 6Anything that has a use may be used well or ill. Now, riches is abundance of useful things (τὰ χρήσιμα). 8, 7But perhaps nothing desires its opposite as such but only accidentally, the desire being really for the mean which is between the two; for this is good. 1, 2are in accordance with “right reason.” But though this is quite true, it is not sufficiently precise. Peters1893: IV. BOOK IV. Since—to resume—all knowledge and all purpose aims at some good, what is this which we say is the aim of Politics; or, in other words, what is the highest of all realizable goods? desirable for the sake of something else), sometimes desirable in themselves, it is evident that happiness must be placed among those that are desirable in themselves, and not among those that are desirable for the sake of something else: for happiness lacks nothing; it is sufficient in itself. They allow that nothing is able to prevail against knowledge, but do not allow that men never act contrary to what seems best; and so they say that the incontinent man, when he yields to pleasure, has not knowledge, but only opinion. Peters1893: III. were never fused together. But he who sets his face against everything is, as we have already said, cross and contentious. 3, 8So much then by way of preface as to the student, and the spirit in which he must accept what we say, and the object which we propose to ourselves. X. 10, 3Kingly government degenerates into tyranny; for tyranny is a vicious form of monarchy: the bad king, then, becomes a tyrant. 1, 23spend on the right occasions. Again, one might kill a man with a drug intended to save him, or hit him hard when one wished merely to touch him (as boxers do when they spar with open hands). when he is impelled by anger or any of the other passions to which man is necessarily or naturally subject. 4, 6But most men, instead of doing thus, fly to theories, and fancy that they are philosophizing and that this will make them good, like a sick man who listens attentively to what the doctor says and then disobeys all his orders. For power and wealth are desirable for honour’s sake (at least, those who have them wish to gain honour by them). Nicomachean Ethics was written by Aristotle around 340 BCE. Peters1893: III. 5, 3Now, the virtues are not emotions, nor are the vices—(1) because we are not called good or bad in respect of our emotions, but are called so in respect of our virtues or vices; (2) because we are neither praised nor blamed in respect of our emotions (a man is not praised for being afraid or angry, nor blamed for being angry simply, but for being angry in a particular way), but we are praised or blamed in respect Peters1893: II. But if this be not the case, then a man is not responsible for, or is not the cause of, his own evil doing, but it is through ignorance of the end that he does evil, fancying that thereby he will secure the greatest good: and the striving towards the true end does not depend on our own choice, but a man must be born with a gift of sight, so to speak, if he is to discriminate rightly and to choose what is really good: and he is truly well-born who is by nature richly endowed with this gift; for, as it is the greatest and the fairest gift, which we cannot acquire or learn from another, but must keep all our lives just as nature gave it to us, to be well and nobly born in this respect is to be well-born in the truest and completest sense. At other periods of life the various organs of the body may perform their functions completely, but in youth this is accompanied by an inexpressible charm which all other ages lack. It is a defect in the exposition here that the difference between these two forms of the major premise is not more expressly noticed. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Peters1893: II.