Eudemian Ethics

Perseus Greek · Perseus Greek · 611 sections

7.10.9.1
That between brothers is principally the friendship of comrades, as being on a footing of equality— For never did he make me out a bastard, But the same Zeus, my lord, was called the sire Of both— for these are the words of men seeking equality. Hence in the household are first found the origins and springs of friendship, of political organization and of justice.
7.10.10.1
And since there are three sorts of friendship, based on goodness, on utility and on pleasure, and two varieties of each sort (for each of them is either on a basis of superiority or of equality), and what is just in relation to them is clear from our discussions, in the variety based on superiority the proportionate claims are not on the same lines, but the superior party claims by inverse proportion—the contribution of the inferior to stand in the same ratio to his own as he himself stands in to the inferior, his attitude being that of ruler to subject;
7.10.11.1
or if not that, at all events he claims a numerically equal share (for in fact it happens in this way in other associations too—sometimes the shares are numerically equal, sometimes proportionally: if the parties contributed a numerically equal sum of money, they also take a share equal by numerical equality, if an unequal sum, a share proportionally equal). The inferior party on the contrary inverts the proportion, and makes a diagonal conjunction;
7.10.12.1
but it would seem that in this way the superior comes off worse, and the friendship or partnership is a charitable service. Therefore equality must be restored and proportion secured by some other means;
7.10.13.1
and this means is honor,which belongs by nature to a ruler and god in relation to a subject. But the profit must be made equal to the honor.
7.10.14.1
Friendship on a footing of equality is civic friendship. Civic friendship is, it is true, based on utility, and fellow-citizens are one another’s friends in the same way as different cities are, and "Athens no longer knoweth Megara," nor similarly do citizens know one another, when they are not useful to one another; their friendship is a ready-money transaction.
7.10.15.1
Nevertheless there is present here a ruling factor and a ruled—not a natural ruler or a royal one, but one that rules in his turn, and not for the purpose of conferring benefit, as God rules, but in order that he may have an equal share of the benefit and of the burden. Therefore civic friendship aims at being on a footing of equality.
7.10.16.1
But useful friendship is of two kinds, the merely legal and the moral. Civic friendship looks to equality and to the object, as buyers and sellers do—hence the saying Unto a friend his wage— .
7.10.17.1
When, therefore, it is based on a definite agreement, this is civic and legal friendship; but when they trust each other for repayment, it tends to be moral friendship, that of comrades. Hence this is the kind of friendship in which recriminations most occur, the reason being that it is contrary to nature; for friendship based on utility and friendship based on goodness are different, but these people wish to have it both ways at once—they associate together for the sake of utility but make it out to be a moral friendship as between good men, and so represent it as not merely legal, pretending that it is a matter of trust.
7.10.18.1
For in general, of the three kinds of friendship, it is in useful friendship that most recriminations occur (for goodness is not given to recrimination, and pleasant friends having got and given their share break it off, but useful friends do not dissolve the association at once, if their intercourse is on comradely and not merely legal lines);
7.10.19.1
nevertheless the legal sort of useful friendship is not given to recrimination. The legal method of discharging the obligation is a matter of money, for that serves as a measure of equality; but the moral method is voluntary. Hence in some places there is a law prohibiting friendly associates of this sort from actions as to their voluntary contracts—rightly, since it is not natural for good men to go to law, and these men make their contracts as good men and as dealing with trustworthy people.
7.10.20.1
And in fact in this sort of friendship the recriminations are doubtful on both sides—what line of accusation each party will take, inasmuch as their confidence was of a moral kind and not merely legal.
7.10.21.1
Indeed it is a question in which of two ways one ought to judge what is a just return, whether by looking at the actual amount or quality of the service rendered, or by its amount or quality for the recipient; for it may be as Theognis says— Goddess, ’tis small to thee, but great to me , and also the result may be opposite, as in the saying This is sport to you but death to me.
7.10.22.1
Hence recriminations, as has been said; for one party claims recompense as having rendered a great service, because he did it for his friend in need, or saying something else of the sort as to how much it was worth in relation to the benefit given to the recipient and not what it was to himself, while the other party on the contrary speaks of how much it was to the donor and not bow much it was to himself.
7.10.23.1
And at other times the position is reversed: the one says how little he got out of it, the other how much the service was worth to him—for instance, if by taking a risk he did the other a shilling’s worth of benefit, the one talks about the amount of the risk and the other about the amount of the cash; just as in the repayment of a money loan, for there too the dispute turns on this—one claims to be repaid the value that the money had when lent,the other claims to repay it at the present value, unless they have put a proviso in the contract.
7.10.24.1
Civic friendship, then, looks at the agreement and to the thing, but moral friendship at the intention; hence the latter is more just—it is friendly justice.
7.10.25.1
The cause of conflict is that moral friendship is nobler but friendship of utility more necessary; and men begin as being moral friends and friends on grounds of goodness, but when some private interest comes into collision it becomes clear that really they were different. For most men pursue what is fine only when they have a good margin in hand, and so with the finer sort of friendship too.
7.10.26.1
Hence it is clear how these cases must be decided. If they are moral friends, we must consider if their intentions are equal, and nothing else must be claimed by either from the other; and if they are friends on the ground of utility or civic friends, we must consider what form of agreement would have been profitable for them. But if one says they are friends on one footing and the other on another, it is not honorable, when an active return is due, merely to make fine speeches, and similarly also in the other case;—
7.10.27.1
but since they did not provide for this in the contract, on the ground that it was a moral friendship, somebody must judge, and neither party must cheat by pretending; so that each must be content with his luck.
7.10.28.1
But it is clear that moral friendship is a matter of intention, since even if a man after having received great benefits owing to inability did not repay them, but only repaid as much as he was able, he acts honorably; for even God is content with getting sacrifices in accordance with our ability.
7.10.29.1
But a seller will not be satisfied if a man says he cannot pay more, nor will one who has made a loan.
7.10.30.1
In friendships not based on direct reciprocity many causes of recrimination occur, and it is not easy to see what is just; for it is difficult to measure by one given thing relations that are not directly reciprocal.
7.10.31.1
This is how it happens in love affairs, since in them one party pursues the other as a pleasant person to live with, but sometimes the other the one as useful, and when the lover ceases to love,he having changed the other changes, and then they calculate the quid pro quo, and quarrel as Pytho and Pammenes used, and as teacher and pupil do in general (for knowledge and money have no common measure), and as Herodicus the doctor did with the patient who offered to pay his fee with a discount, and as the harpist and the king fell out.
7.10.32.1
The king associated with the harpist as pleasant and the harpist with the king as useful; but the king, when the time came for him to pay, made out that he was himself of the pleasant sort, and said that just as the harpist had given him pleasure by his singing, so he had given the harpist pleasure by his promises to him.
7.10.33.1
Nevertheless here too it is clear how we must decide: here too we must measure by one standard, but by a ratio, not a number. For we must measure by proportion, as also the civic partnership is measured. For how is a shoemaker to be partner with a farmer unless their products are equalized by proportion?
7.10.34.1
Therefore the measure for partnerships not directly reciprocal is proportion—for example if one party complains that he has given wisdom and the other says he has given the former money, what is the ratio of wisdom to being rich? and then, what is the amount given for each? for if one party has given half of the smaller amount but the other not even a small fraction of the larger, it is clear that the latter is cheating.
7.10.35.1
But here too there is a dispute at the outset, if one says that they came together on grounds of utility and the other denies it and says it was on the basis of some other kind of friendship.
7.11.1.1
About the good friend and the friend on the basis of goodness, we must consider whether one ought to render useful services and assistance to him or to the friend who is able to make an equal return. This is the same problem as whether it is more one’s duty to benefit a friend or a virtuous man.
7.11.2.1
If a man is a friend and virtuous, perhaps it is not over-difficult, provided one does not exaggerate the one factor and underrate the other, benefiting him greatly as friend but only slightly as good. But in other cases many problems arise, for instance, if A was a friend but is going not to be and B is going to be but is not now, or if A became one but is not one now and B is one now but was not and is going not to be. But the former problem is more difficult.
7.11.3.1
For possibly there is something in the lines of Euripides: Prithee take words as thy just pay for words, But he, that gave a deed, a deed shall have; and it is not one’s duty to give everything to one’s father, but there are other things that one ought to give to one’s mother, although the father is the superior; for even to Zeus not all the sacrifices are offered, nor does he have all the honors but some particular ones.
7.11.4.1
Perhaps, therefore, there are some services that ought to be rendered to the useful friend and others to the good friend: for instance, if a friend gives you food and necessaries you are not therefore bound to give him your society, and accordingly also you are not bound to render to the friend to whom you give your society the things that you do not get from him but from the useful friend; but those who by so doing wrongly give everything to one whom they love are good-for-nothing people.
7.11.4.2
And the defining marks of friendship stated in the discourses all belong to friendship in some sense, but not to the same kind of friendship.
7.11.5.1
It is a mark of the useful friend that one wishes the things good for him, and so of the benefactor, and in fact a friend of any sort (for this definition of friendship is not distinctive); of another friend, that one wishes his existence, of another that one wishes his society; of the friend on the ground of pleasure, that one shares his grief and his joy.
7.11.6.1
All these defining marks are predicated in the case of some friendship, but none of them with reference to friendship as a single thing. Hence there are many of them, and each is thought to belong to friendship as one, though it does not: for instance, the desire for the friend’s existence—for the superior friend and benefactor wishes existence to belong to his own work—and to him who gave one existence it is one’s duty to give existence in return; but he wishes the society not of this friend but of the pleasant one.
7.11.7.1
Friends in some cases wrong each other, because they love things more, not the possessor of them, and are friends of the possessor too on this account (just as a man chose his wine because it was sweet and chose his wealth because it was useful), for he is more useful. Hence naturally he is annoyed, just as if they had preferred his possessions to himself as being inferior; and they complain, for now they look to find in him the good man, having previously looked for the pleasant or the useful man.
7.12.1.1
We must also consider self-sufficiency and friendship, and the interrelationship of their potentialities. For one may raise the question whether if a person be self-sufficing in every respect he will have a friend, or whether on the contrary a friend is sought for in need, and the good man will be most self-sufficing. If the life that is combined with goodness is happy, what need would there be of a friend? For it does not belong to the self-sufficing man to need either useful friends or friends to amuse him and society, for he is sufficient society for himself.
7.12.2.1
This is most manifest in the case of God; for it is clear that as he needs nothing more he will not need a friend, and that supposing he has no need of one he will not have one. Consequently the happiest human being also will very little need a friend, except in so far as to be self-sufficing is impossible.
7.12.3.1
Of necessity, therefore, he who lives the best life will have fewest friends, and they will constantly become fewer, and he will not be eager to have friends but will think lightly not only of useful friends but also of those desirable for society. But assuredly even his case would seem to show that a friend is not for the sake of utility or benefit but that one loved on account of goodness is the only real friend.
7.12.4.1
For when we are not in need of something, then we all seek people to share our enjoyments, and beneficiaries rather than benefactors;and we can judge them better when we are self-sufficing than when in need, and we most need friends who are worthy of our society.
7.12.5.1
But about this question we must consider whether perhaps, although the view stated is partly sound, in part the truth escapes us because of the comparison. The matter is clear if we ascertain what life in the active sense and as an End is.
7.12.6.1
It is manifest that life is perception and knowledge, and that consequently social life is perception and knowledge in common. But perception and knowledge themselves are the thing most desirable for each individually (and it is owing to this that the appetition for life is implanted by nature in all, for living must be deemed a mode of knowing).
7.12.7.1
If therefore one were to abstract and posit absolute knowledge and its negation (though this, it is true, is obscure in the argument as we have written it, but it may be observed in experience), there would be no difference between absolute knowledge and another person’s knowing instead of oneself; but that is like another person’s living instead of oneself, whereas perceiving and knowing oneself is reasonably more desirable. For two things must be taken into consideration together, that life is desirable and that good is desirable, and as a consequence that it is desirable for ourselves to possess a nature of that quality.
7.12.8.1
If, therefore, of the pair of corresponding series of this kind one is always in the class of the desirable, and the known and the perceived are generally speaking constituted by their participation in the determined nature, so that to wish to perceive oneself is to wish oneself to be of a certain character,—since, then, we are not each of these things in ourselves but only by participating in these faculties in the process of perceiving or knowing (for when perceiving one becomes perceived by means of what one previously perceives, in the manner and in the respect in which one perceives it, and when knowing one becomes known)—hence owing to this one wishes always to live because one wishes always to know; and this is because one wishes to be oneself the object known.
7.12.9.1
To choose to live in the society of others might, therefore, from a certain point of view seem foolish (first in the case of the things common to the other animals also, for instance eating together or drinking together, for what difference does it make whether these things take place when we are near together or apart, if you take away speech? but even to share in speech that is merely casual is a thing indifferent, and also neither to impart nor to receive information is possible for friends who are self-sufficing, since receiving information implies a deficiency in oneself and imparting it a deficiency in one’s friend, and likeness is friendship)—
7.12.10.1
but nevertheless it surely seems that we all find it pleasanter to share good things with our friends,as far as these fall to each, and the best that each can—
7.12.11.1
but among these, it falls to one to share bodily pleasure, to another artistic study, to another philosophy—; and so it is pleasanter to be with one’s friend (whence the saying Distant friends a burden are ), so that they must not be separated when this is taking place. Hence also love seems to resemble friendship, for the lover is eager to share the life of the loved one, although not in the most proper way but in a sensuous manner.
7.12.12.1
Therefore the argument in raising the question asserts the former position, but the facts of experience are obviously on the latter lines, so that it is clear that the raiser of the question in a way misleads us.
7.12.13.1
We must therefore examine the truth from the following consideration: friend really denotes, in the language of the proverb,'another Hercules'—another self; but the characteristics are scattered, and it is difficult for all to be realized in the case of one person; though by nature a friend is what is most akin, yet one resembles his friend in body and another in spirit, and one in one part of the body or spirit, another in another. But still none the less a friend really means as it were a separate self.
7.12.14.1
To perceive and to know a friend, therefore, is necessarily in a manner to perceive and in a manner to know oneself. Consequently to share even vulgar pleasures and ordinary life with a friend is naturally pleasant (for it always involves our simultaneously perceiving the friend), but more so to share the more divine pleasures; the reason of which is that it is always more pleasant to behold oneself enjoying the superior good, and this is sometimes a passive, sometimes an active experience, sometimes something else. But if it is pleasant to live well oneself and for one’s friend also to live well, and if living together involves working together, surely their partnership will be pre-eminently in things included in the End. Hence we should study together, and feast together—not on the pleasures of food and the necessary pleasures (for such partnerships do not seem to be real social intercourse but mere enjoyment),
7.12.15.1
but each really wishes to share with his friends the End that he is capable of attaining, or failing this, men choose most of all to benefit their friends and to be benefited by them. It is therefore manifest that to live together is actually a duty, and that all people wish it very much, and that this is most the case with the man that is the happiest and best. But that the contrary appeared to be the conclusion of the argument was also reasonable, the statement being true. For the solution is on the line of the comparison, the correspondence being true; for the fact that God is not of such a nature as to need a friend postulates that man, who is like God, also does not need one.
7.12.16.1
Yet according to this argument the virtuous man will not think of anything; for God’s perfection does not permit of this, but he is too perfect to think of anything else beside himself. And the reason is that for us well-being has reference to something other than ourselves, but in his case he is himself his own well-being.
7.12.17.1
As to seeking for ourselves and praying for many friends, and at the same time saying that one who has many friends has no friend, both statements are correct. For if it is possible to live with and share the perceptions of many at once, it is most desirable for them to be the largest possible number; but as that is very difficult, active community of perception must of necessity be in a smaller circle,
7.12.18.1
so that it is not only difficult to acquire many friends (for probation is needed), but also to use them when one has got them.
7.12.18.2
One for whom we feel affection we sometimes wish to prosper in absence from us, but sometimes to share the same experiences. And to wish to be together is a mark of friendship, for if it is possible to be together and to prosper all choose this; but if it is not possible to prosper together, then we choose as the mother of Heracles perhaps would have chosen for her son, to be a god rather than to be with her but in service to Eurystheus.
7.12.19.1
For men would say things like the jest which the Spartan made when somebody told him to invoke the Dioscuri in a storm.
7.12.19.2
It seems to be characteristic of one who feels affection for another to debar him from sharing his troubles, and of the person for whom affection is felt to wish to share them. Both these things happen reasonably; for to a friend nothing ought to give so much pain as his friend gives pleasure, yet it is felt that he ought not to choose his own interest.
7.12.20.1
Hence people hinder their friends from sharing their sorrows; they are content to be in trouble by themselves, in order that they may not appear from selfish considerations actually to choose the joy of their friend’s grief and furthermore to find it a relief not to bear their misfortunes alone.
7.12.21.1
And as both well-being and companionship are desirable, it is clear that companionship combined with even a lesser good is in a way more desirable than separation with a greater good. But as it is not clear how much value companionship has, at this point men differ, and some think it is friendly to share everything in company, and say, for instance, that it is pleasanter to dine with company though having the same food; others wish to share only in well-being, because, they say, if one supposes extreme cases, people experiencing great adversity in company or great prosperity separately are on a par.
7.12.22.1
And it is much the same as this in regard to misfortunes also; sometimes we wish our friends to be absent, and do not want to give them pain when their presence is not going to do any good, but at other times for them to be present is most pleasant. And the reason of this contrariety is very easily explained; it comes about because of the things stated before, and because to behold a friend in pain or in a bad state is a thing we absolutely shun, as we shun it in our own case, but to see a friend is as pleasant as anything can be, for the reason stated, and indeed to see him ill if one is ill oneself;
7.12.23.1
so that whichever of these is more pleasant, it sways the balance of wishing him to be present or not.And it fits in that the former occurs in the case of inferior people, and for the same reason; they are most eager for their friends not to prosper and not to be absent if they themselves have to suffer adversity. Hence sometimes suicides kill those whom they love with themselves, as they think that they feel their own misfortune more if their loved ones are to survive; just as, if a man in trouble had the memory that he had once been prosperous, he would be more conscious of his trouble than if he thought that he had always done badly.
8.1.1.1
But one may raise the question whether it is possible to use any given thing both for its natural purpose and otherwise, and in the latter case to use it qua itself or on the contrary incidentally: for instance, with an eye qua eye, to see, or also just to see wrong, by squinting so that one object appears two—both these uses of the eye, then, use it because it is an eye, but it would be possible to make use of an eye but to use it in another way, incidentally, for example, if it were possible to sell it or to eat it.
8.1.2.1
And similarly with the use of knowledge: one can use it truly, and one can use it wrongly—for instance, when one spells a word incorrectly on purpose, then at the time one is using knowledge as ignorance, just as dancing-girls sometimes interchange the hand and the foot and use foot as hand and hand as foot.
8.1.3.1
If then all the virtues are forms of knowledge, it would be possible to use even justice as injustice—in that case a man will be behaving unjustly by doing unjust acts as a result of justice, as when one makes ignorant mistakes from knowledge; but if this is impossible, it is clear that the virtues cannot be branches of knowledge. And also if it is not possible from knowledge to be ignorant, but only to make mistakes and do the same things as one does from ignorance, a man will assuredly never act from justice in the same way as he will act from injustice. But since wisdom is knowledge and a form of truth, wisdom also will produce the same effect as knowledge, that is, it would be possible from wisdom to act unwisely and to make the same mistakes as the unwise man does; but if the use of anything qua itself were single, when so acting men would be acting wisely.
8.1.4.1
In the case of the other forms of knowledge, therefore, another higher form causes their diversion; but what knowledge causes the diversion of the actually highest of all? Obviously there is no longer any knowledge or any mind to do it. But moreover goodness does not cause it either; for wisdom makes use of goodness, since the goodness of the ruling part uses that of the ruled.
8.1.5.1
Who then is there in whom this occurs? or is it in the same way as the vice of the irrational part of the spirit is termed lack of control, and the uncontrolled man is in a manner profligate—possessing reason, but ultimately if his appetite is powerful it will turn him round, and he will draw the opposite inference? Or is it manifest that also if there is goodness in the irrational part but folly in the reason, goodness and folly are transformed in another way? so that it will be possible to use justice unjustly and badly, and wisdom unwisely; and therefore the opposite uses also will be possible.For it is strange if whereas when wickedness at any time arises in the irrational part it will pervert the goodness in the rational and cause it to be ignorant, yet goodness in the irrational part when there is folly in the rational should not convert the folly and make it form wise and proper judgements, and again wisdom in the rational part should not make profligacy in the irrational act temperately—which seems to be what self-control essentially is. So that there will actually be wise action arising from folly.
8.1.6.1
But these consequences are absurd, especially that of using wisdom wisely as a result of folly; for that is a thing which we certainly do not see in other cases—for instance profligacy perverts one’s medical knowledge or scholarship, but it does not pervert one’s ignorance if it be opposed to it, because it does not contain superiority, but rather it is goodness in general that stands in this relation to badness; for example, the just man is capable of all that the unjust man is, and in general inability is contained in ability.
8.1.7.1
So that it is clear that men are wise and good simultaneously, and that the states of character above described belong to a different person, and the Socratic dictum Nothing is mightier than wisdom, is right. But in that by wisdom he meant knowledge, he was wrong; for wisdom is a form of goodness, and is not scientific knowledge but another kind of cognition.
8.2.1.1
But wisdom is not the only thing which acting in accordance with goodness causes welfare, but we also speak of the fortunate as faring well, which implies that good fortune also engenders welfare in the same way as knowledge does; we must therefore consider whether one man is fortunate and another unfortunate by nature or not, and how it stands with these matters.
8.2.2.1
For that some men are fortunate we see, since many though foolish succeed in things in which luck is paramount, and some even in things which involve skill although also containing a large element of luck—for example strategy and navigation.
8.2.3.1
Are, then, these men fortunate as a result of a certain state of character, or are they enabled to achieve fortunate results not by reason of a certain quality in themselves? As it is, people think the latter, holding that some men are successful by natural causes; but nature makes men of a certain quality, and the fortunate and unfortunate are different even from birth, in the same way as some men are blue-eyed and others black-eyed because a particular part of them is of a particular quality.
8.2.4.1
For it is clear that they do not succeed by means of wisdom, because wisdom is not irrational but can give reason why it acts as it does, whereas they could not say why they succeed—for that would be science;
8.2.5.1
and moreover it is manifest that they succeed in spite of being unwise—not unwise about other matters (for that would not be anything strange, for example Hippocrates was skilled in geometry but was thought to be stupid and unwise in other matters, and it is said that on a voyage owing to foolishness he lost a great deal of money,taken from him by the collectors of the two-per-cent duty at Byzantium), but even though they are unwise about the matters in which they are fortunate.
8.2.6.1
For in navigation it is not the cleverest who are fortunate, but (just as in throwing dice one man throws a blank and another a six) a man is fortunate according as things were arranged by nature. Or is it because he is loved by God, as the phrase goes, and because success is something from outside? as for instance a badly built ship often gets through a voyage better, though not owing to itself, but because it has a good man at the helm.
8.2.7.1
But on this showing the fortunate man has the deity as steersman. But it is strange that a god or deity should love a man of this sort, and not the best and most prudent. If, then, the success of the lucky must necessarily be due to either nature or intellect or some guardianship, and of these three causes two are ruled out, those who are fortunate will be so by nature.
8.2.8.1
But again, nature of course is the cause of a thing that happens either always or generally in the same way, whereas fortune is the opposite. If, then, unexpected achievement seems a matter of fortune, but, if a man is fortunate owing to fortune, it would seem that the cause is not of such a sort as to produce the same result always or generally—
8.2.9.1
further, if a man’s succeeding or not succeeding is due to his being of a certain sort, as a man does not see clearly because he has blue eyes, not fortune but nature is the cause; therefore he is not a man who has good fortune but one who has as it were a good nature. Hence we should have to say that the people we call fortunate are so not by reason of fortune; therefore they are not fortunate, for the fortunate are those for whom good fortune is a cause of good things.
8.2.9.2
But if so, shall we say that there is no such thing as fortune at all, or that it does exist but is not a cause? No, it must both exist and be a cause.
8.2.10.1
Consequently it will furthermore be a cause of goods or evils to certain persons; whereas if fortune is to be eliminated altogether, then nothing must be said to come about from fortune, in spite of the fact that, although there is another cause, because we do not see it we say that fortune is a cause—owing to which people give it as a definition of fortune that it is a cause incalculable to human reasoning, implying that it is a real natural principle. This, then, would be a matter for another inquiry. But since we see that some people have good fortune on one occasion, why should they not succeed a second time too owing to the same cause? and a third time? and a fourth? for the same cause produces the same effect.
8.2.11.1
Therefore this will not be a matter of fortune; but when the same result follows from indeterminate and in definite antecedents, it will be good or bad for somebody, but there will not be the knowledge of it that comes by experience, since, if there were, some fortunate persons would learn it, or indeed all branches of knowledge would, as Socrates said, be forms of good fortune.
8.2.12.1
What, then, prevents such things from happening to somebody a number of times running not because he has a certain character, but in the way in which for instance it would be possible to make the highest throw at dice every time? And what then? are there not some impulses in the spirit that arise from reasoning and others from irrational appetition? and are not the latter prior?because if the impulse caused by desire for what is pleasant exists by nature, appetition also would merely by nature proceed towards what is good in every case.
8.2.13.1
If, therefore, some men have good natures—just as musical people though they have not learnt to sing have a natural aptitude for it—and without the aid of reason have an impulse in the direction of the natural order of things and desire the right thing in the right way at the right time, these men will succeed even although they are in fact foolish and irrational, just as the others will sing well although unable to teach singing. And men of this sort obviously are fortunate—men who without the aid of reason are usually successful. Hence it will follow that the fortunate are so by nature.
8.2.14.1
Or has the term good fortune more than one meaning? For some things are done from impulse and as a result of the agents’ purposive choice, other things not so but on the contrary; and if in the former cases when the agents succeed they seem to have reasoned badly, we say that in fact they have had good fortune; and again in the latter cases, if they wished for a different good or less good than they have got.
8.2.15.1
The former persons then may possibly owe their good fortune to nature, for their impulse and appetition, being for the right object, succeeded, but their reasoning was foolish; and in their case, when it happens that their reasoning seems to be incorrect but that impulse is the cause of it, this impulse being right has saved them; although sometimes on the contrary owing to appetite they have reasoned in this way and come to misfortune.
8.2.16.1
But in the case of the others, then, how will good fortune be due to natural goodness of appetition and desire? The fact is that the good fortune here and that in the other case are the same. Or is good fortune of more than one kind, and is fortune twofold?
8.2.17.1
But since we see some people being fortunate contrary to all the teachings of science and correct calculation, it is clear that the cause of good fortune must be something different. But is it or is it not good fortune whereby a man formed a desire for the right thing and at the right time when in his case human reasoning could not make this calculation? For a thing the desire for which is natural is not altogether uncalculated, but the reasoning is perverted by something.
8.2.18.1
So no doubt he seems fortunate, because fortune is the cause of things contrary to reason, and this is contrary to reason, for it is contrary to knowledge and to general principle.
8.2.19.1
But probably it does not really come from fortune, but seems to do so from the above cause. So that this argument does not prove that good fortune comes by nature, but that not all those who seem fortunate succeed because of fortune, but because of nature; nor does it prove that there is no such thing as fortune, nor that fortune is not the cause of anything, but that it is not the cause of all the things of which it seems to be the cause.
8.2.20.1
Yet someone may raise the question whether fortune is the cause of precisely this—forming a desire for the right thing at the right time. Or, on that showing, will not fortune be the cause of everything—even of thought and deliberation? since it is not the case, that one only deliberates when one has deliberated even previously to that deliberation,nor does one only think when one has previously thought before thinking, and so on to infinity, but there is some starting-point; therefore thought is not the starting-point of thinking, nor deliberation of deliberating. Then what else is, save fortune? It will follow that everything originates from fortune. Or shall we say that there is a certain starting-point outside which there is no other, and that this, merely owing to its being of such and such a nature, can produce a result of such and such a nature?
8.2.21.1
But this is what we are investigating—what is the starting-point of motion in the spirit? The answer then is clear: as in the universe, so there, everything is moved by God; for in a manner the divine element in us is the cause of all our motions.
8.2.22.1
And the starting-point of reason is not reason but something superior to reason. What, then, could be superior even to knowledge and to intellect, except God? Not goodness, for goodness is an instrument of the mind; and owing to this, as I was saying some time ago, those are called fortunate who although irrational succeed in whatever they start on. And it does not pay them to deliberate, for they have within them a principle of a kind that is better than mind and deliberation
8.2.23.1
(whereas the others have reason but have not this): they have inspiration, but they cannot deliberate. For although irrational they attain even what belongs to the prudent and wise—swiftness of divination: only the divination that is based on reason we must not specify, but some of them attain it by experience and others by practice in the use of observation; and these men use the divine. For this quality discerns aright the future as well as the present, and these are the men whose reason is disengaged. This is why the melancholic even have dreams that are true; for it seems that when the reason is disengaged principle has more strength— just as the blind remember better, being released from having their faculty of memory engaged with objects of sight.
8.2.24.1
It is clear, then, that there are two kinds of good fortune—one divine, owing to which the fortunate man’s success is thought to be due to the aid of God, and this is the man who is successful in accordance with his impulse, while the other is he who succeeds against his impulse. Both persons are irrational. The former kind is more continuous good fortune, the latter is not continuous.
8.3.1.1
We have, then, previously spoken about each virtue in particular; and as we have distinguished their meaning separately, we must also describe in detail the virtue constituted from them, to which we now give the name of nobility.
8.3.2.1
Now it is manifest that one who is to obtain this appellation truly must possess the particular virtues; for it is impossible for it to be otherwise in the case of any other matter either—for instance, no one is healthy in his whole body but not in any part of it, but all the parts, or most of them and the most important, must necessarily be in the same condition as the whole.
8.3.3.1
Now being good and being noble are really different not only in their names but also in themselves. For all goods have Ends that are desirable in and for themselves.
8.3.4.1
Of these, all those are fine which are laudable as existing for their own sakes, for these are the Ends which are both the motives of laudable actions and laudable themselves—justice itself and its actions, and temperate actions, for temperance also is laudable; but health is not laudable, for its effect is not, nor is vigorous action laudable, for strength is not—these things are good but they are not laudable.
8.3.5.1
And similarly induction makes this clear in the other cases also. Therefore a man is good for whom the things good by nature are good. For the things men fight about and think the greatest, honor and wealth and bodily excellences and pieces of good fortune and powers, are good by nature but may possibly be harmful to some men owing to their characters. If a man is foolish or unjust or profligate he would gain no profit by employing them, any more than an invalid would benefit from using the diet of a man in good health, or a weakling and cripple from the equipment of a healthy man and of a sound one.
8.3.6.1
A man is noble because he possesses those good things that are fine for their own sake and because he is a doer of fine deeds even for their own sake; and the fine things are the virtues and the actions that arise from virtue.
8.3.7.1
But there is also a state of character that is the civic character, such as the Spartans have or others like them may have; and this character is of the following sort. There are those who think that one ought, it is true, to possess goodness, but for the sake of the things that are naturally good; hence though they are good men (for the things naturally good are good for them), yet they have not nobility, for it is not the case with them that they possess fine things for their own sake and that they purpose fine actions, and not only this, but also that things not fine by nature but good by nature are fine for them.
8.3.8.1
For things are fine when that for which men do them and choose them is fine. Therefore to the noble man the things good by nature are fine; for what is just is fine, and what is according to worth is just, and he is worthy of these things;

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