The best life, both for individuals and states, is the life of virtue, when virtue has external goods enough for the performance of the good actions. Each one has just so much of happiness as he has of virtue and wisdom, and of virtuous and wise action.There are many ways in which the sections of a state act upon one another. The same thing is equally true of every individual. If this was otherwise, the universe, who has no external actions over and above its own energies, would be far enough from perfection. Hence it is evident that the same life is best for each individual, and for states and for mankind collectively. The happy state may be shown to be that which is best and which acts rightly; and rightly it cannot act without doing right actions and neither individual nor state can do right actions without virtue and wisdom. Thus the courage, justice, and wisdom of a state have the same form and nature as the qualities which give the individual who possesses them the name of just, wise, or temperate. No proof is required to show that the best state of one thing in relation to another corresponds in degree of excellence to the interval between the natures of which we say that these very states are states: so that, if the soul is more noble than our possessions or our bodies, both absolutely and in relation to us, it must be admitted that the best state of either has a similar ratio to the other. Politics, by Aristotle.
Posted on: Sun, 24 Nov 2013 07:23:14 +0000