Nicomachean Ethics, passage 95

It is time that such a life is not distinctively human, but it is the privilege of man to partake in it, and such participation, at however rare intervals and for however short a period, is the highest Happiness which human life can offer. All other activities have value only because and in so far as they render _this_ life possible.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1071

The friendship based upon the pleasurable is, so to say, a copy of this, since the good are sources of pleasure to one another: and that based on utility likewise, the good being also useful to one another.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 317

Now of these, it is true, the majority have really no proper names, but still we must try, as in the other cases, to coin some for them for the sake of clearness and intelligibleness.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1471

[33] The difficulty was raised by the clashing of a notion commonly held, and a fact universally experienced. Most people conceive that Happiness should be abiding, every one knows that fortune is changeable. It is the notion which supports the definition, because we have therein based Happiness on the most abiding cause.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1429

In like manner it may be that collections of laws and Constitutions would be exceedingly useful to such as are able to speculate on them, and judge what is well, and what ill, and what kind of things fit in with what others: but they who without this qualification should go through such matters cannot have right judgment, unless they have it by instinct, though they may become more intelligent in such matters.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 826

To Intuition it is opposed, for this takes in those principles which cannot be proved by reasoning, while Practical Wisdom is concerned with the ultimate particular fact which cannot be realised by Knowledge but by Sense; I do not mean one of the five senses, but the same by which we take in the mathematical fact, that no rectilineal figure can be contained by less than three lines, i.e. that a triangle is the ultimate figure, because here also is a stopping point.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1529

The word [Greek: orexis] means literally “a grasping at or after” now as this physically may be either vague or definite, so too may the mental act, consequently the term as transferred to the mind has two uses, and denotes either the first wish, [Greek: boulaesis], or the last definite movement, Will in its strict and proper sense. These two uses are recognised in the Rhetoric (I 10), where [Greek: orexis] is divided into [Greek: alogos] and [Greek: logistikae].

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 20

It seizes and dwells upon those elements and features in human practice which are most essential and permanent, and it is small wonder that so much in it survives in our own ways of regarding conduct and speaking of it. Thus it still remains one of the classics of Moral Philosophy, nor is its value likely soon to be exhausted.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1481

[43] The terms are borrowed from the Seventh Book and are here used in their strict philosophical meaning. The [Greek: enkrates] is he who has bad or unruly appetites, but whose reason is strong enough to keep them under. The [Greek: akrates] is he whose appetites constantly prevail over his reason and previous good resolutions.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1607

“If by _a sense of interest_ is meant a practical regard to what is upon the whole our Happiness this is not only coincident with the principle of Virtue or Moral Rectitude, but is a part of the idea itself. And it is evident this Reasonable Self-Love wants to be improved as really as any principle in our nature. So little cause is there for Moralists to disclaim this principle.” From the note on sect. iv. of the chapter on Moral Discipline, Analogy, part I chap. v.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1266

If then the fact of living is in itself good and pleasant (and this appears from the fact that all desire it, and specially those who are good and in high happiness; their course of life being most choice-worthy and their existence most choice-worthy likewise), then also he that sees perceives that he sees; and he that hears perceives that he hears; and he that walks perceives that he walks; and in all the other instances in like manner there is a faculty which reflects upon and perceives the fact that we are working, so that we can perceive that we perceive and intellectually know that we intellectually know: but to perceive that we perceive or that we intellectually know is to perceive that we exist, since existence was defined to be perceiving or intellectually knowing.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1208

Whether or no there can really be Friendship between a man and his Self is a question we will not at present entertain: there may be thought to be Friendship, in so far as there are two or more of the aforesaid requisites, and because the highest degree of Friendship, in the usual acceptation of that term, resembles the feeling entertained by a man towards himself.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 822

A corroboration of what I have said is[30] the fact, that the young come to be geometricians, and mathematicians, and Scientific in such matters, but it is not thought that a young man can come to be possessed of Practical Wisdom: now the reason is, that this Wisdom has for its object particular facts, which come to be known from experience, which a young man has not because it is produced only by length of time.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 571

Such men seem likewise to remember those they have done kindnesses to, but not those from whom they have received them: because he who has received is inferior to him who has done the kindness and our friend wishes to be superior; accordingly he is pleased to hear of his own kind acts but not of those done to himself (and this is why, in Homer, Thetis does not mention to Jupiter the kindnesses she had done him, nor did the Lacedæmonians to the Athenians but only the benefits they had received).

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1605

[17] Compare the [Greek: aplos] and [Greek: kath’ ekasta pepaideumenos] of Book I. chap. 1.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1041

Next would seem properly to follow a dissertation on Friendship: because, in the first place, it is either itself a virtue or connected with virtue; and next it is a thing most necessary for life, since no one would choose to live without friends though he should have all the other good things in the world: and, in fact, men who are rich or possessed of authority and influence are thought to have special need of friends: for where is the use of such prosperity if there be taken away the doing of kindnesses of which friends are the most usual and most commendable objects? Or how can it be kept or preserved without friends? because the greater it is so much the more slippery and hazardous: in poverty moreover and all other adversities men think friends to be their only refuge.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 605

Well, the man bearing the mean character is pretty well such as I have described him, but he has no name appropriated to him: of those who try to give pleasure, the man who simply and disinterestedly tries to be agreeable is called Over-Complaisant, he who does it with a view to secure some profit in the way of wealth, or those things which wealth may procure, is a Flatterer: I have said before, that the man who is “always non-content” is Cross and Contentious. Here the extremes have the appearance of being opposed to one another, because the mean has no appropriate name.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 3

The two parts of this treatise are mutually complementary, but in a literary sense each is independent and self-contained. The proem to the _Ethics_ is an introduction to the whole subject, not merely to the first part; the last chapter of the _Ethics_ points forward to the _Politics_, and sketches for that part of the treatise the order of enquiry to be pursued (an order which in the actual treatise is not adhered to).

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 607

In respect then of living in society, those who carry on this intercourse with a view to pleasure and pain have been already spoken of; we will now go on to speak of those who are True or False, alike in their words and deeds and in the claims which they advance.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1260

But it may be, this is not true: for it was stated originally, that Happiness is a kind of Working; now Working plainly is something that must come into being, not be already there like a mere piece of property.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1395

To the Gods then all their life is blessed; and to men in so far as there is in it some copy of such Working, but of the other animals none is happy because it in no way shares in Contemplative Speculation.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 893

VII. Again, men are said to be of Imperfect Self-Control, not simply but with the addition of the thing wherein, as in respect of anger, of honour, and gain.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1664

I understand [Greek: mallon] as meant to modify the word [Greek: malakias], which properly denotes that phase of [Greek: akrasia] (not [Greek: akolasia]) which is caused by pain.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 207

The question may be determined also by a reference to our definition of Happiness, that it is a working of the soul in the way of excellence or virtue of a certain kind: and of the other goods, some we must have to begin with, and those which are co-operative and useful are given by nature as instruments.[30]

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 200

For all these co-exist in the best acts of working: and we say that Happiness is these, or one, that is, the best of them.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 427

If all this be true, how will Virtue be a whit more voluntary than Vice? Alike to the good man and the bad, the End gives its impression and is fixed by nature or howsoever you like to say, and they act so and so, referring everything else to this End.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 109

The thinking involved in right conduct is calculation—calculation of means to an end fixed by nature and foreknowable Action itself is at its best just the realisation of a scheme preconceived and thought out beforehand, commending itself by its inherent attractiveness or promise of enjoyment.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 722

By voluntary, I mean, as we stated before, whatsoever of things in his own power a man does with knowledge, and the absence of ignorance as to the person to whom, or the instrument with which, or the result with which he does; as, for instance, whom he strikes, what he strikes him with, and with what probable result; and each of these points again, not accidentally nor by compulsion; as supposing another man were to seize his hand and strike a third person with it, here, of course, the owner of the hand acts not voluntarily, because it did not rest with him to do or leave undone: or again, it is conceivable that the person struck may be his father, and he may know that it is a man, or even one of the present company, whom he is striking, but not know that it is his father.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1242

It is with good reason questioned which of the two parties one should follow, both having plausibility on their side. Perhaps then, in respect of theories of this kind, the proper course is to distinguish and define how far each is true, and in what way. If we could ascertain the sense in which each uses the term “Self-loving,” this point might be cleared up.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1540

[20] See Book VI. chap. xiii. near the end [Greek: sokrataes aehen oun logous tas aretas oeto einai (epiotaemas gar einai pasas)]

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1363

Well then, we said that it is not a State merely; because, if it were, it might belong to one who slept all his life through and merely vegetated, or to one who fell into very great calamities: and so, if these possibilities displease us and we would rather put it into the rank of some kind of Working (as was also said before), and Workings are of different kinds (some being necessary and choice-worthy with a view to other things, while others are so in themselves), it is plain we must rank Happiness among those choice-worthy for their own sakes and not among those which are so with a view to something further: because Happiness has no lack of anything but is self-sufficient.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 59

On the contrary, there are acknowledged to be many forms of moral virtue, and there is a long list of them, with their correlative vices enumerated.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1262

Again, common opinion requires that the Happy man live with pleasure to himself: now life is burthensome to a man in solitude, for it is not easy to work continuously by one’s self, but in company with, and in regard to others, it is easier, and therefore the working, being pleasurable in itself will be more continuous (a thing which should be in respect of the Happy man); for the good man, in that he is good takes pleasure in the actions which accord with Virtue and is annoyed at those which spring from Vice, just as a musical man is pleased with beautiful music and annoyed by bad. And besides, as Theognis says, Virtue itself may be improved by practice, from living with the good.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 830

Quick perception of causes[35] again is a different faculty from good counsel, for it is a species of Happy Conjecture. Nor is Good Counsel Opinion of any kind.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1230

And this is the case also with artisans; every one, I mean, feels more affection for his own work than that work possibly could for him if it were animate. It is perhaps specially the case with poets: for these entertain very great affection for their poems, loving them as their own children. It is to this kind of thing I should be inclined to compare the case of benefactors: for the object of their kindness is their own work, and so they love this more than this loves its creator.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1355

Furthermore, the Pleasures attendant on Workings are more closely connected with them even than the desires after them: for these last are separate both in time and nature, but the former are close to the Workings, and so indivisible from them as to raise a question whether the Working and the Pleasure are identical; but Pleasure does not seem to be an Intellectual Operation nor a Faculty of Perception, because that is absurd; but yet it gives some the impression of being the same from not being separated from these.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1017

And for this reason all men think the happy life is pleasant, and interweave Pleasure with Happiness. Reasonably enough: because Happiness is perfect, but no impeded active working is perfect; and therefore the happy man needs as an addition the goods of the body and the goods external and fortune that in these points he may not be fettered.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 749

It is evident also that it is the distributor who acts unjustly and not the man who has the greater share: because the mere fact of the abstract Unjust attaching to what a man does, does not constitute unjust action, but the doing this voluntarily: and voluntariness attaches to that quarter whence is the origination of the action, which clearly is in the distributor not in the receiver. And again the term doing is used in several senses; in one sense inanimate objects kill, or the hand, or the slave by his master’s bidding; so the man in question does not act unjustly but does things which are in themselves unjust.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 580

Well, the virtue of Great-mindedness has for its object great Honour, as we have said: and there seems to be a virtue having Honour also for its object (as we stated in the former book), which may seem to bear to Great-mindedness the same relation that Liberality does to Magnificence: that is, both these virtues stand aloof from what is great but dispose us as we ought to be disposed towards moderate and small matters. Further: as in giving and receiving of wealth there is a mean state, an excess, and a defect, so likewise in grasping after Honour there is the more or less than is right, and also the doing so from right sources and in right manner.

Nicomachean Ethics, passage 1443

Whatever gains human praise is to be done; Public praying and almsgiving gave human praise: [ergo] Public praying and almsgiving are to be done.

Nicomachean Ethics

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