Chapter 1

|1094a1| Every art and every investigation, and similarly both action and deliberate choice, seem to aim at some good. That is why they were right to say, “The good is what all things aim at.” We notice a certain distinction among the goals, though: some goals are activities, but other goals are products beyond the activities. Where there are goals beyond the actions, in these cases the products are naturally better than the activities.

Since there are many actions, arts, and sciences, the goals are many too: health is the goal of medical science, a ship is the goal of the shipbuilder’s art, victory is the goal of military science, and wealth is the goal of the household manager’s art. When such arts are subordinate to any single ability—as bridle-making and other tack-producing arts are subordinate to the art of horse-riding, and as the horse-riding art and every military action are subordinate to military science, and of course as other arts are subordinate to other abilities in the same manner—in all these cases the goals of the ruling arts are preferred over all the goals beneath them, for the goals of the subordinate arts are pursued for the sake of the goals of the ruling arts. And it makes no difference whether the actions’ goals are the activities themselves or something else beyond the activities, as with the sciences mentioned above.

Chapter 2

|1094a18| If there is some goal of our endeavors—a goal that we want for its own sake—and we want other things for the sake of this, and we do not choose everything for the sake of something else (for then it would go on indefinitely, so that our desire would be empty and vain), it is clear that this would be what is good, even the best good. Would not knowledge of it have great importance for human life, just as archers are more likely to hit the right mark when they have a target? If so, then we must try—in general outline at least—to grasp it, whatever it is, and of which science or ability it is the goal.

It would seem to be the goal of the most authoritative and supremely ruling art. This appears to be the art of governing a state, for it determines which of the sciences states need, |1094b1| what sort of people should learn them, and to what extent. We see that even the most honored abilities are under it, for example, the art of military leadership, the art of household management, and the art of public speaking. Since it uses the rest of the sciences, and furthermore since it makes laws about what we should do and what we should avoid, the goal of this science would encompass and surpass the goals of the other sciences, so that its goal would be the human good.

Even if for an individual person and for a state the goal is the same, to achieve and preserve the state’s goal appears to be greater and more complete. It is worthwhile to achieve and preserve it in a single individual, but it is more beautiful and divine to achieve and preserve it in a nation and in city-states. Our investigation aims at the latter, being a political inquiry.

Chapter 3

|1094b11| Our discussion will be adequate if it is as clear as the underlying subject matter allows. For we should not seek the same level of precision in all explanations, just as we do not in products of craft. The fine and just things that the art of governing a state examines have much variation and irregularity, so that they seem to be by custom alone, not by nature. Even good things have a certain kind of irregularity due to the fact that they harm many people. Indeed, some people have been destroyed by wealth, others by courage. We should be satisfied, then, to indicate the truth roughly and in outline when we talk about such things and from such assumptions, and to reach conclusions of the same kind when we talk about claims that hold true for the most part and use them as assumptions. We should accept in like manner each of the things that people commonly say. For an educated person seeks precision in each kind to the extent that the nature of the subject allows. For demanding that a public speech contain scientific demonstrations seems as misguided as accepting a mathematical proof that is merely probable. |1095a1|

Each person judges well what he knows, and of these he is a good judge. Therefore, the one educated in a particular subject is a good judge of that subject, but the one educated about everything is a good judge in general. That is why it is not appropriate for a young person to listen to discussions of the art of governing a state, for he is inexperienced in the actions of human life. However, our discussions are about these actions and use them as assumptions. Since he still follows his passions, the young person will listen in vain and without benefit since the goal is not knowledge but action. It makes no difference whether the person is young in years or juvenile in character, for the defect is not due to time but because of living according to passion and pursuing each thing that comes along. For knowledge becomes unprofitable to such people, just as to those who are undisciplined. On the other hand, to those who evaluate their desires and act in accordance with reasoning, knowing about these things would be very beneficial.

Let these be our preliminary remarks about who should hear this discussion, how it should be received, and what project we are setting up for ourselves.

Chapter 4

|1095a14| We now resume our investigation. Since every inquiry and deliberate choice seeks after some good, let us state what it is that we say the art of governing a state aims at and what the highest of all goods achievable by action is. On the one hand, most people agree on its name, for both the many and the refined call it happiness, and they understand “living well” and “doing well” to be the same as “being happy.” On the other hand, they differ on what happiness is, and the many do not give the same account as the wise. Some say that it is something obvious and apparent such as pleasure, wealth, or honor. Others say that it is something else—and often the same person gives different accounts, for when he has fallen ill he thinks that happiness is health, but when poor he thinks that it is wealth; and when they are aware of their own ignorance, they marvel at people who say something grand and over their heads.

Some used to think that beyond these many goods there is some other Good that exists by itself and that is responsible for the goodness in all these goods.

Perhaps it is rather futile to examine carefully all opinions. It is enough to examine the most prominent opinions or those that seem to have some rationale.

We should not forget that explanations from first principles differ from explanations to first principles. For Plato also raised appropriate questions about this and sought to know whether the investigation was from first principles or to first principles, just as |1095b1| in a stadium the course from the judges to the turning point differs from the way back. We should start from things known, but things are known in two ways: some are known to us, others are known in the abstract. Perhaps we should start from things known to us. That is why the person who would listen successfully to discussions of fine and just things—and of civic matters generally—should be raised with good habits. For the fact is a first principle, and if this is abundantly clear to him, he will not need the explanation too. Such a person has or can easily grasp first principles. However, the person who neither has nor can grasp first principles should listen to Hesiod:

The best person is one who understands everything himself.

A good person is the one who follows others’ good advice.

But he who neither understands things himself nor, hearing another,

Takes counsel to heart—he is himself a useless man.

Chapter 5

|1095b14| Let us pick up where we left off. Most people, the most crude, seem reasonably to suppose from their own lives that pleasure is what the human good and happiness are. That is why they like the indulgent life. For three kinds of life are most prominent: the one just mentioned, the civic life, and, third, the contemplative life. Most people appear utterly servile by choosing a life for cattle, but they gain some defense from the fact that many in positions of power have luxurious tastes like Sardanapalus.

Refined and practical people prefer honor, for this is pretty much the goal of the civic life. However, this good appears to be more superficial than the one we seek, for it seems to be more in those who honor than in the one honored. We intuitively feel that the human good is something that belongs to us and is rather hard to take from us. Besides, these people seem to pursue honor to assure themselves of their own goodness. At least they seek to be honored by the wise, in the presence of people who know them, and for virtue. Clearly then, according to them at least, virtue is better. Perhaps one might suppose that virtue rather than honor is the civic life’s goal. Even virtue appears to be rather incomplete, though. For it seems possible, while having virtue, to be asleep or to be inactive throughout life, and in addition |1096a1| to suffer severe distress and calamitous misfortune. No one would consider someone living that way to be happy, unless he were defending a thesis. Enough about these things, for they have also been discussed adequately in the popular works.

Third is the contemplative life. We will make our inquiry in its defense later on.

The moneymaker is someone forced to do what he does. Wealth clearly is not the good we are seeking, for it is merely useful for the sake of something else. That is why a person might understand the goods mentioned earlier to be goals instead, for we like them for themselves. But they appear not to be goals either, and yet many arguments have been laid down for them. So much for these things.

Chapter 6

|1096a11| It is perhaps better to examine the universal good and to raise questions regarding how it is spoken of. Such an inquiry is awkward for us, though, because the men who introduced the Forms are our friends. But it would seem perhaps to be better—and to be required for preserving the truth—to refute the things familiar to us, especially since we are philosophers. For, while both are dear, it is pious to prefer the truth.

Now those who introduced this opinion did not make Forms in those areas in which they spoke of prior and posterior. That is why they did not construct a Form for numbers.

“What is good” is spoken of in categories: what something is, what sort of thing it is, and what its relation is to something. But what it is by itself, that is, substance (ousia), is by nature prior to what is related to something, for the latter is like an offshoot and a coincidental feature of “what is.” Hence, there would not be some common Form over these things. Besides, since “what is good” is spoken of in as many ways as “what is” (for we speak of “what is good” in categories: what something is, for example, God and intellect; what sort it is, for example, the virtues; how much it is, for example, the proportionate amount; what its relation is to something, for example, what is useful; when it is, for example, the right moment; where it is, for example, a home; and other such things), clearly “what is good” cannot be some common universal and one, for we would not speak of it in all the categories but in one category only.

Furthermore, because there would be one science of things related to the one Form, there would be a single science of all good things. In fact, there are many sciences of things falling under even a single category. For example, with regard to the right moment, in war there is military science and in sickness there is medical science. With regard to the proportionate amount, medical science prescribes how much to eat, and exercise science determines how much to exercise.

One would be at a loss to explain whatever it is they mean by “thing itself” if indeed |1096b1| one and the same definition of the human being applies both to “human being itself” and to an individual human being. As human, “human being itself” and an individual human being will not differ. But if that is so, then as good, “good itself” and a particular good will not differ either.

Moreover, the good itself will not be especially good by being eternal, if indeed a white thing which lasts a long time is not whiter than one which lasts only a day.

The Pythagoreans seem to speak more plausibly about it, placing the one in the column of goods. Speusippus seems now to have followed after them. But let us discuss this later.

An objection to our discussion has emerged, namely, that the Platonic arguments were not about every good. Rather, the things which we pursue and like for themselves are called “good” in relation to one Form, but the things which produce these goods, or which somehow preserve them or protect them from their opposites, are called “good” because of these goods and in a different sense.

It is clear, then, that we can speak of goods in two ways: those that are good by themselves, and others that are good because of these. Having distinguished those that are good by themselves from the instrumental goods, let us consider whether the former are called “good” in accordance with a single Form. Into what kind should one place things good by themselves? Are they goods pursued even when isolated from other things, for example, thinking, seeing, certain pleasures, and honors? For if we pursue these goods also because of something else, one would still place them among the things good by themselves. Or is nothing else good by itself except the Form of the Good? In that case the Form will be useless. But if these goods too are among things good by themselves, then one will have to show that the definition of the good for all of them is the same, just as the definition of whiteness is the same for snow and for white lead. But the definitions of honor, wisdom, and pleasure as goods are different and diverse. Therefore, the good is not a common feature in accordance with a single Form.

How should we talk about goods at this point? For it is unlikely that we use the same word for them by chance. Do they all derive from a single thing or contribute to a single thing? Or rather are they goods by analogy? For as sight is good in body, so intellect is good in soul, and something else is good in another thing. Perhaps we should set these matters aside for now, for precision about them would be more suited to another philosophical inquiry. The same is true for the form. For even if the good that is predicated in common is some “one” or is something separate by itself, it clearly would not be something that a human being could do or possess. But that is the kind of good we are now searching for.

One might perhaps think that it is better to know |1097a1| the form as it relates to the goods that we can possess and achieve. For having this form as a kind of model, we will know also the things good for us, and if we know them, we will attain them. This argument has a certain plausibility to it, but it seems to clash with the sciences. For all sciences, while they aim at some good and seek what is missing, leave aside the knowledge of the form. Indeed, it is not reasonable that all experts would fail to recognize or seek something so helpful to them. But we have no idea how knowing this “good itself” would even help a weaver or a builder in his craft, nor how one who had gazed upon the form itself would be a more skillful doctor or general. For the doctor appears not to examine health in this way. Rather, he examines human health or, perhaps even better, the health of a particular human being. For he cures patients one by one.

So much for these questions.

Chapter 7

|1097a15| Let us return again to the good we are looking for, whatever it might be. It appears to be one thing in one action or art, another thing in another. For the good in medical science is different from the good in military science. The same goes for the other arts. So what is the good in each art? Or isn’t it that for the sake of which the other things are done? The good in medical science is health, in military science it is victory, in homebuilding it is a house, and in another art it is something else. The good in every action and deliberate choice is the goal, for everyone does the other things for its sake. Hence, if there is some goal of all endeavors, this would be the achievable good. If there are multiple goals, then they would be the achievable goods.

Although changing course, the argument has arrived at the same point. We should try to state the point yet more clearly. Since the goals appear to be many, and we choose some of them for the sake of others, for example, wealth, flutes, and tools in general, it is clear that not all goals are final. But the best goal appears to be something final. Hence, if there is one goal that alone is final, then it would be the goal we’re looking for. If there are several final goals, then the one we’re looking for would be the most final of them.

We say that a goal that is pursued in its own right is more final than one pursued for the sake of something else. We also say that a goal that is never chosen for the sake of something else is more final than goals chosen both in their own right and for its sake. Indeed, the goal that is always chosen in its own right and never for the sake of something else is final unconditionally.

Happiness seems most of all to be this kind of goal, |1097b1| for we always choose it for its own sake and never for the sake of something else. We choose honor, pleasure, intellect, and every virtue for their own sakes (for we would choose each of them even if it had no further result), but we choose them also for the sake of happiness, assuming that we will be happy because of them. However, no one chooses happiness for the sake of those things or for the sake of anything else at all.

The same conclusion appears also to follow from the self-sufficiency of happiness, for the final good seems to be self-sufficient. We do not mean what is self-sufficient for a person alone, someone living a solitary life, but a life with parents, children, wife, and in general with friends and fellow citizens, since the human being by nature lives in a state. We must set some limit to the people involved, however, for if the limit extends to one’s parents, descendants, and friends of one’s friends, the number of people grows indefinitely. But we should examine this later. We hold that the self-sufficient good is that which by itself makes human life chosen and lacking nothing. We think that happiness is such a good. Besides, happiness is most chosen of all goods and it not counted alongside them. If it were counted alongside other goods, it is clear that it would be more chosen by adding to it the smallest of the goods. For the supplemented good becomes a superior among goods, and the greater of goods is always more chosen. Happiness, then, appears to be something final and self-sufficient, being the goal of our endeavors.

Everyone seems to agree that happiness is the best good, but we want an even clearer statement of what it is. Perhaps we would get this if we understand a human being’s function. For just as with a flute player, a sculptor, and every craftsman, and in general for people who have a characteristic function and action, goodness and proficiency seem to be based in their function, so it would seem for the human being, if humans have a characteristic function. Are there characteristic functions and actions of a carpenter and a shoemaker but none of a human being? Is the human being naturally unemployed? Or just as it seems that there is a characteristic function of an eye, a hand, a foot, and in general of each body part, may we thus posit a characteristic function of a human being beside all these?

What then would it be? For we share being alive even with the plants, but we are looking for something peculiar to human beings. |1098a1| We must therefore reject the life of nourishment and growth as our characteristic function. Another candidate would be a life of sense perception, but we share this with horses, cows, and all animals. There now remains a certain practical life of the part of us that has reasoning. Of this part, one aspect has reasoning in the sense that it obeys reasoning, but the other aspect has reasoning in the sense that it possesses it and engages in thought. Since we speak of life in two ways <i.e. dormant and active>, we should make clear that we mean the active life, for this seems to be the more authoritative meaning.

If the human being’s function is activity of soul in accordance with reasoning or not without reasoning, and we say that a person’s function and an excellent person’s function are the same in kind, just as a harpist’s function and an excellent harpist’s function are the same in kind, and we say that this holds unconditionally for all cases, superiority according to the virtue being added to the function, for a harpist’s function is to play the harp, but the excellent harpist’s function is to play the harp well—if this is so (and we posit that the human being’s function is a certain life, that this life is activity of soul and actions with reasoning, that the excellent man does these well and nobly, and that each is performed well in accordance with the proper virtue; if this is so), then the human good is activity of soul in accordance with virtue. If there are multiple virtues, the human good is activity of soul in accordance with the best and most perfect virtue.

We should add that the human good arises only in a fully mature life. For one robin does not make a spring, nor does one day. Neither does one day or a short time produce a blessed and happy life.

Let that be our outline of the human good. For perhaps one ought to make a sketch first and then fill in the details later. It would seem that a well-done outline allows anyone to make progress and to articulate the details, and that time is a discoverer and a good co-worker in these efforts. That is where advances in arts came from, for anyone could fill in what was missing. But we must remember what we said earlier, that we should not seek the same level of precision in all domains—only what the underlying subject matter allows in each case and up to the standard appropriate to the method of investigation. For the carpenter and the geometer seek the right angle in different ways: the carpenter seeks the right angle that it is useful for his work, but the geometer seeks what the right angle is or what kind it is, for he is a beholder of the truth. We should use the same method also in our other investigations so that side-tasks do not become more numerous than our tasks. Nor should we demand |1098b1| the explanation in all subjects alike, for it is enough in one case to show the fact well, for example, concerning first principles. The fact is a starting point and a first principle. Some first principles are beheld by induction, some by perception, some by a certain habituation, and still others in other ways. We should try to pursue them in way that suits their nature, and we should be careful to define them well, for they have great importance for what follows. For the first principle seems to be more than half of the whole, and many of the things we seek become clear because of it.

Chapter 8

|1098b9| We should consider happiness not only in light of our conclusion and premises, but also in light of what people say about it. For all facts harmonize with the truth, but the truth soon clashes with falsehood.

Of course, goods have been divided into three groups: those called “external,” those concerning soul, and those concerning body. We say that the soul’s goods are the most authoritative and are goods most of all, and we hold that the soul’s actions and activities are the soul’s goods. Hence, we must be on the right track, according to this opinion at least, since it is an ancient opinion and the philosophers agree upon it. We were also correct to say that certain actions and activities are the goal, for the goal thus belongs to the soul’s goods, not to external goods.

Our account also agrees with the thought that the happy person lives well and does well, for we pretty much said that happiness is a certain kind of living well and doing well. All the characteristics that people require of happiness appear to belong to our account, for some think it is virtue, some good judgment, and others a kind of wisdom. Some think it is these, or one of these, with pleasure, or at least not without pleasure. Others add external prosperity too. Many people, including ancients, say some of these things, but a few, including well-regarded men, say others. It is unreasonable to think that both groups are wholly mistaken. Rather, it is likely that they are correct in at least one respect, even most respects.

Our account agrees with those who say that happiness is virtue or one of the virtues, for activity in accordance with virtue is something that belongs to virtue. There is perhaps no small difference, however, between thinking that the best good lies in having something or in using it, in having a state of character or in its activity. For a state of character can exist |1099a1| without producing a good result, for example, in someone asleep or otherwise disengaged. But this is impossible for the activity, for it will be active by necessity, and active in a good way. In the Olympic Games, the most handsome and strong athletes are not the ones crowned champions but those who compete, for the winners are from among the competitors. Similarly, active people are the ones who achieve the fine and good things in life, and rightly so.

Their life is pleasant in its own right. For enjoyment happens in the soul, but each person takes pleasure in what he is said to love. For example, horses are pleasant to horse-lovers, and shows are pleasant to show-lovers. In the same manner, just things are pleasant to the justice-lover and, in general, things in accordance with virtue are pleasant to the virtue-lover. To most people, then, pleasant things conflict because such things are not pleasant by nature. To lovers of fine things, though, things that are pleasant by nature are pleasant. Such are the actions in accordance with virtue, so they are both pleasant to lovers of fine things and pleasant in their own right. Their life does not need further pleasure, of course, as if it needed a charm bracelet. Rather, it has pleasure within itself. For, in addition to what we have said, the person who does not enjoy fine actions is not good. For no one would call “just” someone who does not enjoy acting justly, or “generous” someone who does not enjoy generous actions, and similarly for the other cases. If this is so, then actions in accordance with virtue would be pleasant in their own right. Yet they are surely good and fine too, and each virtuous action is extremely so, if the excellent person is a fine judge of goodness and nobility, as is surely the case. He judges as we have said.

Therefore, happiness is best, finest, and most pleasant. These attributes are not separated from each other as the Delian inscription says:

Finest is that which is most just; best is being healthy.

But what is naturally most pleasant is getting what one passionately desires.

For the best activities have all these traits. We say that these activities are what happiness is—or that it is one of these activities, the best one.

Nevertheless, happiness needs external goods too, just as we said. For it is impossible or not easy to do fine deeds without resources. For, on the one hand, we do many things |1099b1| using friends, wealth, and political power, just as we use tools. On the other hand, those deprived of some goods, such as noble birth, fertility, and beauty, mar blessedness, for a person is unlikely to be happy who is utterly ugly in appearance, low-born, or solitary and childless, and perhaps even less so if his children or friends are completely bad or, although good, have died. So, just as we said, happiness seems to need this kind of prosperity in addition. That is why some people emphasize good luck’s role in happiness, but others emphasize virtue’s role.

Chapter 9

|1099b9| Hence there is a question whether happiness is something gained by learning, by habituation, or by another kind of training, or if it arises according to a divine fate or even by chance. If there is any other gift that gods give to human beings, it is reasonable that happiness is god-given, and that of all things in the human world it especially is god-given, being the best good. While this perhaps might be more appropriate to another inquiry, even if it is not god-sent but arises because of virtue and a certain learning or training, happiness appears to be among the most divine things there are. For the prize and goal of virtue appears to be the best thing there is, even something divine and blessed.

Happiness would seem to be widespread, for through some learning and care it can belong to anyone who has not been impaired with regard to virtue. If it is better to be happy this way than through chance, it is reasonable that happiness really does come through learning and care. If nature’s products are indeed as fine as can be, having become so by nature, the products of art and of every cause are similarly fine, especially the products of the best cause. Leaving the greatest and finest thing to chance would be very out of tune.

Our account has revealed what we are looking for. We said that happiness is some kind of activity of soul in accordance with virtue. Of the other goods, some are necessary for happiness, others are instrumentally helpful and useful for it by nature.

These observations agree with the ones we made at the beginning, for we held that the goal of the art of governing a state is best, and the art of governing a state focuses most of its efforts on producing citizens of a certain kind, namely, good human beings who do fine deeds.

We plausibly say that neither cow, nor horse, nor any of the other animals is happy, for none of them |1100a1| is able to share in such activity. This also explains why a child is not happy, for a child cannot yet do such things due to its age. Young people deemed blessed are called that because of our expectation for their future. For, as we said, happiness requires perfect virtue and a complete life span. For many changes and all sorts of luck happen in a human life, and it is possible for the most flourishing person to fall into great misfortunes in old age, as is told of Priam in Trojan times. No one calls “happy” the person who has fallen into such misfortunes and died miserably.

Chapter 10

|1100a10| Should we then call no human being happy while he is alive? Must we, as Solon says, “see the end”? If we should in fact assume this, is it really possible that he is happy at that point—when he has died? Or isn’t this idea totally strange, especially for us who say that happiness is a certain activity?

But if we do not call the dead person happy, and if Solon did not mean this but meant that one can at that time safely pronounce a human being blessed, as being by then beyond bad things and misfortunes, here too there is a dispute. For it seems that both good and bad things can exist for the dead person, since they exist even for the person who is alive but unaware of them. These include honors and dishonors, and the successes and misfortunes of one’s children and in general of one’s descendants. But this presents a problem. For though a person has lived a blessedly happy life until old age and has died a fitting death, many changes affecting his descendants can happen. Some descendants may be good and may attain a life they deserve, but others may experience the reverse. And clearly the distances by which descendants relate to their ancestors can vary in all sorts of ways. It would surely be strange if the dead person changes as his descendants do and becomes happy at one time but miserable again later. But it would also be strange for the descendants’ fortunes not to affect their ancestors for any time at all.

But we should return to the original question, for it might provide a vantage point from which to consider what is now being sought. If we must in fact “see the end” and only then pronounce a person blessedly happy (not because he is blessedly happy now but because he was earlier), how is it not strange if, when he is happy, his current condition will not be accurately predicated of him because |1100b1| we do not want to pronounce living people happy on account of changes of fortune, and because we assume that happiness is something stable and unchanging while the wheel of fortune turns many times for living people? For it is clear that if we follow his fortunes, we will say that the same person is happy and again wretched many times, representing the happy person as a kind of chameleon and as having an insecure foundation. Or is following a person’s fortunes the wrong approach? For being well or badly off is not in fortunes, although human life needs goods of fortune as additions, as we said. Rather, the activities in accordance with virtue have authority over happiness, and the opposite kind of activities have authority over the opposite condition.

The question we have been discussing also supports our account, for no human work has as much stability as the activities in accordance with virtue. For they seem to be more permanent than even scientific knowledge. And of these activities themselves the most valued are more permanent because blessedly happy people spend their lives most readily and most continuously in them. This seems to be why they do not forget about them.

The happy person will have the characteristic being sought, and he will be happy throughout his life. For he always or most of the time will do and contemplate things in accordance with virtue, and he will bear his fortunes most nobly and gracefully in every way as one who is in fact “truly good” and “foursquare without fault.”

But many things, large and small, happen by chance. Small bits of good or bad luck clearly do not tip the scales of life. But many great things, if they turn out well, will make life more blessedly happy, for they naturally help adorn one’s life, and the use of them is fine and excellent. If they turn out the other way, though, they squeeze and spoil what is blessed, for they both inflict pains and interfere with many activities. And yet even in these conditions what is fine shines through when a person calmly bears many great misfortunes, not through insensitivity to pain, but by being well-bred and great-hearted.

If activities have authority over life, as we said, then no blessedly happy person would become miserable, for he will never do things that are hateful or bad. |1101a1| For we think that the truly good and sound-minded person bears all fortunes gracefully and always does the finest things in the circumstances, just as a good general uses the army presently available in the most strategic way and a leatherworker makes the finest sandal from the hides given him. And all other skilled professionals do the same. And if this is so, then the happy person would never become miserable, but he would surely not be blessedly happy if he fell into fortunes like Priam’s.

He is certainly not unstable and changeable, for he will not be easily dislodged from his happiness—not by ordinary misfortunes, but by many great ones. After such misfortunes he would not become happy again in only a short time. But if he does recover, it will be by having achieved great and fine things inside himself over a long and complete period of time.

What prevents us from saying, then, that a happy person is one who is active in accordance with perfect virtue and is adequately supplied with external goods, not for a chance period of time but over a complete life span? Or should we add both that he will spend his life this way and that he will die a fitting death, since the future is unclear to us and we hold that happiness is our goal and is entirely perfect in every way? If so, we will call “blessedly happy” those among the living who have and will have the qualities mentioned, but “blessedly happy” humans.

Let that be the extent of our analysis of these matters.

Chapter 11

|1101a22| That the fortunes of our descendants and of all our friends have no effect on us whatsoever seems a very unfriendly stance and contrary to people’s opinions. Since the things that happen to us are many and of various sorts, some of them impacting us more, others less, it seems that analyzing each one is a long, even infinite task. Discussing them in general outline would perhaps be enough.

So if, just as some of a person’s misfortunes have a certain weight and influence on his life, but others seem lighter, so too there are similar differences among the misfortunes affecting all his friends, and it makes a difference whether each of these incidents affects the living or the dead (much more of a difference than whether the terrible crimes in tragedies happen before the play or on stage), then we should also take this difference into account, or rather perhaps the question whether the dead share in anything good |1101b1| or bad. For it seems from these considerations that if anything good or bad penetrates through to the dead, it is something weak and small, either simply or for them. But if it is not weak and small, then at least it is of the size and kind as neither to make the unhappy happy nor to deprive the happy of their blessedness.

So the successes and likewise the failures of friends appear to have some effect on the dead, but it is of a kind and size as neither to make the happy unhappy nor to produce any other such change.

Chapter 12

|1101b10| With these distinctions in place, let us consider whether happiness is something we praise or instead something we prize, for it is clear that happiness is not a mere ability.

Anything that is praised seems to be praised for being of a certain kind and for having a some kind of relation to something else. For we praise the just person, the brave person, and in general the good person and his virtue because of his actions and accomplishments, and the strong person, the fast runner, and each of the others for having become a certain kind of person and for having a certain relation to something good and excellent. This is clear also from the praises concerning the gods, for these praises seem ridiculous when we are used as the standard; but we are used as the standard because, as we said, praises arise through reference to something else. If we praise things because of their relations to other things, then clearly the best things receive not praise but something greater and better, as is obvious. For we call the gods and the most godlike men “blessed” and “happy.” The same is true of things that are good, for no one praises happiness in the way we praise something just, but we call happiness “blessed” because it is something better and more divine.

Even Eudoxus seems to advocate the supremacy of pleasure in the right way. For he thought the fact that pleasure is not praised despite being a good reveals that it is better than things that are praised, and that God and what is good are like that, for it is by reference to them that other goods are praised. For we praise virtue, since it is from virtue that we become doers of fine things. Congratulatory speeches, though, are for accomplishments, both those of the body and those of the soul alike. But speaking accurately about these things is perhaps more appropriate to those trained in congratulatory speeches. To us, however, it is clear from what has been said |1102a1| that happiness is among the things that are prized and final.

This seems true also from the fact that happiness is a first principle, for all of us do all other things for the sake of happiness, and we hold that the first principle and the cause of good things is something honored and divine.

Chapter 13

|1102a5| Since happiness is a certain activity of the soul in accordance with perfect virtue, we should examine what virtue is, for perhaps in that way we would have a better perspective on happiness. The true statesman too seems to have worked most on this, for he wants to make the citizens good and obedient to the laws. As precedents we have the Cretan and Spartan lawmakers and others of that kind that there may have been.

If this inquiry belongs to the art of governing a state, our search would clearly accord with our original plan. It is clear that we should examine human virtue, for we are seeking for the human good and human happiness. By “human virtue” we mean the soul’s virtue, not the body’s. We also call happiness an activity of the soul. And if these things are so, it is clear that the statesman should know about soul-related things in a certain way, just as the person who intends to treat the eyes should know about the entire body in a certain way, and all the more since the art of governing a state is better and more prized than medical science. Accomplished doctors put forth much effort to understand the body. The statesman, therefore, should investigate the soul, and should do so for the sake of understanding human virtue and happiness—at least to an extent sufficient for the investigation, for gaining a greater degree of precision is perhaps more trouble than his project requires.

Some things about the soul have been adequately discussed also in our popular works, and we should use them. For example, one part of the soul is without reasoning, but another part has reasoning. It makes no difference for now whether these parts are separated like body parts and anything divided, or are two things in account but undivided in nature like the convex and concave sides of a curved surface.

Of the part without reasoning, one part seems to be widely shared and plantlike. I mean that part which causes something to be nourished and to grow. One must hold that such a power of the soul is in all infants and all embryos. |1102b1| The same power is in full-grown creatures too, for this is more reasonable than holding that theirs is some other power. An excellence of this power appears to be widely shared among all species and not to be specifically human. For this part and this power seem to be active in sleep most of all, |b5| and the good person and the bad person seem to be hardest to distinguish from each other when they are asleep (which is why they say that for half their lives happy people are no different from miserable people; and this makes some sense, for sleep is an idleness of that part of the soul in virtue of which the soul is called good or bad), except some of this part’s movements penetrate through to a small extent, |b10| and in this respect the dream images of good people are better than those of ordinary people. But that is enough about that. Let us leave the nutritive part alone since by its nature it has no share in human virtue.

But there seems to be also another natural part of the soul that is without reasoning but that shares in reasoning in a way. For we praise the reasoning of the disciplined person and of the undisciplined person, |b15| and the part of the soul that has reasoning, for it urges them in the right direction and toward the best things. But there appears to be something else in them that is naturally contrary to reasoning, something that fights and opposes reasoning. For just as paralyzed parts of the body, although we decide to move them to the right, are turned in the opposite direction to the left, |b20| so it is with the soul too, for the impulses of undisciplined people move in the opposite direction. In our bodies we see what goes in the wrong direction, but in our soul we do not see it. But we should probably suppose nonetheless that in the soul too there is something contrary to reasoning, something that opposes and resists it. |b25| It makes no difference how this part of the soul is different. But even this part appears to share in reasoning, as we said. At any rate in the disciplined person this part obeys reasoning, and in the temperate and brave person this part is probably more obedient still, for in him all parts agree with reasoning.

Therefore, the part of the soul without reasoning appears to have two parts: one part by its nature does not share in reasoning, |b30| but the lusting and in general the desiring part somehow shares in reasoning as something that listens to and obeys it. By “sharing in reasoning” we mean the sense in which someone has reasoning who listens to and obeys his father and his friends, not the sense in which someone has reasoning who listens to mathematicians. Admonition and every chastisement and exhortation indicate that the part without reasoning is somehow persuaded by reasoning. |1103a1| If we must say that this part too has reasoning, then the part that has reasoning will have it in two ways: one part having reasoning authoritatively and inside itself, the other part having reasoning as something that can listen as to one’s father.

Virtue too is divided according to this difference. For we say that some virtues are intellectual, others moral. |a5| Theoretical understanding, comprehension, and wisdom are intellectual virtues. Generosity and temperance are moral virtues. For when we speak of a person’s character, we do not say that he is wise or has understanding but that he is gentle or temperate. And we praise the wise person for state of character, and the praised states of character we call virtues. |a10|