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[1215a]
[1]
for they
talk at random about almost everything, and especially about
happiness. We ought to examine only the opinions of the wise1; for it is out of place to apply reasoning to
those who do not need reasoning at all, but experience. But since every subject has
special difficulties related to it, it is clear that there are such in
regard to the highest life and the best mode of existence; it is then
well to examine the opinions putting these difficulties, since the
refutations advanced by those who challenge them are demonstrations of
the theories that are opposed to them.Moreover to
notice such matters is especially advantageous with a view to the
subjects to which all inquiry ought to be directed—the
question what are the means that make it possible to participate in
living well and finely (if 'blissfully' is too invidious an
expression)—and with a view to the hope that we may have of
the things that are good in the various departments. For if living finely depends
on things that come by fortune or by nature, it would be beyond the
hopes of many men, for then its attainment is not to be secured by
effort, and does not rest with men themselves and is not a matter of
their own conduct; but if
it consists in oneself and one's own actions having a particular
quality, the good would be more common and more divine—more
common because it would be possible for more people to share it, and
more divine because happiness would then be in store for those who
made themselves and their actions of a particular quality.
[20]
Most of the points debated and the difficulties
raised will be clear if it be satisfactorily determined what the
proper conception of happiness is—does it consist merely in
a person's possessing some particular quality of spirit,2 as some of the sages and the older thinkers
held, or although a particular personal character is indeed an
indispensable condition, is a particular quality of conduct even more
necessary?There are various different modes of life,
and some do not lay any claim to well-being of the kind under
consideration, but are pursued merely for the sake of things
necessary—for instance the lives devoted to the vulgar and
mechanic arts and those dealing with business (by vulgar arts I mean
those pursued only for reputation, by mechanic the sedentary and
wage-earning pursuits, and by arts of business those concerned with
market purchase and retail selling); but on the other hand, the things
related to the happy conduct of life being three, the things already
mentioned3 as the
greatest possible goods for men—goodness, wisdom and
pleasure, we see that there are also three ways of life in which those
to whom fortune gives opportunity4 invariably choose to live, the life of
politics,5 the
life of philosophy, and the life of enjoyment.
1 The words translated 'happiness' and 'the opinions of the wise' are conjectural insertions in the Greek.
2 The word ψυχή, usually rendered 'soul,' has no term exactly corresponding to it in English, as it denotes the whole vitality of a living creature, with the unconscious factors of nutrition and growth as well as conscious feelings or emotions and thoughts.
3 See Aristot. Eud. Eth. 1214a 30-b 5.
4 Perhaps the Greek should be emended to give 'those who happen to be in power.'
5 i.e. active citizenship: 'statesmanship' is too lofty a term.
Aristotle. Aristotle in 23 Volumes, Vol. 20, translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1981.
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