Aristotle, Politics

[1333a] [1] Hence their education also is bound to be in one way the same and in another different. For he who is to be a good ruler must have first been ruled, as the saying is¹ （and government, as has been said in the first discourses,² is of two sorts, one carried on for the sake of the ruler and the other for the sake of the subject; of these the former is what we call the rule of a master,the latter is the government of free men . . .³ But some of the commands given differ not in nature of the services commanded but in their object. Hence a number of what are thought to be menial services can be honorably performed even by freemen in youth; since in regard to honor and dishonor actions do not differ so much in themselves as in their end and object）. But since we say that the goodness of a citizen⁴ and ruler are the same as that of the best man, and that the same person ought to become a subject first and a ruler afterwards, it will be important for the legislator to study how and by what courses of training good men are to be produced, and what is the end of the best life.

The soul is divided into two parts, of which one is in itself possessed of reason, while the other is not rational in itself but capable of obeying reason. To these parts in our view belong those virtues in accordance with which a man is pronounced to be good in some way. But in which of these [20] two parts the end of man rather resides, those who define the parts of the soul in accordance with our view will have no doubt as to how they should decide. The worse always exists as a means to the better, and this is manifest alike in the products of art and in those of nature; but the rational part of the soul is better than the irrational. And the rational part is subdivided into two, according to our usual scheme of division; for reason is of two kinds, practical and theoretic, so that obviously the rational part of the soul must also be subdivided accordingly. A corresponding classification we shall also pronounce to hold among its activities: the activities of the part of the soul that is by nature superior must be preferable for those persons who are capable of attaining either all the soul's activities or two⁵ out of the three; since that thing is always most desirable for each person which is the highest to which it is possible for him to attain. Also life as a whole is divided into business and leisure, and war and peace, and our actions are aimed some of them at things necessary and useful, others at things noble. In these matters the same principle of preference that applies to the parts of the soul must apply also to the activities of those parts: war must be for the sake of peace, business for the sake of leisure, things necessary and useful for the purpose of things noble. The statesman therefore must legislate with all these considerations in view, both in respect of the parts of the soul and of their activities, and aiming more particularly at the greater goods and the ends. And the same principle applies in regard to modes of life and choices of conduct: a man should be capable of engaging in business and war,