Chapter 14

Term 1

Perishing

Some have perished for riches, others in acts of courage.

Term 2

Stinginess

Stinginess is the defect of the habit of magnificence.

Term 3

The Stingy Man

The Stingy man lacks in every instance where the magnificent man excells.

Term 4

Little People

Little people may be fair but are not handsome.

Term 5

The Small-Souled Man

The pusillanimous man is he who accords himself less than what he deserves.

The pusillanimous man falls short of both himself and of the magnanimous man.

The pusillanimous man is he who does not accord himself the goods he deserves.

The pusillanimous man and the conceited man are not evil, because they are not criminals, but they are mistaken.

Pusillanimous men are more lazy than foolish, inasmuch as they neglect knowledge of themselves.

Term 6

Small-Souledness

Pusillanimity is more opposed to magnanimity than men who are conceited.

Term 7

The Wicked

Men who are wicked not because they are corrupted because of shameful sins, but rather because of some childishness, seem to be friendly to themselves. They think that they are just men, but this is certainly not true of men who are truly wicked.

Wicked men are not friendly to themselves, because they do not afford themselves what good works are best for them, they instead choose things that are harmful and pleasureable to them.

Wicked men are hated because of how great their vice is so they flee from this life and put an end to their lives.

The wicked man is not deserving of honour.

In wicked men there is something naturally good, a thing greater than their own evil deeds.

It is necessary to punish a wicked man seeking after pleasure, by curbing him against it with something disagreeable, such as with a beast of burden.

Men become wicked by pursuing pleasures or by fleeing them, either the wrong ones or in the wrong way.

Wicked men are filled with remorse.

The soul of wicked men contends against itself. The lower part is pained when pleasure is drawn away, but the higher part delights in it.

The wicked man does not act as a friend to himself, since he does not see any lovable quality in himself.

Wicked men do not wish to live with one another, but they seek after others to live with, since they do not find anything lovable in themselves.

Term 8

Proportionality

Proportionality is an equality of proportion in at least four ways.

All proportionality is either disjunctive or continuous. Disjunctive when the parts sharing proportionality do not coincide in a common term, continuous when they do coincide in one common term, he gives examples of this..

Such proportionality is call geometrical in mathematics, because in geometry the whole is compared to the whole, as the part compared to the part.

Proportionality in distributive justice is not discrete but rather continuous, since it is carried out by one term: to whom and what is given.

Term 9

What is Proportional

What is proportional regards not only abstract number, but to all numbering.

Term 10

The Ruler

If the ruler strikes a man, justice does not demand he need to be striken back, but if someone strikes the prince, that man must not only be striken, but punished.

The ruler is the guaridan of justice and equality. He does not afford himself too much of what is good without qualification, except what is in proper proportion for him, therefore he works for the benefit another.

A ruler's reward is honour and glory. Those not who cannot be content with these become tyrants.

Rulers marshall an army to undertake courageous deeds.

Term 11

To Rule

We do not allow a man to rule merely because of his human nature, but because of his perfection in reason. A man too concerned with benefitting himself is a tyrannt.

Term 12

Rule

Having rule will show a man's character.

Different kinds of rule suit different groups of people.

Term 13

What is more important in virtue

He asks which is more important to virtue, choice or outward action.

Term 14

The Wasteful Man

The wasteful man is greater than the illiberal man, since his condition is more easily remedied by age or by necessity.

The wasteful man does not seem to have an evil character.

The wasteful man seems to be foolish, because he does not know how to provide for himself.

The wasteful man seems to be much better than the illiberal man, since he makes many for friends by benefitting many people.

Many men who accept gifts from people they should not are wasteful. This is because they always want to be giving and cannot even look after their own needs, and quickly run out. Then they will take from whomever they can.

Wasteful men long to give and so it makes no difference to them how much or from where.

The gifts of wasteful men are not liberal.

Many wasteful men are intemperate, since they squander all they have in intemperate things.

They are called 'wasteful' who spend and consume all they have intemperately.

The wasteful man is properly said to err specifically in one thing: wasting his substance, the possessions that support him.

A man is really wasteful if he is wasteful to himself. His loss is a corruption to him, since the things he loses are the things that maintain a man's life.

The wasteful man does not delight in the right things or in the right way, and he is not pained by the things that should pain him.

The wasteful man exceeds in spending but lacks in accepting. The illiberal man, however, is the other way round.

Term 15

Wastefulness

Wastefulness and illiberality concern excess and lacking in wealth.

The term 'wastefulness' is sometimes applied to men with the vice of intemperance.

Wastefulness in giving does not increase much, since in doing so a man loses his substance.

Term 16

The Most Wicked Man

A man who practices vice toward himself and to his friends is a most wicked man. The best kind of man, however, is not the man who practices virtue toward himself, but toward others.

Term 17

The Affable Man

Affable men are those who praise everything said and done to get along well, they do not contradict anything, they judge that both good and evil men alike should get along without any trouble.

The affable man is he who wishes to live with others smoothly, but not out of any other motive.

Term 18

Political Science

Political science is more honourable than the practice of medicine.

Political science does not seek present gain, but rather one that lasts through all of life.

The offering of sacrifices, the convocation of ministers, making offerings to the gods, and giving oneself time to rest in holiday, all these under political science fall.

There are three kinds of political science and they each have a corrupted opposite: the first is monarchy, the second aristocracy, the third is democracy.

Those who seek knowledge of political science require experience.

Term 19

The Statesman

The statesman must have some knowledge of the soul, just as the man who tends to illness in the eye must know something about the whole body.

It is better for the statesman to write and speak in civic functions than in judicial or persuasive speeches.

Term 20

The Passions

A man who pursues passions will strive without reward or use, since its end is not knowledge but actitivy.

Passions are all those things toward whichlead to pleasure or pain many examples follow.

Passions are neither virtues nor vices, they do not make us good nor evil.

We are neither praised nor held to blame by reason of the passions, examples follow.

Passions do not happen by some choice, but we do seemingly become angry or scared unwillingly.

We are said to be moved in a way by the passions.

Some passions of the soul have no mean.

Passion does not seem to always give way to discussion.

Term 21

Philosophy

Philosophy offers wonderful pleasures in stable and pure way, more so for those contemplating it than those still seeking it. This is because they do not yet possess it, but work toward it by their inquiry.

Term 22

The Ambitious Man

The ambitious man is immoderately excessive in his desire for great honour, but the man who lacks in this too much is called unambitious. The mean in ambition, however, does not have a name.

Term 23

Philoxenus

Philoxenus Erixius prayed that his throat might be longer than a crane's, that by longer contact with his food he might delight more.

Term 24

The Boxer

For boxers their end is a pleasure: a laurel and honours. But they do suffer pain when they receive blows, since they sensible flesh.

The boxer does not fight the same way against all opponents. Anyone acts more surely if he applies an action specific to his circumstance, rather than only a general one. If he does this, he will have greater chance of meeting a his desired result.

Term 25

Money

Wealth is something measured by money.

It is not possible to have wealth without also taking some care to have it, as it happens in other things.

Men strive for things like wealth and other such goods.

Term 26

Powers

Powers correspond to what we are able to do, such as becoming angry or being sad or taking pity.

Our powers are ours by nature, we are not made good or evil by nature.

Term 27

Children

Children live by their desires and strive most for pleasure.

Just as children must live according to the directions of their teacher, so must desire live in accord with reason.

No child is rightly called happy, since his age prevents him from doing good deeds.

Children become happy because of hope, but they also need perfect virtue and a perfect life.

A child can become a mathematician but not a philosopher or a physicist.

Some natural habits that exist in children and beasts, are harmful to them without understanding. Just as if a powerful body were to lack a sense of sight it would lumber dangerously, and this strong thing could even kill his father if he thought he was an enemy.

Children first string together sentences and pronounce words, but do not understand, this must come about naturally.

Term 28

Those Placed in Power

Those who seek after pleasure are placed in positions of power, as Sardanapalus.

Those who are in positions of power have some friends for utility and some for pleasure, but most are not both kinds of friend at the same time.

Those placed in power do not seek pleasurable friends with virtue, nor do they seek useful friends to accomplish good things. They seek rather after witty men, buffoons, wanting pleasures and shrewd, skillful men.

Term 29

Parents

Parents love their children as part of themselves. Children, however, love parents as the authors of their existence.

Parents have greater knowledge that their chilrden are their own, than children have about who their parents are.

Parents love their children as other for their own sake.

The benefits of our being, rearing, and education come from our parents.

Parents love their children more than children love their parents.

Term 30

A Father's Rule

The rule of the father toward his sons has a likeness to a monarchy, since the father has care for his sons.

Among the Persians, the rule of the father is as a tyrant who uses his sons as slaves.

Term 31

The Father

The father who treats his sons as slaves is a corrupt man and is like a tyrannt.

We reckon fathers as greatest in benefits, since they are the cause of our being, rearing, and education.

It is in the nature of a father, progenitor, and king all to rule.

Fathers love their sons more than their sons love their fathers.

The father is nearer to his son than his son is to his father.

No father will disown his son unless his son is overtaken with vice.

A father who has an evil son should avoid him if he is set in his wickedness, or should not be in a hurry to supply his needs.

The father is indeed owed obedience in all matters. Not, however, for example, in questions of medicine, when one should obey not one's father but a physician. So too for a man in war as a soldier, he must follow the commands of his general in the army, not his father's.

I must first pay the ransom of my father even before that of the man who paid mine.

We must provide enough food for our parents even before ourselves, and we owe them such honour as to the gods because from them we have received the greatest benefits.

Term 32

Fatherly

Fatherly rule is the ideal of monarchy.

Term 33

Fatherly Friendship

The nature of a father's friendship is just as a king's: the greater is the one who bestows gifts.

Term 34

A Father's Directions

A father's directions in the home are as the laws in cities.

Tern 35

A Father's Precept

A father's precept does not have the same coercive force, nor does anyone else's unless he is a public man such as the king.

Term 36

Pain

It is commonly held that man's love for pleasure should be corrected by pain.

Term 37

The Presence of a Friend

The presence of friends is a pleasurable thing, both in good fortunes and bad, for the spirits of saddened men are raised by friends who share their pains.

The presence of a friend is pleasurable, knowing that someone is a friend and that he shares his pain lessens it.

The presence of a friend in misfortunes has a mixed effect, it is pleasurable and painful. Pleasurable because simply seeing our friends is a pleasurable thing and because having sight of them and speaking with them helps to fend off sadness. Even so, it is painful since no one wishes to be a source of sadness for his friend.

The presence of a friend in good fortunes does not have a mixed effect, but provides pleasurable conversation and understanding, as much as the friend does understand him and shares his joy in his goods.

Term 38

Priam

Priam, as the story goes, lost everything miserably at the at the end of his life.

Term 39

Offspring

Offspring are likened to accidents of being.

Term 40

Approximation

It is approximately the same thing for a mathematician to be satisfied with persuasive reasoning and for a rhetorician to demand logical demonstrations.

Term 41

The First Principle

Of first principles, we observe some by induction, some by perception, and others by some habituation.

The beginning seems to be more than half of a whole, and many of our questions are resolved by this.

First principles must be more well-known than a conclusion, if these are unknown then the resulting conclusion would be incidental.

First principles cannot be demonstrated.

Firstly we must understand from whom a man benefits and what benefits he receives.

Term 42

Pythagoras

Pythagoras, when teaching something, commanded the learner to repay him honour according as he valued the thing he had learned from Pythagoras.

Term 43

To Please

It is a difficult thing for many people to please the same person greatly, because of the variety of customs which this in any case may not be a good thing.

Term 44

Prudence

Prudence is neither knowledge, nor a craft, nor an opinion, since knowledge regards necessary things and opinion regards contingent things, and a craft, what is able to be done.

Prudence is a true and rational habit of action regarding what is good and evil for man.

Prudence is found in the conjectural part of the soul.

Prudence is not the most excellent or honourable thing, since its object is human things.

Prudence is not only concerned with universal things but also with particulars.

Prudence must have two ways of knowing, universal and particular, the greater of the two is particular.

Prudence seems to be concerned with itself in a special way.

Prudence must also include domestic and governmental prudence.

Prudence is concerned with the utmost particular thing, about which there is not understanding or universal knowledge.

Prudence gives orders: what must or what must not be done, this is its end.

One cannot have prudence without moral virtue.

We have need of prudence even if it were to have no practical use, since it is a virue that perfects a particular part of the soul.

Term 45

The Prudent Man

It belongs to the prudent man to be able to give counsel not just for one part of life, but for everything useful for him to live well.

Men who can consider well what is good for themselves and others are prudent, such as Pericles, who was skilled in counsels.

The prudent man is he who reckons well about particular things that concern him.

A man is not prudent unless he is continent.

The prudent man and the godlike man are sometimes called incontinent.

The prudent man most shows his strength in practicable things.

Term 46

The Parts of the Soul

The parts of the soul are both rational and irrational.

Term 47

Practical Reason

Practical reason is ruled by the productive intellect.

Term 48

The Erring Man

A man who deliberatly makes a mistake in art is preferable to the man whose error is injustice. The opposite is true of prudence.

Term 49

Error

Error in reckoning can concern either a universal or a particular. He gives the example of sluggish water.

Term 50

Politicians

Politicians busy themselves with many affairs.

Term 51

The Reckless

The reckless do not deliberate, but if they allow counsel to bolster their reason, they do not succumb to passion. This is the case with those who are excited but are not stirred by others.

Recklessness and weakness are forms of incontinence.

Term 52

Worse

An undersireous or calm man acting shamefully is worse than a man who is normally overtaken by desire. It is worse for an unagered man to strike someone than for an enraged man.

Term 53

The Perseverant Man

The man is called perseverant who overcomes difficulties which have overtaken many men.

Term 54

Phalaris

Phalaris was an abominable man who kept men at his bed and, if he found others who he deemed better, would have them beheaded.

Term 55

The Particular

Particular instances do not regard scientific knowledge as universals do, therefore the more particular a thing the less certain this knowledge. What Socrates proposed, therefore, seems to be true, that scientific knowledge does not err, since it regards universal truths and not something present at hand.

Term 56

Punishment

Punishment relieves the drive of anger and replaces sadness with delight.

Man is more prone to exact punishment than be forgiving.

Term 57

Quarrels

Quarrels and disputes arise when there is some imbalance among equals and when those who are not equal receive the same share.

Term 58

Potency and Scientific Knowledge

Potency and scientific knowledge both seem to regard contrary things, but a habit does not, we do not things contrary to health hoping to attain it, but we do only what is healthy.

Vox 59

A Deposit

If a man returns his deposit not willingly, but for fear, this man is not said to be acting justly.

Term 60

Suffering Anything Against One's Will

A man only suffers something if it is against his will.