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Book II Chapter 7

Contemplation and Sociability

If circumstances prevent him from engaging in both, he will follow one or the other, preferring the contemplative life but turning toward political actions because of his sociability.⁶⁸³

Marriage Love and Accommodation to Others

Thus he will also marry, have children, take part in public life, fall in love temperately,⁶⁸⁴ and become drunk as an accommodation to others, even if not as a primary aim.⁶⁸⁵

Remaining in Life and the Customary Rites

And in general, practicing virtue, he will remain in life; yet, if it should ever be necessary because of constraints, he will depart from it,⁶⁸⁶ having made provision for burial in accordance with law and ancestral custom and for the other things that it is pious to perform for the departed.⁶⁸⁷

Three Forms of Life

There are three forms of life: the practical, the contemplative, and the life composed of both.⁶⁸⁸ For the life of enjoyment falls below what befits a human being, while of the other lives the contemplative is preferred.⁶⁸⁹

Public Life as a Primary Choice

The virtuous person will participate in public life as a primary choice, not merely as circumstances dictate; for the practical life is the same as the political life.⁶⁹⁰

The Best and the Second Life

The best life is that in accordance with virtue amid things in accordance with nature; second is the life in accordance with the intermediate state, possessing most and the most important of the things in accordance with nature.⁶⁹¹ These lives, then, are choiceworthy; the life in accordance with vice is to be avoided.⁶⁹²

The Happy and the Noble Life

The happy life differs from the noble life in that the former requires conditions in accordance with nature throughout, while the latter can exist even amid conditions contrary to nature.⁶⁹³ Virtue is not sufficient for the former, but is sufficient for the latter.⁶⁹⁴

The Intermediate Life and Appropriate Actions

There is an intermediate life, that in accordance with the intermediate state, in which appropriate actions are also performed.⁶⁹⁵ For correct actions belong to the life in accordance with virtue, errors to the life in accordance with vice, and appropriate actions to the life called intermediate.⁶⁹⁶

Ethical Virtue and the Noble

Having considered these matters, let us also distinguish the following. Ethical virtue, in general, is a state involving the choice of intermediate pleasures and pains,⁶⁹⁷ aiming at the noble as noble; vice is contrary to it.⁶⁹⁸

Contemplative and Practical States

Common to the opinion-forming and the ethical is a state that contemplates, chooses, and performs the noble things found in actions.⁶⁹⁹ Intellectual virtue, and of the scientific [text missing], is a common excellence of rational constitution, contemplative and practical.⁷⁰⁰

Wisdom and Practical Wisdom

Wisdom is knowledge of the first causes.⁷⁰¹ Practical wisdom is a state that deliberates about and performs good and noble things as ⟨good and⟩ noble.⁷⁰²

Courage and Self Control

Courage is a blameless state concerning confidence and fears at the mean.⁷⁰³ Self-control is a state that renders people blameless in choice and avoidance for the sake of the noble itself.⁷⁰⁴

683.Θατέρῳ permits either one of the two activities. The preference for contemplation remains alongside the impulse toward political action, which is grounded in τὸ κοινωνικόν, sociability or one’s social nature. The clause does not say that contemplation is the only virtuous activity. The later statement about public life as a primary choice is also retained; see II.7.24.7.

684.All five activities remain in the translation. The love is expressly qualified: τὸν σώφρονα ἔρωτα, literally the self-controlled or temperate love. The text does not give an unqualified endorsement of every kind of erotic attachment; compare its distinctions among kinds of love in II.7.21.3.

685.Μεθυσθήσεσθαι is to become drunk, not simply to drink wine. Κατὰ συμπεριφοράς is understood in the sense of accommodation or compliance with others; it explains the social occasion without specifying particular companions or amounts. The printed plural is retained; Wachsmuth queries a singular form in his apparatus. Κἂν εἰ μὴ προηγουμένως preserves the qualification even if not as a primary aim, rather than making drunkenness an end pursued for its own sake.

686.The conditional εἰ δέοι ποτὲ δι’ ἀνάγκας is retained: if it should ever be necessary because of constraints. In this contrast, ἀπαλλαγήσεσθαι means to depart from life. The printed μενεῖν is a future infinitive, giving he will remain, alongside the future of departing; Wachsmuth’s apparatus records the transmitted present μένειν. No particular necessity or manner of departure is specified.

687.The provision concerns both burial and the other observances owed to the dead. Κατὰ νόμον καὶ τὸ πάτριον ἔθος specifies law and ancestral custom, while ὅσιον means pious or religiously proper. Τοῖς κατοιχομένοις means the departed or the dead. The sentence presents the arrangements as having been made before departure.

688.All three forms remain, including the composite life. Πρακτικός concerns activity or action, and θεωρητικός contemplation. The source’s ἰδέαι are forms or kinds in this classification, without an express reference to separately existing Platonic Forms.

689.The life of enjoyment, ἀπολαυστικός, is placed below the human standard rather than counted among the three forms just named. The comparative preference for contemplation is retained. This judgment concerns a way of life organized around enjoyment; it does not itself state that every pleasure is vicious.

690.Προηγουμένως contrasts a primary choice with what is done κατὰ περίστασιν, in response to circumstances. Wachsmuth notes the Stoic terminology in this Peripatetic account. The assertion remains alongside the preference for contemplation in II.7.24.3 and 24.6; the text does not resolve that tension by retracting either statement. It also expressly identifies practical and political life.

691.The best life combines virtue with things in accordance with nature. The second combines an intermediate state, μέση ἕξις, with most and the most important of those natural things; both qualifications remain. This intermediate state is distinct from ethical virtue itself as a mean. The passage does not call the second life fully virtuous.

692.The plural τούτους makes both of the preceding lives choiceworthy, despite their different rank. The life according to vice is separately rejected. The following account distinguishes happiness from nobility, clarifying why the presence or absence of natural conditions matters.

693.Βούλεται, literally wishes or wants, is understood as requires in this characterization of the happy life. Διὰ παντός, throughout, remains a condition of that life. The noble life can exist even amid things contrary to nature; their presence does not by itself make virtuous conduct impossible.

694.The first relative clause refers to the happy life and the second to the noble life. Virtue alone is insufficient for happiness here but sufficient for nobility. This distinction belongs to the Peripatetic account and is not replaced with the earlier Stoic claim that virtue suffices for happiness.

695.The life is classified by an intermediate state, μέση ἕξις, between virtue and vice. It is distinct from the life combining practical and contemplative activity above. Καθήκοντα are appropriate actions, and ἀποδίδοσθαι presents them as performed or discharged.

696.All three correspondences remain: κατορθώματα, correct actions, with virtue; ἁμαρτήματα, errors, with vice; and καθήκοντα, appropriate actions, with the intermediate life. Wachsmuth notes the Stoic vocabulary and refers back to printed p. 119, lines 15–19, translated at II.7.13.9. Its occurrence here is preserved within the Peripatetic exposition. Section 24 ends with this sentence.

697.The first-person invitation belongs to the exposition. Ἕξις προαιρετική is a state involving choice, as in II.7.20.12. The Greek specifies τῶν μέσων ἡδονῶν τε καὶ λυπῶν, intermediate pleasures and pains: the pleasures and pains are at the mean, rather than being classified here as morally indifferent. Section 25 has no separate summary heading. The final numbered subdivisions and their descriptive labels serve layout only.

698.Στοχαστική means aiming at a target. The qualification ᾗ καλόν, as noble, makes the noble itself the ground of the aim. The printed feminine ὑπεναντίαν refers to vice as contrary to ethical virtue; the Greek is not replaced with the wording of a parallel Aristotelian definition.

699.The construction is compressed: the feminine genitives δοξαστικῆς and ἠθικῆς, opinion-forming and ethical, have no expressed noun. The translation leaves that relation open rather than deciding silently between virtues and faculties. Wachsmuth queries the corresponding neuter forms, with a comparison to Nicomachean Ethics VI.13, 1144b14–15; those proposed forms are not substituted for the printed Greek. All three activities, contemplation, choice, and performance, remain.

700.This clause is damaged. Τοῦ ἐπιστημονικοῦ means of the scientific or knowing part, but its grammatical connection is incomplete. The English deliberately retains a broken phrase at that point. The two asterisks mark a textual gap, not necessarily two missing words. Wachsmuth suggests adding and of the deliberative part, but does not print that reconstruction. Ἀκρότης is excellence or a highest development, and λογικὴ κατασκευή a rational constitution; both contemplative and practical remain in the surviving conclusion.

701.Σοφία is wisdom and ἐπιστήμη knowledge. The first causes, τὰ πρῶτα αἴτια, are the stated objects of this knowledge; the definition does not name particular causes or replace first with a different classification. Wachsmuth compares Metaphysics I.1, 981b28 and 982b9.

702.Φρόνησις remains practical wisdom, distinct from σοφία. Both deliberating and acting are included, and the good and noble are considered precisely as such. The supplied words ⟨ἀγαθὰ καὶ⟩ remain bracketed as good and, retaining the editor’s visible supplement.

703.The printed plural θάρσεσι concerns instances or manifestations of confidence, paired with φόβοις, fears. Τοῖς μέσοις locates both at the mean. Courage is not defined here as the absence of every fear; compare the examples in II.7.20.4 and 20.16.

704.The plural ἀμέμπτους, blameless, supplies the implicit people made so by this state. Both choice and avoidance remain, with δι’ αὐτὸ τὸ καλόν identifying the noble itself as their motive. Σωφροσύνη is self-control in this Peripatetic account, distinct from the resistance to contrary desires called ἐγκράτεια.