Eudemian Ethics

We must consider, therefore, what the best is, and in how many senses the term is used. The answer seems to be principally contained in three views. For it is said that the best of all things is the Absolute Good, and that the Absolute Good is that which has the attributes of being the first of goods and of being by its presence the cause to the other goods of their being good;

and both of these attributes, it is said, belong to the Form of good (I mean both being the first of goods and being by its presence the cause to the other goods of their being good), since it is of that Form that goodness is most truly predicated (inasmuch as the other goods are good by participation in and resemblance to the Form of good) and also it is the first of goods, for the destruction of that which is participated in involves the destruction of the things participating in the Form (which get their designation by participating in it),

and that is the relation existing between what is primary and what is subsequent; so that the Form of good is the Absolute Good, inasmuch as the Form of good is separable from the things that participate in it, as are the other Forms also.

Now a thorough examination of this opinion belongs to another course of study, and one that for the most part necessarily lies more in the field of Logic, for that is the only science dealing with arguments that are at the same time destructive and general.

But if we are to speak about it concisely,we say that in the first place to assert the existence of a Form not only of good but of anything else is an expression of logic and a mere abstraction (but this has been considered in various ways both in extraneous discourses and in those on philosophical lines);

next, even granting that Forms and the Form of good exist in the fullest sense, surely this is of no practical value for the good life or for conduct.

For good has many senses, in fact as many as being. For the term is, as it has been analyzed in other works, signifies now substance, now quality, now quantity, now time, and in addition to these meanings it consists now in undergoing change and now in causing it; and the good is found in each of these cases—in essence, as mind and God, in quality justice, in quantity moderation, in time opportunity, and as instances of change, the teacher and the taught.

Therefore, just as being is not some one thing in respect of the categories mentioned, so neither is the good, and there is no one science either of the real or of the good. But also even the goods predicated in the same category, for example opportunity or moderation, do not fall within the province of a single science to study, but different sorts of opportunity and of moderation are studied by different sciences, for instance opportunity and moderation in respect of food are studied by medicine and gymnastics, in respect of military operations by strategics, and similarly in respect of another pursuit by another science; so that it can hardly be the case that the Absolute Good is the subject of only one science.

Again, wherever there is a sequence of factors, a prior and a subsequent, there is not some common element beside these factors and that element separable;

for then there would be something prior to the first in the series, for the common and separable term would be prior because when the common element was destroyed the first factor would be destroyed. For example, if double is the first of the multiples, the multiplicity predicated of them in common cannot exist as a separable thing, for then it will be prior to double, if it is the case that the common element is the Form, as it would be if one were to make the common element separable: for if justice is a good, and courage, there is then, they say, a Good-in-itself,

so the term in itself is added to the common definition. But what could this denote except that the good is eternal and separable? Yet a thing that is white for days is no more white than a thing that is white for one day, so that the good is no more good by being eternal; nor yet therefore is the common good the same as the Form, for it is the common property of all the goods.

Also the proper method of proving the Absolute Good is the contrary of the method now adopted. At present it is from things not admitted to possess goodness that they prove the things admitted to be good, for instance, they prove from numbers that justice and health are good, because they are arrangements and numbers—on the assumption that goodness is a property of numbers and monads because the Absolute Good is unity.

But the proper method is to start from things admitted to be good, for instance health, strength, sobriety of mind, and prove that beauty is present even more in the unchanging; for all these admitted goods consist in order and rest, and therefore, if that is so, the things unchanging are good in an even greater degree, for they possess order and rest in a greater degree.—

And it is a hazardous way of proving that the Absolute Good is unity to say that numbers aim at unity; for it is not clearly stated how they aim at it, but the expression is used in too unqualified a manner; and how can one suppose that things not possessing life can have appetition?

One ought to study this matter carefully, and not make an unreasoned assumption about something as to which it is not easy to attain certainty even with the aid of reason.—And the statement that all existing things desire some one good is not true; each thing seeks its own particular good, the eye sight, the body health, and similarly another thing another good.

Such then are the difficulties indicating that the Absolute Good does not exist,—and that it is of no use for political science, but that this has a special good of its own, as have the other sciences also—for instance the good of gymnastics is good bodily condition.

Further there is also what has been written in the discourse: either the Class-form of the good is in itself useful to no science, or it is useful to all alike.

Further it is not practicable.

And similarly the good as universal also is not an Absolute Good (for universality might be an attribute of even a small good), and also it is not practicable; for medical science does not study how to procure an attribute that belongs to anything, but how to procure health, and similarly also each of the other practical sciences.

But good has many meanings, and there is a part of it that is beautiful, and one form of it is practicable but another is not. The sort of good that is practicable is that which is an object aimed at, but the good in things unchangeable is not practicable.

It is manifest, therefore, that the Absolute Good we are looking for is not the Form of good, nor yet the good as universal, for the Form is unchangeable and impracticable, and the universal good though changeable is not practicable. But the object aimed at as End is the chief good, and is the cause of the subordinate goods and first of all;

so that the Absolute Good would be this—the End of the goods practicable for man. And this is the good that comes under the supreme of all the practical sciences, which is Politics and Economics and Wisdom; for these states of character differ from the others in the fact that they are supreme (whether they differ at all from one another must be discussed later on).

And that the End stands in a causal relation to the means subordinate to it is shown by the method of teachers; they prove that the various means are each good by first defining the End, because the End aimed at is a cause: for example, since to be in health is so-and-so, what contributes to health must necessarily be so-and-so;the wholesome is the efficient cause of health, though only the cause of its existing—it is not the cause of health’s being a good.

Furthermore nobody proves that health is a good (unless he is a sophist and not a physician—it is sophists that juggle with irrelevant arguments), any more than he proves any other first principle.

After this we must take a fresh starting-point and consider, in regard to the good as End for man and in regard to the best of practicable goods, how many senses there are of the term best of all, since this is best.