Eudemian Ethics

Greatness of Spirit and Magnificence and Liberality are also middle states. Liberality is the mean in regard to the acquisition and expenditure of wealth. The man who is more pleased than he ought to be by all acquisition and more pained than he ought to be by all expenditure is mean, he that feels both feelings less than he ought is prodigal, and he that feels both as he ought is liberal (what I mean by as he ought, both in this and in the other cases, is as right principle directs).

And since the two former characters consist in excess and deficiency, and where there are extremes there is also a mean, and that mean is best, there being a single best for each kind of action, a single thing, it necessarily follows that liberality is a middle state between prodigality and meanness as regards getting and parting with wealth.

But the terms wealth and art of wealth we use in two senses, since one way of using an article of property, for example a shoe or a cloak, is proper to the article itself, another is accidental, though not as using a shoe for a weight would be an accidental use of it, but for example selling it or letting it on hire, for these uses do employ it as a shoe.

The covetous man is the party whose interest centers on money, and money is a thing of ownership instead of accidental use.

But the mean man might be even prodigal in regard to the accidental mode of getting wealth, inasmuch as it is in the natural acquisition of wealth that he pursues increase. The prodigal man lacks necessities, but the liberal man gives his superfluity.

And of these classes themselves there are species designated as exceeding or deficient in respect of parts of the matter concerned: for example, the stingy man, the skinflint and the profiteer are mean—the stingy in not parting with money, the profiteer in accepting anything, the skinflint is he who is very excited about small sums; also the man who offends by way of meanness is a false reckoner and a cheat.

Similarly prodigal includes the spendthrift who is prodigal in unregulated spending and the reckless man who is prodigal in not being able to endure the pain of calculation.