Virtue is a perfection of nature (why; how)

a) Why virtue is a perfection of nature

This first part of this paper in general proposes that a man with a ‘perfected’ nature will 1) reflect actions aimed at right choices 2) use reason to determine choices and perform activities excellently 3) be conscious of the chief ends of all his actions; happiness. Only a virtuous person can attain happiness. Only a person whose nature is perfected, who knows how to feel pain and pleasure rightly can do this. Hence, based on this line of argument, virtue is a perfection of nature.

All man without virtue is prone to a slavish taste [NE 1095b: 20] and prefer to live a life suitable to a beast [NE 1095b: 21]. Without virtues, men are led by their impulses [NE 1102b: 19] and appetites [NE: 1102b: 30] in contrary directions [NE 1102b: 20]. He will, like animals, tend only towards pleasure [NE 1104b: 34]. But virtue is a state of character or a disposition that will that will bring into the work and function of men, the quality of excellence and make men good [NE 1106a: 23]. He will thus, know the right choices [NE 1107a]. Right actions and choices lie in the intermediate or mean [1106b: 36] and virtue is the quality of aiming at this intermediate [NE 1106b: 15]. All actions are accompanied by pleasure and pain. A virtuous person will know how to delight and pain rightly and wrongly [NE 1105a: 6]. He know how to feel pain and pleasure at the right times, with reference to the right objects, towards the right people and with the right motive and in the right way [NE 1106b: 20-23].

Based on the above, virtue is thus a state of character concerned with choice [NE 1106b: 36]. If so, it is attainable only by making the right choice that entails choosing the mean or intermediate relative to us [NE 1107a] and feeling pleasure not pain in making the right choice. The only way Aristotle claims that one can make the right choice is by reason [NE 1107a]. It is reason that is the idiosyncratic function of man not the life of vegetation and growth whose function belongs to plants [NE 1097b: 34-1098a], nor the life of perception whose function belongs to animals [NE 1098a: 1]. Reason is a function peculiar to man [1097b: 32]. Man can reason because man has speech [P: 1253a: 13]. With speech, man can reason and make clear what is just or unjust, beneficial or harmful [NE 1253a: 15] and good or bad. Thus, man can exercise thought [NE 1098a: 4], perceive, judge and reason things. Speech gives man the capacity to reason and with reason, man can make prudent choices in the activities of his life and ensure that the activity or action is well performed [NE 1109a: 14]. But actions are only performed well only if it is performed in accordance with appropriate virtue [NE 1109a: 15]. This is so since virtue is a state of character that allows a person to make the right choice [NE 1106b: 36] in the right situational contexts.

Virtues are starting points of action [NE 1144a: 36]. Virtue sets the goal and makes it correct [NE 1144a: 9]. Virtues hold moral truths [NE 1143b: 28] of what is best, deficient and in excess and aims at what is best or the intermediate [NE 1106b: 25]. For instance, with regard to the giving and taking of money, virtue tells us that the intermediate or best disposition is liberality [NE 1107b: 9-10]. But excess is prodigality and the dearth of this quality is meanness [NE 1107b: 9-10]. With regard to feelings of fear and confidence, virtue tells us that the intermediate disposition is courage [NE 1107b]. But excessive fear gives rise to cowardice and excessive courage gives rise to rashness [NE 1107b: 1-3]. With regard to honour and dishonor, virtue tells us that the intermediate is pride while excess is just ‘empty vanity’ and deficiency is undue humility [NE 1107b: 24-26]. Similarly, with regard to pleasantness in the giving of amusement, virtue tells us that the intermediate is the ready-witted but excess of it is just buffoonery and if one falls short of it, his state is simply, boorishness [NE 1108a: 25-28]. Also, a person who is pleasant in the right way is friendly while excessively, he becomes obsequious and if in deficient quantities, he is just quarrelsome and surly [NE 1108a: 29-31]. Thus, reason can help us determine what the right virtues are. So, reason can determine for us that what is morally virtuous and good is “liberality,” “temperance,” “pleasantness,” “friendliness,” “truthfulness,” and “pride”. Thus, if one has good starting points or virtues, one is likely to be on the right track.

Only with virtues can there be the perfection of nature because virtues supply the moral truths; tells us what is right; aims at the intermediate. Without virtue, man’s nature cannot be perfected. He will have no right aims and will be swayed by the extreme states of excess and deficiency and will be led by pleasures. He will not live well and will succumb to the slavish tastes of the mass of mankind [NE 1095b: 20]. If so, several conclusions can be made. First, one who inheres virtue will have a perfect nature and will reflect a perfect nature. From this, we can safely say that virtue is the perfection of man’s nature if we define the perfect nature of man as one that is able to perform any of his activities or functions in life well with reason. If one inheres and uses reason, reason will ensure that one knows the right moral virtues to act in accordance with [NE 11098a: 15]. Hence, if a perfect nature is one from which follows all virtuous actions and if all virtuous actions immanently have their aim at the most choiceworthy and self-sufficient aim of happiness by which we choose everything for [NE 1097b: 4], then virtue necessarily reflects the perfection of man’s nature because only a person with a perfect nature can know what is the right thing to aim at i.e. the human good. This human good happens to be the good that all things aim at. It is the end of all action [NE 1097b: 21] and it is in itself, desirable, self-sufficient and final [1097b: 15-19]. It is the chief human good [NE 1097a: 28] and chief human good is happiness since happiness is the final self-sufficient end of all action [NE 1097a: 20-21]. Only the virtuous aim rightly at happiness and to be able to do so, one must have a perfected nature. Thus, arguably, virtue is the perfection of nature.

2) How virtue is a perfection of nature

This second part of the paper will elucidate the actions of man with virtue and illustrate several ways to become virtuous or to have a “perfect” nature.

Man with virtue, whose nature is arguably perfected will have knowledge of virtuous acts [NE 1105a: 31]; will choose these acts and choose them for their own sakes because they are by themselves good acts [NE 1105a: 32]; his action will proceed from a firm and unchangeable character [NE 1105a 33-34]. Thus, the man with virtue will have a good state or character and disposition [NE 1105b: 6] and as corollary, he will choose the intermediate relative to him [NE 1106b: 36] because it is the good choice unlike the savage of man [P I: 35] whose nature is not perfected and will make the worst choices especially where food and sex are [P I: 36]. Virtue hence allows one to act in the morally right ways determined by reason as above argued.

Aristotle however, claims that the best choice or mean or the middle is not easy to find [NE 1109a: 25]. One cannot for instance, know how much space for deviation is available before he becomes blameworthy [NE 1109b: 21]. It is beyond the prowess of reasoning [NE 1109: 22] to determine this. As such, it becomes wholly contingent on our perception [NE 1109b: 23]. Perception is everything that is perceived by our senses [NE 1109b: 22] and our senses is automatically affected constantly by our environments, surroundings and hence, upbringing and experiences. From this, it is imputable that a person’s starting point (or all of the above mentioned) [1095b: 5-6] is cardinal. Moreover, Aristotle himself claims that where one is brought up in makes all the difference [NE: 1103b: 25-26]. This is especially since moral virtue comes about as a result of habit [NE 1103a: 17] and through exercising them [NE 1103a: 31]. States of character arises out of activities [NE 1103a: 23] and only by exercising virtues in the real social world can we have states of character such as ‘just’ or ‘unjust’ [1103b: 21-22]. The perfection of virtue thus demands a good environment and the exercising and practicing of virtue.

Moreover, moral virtues only set the aim and what is needed to achieve it is also, practical wisdom [NE 12]. Practical wisdom inheres the faculty of cleverness that is able to do things that tend towards the goal set and hit or attain it [NE 1144a: 25-26] although this attaining process is not instant and we often have to incline towards the excess and deficiency sometimes to know and hit the intermediate which is right [NE 1109b: 24-26]. It can hence be imputed that experience in life is thus necessary to mold the right perception of matters in life. Having the right perception will bequeath to us the knowledge of an approximate the right direction to move in with regards to things. Moreover, only if we are brought up in a good environment and acquire virtues or starting points that inheres the best ends [NE 1144a: 30-34] and have the right perception of things. Having virtue or good starting points will give us a right state of character whereby we act as a result of choice for the sake of acts themselves [NE 1144a: 18-20]. Hence, it is arguable that only good man or a man with a perfection of his nature by embodying right virtues and moral believes can have practical wisdom to act upon it and thus exude or manifest virtues that a good man has. Without virtue or good starting points of action, we cannot act virtuously or act with practical wisdom. We would be perverted by wickedness [NE 1144a: 35] and will not be in the right state of character to act rightly. If we have not attained the right state of character, we will not be able to act with practical wisdom. Thus, we will not be virtuous because we do not have virtue. Moreover, virtue is not about knowing it. One has to simultaneously have and set the right goals and lead his actions up to the goals [NE 1144a: 8]. Thus, only with a perfection of nature can we act with virtue and only with virtue can we exude a demeanor that one with a perfect nature, whose acts embodies reason and right perception has.

Lastly, to have virtue, Aristotle proposes that it is imperative for a man to be part of a city-state. No man unless he is beast or god can live apart from the city-state [P 1253a: 30] because city-states impart moral virtues through law and justice to man [P 1253a: 33-34]. If man is apart from the city-state, he will have no contact with moral restraints through law and will be the most savage of animals [P 1253a: 35-36].

c) Conclusion

Man with a perfect nature is one with virtues. He alone will know how to act in the right way embodying right virtues at the right time and contexts. He as a virtuous person will know the ends of all action is happiness and all his acts will embody this chief human good. This man will not only be a moral but a happy person.