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results from the two, the soul must in one type of case affirm the
conclusion, while in the case of opinions concerned with production
it must immediately act (e.g. if 'everything sweet ought to be tasted',
and 'this is sweet', in the sense of being one of the particular sweet
things, the man who can act and is not prevented must at the same
time actually act accordingly). When, then, the universal opinion
is present in us forbidding us to taste, and there is also the opinion
that 'everything sweet is pleasant', and that 'this is sweet' (now
this is the opinion that is active), and when appetite happens to
be present in us, the one opinion bids us avoid the object, but appetite
leads us towards it (for it can move each of our bodily parts); so
that it turns out that a man behaves incontinently under the influence
(in a sense) of a rule and an opinion, and of one not contrary in
itself, but only incidentally-for the appetite is contrary, not the
opinion-to the right rule. It also follows that this is the reason
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NICOMACHEAN ETHICS 88
why the lower animals are not incontinent, viz. because they have
no universal judgement but only imagination and memory of particulars.
The explanation of how the ignorance is dissolved and the incontinent
man regains his knowledge, is the same as in the case of the man drunk
or asleep and is not peculiar to this condition; we must go to the
students of natural science for it. Now, the last premiss both being
an opinion about a perceptible object, and being what determines our
actions this a man either has not when he is in the state of passion,
or has it in the sense in which having knowledge did not mean knowing
but only talking, as a drunken man may utter the verses of Empedocles.
And because the last term is not universal nor equally an object of
scientific knowledge with the universal term, the position that Socrates
sought to establish actually seems to result; for it is not in the
presence of what is thought to be knowledge proper that the affection
of incontinence arises (nor is it this that is 'dragged about' as
a result of the state of passion), but in that of perceptual knowledge.
This must suffice as our answer to the question of action with and
without knowledge, and how it is possible to behave incontinently
with knowledge.
4
(2) We must next discuss whether there is any one who is incontinent
without qualification, or all men who are incontinent are so in a
particular sense, and if there is, with what sort of objects he is
concerned. That both continent persons and persons of endurance, and
incontinent and soft persons, are concerned with pleasures and pains,
is evident.
Now of the things that produce pleasure some are necessary, while
others are worthy of choice in themselves but admit of excess, the
bodily causes of pleasure being necessary (by such I mean both those
concerned with food and those concerned with sexual intercourse, i.e.
the bodily matters with which we defined self-indulgence and temperance
as being concerned), while the others are not necessary but worthy
of choice in themselves (e.g. victory, honour, wealth, and good and
pleasant things of this sort). This being so, (a) those who go to
excess with reference to the latter, contrary to the right rule which
is in themselves, are not called incontinent simply, but incontinent
with the qualification 'in respect of money, gain, honour, or anger',-
not
simply incontinent, on the ground that they are different from
incontinent
people and are called incontinent by reason of a resemblance. (Compare
the case of Anthropos (Man), who won a contest at the Olympic games;
in his case the general definition of man differed little from the
definition peculiar to him, but yet it was different.) This is shown
by the fact that incontinence either without qualification or in respect
of some particular bodily pleasure is blamed not only as a fault but
as a kind of vice, while none of the people who are incontinent in
these other respects is so blamed.
But (b) of the people who are incontinent with respect to bodily
enjoyments,
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NICOMACHEAN ETHICS 89
with which we say the temperate and the self-indulgent man are
concerned,
he who pursues the excesses of things pleasant-and shuns those of
things painful, of hunger and thirst and heat and cold and all the
objects of touch and taste-not by choice but contrary to his choice
and his judgement, is called incontinent, not with the qualification
'in respect of this or that', e.g. of anger, but just simply. This
is confirmed by the fact that men are called 'soft' with regard to
these pleasures, but not with regard to any of the others. And for
this reason we group together the incontinent and the self-indulgent,
the continent and the temperate man-but not any of these other types-
because
they are concerned somehow with the same pleasures and pains; but
though these are concerned with the same objects, they are not similarly
related to them, but some of them make a deliberate choice while the
others do not.
This is why we should describe as self-indulgent rather the man who
without appetite or with but a slight appetite pursues the excesses
of pleasure and avoids moderate pains, than the man who does so because
of his strong appetites; for what would the former do, if he had in
addition a vigorous appetite, and a violent pain at the lack of the
'necessary' objects?
Now of appetites and pleasures some belong to the class of things
generically noble and good-for some pleasant things are by nature
worthy of choice, while others are contrary to these, and others are
intermediate, to adopt our previous distinction-e.g. wealth, gain,
victory, honour. And with reference to all objects whether of this
or of the intermediate kind men are not blamed for being affected
by them, for desiring and loving them, but for doing so in a certain
way, i.e. for going to excess. (This is why all those who contrary
to the rule either are mastered by or pursue one of the objects which
are naturally noble and good, e.g. those who busy themselves more
than they ought about honour or about children and parents, (are not
wicked); for these too are good, and those who busy themselves about
them are praised; but yet there is an excess even in them-if like
Niobe one were to fight even against the gods, or were to be as much
devoted to one's father as Satyrus nicknamed 'the filial', who was
thought to be very silly on this point.) There is no wickedness, then,
with regard to these objects, for the reason named, viz. because each
of them is by nature a thing worthy of choice for its own sake; yet
excesses in respect of them are bad and to be avoided. Similarly there
is no incontinence with regard to them; for incontinence is not only
to be avoided but is also a thing worthy of blame; but owing to a
similarity in the state of feeling people apply the name incontinence,
adding in each case what it is in respect of, as we may describe as
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