Ethics
Lecture 10: Moral Virtues and the Order of Their Treatment

Transcript
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It's not desired for the sake of anything. But sometimes, well, you know, avoid that, for instance, it's desired for its own sake. But what does that mean, for its own sake? Desiring happiness for the sake of happiness? Or is there health for the sake of medicine? Or medicine for the sake of health? No. You couldn't desire happiness for the sake of happiness, could you? Because then your desiring happiness would be the cause of your desiring happiness. It doesn't make any sense. So the fact that you tend to use a negation like that is kind of a sign that the first things, right, are in a way less known, right? And Thomas, you know, will touch upon that way of knowing the first things but the things that come afterwards. He discusses that definition of the good. The good is what all want, right? You're defining it by what comes after it. Its effect, right? Interesting, huh? But if you define the principle, you know, the first premises, as a statement known, not the other statement, it's in a way you're defining it by the negation of the way in which a conclusion is known, huh? You know, what comes before, you're discussing what comes before in terms of what comes after. Just like the good is defined in terms of what comes after it, its effect. The good arouses desire in it, huh? Desire in us for it, I mean. Okay? I don't have too much time left. Let's talk a little bit. We go to what time? 4.30. 4.30? Okay, let's talk a little bit here about now the moral virtues, huh? Okay, but I'm going to erase this so I can have a little more room. So I'm going to subdivide the first one. In this secunda secunde, the Summa Theologiae, how does Thomas divide the moral virtues? Has anybody looked at that? What? In terms of the four. Yeah. Yeah, in terms of the four cardinal virtues, right? So in a way, the secunda secunde takes a faith, hope, and charity, which would be part of the theology, right? But then prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance, huh? And other virtues, other moral virtues, are taken up by their likeness to justice or fortitude or temperance or courage, yeah? Okay? I mean, prudence, yeah, yeah. Okay? That's the way Aristotle does it. Okay? Because prudence, as we say, is taken up in book six among the virtues of reason, right? Okay? And Thomas takes up justice before, what, fortitude, right? And fortitude before temperance there in the secundae. Aristotle takes up fortitude or courage and temperance or moderation before justice. And justice is the last thing he takes up. The order is the reverse, huh? And notice, huh? In Nicomarckian Ethics, he takes up courage and moderation, those are words I like to use, fortitude and temperance, in book three. He takes up justice in book five, prudence, or foresight in book six. Thomas takes up foresight first, then justice, and then fortitude and temperance, huh? Two greatest minds here proceeding in contrary directions, right? How do you explain that? Is Aristotle going from appetite to appetite, so he's working from the sense appetites first? Yeah. And then justice goes into the will, and then finally it's the importance. The one thing to remember is that Thomas in the Secundus Secundae is in theology, he's not in philosophy anymore. And of the cardinal virtues, right, which one is least like that of the four cardinal virtues? Temperance. Temperance, yeah. In fact, temperance is so unlike God that we don't even metaphorically say that God is chaste or God is, you know, sober and so on, right? Now, sometimes metaphorically we say God is strong, right? Afforded to me like that. Yeah, yeah. But God has understanding and will, and therefore he can have foresight but not the defects of our foresight, right? And we speak of justice very much in God, right? Oh, yeah. You see, in theology, all things are considered in comparison to God. Yeah, yeah. So faith, hope, and charity, which have God as their object, are considered first, and then prudence and justice, which are like God's intellect and will, right? And then fortitude, which is, you know, metaphorically more like God, then temperance, temperance last, right? But that's the, what? Theological order, right? And, you know, if you look at theology as a whole, in comparison to philosophy, as Thomas explains in the beginning of the second book of the Summa Contra Gentiles, the order is just contrary to philosophy. Because in theology, you consider God, first of all, and then creatures in comparison to God. But in philosophy, you reason from the creatures that you know through your senses to God. So God is the last thing we know, right? That Aristotle considers God in the last, God fully, in the last part of the last part of philosophy, okay? So you have logic, and then geometry, and arithmetic, and natural philosophy, and ethics, and political philosophy, and finally wisdom, and in the last part of wisdom, you learn about God, right? But that's because you're in philosophy, and you're starting from what you naturally know through your senses, and you're reasoning your way ultimately to God, huh? So God is the last thing we know, right? But in theology, it's based on faith, right? And believing God, and God knows primarily himself, and by knowing himself, knows other things. So we even take God's way of knowing in theology a bit, and that we know God primarily, and other things in comparison to what? To God. But you have something like that in that order of the virtues, in the secundi secundi, right? Okay? So our style doesn't talk about faith, hope, and charity, or theological virtues at all. But those are the virtues that have God as their object, and they're closest in that sense to God, huh? And then he talks about prudence, and justice, and fortitude, and temperance. But in that order, right? Okay? But you've got to forget that order, and not mix it up with the order in philosophy, huh? So, in the second book of the Nicomachian Epics, Aristotle is going to work out a definition of moral virtue, and he will manifest that in a general way in all the virtues in that second book. And then he takes up, in the third book, in the second part, he takes up first courage, and then he takes up temperance, or moderation, and that's in book three. Now, in book five, he'll take up justice. This is in book three now. This is in book five, huh? And in between these, he takes up a number of lesser little virtues, huh? Of which there's about eight he takes up, okay? Now, why does he begin with courage, huh? It must be most known to us in some way. Yeah, yeah. And he's coming to the end of the first book of Nicomachean Ethics. He speaks of virtue there as a praiseworthy quality, right? An honorable quality, right? Well, what virtue is the most praised in practice? Well, in the United States of America, there's something called the Medal of Honor. Some people call it the Congressional Medal of Honor, but the Middle Tech calls it the Medal of Honor. And that's given for courage, right? And I can be moderate in my eating and drinking all my life and never give me a Medal of Honor. I can be just all my life and pay what I owe and so on, right? But never give me a Medal of Honor, right? But for one glorious afternoon there on the battlefield, I can receive the Medal of what? Honor, right? That's one hint that stands out, right? What's the greatest work of Greek fiction? It's the Iliad, huh? Okay, and celebrating this virtue, right? There's also a hint at this being known from the word virtue itself, right? Oh, right. And you see, in Greek, the word would be arete, which is related to ares, the god of Mars, right? That word is virtus, which is related to the word vir, right? What's the English word, the native English word for virtue? That's close, yeah. But there's a word very close to virtue. It's manliness. Manhood, I can say. Manhood. You see, manhood is kind of the most, the closest English equivalent to the, etymologically even, to the word virtus, and because as man, in the sense of the masculine, right? It would be the soldier, right? The virtue of a man, right? You see? And you see that somewhat in our Proverbs, you go man or a mouse. What does that mean, right? See? It's not that about temperance. It's talking about courage, isn't it? Okay? And if you look in Shakespeare, the use of the word manhood, right? Usually the word manhood in Shakespeare will refer to, what? Courage. Okay? But you can see sometimes he'll move the word manhood to cover any human virtue, right? Okay. So in a sense, what you've done is take the name of a particular virtue, and you've kind of used it to cover the hole, right? Okay? So that virtue of courage would seem to stand out. Taylor has a dialogue called the Lachez, L-A-C-H-E-S, where Socrates talks to an old general named Lachez about what courage is, right? Very done, okay? Now, what do courage and moderation have in common, huh? That makes it kind of appropriate to talk about those two together in the third book, right? Before he gets to the virtues he takes up in the fourth book. What do courage and moderation have in common? In a sense, with courage, you're actually moderating your fear, your natural fear. Okay. Okay. You go to emotions he's a concern with, right? In courage, you're concerned with the emotions of fear, right? And boldness, right? Okay. And notice he's quite in moderation. You're concerned more with the, what? Desire, right? For pleasure, right? But for bodily pleasure, right? Okay. So in moderation, food and drink and sex and so on comes under this, right? Okay. But those in justice, you're concerned with the will, right? So these virtues being concerned with emotions are perhaps more known to us than the ones concerned with the will. We saw that in our study of love and friendship, remember that? That the word love can name an emotion or it can name an act of the will, right? And so the love of God, let's say, or the love of wisdom, the love of justice, that love is in the will, okay? But your love of this music maybe or your love of this woman or something like that could be an emotion, right? Now, if you ever have a, after you teach a Love and Friendship course to, you know, some students there in college, and you ask them, what is love, you know, the first day of class, they all come out and say, it's emotion, right? Okay? And I say, well, there's a love that is an emotion, I say, yeah. But maybe a love that is not an emotion, too, but love is not the only emotion, anyway. But you notice, the love that is an emotion is more known to us than the love that is a, what? Act of the will. And most people have a very hard time seeing that distinction. So if the virtues are concerned with emotions, and these are concerned with emotions, they're very strong, right? This fear of death, you know? And this desire for what is pleasing to the body, right? These are very strong emotions, right? And so the virtues are concerned with those very strong emotions are perhaps more known to us than the virtue concerned with the act of the will, right? Okay? But now, another thing about these here, for putting courage and moderation together, not just in terms of the, how fundamental those emotions are, but some that they have in common. In a way, they're both concerned with our, what? Body, huh? Okay? Okay? It's courage, in a way, is about things that threaten the very survival of our body, right? Okay? And moderation is concerned with things that preserve our body, right? Preserve the species, and that are very pleasing to the body, and so on, right? Huh? So there's something very fundamental about these ones. He begins with those two, courage and moderation. The next group of emotions that are the first five, you might say, among the eight ones he takes up here in book four here of the Nicomarchian Ethics. The first six to five ones are concerned on our own body, with what threatens our own body, or what preserves our own body, like food, right? But with exterior good or bad things, huh? Okay? And the first ones, Aristotelic gives, are the ones concerned with our possessions, right? And they call this first virtue liberality or generosity, right? Okay? And this is concerned now with money and things that are measured by money, okay? Liberality or generosity. Interesting, huh? Can we praise someone who's generous with their money, right? Aristotelic distinguishes between liberality or generosity, which, whose act all of us can have, and then one that's concerned with large sums, huh? Which could be called munificence, huh? Okay? And, you know, founds a hospital, right? Okay? Went down to this, one of the places on this tour he went to was down to Pompeii, that man who's recently been, I guess, a little long ago? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's what he did, right, huh? He set up hospitals and schools and took care of the street children and so on, right? Okay? But anyway, a man who, and he married a countess, right? Oh. So, but munificence, right, huh? Right. You know, spending large sums of money, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay? It's interesting. I make a thing less marketer. But both of these are concerned with money and things that are measured by money, right? Okay? That has a certain conviction there with the body, right? Because you need money to, what? Get food and, you know, a house and cars and things of that sort, right, huh? Yeah. And I notice how when people spend a lot of money on their cars, you know, it's going to cost your memory away, you know, but who knows that way of speaking reminds a little bit of courage of these things, right, huh? You know, people come back with a memory away from war, right, huh? And, you know, you make a big down payment on a car or a house, you know, you feel like you've kind of lost on them, or, you know? You see? Yeah. So these two virtues are both concerned with exterior blood things, right? And then he has magnanimity, yeah? And they make a coin of where he makes philatomia, love of honor. But two virtues concerned with honor, doing things that are honorable. So you have magnanimity and philatomia. I'm taking any size of the Greek word there. But magnanimity and philatomia differ like beneficence and liberality do, right? But magnanimity is concerned with great honors, right? And philatomia with small honors, right? And I'm putting it in this order because that's where material still takes them up. He takes up liberality before beneficence, but magnanimity before philatomia. I think there are very subtle reasons why he does this, but I won't try to explain those fully. And of course, for the common understanding there, I mean, Achilles and Agamemnon, these are magnanimous men, right? They're seeking great honors, huh? But the great soldiers are related as, what? What's the motto of West Point? Duty, honor, country, right? Nothing in there about money, right? If you're getting the MBA, you're going to go up and throw the money, right? But some of these men, you know, have riches because they have money, because they use their money well, right? Some don't, you know. But don't, you know, concentrate too much on the difference between these two, but on the basic object here, right? These are concerned with exterior, what? Good things, right? And they're basically two kinds. The material ones, and then you're on it, right? Yes, your honor. Some of you will think that the end of the took life was honor, right, you know? So we think there's something magnanimous about Winston Churchill, let's say, right? Okay? Or maybe Charles de Gaulle, right? Or George Washington or something like that, huh? Or Douglas MacArthur or something like this, huh? Okay? I'm going to soften up a room here. The great justice down here. Is there a missing foresight? That's because there's no foresight on the board. The right of you, the board of death. Okay. Then comes mildness, right? Which I'll call weakness, but I think mildness is a better word to use. Mildness, which is concerned with the emotion of what? Anger, right? If you state the emotions, you can see how these are related to emotions. Courage, concerned with fear and boldness also. Moderation, more with desire, you know, pleasure. And somewhat good reality, somewhat too. These more with hope, right? And despair, right? And mildness with what? Anger, right? But mild anger is aroused, usually by insult or something of this sort, right? Which is the opposite of honor, but an exterior evil, right? Okay. So concerned with insult and things of that sort. You better arouse your anger, right? Achilles had that virtue, right? You know, Achilles and Agamemnon, right? Their anger in the beginning. But notice the order in which the Aristotle is proceeding here. The first two virtues he takes up are considered the own body, right? Okay? And the emotions that are aroused because something threatens a very survivor body. A bullet or a fire, a brain building, whatever it is, right? Shark. Or something that is, what? Preserves your body, right? Or the species, right? Food and drink and so on, reproduction. And things that are very pleasant to the body, right? Okay. And then these ones are concerned, and that's fundamental because they're concerned with exterior goods. And basically there's two exterior goods. Money, the things that are measured by money. Possessions, right? And then what? Honor, right? Okay. And then exterior evil, the insult, the slight other things that arouse our anger, right? Okay. As you start to approach justice, you're more concerned with doing or action, right? And the next virtues Aristotle takes up in the spirit of them, they're concerned with, you might call them, some of you want to call them like the social virtues, right? But there are three of them, huh? And one is called friendliness, huh? Okay. And this should not be confused with friendship, right? Okay. So I'm going to get on the airplane and engage in a friendly conversation with my neighbor, right? And I don't try to be disagreeable, right? You know how airplanes are, huh? You know? They're kind of packed in their tank, right? And somebody may be up against the window, right? And he's got to go to the bathroom. So this person next to him and the person next to that person, they've got to get up to get the guy out, right? So there's always a little bit of battery, right? Oh, the guy says, I know sometimes you have to get up, you know? And so we're friendly, joking about these things, see? But, you know, we try to be agreeable, right, huh? With people, with you every day. They're not really your friends in the strict sense, right? Okay. But Aristotle regards it as a very important virtue in life, huh? Friendliness, huh? Okay? And that's concerned with serious things. I mean, you know, maybe your car won't start, right, huh? But I've got a battery cable, right, huh? So I'll help you out, right? Or you've probably seen somebody trying to get out. And so two or three guys come along, you know, you've got a Porsche. You've got a Porsche and he's out, right? We don't even know who the guy is, maybe, huh? But that's something friendly to do, isn't it? See? And we hope that he would do the same thing, right? That he would be the same person to do that, right? Okay? Okay? So Aristotle considers that to be a virtue, right, huh? Friendliness, huh? That's one of these virtues here. Another one is called what? Truthfulness. Veracity. Veritas, huh? Whereby a man shows himself in what he says and does as he really is, huh? Okay? And then you have, what other virtue? Is this right if it's foresighted? No. But that's a virtue of reason, right? That'd be down in book six, right? Oh, yeah, sure. Yeah. He has one called, in Greek it's called eupropoleia. Which means, literally in Greek, easily turning, right? And it's a man who can take what you say and turn it in a way that's amusing, huh? Okay? So there's a lot of exercises of eupropoleia there on the bus, you know, that people are at a two-hour ride on the bus, right? So someone is telling something or turning what somebody says, right, huh? And that way that it's naming Greek is interesting, huh? And if you look at Love's Day Was Lost by Shakespeare, huh? Byron is described as having this virtue, huh? And Shakespeare uses those words, easily turning, huh? Okay? But always with becoming worth, huh? Proper worth. Bishop Wright has got a eutropoleia, right? But there are jokes that are appropriate for a bishop to make, and ones that are inappropriate for a bishop to make, right? So there's a difference in what's virtuous and vicious to, what, make a joke of, huh? This one that Bishop Riley, I've heard him tell more other times, too, but you've heard this. You know, we're on the airplane and the captain announces we have trouble with one of our engines, but don't worry, we've got three engines, you know, and we've got four bishops on the airplane, you know, and some customer says, I'd rather have four engines than three bishops. So, it can be virtuous to tell a joke at the right time and so on, right? And about the right things, huh? Yeah. But to me, there's some things you shouldn't make a joke about, shall we say, right? And some kind of jokes might not be appropriate in mixed company, as we say, right? And some jokes might not be appropriate for you as an individual to make because of your position, right? But not for someone else, it might be appropriate, huh? I told you the one with John Paul II there, and President Hagen, I told you that one, and it's very funny. They came out of some, Hagen was like a gentleman waiting, whatever they call it, to the Pope, right? And he presented Clinton to the Pope and, you know, all kinds of American officials. And they came out of one of these meetings, I suppose, kind of typed, you know, and out of the blue, Hagen now was President of Assumption College at the time, right? And out of the blue, the Pope says, do you tell Polish jokes at your school? And, of course, you know, I mean, out of the blue, what do you do? I mean, he's a college president. At first you're actually like, oh, no. So the Pope has got to join this temporary, you know. And then the Pope, and he says, you don't tell them around here very much, you worry, either. You see, you know, that's a virtue of the Pope. He trapped a layer, right? And so, remember, we have a good name for it in English. I mean, we speak of a sense of humor, you know, but does that name a virtue? Maybe it does, you know, but Eutropole is the name given in the Greek, huh? So, you have truthfulness, which again, this is referring now to the truth of geometry or the truth of, you know, natural philosophy, but it means showing yourself in your words and deeds as you are, right? Not trying to give the impression that you're more than you are, right? Or the impression that you are less than you are, right? Okay? So being either boastful, right, nor kind of what we call a false humility, right? What does St. Teresa of Alice say? Humility is the truth. So truthfulness is one of these virtues. Another one is friendliness, right? And the third is this eutropoleia. But these three virtues are spoken of as being more about acts or doings, while the ones up to this point are more about the emotions, right? Courage being with fear and boldness, moderation with sense desire, right? Liberality, a little bit like that, because you have an attachment, right, to your goods, a little bit like your attachment to your own body, huh? Because it's by its material possessions that you support yourself, your body, huh? It's interesting to recall a wealthy man, a man of substance, right? Even though his money is not really a substance, right? His substance is up here in his body and his soul, right? But we do give you that expression, right? A man of substance, huh? A man of substantial beings, right? Okay? And somebody was describing to me when he was about to get engaged, I suppose, or was engaged. And the father was concerned, how are you going to support his daughter, right? And he gave kind of the father a cavalier example, you know, well, if we have to weed on crates, you know, and so on. And the father got so upset, he just left the room, you know? So, very serious guy, apparently, you know? He wanted to know exactly how he got to support his daughter in some way, you know? That wasn't good enough answer for more, uh, this guy just talked the other day, that was kind of funny, you know? Let's see. So, you're kind of, you're getting virtues that are more like justice, which is concerned with what you do, right? More than the question of virtue, right? In other words, it's not a matter of justice so much, am I sad or joyful, I paid what I owe, right? But did I do it, right? Well, up here it's more concerning with being attached to my possessions too much or too little, right? Okay. So, these are the moral virtues that Aristotle takes up, and it's a different week, right? And when Thomas takes up the virtue of humility in the Summa Theologiae, and of course, you know, he'll ask, first of all, it's humility of virtue, right? And one of the objections given, right, is, well, it's not one of the virtues that Aristotle takes up, the Nicomachean Ethics. And Thomas says, well, Aristotle there is taking up the virtues whereby one lives well in the city, huh? Ethics is order to political philosophy, ultimately, huh? And you can see that all of these virtues are very necessary for life in the city. I mean, how can you have a city without justice, right? That's a chaos, right? How can you defend the city without courage, right? How can you live well in the city without, you know, moderation and eating and drinking? People are always getting in trouble because they drink too much or they're, you know, attacking somebody's woman or wife or something, you know? Okay? But, you know, innocence is very necessary in the city, right? Liberality is necessary. And how do you want to live in the city without people being friendly or having no sense of humor or, you know, never, you know, showing themselves as they are, right? All these virtues are very necessary for life in the city. But he says humility is primarily putting yourself under God, right? And then others in reference to God, right? So humility is more appropriately talked about in theology than in philosophy. In other words, though, he does talk about humility, huh? He's talking about the truth, right? And how men are deceived by pride, huh? And he tributes it to the first species of pride, boastfulness, right? That very big is, huh? But that's more, you're thinking now about God, who's truth itself, right? And when Aristotle was talking in that passage I referred to in the first book, I've got to stop you in a second, that to prefer your human friends to truth itself would be impious, he says, right? And Thomas and he coming to Aristotle, why does he say impious, right? Because he'd be opposed to God, who's truth itself. So Aristotle was more apt to talk a little bit about humility, when he's pursuing truth, right, in philosophy, right? But the Nicomarckian Ethics, as you'll see when we look eventually at the premium, this is in a way the elements of political philosophy, huh? And he's emphasizing the virtues primarily here, for by one is disposed well towards life in the city, without the human being. And that's why humility is not here, because that's primarily with respect to, what? God, right? So by humility I place myself under God, and then under other men, but in reference to God, right? So you place yourself under the Abitur, you know, you're your natural father and you're a child, right? Because they and some are representing God, huh? For you, right? Okay. So we'll stop here, but I'll put the bank on with more about the moral virtues.