Ethics, as Mr. L. Stephen says, what the squaring of the circle is for Mathematics.

§ 7. Friendship in Modern Education.

Returning to the main function assigned by Plato and Aristotle to Friendship in the development of character, and comparing their view of it with our modern ideas on the same subject, the contrast is at first sight almost startling. It is not only that in modern states there is no attempt such as was not uncommon among the Greeks, and was advocated by Plato, to regulate friendship in the interest of society in general, but the subject is almost totally neglected by teachers and educational writers. It is hardly going too far to say that the element of personal attachment, especially among young people, has come to be regarded in some quarters with suspicion.* Even so enlightened a writer as Professor Baldwin seems to suggest that parents and teachers should do their best to prevent the formation of permanent friendships among children. The reader of Aristotle's Ethics will be inclined to regard this neglect as a great loss to the theory of education, and to agree with Mr. Edward Carpenter that those who carry it into practice “fling on the dust-heap one of the noblest and most precious elements in human nature." In contrast to the prevailing apathy (or worse) it is refreshing to read the same writer's bold statement of his belief that "the more

* See Mr. Edward Carpenter's protest, "Affection in Education," International Journal of Ethics, July, 1899.

the matter is thought of, the clearer will it appear that a healthy affection must in the end be the basis of education." We may be permitted to add that if what has already been said is true, the recognition of this fact may be expected to open a way out of other modern difficulties besides those of the schoolroom, to which Mr. Carpenter particularly refers.

Meantime it may help in some degree to bring this recognition about if, in conclusion, we note from the side of theory that there is one line of thought, familiar enough to the student of recent psychology, which may form a meeting-ground of ancient and modern ideas.

In tracing the development of consciousness, modern text-books lay stress on the growth of the idea of self as one of the most important ideas which a child acquires. Various "factors" are mentioned as entering into its formation-among others the social factor. The child, it is pointed out, does not grow up by itself, but as one among other selves, who re-act upon it in two ways. In the first place, the persons who surround it are a mirror in which it sees itself; and in the second, the actions of others, and especially those of intimate friends, offer a copy by means of which, under pressure of the dominant instinct of imitation, the child's consciousness of its own powers are developed.* Without going further we may see that there is much in this doctrine that reminds us of Aristotle. It might indeed appear that we have here only an extension to the consciousness of self in general of the

*

* See, for example, Professor Baldwin's Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development, Bk. I. c. i.

principle which Aristotle confines to the consciousness of the moral self. There is, however, more in the Aristotelian doctrine than a partial anticipation of a popular modern view. It contains suggestions which go beyond and correct it in two essential particulars. In the first place the self-consciousness Aristotle is thinking of is not one among other forms of consciousness, the "idea" of self not one among other ideas. It is consciousness at its fullest development, the idea which includes and gives their place to all other ideas. It is thus the end of all individual development, not merely one of the elements in that development. But, secondly, in emphasizing “community of life and the intercourse of word and thought" as a factor in the development of self-consciousness, Aristotle is thinking of something far more important than imitation, conscious or unconscious. Imitation is the mere reproduction of the actions of another. Whether there is in normal human conduct any such thing as imitation in this sense, or whether in any action that can be properly called voluntary, there is not normally an element of adaptation, i.e. a real attempt to express one's self, accompanying the effort to reproduce, we need not further discuss.* If there be any such thing as imitation pure and simple, it is of comparatively little educational importance, and is certainly not what Aristotle has in view. He is thinking throughout of the power of friendship to stimulate reciprocity of services rather than imitation of the actions of another. It is in respect of their *See what has already been said on this subject, chapter vi.

reciprocity that the mutual services of friends reproduce in microcosm those which civic society at large requires of us. What is claimed for friendship (to repeat it once more) is that by suffusing the life of ordinary social duty with the glow of feeling, it imparts to it at once a new glory and a new quality of transparency.

CHAPTER XIII.

PLEASURE.

"Pleasure is the unbought and unbuyable grace of life: the electric spark, as it were, which flashes out at the point where the outgoing line of action returns upon itself and is just completing its redintegration with self: it is the consciousness that the object which is presented by natural causes, or which we have ourselves produced by an act of will, is in harmony and co-operation with the subjective conditions and forces of life which reveal themselves in our voluntary agency."

W. WALLACE.

§ 1. The Two Discussions of Pleasure in the Ethics.

[Bk. VII. cc. xi.-xiv. ; Bk. X. cc. i.-v.]

ARISTOTLE'S Ethics contain two separate discussions of Pleasure, one at the end of Book VII., the other at the beginning of Book X. Prima facie, the doctrine in these two passages is different. In the former, Aristotle seems to maintain that Pleasure is the supreme good; in the latter, to contest this opinion. The passage that causes the chief difficulty will be found in Book VII. c. xiii. § 2: "There is no reason why a certain kind of pleasure should not be the supreme good, even though some kinds be bad, just as there is no reason why a certain kind of knowledge should not be, though some kinds be bad. Nay, perhaps we