§ 4. Character and Action.

[II. c. iv. §§ 1-3.]

Chapter iv. opens with the statement of an objection to the theory of habit as just explained. Seeing that good action presupposes good habit, how can the latter have its origin in the former? The sections in which Aristotle states his reply are not without obscurity, owing to a certain confusion in the thought. In § 2 it is pointed out that the objection rests on a failure to distinguish acts which are formally or accidentally right, from those which as the outcome of good character are right in the full sense. The second part (§ 3) is a criticism of the popular analogy between art and morality, and the obscurity comes from the looseness of the relation in which this criticism stands to the rest of the argument. Not only does it throw no further light on the difficulty with which the chapter opens, but it introduces a new difficulty, viz. that of the relation between virtue and knowledge, which is here only partially met.

Apart, however, from the bearing of these sections. on the particular objection to which they are intended. to furnish the reply, they are interesting as throwing light upon Aristotle's views on two questions which naturally rise in connexion with the present discussion (a) What is the relation between the goodness of an act and the motive of it? (b) What is the true relation between art and morality?

(a) The objection itself, suggested in c. iv. § 1, is

perhaps not one that would naturally have suggested itself to a modern reader. It seems quite natural to us to separate off action on the one hand from character and motive on the other, and we find no difficulty in speaking of actions as good independently of the will that they express. It is even characteristic of the current utilitarian view to justify this distinction on the ground that an action is right and good because it "produces happiness," not because it is the act of a good man.* And indeed it is difficult to see how, if we grant the utilitarian contention that the end or good is something different from virtue or goodness, and that the good action is valuable only in so far as it tends to produce pleasure or happiness, the good character only in so far as it tends to produce good actions, this conclusion can be avoided. There is in this case no organic connexion between good character or virtue and the end for which it exists, and an action may be in the fullest sense good whatever the character of the man who does it.

Now, it is true that the contrast in Aristotle's mind is not the modern one between motive and consequence, but between action which is the result, say, of obedience to a command, and action which is the outcome of a fully developed character. Yet the statement of the objection and the reply to it have a deeper interest for us on account of the complete reversal of the current distinction which they imply. According to Aristotle's view we must deny goodness of action, however good may be its consequences, * See Mill's Utilitarianism, chap. ii. p. 26.

unless it is the spontaneous expression of good character and motive. To take Mill's example, the saving of the life of a fellow-creature, if it is done. from a wrong motive, eg. to win the medal of the Royal Humane Society, could only be called good "accidentally." To be a truly good action it must be done from no selfish motive, but simply because it is the right thing to do: because, being the man he is, the doer of it "cannot do otherwise."

If it be said that it is contrary to common sense to deny goodness of an action which is right (in itself) inasmuch as it produces consequences which are good quite independently of the will that is expressed in it, the reply is that this depends on the answer we give to two questions. (1) What are the consequences at which the act which is good aims? (2) Can these consequences really be attained if the motive is bad? In reply to the first question, Aristotle would have maintained that "good" consequences are not to be measured by the amount of pleasure to one's self and others that the action produces. The production of pleasure taken by itself is neither good nor evil from the point of view of morality. "Good" "Good" consequences in the moral sense can only mean those that make for the increase of happiness in the sense of the exercise of virtue or excellence, and this, as we have just seen, is a matter of character. It is perhaps difficult to say what an ancient Greek philosopher would have replied to so essentially modern a question as the second of the above. It is not, however, difficult to see that the answer that has been given to it by

one of his most distinguished modern followers is in essential accordance with Aristotle's principles. Discussing the question whether actions which are the expression of a bad or imperfect character can really have good consequences of the kind just described, Green says: "It is only to our limited vision that there can seem to be such a thing as good effects from an action that is bad in respect of the will which it represents, and that in consequence the question becomes possible whether the morality of an action is determined by its motive or by its consequences. There is no real reason to doubt that the good or evil in the motive of an action is exactly measured by the good or evil of its consequences as rightly estimated-estimated, that is, in their bearing on the production of a good will or the perfecting of mankind." [Thus to use Green's own instance: "The good in the effect of a political movement will correspond to the degree of good will which has been exerted in bringing it about; and the effects of any selfishness in its promoters will appear in some limitation to the good it brings society."] "The contrary only appears to be the case on account of the limited view we take both of action and consequences." *

§ 5. Art and Morality.

[II. c. iv. § 3.]

(b) The organic connexion which in Aristotle's view exists between action and character is further

* Prolegomena to Ethics, § 295.

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illustrated by what is said in chapter iv. § 3 on the relation between art and morality.

It is a common view that the distinction between art and morality, the beautiful and the good, is overlooked by Greek ethics in general, and by Aristotle in particular. The impression is founded partly on the identity of their artistic and ethical terminology (as Ruskin says, “There is scarcely a word in Greek social philosophy which has not a reference to musical law, and scarcely a word in Greek musical science which has not an understood reference to social law "); partly on the care with which the great ethical writers themselves work out the conception of the good life, as consisting essentially in harmony or proportion between the different elements of human nature. It is strengthened in the case of Aristotle by frequent reference (e.g. I. c. vii. § 9 foll.) to the analogy between the function of man as man and the craft of the artist, by his picture of the happy man (e.g. I. c. viii. §15) as an actor duly equipped with all the stage properties necessary for the part he has to play in life, but most of all by his definition of virtue as a mean and his conception of the good act as not only one that is harmonious in all its parts, but as one that is done for the sake of its harmony or beauty.

How far this criticism is from the truth in respect to happiness in general, we have already seen. Happiness is no artificial product, but the full development of the true nature of man. As Professor Stewart puts it: "Since the subject of ethics is the life of man at its best (the 'good life'), it is easy to