The Ethics of Aristotle - Penn State Hazleton

The Ethics of Aristotleselves bad, not the having too much or too little of them.In these then you never can go right, but must always bewrong: nor in such does the right or wrong depend on theselection of a proper person, time, or manner (take adulteryfor instance), but simply doing any one soever of those thingsis being wrong.You might as well require that there should be determineda mean state, an excess and a defect in respect of acting unjustly,being cowardly, or giving up all control of the passions:for at this rate there will be of excess and defect a meanstate; of excess, excess; and of defect, defect.But just as of perfected self-mastery and courage there isno excess and defect, because the mean is in one point ofview the highest possible state, so neither of those faulty statescan you have a mean state, excess, or defect, but howsoeverdone they are wrong: you cannot, in short, have of excessand defect a mean state, nor of a mean state excess and defect.VIIIt is not enough, however, to state this in general terms, wemust also apply it to particular instances, because in treatiseson moral conduct general statements have an air of vagueness,but those which go into detail one of greater reality: forthe actions after all must be in detail, and the general statements,to be worth anything, must hold good here.We must take these details then from the Table.I. In respect of fears and confidence or boldness:[Sidenote: 1107b]The Mean state is Courage: men may exceed, of course,either in absence of fear or in positive confidence: the formerhas no name (which is a common case), the latter is calledrash: again, the man who has too much fear and too littleconfidence is called a coward.II. In respect of pleasures and pains (but not all, and perhapsfewer pains than pleasures):The Mean state here is perfected Self-Mastery, the defecttotal absence of Self-control. As for defect in respect of pleasure,there are really no people who are chargeable with it,51