GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

ARISTOTLE'S MORALS AND POLITICS in
psychologists tend to think of reason as a kind of engine,
and of desire as the steam that causes it to function. It is
only when a sufficient head of steam has accumulated in
the boiler that the engine moves. The analogy illustrates
the conception with which Aristotle has been traditionally
credited of the relation between reason and desire; that
is to say, between the intellectual and the appetitive
elements in the will and their bearing upon conduct.
This conception represents reason as being merely the
servant of desire; but if reason is the servant of desire,
reason is not free. What, then, is the status of desire?
Desire and emotion, it will be remembered, are, in Aristotle's
scheme, neither good nor bad. They only become
the objects of ethical judgment when they operate in a
certain way; when, in other words, they become directed
to certain ends. Now the ends to which the desires of the
ordinary man are directed are those to which the educator
by his system of education, the legislator by the provisions
of his laws, have directed them. In other words, what we,
as ordinary men and women, desire is not determined by
us, but for us.
The Doctrine of Self-Determinism. 2. Let us now
consider Aristotle's doctrine of the will in its bearing upon
his general theory of character formation. Character, it
will be remembered, is defined as "a settled condition of
the soul which wills or chooses" to act in certain ways.
Character, in other words, expresses itself in actions, and
the will is that aspect of character which chooses the
actions. By what, then, is the will determined? Presumably
by the character, for according to our character's com*
plotion, so do we will. What, then, it is important to know,
forms the character? The answer would appear to be
that the character is formed by acts of will. The suggestion
of circularity in this argument is important, and it is worth
while pausing to develop it
Let us suppose that I am a person continually given to
good works; all my actions, we will suppose, are notjlc,