BOOK VII

[1] The account of Virtue and Vice hitherto given represents rather what men may be than what they are. In this book we take a practical view of Virtue and Vice, in their ordinary, every day development.

[2] This illustrates the expression, “Deceits of the Flesh.”

[3] Another reading omits the [Greek:——]; the meaning of the whole passage would be exactly the same—it would then run, “if he had been convinced of the rightness of what he does, i.e. if he were now acting on conviction, he might stop in his course on a change of conviction.”

[4] Major and minor Premises of the [Greek:——] [Greek——]

[5] Some necessarily implying knowledge of the particular, others not.

[6] As a modern parallel, take old Trumbull in Scott’s “Red Gauntlet.”

[7] That is, as I understand it, either the major or the minor premise, it is true, that “all that is sweet is pleasant,” it is true also, that “this is sweet,” what is contrary to Right Reason is the bringing in this minor to the major i.e. the universal maxim, forbidding to taste. Thus, a man goes to a convivial meeting with the maxim in his mind “All excess is to be avoided,” at a certain time his [Greek:——] tells him “This glass is excess.” As a matter of mere reasoning, he cannot help receiving the conclusion “This glass is to be avoided,” and supposing him to be morally sound he would accordingly abstain. But [Greek:——], being a simple tendency towards indulgence suggests, in place of the minor premise “This is excess,” its own premise “This is sweet,” this again suggests the self-indulgent maxim or principle (‘[Greek:——]), “All that is sweet is to be tasted,” and so, by strict logical sequence, proves “This glass is to be tasted.”
    The solution then of the phænomenon of [Greek:——] is this that [Greek:——], by its direct action on the animal nature, swamps the suggestions of Right Reason.
    On the high ground of Universals, [Greek:——] i.e. [Greek:——] easily defeats [Greek:——]. The [Greek:——], an hour before he is in temptation, would never deliberately prefer the maxim “All that is sweet is to be tasted” to “All excess is to be avoided.” The [Greek:——] would.

Horace has a good comment upon this (II Sat 2):

Quæ virtus et quanta, bom, sit vivere parvo
Discite, non inter lances mensasque nitentes
Verum hic impransi mecum disquirite

Compare also Proverbs XXIII. 31. “Look not thou upon the wine when it is red,” etc.

[8] As we commonly speak, Metaphysicians. Physiology of course includes Metaphysics.

[9] [Greek: oron]. Aristotle’s own account of this word (Prior Analyt ii. 1) is [Greek: eis on dialuetai hae protasis], but both in the account of [Greek: nous] and here it seems that the proposition itself is really indicated by it.

[10] The Greek would give “avoids excessive pain,” but this is not true, for the excess of pain would be ground for excuse the warrant for translating as in the text, is the passage occurring just below [Greek: diokei tas uperbolas kai pheugei metrias lupas].

[11] Compare Bishop Butler on Particular Propensions, Analogy, Part I chap v sect. iv.

[12] That is, they are to the right states as Vice to Virtue.

[13] See the letter of Sabina Rentfree. Spectator, 431.

[14] Consult in connection with this Chapter the Chapter on [Greek: orgae] in the Rhetoric, II. 2, and Bishop Butler’s Sermon on Resentment.

[15] The reasoning here being somewhat obscure from the concisement of expression, the following exposition of it is subjoined.

Actions of Lust are wrong actions done with pleasure,
Wrong actions done with pleasure are more justly objects of wrath, [*]
Such as are more justly objects of wrath are more unjust,
Actions of Lust are more unjust

[*] [Greek: hubpis] is introduced as the single instance from which this premiss is proved inductively. See the account of it in the Chapter of the Rhetoric referred to in the preceding note.

[16] [Greek: ton dae lechthenton]. Considerable difference of opinion exists as to the proper meaning of these words. The emendation which substitutes [Greek: akrataes] for [Greek: akolastos] removes all difficulty, as the clause would then naturally refer to [Greek: ton mae proairoumenon] but Zell adheres to the reading in the text of Bekker, because the authority of MSS and old editions is all on this side.
    I understand [Greek: mallon] as meant to modify the word [Greek: malakias], which properly denotes that phase of [Greek: akrasia] (not [Greek: akolasia]) which is caused by pain.
    The [Greek: akolastos] deliberately pursues pleasure and declines pain if there is to be a distinct name for the latter phase, it comes under [Greek: malakia] more nearly than any other term, though perhaps not quite properly.
    Or the words may be understood as referring to the class of wrong acts caused by avoidance of pain, whether deliberate or otherwise, and then of course the names of [Greek: malakia] and [Greek: akolasia] may be fitly given respectively.

[17] “If we went into a hospital where all were sick or dying, we should think those least ill who were insensible to pain; a physician who knew the whole, would behold them with despair. And there is a mortification of the soul as well as of the body, in which the first symptoms of returning hope are pain and anguish” Sewell, Sermons to Young Men (Sermon xii.)

[18] Before the time of trial comes the man deliberately makes his Moral Choice to act rightly, but, at the moment of acting, the powerful strain of desire makes him contravene this choice his Will does not act in accordance with the affirmation or negation of his Reason. His actions are therefore of the mixed kind. See Book III. chap. i, and note on page 128.

[19] Let a man be punctual on principle to any one engagement in the day, and he must, as a matter of course, keep all his others in their due places relatively to this one; and so will often wear an appearance of being needlessly punctilious in trifles.

[20] Because he is destitute of these minor springs of action, which are intended to supply the defects of the higher principle.
    See Bishop Butler’s first Sermon on Compassion, and the conclusion of note on p. 129.