Arthur Train - "The Confessions of Artemas Quibble"

Anonymous - "The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV"

E. Phillips Oppenheim - "An Amiable Charlatan"

Eugene Field - "A Little Book of Profitable Tales"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Ethics

A >> Aristotle >> Ethics





VIII

We must now inquire concerning Happiness, not only from our conclusion
and the data on which our reasoning proceeds, but likewise from what
is commonly said about it: because with what is true all things which
really are are in harmony, but with that which is false the true very
soon jars.

Now there is a common division of goods into three classes; one being
called external, the other two those of the soul and body respectively,
and those belonging to the soul we call most properly and specially
good. Well, in our definition we assume that the actions and workings of
the soul constitute Happiness, and these of course belong to the soul.
And so our account is a good one, at least according to this opinion,
which is of ancient date, and accepted by those who profess philosophy.
Rightly too are certain actions and workings said to be the end, for
thus it is brought into the number of the goods of the soul instead of
the external. Agreeing also with our definition is the common notion,
that the happy man lives well and does well, for it has been stated by
us to be pretty much a kind of living well and doing well.

But further, the points required in Happiness are found in combination
in our account of it.

For some think it is virtue, others practical wisdom, others a kind of
scientific philosophy; others that it is these, or else some one of
them, in combination with pleasure, or at least not independently of it;
while others again take in external prosperity.

Of these opinions, some rest on the authority of numbers or antiquity,
others on that of few, and those men of note: and it is not likely that
either of these classes should be wrong in all points, but be right at
least in some one, or even in most.

Now with those who assert it to be Virtue (Excellence), or some kind of
Virtue, our account agrees: for working in the way of Excellence surely
belongs to Excellence.

And there is perhaps no unimportant difference between conceiving of
the Chief Good as in possession or as in use, in other words, as a mere
state or as a working. For the state or habit may possibly exist in a
subject without effecting any good, as, for instance, in him who is
asleep, or in any other way inactive; but the working cannot so, for it
will of necessity act, and act well. And as at the Olympic games it is
not the finest and strongest men who are crowned, but they who enter the
lists, for out of these the prize-men are selected; so too in life, of
the honourable and the good, it is they who act who rightly win the
prizes.

Their life too is in itself pleasant: for the feeling of pleasure is a
mental sensation, and that is to each pleasant of which he is said to be
fond: a horse, for instance, to him who is fond of horses, and a sight
to him who is fond of sights: and so in like manner just acts to him who
is fond of justice, and more generally the things in accordance with
virtue to him who is fond of virtue. Now in the case of the multitude of
men the things which they individually esteem pleasant clash, because
they are not such by nature, whereas to the lovers of nobleness those
things are pleasant which are such by nature: but the actions in
accordance with virtue are of this kind, so that they are pleasant both
to the individuals and also in themselves.

So then their life has no need of pleasure as a kind of additional
appendage, but involves pleasure in itself. For, besides what I have
just mentioned, a man is not a good man at all who feels no pleasure in
noble actions, just as no one would call that man just who does not feel
pleasure in acting justly, or liberal who does not in liberal actions,
and similarly in the case of the other virtues which might be
enumerated: and if this be so, then the actions in accordance with
virtue must be in themselves pleasurable. Then again they are certainly
good and noble, and each of these in the highest degree; if we are to
take as right the judgment of the good man, for he judges as we have
said.

Thus then Happiness is most excellent, most noble, and most pleasant,
and these attributes are not separated as in the well-known Delian
inscription--

"Most noble is that which is most just, but best is health; And
naturally most pleasant is the obtaining one's desires."

For all these co-exist in the best acts of working: and we say that
Happiness is these, or one, that is, the best of them.

Still it is quite plain that it does require the addition of external
goods, as we have said: because without appliances it is impossible, or
at all events not easy, to do noble actions: for friends, money, and
political influence are in a manner instruments whereby many things
are done: some things there are again a deficiency in which mars
blessedness; good birth, for instance, or fine offspring, or even
personal beauty: for he is not at all capable of Happiness who is very
ugly, or is ill-born, or solitary and childless; and still less perhaps
supposing him to have very bad children or friends, or to have lost good
ones by death. As we have said already, the addition of prosperity of
this kind does seem necessary to complete the idea of Happiness; hence
some rank good fortune, and others virtue, with Happiness.

And hence too a question is raised, whether it is a thing that can be
learned, or acquired by habituation or discipline of some other kind, or
whether it comes in the way of divine dispensation, or even in the way
of chance.

Now to be sure, if anything else is a gift of the Gods to men, it is
probable that Happiness is a gift of theirs too, and specially because
of all human goods it is the highest. But this, it may be, is a question
belonging more properly to an investigation different from ours: and it
is quite clear, that on the supposition of its not being sent from the
Gods direct, but coming to us by reason of virtue and learning of a
certain kind, or discipline, it is yet one of the most Godlike things;
because the prize and End of virtue is manifestly somewhat most
excellent, nay divine and blessed.

It will also on this supposition be widely participated, for it may
through learning and diligence of a certain kind exist in all who have
not been maimed for virtue.

And if it is better we should be happy thus than as a result of chance,
this is in itself an argument that the case is so; because those things
which are in the way of nature, and in like manner of art, and of every
cause, and specially the best cause, are by nature in the best way
possible: to leave them to chance what is greatest and most noble would
be very much out of harmony with all these facts.

The question may be determined also by a reference to our definition of
Happiness, that it is a working of the soul in the way of excellence or
virtue of a certain kind: and of the other goods, some we must have to
begin with, and those which are co-operative and useful are given by
nature as instruments.

These considerations will harmonise also with what we said at the
commencement: for we assumed the End of [Greek Text: poletikae] to be
most excellent: now this bestows most care on making the members of the
community of a certain character; good that is and apt to do what is
honourable.

With good reason then neither ox nor horse nor any other brute animal
do we call happy, for none of them can partake in such working: and for
this same reason a child is not happy either, because by reason of his
tender age he cannot yet perform such actions: if the term is applied,
it is by way of anticipation.

For to constitute Happiness, there must be, as we have said, complete
virtue and a complete life: for many changes and chances of all kinds
arise during a life, and he who is most prosperous may become involved
in great misfortunes in his old age, as in the heroic poems the tale is
told of Priam: but the man who has experienced such fortune and died in
wretchedness, no man calls happy.

Are we then to call no man happy while he lives, and, as Solon would
have us, look to the end? And again, if we are to maintain this
position, is a man then happy when he is dead? or is not this a complete
absurdity, specially in us who say Happiness is a working of a certain
kind?

If on the other hand we do not assert that the dead man is happy, and
Solon does not mean this, but only that one would then be safe in
pronouncing a man happy, as being thenceforward out of the reach of
evils and misfortunes, this too admits of some dispute, since it is
thought that the dead has somewhat both of good and evil (if, as we must
allow, a man may have when alive but not aware of the circumstances),
as honour and dishonour, and good and bad fortune of children and
descendants generally.

Nor is this view again without its difficulties: for, after a man has
lived in blessedness to old age and died accordingly, many changes may
befall him in right of his descendants; some of them may be good and
obtain positions in life accordant to their merits, others again quite
the contrary: it is plain too that the descendants may at different
intervals or grades stand in all manner of relations to the ancestors.
Absurd indeed would be the position that even the dead man is to change
about with them and become at one time happy and at another miserable.
Absurd however it is on the other hand that the affairs of the
descendants should in no degree and during no time affect the ancestors.

But we must revert to the point first raised, since the present question
will be easily determined from that.

If then we are to look to the end and then pronounce the man blessed,
not as being so but as having been so at some previous time, surely it
is absurd that when he _is_ happy the truth is not to be asserted of
him, because we are unwilling to pronounce the living happy by reason of
their liability to changes, and because, whereas we have conceived of
happiness as something stable and no way easily changeable, the fact is
that good and bad fortune are constantly circling about the same people:
for it is quite plain, that if we are to depend upon the fortunes of
men, we shall often have to call the same man happy, and a little while
after miserable, thus representing our happy man

"Chameleon-like, and based on rottenness."

Is not this the solution? that to make our sentence dependent on the
changes of fortune, is no way right: for not in them stands the well, or
the ill, but though human life needs these as accessories (which we have
allowed already), the workings in the way of virtue are what determine
Happiness, and the contrary the contrary.

And, by the way, the question which has been here discussed, testifies
incidentally to the truth of our account of Happiness. For to nothing
does a stability of human results attach so much as it does to the
workings in the way of virtue, since these are held to be more abiding
even than the sciences: and of these last again the most precious
are the most abiding, because the blessed live in them most and most
continuously, which seems to be the reason why they are not forgotten.
So then this stability which is sought will be in the happy man, and
he will be such through life, since always, or most of all, he will be
doing and contemplating the things which are in the way of virtue: and
the various chances of life he will bear most nobly, and at all times
and in all ways harmoniously, since he is the truly good man, or in the
terms of our proverb "a faultless cube."

And whereas the incidents of chance are many, and differ in greatness
and smallness, the small pieces of good or ill fortune evidently do not
affect the balance of life, but the great and numerous, if happening for
good, will make life more blessed (for it is their nature to contribute
to ornament, and the using of them comes to be noble and excellent), but
if for ill, they bruise as it were and maim the blessedness: for they
bring in positive pain, and hinder many acts of working. But still, even
in these, nobleness shines through when a man bears contentedly many and
great mischances not from insensibility to pain but because he is noble
and high-spirited.

And if, as we have said, the acts of working are what determine the
character of the life, no one of the blessed can ever become wretched,
because he will never do those things which are hateful and mean. For
the man who is truly good and sensible bears all fortunes, we presume,
becomingly, and always does what is noblest under the circumstances,
just as a good general employs to the best advantage the force he has
with him; or a good shoemaker makes the handsomest shoe he can out
of the leather which has been given him; and all other good artisans
likewise. And if this be so, wretched never can the happy man come to
be: I do not mean to say he will be blessed should he fall into fortunes
like those of Priam.

Nor, in truth, is he shifting and easily changeable, for on the one
hand from his happiness he will not be shaken easily nor by ordinary
mischances, but, if at all, by those which are great and numerous; and,
on the other, after such mischances he cannot regain his happiness in a
little time; but, if at all, in a long and complete period, during which
he has made himself master of great and noble things.

Why then should we not call happy the man who works in the way of
perfect virtue, and is furnished with external goods sufficient for
acting his part in the drama of life: and this during no ordinary period
but such as constitutes a complete life as we have been describing it.

Or we must add, that not only is he to live so, but his death must be in
keeping with such life, since the future is dark to us, and Happiness we
assume to be in every way an end and complete. And, if this be so, we
shall call them among the living blessed who have and will have the
things specified, but blessed _as Men_.

On these points then let it suffice to have denned thus much.


XI

Now that the fortunes of their descendants, and friends generally,
contribute nothing towards forming the condition of the dead, is plainly
a very heartless notion, and contrary to the current opinions.

But since things which befall are many, and differ in all kinds of ways,
and some touch more nearly, others less, to go into minute particular
distinctions would evidently be a long and endless task: and so it may
suffice to speak generally and in outline.

If then, as of the misfortunes which happen to one's self, some have a
certain weight and turn the balance of life, while others are, so to
speak, lighter; so it is likewise with those which befall all our
friends alike; if further, whether they whom each suffering befalls
be alive or dead makes much more difference than in a tragedy the
presupposing or actual perpetration of the various crimes and horrors,
we must take into our account this difference also, and still more
perhaps the doubt concerning the dead whether they really partake of any
good or evil; it seems to result from all these considerations, that if
anything does pierce the veil and reach them, be the same good or bad,
it must be something trivial and small, either in itself or to them; or
at least of such a magnitude or such a kind as neither to make happy
them that are not so otherwise, nor to deprive of their blessedness them
that are.

It is plain then that the good or ill fortunes of their friends do
affect the dead somewhat: but in such kind and degree as neither to make
the happy unhappy nor produce any other such effect.


XII

Having determined these points, let us examine with respect to
Happiness, whether it belongs to the class of things praiseworthy or
things precious; for to that of faculties it evidently does not.

Now it is plain that everything which is a subject of praise is praised
for being of a certain kind and bearing a certain relation to something
else: for instance, the just, and the valiant, and generally the good
man, and virtue itself, we praise because of the actions and the
results: and the strong man, and the quick runner, and so forth, we
praise for being of a certain nature and bearing a certain relation to
something good and excellent (and this is illustrated by attempts to
praise the gods; for they are presented in a ludicrous aspect by being
referred to our standard, and this results from the fact, that all
praise does, as we have said, imply reference to a standard). Now if
it is to such objects that praise belongs, it is evident that what is
applicable to the best objects is not praise, but something higher and
better: which is plain matter of fact, for not only do we call the gods
blessed and happy, but of men also we pronounce those blessed who most
nearly resemble the gods. And in like manner in respect of goods; no man
thinks of praising Happiness as he does the principle of justice, but
calls it blessed, as being somewhat more godlike and more excellent.

Eudoxus too is thought to have advanced a sound argument in support of
the claim of pleasure to the highest prize: for the fact that, though it
is one of the good things, it is not praised, he took for an indication
of its superiority to those which are subjects of praise: a superiority
he attributed also to a god and the Chief Good, on the ground that they
form the standard to which everything besides is referred. For praise
applies to virtue, because it makes men apt to do what is noble; but
encomia to definite works of body or mind.

However, it is perhaps more suitable to a regular treatise on encomia to
pursue this topic with exactness: it is enough for our purpose that from
what has been said it is evident that Happiness belongs to the class of
things precious and final. And it seems to be so also because of its
being a starting-point; which it is, in that with a view to it we all do
everything else that is done; now the starting-point and cause of good
things we assume to be something precious and divine.


XIII

Moreover, since Happiness is a kind of working of the soul in the way
of perfect Excellence, we must inquire concerning Excellence: for so
probably shall we have a clearer view concerning Happiness; and again,
he who is really a statesman is generally thought to have spent most
pains on this, for he wishes to make the citizens good and obedient
to the laws. (For examples of this class we have the lawgivers of the
Cretans and Lacedaemonians and whatever other such there have been.)
But if this investigation belongs properly to [Greek: politikae], then
clearly the inquiry will be in accordance with our original design.

Well, we are to inquire concerning Excellence, _i.e._ Human Excellence
of course, because it was the Chief Good of Man and the Happiness of Man
that we were inquiring of just now. By Human Excellence we mean not that
of man's body but that of his soul; for we call Happiness a working of
the Soul.

And if this is so, it is plain that some knowledge of the nature of the
Soul is necessary for the statesman, just as for the Oculist a knowledge
of the whole body, and the more so in proportion as [Greek: politikae]
is more precious and higher than the healing art: and in fact physicians
of the higher class do busy themselves much with the knowledge of the
body.

So then the statesman is to consider the nature of the Soul: but he must
do so with these objects in view, and so far only as may suffice for
the objects of his special inquiry: for to carry his speculations to a
greater exactness is perhaps a task more laborious than falls within his
province.

In fact, the few statements made on the subject in my popular treatises
are quite enough, and accordingly we will adopt them here: as, that
the Soul consists of two parts, the Irrational and the Rational (as to
whether these are actually divided, as are the parts of the body, and
everything that is capable of division; or are only metaphysically
speaking two, being by nature inseparable, as are convex and concave
circumferences, matters not in respect of our present purpose). And of
the Irrational, the one part seems common to other objects, and in fact
vegetative; I mean the cause of nourishment and growth (for such a
faculty of the Soul one would assume to exist in all things that receive
nourishment, even in embryos, and this the same as in the perfect
creatures; for this is more likely than that it should be a different
one).

Now the Excellence of this manifestly is not peculiar to the human
species but common to others: for this part and this faculty is thought
to work most in time of sleep, and the good and bad man are least
distinguishable while asleep; whence it is a common saying that during
one half of life there is no difference between the happy and the
wretched; and this accords with our anticipations, for sleep is an
inactivity of the soul, in so far as it is denominated good or bad,
except that in some wise some of its movements find their way through
the veil and so the good come to have better dreams than ordinary men.
But enough of this: we must forego any further mention of the nutritive
part, since it is not naturally capable of the Excellence which is
peculiarly human.

And there seems to be another Irrational Nature of the Soul, which yet
in a way partakes of Reason. For in the man who controls his appetites,
and in him who resolves to do so and fails, we praise the Reason or
Rational part of the Soul, because it exhorts aright and to the best
course: but clearly there is in them, beside the Reason, some other
natural principle which fights with and strains against the Reason. (For
in plain terms, just as paralysed limbs of the body when their owners
would move them to the right are borne aside in a contrary direction to
the left, so is it in the case of the Soul, for the impulses of men who
cannot control their appetites are to contrary points: the difference is
that in the case of the body we do see what is borne aside but in the
case of the soul we do not. But, it may be, not the less on that account
are we to suppose that there is in the Soul also somewhat besides the
Reason, which is opposed to this and goes against it; as to _how_ it is
different, that is irrelevant.)

But of Reason this too does evidently partake, as we have said: for
instance, in the man of self-control it obeys Reason: and perhaps in
the man of perfected self-mastery, or the brave man, it is yet more
obedient; in them it agrees entirely with the Reason.

So then the Irrational is plainly twofold: the one part, the merely
vegetative, has no share of Reason, but that of desire, or appetition
generally, does partake of it in a sense, in so far as it is obedient to
it and capable of submitting to its rule. (So too in common phrase we
say we have [Greek: _logos_] of our father or friends, and this in a
different sense from that in which we say we have [Greek: logos] of
mathematics.)

Now that the Irrational is in some way persuaded by the Reason,
admonition, and every act of rebuke and exhortation indicate. If then we
are to say that this also has Reason, then the Rational, as well as the
Irrational, will be twofold, the one supremely and in itself, the other
paying it a kind of filial regard.

The Excellence of Man then is divided in accordance with this
difference: we make two classes, calling the one Intellectual, and
the other Moral; pure science, intelligence, and practical
wisdom--Intellectual: liberality, and perfected self-mastery--Moral: in
speaking of a man's Moral character, we do not say he is a scientific
or intelligent but a meek man, or one of perfected self-mastery: and we
praise the man of science in right of his mental state; and of these
such as are praiseworthy we call Excellences.




BOOK II

Well: human Excellence is of two kinds, Intellectual and Moral: now the
Intellectual springs originally, and is increased subsequently, from
teaching (for the most part that is), and needs therefore experience
and time; whereas the Moral comes from custom, and so the Greek term
denoting it is but a slight deflection from the term denoting custom in
that language.

From this fact it is plain that not one of the Moral Virtues comes to be
in us merely by nature: because of such things as exist by nature, none
can be changed by custom: a stone, for instance, by nature gravitating
downwards, could never by custom be brought to ascend, not even if one
were to try and accustom it by throwing it up ten thousand times; nor
could file again be brought to descend, nor in fact could anything whose
nature is in one way be brought by custom to be in another. The Virtues
then come to be in us neither by nature, nor in despite of nature, but
we are furnished by nature with a capacity for receiving themu and are
perfected in them through custom.

Again, in whatever cases we get things by nature, we get the faculties
first and perform the acts of working afterwards; an illustration of
which is afforded by the case of our bodily senses, for it was not
from having often seen or heard that we got these senses, but just
the reverse: we had them and so exercised them, but did not have
them because we had exercised them. But the Virtues we get by first
performing single acts of working, which, again, is the case of other
things, as the arts for instance; for what we have to make when we
have learned how, these we learn how to make by making: men come to be
builders, for instance, by building; harp-players, by playing on the
harp: exactly so, by doing just actions we come to be just; by doing the
actions of self-mastery we come to be perfected in self-mastery; and by
doing brave actions brave.

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