Afleveringen
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“It is to be expected, then, that we do not say that either a cow or a horse or any other animal is at all happy, for none of them are able to share in such an activity.
It is because of this too that a child is not happy either: he is not yet apt to do such things, on account of his age. …
As we said, both complete virtue and a complete life are required: many reversals and all manner of fortune arise in the course of life, and it is possible for someone who is particularly thriving to encounter great disasters in old age, just as the myth is told about Priam in the Trojan tales.
Nobody deems happy someone who deals with fortunes of that sort and comes to a wretched end.” (Nicomachean Ethics, I.9)
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“The good Epicurean believes that certain events occur deterministically, that others are chance events, and that still others are in our own hands.
He sees also that necessity cannot be held morally responsible and that chance is an unpredictable thing, but that what is in our own hands, since it has no master, is naturally associated with blameworthiness and the opposite.
Actually it would be better to subscribe to the popular mythology than to become a slave by accepting the determinism of the natural philosophers, because popular religion underwrites the hope of supplicating the gods by offerings, but determinism contains an element of necessity, which is inexorable.” (Letter to Menoeceus, II)
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Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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“[Socrates] First of all, then, let’s try to say what bravery is, Laches; and after that we’ll investigate any ways of adding it to young men, in so far as it may be possible to do so by means of various activities and disciplines. So, as I say, try to put into words what bravery is.
[Laches] My word, Socrates, that’s not difficult! If a man is prepared to stand in the ranks, face up to the enemy and not run away, you can be sure that he’s brave. …
[Socrates] But what about another man, a man who still fights the enemy, but runs away and doesn’t make a stand?
[Laches] How do you mean, ‘runs away’?
[Socrates] Well, I suppose just like the Scythians are said to fight every bit as much in retreat as in pursuit. …
[Laches] Your point about the Scythians applies to cavalry – that’s the way cavalry go into action, but infantry operate as I described.
[Socrates] With the possible exception, Laches, of the Spartan infantry. At the battle of Plataea, so the story goes, the Spartans came up against the troops with wicker shields, but weren’t willing to stand and fight, and fell back. The Persians broke ranks in pursuit; but then the Spartans wheeled round fighting like cavalry and so won that part of the battle.
[Laches] That’s true.
[Socrates] Well, this is what I meant just now when I said it was my fault you didn’t give a proper answer, because I didn’t phrase the question properly; you see, I wanted to find out not just what it is to be brave as an infantryman, but also as a cavalryman, and as any kind of member of the forces; and not just what it is to be brave during a war, but to be brave in the face of danger at sea; and I wanted to find out what it is to be brave in the face of an illness, in the face of poverty, and in public life; and what’s more not just what it is to be brave in resisting pain or fear, but also in putting up stern opposition to temptation and indulgence – because I’m assuming, Laches, that there are people who are brave in all these situations.
[Laches] Very much so, Socrates.
[Socrates] … So try again, and tell me with respect to bravery first of all what the constant factor in all these situations is – or do you still not understand what I mean?” (Laches, 190d-191d)
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“Happiness manifestly requires external goods in addition, just as we said. For it is impossible or not easy for someone without equipment to do what is noble: many things are done through instruments, as it were—through friends, wealth, and political power.
Those who are bereft of some of these (for example, good birth, good children, or beauty) disfigure their blessedness, for a person who is altogether ugly in appearance, or of poor birth, or solitary and childless cannot really be characterized as happy; and he is perhaps still less happy, if he should have altogether bad children or friends or, though he did have good ones, they are dead.
Just as we said, then, happiness seems to require some such external prosperity in addition.” (Nicomachean Ethics, 1.8)
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“LACHES: I take courage to be a certain endurance present in one’s character, if I have to mention the element essentially present in all cases.
SOCRATES: Now, this is how it appears to me: by no means every kind of endurance, I think, can appear to you to be bravery. So endurance accompanied by wisdom would be both fine and good, wouldn’t it?
LACHES: Certainly.
SOCRATES: But what of it when accompanied by foolishness? Surely it’s quite the opposite, damaging and detrimental?
LACHES: Yes.
SOCRATES: So, according to your account, wise endurance will be bravery.
LACHES: So it seems.
SOCRATES: Let’s see now: wise, but wise in what respect? Perhaps in every respect, great or small? Suppose, for instance, someone showed endurance in spending his money wisely, because he realized that if he spent it, he’d make a profit: would you call him brave?
LACHES: Good heavens, I certainly wouldn’t!
SOCRATES: Well then, suppose during a war a man showed endurance by being prepared to fight: he has calculated his chances wisely and realized that others will support him, and that he’ll be fighting an enemy outnumbered and outclassed by his own side, and that he has the stronger position – now, which would you say is the braver, the man showing endurance with the benefit of this kind of wisdom and these resources, or a man from the opposing camp willing to show endurance in standing against him?
LACHES: I’d say the man in the opposing camp, Socrates.
SOCRATES: But surely his endurance is more foolish than that of the other?
LACHES: Yes, you’re right.
SOCRATES: Now, we’ve previously shown that without knowledge endurance and daring are disgraceful and damaging, haven’t we?
LACHES: Certainly.
SOCRATES: But now we’re claiming, on the contrary, that this disgraceful thing, endurance without knowledge, is bravery.
LACHES: Apparently so.
SOCRATES: Then do you think we’ve given a good account?
LACHES: Good heavens, Socrates, I certainly don’t. I’m not prepared to give up too soon, Socrates. I’m really annoyed because I can’t find the words to say what I’m thinking – I’m sure I can see what Bravery is, but somehow or other she has escaped me for the moment, so I can’t find the words to catch her and actually say what she is!
SOCRATES: Then do you mind if we invite Nicias here to join the hunt? He may be more resourceful than we are.
LACHES: Of course I don’t mind.
SOCRATES: Come on then, Nicias, your friends are floundering in a sea of words! We’ve got ourselves hopelessly confused, so you’d better give us some help, if there’s anything you can do. The hopelessness of our predicament is obvious; but if you tell us what you think bravery is, you’ll get us out of this hopeless state, and you’ll also confirm your own thoughts by putting them into words.” (Laches, 192c-194c)
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“When I say that pleasure is the goal of living I do not mean the pleasures of libertines or the pleasures inherent in positive enjoyment, as is supposed by certain persons who are ignorant of our doctrine or who are not in agreement with it or who interpret it perversely.
I mean, on the contrary, the pleasure that consists in freedom from bodily pain and mental agitation. The pleasant life is not the product of one drinking party after another or of sexual intercourse with women and boys or of the seafood and other delicacies afforded by a luxurious table.
On the contrary, it is the result of sober thinking – namely, investigation of the reasons for every act of choice and aversion and elimination of those false ideas about the gods and death which are the chief source of mental disturbances.” (Letter to Menoeceus, II)
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“But should we grant them even this, that people are by death deprived of good things; would it follow that the dead are therefore in need of the good things of life, and are miserable on that account? …
Can those who do not exist be in need of anything? To be in need of has a melancholy sound, because it in effect amounts to this — they had, but they have not; they regret, they look back upon, they want.
Such are, I suppose, the distresses of one who is in need of. Are they deprived of eyes? to be blind is misery. Are they destitute of children? not to have them is misery.
These considerations apply to the living, but the dead are neither in need of the blessings of life, nor of life itself. But when I am speaking of the dead, I am speaking of those who have no existence. …
‘To want,’ then, is an expression which you cannot apply to the dead. …
When such an expression is used respecting the dead, it is absolutely unintelligible. For to want implies to be sensible; but the dead are insensible: therefore, the dead can be in no want.” (Tusculan Disputations, I.36)
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“Helvidius Priscus saw this, too, and acted on the insight.
When Vespasian told him not to attend a meeting of the Senate, he replied, ‘You have the power to disqualify me as a senator, but as long as I am one, I’m obliged to attend meetings.’
‘All right, then, attend the meeting,’ says Vespasian, ‘but don’t say anything.’ ‘Don’t ask me for my opinion and I’ll keep quiet.’
‘But I’m bound to ask you.’ ‘And I’m bound to say what seems right.’
‘But if you speak, I’ll have you killed.’ ‘Did I ever tell you that I was immortal? You do your job and I’ll do mine. Yours is to put me to death and mine to die fearlessly. Yours is to send me into exile and mine to leave without grieving.’” (Discourses, 1.2.19)
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“The case of our friend Pompey was something better: once, when he had been very ill at Naples, the Neapolitans, on his recovery, put crowns on their heads, as did those of Puteoli; the people flocked from the country to congratulate him—it is a Grecian custom, and a foolish one; still, it is a sign of good fortune.
But the question is, had he died, would he have been taken from good, or from evil?
Certainly from evil. He would not have been engaged in a war with his father-in-law; he would not have taken up arms before he was prepared; he would not have left his own house, nor fled from Italy; he would not, after the loss of his army, have fallen unarmed into the hands of slaves, and been put to death by them; his children would not have been destroyed; nor would his whole fortune have come into the possession of the conquerors.
Did not he, then, who, if he had died at that time, would have died in all his glory, owe all the great and terrible misfortunes into which he subsequently fell to the prolongation of his life?” (Tusculan Disputations, 1.35)
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“Lysimachus and Melesias have invited us to discuss their sons, because they’re anxious for the boys’ characters to develop in the best way possible. So, what we must do, if we claim we can, is to point out to them teachers who are known firstly to have been upstanding men in their own right and to have cared for many young men’s characters, and secondly to have taught us also. …
I’ll be the first to explain my position, then, Lysimachus and Melesias, and I may say I’ve not had any instruction on the subject, although it’s true that it has been a passionate interest of mine ever since I was a boy. But I’ve never been able to pay fees to the sophists – the only ones who professed to be able to make a good and honest man of me – and I can’t discover the art for myself even now. …
I have in consequence a request to make of you in return, Lysimachus. …
I urge you not to let Laches or Nicias slip away, but to ask them some questions. Say to them, ‘Socrates says he doesn’t understand this subject in the slightest and isn’t competent to decide which of you is right: he hasn’t been taught, or discovered for himself, anything about that kind of thing at all. And now you, Laches and Nicias, are each to tell us if you’ve met anyone who was highly skilled in bringing up the young, and whether you learnt what you know from someone else or discovered it for yourselves. If you learnt it, could you tell us who taught each of you, and who is in the same profession?” (Laches, 186a-186e)
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“[Lysimachus] ‘I am asking you, Socrates, because it seems as if our council needs someone to act as umpire.’
[Socrates] ‘What, Lysimachus? Do you intend to follow whatever course the majority of us recommends?’
[Lysimachus] ‘Yes, what alternative is there, Socrates?’
[Socrates] ‘Imagine there was some discussion about the kind of athletic training your son should practice: would you be influenced by the majority of us, or by the man who happened to have trained and exercised under a good coach. … I think that if a decision is to be made properly, then it must be made on the basis of knowledge and not numbers.’
‘So, what we should do now, first of all, is consider whether we have among us an expert in the subject we’re discussing or not. If we have, we should take his advice and ignore other people; and if we haven’t, we should look for somebody else.’” (Laches, 184c-185a)
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“There are many who labor on the other side of the question, and condemn souls to death, as if they were criminals capitally convicted; nor have they any other reason to allege why the immortality of the soul appears to them to be incredible, except that they are not able to conceive what sort of thing the soul can be when disentangled from the body; just as if they could really form a correct idea as to what sort of thing it is, even when it is in the body; what its form, and size, and abode are; so that were they able to have a full view of all that is now hidden from them in a living body, they have no idea whether the soul would be discernible by them, or whether it is of so fine a texture that it would escape their sight.
Let those consider this, who say that they are unable to form any idea of the soul without the body, and then they will see whether they can form any adequate idea of what it is when it is in the body. For my own part, when I reflect on the nature of the soul, it appears to me a far more perplexing and obscure question to determine what is its character while it is in the body—a place which, as it were, does not belong to it—than to imagine what it is when it leaves it, and has arrived at the free aether, which is, if I may so say, its proper, its own habitation.” (Tusculan Disputations, I.22)
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“Saying that ‘happiness is best’ is something manifestly agreed on, whereas what it is still needs to be said more distinctly. Now, perhaps this would come to pass if the work of the human being should be grasped. …
So whatever, then, would this work be? For living appears to be something common even to plants, but what is peculiar [to human beings] is being sought. One must set aside, then, the life characterized by nutrition as well as growth.
A certain life characterized by sense perception would be next, but it too appears to be common to a horse and cow and in fact to every animal. So there remains a certain active life of that which possesses reason. …
We assert that the work of a given person is the same in kind as that of a serious person, just as it would be in the case of a cithara player. … For it belongs to a cithara player to play the cithara, but to a serious one to do so well. …
If we posit the work of a human being as a certain life, and this is an activity of soul and actions accompanied by reason, the work of a serious man is to do these things well and nobly. …
But, in addition, in a complete life. For one swallow does not make a spring, nor does one day. And in this way, one day or a short time does not make someone blessed and happy either.” (Nicomachean Ethics, 1.7)
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“Which is preferable, death or life? Life, of course. Pain or pleasure? Pleasure, of course.
‘But if I refuse to take part in the Emperor’s show, I’ll lose my head.’ ‘Go ahead, then. Take part. But I won’t.’
‘Why me and not you?’ ‘Because you’re thinking of yourself as just one thread in the toga.’ ‘Meaning what?’
‘You’re bound to care about how to be similar to other people, just as a thread too wants to be no different from all the other threads. But I’d like to be purple, the little bit of brightness that makes all the rest seem fair and lovely. So why are you telling me to conform to the majority? How, in that case, would I be purple?’” (Discourses, I.2.15-18)
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“In order to determine what is and isn’t reasonable, we not only take account of the values of external things, but each of us also takes his role into consideration.
For one person it’s reasonable to fetch someone else’s chamber pot, because he’s focused on the fact that, if he doesn’t do it, he’ll be flogged and denied food, while, if he does, nothing unpleasant or painful will happen to him.
But another person not only considers it unbearable to do that but can’t stand even the idea of someone else’s doing it.
So if you ask me, ‘Should I or shouldn’t I fetch the chamber pot?’ I’ll reply that being fed is preferable to being denied food, and that being thrashed is less preferable than not being thrashed, and that therefore, if these are the criteria by which you measure what’s in your interest, you should go and fetch it.
‘But that’s not the kind of person I am.’ That’s something for you, not me, to take into account in your deliberations. After all, you’re the one who knows himself, which is to say you know how much you’re worth to yourself and at what price you sell yourself. For different people sell themselves at different prices.” (Discourses, I.2.7-11)
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“Cato left this world in such a manner as if he were delighted that he had found an opportunity of dying; for that God who presides in us forbids our departure hence without his leave.
But when God himself has given us a just cause, as formerly he did to Socrates, and lately to Cato, and often to many others — in such a case, certainly every man of sense would gladly exchange this darkness for that light.
For the whole life of a philosopher is, as the same philosopher says, a meditation on death.” (Tusculan Disputations, 1.30)
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“Because of the very fact that pleasure is our primary and congenital good we do not select every pleasure; there are times when we forgo certain pleasures, particularly when they are followed by too much unpleasantness.
Furthermore, we regard certain states of pain as preferable to pleasures, particularly when greater satisfaction results from our having submitted to discomforts for a long period of time.
Thus every pleasure is a good by reason of its having a nature akin to our own, but not every pleasure is desirable. In like manner every state of pain is an evil, but not all pains are uniformly to be rejected.
At any rate, it is our duty to judge all such cases by measuring pleasures against pains, with a view to their respective assets and liabilities, inasmuch as we do experience the good as being bad at times and, contrariwise, the bad as being good.” (Letter to Menoeceus, 2)
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“Let us go back again to the good being sought, whatever it might be. For it appears to be one thing in one action or art, another in another: it is a different thing in medicine and in generalship, and so on with the rest. What, then, is the good in each of these? Or is it that for the sake of which everything else is done? In medicine, this is health; in generalship, victory; in house building, a house; and in another, it would be something else. But in every action and choice, it is the end involved, since it is for the sake of this that all people do everything else. As a result, if there is some end of all actions, this would be the good related to action; and if there are several, then it would be these. …
Happiness above all seems to be of this character, for we always choose it on account of itself and never on account of something else. Yet honor, pleasure, intellect, and every virtue we choose on their own account—for even if nothing resulted from them, we would choose each of them—but we choose them also for the sake of happiness, because we suppose that, through them, we will be happy. But nobody chooses happiness for the sake of these things, or, more generally, on account of anything else.” (Nicomachean Ethics, 1.7)
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“It should be recognized that within the category of desire certain desires are natural, certain others unnecessary and trivial; that in the case of the natural desires certain ones are necessary, certain others merely natural; and that in the case of necessary desires certain ones are necessary for happiness, others to promote freedom from bodily discomfort, others for the maintenance of life itself.” (Letter to Menoeceus, 2)
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“For a rational being, the only unbearable thing is unreasonableness, but anything reasonable is bearable. Being beaten isn’t in itself unbearable.
‘What do you mean?’
Look at it this way: the Spartans submit to being flogged once they’ve realized that it’s a reasonable thing to do.
‘But being hanged is unbearable, isn’t it?’
Except that when a person feels that it’s a reasonable thing to do, he’ll go and hang himself.
In short, if we look carefully, we’ll find that nothing distresses a rational being as much as what is unreasonable and, conversely, that nothing attracts it as much as what is reasonable.
But people’s views of what’s reasonable and unreasonable differ, just as their views of good and bad do, and what is or is not expedient.
This, above all, is why we need education, so that we learn how to adjust our preconceptions of what’s reasonable and unreasonable until they fit particular instances in a way that conforms with nature.”
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