2. Virtue Ethics (Aristotle)
The Nicomachean Ethics
Book I- (The End)
Book II- (Moral Virtue)
Book III- (The Will)
Book IV- (The Several Moral Virtues and Vices I)
Book V-(The Several Moral Virtues and Vices II)
Book VI- (The Intellectual Virtues)
Book VII- (Characters other than Virtue and Vice)
Book VIII- (Friendship or Love I)
Book IX- (Friendship or Love II)
Book X – (Pleasure and Conclusion)
3. The Nicomachean Ethics
Book VIII- (Friendship or Love I)
(Why we need friendship)
1. Uses of friendship. Differences of opinion about it.
2. Three motives of friendship. Friendship defined.
3. Three kinds of friendship, corresponding to the three
motives Perfect friendship is that whose motive is the
good.
4. The others are imperfect copies of this.
5. Intercourse necessary to the maintenance of friendship.
6. Impossible to have many true friends.
Contd.
4. 7. Of friendship between unequal persons and its rule of
proportion. Limits within which this is possible.
8. Of loving and being loved.
9. Every society has its own form of friendship as of justice.
All societies are summed up in civil society.
10. Of the three forms of constitution.
11. Of the corresponding forms of friendship.
12. Of the friendship of kinsmen and comrades.
13. Of the terms of interchange and quarrels hence arising in
equal friendships.
14. Of the same in unequal friendships.
Contd.
5. Why we need friendship
Friendship is clearly necessary and splendid, but
people disagree on its precise nature.
Friendship consists of a mutual feeling of
goodwill between two people.
There are three kinds of friendship.
6. Three kinds of friendship:
First
• based on utility, where both people derive some
benefit from each other.
Second
• based on pleasure, where both people are drawn
to the other’s wit, good looks, or other pleasant
qualities.
Third
• based on goodness, where both people admire
the other’s goodness and help one another strive
for goodness.
7. • The first two kinds of friendship are only accidental,
because in these cases friends are motivated by their
own utility and pleasure,
not by anything essential to the nature of the friend.
• Both of these kinds of friendship are short-lived because
one’s needs and pleasures are apt to change over time.
• Goodness is an enduring quality, so friendships based on
goodness tend to be long lasting.
• This friendship encompasses the other two, as good
friends are useful to one another and please one another.
Contd.
8. • Such friendship is rare and takes time to develop, but it is
the best. Bad people can be friends for reasons of pleasure
or utility, but only good people can be friends for each
other’s sake.
• On the whole, friendships consist of equal exchanges,
whether of utility, pleasantness, or goodness.
• However, there are some relationships that by their nature
exist between two people of unequal standing: father-son,
husband-wife, ruler-subject.
• In these relationships, a different kind of love is called for
from each party, and the amount of love should be
proportional to the merit of each person.
Contd.
9. • For instance, a subject should show more love for a ruler
than the reverse.
• When there is too great a gap between people, friendship
is impossible, and often two friends will grow apart if
one becomes far more virtuous than the other.
• Most people prefer being loved to loving, since they
desire flattery and honor.
• The true mark of friendship, though, is that it consists
more of loving than of being loved.
• Friendships endure when each friend loves the other
according to the other’s merit.
Contd.
10. • Friendships endure when each friend loves the other
according to the other’s merit.
• Justice and friendship are closely connected, as both tie
communities together.
• Since justice, friendship, and community are closely
related, it is far worse to abuse a close friend or family
member than it is to abuse a stranger.
Contd.
11. There are three kinds of political constitution:
monarchy, aristocracy, and timocracy.
Monarchy
• Tyranny is the corruption of monarchy, where the
tyrant looks out for his own interest rather than
that of his subjects
Aristocracy
• Oligarchy is a perversion of aristocracy.
Timocracy
• Democracy is a perversion of timocracy, but
neither is as bad as tyranny.
12. • Monarchy is analogous to the father-son relationship,
aristocracy to the husband-wife relationship, and
timocracy to the relationship between brothers.
• Corrupt political institutions are like those relationships
where no friendship exists, as in the master-slave
relationship.
• Problems between friends occur most frequently within
friendships based on utility.
• On the whole, the person who receives a service, and not
the giver, should determine the value of that service.
13. • In unequal friendship, it is important that each person
receive an appropriate benefit.
• A poor person cannot give money to a rich benefactor, but
can give whatever honor is within the poor person’s means.
