In specifying the ethical excellences, or excellences of disposition,

we explained that each of them aimed to realize a mean--and that this
mean was to be determined by Right Reason
In specifying the ethical excellences, or excellences of disposition,
we explained that each of them aimed to realize a mean--and that this
mean was to be determined by Right Reason. To find the mean, is thus an
operation of the Intellect; and we have now to explain what the right
performance of it is,--or to enter upon the Excellences of the
Intellect. The soul having been divided into Irrational and Rational,
the Rational must farther be divided into two parts,--the Scientific
(dealing with necessary matter), the Calculative, or Deliberative
(dealing with contingent matter). We must touch, upon the excellence or
best condition of both of them (I). There are three principal functions
of the soul--Sensation, Reason, and Appetite or Desire. Now, Sensation
(which beasts have as well as men) is not a principle of moral action.
The Reason regards truth and falsehood only; it does not move to
action, it is not an end in itself. Appetite or Desire, which aims at
an end, introduces us to moral action. Truth and Falsehood, as regards
Reason, correspond to Good and Evil as regards Appetite: Affirmation
and Negation, with the first, are the analogues of Pursuit and
Avoidance, with the second. In purpose, which is the principle of moral
action, there is included deliberation or calculation. Reason and
Appetite are thus combined: Good Purpose comprises both true
affirmation and right pursuit: you may call it either an Intelligent
Appetite, or an Appetitive Intelligence. Such is man, as a principle of
action [hae toiautae archae anthropos].

[Footnote 12: This theory (taken in its most general sense, and apart

from differences in the estimation of particular pleasures and pains),
had been proclaimed long before the time of Epicurus
[Footnote 12: This theory (taken in its most general sense, and apart
from differences in the estimation of particular pleasures and pains),
had been proclaimed long before the time of Epicurus. It is one of the
various theories of Plato: for in his dialogue called Protagoras
(though in other dialogues he reasons differently) we find it
explicitly set forth and elaborately vindicated by his principal
spokesman, Sokrates, against the Sophist Protagoras. It was also held
by Aristippus (companion of Sokrates along with Plato) and by his
followers after him, called the Cyrenaics. Lastly, it was maintained by
Eudoxus, one of the most estimable philosophers contemporary with
Aristotle. Epicurus was thus in no way the originator of the theory:
but he had his own way of conceiving it--his own body of doctrine
physical, cosmological, and theological, with which it was
implicated--and his own comparative valuation of pleasures and pains.]