Pagina 377 di 734

Chapter I.

Next we must take a different point to start from,[1] and observe

that of what is to be avoided in respect of moral character there

are three forms; Vice, Imperfect Self-Control, and Brutishness.

Of the two former it is plain what the contraries are, for we

call the one Virtue, the other Self-Control; and as answering to

Brutishness it will be most suitable to assign Superhuman, i.e.

heroical and godlike Virtue, as, in Homer, Priam says of Hector

"that he was very excellent, nor was he like the offspring of

mortal man, but of a god." and so, if, as is commonly said, men

are raised to the position of gods by reason of very high

excellence in Virtue, the state opposed to the Brutish will

plainly be of this nature: because as brutes are not virtuous or

vicious so neither are gods; but the state of these is something

more precious than Virtue, of the former something different in

kind from Vice.