4

  Let us resume our inquiry and state, in view of the fact that all
knowledge and every pursuit aims at some good, what it is that we
say political science aims at and what is the highest of all goods
achievable by action. Verbally there is very general agreement; for
both the general run of men and people of superior refinement say that
it is happiness, and identify living well and doing well with being
happy; but with regard to what happiness is they differ, and the
many do not give the same account as the wise. For the former think it
is some plain and obvious thing, like pleasure, wealth, or honour;
they differ, however, from one another- and often even the same man
identifies it with different things, with health when he is ill,
with wealth when he is poor; but, conscious of their ignorance, they
admire those who proclaim some great ideal that is above their
comprehension. Now some thought that apart from these many goods there
is another which is self-subsistent and causes the goodness of all
these as well. To examine all the opinions that have been held were
perhaps somewhat fruitless; enough to examine those that are most
prevalent or that seem to be arguable.

  Let us not fail to notice, however, that there is a difference
between arguments from and those to the first principles. For Plato,
too, was right in raising this question and asking, as he used to
do, 'are we on the way from or to the first principles?' There is a
difference, as there is in a race-course between the course from the
judges to the turning-point and the way back. For, while we must begin
with what is known, things are objects of knowledge in two senses-
some to us, some without qualification. Presumably, then, we must
begin with things known to us. Hence any one who is to listen
intelligently to lectures about what is noble and just, and generally,
about the subjects of political science must have been brought up in
good habits. For the fact is the starting-point, and if this is
sufficiently plain to him, he will not at the start need the reason as
well; and the man who has been well brought up has or can easily get
startingpoints. And as for him who neither has nor can get them, let
him hear the words of Hesiod:

     Far best is he who knows all things himself;

      Good, he that hearkens when men counsel right;

      But he who neither knows, nor lays to heart

      Another's wisdom, is a useless wight.

                                 5

  Let us, however, resume our discussion from the point at which we
digressed. To judge from the lives that men lead, most men, and men of
the most vulgar type, seem (not without some ground) to identify the
good, or happiness, with pleasure; which is the reason why they love
the life of enjoyment. For there are, we may say, three prominent
types of life- that just mentioned, the political, and thirdly the
contemplative life. Now the mass of mankind are evidently quite
slavish in their tastes, preferring a life suitable to beasts, but
they get some ground for their view from the fact that many of those
in high places share the tastes of Sardanapallus. A consideration of
the prominent types of life shows that people of superior refinement
and of active disposition identify happiness with honour; for this is,
roughly speaking, the end of the political life. But it seems too
superficial to be what we are looking for, since it is thought to
depend on those who bestow honour rather than on him who receives
it, but the good we divine to be something proper to a man and not
easily taken from him. Further, men seem to pursue honour in order
that they may be assured of their goodness; at least it is by men of
practical wisdom that they seek to be honoured, and among those who
know them, and on the ground of their virtue; clearly, then, according
to them, at any rate, virtue is better. And perhaps one might even
suppose this to be, rather than honour, the end of the political life.
But even this appears somewhat incomplete; for possession of virtue
seems actually compatible with being asleep, or with lifelong
inactivity, and, further, with the greatest sufferings and
misfortunes; but a man who was living so no one would call happy,
unless he were maintaining a thesis at all costs. But enough of
this; for the subject has been sufficiently treated even in the
current discussions. Third comes the contemplative life, which we
shall consider later.

  The life of money-making is one undertaken under compulsion, and
wealth is evidently not the good we are seeking; for it is merely
useful and for the sake of something else. And so one might rather
take the aforenamed objects to be ends; for they are loved for
themselves. But it is evident that not even these are ends; yet many
arguments have been thrown away in support of them. Let us leave
this subject, then.

                                 6

  We had perhaps better consider the universal good and discuss
thoroughly what is meant by it, although such an inquiry is made an
uphill one by the fact that the Forms have been introduced by
friends of our own. Yet it would perhaps be thought to be better,
indeed to be our duty, for the sake of maintaining the truth even to
destroy what touches us closely, especially as we are philosophers
or lovers of wisdom; for, while both are dear, piety requires us to
honour truth above our friends.

  The men who introduced this doctrine did not posit Ideas of