Lecture on Aristotle’s Ethics – Book I, Chapter 06

Note: The following text is a direct transcription of the spoken lecture above.

Welcome to the Classical Liberal Arts Academy. This lecture is intended for students enrolled in the Academy’s Philosophy 311, Classical Ethics course. If you’re not enrolled and would like to join us for self-paced studies, please visit classicalliberalarts.com. My name is William C. Michael. I’m the Academy headmaster, and I’ll be leading this study.

Prelection

The subject of this lesson is Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Book One, Chapter Six. This chapter is a very difficult chapter for most students because it examines the question of whether there is a single universal form or idea of the good, and this brings us into Platonic philosophy, which is why it’s difficult for students to understand. And so we’ll take our time working through this lesson to make sure all of the content that we read is clear and easy to understand. So bear with me as I work through this, because it’s going to be a lengthy lesson for the sake of review.

Aristotle, our author, was a Greek philosopher who lived from 384 to 322 BC. He wrote the Nicomachean Ethics as a work on the science of moral philosophy studying human virtue and happiness. This chapter, as I mentioned, examines whether there is a single universal idea or form of the good that applies to all things. And Aristotle argues against Plato’s theory that such a form exists. So just to give away the answer, Aristotle is going to say no—there is no such single universal idea of the good, whereas Plato and other philosophers before Aristotle said that there was. Aristotle’s responding to Plato’s teaching about the forms. And I don’t expect you to understand this if you’ve never studied the teaching of Plato, nor do I recommend that you spend time doing so. But these ideas of forms that were taught by Plato were supposed to be perfect, unchanging patterns that all earthly things, which are imperfect, imitate. So in the overall plan of the ethics, this chapter is very important because it establishes a break between Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy. It establishes, as I said, that the good is not a single abstract concept, but rather something that varies according to the different categories of being, which we study in Aristotle’s Categories and the different sciences.

This argument that Aristotle made, or the series of arguments that Aristotle made in this chapter, has profoundly influenced Catholic theology and Scholastic philosophy, particularly through the work of St. Thomas Aquinas, who adopted Aristotle’s reasoning to explain how God is the ultimate good, while created goods are many in number and are ordered towards proper ends according to natural law. So the key difference here in Aristotelian or Scholastic philosophy is that God is established as the source of all good, rather than some theoretical idea of the good, as Plato and other philosophers proposed.

So that’s an introduction to this lesson. And as I said, the content is going to be abstract, as Platonic philosophy is, but I’m going to try to make it as easy to understand as possible so we can move away from Platonic ideas, which many who dabble in philosophy get wrapped up in, but they’re false and they’ve been proven false. And what we want is not a mastery of the history of philosophy—mastery of the history of false teachings—but we want to master the true teaching, because the goal of our study is truth.

First Reading

So having introduced the lesson, or the lecture, I should say, I’d like to make sure that you have read through Aristotle’s text on your own before you move forward with this lecture, which is intended to help clarify that reading. I don’t want students to be lazy and just listen to lectures or read expositions and then repeat what they’ve read. That’s not real study. So you should have made a first reading of Chapter Six of Book One of Aristotle’s Ethics. And if you haven’t done so, I’d like you to stop the lecture here, go and complete that reading, and then come back and pick up when you’re ready.

If you have already done the reading, then we’ll continue with the next part of our lecture, which is the division of the chapter’s concept and content. So let’s divide Chapter Six into its significant parts. As we look at Chapter Six, we’re going to see that the content can be divided into five different parts.

Division

The first part contains Aristotle’s explanation of the difficulty of philosophical study because of human relationships and the need to commit ourselves to be loyal to the truth, even if that means separating from our friends. Aristotle begins the chapter saying, “Perhaps it is better to consider universal good.” But then he goes on to explain that this is a false teaching, and it’s a teaching that is held by our friends, by Plato, who was Aristotle’s own teacher, whom he highly respected. And Aristotle teaches us that the moral challenge—the personal moral challenge that we’re always going to face as we study philosophy—is that we’ve got to be loyal to the truth and go where the truth leads us in our investigations. So that’s Part One: an introduction where Aristotle talks of our duty to the truth.

Part Two begins where we read, “Those, however, who have introduced this opinion.” And he presents here the first argument against Plato’s teaching of the forms and the good as a universal form. So Part Two is the logical argument from prior and posterior existence. And this begins, as I said, where he writes, “Those, however, who have introduced this opinion.”

Part Three introduces the argument from the categories. And we find this where we read, “Again, good is predicated in as many ways as being.” Here, Aristotle makes an argument from the categories.

Part Four: Aristotle makes an argument from the different sciences. So Part Four is the argument from the sciences. And that begins where we read, “Farther still, since of things which subsist according to one idea, there is also one science.”

And then lastly, Part Five: the distinction between goods per se, or in and of themselves, and per accidens, and the conclusion of this chapter. Part Five begins where we read, “A certain doubt, however, presents itself.”

So here we have the five parts of this chapter. At the end, Aristotle addresses a practical objection: even if there were a separate and universal form of the good, it would be useless because it wouldn’t be something that we could actually achieve or practice. What matters for human life is that Aristotle’s concern is not to know what’s good, but to actually be good. He explains that purpose himself: the goal is to actually fulfill the potential for goodness, not just to know about it as if that knowledge is the end, but it needs to be something that we can actually achieve or practice.

The physician, for example, doesn’t study health in some abstract kind of way, talking about health itself, but he talks about the health of human beings—even individual human beings, the health of a particular person who needs to be healed from particular problems in particular circumstances. And so the same in moral philosophy: the investigation has to focus on practical goods, real goods that humans can actually attain. Otherwise, it’s just really a bunch of idle nonsense. And when philosophical discussions become disconnected from human happiness, it becomes very difficult to evaluate the truth of things that are said, because all of it is separated from our experience, and we’re told that our experience is meaningless.

We see this in modern society, where people can’t even answer simple questions anymore about what we should eat or what we should wear or how we should live, because we have all been taught to ignore our experience and get lost in this world of endless talk, endless theories, and so on. Aristotle protects us from that kind of excessive theoretical thinking disconnected from real life.

So that’s a division of the content of this chapter. Again, the goal of this chapter is to make a break from the errors of Platonism and allow us to move forward in establishing a true science of moral philosophy.

So let’s get to the real work here and begin the interpretation. We’ll go through each line of the chapter. We’ll take our time. I know these talks can get long, but our goal here is not to get finished fast and check a box. Our goal is to actually understand what we read. And we’re reading this 2,300 years after it was written, and there’s a lot that needs to be understood for us to really grasp what Aristotle is teaching. So I’m going to take my time working through this and make sure that we’ve addressed every line and all of the terms and ideas are clear. And if worse comes to worst, we’ll divide this lecture into two parts, but I ask you to be patient and work through all the content so that you can really understand what Aristotle is teaching here and move forward on a firm foundation.

Interpretation

So let’s begin with the interpretation. Aristotle writes, “Perhaps, however, it is better to consider universal good, or the universal good, and inquire how it is said to subsist—how exactly does this universal good exist? What is it? Though such an enquiry will be arduous or difficult, because the men who have introduced ideas are our friends.”

So Aristotle begins by acknowledging that investigating whether a universal good exists or not is going to be difficult work. The difficulty is not simply intellectual, but it’s personal. And much of the study of philosophy and the pursuit of truth does become personal. It has to do with relationships. It can cause us to become unpopular. Jesus introduced himself as the truth, and he was crucified by men. So this pursuit of truth is no easy business. It’s not for the faint-hearted.

Plato and his followers taught a theory of forms, as I mentioned earlier. Aristotle was a student in Plato’s Academy. He respected Plato, and he was friends with Plato’s followers. They taught this theory of forms. They were respected teachers. They were friends of Aristotle, and they were considered the leaders of the philosophical tradition that existed in classical Greece. So for Aristotle to question their teaching, to separate himself from them, required a lot of courage in his day and also a lot of intellectual honesty. So we’re going to see some of Aristotle’s character on display in Chapter Six.

He goes on to say, quote: “It may perhaps seem to be better, and indeed necessary to the salvation of truth, to subvert the opinions even of our friends. For both being our friends—that is, Plato and truth—it is holy to give preference to truth.”

So here, Aristotle establishes a great principle of philosophical investigation. He says that truth must take precedence over loyalty to persons, especially friends and persons that we admire and respect. Truth must always have our loyalty. And he presents this in a poetic sort of way, as a choice between two friends. He says, on the one side is my friend Plato, and on the other side is my friend truth. While I may respect Plato as a teacher, truth is the highest good and demands my constant allegiance at any cost.

And what we see here in Aristotle’s teaching reflects the principle that we’ll find later in Scholastic philosophy: that reason must follow evidence wherever it leads us, and the pursuit of truth is really a sacred duty. Notice that Aristotle refers to it as holy. It’s a sacred duty that we have to follow the truth at all costs.

In Catholic teaching, this aligns perfectly with the virtue of prudence, which seeks to know reality as it actually is. That’s what it means to be true: to think and speak in a way that agrees with what really exists. That’s what the truth is, and we have to be careful that we follow the truth and that we think and speak according to the truth, rather than that we think and speak according to what we would like the truth to be. We have to follow the truth where it leads us, even when it leads us into uncomfortable places, places that are contrary to our own will or preference. We’ve got to follow the truth wherever it leads us, and that’s often very difficult. It requires sacrifice.

Aristotle’s teaching us here that genuine friendship with a teacher means being willing to examine and, if we need to, correct their teachings in the light of reason. So we see a healthy relationship presented here between a pupil and his teacher. There needs to be respect. We should always respect and trust our teachers, but at the same time, we shouldn’t be afraid to object to something that is taught because it may hinder us from moving forward in our pursuit of truth.

Aristotle continues. He says, quote: “Those, however, who have introduced this opinion do not make ideas of things in which they admit there are prior and posterior. Hence, neither do they establish an idea of numbers.”

So here, Aristotle begins to point out the flaws, the reasons why he is led to move away from this Platonic teaching. He says they do not make ideas of things in which they admit there are prior and posterior. And he gives an example: he says, hence, they do not establish any idea of numbers. And remember, the word “idea” here is referring to Plato’s teaching of forms. It’s not just a common use of the word “idea.”

So Aristotle observes here that Plato’s followers recognize a limitation to this theory of forms. They themselves, he says, know that it is not universally true. He says they do not claim that a form exists for everything. They do not claim—they know not to claim—that a form exists for everything. And specifically, he says they do not propose any form for numbers. And why don’t they do so? Because there is an inherent order to numbers: one is prior to two; two is prior to all numbers; two is prior to three, and so on.

The reason why they can’t apply this theory of form to numbers is that a form, according to Plato, is supposed to be a perfect, unchanging pattern that all particular instances imitate equally. I’ll repeat that: a form is supposed to be a perfect, unchanging pattern that all particular instances, or individual instances, imitate equally.

But—and this is Aristotle’s argument—if some numbers are naturally prior to other numbers, they cannot all equally participate in a single form of number. So the theory of forms doesn’t work when we consider number, something as fundamental as number. And what Aristotle argues is that this reveals an internal inconsistency. This reveals a flaw in Plato’s theory of forms. If the theory can’t account for numbers, which are themselves in Greek philosophy, or at least Platonic philosophy, abstract and eternal, how can it account for something even greater, such as the good itself, which is more complex?

So Aristotle argues here from the lesser to the greater: if we see this theory of forms break down in its inability to explain numbers or apply to numbers, how can it possibly explain for us some universal good?

Notice what Aristotle’s doing. He’s showing the reasons why he doesn’t believe that Plato’s theory of forms can be reconciled to reality or to the truth. He’s pointing out the flaws.

He goes on to say, “But good is predicated of essence, of quality, and of relation. Good is predicated of essence, of quality, and of relation.”

Now, if you haven’t yet studied Aristotle’s Categories, you won’t recognize or appreciate what’s being said in this sentence. In the Categories, Aristotle shows that predicates, or things that may be asserted of any subject, can be divided into ten different categories. There are ten different kinds of predicates, or things that can be said of different subjects. It’s really the foundation for his whole system of philosophy. And the three things that he lists here in this sentence—essence, quality, and relation—are three of those ten categories.

So what Aristotle is saying here is that Plato’s explanation of what the good is—that there is this universal, perfect idea of the good, and any time we say that something is good, we mean that it’s participating in that universal idea of the good—he says this can’t be true because we say that things are good and the things that we talk about are from different categories. So we use the term “good” in different ways at different times. We’re not talking about some universal idea of the good, but different ideas of the good.

He says, “The good is predicated of essence”—one category—”of quality”—another category—”and of relation”—another category—”and we’ll see that good is predicated of even more categories than those.”

So he applies this reasoning to the good. And again, he says the word “good,” and this is very easy to understand because we all do this: the word “good” is used in different ways, depending on what kind of thing we’re talking about, what we’re calling good.

We can say that something is good in terms of its essence, what it fundamentally is. We can say that God is good. And we’re talking about God in his essence: God is good, essentially good.

We can also talk about quality—just some common properties, accidental qualities that different things have. We can say that this dinner that mom made is good. This is good. We can say that this ice cream is good, or the weather is good, and so on, just commonly referring to a quality.

We can also refer to good in terms of relation—how it stands in relation to other things.

So these are three different categories of being, and the good appears in each of them. The good is predicated in each of them in different ways. So we’re not talking about one universal idea of the good, as Plato suggested. We’re recognizing that what we mean by the good has various meanings and uses in thought, philosophy, and language, and so on.

So Plato’s theory that there is this universal good that is the source of good in every circumstance just doesn’t hold up when we think about what we’re actually saying about different things. And that criticism, this argument that Aristotle is making, could only be made after Aristotle developed this theory of the categories, which was the foundation for his whole art of logic in the Organon. That’s really what made Aristotle famous: his discovery of the art of reasoning.

And what he’s showing here is that this art of reasoning, which he himself discovered, that art of reasoning proves Plato’s philosophy of the good to be false. So that’s what gives Aristotle this insight. Aristotle’s greater understanding of the art of reasoning allows him to see and point out and explain faults in Plato’s philosophy.

Before Aristotle’s Organon was composed, in which he teaches the art of reasoning—which was a historical breakthrough in philosophy—before that, no one had the method that was needed to understand whether Plato’s teaching was right or wrong. When the art of reasoning was established in the Organon, Aristotle then possessed the method that could not only recognize that something was wrong in Plato’s teaching, but could actually explain it and prove that it was wrong. And that’s what he’s explaining there.

So let’s continue here with the lesson. He says, “That, however, which has a subsistence per se—that which has subsistence or existence in and of itself—is naturally prior to that which subsists as a relative.”

And again, he’s talking about the different categories that he explains in his art of reasoning. That which is an essence or a substance has subsistence in and of itself, whereas other things, they exist in other things. They don’t have existence in and of themselves. They’re not substances. Substances or essences are naturally prior to that which subsists in some other way.

Now, just to clarify this: I mentioned that Aristotle taught that things could be divided into ten different categories. And when I say “things,” I mean, or Aristotle means, things that we can assert or predicate about any subjects. He says there are ten different kinds of predicates that we can give. One of them is substance, one of them is quantity, one is quality, one is relation, and they go on for the rest of the ten categories.

So these different kinds of ways of being—ways in which different things that we assert actually exist—the first, which I mentioned, essences or substances. The word can be used interchangeably: essences or substances. They exist in themselves, whereas all of the other categories—all of the other nine categories—are said to be attributes or accidents of substances. So the substances, if the substances don’t exist, the attributes have no way of existing. So the substances are prior in nature to the accidents.

So that’s the idea that Aristotle’s referring to here: that which has subsistence per se—that which has subsistence in itself—is prior to that which subsists as a relative, which is one of those other nine categories.

He says, “For this, that is a relative, resembles the branch of a tree and is an accident of being. So there will not be a common idea in these.”

The relative, he says, is like the branch that grows from the tree. He separates the idea of the tree itself from different qualities or different attributes of that tree—a branch of the tree, rather than the heart of the tree itself. And he says, so there are going to be different ideas present in these different categories, not a common idea in all of them.

And this is a crucial philosophical point that Aristotle is making: things that exist in themselves—and that’s what this Latin phrase “per se” means, things that exist in themselves, things that are substantive, things that can be thought of in isolation or absolutely by themselves—they are naturally prior to things which exist only in relation to something else, which is what the Latin phrase “per accidens” means.

A branch of a tree, to use the illustration that Aristotle gives, cannot exist by itself. The branch of a tree cannot exist without the trunk of the tree. It’s dependent on the tree itself for its existence.

So you see this idea that Aristotle is using of something that is prior and something that’s posterior. The tree naturally subsists prior to the branch. And so if we were to say that the branch is good and the tree is good, we’d be talking about two different categories of things, and the term “good” would be used in two different senses, not referring both of those things to some common idea of good. That’s Aristotle’s point here.

He says a relative thing—something that is only what it is because of its relation to something else—is like an accident of being. It’s like the branch of a tree. It depends on something else for its existence and nature.

Because essence and relation are fundamentally different kinds of being, they belong to different categories, as I explained. Essence is prior and more fundamental, so they can’t both participate equally in a single form as Plato would require, because they’re different. They belong to different kinds of being, different categories. They don’t participate in a single form equally or in the same way.

If good—the idea of good—appears in both essence and relation, and they’re different kinds of being, then the good that’s spoken of in them must also be different. It can’t be referring to a single universal form called “the good.”

So Aristotle uses this to prove that Platonic philosophy, in light of the art of reasoning, is false. That’s the point that he’s making here.

Now I want to make sure this is clear, because Chapter Six really challenges students. Because, as I said earlier, most students getting started in Aristotle’s ethics are not growing up in the fourth century BC, where Plato’s teaching would be known. Plato’s teaching is not known in modern society. So let’s just clarify this a little further.

When we say that God is good, we mean that goodness belongs to God’s essence. Goodness is what God is. God is good. We’re talking about God’s essence.

But when we say that something else, like money, is good, we’re saying that it’s good in a different way. We’re saying that it’s good in relation to something else. It’s instrumental. It’s useful. That’s what we mean by good: it’s useful for obtaining other things.

And if we think about this carefully, we’ll see that these are two completely different ways of being good—two completely different ways of being good. The goodness of God is independent of anything else and is self-subsisting. The goodness of money is dependent and relational. It’s good with reference to something else. It’s good that assumes the existence of something else.

Aristotle’s point is that a single form or idea of the good cannot include or encompass both of these radically different ways of being.

So that’s how Aristotle’s doctrine of the categories—his discovery of this science of the categories as the foundation of the art of reasoning—destroyed Platonic philosophy.

So I hope that that’s clear. Let’s go on with the text here.

Aristotle writes again, “Good is predicated in as many ways as being. Good is predicated in as many ways as being, for it is predicated in essence as God and intellect, which are essences and are said to be good. It’s also predicated in quality, as the virtues are said to be good. It’s also predicated in quantity, as what is moderate is said to be good. It’s also predicated in relation as utility or usefulness is said to be good. It’s also predicated in time as a proper occasion is said to be good. It’s also predicated in place as a certain habitation is said to be good with respect to place. And the same can be said, he says, after the same manner in the other predicaments.”

And that word “predicaments” is just another word referring to the categories that I’ve been talking about. In Latin, the book that he wrote called the Categories is called the Predicamenta. So the predicate, the predicaments, and the categories are the same thing.

So he says good is predicated in as many different ways as being. And he gives examples going through the different categories.

That passage there presents what is Aristotle’s most powerful argument against Plato’s idea of the good. Aristotle shows us that “good”—and I want to put this in quotes—when we say “good,” it’s predicated in as many different ways as being itself is predicated.

In Aristotelian philosophy, the categories are the fundamental ways that things can be said to exist or to be described. So when Aristotle says that the good is predicated in as many ways as being itself, what he’s saying is the good is predicated of every different one of the categories.

Now I’ve mentioned categories twenty times by now. Let’s take a minute to examine each of these categories so that this is clear, especially for those who haven’t had the opportunity yet to study the categories in classical reasoning.

So let’s just start. The first category is substance or essence. And I say substance or essence because in different books, you’ll see the different words used, but they refer to the same thing. They’re referring to the first of the ten categories. Some use the term “substance,” some use the term “essence,” but in essence, what Aristotle explains is that God and intellect, as two different substances, are called good because this idea of goodness belongs to their nature. The intellect is good in and of itself, its essence. It is essentially good. God is essentially good. They’re good in what they actually are. This is the highest and most perfect way of being good.

So we start with predicating good concerning substances, and we’re talking about their essence. But then we can go on to the next category, which is quality. We can talk about the virtues, Aristotle says. And when he talks about the virtues, he’s talking about the four classical or cardinal virtues: courage, temperance, justice, and wisdom. He can talk about these and say that these qualities are good. They’re good not as substances, but as characteristics or properties of substances—properties that a person can possess. They exist in a person. A courageous person is good with respect to the quality of courage.

So again, remember his illustration of the tree and the branch. The person, the man, is like the tree, and the virtue is like the branch. So to say that God is good is to say that the tree is good. To say that the virtue is good in this tree—that there is goodness in the tree with respect to virtue—is like saying a branch of the tree is good. There’s a difference in how these two different things subsist, or how they actually exist.

A third category would be quantity. And Aristotle mentions the moderate because moderate is a quantity. The moderate, or what he usually refers to as the mean—like the golden mean—the mean is good with respect to quantity, not good in and of itself, but good with respect to quantity.

So when we speak of using moderation in eating, for example, we mean the right quantity of food. It has a certain meaning in that particular context. There’s no absolute good that applies to all different qualities. What is good varies from one thing to the next, and it varies in different circumstances, among different persons, at different times and places, in all different ways. This is Aristotle’s point here.

So moderation is good with respect to quantity. And an example would be moderation in eating. We would say that he eats well, or he’s a good eater, because he eats in moderation. We mean the right quantity of food—not too much, not too little, not too indulgent to his tastes, but balanced, moderate in all things.

When we use the term “good” here, it’s a matter of proper measure or amount. So it’s good with respect to quantity.

He goes on to also mention relation: good with respect to relation. And he uses the term utility or usefulness. Utility is good with respect to relation. Something is useful because it relates to or serves some other thing or some other purpose. A knife is said to be a good tool or a good utensil because it serves well the purpose of cutting. It serves some other thing.

But notice that all of these different qualities that I’ve mentioned—all of these different attributes: quality, quantity, relation, and so on—notice how they assume the prior existence of something else. That’s the point that Aristotle is focusing on here: showing how the good is signified in different ways, some as prior to others, some as posterior to others, and across all of the categories, so in different ways of being or existing.

So utility calls something good in relation to something else.

Another category would be time. So the opportunity or occasion for something is said to be good. It’s a good opportunity. It means the time is right. So it’s good with reference to time. Time, the right moment to act, is called good timing. Saying something at the wrong time is not good with respect to timing. We’re using the term “good” in a different way to express or relate to a different mode of being with respect to time.

Next, another category would be place. So a good place means that it’s good with reference to location. It’s not morally good. It could be good because it’s safe or because it’s clean. It’s a good location. It’s good with respect to place. A good home is said to be good because it’s a place that’s suitable for living well. It’s a good place. So good with respect to place.

Now, as we go through all of these, the key insight—the important thing to learn—is this: if this predicate, this word “good,” can be predicated across all these different categories of being, then good cannot be a single, universal form.

If good is predicated across all these different categories, if it’s used in all these different senses, then the good can’t be a single, universal form. A form, again, in Plato’s theory, is supposed to be one, unchanging pattern that all particular instances share in equally. We can see that in these examples we’ve studied of the categories, that is not true of the good.

So the form of the good would not be one universal thing that’s equally shared in all of these different situations. Good doesn’t work in the way that Plato suggests it does. And again, this was made clear by Aristotle’s discovery of the doctrine of the categories. Good doesn’t work the way that Plato assumes it does.

The goodness of God in essence is completely different from the goodness of courage in quality, which is also different from goodness of moderation in quantity, which is different from the goodness of a tool in relation, and so on.

These examples that we’ve looked at are not different instances of the same thing. They’re not particular instances of the same form. They’re completely different kinds of things, and the goodness that’s referred to is actually a different kind of goodness in each situation.

So this is Aristotle’s argument against the doctrine of forms.

Let’s keep going through Aristotle’s text here. He then says, quote: “It is evident, therefore, that there will not be a certain common, universal, or one good. For it would not be predicated in all the categories, but in one alone. There will not be a certain common, universal, and one good—capital G, good—for it would not be predicated in all the categories, but in one alone.”

So Aristotle draws this logical conclusion here: there can’t be a single universal capital-G good that applies to all things. If there was such a universal form, it would have to be predicated in only one category of being, and not in all of them. But when we look at the categories, we see that good appears in all of the categories. So there cannot be a single universal form of good.

Now, this argument that Aristotle makes here—and we’ve got to respect the courage that it took for Aristotle to go out on this limb and make this argument, and the incredible amount of work that it took to first establish a true art of reasoning so that he could make this argument and establish true philosophy—but this is fundamental for us to understand Scholastic philosophy, because the Scholastic system of philosophy developed from Aristotelian philosophy and was developed by St. Thomas Aquinas to reconcile with Christian divine revelation.

And Christian divine revelation presents the idea of goodness in this Aristotelian way, and not in the Platonic way.

In the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas, goodness is said to be analogical rather than univocal. It’s said to be analogical rather than univocal.

What this means, when St. Thomas explains this, is that when we say that different things are good, we’re not using the word “good” in the same way every time. Rather, all good things are related to a primary exemplar, that is God himself. God, in Christian philosophy, God is goodness itself.

And so we can see here that, to a certain degree—and St. Augustine mentions this—to a certain degree, Plato was kind of touching on certain truths that could only be explained by divine revelation, and that actually led him into errors in philosophy. His philosophy goes too far. Just as modern scientists like to try to talk about things like the origin of the universe, they go beyond their limits and they get into all kinds of nonsense and make all kinds of errors. In the same way, Plato went too far in his theology and tried to get into subjects that were beyond the reach of human reason.

Aristotle, being wiser and more temperate, controlled that urge and avoided doing so. The limits to Aristotle’s philosophy were allowed to be overcome by the addition of divine revelation. And that’s why, in Scholasticism—where Christian divine revelation is brought to enlighten Aristotelian philosophy—we have the perfection of human philosophy. We have the synthesis of both philosophy and theology, human reason and divine revelation.

So Plato’s error was that he tried to accomplish everything by means of philosophy, when philosophy can’t go there.

So in the teaching of Thomas Aquinas, like I said, God himself is the source of all goodness. But—and here’s the key—each creature, each created thing that exists, which was created by God, each creature participates in goodness, in that original goodness of God, in its own way, according to its own nature and purpose.

So here is where the truth becomes clear, which Plato kind of messed around with, but Aristotle clarified for us: every created thing, which is an effect caused by God himself and which contains in it his own goodness, each created thing participates in goodness according to its own nature—what it actually is—and its purpose, its final cause. The nature of a thing is its formal cause. The purpose of a thing is its final cause.

So, for example, a knife, as I mentioned before, is said to be good. It participates in this goodness in one way, namely, as a tool that’s used for cutting. So we could define it as a tool that’s sharp and used for cutting. We can give its formal cause, but then we can also give its final cause and explain that it’s used to cut things.

A person is a creature who participates in goodness by means of virtue. We can say that a person is good because he’s virtuous. And we can say that God is good in a different way, namely, that he is the source of all goodness.

Remember, God created the world out of nothing. That’s the Christian doctrine. God created the world out of nothing. Therefore, all of the goodness that exists in all created things—all the different forms, or all the different modes of goodness—can all be said to have their origin in God, who was the first cause.

So this idea of goodness reflects a reality that goodness is fundamentally relational to being, and being is analogical.

So I know these are some philosophical terms, but there’s a very, very simple concept actually. Because one of the challenges we face in theology is the question of how can we actually talk about God when we read Scripture? For example, we read things about God that are not simply true. For example, we can read in Scripture that God is angry. We can read in Scripture that the arm of the Lord is mighty. And yet God has no body, so he doesn’t have an arm. What does it mean when we talk like this about God?

God is a perfect spirit. He’s infinite, eternal, unchangeable. What does it mean when we talk about God? Everything that we say about God is analogical. We’re comparing God to things that have been made as points of reference. And so we talk about God analogically. Everything is related to God in an analogical way.

A good example of this is seen in Jesus’ teaching through parables. How do we explain what we have never seen? How do we explain things that are mysterious and eternal and beyond the reach of our reason or observation? We speak of them by means of comparisons.

St. Paul in Romans says that the invisible things of God, his eternal attributes, they can be understood. They can be understood even though they are beyond our experience. They can be understood by investigating the things that were made. St. Paul says this in Romans, Chapter One.

So when we talk about God, when we think about God, none of us know God directly. We talk about God by way of analogy or comparison. That’s the idea here.

So let’s go on and think a little bit more of how this teaching from Aristotle destroys Plato’s theory of forms, and what should make us respect Aristotelian philosophy for this division, this separation from Platonic philosophy that Aristotle made at great personal sacrifice.

By the way, as I said, in Chapter Six, here we see this fundamental break between Aristotle and his teacher, Plato. And what we’re seeing here really is the formation of a new philosophical school, or a new philosophical approach, that would go on to define thought in Western civilization for centuries and centuries. In fact, as I said, it will become Christian philosophy for all time.

Plato’s theory of forms, which were established as the standard in Greek philosophy before Aristotle—before Aristotle took this role of being the great philosopher—Plato’s theory of forms was built on a conviction, really, a belief that true reality, reality itself, consists of perfect, eternal, and unchanging patterns, ideas of things.

So, like the perfect circle, for example: you may never find a perfect circle in this world. And so Plato would explain that the idea of a perfect circle exists in a different realm, not in this world, but in something of a more divine or heavenly realm. So there was this world which was the ultimate reality, true reality, and it consisted in this perfect, eternal, unchanging world where all of these different ideas or forms existed. And it was beyond the physical world. All of the particular things that we see in this present world—anything, whether it’s actual objects that exist, actions performed by people, qualities like beauty, virtues like justice, whatever it might be—Plato argued that all of these things were shadows or imperfect examples of those perfect forms that existed in this divine or heavenly realm.

So the form, or the perfect pattern of the good, was, according to Plato’s teaching, the highest and most perfect of all the forms. So goodness stood at the top of this whole hierarchy of forms or ideas. The good, with a capital G, the good, was the highest and most perfect of all the forms, and it was the source from which all of the other forms derived their reality or their meaning. Everything came from the good.

But Aristotle rejects that whole notion. First of all, he rejects the whole idea that there is this separate world of perfect forms. Aristotle rejects that whole thing. Aristotle’s argument in this chapter destroys all of that. That’s why this chapter is so important. It destroys that whole framework, that whole Platonic system, that conviction, as I said, on which all of Plato’s teaching depends.

When Aristotle demonstrates that good is predicated in many different ways across all of the different categories of being, he proves that there cannot be a single, unified form of the good. There can’t be any such thing. And again, the reason why that’s so important is because Plato’s whole system of forms came from the good. So if the good, as the highest and most perfect form, is destroyed by Aristotle’s arguments, the whole system of forms is destroyed. If the good can’t exist as a form, then the whole system of Platonic forms can’t exist. And that’s exactly what Aristotle proved here.

He showed that there can’t be a single unified form of the good. The different kinds of goods—goods in essence, goods in quality, goods in quantity, goods in relation, and all the other categories—they prove that goodness is not a single reality. That’s what Aristotle proves here.

Instead, what Aristotle argues is that goodness is intrinsic to the nature of things themselves. Goodness is intrinsic to the nature of things themselves. And we just talked about how this relates to Christian philosophy, where God is the Creator of all things, and what makes a thing good is what it is and whether or not it serves God’s intended purpose for that thing.

A thing is good in Aristotelian philosophy when it fulfills its proper function, when it achieves its natural end. And this will bring us into Aristotle’s teaching of potentiality and actuality. A thing has a certain potential, and then when it actualizes that potential, it’s said to be perfect. It’s complete. It is what it is. It becomes good when it fulfills its purpose.

And this is a radical shift from the teaching of Plato. This is a revolutionary change in the history of philosophy.

Instead of living in this world and thinking—and again, what’s dangerous about Platonism is that it sometimes seems like it might be like Christianity, because we talk about earth and heaven. Think about in the Lord’s Prayer, we say, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” We acknowledge that there are these two different realms. St. Paul says, “If you are risen in Christ, then set your mind on things above where Christ dwells at the right hand of God.”

So in Christianity, we have this idea of the present world. Think of when we sing the Salve Regina at the end of the Rosary, and we talk about this world as being a veil of tears, a valley of tears, a place of suffering. And we think about heaven, our true home. There appears to be this teaching of two different realms. But they’re not two different realms of reality. The Platonic idea sometimes sounds like Christianity, but it’s not Christianity. It’s something totally different.

Aristotle is the one actually teaching in accordance with the teaching of Christianity. He argues that goodness is intrinsic in things themselves when they fulfill their purpose as created things. That’s what we mean by goodness, and it all relates back to God, whom we learn about through divine revelation.

So again, instead of looking to some transcendent realm of perfect forms and calling that reality—which leaves this world to be something like not reality—instead of talking about some other world as reality, Aristotle directs our attention to the actual world in which we live, to the actual world where we observe things as they are.

Aristotle draws us away from this crazy philosophical speculation about other worlds and perfect forms and all of this stuff. He directs our attention to the world we actually live in, a world that consists of particular created things. And he asks us, what makes each thing good according to its own nature? What makes each thing good?

So notice how Aristotelianism pulls us out of this crazy Platonic world of thinking that reality is someplace else and this world is useless, everything here is imperfect and bad, and it exists in a good form someplace else. Aristotle rejects all of that and says, “No, this is the created world, and things in this world have the potential to be perfect. Things in this world have the potential to be perfect.”

A good example of this: we could say Jesus Christ is an example of this. Jesus Christ lived as a perfect man. He was the perfection of human nature. Why? Because he fulfilled the purpose of human nature, which was to glorify God. We could say that the saints are examples of perfection in this world. Why? Because they came to a point where they fulfilled God’s purpose in their lives, and that’s what it means to be good. That’s what it means to be perfect.

So perfection is not something that exists somewhere else. Perfection exists in potentiality in this world, and occasionally it becomes present in actuality. And so that difference between potential and actuality is how Aristotle explained the true nature of different perfect ideas we might have, without going into this crazy Platonic system of this other world, this other reality, where all of this perfection exists.

This chapter—Chapter Six in Book One—shows us where and when Aristotelian philosophy destroyed Platonism.

Plato, to try and reconcile this confusion, Plato sought for truth in some abstract, universal forms that were separated from this material world—a sort of dualistic worldview. Aristotle grounds truth in observation and analysis. His concept of analysis, which again we’ll study in the study of the art of reasoning, but Aristotle grounds the truth in this world where things actually exist.

Plato believed that true knowledge comes from contemplating these eternal, unchanging patterns—thinking about this world of perfect things—that’s how you actually come to know what’s true. But Aristotle rejects that.

Aristotle argues that we must study the sciences—the sciences of things here in this world, each of which, as he explains, pursues its own particular good through practical investigations and through our own experience. So our senses, our common sense, knowledge, and experience of the world isn’t said to be useless. It’s actually the beginning of true wisdom. We begin learning by means of our observation and experience.

But as I mentioned, what Aristotle teaches is that the reality of the world, the nature of things, is more complicated than they appear on the surface. And so through philosophy, we analyze, or we break things down into their causes and parts, so that we can understand why things are the way they are. We could get to the real essence of things. We can understand all of the causes—the four different causes of things—and that gives us a mature philosophical understanding.

So the common sense knowledge that all people have just by their own limited observation and experience is not all false and meaningless. It’s actually the starting point of true learning. But we have to learn how the learning process actually works, how we actually progress towards wisdom.

So Plato and Aristotle aren’t simply disagreeing about what good is. It’s not this sort of random philosophical disagreement between two nerdy guys who have different ideas. This disagreement is a fundamental disagreement about the nature of reality itself and how we come to know about that reality. And remember, the knowledge of reality is what’s meant by truth. The knowledge of reality is the truth.

So this is the real difference between Platonism and Aristotelianism. Aristotle establishes the true nature of things, and that also establishes for us the true process by which we learn about the nature of things, by which we pursue the truth.

So this is really not just some philosophical difference that we can ignore. This is really the difference between understanding the truth and being lost in falsehood, lost in the dark, as it were—a fundamental disagreement that leads to the establishment of true philosophy by Aristotle.

Aristotle’s critique of this idea of the form of the good is the philosophical foundation upon which all Aristotelian philosophy is built. This issue is the foundation on which true philosophy is built, just as Plato’s false philosophy was built on his idea of goodness being a universal form.

The conviction that reality is fundamentally particular—that is, it exists in particular created things rather than forms. That being is analogical, as I mentioned, and I know that’s a foreign concept. It’s really one that we’re not going to understand until we study Scholastic philosophy itself. But the conviction that being is analogical—that we speak of these things in different ways, in different modes of speaking, in different figures, and so on—rather than univocal.

This is why, when we read Aristotle’s Categories, he begins by talking about things being synonymous, homonymous, and paronymous. And when we open that book, we wonder, “What in the world is he talking about? Why is he talking about these things at the beginning of the Categories?” Because that really is the foundation for the whole art of reasoning and for the whole system of true philosophy.

The third important issue is that truth is discovered through the careful study of nature. This is the point of philosophy: to actually study nature, to study the philosophical sciences—not through some kind of weird, mystical, abstract speculation, or what Plato would call contemplation of these transcendent imaginary forms. That’s not the means to wisdom. But the means to wisdom is actually the study of the art of reasoning and the philosophical sciences, as we find in the writings of Aristotle.

So this really becomes the foundation for all true philosophy, and ultimately is united to Christianity as the source of Christian philosophy. And that’s what Scholasticism is.

So I want to make sure—I said I was going to take time in this lecture to make sure that this is clear, and that the importance of this chapter is really made clear.

Now let’s move on here. We’ve got a lot still to cover.

Aristotle goes on to make another argument against Plato’s idea of the good, and he makes this argument from the sciences. He says this: “Farther still, since of things which subsist according to one idea, there is also one science of all goods.”

If Plato’s teaching was true, then of all goods, there would be one science. There would be one science of the good. But that’s not true. Aristotle says, he says there are many sciences of things which are under one category.

So here is Aristotle’s second argument against Plato’s idea of universal goodness. He says that each science studies things that share a common nature. But if all goods, if everything participated in a single form of the good, then there would just be one science which studies all good things. All things would be included in one bucket, as it were. They would just all be called “good.” And then we would have a science of the good. We’d have “goodology,” and that would be the only science. But it’s obvious that that’s not what we have.

And even Plato and Plato’s followers knew that that’s not what we have. Plato would acknowledge that there is a science of geometry. He would acknowledge that there are different sciences, even though they weren’t established yet in his generation, because they wouldn’t be established until Aristotle established them. But this was already a sign that the Platonic system was false.

Aristotle goes on and says, “Thus, for instance, with occasion, the art of commanding an army is conversant in war, but the medical art is conversant in disease. And with the moderate, the medical art is conversant in food, but the gymnastic art is conversant in labor.”

So he gives examples that show that these different sciences exist and that they concern themselves with the good in different ways, in different senses. He gives us some concrete examples.

So he says, “Consider the category of occasion, or which is the right time for something. He says, the art of commanding an army studies the right occasion, the right timing of military action. When should they attack? When should they retreat? When should they hold their position? And that’s what’s meant by good with respect to time in the study of military commanding, or the art of war.”

He then says, medicine, the art of medicine, also deals with this same subject of occasion—that is, good with respect to time. In medicine, we study the right time to administer medicine, the right time to perform surgery, and so on. But these, even though they both deal with the goodness of occasion or time, they are two completely different sciences. They have two completely different methods, completely different purposes. And so in the same way, Aristotle is arguing, if we consider the category of moderation—right, the right amount, or the good with respect to measure—medicine studies moderation, the good with respect to moderation in food. What diet, for example, would be healthy? But if we look at gymnastics, we would find that moderation, the good of moderation, has to do with physical labor that’s performed in exercise, how much exercise is appropriate, and so on. And so we have two completely different sciences that are both considering good in the same way. And we see that good is considered in different ways across different sciences. So we don’t have this simple system of sciences that Plato’s philosophy would lead to. We have this diversity of sciences, which proves that Plato’s theory of the forms—which was very simple—cannot possibly be true. And Aristotle would even argue that Plato and his followers had to be aware of this because the diversity of sciences proves that that simple theory of forms can’t possibly be true.

So there are different sciences. The point of all of that is that if all good things, if all goods were united under a single form of the good at the top of this whole system of forms, then we would expect that all goods would be studied in a single science—like I said before, jokingly, “goodology”—but in reality, we don’t find that goods are studied by many different sciences, each appropriate to its own domain or area. And so the diversity of sciences that we see in philosophy proves that goods are not united under a single form of goodness. Instead, goods are organized according to different categories, as Aristotle teaches, and different purposes.

So the fact that there is a diversity of sciences proves Aristotle’s categories and Aristotle’s philosophy to be true, because Aristotle can explain why there are a diversity of sciences, and Aristotle can also explain how those sciences ought to be pursued. So that reality of the diversity of sciences, the diversity of different subjects of study, proves Aristotelian philosophy to be true.

So again, we’re not dealing with the science of education here, or philosophy in general. This is an ethics class, and this, what Aristotle is establishing here, is really the foundation for this whole science—this true science of ethics—to be built. And this has really profound implications for moral philosophy.

What Aristotle is showing us here is that there is no single formula, there is no single principle that can be applied in some mechanical way to determine what’s good in every situation. And we’re going to see the complexity of moral philosophy, which we all are familiar with. We know, for example, that what’s considered good morally in one situation will not be good in a different situation, or for one person in one set of circumstances will not be good for a different person in a different set of circumstances. There’s no single formula. There’s no single rule for how much a person should eat. There’s no single rule for how much a person should exercise or at what time a general of an army should do this or that. Plato’s system overly simplifies things and simply doesn’t work in reality.

It’s worth noting that when Aristotle taught politics, it produced Alexander the Great, who conquered the whole world. When Plato dabbled in politics, he created total chaos and was a failure. That’s a separate issue, but Plato’s philosophy may be interesting if you’re sitting around in a library, not doing anything, but if you actually want to engage with real life, Plato’s philosophy is not going to help you. Aristotle’s philosophy actually makes sense of the real world in which we live, because it is true—it is in agreement with reality.

So there’s no single formula, there’s no easy way or single principle that’s going to be applied in every situation to determine what’s good or not. Rather than that, the virtue of prudence—which is practical wisdom—has to judge what is good in every particular case. The virtue of prudence is actually very complex. It has to consider the nature of the activity. It’s got to consider all of the circumstances. It’s got to consider the persons who are involved, and it’s got to understand what the ultimate end is. Prudence has to consider all of these different things to determine, in practical circumstances, practical matters, what is good? That’s the whole focus of moral philosophy.

So ethics—Aristotle is going to move on to show that ethics can’t be turned into some kind of mathematical science. It’s more complex than that. We can’t make clear rules or clear prescriptions for what’s good and bad in every circumstance, because the good is much more complex than that. To know what’s good with respect to morals requires judgment and experience, and that’s what we’re going to study in Aristotle’s moral philosophy in Nicomachean Ethics.

Let’s get back to Aristotle’s text. He says, “It may, however, be doubted, what their intention is in denominating every idea itself, since in man itself and in man, there is one and the same definition of man. For so far as man, there is no difference between them.”

So here he raises another problem with Plato’s own theories. He raises a logical problem. Plato taught that there is a form of man. Remember, there’s a form of everything that exists in this fantasy world of forms. So there was a form, or a perfect idea of man—this perfect, eternal pattern of what it means to be man, the perfect form of man. But there are also particular men who would, according to Plato, again, who would participate in this form—that is, they would be something like a shadow or an imitation of this perfect form of man.

So, according to Plato, the form of man, that perfect form, and individual men would have the same definition. They would both be defined as man. But if they have the same definition, then in what sense, Aristotle asks, in what sense are they different? If they have the same definition, how are they different? The form of man, and again, this is Aristotle’s argument, the form of man, that perfect image of man, is not more truly man than any individual man. They’re both equally man, but they’re man in different ways.

So Aristotle’s argument here is that if the definition of man is the same for the form and for each individual man, then how are they different? Plato’s philosophy can’t explain that, and so it has this logical flaw.

Aristotle goes on and says, “If this be the case, if this be the case, neither so far as good will good itself and goods, individual goods, differ, nor will it be in a greater degree good from being eternal, since neither is that which is white for a long time more white than that which is white for only one day.”

So what Aristotle does here is he uses this clear demonstration from the nature of man to show that the idea of forms doesn’t work. And he says, the same thing is true of goodness. The theory of forms doesn’t work for the same reason. So he applies that same reasoning that we just looked at with man—which you can see was very clear and easy to understand—he applies that same argument to this idea of the good.

If the form of the good and if particular goods—that is, individual things which are called good—if they have the same definition of goodness, then they’re really not different. They’re the same things. And to go further, the form of the good would not be more good simply because it’s eternal. That would not make it more good if the definition was the same.

And Aristotle uses this illustration. He says, if two things are white, one thing is white for a long time, and one thing is white for a short time, we don’t say that the thing that’s white for a long time is more white than the other thing. The color white is not dependent on time. So saying that the form is eternal, that that somehow makes it different or better, doesn’t make any sense. So the form of the good wouldn’t be more good than particular goods, simply because it’s eternal.

So you know, if you can imagine Plato trying to defend this world of the good, and spending all this time in contemplation and imagining that this is what it means to be a good person, to be a wise man, to always contemplate the world of forms—if Aristotle was to ask him, “How is that actually good?” there would be no answer. He would not be able to explain why contemplating this imaginary world of forms is better than actually studying the goodness in things as they actually exist in the world. It just becomes a bunch of academic or philosophical nonsense, which is what Platonism was.

And you know, in modern education, we see the same error. We see the separation of this academic world talking about all kinds of craziness. I just wrote an article about the absurdity of modern mathematics, where these mathematicians are now talking about things that they admit don’t exist in the natural world, like negative numbers or imaginary numbers. And we get to a point where we have to stop and say, “What in the world are we doing anymore? What does this have to do with the purpose of our life?” And it has nothing to do with the purpose of our life. That’s what Aristotle is concerned with.

With Platonism, he wants it to be rooted in reality, because we need to not merely know what is good, not just be a bunch of idle contemplatives, but we have to actually be good individuals—actual men good in the real world, in our own unique circumstances. That’s the real goal of moral philosophy.

So just because the form is said to be eternal, that doesn’t prove that the system is true. That doesn’t prove this makes any sense. And that logical argument from Aristotle just destroys Plato’s claim that the form of a good is superior because it’s eternal or because it lasts for a longer amount of time.

So at that point, at that point, Aristotle moves away from Platonism and takes a look at a different school of philosophy. He talks about the teachings of the Pythagoreans. He says this, quote: “The Pythagoreans appear to speak more probably concerning the good.”

In other words, Aristotle says, if I had to choose between what Pythagoras taught about goodness and what Plato taught, I would go with Pythagoras. “The Pythagoreans appear to speak more probably, more reasonably, concerning the good, for they place the good in, or they place the one, he says, in the coordination of things good, whom Speusippus also seems to have followed. But the discussion of these things pertains to another treatise.”

In other words, we’re not going to get into this. So he mentions here an alternative to Platonism, which is the teaching of the Pythagoreans and by Speusippus, who was another philosopher who was actually the successor to Plato at the Academy.

Rather than proposing a single form of the good as Plato did, rather than proposing this idea of a separate, perfect, eternal good that exists in this world of forms, the Pythagoreans placed, quote, unquote, “the one”—this idea of unity. And remember, the Pythagorean philosophy is related to this Pythagorean system of numbers as the elements of all things. It’s very abstract and difficult for us to understand today, but Aristotle argues that with respect to their teaching on goodness, he’s not saying everything about Pythagoreanism was better than Platonism. He’s saying with respect to their teaching on goodness, Pythagoreans placed unity, or the one—this idea of oneness—at the head of what he calls a coordinated system of goods.

So what that means is that the Pythagoreans understood the good not as a separate form the way Plato did, but as the principle of order. And when we say “principle,” think of the beginning, as the beginning point, the starting point of order and unity that organizes many different goods into a whole that’s harmonious—a whole system of goods.

Aristotle looks at this Pythagorean explanation of the good and says, “Yeah, that makes more sense than what Plato teaches.” But he doesn’t get into this because he says, “This is not going to help us, and our goal here is to teach and investigate the science of moral philosophy.”

So he points out that there were other philosophers at the time, even before Plato, who had different views—not views that he would accept as true, but that were better than Plato—and that makes it easier for us. Rhetorically, it makes it easier for us to step away from Plato, especially in Aristotle’s day, when you could see that Plato’s ideas were not shared by all wise men. And so that’s probably the reason why Aristotle introduces that here and then says, “But we’re not going to get into that.” It just had a rhetorical purpose. So that’s the significance of that reference there to the Pythagoreans.

Let’s go on and get back to Aristotle’s text. He says, quote: “A certain doubt, however, presents itself concerning the particulars we have just mentioned. A certain doubt presents itself because reasons are not assigned concerning every good, but things which are of themselves, the objects of pursuit and love, they are predicated according to one species. And those things which are effective of these—those things which produce these or in a certain respect preserve them or impede their contraries—are predicated on account of these and after another manner.”

So that’s a mouthful to read through, and you should read through that sentence a couple of times. But what Aristotle is doing here is he’s introducing an important distinction that we need to make that’s going to help clarify for us the nature of goods.

So he’s making this distinction for the sake of creating some clarity here. He says, not all goods are pursued for the same reason. Not all goods are pursued for the same reason. Some things are pursued for their own sake, and we understand this. This is not complicated. Some things are pursued for their own sake. We desire them because they are good in themselves. Other things are desired not for their own sake, but because they lead to or preserve things that are good in themselves, or because they prevent bad things from happening.

So not all good things are pursued for the same reason or in the same way.

So having explained that, let’s just read that passage one more time. Aristotle said, “A certain doubt presents itself concerning the particulars we’ve just mentioned, because reasons are not assigned concerning every good. Things which are of themselves, the objects of our pursuit and love, are predicated according to one species. And those things which are effective of these—that is, those things which we don’t pursue for their own sake, but which are pursued for the sake of other things we desire, or which simply preserve what’s good, or which impede bad things, which impede their contraries—these are predicated on account of these in a different way, after another manner.”

So that’s the idea there. Aristotle is explaining that we do predicate what is good about things in different ways based on whether the goodness exists in those things themselves, or whether it exists in things that we pursue for the sake of those. And if you think about what Aristotle has already said in these opening chapters of the work on ethics, you’ll know that he’s already talked about that. He’s already talked about the difference between things pursued for their own sake and things pursued for the sake of other things.

So you can see how he’s tying his whole system of moral philosophy together and explaining the details that go into making that true system of moral philosophy.

He says, “For example,” I’m sorry. He says, “It is evident, therefore, this is going on to the next sentence. It is evident therefore that goods may be predicated in two ways, and that some things indeed are good per se, and others are good on account of these.”

So here is this difference: goods that are good in themselves, or per se, and goods that are good because of their relation to other goods, per accidens, or on account of those other things. There are two different ways in which we predicate what’s good. This helps us. Aristotle is saying, this helps us to understand the nature of goodness itself.

A thing that is good per se, a thing that’s good in and of itself, has its goodness intrinsically. It has its goodness in itself. Its goodness doesn’t depend on anything else. But a thing that’s good per accidens, or good on account of something else, has its goodness in a different way. It has it extrinsically—that is, not in and of itself. The goodness of that kind of thing depends on its relationship to something else, to something that’s good in and of itself.

So there’s a difference between things that are good in themselves and things that are only relatively good—good to the extent that they lead us to those things which are good in themselves.

And if you allow your mind to work on that a little bit, you can say, “Okay, so I see this idea of a hierarchy of goods that Aristotle has already talked about. So if this thing is called good, but it’s only good because it leads us to this other thing, is that thing the final good or the ultimate good? Or does that thing also lead us to some other good? And is there this ongoing climb from things that are desired for the sake of something else to something at the top of this whole system of goods, which is the ultimate good, the chief good?”

And Aristotle argues that there is such a good. That’s what we’re going to study in Nicomachean Ethics. We’re going to identify what the ultimate good is, which is pursued above all other goods, for its own sake and not for the sake of something above it. That is the ultimate good.

And so if we can identify that ultimate good, then we can understand—remember, getting back to this idea that making judgments about doing things in moral philosophy is very complicated, it requires prudence, it’s circumstantial, and so on—how can we make principled decisions in moral issues unless we actually have a principle to direct all of those decisions towards?

So this identification of the chief end, the highest good, is what allows a whole system of moral philosophy to be possible. It’s what allows us to actually live and make decisions with prudence.

So there’s this distinction that some things are good in themselves, other things are only good with respect to other things. And this begins to lead us to recognize that there must be some hierarchy of goods, which there is.

Now, in Scholastic philosophy—that is, Christian philosophy—this distinction between things that are good in themselves and things that are good on account of something else is central to this idea of understanding the hierarchy of goods and the ultimate end of human life. Some goods are instrumental, and they’re to be valued as such. They’re good insofar as they serve the higher end or the ultimate end. Others are intrinsically good. They’re good in themselves, for their own sake.

And so the ultimate good, as I said, which connects both Aristotelian philosophy and Christian theology, the ultimate good must be something that’s good in and of itself and is not instrumental to anything else.

And if we think back to what we said, God is the source of all goodness, and so God becomes that ultimate good for which everything else is to be sought. Everything is sought not for its own sake, but ultimately for the enjoyment of God himself, who is the source of all goodness. That’s where we get to in Scholastic philosophy, and that is why the ultimate perfection of human nature occurs when we enter into the Beatific Vision, where we enter into the presence of God himself, who is all and perfect goodness per se.

So you can see how this Aristotelian philosophy shows us this mountain, this hierarchy of goods, and we can start moving up that mountain with the help of Aristotelian philosophy. But at some point, we’re going to reach the limit of Aristotelian philosophy, and that’s where divine revelation and Scholastic theology begin and bring us forward.

Now, just to add a little note, a good illustration of this can be seen in Dante’s Divine Comedy. It illustrates this idea, because we see that the philosophers like Aristotle are placed by Dante in limbo—a place in the Inferno which is not hell in the sense that they are punished for evil, but they’re also not able to go higher. They’re in this highest circle of hell where they’re marked as being different from the people deeper in hell who are being actively punished and will be punished forever. They’re exempt from that punishment because they are relatively good. They made it to a certain point, but they were not able to move higher, beyond the Inferno.

And in order to move higher, as Dante goes on his journey, Virgil—who starts out as the ancient poet Virgil, who starts out as his guide—comes to a place where he is no longer able to serve as Dante’s guide. And so we see this idea of the limitations of human learning, or the human arts, the limitation, and where theology needs to take over.

So we see this Aristotelian philosophy and Christian theology coming together, and that, of course, is what was accomplished through the work of St. Thomas Aquinas.

Let’s continue with Aristotle. He says, “Separating therefore, goods per se from things that are useful—that is, things that are good on account of other things—let’s consider whether they, these two different kinds of things, let’s consider whether they are predicated according to one idea. But what kind of goods can be said to be good per se? Are they such as are pursued alone, apart from other things, such as to be wise, to see, and some pleasures and honors? For these, he says, though we pursue them on account of something else, yet at the same time, they may be ranked by some one among goods which are good per se.”

So here Aristotle makes an important point. He says, even though we might sometimes pursue wisdom, or something like the ability to see, for some other reason—we might pursue wisdom, for example, to succeed in business or to manage our household happily, we might seek sight so that we can enjoy the sight of something—we can still rank those things among goods that are good in and of themselves, because they are also, in some circumstances, pursued for their own sake.

A good per se is something that can be pursued as an end in itself, but sometimes it can be pursued for other reasons as well.

Or Aristotle says, “Is the good per se, nothing else except idea? Is the good per se, the good that exists for its own sake, is it nothing else except idea, form therefore or idea will be vain.”

So Aristotle here raises a question that’s critical of Plato’s philosophy. He says, “Could the good per se, could a good that’s pursued for its own sake be nothing other than the Platonic form or the idea of what is good?” And he says, if that’s the case, then the form of good would be the only thing that’s good in itself, and all other particular goods would be merely instrumental to it.

But this would make the form of the good, Aristotle says, it’d make it empty. It’d be useless, because it would be separated from all other particular goods that we actually possess and value and use. So what would be the point of possessing that form of the good if Platonic philosophy is true? What would be the point? It would be useless.

He goes on and says, “If these also rank among goods which are good per se, then it will be requisite that the same definition of the good should be conspicuous in all of them, just as there is the same definition of whiteness. But of honor and prudence and pleasure, there will be other and different definitions. So far as they are goods, if wisdom, Aristotle asks, and pleasure and honor are all goods in and of themselves, then they should all share a common definition of goodness, just as snow and ceruse, which is a white pigment or coloring, they share—even though they’re different—to be white means the same thing in both cases.”

So again, if wisdom, pleasure, and honor are all goods per se, then they should all have the same definition of goodness. But they don’t. Honor is defined differently from wisdom, and both of them are defined differently from pleasure with respect to good.

So when we ask what makes honor good, we get a different answer than when we ask what makes wisdom good, or what makes pleasure good.

And what this shows, Aristotle says, is that these goods don’t share a single common definition, and therefore the conclusion is that they can’t all participate in some single, universal form of the good.

So again, this is another argument that disproves Plato’s philosophy. And Aristotle argues, quote: “The good therefore is not something common, according to one idea as Plato teaches.”

So Aristotle then goes on to another point. He says, quote: “In what manner, however, is it said that there is one idea of the good? In what manner is it said that there is one idea of the good, for it doesn’t resemble things which are fortuitously homonymous, and we’ll explain this phrase in just a second. It does not resemble things which are fortuitously homonymous. And as I said, Aristotle is now asking a new question: if there is no single universal form of the good, if Plato’s philosophy is false, then in what sense can we still talk about the good as one thing? What does that mean?”

And he says that the good doesn’t resemble things that are merely homonymous. As I said before, at the beginning of the Categories, Aristotle explains these three terms: synonymous, homonymous, and paronymous. So this word just doesn’t come from nowhere in the Categories. Aristotle explains that this concept of synonymous terms, homonymous terms, and paronymous terms is actually crucial to clear understanding and the use of language.

So here he says, or he asks this question again: if there’s no single universal form of good, there’s not just one idea of the good, then how can we talk about the good as one thing? And so he says that the good does not resemble things that are merely homonymous.

And what it means to be homonymous is to have the same name. In other words, they’re both called good, but that has different meanings. Aristotle says the good does not resemble things that are merely homonymous. We don’t just use the same word with different meanings.

For example, the word “bank.” This is a common example given to show what a homonymous term is. We can say, “I’m going to the bank,” and that means we’re going to deposit a check. We’re going to the bank, a financial institution. We could also say that we’re going to the bank to go fishing, and refer to the side of a river, the river bank. So we’ve got these two words, “bank.” The name is the same for both of these things, but the meanings are obviously different. That’s what it means to be homonymous terms.

Homonyms are words in philosophy. Homonyms are words that are the same but have different meanings. They’re like two labels that are used to label different things, even though the label says the same thing.

So Aristotle is asking: if good were just homonymous, so it was just a word that was used in different circumstances with different meanings, then calling things good would be accidental. There would be no relationship between these different things. The use of the word “good” would just have no connection at all. There would be no connection between them.

But Aristotle is saying there is, though. There is some connection between them. And so we’ve got to understand what this connection actually is.

He says, quote: “Is it because all goods are from one and are referred to one good? Is the use of this term good connected because all goods are from one and are referred to one good? Or is it, rather, according to some kind of analogy? For just as sight is in the body, so is intellect in the soul, and another thing in another.”

So he’s asking, let me make this really clear. He’s saying, when we reject Plato’s idea that there is one form of good and that all things said to be good participate in this one form of good, when we reject that, what are we left with? We use “good” to name or to describe different things. Is it all just random? Are we just using the word “good” in a million different ways, and there’s no real connection between them? Is it just used homonymously? Or is there some connection?

And if we ask the question, “Well, what could the connection possibly be?” Aristotle says, “Could it be that the word good is used in all these different ways, but it’s used in a way that’s connected by means of some kind of analogy? Are we using it according to analogy?” That’s the question that he asks.

So there are a number of possible ways that the good might be unified without being a single universal form. So just because we reject Plato’s explanation doesn’t mean that the good can’t be recognized as something that is one, but it’s the way that we refer to it, which may need to be clarified. And this is where Aristotle and his philosophy corrects Plato’s error.

He suggests that there may be two possible ways that the good might be one, but not be a single universal form.

He says, first, all goods might be unified because they come from one source, and we refer back to that one common good. So maybe because they all come from one source. And this is the view that we’re actually going to learn when we study Scholastic philosophy. All things are said to be good with respect to their common origin in God. God being the source of all goodness. So that is the Scholastic view: that all created goods come from God, and all created goods are ordered toward God as their ultimate end, and that’s what actually makes them good, even though they’re good in different ways. The notion of good can all be traced back to their origin in God himself.

The second way, he says, is that the good might be unified analogically. So there may be this unity in the use of these different uses of the term “good” that may be analogous. It may be by analogy. Just as sight is the power of vision in the body, and intellect is the power of understanding in the soul, and other faculties exist in other parts of the soul, so in the same way, different goods might be related to some primary good in different ways according to the nature of each thing.

So he compares this analogy between the good of sight in the body and the good of intelligence in the soul. And remember, intellect in Platonic teaching was referred to as the eye of the soul, that shows this idea of analogy. It’s like the eye of the body. It’s like it’s compared to, it’s good in relation to, and so on.

So this is this idea of analogy. Things are said to be good in different ways, but the different ways are all related because there is some primary standard that they’re being compared to.

Aristotle goes on and says the following, quote: “Perhaps, however, these things must be omitted at present, for the accurate discussion of them will be better adapted to another philosophy.”

So again, just as he did before, when he started to talk about Pythagorean philosophy, here he says, “You know, this may be possible, but this is really beyond the scope of our present investigation, which is limited to moral philosophy.” He defers any kind of detailed discussion of these questions, which you can see are pretty weighty questions. And he says that they belong to a different study.

He recognizes that the question of how goods are unified—and that’s the question he’s considering here—if we reject Plato’s teaching that there is this one form that all goods relate to, if we’re rejecting that, then this question of how they actually might be unified, whether through a common source, as we said, or by analogy or by something else—that’s a study that requires a lot more attention than we can give in this place in moral philosophy.

So Aristotle here identifies the problem, and this is helpful. And this is what makes him a great teacher. He shows us that there’s more to think about here, but he doesn’t wander down rabbit trails that go on forever. He then brings us back to focus on the subject of the present study.

He goes on and says, quote: “In a similar manner, concerning idea. In a similar manner concerning idea, even if there is some one good which is predicated in common, or which is something itself separate by itself, it is evident that it cannot be practicable, nor can it be acquired by man. If there is some good which is predicated in common of all things, or which is something itself, separate by itself, it’s evident that it can neither be practicable nor acquired by man.”

So here Aristotle is raising a practical objection, and he’s referred to this before—a practical objection to the whole theory of any universal form of good.

So he says, even if we granted that there is some one good that’s predicated in common to all things, even if there is some separate form of the good existing by itself, it would be useless. It wouldn’t be something that we can practice. It wouldn’t be something that we can acquire, and so it wouldn’t be something that we can actually achieve or work toward in our lives. And so it would have nothing to do with moral philosophy, even if there was such a form that existed.

And again, this brings us back to what makes Aristotelian philosophy different. According to Aristotle, philosophy is not merely theoretical—none of this fake philosophical nonsense. Philosophy is not just theoretical. It must have practical relevance to human life.

According to Aristotle, philosophy must be practically relevant in human life. If the good is something that’s completely separate from human experience, completely separate from human activity, then studying it would be pointless. We need to understand, Aristotle says, we need to understand the good that we can actually achieve. What we’re looking for would be something else anyway. We’re looking for what we need to actually be good men. We’re looking for a good that we can actually work toward and enjoy in our own lives. So Plato’s form wouldn’t help us anyway. We want to understand the good that we can actually pursue and achieve.

This is what’s unique and special about Aristotelian philosophy. It’s for humans. It’s not some abstract nonsense, speculating about all kinds of things that are ultimately useless for the needs and concerns that we have. True philosophy is for us in our present circumstances, in this present world, and it assists us in the pursuit of happiness. That’s the aim of moral philosophy.

So Aristotle goes on and says, quote: “But now that which is practicable by man, that which he may obtain, that is the object of our investigation.”

So he clarifies the purpose of our study. In moral philosophy, if you’re looking for abstract speculation about all kinds of nonsense, you need to go someplace else, because in Aristotelian philosophy, we’re seeking to become good men. We’re investigating the good that is practicable by humans, the good that humans can actually work toward and achieve through their actions and choices in real life circumstances. That’s the proper subject matter for ethics or moral philosophy.

He goes on to another objection to Plato’s theory. He says, “Perhaps, however, the knowledge of this separate good may, to some one, appear to be better with respect to those goods which may be acquired and which are practicable. For having this form of the good as an exemplar, we may, in a greater degree, know those things which are good for us, and by knowing may more easily obtain them.”

So Aristotle considers: maybe we can make, maybe we can make an argument that this knowledge of Plato’s, this idea of the good, actually does help us to live well. Someone might argue, he says, that this separate form of the good, even if it’s not practicable itself, knowledge of it might still be useful. It might actually help us. If we knew the form of this good, we could use it as a model or exemplar to understand the particular goods that we can actually achieve in this life. And if we understand the perfect pattern of goodness, maybe we could better understand how to achieve goodness ourselves in our own actual lives.

Aristotle goes on and says, quote: “This assertion has judged a certain probability, but it seems to be dissonant to the sciences. This assertion has judged a certain probability, yeah, probability, but it seems to be dissonant to the sciences.”

So Aristotle says, “That’s fine. I acknowledge that this argument has some plausibility or probability, but it’s inconsistent with how the sciences actually work.” The sciences don’t proceed by first understanding some perfect abstract exemplar or model and then applying that to particular cases. That’s not how the sciences work.

So again, theoretically, that may be true. Maybe the study of the form will actually help us to pursue the good in real life. But he says, if we actually look at the sciences and how sciences work, how human learning works, that’s not it. That’s not how it works. We don’t start by taking children and teaching them some complex, abstract idea and then saying, “There, now just apply that to your own circumstances.” That’s not how the sciences work. That’s not how anything is learned.

He says, quote: “All the sciences aspire after a certain good and investigate that which is wanting, omitting the knowledge of it. Though it’s not reasonable to suppose that all artists are ignorant of and do not search for an aid of such great importance.”

He says, “All the sciences and arts aim at some good that’s specific to their domain. They investigate what is lacking or what’s deficient in their particular field, and they work to remedy that deficiency. If knowledge of this universal form of the good were truly necessary and helpful, then we would see scientists. We would see craftsmen doing something very different. We would see scientists and craftsmen searching for that form or that exemplar. We wouldn’t see them going about the sciences the way that they do. They’d be searching for that form, and they would consider themselves to be completely ignorant without it. There would be no way of knowing anything true until they obtained a knowledge of that form. But that’s not how any sciences work.”

“What we actually see is that scientists and craftsmen are able to pursue their particular goods without needing to know the universal form of the good. So they’re already able to obtain a great deal of truth without study. And the whole purpose of the sciences is to establish a path to learn what is normally not capable of being learned by common sense or experience. But nobody thinks that you should, or nobody thinks that it’s impossible to possess any good unless you first learn of the form. Everyone knows that there’s a great amount of good you can enjoy and pursue in different fields. And then when they devote themselves to the sciences, they look to understand what’s lacking.”

Aristotle says, “They don’t wait until they obtain a knowledge of this perfect example and then begin studies.”

He says, quote: “It’s likewise dubious or uncertain or doubtful. I guess would be better. It’s likewise doubtful what advantage a weaver or a carpenter would derive in their arts from the knowledge of this good itself, this idea of good itself, or how he who surveys the idea itself of the good would become more skilled in medicine or in commanding an army. What would be the practical use of this knowledge?”

Again, Aristotle just keeps hammering on the impracticality of Platonic philosophy—that it doesn’t actually help us. And he gives concrete examples of what he considers to be real life. How would a weaver or a carpenter benefit from this knowledge of Plato’s idea of the good? How would studying the form of the good make the carpenter better at his craft? How would it make a physician more skilled in medicine? Or how would it help a general to command an army? It wouldn’t help at all.

Aristotle says the weaver needs to know about weaving. Aristotle teaches that we become good at things by doing them. The carpenter needs to know about carpentry. The physician needs to know about medicine. The general needs to know about military strategy. Plato’s theory would make all experience useless. The knowledge of some separate, abstract form of the good would be irrelevant to their practical pursuits.

And these mechanical arts, or these practical sciences, are a part of philosophy.

Aristotle goes on and says, quote: “It appears that the physician does not in this way consider health, but that he considers the health of man, and perhaps rather the health of this particular man. He restores health to an individual.”

So this is a powerful example, very clear example, that Aristotle provides that illustrates the importance of particularity in ethics—that the study of what’s good has to do with particular things.

A physician doesn’t study capital-H health as some abstract idea. He doesn’t study health in general, at least a good physician doesn’t do so. Rather, what the physician studies is the health of individuals, and even more specifically, he studies the health of the individuals with whom he works as their physician. His goal is to restore health to individual people in unique circumstances.

And that skill that he seeks through his practice and study, that skill requires knowledge of human nature and how it functions. That’s pretty general, but it also requires prudence and practical judgment about a particular patient’s condition, a particular patient’s circumstances, a particular person’s needs, and so on. And Plato’s idea of the good would just be useless for a physician.

So this example that Aristotle gives us of how the physician serves the individual—it’s important because it helps us to understand the nature of practical wisdom, what prudence really is, and what we’re studying when we take up this study of ethics.

Ethics isn’t a matter of just applying some kind of abstract universal principles to different cases. There’s not one rule. It’s not one-size-fits-all study. Rather, ethics requires practical wisdom. It requires prudence. We have to be able to judge what is good in a particular situation. We have to be able to judge what’s good for a particular person, in particular circumstances. That’s what we consider in deliberation, when we think about making a choice, when we think about taking some action.

What’s difficult is that what’s right and wrong, what’s good and bad, depends on a knowledge of all of these circumstantial details. And that’s a unique challenge of moral philosophy. But that’s also the challenge, as Aristotle says, that’s also the challenge in these other sciences. That’s the challenge of carpentry. That’s the challenge of the art of medicine and of serving as a general. We’re not just philosophers sharing theories. We have to actually go and win a specific battle. That’s the challenge of real life work. That’s real practical wisdom. That’s real prudence.

And then Aristotle concludes, finally, says, “And thus much concerning these things.”

So that is a rich chapter full of very, very important content, which is why I wanted to take my time and go through it all in detail. I’m at two hours and thirty minutes presently. But I’d like to go and finish the last two sections, go through the memory work especially, and then wrap up.

So tons of content, lots to think about in Chapter Six, lots of really important content. We really see here the separation of Aristotelian philosophy from Platonism, and why I say that Christians shouldn’t even be studying Platonism, and why Platonism is, throughout church history, a cause of lots of trouble and confusion, even heresy. We’re Aristotelians as far as philosophy is concerned, and we need to understand the difference so that we can really focus on true Aristotelian philosophy.

Memory

Let me give you a number of key points to wrap up this lesson that are worth memorizing. I’m going to give you thirteen of them, and I’m going to read through them quickly, because you can always pause or replay this lecture and hear them again.

Thirteen points worth memorizing that summarize the content of this lecture:

Number one: Truth must take priority over loyalty to persons, even when those persons are respected teachers.

Number two: Good is predicated in many different ways corresponding to the different categories of being—essence, quality, quantity, relation, time, place, and so on.

Number three: Because good is predicated across all the categories, rather than in only one category, there can’t be a single universal form of the good.

Number four: If all goods participated in a single form, there would be one science of all goods. But in reality, there are many different sciences, each studying goods within its own domain.

Number five: Some goods are good in themselves, or per se, while other goods are good because of their relation to things that are good in themselves—that is, things per accidens, good per accidens.

Number six: Goods that are good in themselves do not share a single common definition. Wisdom, pleasure, and honor are each good in different ways.

Number seven: The good might be unified, not through a single universal form, as Plato teaches, but through analogy, with all goods related to a primary good as their source and exemplar.

Number eight: A good that is not practicable or achievable by humans is useless for the purposes of ethics.

Number nine: The sciences and arts pursue particular goods specific to their domains without needing knowledge of a universal form of the good.

Number ten: The physician studies not health in an abstract sense, but the health of human beings, and even more specifically, the health of this particular person who needs healing.

Number eleven: Ethics requires practical wisdom to judge what is good in particular situations, not merely the application of some abstract universal principles.

Number twelve: The good that is the object of ethical investigation is the good that humans can actually practice and obtain through their choices and actions.

And lastly, number thirteen: Aristotle’s critique of Plato’s form of the good marks the birth or separation of Aristotelian philosophy, which grounds truth in the observation of particular things, rather than through abstract, transcendent forms.

Conclusion

So in this lecture, we’ve studied Chapter Six of Book One of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, and we’ve covered a lot of content. We’ve discussed Aristotle’s critique of Plato’s theory of forms as applied to the good. We’ve studied the argument that good is predicated in many ways across the categories of being. We’ve studied the distinction between goods that are good in themselves and goods that are good on account of their relation to other things. We’ve studied the importance of practical goods that humans can actually achieve and the role of practical wisdom in determining what is good in particular circumstances. We’ve also examined how this chapter—Chapter Six of Book One—represents a fundamental break between Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy, establishing the foundation for all subsequent Aristotelian thought.

Having gone through all of that, having provided all of this in this lecture, now it’s time for you to get back to Aristotle’s text, to reread and study Chapter Six of Book One of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics for yourself, so that you can develop your understanding of the content of the text and demonstrate that understanding by completing the graded assignments that are provided with the course.

If you have any questions about this, if there’s anything you’d like to discuss further, or that you still just can’t wrap your head around, please contact me anytime. I’m happy to help.

Once again, my name is William C. Michael. I’m the headmaster of the Classical Liberal Arts Academy, and I hope that this lesson, as long as it was, might be helpful. God bless your studies.

Mr. William C. Michael, O.P.
Headmaster
Classical Liberal Arts Academy
mail@classicalliberalarts.com