Aristotelian Studies I; On the Structure of the Seventh Book of the Nicomachean Ethics, Chapters I-X (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1879 edition. Excerpt: ... is difficult to see what word the author could have used, but the point is that he does not attempt a distinction. The above however is not enough to prove that B3, which is in some ways an advance (see a, j3, y), is by the less able philosopher. 49. The expression rj airXfj o-Kpao-la, in B3, looks un-Aristotelian. Aristotle seems not to use the adjective airXovs in the sense of ov Kara irp6cr6ecriv, but the adverb cnrX&s: airXrj rpayuibla and the like are clearly not parallels. In the Eudemian Ethics the adjective occurs in a similar manner where the adverb would be Aristotelian: VII. ii. 1238 b 6, airXa ayadd=ra airX&s dyadd, and again 1238 b 7. This seems to be the only phrase in either passage which could be called a 'Eudemianism, ' and it is noteworthy that it is found in the version which seems to be the later, as before. B2 has airX&s, 1149 a 18-19. 50. The facts in the two passages taken by themselves are too scanty to justify a conclusion as to their authorship, but their general relation to one another is parallel to that of the other versions treated of, where there is better evidence of the work of different hands. SECTION IV. Nic. Eth. VII. vi. 5-7; and VII. v. (table III.) 51. The following relations between the three versions in these chapters suggest that the one in ch. vi (A1, Bj) is the earlier. (a) As already stated, the terms 'natural' and 'unnatural' are applied in A1 only to human pleasures; but in A3 they are applied to the pleasures of brutes also. (/3) A3 has a further refinement in the distinction of that which is natural absolutely (airX&s), from that which is natural relatively to the particular kind of man or animal considered. Of this there is no trace in ch. vi. (y) In Aj, ch....