Role Of Virtue In Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics

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In Aristotle’s book The Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle defines εὐδαιμονία (eudaimonia) as the supreme good for humanity. When you translate eudaimonia it means happiness or flourishing. Aristotle defines happiness as the life of rational activity in accordance with virtue. People often think that happiness is a state of mind, but for Aristotle, happiness is like a goal or the final end that binds together the entireness of one’s life, “one swallow does not make a summer, neither does one fine day; similarly one day or brief time of happiness does not make a person entirely happy” (The Nicomachean Ethics 1098a 18). Virtue is more of a mentality instead of an action. Someone who is virtuous is naturally designed to behave in a justified way for the right reason, and feels pleasure when behaving rightly. In order …show more content…
First a person must be virtuous, have friendship, and understand the pleasures in life.
To be a virtuous person means to do activities out of voluntary action. Virtue by Aristotle’s sense, is not just an isolated action, but is a habit of acting well. Doing a virtuous action means that the person doing the action is deliberately doing it because he or she knows it is a noble action. There are a lot of different virtues that Aristotle talks about. Courage is one of the first virtues discussed. This means someone acts between the mean of cowardice and rashness. A courageous man is someone who faces their fears and preforms his actions for the right reason at the right time. They are fearless in when facing death for a noble cause. Generosity is another virtue Aristotle talks about. Having generosity is acting between being stingy and wasteful. It is about taking care of one’s own belongings and knowing what to give to the right person at the right time. Temperance is a very crucial virtue. This means that you have a regard to bodily pleasures. Someone who is intemperate desires all pleasurable things and

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