XII
These questions having been definitely answered, let us consider whether
happiness is among the
things that are praised or rather among the
things that are prized; for clearly it is not to be placed among potentialities.
Everything that is praised seems to be praised because it is of a
certain kind and is related somehow to
something else; for we praise
the just or brave man and in general both the good man and virtue
itself because of the actions and functions involved, and we praise
the strong man, the good runner, and so on, because he is of a certain
kind and is related in a certain way to something good and important.
This is clear also from
the praises of the gods; for it seems absurd
that the gods should be referred to our standard, but this is done
because praise involves a reference, to something else. But if if
praise is for things such as we have described, clearly what applies
to the best things is not praise, but something greater and better,
as is indeed obvious; for what we do to the gods and the most godlike
of men is to call them blessed and happy. And so too with good things;
no one praises happiness as he does justice, but rather calls it blessed,
as being something more divine and better.
Eudoxus also seems to have been right in his method of advocating
the supremacy of pleasure; he thought that the fact that, though a
good, it is not praised indicated it to be better than the things
that are praised, and that this is what God and the good are; for
by reference to these all other things are judged. Praise is appropriate
to virtue, for as a result of virtue men tend to do noble deeds, but
encomia are bestowed on acts, whether of the body or of the soul.
But perhaps nicety in these matters is more proper to those who have
made a study of encomia; to us it is clear from what has been said
that happiness is among the things that are prized and perfect. It
seems to be so also from the fact that it is a first principle; for
it is for the sake of this that we all do all that we do, and the
first principle and cause of goods is, we claim, something prized
and divine.
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