a quick, and yet somehow still exhausting, tour of a thousand years virtue in the middle ages
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A Q U I C K , A N D Y E T S O M E H O W S T I L L E X H A U S T I N G , T O U R O F A T H O U S A N D Y E A R S
VIRTUE IN THEMIDDLE AGES
TWO WAYS OF APPROACHINGTHE MATERIAL
• One or two selected figures• The grand historical sweep
ORGANIZING QUESTIONS FOR THE GRAND TOUR
• 1. What is the role of virtue in each thinker’s ethics as a whole?• 2. How does each thinker arrive at a
characterization of particular virtues?• 3. What’s more important: human nature
or the human condition?• 4. Does psychological analysis play a
crucial role?• 5. How are knowledge, love, and virtue
related?
ORGANIZING QUESTIONS FOR THEGRAND TOUR
• 6. What is the connection between virtue and happiness?• 7. What is will?• 8. How trainable are the appetites?• 9. What about the unity of the virtues?
ONE THOUGHT PER THINKER
• Augustine: The pagan idea of virtue is pride and delusion.• Anselm : It’s all about obedience.• Peter Abelard : Intentions are all that
matters.• Thomas Aquinas: Virtue perfects human
nature.• John Duns Scotus : It’s all about the will.• William Ockham : The language of virtue
falls apart.
AUGUSTINE (354-430)THE PAGAN IDEA OF VIRTUE IS PRIDE
AND DELUSION
“You’ve heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates? Morons.”
AUGUSTINE (354-430)THE PAGAN IDEA OF VIRTUE IS PRIDE
AND DELUSION
• Human responsibility for sin: the concept of will• The damage to human nature• The anti-Pelagian polemic• What the Pelagians said• Augustine’s retort
• The problems of ignorance and difficulty
AUGUSTINE (354-430)THE PAGAN IDEA OF VIRTUE IS PRIDE
AND DELUSION
• Implications for standard philosophical doctrine• Against the inseparability of the virtues• Against the Stoic theory of emotions• Against the philosophers’ conception of
virtue• Against the Grand End Theory
• The fate of the cardinal virtues
ANSELM (1033-1109)IT’S ALL ABOUT OBEDIENCE
“As you wish.”
ANSELM (1033-1109)IT’S ALL ABOUT OBEDIENCE
• Anselm never approaches ethics as an independent area of inquiry.• Our purpose• Our place• Two definitions of rectitude of will (which
come to the same thing)• Justice is rectitude of will preserved for its
own sake.
WHAT IS JUSTICE INANSELM’S ACCOUNT?
• It’s a disposition, but not an Aristotelian hexis: it is neither acquired by human effort nor strengthened by habituation.• In this life our possession of justice is
always precarious.• Hence, the moral life requires exceptional
vigilance, and every disobedience, however apparently trivial, is a grave evil.• Notice how unlike an Aristotelian virtue this
is.
FURTHER INDICATIONS THAT THE ROLE OF VIRTUE IS LIMITED AT BEST
• The traditional vocabulary of the cardinal virtues other than justice is almost completely absent.• Anselm doesn’t appear to envision the
possibility of training the emotions.• And anyway, preserving rectitude of will is
what’s important – and obedience is always possible, no matter what the state of one’s emotions might be.• And what about charity?
PETER ABELARD (1079-1142)INTENTIONS ARE ALL THAT MATTERS
• Start with the analysis of cases• The tempted monk• The servant who kills his master• The man who marries his sister• The two hangmen
PETER ABELARD (1079-1142)INTENTIONS ARE ALL THAT MATTERS
• The key terms• Disposition of the mind• Will• Consent• Act
• So what about virtue?
THOMAS AQUINAS (1225-1274)VIRTUE PERFECTS HUMAN NATURE
• From natural law to virtue• The standing analogy between speculative and
practical reasoning
Speculative reason
Practical reason
Starts from First principles Natural law
Proceeds by way of
Theoretical syllogism
Practical syllogism
Until it reaches A conclusion An act
FROM NATURAL LAW TO VIRTUE (CTD)
• The first precept of the natural law is that good is to be done and evil avoided.• The most general precepts of the natural law are
more substantive principles that point out specific goods to be pursued.• Aquinas identifies these goods by appealing to a
general metaphysical theory of goodness and a philosophical anthropology.• These goods are arranged hierarchically and
inclusively.• Aquinas posits appetites corresponding to each
level of good.
AND SO WE ARRIVE AT VIRTUE
• Virtues are dispositions by which we achieve our specific good effectively.• We need them because our specific good
is rational activity, and our appetites alone do not suffice for fully rational choice.• Sensory appetite needs virtue in order to
follow reason.• Intellectual appetite needs virtue in order
to be directed toward the common good.• Reason needs virtue in order to judge well.
THUS THE FOURCARDINAL VIRTUES
• There are two virtues perfecting the sensory appetite:• Temperance (temperantia) perfects the
concupiscible appetite• Fortitude (fortitudo) perfects the irascible
appetite.• Justice (iustitia) perfects the intellectual
appetite (will).• Practical wisdom (prudentia) perfects
reason.
ANALYZING PARTICULAR VIRTUES
• We’ll take temperance as our example, just because I have a handy chart.• The basic rule of temperance: natural law
at work• The psychological complexity of
temperance
THE LINCHPIN:PRACTICAL WISDOM
• In deliberate action• We apprehend the end• We deliberate about how that end can be
achieved here and now• We judge what is to be done• We command the external bodily
members to do it• Practical wisdom in the broadest sense is
the virtue by which we deliberate well, judge well, and command well.
THE LINCHPIN:PRACTICAL WISDOM
• There are corresponding vices in each case• Foolish haste or “precipitation” is a failure in
deliberation: you don’t stop and think.• Thoughtless is a failure in the act of judgment:
you can’t be bothered to pay attention to the relevant considerations.• Inconstancy is a failure in the act of command:
you don’t follow through.• Since moral defects cause these defects in
practical reason, practical wisdom is impossible without moral virtue.
NATURAL & SUPERNATURAL GOODS(OR, HOW AQUINAS OUT-BOOK-TENS BOOK TEN)
• The specifically human activity that constitutes our good is not theoretical but practical reason.• The life of practical reason – the life of the
activity of the moral virtues – is “proportionate to human beings.”• The life of theoretical reason is in an important
sense superhuman.• But as a Christian Aquinas believes that God
intends human beings for a life that surpasses their nature.
NATURAL & SUPERNATURAL GOODS(OR, HOW AQUINAS OUT-BOOK-TENS BOOK TEN)
• But note: grace does not destroy nature; it brings nature to fulfillment. (Gratia non tollit naturam sed perficit.)• Heaven fulfills our nature, though in a way
beyond nature’s power; and our supernatural life begins not with death but with baptism.• We need virtues that dispose us toward that
supernatural happiness: faith, hope, charity.• These virtues have a parallel structure to the
moral virtues.
JOHN DUNS SCOTUS (1265/66-1308)IT’S ALL ABOUT THE WILL
• All virtues of character are in the will.• Possession of a virtue is neither necessary
nor sufficient for right action.• The virtues are not necessarily connected;
they are partial perfections.
WILLIAM OCKHAM (C. 1287-1347)THE LANGUAGE OF VIRTUE FALLS APART
• Ockham agrees with Scotus that• Virtues exist only in the will.• The virtues are not necessarily connected.• The intellect’s judgment never determines
the will.• No innate inclination or acquired habit in the
will – not even a virtue – causally determines the will’s actions.
• But he’s more radical than Scotus in his view of the neutrality of the will.
WILLIAM OCKHAM (C. 1287-1347)THE LANGUAGE OF VIRTUE FALLS APART
• The most characteristic feature of Ockham’s discussion of the virtues is that he uses the language of virtue and vice to talk about particular actions rather than dispositions.• This tendency aligns Ockham with the
approach that is commonly said to be characteristic of modern moral philosophy.
ORGANIZING QUESTIONS FOR THE GRAND TOUR
• 1. What is the role of virtue in each thinker’s ethics as a whole?• 2. How does each thinker arrive at a
characterization of particular virtues?• 3. What’s more important: human nature
or the human condition?• 4. Does psychological analysis play a
crucial role?• 5. How are knowledge, love, and virtue
related?
ORGANIZING QUESTIONS FOR THEGRAND TOUR
• 6. What is the connection between virtue and happiness?• 7. What is will?• 8. How trainable are the appetites?• 9. What about the unity of the virtues?
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