E. M. Cope, Commentary on the Rhetoric of Aristotle

‘Let love then be assumed to be, the wishing to another whatever we think good, for his sake, not for our own, and the inclination to do such things (to do him good) to the utmost of our power’. Eth. Nic. VIII 3, sub init. οἱ δὲ φιλοῦντες ἀλλήλους βούλονται τἀγαθὰ ἀλλήλοις ταύτῃ ᾗ φιλοῦσιν. This makes the nearest approach to a regular definition of φιλία in the Ethics, and is constantly recognised as the principle of love through out the treatise on φιλία, in Books VIII and IX. It represents the desire or the inclination of doing good to the object of your affection, which is naturally, or has become by habit, instinctive, and therefore a πάθος. In both definitions βούλεσθαι is prominent and characteristic. Love is a feeling, a sort of appetite, the wish to do good; the power and the means of doing good being alike accidental and non-essential, though it is true (which is here added to the definition) that the inclination is always present, and will be gratified when the means are forthcoming. The words ἐκείνου ἕνεκα ἀλλὰ μὴ αὑτοῦ express the unselfishness, the disinterested character, of the emotion. ὁ δὲ βουλόμενός τιν᾽ εὐπραγεῖν ἐλπίδα ἔχων εὐπορίας δἰ ἐκείνου, οὐκ ἔοικ̓ εὔνους ἐκείνῳ εἶναι, ἀλλὰ μᾶλλον ἑαυτῷ, καθάπερ οὐδὲ φίλος, εἰ θεραπεύει αὐτὸν διά τινα χρῆσιν (Eth. Nic. IX 5 sub fin.). Cicero, de Nat. Deor. I ult. (quoted by Schrader), has the same remark. He adds, ‘Prata et arva et pecudum greges diliguntur isto modo quod fructus ex iis capiuntur. Hominum caritas et amicitia gratuita est.’

‘And a friend is one that loves, and is beloved in return. And those that have this disposition, or entertain this feeling to one another’. εὔνοιαν γὰρ ἐν ἀντιπεπονθόσι φιλίαν εἶναι. Eth. N. VIII 2, 1155 b 34.