Plutarch, De virtute morali
W. C. Helmbold, Ed.

Those who wonder how it is that this part is irrational, yet subservient to reason, do not seem to me to reflect thoroughly upon the power of reason,

How great it is, how far it penetrates,¹

through its mastery and guidance, not by harsh and inflexible methods, but by flexible ones, which have a quality of yielding and submitting to the rein which is more effective than any possible constraint or violence. For, to be sure, even our breathing, our sinews and bones, and the other parts of the body, though they are irrational, yet when an impulse comes, with reason shaking the reins, as it were, they all grow taut and are drawn together in ready obedience. So, when a man purposes to run, his feet are keyed for action ; if he purposes to throw or to grasp, his hands fall to their business. And most [p. 31] excellently does the Poet² portray in the following words the sympathy and conformity of the irrational with reason :

Thus were her fair cheeks wet with tears, as she
Wept for her lord, though he sat by. In heart
Odysseus pitied his lamenting wife,
But kept his eyes firm-fixed within their lids
Like horn or iron : with guile he hid his tears.
Under such subjection to his judgement did he keep
his breathing and his blood and his tears.

An evident proof of this is also the shrinking and withdrawal of the private parts, which hold their peace and remain quiet in the presence of such beautiful maidens and youths as neither reason nor law allows us to touch. This is particularly the case with those who first fall in love and then hear that they have unwittingly become enamoured of a sister or a daughter ; for lust cowers as reason asserts itself and, at the same time, the body brings its parts into decent conformity with the judgement. Indeed, very often with foods and meat, when men have partaken of them with gusto, if they then perceive or come to know that they have eaten something unclean or unlawful, not only is this judgement of theirs attended by displeasure and remorse, but the body itself, revolted and sharing the mind's disgust, falls a prey to the retchings and vomitings of nausea.

But I fear that I shall be thought to be rounding out my discourse with instances which are altogether seductive and exotic, if I recount in full how harps and [p. 33] lyres, pipes and flutes, and all the other harmonious and consonant instruments which musical art has devised, void of soul though they be, accord in songs of both joy and grief, in stately measures and dissolute tunes, with human experiences, reproducing the judgements, the experiences, and the morals of those who use them. And yet they say that even Zeno³ on his way to the theatre when Amoebeus⁴ was singing to the lyre, remarked to his pupils, ‘Come, let us observe what harmony and music gut and sinew, wood and bone, send forth when they partake of reason, proportion, and order.’

But, letting these subjects pass, I would gladly learn from my opponents whether, when they see dogs, horses, and domestic birds, through habituation, breeding, and teaching, uttering intelligible sounds and moving and assuming postures in subordination to reason, and acting in a manner conformable to due proportion and our advantage ; and when they hear Homer declaring that Achilles

Urged on both horses and men⁵

to battle - whether, I say, they still wonder and are in doubt that the element in us which is spirited and appetitive and experiences pain and pleasure, does, by its very nature, harken to the intelligence, and is affected and harmoniously disposed by its agency, and does not dwell apart from the intelligence, nor is it separated therefrom, nor moulded from without the body, nor formed by any extraneous violence or [p. 35] blows, but that by its nature it is dependent upon the intelligence and is always in association with it and nurtured together with it and influenced by familiar intercourse.

Therefore, also, ethical, or moral, virtue (ethos) is well named,⁶ for ethical virtue is, to but sketch the subject, a quality of the irrational, and it is so named because the irrational, being formed by reason, acquires this quality and differentiation by habit (ethos), since reason does not wish to eradicate passion completely (for that would be neither possible⁷ nor expedient), but puts upon it some limitation and order and implants the ethical virtues, which are not the absence of passion but a due proportion and measure therein ; and reason implants them by using prudence to develop the capacity for passion into a good acquired disposition. For these three things the soul is said to possess⁸: capacity, passion, acquired state. Now capacity⁹ is the starting-point, or raw material, of passion, as, for instance, irascibility, bashfulness, temerity. And passion is a kind of stirring or movement of the capacity, as anger, shame, boldness. And finally, the acquired state is a settled force and condition of the capacity of the irrational, this settled condition being bred by habit and becoming on the one hand vice, if the passion has been educated badly, but virtue, if educated excellently by reason.