Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics
H. Rackham, Ed.

the spectators conceive goodwill and sympathy for them, though they would not actively assist them, for as we said, their goodwill is a sudden growth, and the kindly feeling is only superficial. [3]

Goodwill seems therefore to be the beginning of friendship, just as the pleasure of the eye is the beginning of love. No one falls in love without first being charmed by beauty, but one may delight in another's beauty without necessarily being in love: one is in love only if one longs for the beloved when absent, and eagerly desires his presence. Similarly men cannot be friends without having conceived mutual goodwill, though well-wishers are not necessarily friends: they merely desire the good of those whose well-wishers they are, and would not actively assist them to attain it, nor be put to any trouble on their behalf. Hence extending the meaning of the term friendship we may say that goodwill is inoperative friendship, which when it continues and reaches the point of intimacy may become friendship proper—not the sort of friendship whose motive is utility or pleasure, for these do not arouse goodwill. Goodwill is indeed rendered in return for favors received, but this is merely the payment of a due; and that desire for an other's welfare which springs from the anticipation of favors to come does not seem really to show goodwill for one's benefactor, but rather for oneself; just as to court a man for some interested motive is not friendship. [4] Speaking generally, true goodwill is aroused by some kind of excellence or moral goodness: it springs up when one person thinks another