Prima Secundae
4. Happiness as Activity by Virtue: The General Meaning of Virtue, Moral Virtue and Choice, and Shakespeare on Reason
Class of 2011-02-10
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/11-prima-secundae/004-happiness-as-activity-by-virtue-the-general-meaning-of-virtue/

[0:00] To the next to the last paragraph on page three, huh? And notice the way Aristotle's proceeding there. He's kind of proceeding by an either-or, right? What does it mean for a man to live well, right? Well, take one part of that. What does it mean? What kind of life, right? The life of a plant, right? The life of a beast, or is it human life, right?

[0:31] Okay. Then in the last paragraph on page three, he's starting to get into the second part of the definition, huh? Which is the idea of being done well, right? And then on the top of page four, you get to the third part, right? The definition. If then the activity of man is an act of the soul by reason or not without reason, right? While we say that the act of something and its good act are the same in general, right?

[1:00] As of a harpist and a good harpist, right? And generally thus and all, adding that it excels by virtue, huh? For it belongs to the harpist to play the harp, but to the good harpist to play the harp well. Then, if this is so, and further that we lay it down that the act of man is some life, and this the act of the soul and actions with reason, but of the good man these done well and what fairly, and each is completed by its own virtue.

[1:32] If then it is thus, the human good turns out to be an act of the soul by virtue, and if there are many virtues, which we'll go through in books two through six, according to the best and most perfect, right? That's why it come after he's gone through all the virtues, it comes back again. But let's take that idea of virtue, right? Hmm.

[2:00] Why does Aristotle take this as being kind of the same thing? To act well and to act by virtue, right? Well, you got to realize what the word virtue means, and the common meaning of virtue rather than a narrow meaning of virtue, right? When we hear the word virtue, we think of human virtue, right? And maybe of some what human virtue in particular, right? A virtuous woman, a chaste woman, right?

[2:33] Okay. But you got to go back to the general to start your thinking about virtue, right? And what is the general meaning of virtue, right? Huh? Strong. Yeah, that's a kind of analogy, but the general meaning of virtue.

[2:57] Is what makes a thing good and its own act good, right? Okay. What makes its haver and its own act good? Okay. So in this broad meaning of virtue, anything that has its own act can have its own what virtue, and for that matter, its own what vice, right? Okay. And the virtues of things other than man are more known to us, huh? Okay. So you take example of let's say a knife.

[3:44] What a knife's own act we say is to what to cut. Now, what is it in the knife that would make the knife cut well, and therefore be a good knife, and its act, which is to cut, to be well? What would be the virtue of a knife? Sharpness. Yeah. Now notice, sharpness is that the same thing as a knife? No. Is that the same thing as cutting well, sharpness?

[4:22] No. But sharpness is something had by the knife in some cases, right? Which makes it a good knife, and its own what? Yeah. Now you know we got this kind of a wooden thing—a knife—in the house. This one knife is really good, you know. Yeah. But this other knife, you know, it's dull. So I got a virtuous knife and an vicious knife, right? So sharpness is what makes a knife a good knife and its own act to cut good, right?

[4:58] And what would be the vice of the knife then, right? Dullness. Dullness. Yeah. So sometimes when I compare what you're doing in ethics, you say, well, you have to know first of all what a thing's own act is, then the quality of that thing that will make it do its own act well, and then how does it get that one, right? So you begin by saying a knife's own act is to cut.

[5:26] What will enable the knife to cut well? Sharpness, and then finally, how do you sharpen a knife, right? So you're going to do exactly the same thing with man, right? What is man's own act? What is that quality of man that will enable him to do his own act well? This is the virtue of man, right? And then how do you acquire that virtue, right? Because the moral virtues, say, and the virtues of reason itself, will be acquired in different ways, right?

[5:54] Okay. See how true that is, right? Warren Murray has a plaque on his kitchen wall, right? And what the plaque says is this: "Much virtue in herbs,

[6:16] little in men. The people are probably eating too much and drinking too much, though. But notice, much virtue in herbs, right? What does an herb's own act? It's to season the food, right? Huh? So if it seasons the food well, makes it more delicious, and so on, right? Then it has the virtue of a what herb, right? That's not the virtue of man, but it's the virtue of an herb, right?

[6:50] So Warren comes down and looks at my herbs. Well, it's been around too long for anything else. See, it's lost its virtue, right? And notice, our Lord makes that comparison, right? You're the salt of the earth, right? Well, if the salt loses its what? Its virtue. He could have said that, right? Its savour is another thought out, right? Amplifying. So everything that has its own act, even an herb, can be said to have a what virtue, right?

[7:17] Okay. Now, which of my eyes is more virtuous? Huh? You know, you're kind of a blur now, you guys over there. You're a medium blur, yeah. Yeah. I'm more, you're more distinct, you know. Okay. So he

[7:38] might say that which is my virtuous eye. This eye here is more virtuous than this one here, at least for seeing at a distance, right? Huh? For reading, it might be different. Okay. Um, I say it doesn't mean that I look at at the girls with this eye, the bad eye. No, I probably more look at the girls with the good eye, right? And the bad eye, right?

[8:02] You see, It doesn't have to do with moral virtue, right? Now, it's more difficult to know what the virtue of the eye is than the virtue of the what knife. But if you go to the eye doctor, he examines your eye and so on, right? He'd probably say the shape of my thing is this, and that's why I don't see clearly, right? And so on. Um. Now I guess they they can fix your eye, but actually, you know, these things, I'm not afraid of those things.

[8:31] Yeah. So I can still read it quite easily with this, so why bother? But and I can even read without you know laying in bed or anything. But uh, uh, again, you say the virtue of the eye, whatever it is, right, enables the eye to see what well, right? Huh? And then how is it you can acquire that virtue that can be acquired, right? Huh?

[8:57] So this is the general meaning of virtue, right? It's the quality, right, that enables the thing to do its own act well. And you can speak of the vice then too, right? The opposite of that, the quality that would make it do badly. Yeah. So what is the quality of the eye here and the right that makes these guys be a blur down there? You know. And what is the quality of this eye that makes them be more distinct in my seeing, right?

[9:31] You see the idea? So most people don't know where to begin when they hear the word virtue, right? But this is where you're supposed to begin, right? And you're supposed to see the virtue of the knife before you see the virtue of man, right?

[9:52] But even before you know what the virtue of man is, Aristotle started to investigate that in the beginning of the second book, right? He'll define moral virtue and so on, but it's already clear from the general idea of virtue that these are equivalent: to act well and to act what by virtue. So Shakespeare in *Taming of the Shoe*, I guess it is, yeah, early part there. The man is studying virtue,

[10:30] and that part of what it treats of happiness by virtue, especially to be achieved, right? See, most people say, "Well, I know what virtue's got to do with my happiness," you know, but if by virtue means what enables you to do your own act well, and to do your own act well is what happiness is, well, then it must be activity in accordance with what virtue, right?

[10:55] That's where Aristotle spends all this time talking about the virtues in books two through five: the moral virtues and the virtues of reason itself in book what six, right?

[11:08] Then book seven he talks about things that either excel virtue or fall below it, right? I don't have quite the full notion of virtue. Then he has two whole books devoted to the friendship, right, which is either a virtue or an effect of virtue, the highest friendship. But a little ahead of the game here, right?

[11:33] That's why he adds as a second part: it's man's own act. You can see either done well or man's own act according to what human virtue, right? Then the third one, but further in a complete life, right? For one swallow does not make a spring, nor one day, right? And thus, neither one day nor a short time makes one blessed and happy. Huh?

[12:05] So I study Euclid for one day or one week. That doesn't make me happy, but if I study them for a lifetime, I'll be happy man.

[12:14] And of course, in Christianity, we talk about something called what perseverance, right? So what is Aristotle done here? He says a line therefore has been drawn around the what good, huh? That's why I translate the Greek word perigraphe right? Peri around graphe to draw a line.

[12:42] But Aristotle will, in the tenth book of *Nicomachean Ethics*, actually gone through all the virtues and knows them and so on. Then he comes back and say more precisely what the end of man is.

[12:57] Coming back, is it according to what political foresight? Or is it according to wisdom? Huh? And the one is more human happiness, but the other is more godlike and more divine, therefore a higher one.

[13:15] So I thought it would be good to look at these texts here a little bit before we go to the prima secunda, right? Let's go back to Aristotle and Aristotle, but Shakespeare's exhortation to use reason, right?

[13:40] Examine a little more logically the logical structure of this. What does Shakespeare say there? What is a man, right? If his chief good and market of his time be but to sleep and feed a beast no more, right?

[13:59] What's the structure of what Shakespeare's saying here, right? Put the words down here. Begins here. What is a man? if his chief good of his time

[14:26] be but to sleep and feed a beast no more. Okay. Don't worry very hard on making that you take so also Okay If. You want to analyze what he's doing here, in a sense, logically, right? What does he base himself upon? You take the three ways I mentioned in the Aristotle's arguments here, right? You can make a long, a large induction, right, establishing the general statement that a thing's own act is its what, end, right?

[15:25] And then seeing that man's own act is the act with reason, then syllogizing that that's his end, right? Or you can proceed by way of a what, seeing a proportion, right, that the act with reason is to man as cutting is to the knife or seeing is to the eye, and then recognizing that seeing is the purpose of the eye or cutting is the purpose of the knife, right?

[15:51] Then including the act with reason must be, right? Or a third way that man's end is to live well, is it by the life of a plant or the life of a beast or the life of a man, right?

[16:05] Which of these three ways of reasoning is Shakespeare using here in this great exhortation to use reason? I consider the greatest short exhortation to use reason I've ever seen.

[16:27] Was it based upon an either-or primarily, or is it based upon a proportion? Yeah. Because what proportion is underlining this whole thing here? Chief good of man, I suppose. Chief good of the beast. Yeah, yeah. Now, in order not to, you know, pedantic and so on, right? He doesn't speak of the chief good of the beast, right? But he he says what it is, right? To sleep and feed, right?

[17:02] So that's basically proportion, right? The chief good of the beast is to the beast, right? As the chief good of man is to what? Man, right? That makes sense, doesn't it? Well, then you can argue by alternating the proportion, right? If the chief good of man is no more than the chief good of the beast, then man is more than a beast, right? Then man is more than a beast, right?

[17:33] But man is more than a beast, right? Another way of arguing this then argument, right? A denial of the consequent. Therefore, the chief good of man must be something more than the chief good of the what? Beast, huh?

[17:50] Now, I'm trying to show the students to examine the force of the argument, the way it proceeds. I used to take a mathematical example, right? And I say, what is the three? No, excuse me. What is what is a yeah? What is the three if it be half of four? Two. At two, no more, yeah. And of course, Aristotle says that you know the natures of things like numbers, right?

[18:16] Okay. Or what is a four if it be half of six? Yeah. So you can say half of four is to two, as half of six is to what? Three, right? So if three is is half of four, it's no more than two, and that's obviously absurd, right? So likewise here, right? If the chief good of man is simply the chief good of the beast, then man is no more than a beast.

[18:48] But we all know man is more than a beast, right? If you don't think so, we'll treat you like a beast, and you will rave and rant and protest that you're being treated like a like a dog, right? That's all you are. What are you complaining for? It's your own positions, you know. I'm no more than a dog. Treat me as a dog, right? So in a sense, Shakespeare is what very rigorous in this way of reasoning.

[19:13] Marvelous, marvelous exhortation there you were saying, the third argument here, too, because Aristotle is saying that to live well means to live the life not of a beast, but the life of a of a man, and that's a life that's reasonable.

[19:38] I wonder how many people would even admit that, right? Because they're not too sure exactly what a reasonable life is, and they're afraid if they admit that they should be leading a reasonable life, that they may find out that they're not doing that, and now they're caught. They would have to inconvenience themselves. Yeah

[20:16] A reasonable act is almost an act with reason done well. It almost says that meaning, doesn't it? So Shakespeare, had obviously read the Nicomachean Ethics. It's in Troilus and Cressida that he has one of the characters, you know, allude to the who's not a proper hero of ethics, right? But there's other description of Shakespeare there, where the character says

[20:53] he's studying that part of he's applying that part of philosophy that treats of happiness by virtue, especially to be achieved. It's a pretty good description, you know, short description of of the Nicomachean Ethics, it seems to me, right?

[21:08] It's about happiness, but spends a long time talking about virtue, right? Books and books. So it's it's about happiness being achieved by virtue, right?

[21:30] What are the in for the Christian? What are the the chief virtues? Yeah, and Theological cardinal virtues yeah Yeah But most of all the the what theological virtues, huh? Faith, hope, and and charity. Yeah.

[21:51] That's why I kind of admire the the proemium right? To verbum Dei, right? If you get the official Latin text, it doesn't like the translation's introduction. It says proemium, and the first part of the proemium there is talking about about sharing God's life and so on, right? Huh? But then goes at the end to what? Faith, hope, and charity, right? But it talks about the order of generation there in Augustine, right?

[22:20] That the world by believing might come to hope in God, right? And by hoping God come to what? To love, right? Huh? After love arises in the scene, then it perfects, you know, hope and and faith. But in the order of generation, belief comes first, and then hope, and then finally charity, right? Huh?

[22:45] So it's those virtues that make these activities what be done well, right? Can you believe without the virtue of belief? Well, you might in kind of a haphazard, feeble way, you know, and maybe so, you know.

[23:11] Remember working in the package store, and the guy seeing you one day. What they find out that Christ had never been there, and would that be something, you know? There had been such a man, right? Would that be, you know? I don't know what the man's faith was, you know. You know, you never know what's going to show up these days, you know. I mean, you know, it's stuff you know But that kind of, you know, yeah, you know, kind of a little bit shaky there, you know.

[24:03] Well, should we go on now? Should we go on? Now, what Aristotle does at towards the end of Book One of the Nicomachean Ethics is to give a division of what?

[24:23] Yeah, but a division of human virtue, right? Okay. And what's that division he gives of human virtue is touched upon here in this text. What is that division of human virtue that he gives?

[24:37] Reason in itself and reason by participation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's why I tend to, when I first, you know, state the in the man, I tend to use the phrase "an act what with reason," right? And as I explain to students,

[25:08] say, "Is an act with reason mean the same thing as an act of reason?" No. How are these two phrases related? Yeah. So you could say every act of reason, like reasoning or understanding, right, is an act with reason, right? But is every act with reason an act of reason?

[25:50] The doctor says to me, "You shouldn't get large-sized breakfast, right?" I always tell the story. Roger Carter tells the story, you know. He was feeling too good, you know, and so on. And so he goes to the doctor, right? And the doctor says, "There's nothing wrong with you." He says, "You just don't get any exercise." It just happens to some of the executive types you know, they, don't get any exercise.

[26:11] So maybe taking a walk is a reasonable what thing for me to do, right? So I'm taking a walk. This is an act with reason, but it's certainly not an act of reason. Well, something to mix a thought there, you know.

[26:33] So what about an emotion, right? Can can anger be an act with reason? Can there be a reasonable anger, right? Of course, in the Gospel of the Mark, I think it is, there's a place where Christ is actually angry with the hardness of heart of these Pharisees and so on, right?

[26:58] Always, you know, for the girls in my class, you know, we're not saying yet that that an act of reason is better than an act of reason. There could be a reasonable love, right? Right. You see. And so a reasonable love, you know, at this point we don't know whether that's the end of man or not, right? Okay.

[27:22] So we're not yet saying the end of man is understanding or something like that, right? It might be just a reasonable love, right? That means you didn't have any sisters.

[27:35] Why? Why do you object to this? Being a girl, picking on the girls. You had sisters that had cleaned your clock. So then there's an act, therefore, that is what

[27:54] an act ordered or measured by reason, right? But that is not a what act of reason itself, right? And so on the basis of this distinction, Aristotle is going to distinguish between two kinds of virtue, right? And the moral virtues, which of course correspond to the second here, right? And the virtues of reason itself. Now, usually translations they speak of the moral virtues and intellectual virtues. I like that term, intellectual virtues.

[28:30] I'd rather call them simply the virtues of reason, right? Of itself, right? And Aristotle, when the sixth book, you know, when he first distinguishes the virtues of reason, he'll distinguish five of them, right? And one is the art in the sense of the right reason about making, right? And then foresight or prudence, as they call it from Latin, the word for foresight. Which is right reason about doing right, and those are the practical virtues of reason right.

[29:00] And then you have what he calls nous, intellectus in Latin, natural understanding right, reasoned out understanding, and then what wisdom right. You distinguish those what five right. Okay. Now some of those are what lowest species, like natural understanding and wisdom is only one of them. Some are what General, yeah, Like reasoned out understanding, you know, geometry, arithmetic, logic, natural philosophy, and so on right. And then art.

[29:37] That's not many ones going to different matters. And then foresight right. Well, you know, Thomas takes a foresight in the in the Secunda Secundae. He speaks of the foresight, the individual, the father, the family, right, the king, and then Douglas MacArthur, right. You know, he has those four, the military foresight, political foresight, right. Eternal foresight, and then the foresight for your own individual life, right? So three of them are genera, right, and they can be subdivided, right?

[30:12] But two of them are lowest species, right? They can't be subdivided into different kinds, huh? But in the books two through five, he takes up the these virtues that are not in reason itself, but in what can partake of reason. And this is true both of the will and of the what emotions, huh? Now it's clear that some of the moral virtues are in the emotions, like courage is in the irascible emotions, irascible appetite is called thumos in Greek, and some are in the concupiscible appetite, like temperance, right?

[31:00] Various kinds of temperance, and probably eutrapelia, and but some are in in the will, right? And clearly justice is in the will, right? Now some of the other virtues is a little more hesitation sometimes, but

[31:23] Thomas was speaking of the Summa only as liberality as being in the will, right? Of course, in the Great Divine Names it says, you know, God alone is liberal, right? But God doesn't have, properly speaking, the virtues are in the the emotions, right? But he does have the virtues that are in the what will, right? And so he has justice, right? Things of this sort, and liberality.

[31:51] So kind of interesting the the the order which Aristotle proceeds, right? Huh? Because he begins the first virtue he talks about is courage, right? And then temperance, huh? And perhaps he talks about those two first because they both concern your body, right? Huh? Courage, what can threaten your body, right? And temperance, what pleases the body, right? Therefore, they're very fundamental virtues. But there's also an interesting thing that the word virtue itself seems to have come from what courage, right?

[32:33] The virtue of a man, vir, huh? And uh the same way the Greek, the Greek word arete has that connection with courage, huh? It's kind of interesting, you know, that that the

[32:48] the medal of honor and so on is given for courage, right? They don't give you a medal of honor for being temperate, or even being just all your life, you know? They don't give you a medal of honor, right? Is if somehow courage is recognized as a virtue before temperance is, or before even justice, right?

[33:10] And then he takes up the virtues that are concerned with what money, and you have liberality, right? And magnificence, huh? And this is kind of closer to your body, right? Because this is where you, you know, you're a man of substance, as they say. He has money, huh? Yeah, and then he goes to the virtues that are concerned with honor, like magnanimity, and so on. Interesting the way he proceeds there, right?

[33:42] And takes up mildness, which is kind of concerned with honor and dishonor, right? Get angry because insulted or something, right? And then he takes up the social virtues there, huh? Truthfulness and eutrapelia and friendliness, right? And the virtue of friendliness should not be confused with friendship, right? Huh? Because friendliness is something shown to everybody in your daily life, right? Like friendship is something more one to one, you know, so on.

[34:17] It's very important now. In fact, woman from a woman, where the woman is is is friendly, or where she really your friend, right? But that's there's a difference there, right? Huh? And I mean, kind of interesting distinction.

[34:39] So in book three, you know, I mean, book two he works out the definition of moral virtue, and then he exemplifies in all the moral virtues. So it's a habit with choice, right? Existing in the middle, towards us is determined by reason. He shows how that's true of courage, right? And how it's true of what temperance, and how it's true of liberality. Liberality is between what stinginess and what extravagance, yeah, yeah, prodigality, yeah.

[35:13] And then in book three he takes up discussion there of choice, what's going to be involved in moral virtue, right? But then he he takes up courage and temperance in book three, and then the other moral virtues in book four, liberality and so on. And then finally, book five, the whole book is devoted to justice, right? Very important for a gentleman. And then book six is the virtues of reason.

[35:43] So he takes up the moral virtues before the virtues of what reason itself. Thomas gives us a reason for that. He gives two reasons. He says they're more known to us, and because by them we're disposed to the virtues of reason, so.

[36:06] Stingy and intemperance on—you're not well disposed to the life of the mind, and so not for foresight, right? Explains what goes on in Washington. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Guy, a representative had to. You heard about just had to resign his position there. Involved in getting a woman there in Washington. Same group. Getting was involved in getting a woman, you know. I didn't hear who. A representative from New York State.

[36:38] Yeah, he had to resign his position. This was going to be a election in the spring for his. Do I possibly ramble? No, no, no. This is—I didn't know the guy's name. I'd never heard before. You know, it's one of the districts there. But he—he's a married man with kids and so on, and got involved in some extracurricular activities. So had to resign now. So. Dr. Rourke, could could you kind of slowly go over again that definition, just rattle off about?

[37:09] Yeah. A moral virtue. Yeah. Okay, it's a habit with choice, right? Habit with choice. Existing in the middle, right? Not the middle of the thing, but the middle towards us, right? Right. As determined by what right reason, right? Meaning by foresight, really, huh? As determined by. Yeah, yeah. So you see, like if you take, say, take mildness, right? Anger is concerned with anger as a matter, right?

[37:42] Well, I can get angry more than I what. Should right, but I can also get angry less than I what. Should. Who's named Donnie there? You know, Catholicly, you know, he's already there. There are various things going on, right? Huh? You see, and there are things you should get angry about, right? If you're using my kids for target practice, you know, I mean, you know, I shouldn't be too gentle about this, right?

[38:10] You see, but now if you bump me in the hall, right? You see. Well, was it an accident, or were you, you know, one of the kids that get high school goes down and bumping everybody, and all these kids get to high school, and and so in some cases there might be some anger required. Other cases, not, right? Huh. You see, but only reason can can say that, right?

[38:32] Huh. Or I say, how much should you eat? You know, for dinner. Well, if Grandma is serving Thanksgiving dinner, you might eat more than you would eat normally at home, right? But you take into account the fact that the grandma's gone to an awful lot of work to prepare this stuff, and she will be disappointed if you don't eat heartily and and so on, right? But you got to take into account the what, the circumstances, right?

[38:58] Huh. No, the doctor. Can the doctor have a drink? Well, I wouldn't say before he goes into brain surgery. surgery. Surgery, yeah. But maybe maybe after he comes out of ten hours of you know being in the you know these huge things, maybe it's time for a drink or something to relax him, right? You know. But but reasons as I drink before would have been bad, right?

[39:24] Maybe afterwards it helps him relax and calm down from this thing. I I worked with a guy who had been in the airplanes going over Germany, you know, before the landing there. Of course, he said you didn't eat anything because you just thought up got there. So tense, you know. And just the first day they would name us their targets. So next day they said go back but fly lower.

[39:49] Oh boy! Yeah. And he says, but when you got back to England and you got off the airplane, they were passing out cups of scotch, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[40:05] So I mean, but reason only reason can take into account the circumstances, right? Should I get angry at all or not angry at all? You know, maybe sometimes we should get angry, defend the faith, right? By other times, maybe we shouldn't get angry or maybe very little or not at all. You know, only reason can see that, right? So, so it's it's a middle towards us, right?

[40:30] Which may not be the same thing for the little boy might eat less than than the working man, right? Working man might eat more than the than the professor. Professor, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know, I guess these farmers. My brother Richard worked on the farm one time in the summer, and they have you know like a they got a meal between breakfast and lunch. I mean, otherwise they couldn't keep going, right?

[40:54] But we we we don't need a meal between breakfast and lunch, and so that's the way he defines it. you know, It's a habit with choice existing in the middle towards us, right? But it's neither too much nor too little for me today in these circumstances, right? And that requires the use of reason, right? But he has choice in the definition of it too, right?

[41:23] Sometimes you can almost change the definition of it and say it's a habit of choosing, right? What is in the middle towards us, right? Is determined by right reason, huh?

[41:37] To get in the habit of choosing to drink moderately, I'd say, right? And I knew a guy in college; he and his brother there every Friday and Saturday night they go down to the to the bar, right? And you know, seven or eight whatever time it was, and drink until closing time. Well, I think you're choosing to to drink kind of you know excess, right? And and you you kind of get a little vice, I guess.

[42:10] You know, you get a little too dependent. Huh? You have to go on the wagon for a while. This guy go up to the Jesuit retreat house there in northern Minnesota, get fixed up for a while. But to get into this habit, you know,

[42:39] Aristotle does take up choice, you know, which is an element in the definition of moral virtue in the second book, right? He does take up choice and consider that what it is, right, in the beginning of book three, there, you know.

[43:08] I was doing it, and they talked about marriage a bit. You know, I define marriage as the stable union of a man, woman by mutual choice, right, for the sake of children, right. So I said, when the priest says to you, "Do you take so and so as your wife or your husband?" It doesn't say, you know, do you have wonderful feelings about so and so? You do have wonderful feelings, but he's not asking you asking you to make a what choice,

[43:42] and then I would come back and I'd say, you know, now if the husband or the wife is is tempted to be unfaithful, right, are they being true to themselves?

[43:57] They're being true to their emotion, this sudden emotion that has arisen, but they're not being true to their choice, right? Okay, which is more me, my emotions or my what choice? Or take that example I did give there. You know, suppose I am alcoholic, right, and so after one of my bust-ups, you know, I do a little thinking, and I say I got to give up drinking, right, and now I what chosen to give up drinking, right?

[44:34] Now an alcoholic is going to be challenged, right, to drink at some time again, right, and now if he follows that urge to drink again when he can't handle it, is he being true to himself?

[44:51] Which is more him? His what choice or his what urging for a drink? You know, choice is more you, right? And sometimes trying to bring it out, I'd say, you know, if you are a member of the jury and judge or whatever it is,

[45:14] which do you take more seriously, other things being equal, a premeditated murder or a murder of passion? Which you take more seriously, premeditated murder, because he seems more to have what? Chosen. Because he has chosen, in a sense, to murder this person. Right, he's had time to think about it. Right,

[45:39] the passion t here is less choice involved there, right? So he seems less responsible, right? So the choice is more me, right? You know, Shakespeare has a beautiful two plays there, where one is in the concupiscible appetite, one is in the irascible appetite, right, and the man who is. Fouling his concupiscible appetite in opposition to his his reasonable choice, right? Thinks he's being true to himself, right?

[46:14] And that's Proteus there in the two gentlemen of Verona. Now he's engaged, and engagement in those days meant more than means in our day, right? It's almost equivalent to marriage, right? And he's he's with twenty, you know, thousand soul confirming oaths. He's pledged to Julia, right? And then he sees his friend's girl at the court, right? And you know, he's got to pursue her; otherwise, he's not true to himself.

[46:42] Well, he's not true to his what emotion? And the other one is in in Coriolanus, right? Where Coriolanus is true to his angry nature, right? Now, shall we be false to myself? He says, you know, you know, come, come. And but I contrast that with what Polonius says in Hamlet: "This above all, to an own self be true; Must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man be false to any man, right?

[47:17] " So Proteus is going to be false to Julia and false to his friend Valentine, right? He's going to steal Valentine's girl. Right, anyway, and is he being true to himself then? See, well, I mean, Polonius is saying, "If you're true to yourself, you can't be false to anybody else." But these guys are saying, "One of them is saying he's got to be false to his friend and his girl in order to be true to himself."

[47:43] So who's who's correct, right? Well, I think Polonius is right because when you're when you're true to your reasonable choice, right, you're more being true to yourself than when you're true to your what temporary or sudden emotion, right? Because that reasonable choice is more you than you know. Maybe that's why he says to thine own self rather than just to thyself, to thine own self. Yeah, yeah.

[48:16] It's more of this thing. Yeah. But again, it's because reason is more me than emotion, right? And reason is involved in choice. It's like in the monastic life, I mean, you make a choice, right? You know, but this is considered thing, and that that's more you than this sudden. You know, I just I want to be free. You know, this prison. You know, whatever it is. Doctor Burke, which which play under Shakespeare has the exhortation to reason?

[48:49] Hamlet. Hamlet. Yeah, Hamlet is a very key play. In fact, Hamlet has a lot in there about the nature of fiction of the play itself, right? So you get the the mood, you know, that Shakespeare's creating there as well. But it's really kind of a marvelous. Thing that definition of reason I think is is best definition of reason I I was reading my favorite book the other day there Summa Contra Gentiles and Aristotle presents I mean Thomas's reasoning against the very way it's there you know as as the years and so on but I'm kind of struck you know and what Aristotle calls the perspectivum faculty right well I guess that's the word for looking looking yeah and Aristotle several times says that you know

[49:39] but but kind of Shakespeare puts it together right in the way that you don't find exactly it's kind of strange I mean Shakespeare's defined reason in a sense more fully than Aristotle or anybody else but

[49:59] kind of strange I don't know. Why? You know the in the Henry the Fourth plays, you know, where the king, I mean, Falstaff, right, is not leading the life of reason, right?

[50:21] And you know Shakespeare introduces him to to us, you know, as a character, right? What time of day is it? And then then Prince Hal, you know, speaks of how superfluous. Why was he asking this? What difference does it make him what time of day it is, right? Unless you know the son was a woman in Taffeta and all sorts of stuff, and so on. Well, if you go to to what Aristotle says, or go to Shakespeare's definition of a reason, right, it's looking before and after, right.

[50:56] And the first sense of before and after is in time, right? What What difference does it make the man is doing this irregular life? What time of day it is, right? I mean, I feel like having a drink, you know. My brother Mark used to say, you know, you should never drink before noontime. No, that was kind of a secret rule. you know, you don't, sit down, have you know bottle of wine for your breakfast or something like that, right?

[51:20] And but but the man just follows, you know, the urge to have a drink, you know, any time of day, morning, noon, or night. What difference does it make what time it is, right? You know, it's kind of incredible that Shakespeare should have introduced him that way, right? Asking a question that is obviously relevant to his life. He doesn't observe any order, right? You know, there's a time for this, a time for that.

[51:44] The scripture says, right? And so if you're really concerned with the time of day, because now it's time to to sleep, or now it's time to eat, or now it's time to pray, or now it's time to go to church, or whatever, you know. And that's kind of the start of you know when Aristotle talks about about that in the

[52:05] third book on the soul, he says man is the animal who has a sense of time, right? And in a sense, if a man just thinks of what he wants to do here and now, doesn't look at the larger picture, right? In time, he's not really making a human decision there, right?

[52:32] Doctor says, "I need a drink," you know, and doesn't even think about the fact that an hour from now he's going to be operating on somebody. He's not using his reason, right? So that's kind of where you begin to see the use of reason, um, in time, right? You know, your mother probably said to you, you know, don't you need that now? It's going to spoil your dinner.

[52:57] You know, that's looking at the the wider picture, right? You're starting to use your reason a bit, huh? My mother would say you know, eat your fruit before your candy because if you eat the candy first, the fruit will taste bitter, right? You start to use your reason a little bit here, right?

[53:19] So that's important. So it's actually marvelous that Shakespeare would do something like like that, right? In that way, this is just nature, their natural gift or something, but just seems to know how to say things.

[53:44] I was saying to one of my my son-in-law, my son-in-law's sisters there is doing a doctorate in English there at the Catholic U. I said, "What is what is Shakespeare's two best uses of the of gold and dust, right? "

[54:03] He says, "Well, one where he says, 'Golden lads and girls all must as chimney sweepers come to dust. ' " That's a beautiful saying. I can't say better than that, right? And and then the other one where, "And give to dust that is a little guilt more loud than guilt or dusted. "

[54:28] That's a famous you know thing on on fashion, right? Huh? And give to dust that is a little guilt. Dusting a little bit of you know gold paint outside, you know, spray paint like that. And give to dust that is a little guilt more loud, more praise, right? Than guilt or dusted. You know, solid gold that dust has accumulated, right? You know, you got this dust in the book.

[54:51] You know, you give to dust that is a little guilt. You know, you pick up the New York Times or something like that, you know, and they're writing about this latest book or this latest, you know, thing, and it's dust the book, you know, but it's got a little glitter gold and it's new and you know what's on. And then see Augustine, you know, there's solid gold there, dusted on top of those.

[55:16] Dusting what that, you know? It's marvelous the way he says it, right? And give to dust that is a little guilt more laud than guilt or dusted. Couldn't say better than that. Golden lads and girls all must as chimney sweepers come to dust. I suppose you saw chimney sweepers, you know, coming all covered in dust. So he said, "You think of you know how golden lads and girls are going to going to fall, fall prey to dust, you know?

[55:45] " But that's kind of the funeral song there and symbolized, you know, beautiful. What was the other one? The other one was Troilus and Cressida They have the famous thing on the greatest denunciation, you might say, the greatest understanding, ever written on the danger of fashion, right? Huh?

[56:07] It's curious how certain authors or things become fashionable, right? And they're, you know, you know Samuel Johnson and his circle—they had the hundred-year rule that the poet is still being read a hundred years after he's dead, and that's prima facie evidence that there might be something to the poet, right? But I mean, if a guy is, you know, being read today, and somebody else is being read tomorrow, and somebody else the next day, you don't know what he's.

[56:37] New York Times bestseller list. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of the danger, right? Huh? I said, you know, can't really say anymore about these new machines, but, but, said, what's the most read thing in the in the in the country today, right? Well, in those days, it was the new newspaper, right? The very name indicates it's about the new, right? Why is everybody reading the newspaper? You know, probably because it's new, right?

[57:08] You know, maybe don't look at the Bible today; that's old stuff, you know. It's an old thing, you know. So the Bible might be, what?

[57:21] Gold, right? The wisdom is is gold, right? But that's just accumulated in the Bible, right? So they want this dusty thing, you know, sprinkled.