Virtue
Virtue is excellence; intellectual and moral virtues are excellences of the soul by which a person thinks, chooses, and acts well.
The word virtue translates the Greek aretē, which means excellence.
We can speak of the excellences appropriate to a horse, a tool, a physical body, or some other thing according to what it is, what its purpose is, and what it is capable of doing. The virtue of a good knife is that it cuts well. The virtue of a good horse is that it runs fast, possesses strength and endurance, and responds well to a good rider.
Human beings possess physical excellences too—strength, speed, agility, and the like. But the virtues most important to our personal and civic lives are intellectual and moral virtues—excellences of the human soul.
Intellectual and Moral Virtue
Aristotle distinguishes intellectual virtues from moral virtues.
Intellectual virtues perfect our capacities for knowing, understanding, reasoning, and judging. They include theoretical wisdom and practical judgment that enable the mind to discern what is true and decide well about what should be done.
Moral virtues govern our appetites, passions, choices, and actions by bringing them into proper relation with reason. Courage, moderation, and justice are among the most important examples.
Virtue is therefore not merely knowing what is right. A person may understand what he ought to do and still fail to do it because fear, anger, appetite, pleasure, or some other passion overpowers his judgment. A person can know the diet and exercise regimen required to maintain a healthy weight yet become unhealthy if he does not actually follow it.
The morally virtuous person does more than recognize the good. He chooses the good; he does what is good.
Virtue Is Developed Through Habit
Human beings are not born possessing fully developed moral virtues.
We possess natural capacities that make virtue possible, but those capacities must be developed—much as nearly everyone is born with arms capable of throwing, while becoming a Major League baseball pitcher requires years of practice.
Aristotle observes that moral virtue arises largely through habituation. We become better at choosing and acting well by repeatedly choosing and acting well. A single courageous action does not necessarily make someone courageous, just as one dishonest act does not necessarily establish a settled vice.
Repeated choices matter.
A person who repeatedly gives in to anger can become increasingly governed by anger. Someone who repeatedly indulges every appetite can become increasingly incapable of resisting appetite. Conversely, someone who repeatedly practices moderation, courage, honesty, and justice can develop increasingly stable dispositions toward those excellences.
Virtue therefore involves becoming a certain kind of human being—not merely agreeing with correct moral propositions.
Reason, Passion, and the Mean
Aristotle famously describes moral virtue as involving a mean between extremes.
Courage, for example, stands between cowardice and rashness. Moderation stands between deficient and excessive relations to pleasure and appetite.
But the mean is not a mathematical midpoint, nor does virtue always consist in compromise. The appropriate response depends upon the circumstances and must be determined by reason. Vice can result from both excess and deficiency, while virtue finds and chooses what is appropriate.
This connects virtue directly to liberty.
As we saw under that Key Idea, personal liberty requires the rule of reason over passions and appetites according to the moral law. Virtue strengthens that rule.
The courageous person can govern fear, and wisely choose how to act while experiencing it. The moderate person can govern appetite. The just person can resist the temptation to take what rightfully belongs to another. The prudent person can deliberate well about what should be done.
Virtue therefore increases a person’s capacity for personal self-government.
Virtue and Happiness
Aristotle connects virtue with eudaimonia—living well or human flourishing, often translated as “happiness.”
But happiness, in the classical understanding, is not merely a pleasant feeling or succession of enjoyable experiences. It concerns the quality of a human life considered as a whole. Human flourishing centrally involves excellent activity of the rational soul, while friendship and other external goods also contribute to living well.
George Washington echoed this relationship between virtue and happiness in his First Inaugural Address. He spoke of an “indissoluble union between virtue and happiness” and argued that sound national policy should rest upon enduring principles of private morality.
Virtue is therefore not merely a sacrifice made for the benefit of others. The virtues are indispensable for living well. They are key to a happy, good life.
Virtue and Political Self-Government
The relationship between virtue and self-government also has a political dimension.
A republic places considerable political responsibility in the hands of citizens. Constitutional structures can limit power, divide authority, and provide checks against misconduct. But institutions cannot eliminate the need for human beings capable of judgment and restraint.
Federalist No. 55 acknowledges enough human depravity to require caution and institutional safeguards, while also arguing that republican government presupposes “sufficient virtue among men for self-government.”
Federalist No. 57 makes the political importance of virtue still clearer. One aim of a good constitution, Publius argues, is to elevate governors and statesmen possessing the wisdom to discern the common good and the virtue to pursue it—and then to keep them responsible while exercising public trust.
Virtue is therefore required on both sides of republican government.
Citizens need sufficient virtue to govern themselves, judge political questions, resist destructive passions, and hold public officials accountable. Those entrusted with political power need enough virtue to pursue rightful public purposes rather than merely their own ambition, interest, or appetite.
Cultivating Virtue
Because virtue develops partly through habit and education, early Americans frequently connected education with the preservation of free government.
The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 declared that “religion, morality, and knowledge” are necessary to good government and human happiness and therefore called for schools and education to be encouraged.
Washington made a related argument in his Farewell Address. He described religion and morality as indispensable supports of political prosperity and called virtue a necessary spring of popular government.
These statements reflect a larger principle: political institutions alone cannot produce a free and flourishing society. The human beings operating within those institutions matter. Constitutions can limit government from the outside. Virtue helps human beings govern themselves from within.
