Ethics

V

Early Greek Ethics

In the 6th century bc the Greek philosopher Pythagoras developed one of the earliest moral philosophies from the Greek mystery religion Orphism. Believing that the intellectual nature is superior to the sensual nature and that the best life is one devoted to mental discipline, he founded a semireligious order with rules emphasizing simplicity in speech, dress, and food. The members observed rituals that were designed to demonstrate the decreed ethical beliefs.

In the 5th century bc the Greek philosophers known as Sophists, who taught rhetoric, logic, and civil affairs, were skeptical of moral absolutes. The Sophist Protagoras taught that human judgment is subjective, and that one's perception is valid only for oneself. The Sophist Gorgias went to the extreme of arguing that nothing exists; that if anything does exist, human beings could not know it; and that if they did know it, they could not communicate that knowledge. Other Sophists, such as Thrasymachus, believed that might makes right. Socrates opposed the Sophists. His philosophical position, as represented in the dialogues of his pupil Plato, may be summarized as follows: virtue is knowledge; people will be virtuous if they know what virtue is; and vice, or evil, is the result of ignorance. Thus, according to Socrates, education can make people moral.

VI

Greek Schools of Ethics

Most later Greek schools of moral philosophy were derived from the teachings of Socrates. Four such schools originated among his immediate disciples: the Cynics, the Cyrenaics, the Megarians (a school founded by Euclid of Megara), and the Platonists.

The Cynics, notably the philosopher Antisthenes, maintained that the essence of virtue, the only good, is self-control and that it is capable of being taught. The Cynics disdained pleasure as an evil, if accepted as a guide to conduct. They considered all pride a vice, including pride in appearance or cleanliness. Socrates is reputed to have said to Antisthenes, “I can see your pride through the holes in your cloak.”

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The Cyrenaics, notably Aristippus of Cyrene, were hedonists, postulating pleasure as the chief good (as long as it does not dominate one's life), that no one kind of pleasure is superior to another, and that it is measurable only in degree and duration.

The Megarians, Euclid's followers, posited that although good may be called wisdom, God, or reason, it is “one,” and that good is the final secret of the universe, which can be revealed only through logical inquiry.

According to Plato, good is an essential element of reality. Evil does not exist in itself but is, rather, an imperfect reflection of the real, which is good. In his Dialogues (first half of the 4th century bc) he maintains that human virtue lies in the fitness of a person to perform that person's proper function in the world. The human soul has three elements—intellect, will, and emotion—each of which possesses a specific virtue in the good person and performs a specific role. The virtue of intellect is wisdom, or knowledge of the ends of life; that of the will is courage, the capacity to act; and that of the emotions is temperance, or self-control. The ultimate virtue, justice, is the harmonious relation of all the others, each part of the soul doing its appropriate task and keeping its proper place. Plato maintained that the intellect should be sovereign, the will second, and the emotions subject to intellect and will. The just person, whose life is ordered in this way, is therefore the good person.

Aristotle, Plato's pupil, regarded happiness as the aim of life. In his principal work on ethics, the Nicomachean Ethics (late 4th century bc), he defined happiness as activity that accords with the specific nature of humanity; pleasure accompanies such activity but is not its chief aim. Happiness results from the unique human attribute of reason, functioning harmoniously with human faculties. Aristotle held that virtues are essentially good habits, and that to attain happiness a person must develop two kinds of habits: those of mental activity, such as knowledge, which lead to the highest human activity, contemplation; and those of practical action and emotion, such as courage. Moral virtues are habits of action that conform to the golden mean, the principle of moderation, and they must be flexible because of differences among people and conditioning factors. For example, the amount one should eat depends on one's size, age, and occupation. In general, Aristotle defines the mean as being between the two extremes of excess and insufficiency; thus, generosity is the mean between prodigality and stinginess. For Aristotle, the intellectual and the moral virtues are merely means toward the attainment of happiness, which results from the full realization of human potential.

VII

Stoicism

The philosophy of Stoicism developed about 300 bc, during the Hellenistic and Roman periods. In Greece the principal Stoic philosophers were Zeno of Citium, Cleanthes, and Chrysippus of Soli. In Rome, Stoicism proved to be the most popular of the Greek philosophies, and Cicero was among the famous Romans who came under its influence. Its principal figures during the Roman period were the Greek philosopher Epictetus and the Roman emperor and philosopher Marcus Aurelius. According to the Stoics, nature is orderly and rational, and only a life led in harmony with nature can be good. The Stoic philosophers, however, agreed also that because life is influenced by material circumstances one should try to be as independent of such circumstances as possible. The practice of certain cardinal virtues, such as practical wisdom, courage, discretion, and justice, enables one to achieve independence in the spirit of the Stoic motto “Endure and renounce.” Hence, the word stoic has come to mean fortitude in the face of hardship.

VIII

Epicureanism

In the 4th and 3rd centuries bc, the Greek philosopher Epicurus developed a system of thought, later called Epicureanism, which identified the highest good with pleasure, particularly intellectual pleasure, and, like Stoicism, advocated a temperate and even an ascetic life devoted to contemplative pursuits. The principal Roman exponent of Epicureanism was the poet and philosopher Lucretius, whose poem De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things), written in the middle of the 1st century bc, combined certain ideas derived from the cosmological doctrines of the Greek philosopher Democritus with others derived from the ethics of Epicurus. The Epicureans sought to achieve pleasure by maintaining a state of serenity—that is, by eliminating all emotional disturbances. They considered religious beliefs and practices harmful because they preoccupy one with disturbing thoughts of death and the uncertainty of life after death. The Epicureans also held that it is better to postpone immediate pleasure in order to attain more secure and lasting satisfaction in the future; they therefore insisted that the good life must be regulated by self-discipline.

IX

Christian Ethics

The ethical systems of the classical age were applied to the aristocracy, particularly in Greece. The same standards were not extended to non-Greeks, and the term for them, barbaroi (“barbarians”), acquired derogatory connotations. As for slaves, the attitude toward them can be summed up in Aristotle's characterization of a slave as a “living tool.” Partly for these reasons, as the pagan religions decayed, the contemporary philosophies did not gain any popular following, and much of the appeal of Christianity was its extension of moral citizenship to all, even to slaves.

The coming of Christianity marked a revolution in ethics, for it introduced a religious conception of good into Western thought. In the Christian view a person is totally dependent upon God and cannot achieve goodness by means of will or intelligence but only with the help of God's grace. The primary Christian ethical belief is stated in the golden rule, “So whatever you wish that men would do to you, do so to them” (Matthew 7:12); in the injunctions to love one's neighbor as oneself (see Leviticus 19:18) and to love one's enemies (see Matthew 5:44); and in Jesus' saying, “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's” (Matthew 22:21). Jesus believed that the essential meaning of Jewish law is in the commandment “you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27).

Early Christianity emphasized as virtues asceticism, martyrdom, faith, mercy, forgiveness, and nonerotic love, few of which had been considered important by the philosophers of classical Greece and Rome.

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