BOOK V

                                 

                              BOOK V

                                 
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But at all events what we are investigating is the justice which
is a part of virtue; for there is a justice of this kind, as we
maintain. Similarly it is with injustice in the particular sense
that we are concerned.

  That there is such a thing is indicated by the fact that while the
man who exhibits in action the other forms of wickedness acts
wrongly indeed, but not graspingly (e.g. the man who throws away his
shield through cowardice or speaks harshly through bad temper or fails
to help a friend with money through meanness), when a man acts
graspingly he often exhibits none of these vices,-no, nor all
together, but certainly wickedness of some kind (for we blame him) and
injustice. There is, then, another kind of injustice which is a part
of injustice in the wide sense, and a use of the word 'unjust' which
answers to a part of what is unjust in the wide sense of 'contrary
to the law'. Again if one man commits adultery for the sake of gain
and makes money by it, while another does so at the bidding of
appetite though he loses money and is penalized for it, the latter
would be held to be self-indulgent rather than grasping, but the
former is unjust, but not self-indulgent; evidently, therefore, he
is unjust by reason of his making gain by his act. Again, all other
unjust acts are ascribed invariably to some particular kind of
wickedness, e.g. adultery to self-indulgence, the desertion of a
comrade in battle to cowardice, physical violence to anger; but if a
man makes gain, his action is ascribed to no form of wickedness but
injustice. Evidently, therefore, there is apart from injustice in
the wide sense another, 'particular', injustice which shares the
name and nature of the first, because its definition falls within
the same genus; for the significance of both consists in a relation to
one's neighbour, but the one is concerned with honour or money or
safety-or that which includes all these, if we had a single name for
it-and its motive is the pleasure that arises from gain; while the
other is concerned with all the objects with which the good man is
concerned.

  It is clear, then, that there is more than one kind of justice,
and that there is one which is distinct from virtue entire; we must
try to grasp its genus and differentia.

  The unjust has been divided into the unlawful and the unfair, and
the just into the lawful and the fair. To the unlawful answers the
afore-mentioned sense of injustice. But since unfair and the
unlawful are not the same, but are different as a part is from its
whole (for all that is unfair is unlawful, but not all that is
unlawful is unfair), the unjust and injustice in the sense of the
unfair are not the same as but different from the former kind, as part
from whole; for injustice in this sense is a part of injustice in
the wide sense, and similarly justice in the one sense of justice in
the other. Therefore we must speak also about particular justice and
particular and similarly about the just and the unjust. The justice,
then, which answers to the whole of virtue, and the corresponding
injustice, one being the exercise of virtue as a whole, and the
other that of vice as a whole, towards one's neighbour, we may leave
on one side. And how the meanings of 'just' and 'unjust' which
answer to these are to be distinguished is evident; for practically
the majority of the acts commanded by the law are those which are
prescribed from the point of view of virtue taken as a whole; for
the law bids us practise every virtue and forbids us to practise any
vice. And the things that tend to produce virtue taken as a whole
are those of the acts prescribed by the law which have been prescribed
with a view to education for the common good. But with regard to the
education of the individual as such, which makes him without
qualification a good man, we must determine later whether this is
the function of the political art or of another; for perhaps it is not
 the same to be a good man and a good citizen of any state taken at
random.

  Of particular justice and that which is just in the corresponding
sense, (A) one kind is that which is manifested in distributions of
honour or money or the other things that fall to be divided among
those who have a share in the constitution (for in these it is
possible for one man to have a share either unequal or equal to that
of another), and (B) one is that which plays a rectifying part in
transactions between man and man. Of this there are two divisions;
of transactions (1) some are voluntary and (2) others
involuntary- voluntary such transactions as sale, purchase, loan for
consumption, pledging, loan for use, depositing, letting (they are
called voluntary because the origin of these transactions is
voluntary), while of the involuntary (a) some are clandestine, such as
theft, adultery, poisoning, procuring, enticement of slaves,
assassination, false witness, and (b) others are violent, such as
assault, imprisonment, murder, robbery with violence, mutilation,
abuse, insult.

                 
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(A) We have shown that both the unjust man and the unjust act are 
unfair or unequal; now it is clear that there is also an
intermediate between the two unequals involved in either case. And
this is the equal; for in any kind of action in which there's a more
and a less there is also what is equal. If, then, the unjust is
unequal, just is equal, as all men suppose it to be, even apart from
argument. And since the equal is intermediate, the just will be an
intermediate. Now equality implies at least two things. The just,
then, must be both intermediate and equal and relative (i.e. for
certain persons). And since the equal intermediate it must be between
certain things (which are respectively greater and less); equal, it
involves two things; qua just, it is for certain people. The just,
therefore, involves at least four terms; for the persons for whom it
is in fact just are two, and the things in which it is manifested, the
objects distributed, are two. And the same equality will exist between
the persons and between the things concerned; for as the latter the
things concerned-are related, so are the former; if they are not
equal, they will not have what is equal, but this is the origin of
quarrels and complaints-when either equals have and are awarded
unequal shares, or unequals equal shares. Further, this is plain
from the fact that awards should be 'according to merit'; for all
men agree that what is just in distribution must be according to merit
in some sense, though they do not all specify the same sort of
merit, but democrats identify it with the status of freeman,
supporters of oligarchy with wealth (or with noble birth), and
supporters of aristocracy with excellence.

  The just, then, is a species of the proportionate (proportion
being not a property only of the kind of number which consists of
abstract units, but of number in general). For proportion is 
equality of ratios, and involves four terms at least (that discrete
proportion involves four terms is plain, but so does continuous
proportion, for it uses one term as two and mentions it twice; e.g.
'as the line A is to the line B, so is the line B to the line C';
the line B, then, has been mentioned twice, so that if the line B be
assumed twice, the proportional terms will be four); and the just,
too, involves at least four terms, and the ratio between one pair is
the same as that between the other pair; for there is a similar 
distinction between the persons and between the things. As the term A,
then, is to B, so will C be to D, and therefore, alternando, as A is
to C, B will be to D. Therefore also the whole is in the same ratio to
the whole; and this coupling the distribution effects, and, if the
terms are so combined, effects justly. The conjunction, then, of the
term A with C and of B with D is what is just in distribution, and
this species of the just is intermediate, and the unjust is what
violates the proportion; for the proportional is intermediate, and the
just is proportional. (Mathematicians call this kind of proportion
geometrical; for it is in geometrical proportion that it follows
that the whole is to the whole as either part is to the
corresponding part.) This proportion is not continuous; for we
cannot get a single term standing for a person and a thing.

  This, then, is what the just is-the proportional; the unjust is what
violates the proportion. Hence one term becomes too great, the other
too small, as indeed happens in practice; for the man who acts
unjustly has too much, and the man who is unjustly treated too little,
of what is good. In the case of evil the reverse is true; for the
lesser evil is reckoned a good in comparison with the greater evil,
since the lesser evil is rather to be chosen than the greater, and
what is worthy of choice is good, and what is worthier of choice a
greater good.

  This, then, is one species of the just.