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http://www.jstor.org F:ROM HOMER TO BENJAMIN FRANKLIN l
The Nature of the Virtues by ALASDAIRMacINTYRE
ourselves. For we would now seem to be saying that Ho- mer's concept of an arete, an excellence, is one thing and O ne responseto the historyof Greekand medieval that our concept of a virtue is quite anothersince a particu- thoughtabout the virtuesmight well be to suggest thateven lar qualitycan be an excellence in Homer's eyes, but not a within that relativelycoherent tradition of thoughtthere are virtue in ours and vice versa. just too many different and incompatibleconceptions of a But of course it is not that Homer's list of virtues differs virtuefor there to be any real unity to the concept or indeed only from our own; it also notablydiffers from Aristotle's. to the history. Homer, Sophocles, Aristotle, the New Testa- And Aristotle'sof course also differsfrom our own. For one ment and medieval thinkers differ from each other in too thing, some Greek virtue-wordsare not easily translatable many ways. They offer us different and incompatiblelists into English or ratherout of Greek. Moreoverconsider the of the virtues;they give a differentrank order of importance importanceof friendshipas a virtuein Aristotle'slist-how to differentvirtues; and they have differentand incompati- differentfrom us! Or the place of phronesis, the virtue ex- ble theories of the virtues. If we were to consider later hibited in excellence of practicaljudgment-how different Western writers on the virtues, the list of differences and from Homer and from us! The mind receives from Aristotle incompatibilitieswould be enlarged still further;and if we the kind of tribute which the body receives from Homer. extendedour enquiryto Japanese,say, or AmericanIndian But it is not just the case that the differencebetween Aris- cultures, the differences would become greater still. It totle and Homer lies in the inclusion of some items and the would be all too easy to conclude thatthere are a numberof omission of othersin theirrespective catalogues. It turnsout rival and alternativeconceptions, but, even within the early also in the way in which those catalogues are ordered, in Westerntradition, no single core conception. which items are rankedas relativelycentral to humanexcel- The case for such a conclusion could not be better con- lence and which marginal. structedthan by beginningfrom a considerationof the very Moreover the relationshipof virtues to the social order differentlists of items which different authorsin different has changed. For Homer the paradigmof humanexcellence times and places have included in their catalogues of vir- is the warrior;for Aristotle it is the Athenian gentleman. tues. Let me recall some of the key features of some of Indeedaccording to Aristotlecertain virtues are only availa- these catalogues-Homer's, Aristotle'sand the New Testa- ble to those of great riches and of high social status;there ment's-and then introduce for further comparison Ben- are virtues which are unavailableto the poor man, even if jamin Franklinand Jane Austen. he is a free man. And those virtues are on Aristotle'sview ones centralto human once The first example is that of Homer. At least some of the life; magnanimity-and again, translationof is items in a Homeric list of the aretai would clearly not be any megalopsuchia unsatisfactory-and munificence are not but virtues counted by most of us nowadaysas virtues at all, physical just virtues, important within the Aristotelianscheme. strengthbeing the most obvious example. To this it might At once it is to the remarkthat the most be replied that perhapswe ought not to translatethe word impossible delay contrastwith Aristotle's is to be found arete in Homer by our word 'virtue,' but instead by our striking catalogues neitherin Homer's nor in our but in the New Testa- word 'excellence';and perhaps,if we were so to translateit, own, ment's. For the New Testamentnot virtues of the apparentlysurprising difference between Homer and only praises which Aristotleknows and love-and ourselves would at first sight have been removed. For we nothing-faith, hope aboutvirtues such as which are cru- could allow without any kind of oddity that the possession says nothing phronesis cial for but it at least one as a of physical strengthis the possession of an excellence. But Aristotle, praises quality seems to count as one of the vices in fact we would not have removed, but instead would virtue which Aristotle relativeto Moreover,since merely have relocated, the difference between Homer and magnanimity,namely humility. the New Testamentquite clearly sees the rich as destined for the pains of Hell, it is clear thatthe key virtuescannot be ALASDAIR MACINTYRE is Henry Luce Professor in the Philos- availableto them; yet they are availableto slaves. And the ophy Department at Wellesley College. This article, which is New Testamentof course differs from both Homer and Ar- with the the author and the University of reprinted permission of istotle not only in the items included in its catalogue, but Notre Dame Press, is excerptedfrom Chapter 14 of After Virtue: once in its rank orderingof the virtues. A Study in Moral Theory and contains only a preliminary ac- again count of the concept of a virtue, an account which is extended Turn now to compareall three lists of virtues considered elsewhere in the book. Copyright ? 1980 Alasdair Maclntyre. so far-the Homeric, the Aristotelian,and the New Testa-
The HastingsCenter 27 ment's-with two much later lists, one which can be com- does becomes intelligible at once when we recognize that piled from Jane Austen's novels and the other which the key virtues thereforemust be those which enable a man Benjamin Franklinconstructed for himself. Two features to excel in combatand in the games. We cannotidentify the stand out in Jane Austen's list. The first is the importance Homeric virtuesuntil we have first identifiedthe key social that she allots to the virtue which she calls 'constancy'.In roles in Homeric society and the requirementsof each of some ways constancyplays a role in JaneAusten analogous them. The concept of what anyonefilling such-and-sucha to that ofphronesis in Aristotle;it is a virtue the possession role ought to do is priorto the concept of a virtue;the latter of which is a prerequisitefor the possession of othervirtues. concept has applicationonly via the former. The second is the fact that what Aristotletreats as the virtue of agreeableness (a virtue for which he says there is no name) she treats as only the simulacrumof a genuine vir- And Hector killed a tue-the virtuein Periphetes, Mycenaean, genuine questionis the one she calls ami- son . .the son the ability. For the man who practices agreeablenessdoes so of Kopreus. outstripped fa- from considerationsof honour and expediency, according ther in every kind of virtue, in swiftness of to Aristotle; whereas Jane Austen thought it possible and foot and as a soldier and he ranked high necessary for the possessor of the virtue to have a certain the his real affection for people as such. (It mattershere that Jane among Mycenaeansfor understanding. Austenis a Christian.)Remember that Aristotle himself had Homer, Iliad XV 638-643 treated military courage as a simulacrumof true courage. Thus we find here yet anothertype of disagreementover the virtues;namely, one as to which human qualities are gen- On Aristotle's account matters are very different. Even uine virtues and which mere simulacra. though some virtues are available only to certain types of In BenjaminFranklin's list we find almost all the types of people, none the less virtuesattach not to men as inhabiting differencefrom at least one of the other catalogueswe have social roles, but to man as such. It is the telos of man as a considered and one more. Franklinincludes virtues which species which determineswhat humanqualities are virtues. are new to our considerationsuch as cleanliness, silence We need to remember however that although Aristotle and industry;he clearly considersthe drive to acquireitself treatsthe acquisitionand exercise of the virtues as means to a partof virtue, whereasfor most ancientGreeks this is the an end, the relationshipof means to end is internaland not vice of pleonexia; he treatssome virtues which earlierages external.I call a means internalto a given end when the end had consideredminor as major;but he also redefinessome cannotbe adequatelycharacterized independently of a char- familiarvirtues. In the list of thirteenvirtues which Franklin acterizationof the means. So it is with the virtues and the compiled as partof his system of privatemoral accounting, telos which is the good life for man on Aristotle'saccount. he elucidates each virtue by citing a maxim, obedience to The exercise of the virtues is itself a crucial componentof which is the virtue in question. In the case of chastity the the good life for man. This distinctionbetween internaland maxim is 'Rarelyuse venery but for health or offspring- externalmeans to an end is not drawnby Aristotlehimself never to dullness, weakness or the injury of your own or in the Nicomachean Ethics, as I noticed earlier, but it is an another'speace or reputation'.This is clearly not what ear- essential distinction to be drawn if we are to understand lier writershad meant by 'chastity'. what Aristotleintended. The distinctionis drawnexplicitly We have thereforeaccumulated a startlingnumber of dif- by Aquinas in the course of his defense of St. Augustine's ferences and incompatibilitiesin the five statedand implied definitionof a virtue, and it is clear thatAquinas understood accountsof the virtues. So the questionwhich I raisedat the that he was maintainingan Aristotelianpoint of view. outset becomes more urgent.If differentwriters in different The New Testament'saccount of the virtues, even if it times and places, but all within the history of Westerncul- differs as much as it does in contentfrom Aristotle's-Aris- ture, include such differentsets and types of items in their totle would certainlynot have admiredJesus Christand he lists, what groundshave we for supposingthat they do in- would have been horrifiedby St. Paul-does have the same deed aspireto list items of one and the same kind, thatthere logical and conceptual structureas Aristotle's account. A is any sharedconcept at all? A second kind of consideration virtue is, as with Aristotle, a quality the exercise of which reinforces the presumption of a negative answer to this leads to the achievementof the human telos. The good for question. It is not just that each of these five writers lists man is of course a supernaturaland not only a naturalgood, differentand differingkinds of items; it is also that each of but superature redeems and completes nature. Moreover these lists embodies, is the expressionof a differenttheory. the relationshipof virtues as means to the end which is In the Homericpoems a virtue is a qualitythe manifesta- human incorporationin the divine kingdom of the age to tion of which enables someone to do exactly what their come is internaland not external,just as it is in Aristotle.It well-definedsocial role requires.The primaryrole is thatof is of course this parallelismwhich allows Aquinas to syn- the warriorking and thatHomer lists those virtueswhich he thesise Aristotle and the New Testament.A key featureof
28 The Hastings Center Report,April 1981 this parallelismis the way in which the concept of the good Yet althoughI have dwelt upon the prima facie case for lifefor man is priorto the conceptof a virtuein just the way holding that the differences and incompatibilitiesbetween in which on the Homeric account the concept of a social different accounts at least suggest that there is no single, role was prior. Once again it is the way in which the former central, core conceptionof the virtues which might make a concept is applied which determineshow the latteris to be claim for universalallegiance, I ought also to point out that applied. In both cases the concept of a virtue is secondary. each of the five moral accounts which I have sketched so The intent of Jane Austen's theory of the virtues is of summarilydoes embody just such a claim. It is indeedjust anotherkind. C.S. Lewis has rightly emphasizedhow pro- this featureof those accountsthat makes them of more than foundly Christianher moral vision is and GilbertRyle has sociological or antiquarianinterest. Every one of these ac- equally rightly emphasized her inheritancefrom Shaftes- counts claims not only theoretical,but also an institutional bury and from Aristotle. In fact her views combine ele- hegemony. For Odysseus the Cyclopes stand condemned ments from Homer as well, since she is concerned with because they lack agriculture,on agora and themis. For social roles in a way that neither the New Testamentnor Aristotlethe barbariansstand condemned because they lack Aristotle are. She is therefore importantfor the way in the polis and are thereforeincapable of politics. For New which she finds it possible to combine what are at first sight TestamentChristians there is no salvationoutside the apos- disparatetheoretical accounts of the virtues. But for the mo- tolic church. And we know that BenjaminFranklin found ment any attemptto assess the significanceof JaneAusten's the virtues more at home in Philadelphiathan in Paris and synthesismust be delayed. Insteadwe must notice the quite thatfor JaneAusten the touchstoneof the virtuesis a certain differentstyle of theory articulatedin BenjaminFranklin's kind of marriageand indeed a certainkind of naval officer account of the virtues. (that is, a certainkind of English naval officer). Franklin'saccount, like Aristotle's, is teleological; but unlike Aristotle's, it is utilitarian.According to Franklinin his Autobiographythe virtues are means to an end, but he Virtueis a matterof passionsand actions;and envisages the means-endrelationship as externalrather than internal. The end to which the cultivation of the virtues excessand deficiencyare errorswhere passions ministers is happiness, but happiness understood as suc- and actionsare concerned,while the mean is cess, prosperityin Philadelphiaand ultimately in heaven. praisedand achievessuccess. And praiseand The virtues are to be useful and Franklin'saccount continu- successare both outcomes virtue. ously stresses utility as a criterion in individual cases: of 'Makeno expence but to do good to othersor yourself;i.e., Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1106b 25 waste nothing', 'Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling conversation'and, as we have al- ready seen, 'Rarely use venery but for health or off- The questioncan thereforenow be posed directly;are we spring. . .' When Franklinwas in Paris he was horrifiedby or are we not able to disentanglefrom these rival and vari- Parisianarchitecture: 'Marble, porcelain and gilt are squan- ous claims a unitarycore concept of the virtuesof which we dered without utility.' can give a more compelling account than any of the other We thus have at least threevery differentconceptions of a accounts so far? I am going to argue that we can in fact virtue to confront: a virtue is a quality which enables an discover such a core concept and that it turnsout to provide individual to discharge his or her social role (Homer); a the traditionof which I have written the history with its virtue is a quality which enables an individual to move conceptualunity. It will indeed enable us to distinguishin a towards the achievement of the specifically human telos, clear way those beliefs about the virtues which genuinely whethernatural or supernatural(Aristotle, the New Testa- belong to the tradition from those which do not. Un- ment and Aquinas);a virtueis a quality which has utility in surprisinglyperhaps it is a complex concept, differentparts achieving earthlyand heavenly success (Franklin).Are we of which derive from differentstages in the developmentof to take these as three rival accounts of the same thing? Or the tradition.Thus the concept itself in some sense embod- are they instead accounts of three differentthings? Perhaps ies the history of which it is the outcome. the moral structuresin archaic Greece, in fourth-century One of the features of the concept of a virtue which has Greece, and in eighteenth-centuryPennsylvania were so emerged with some clarityfrom the argumentso far is that differentfrom each other that we should treatthem as em- it always requiresfor its applicationthe acceptanceof some bodying quite different concepts, whose difference is ini- prior account of certainfeatures of social and moral life in tially disguised from us by the historical accident of an terms of which it has to be defined and explained. So in the inherited vocabulary which misleads us by linguistic re- Homericaccount the concept of a virtueis secondaryto that semblancelong afterconceptual identity and similarityhave of a social role, in Aristotle'saccount it is secondaryto that failed. Our initial question has come back to us with re- of the good life for man conceived as the telos of human doubled force. action and in Franklin'smuch later account it is secondary
The HastingsCenter 29 to that of utility. What is it in the accountwhich I am about Planting turnips is not a practice; farming is. So are the to give which providesin a similarway the necessaryback- enquiriesof physics, chemistry and biology, and so is the groundagainst which the conceptof a virtuehas to be made work of the historian,and so are paintingand music. In the intelligible? It is in answeringthis question that the com- ancient and medieval worlds the creationand sustainingof plex, historical, multilayeredcharacter of the core concept human communities-of households, cities, nations-is of virtue becomes clear. For there are no less than three generallytaken to be a practicein the sense in which I have stages in the logical developmentof the concept which have defined it. Thus the range of practices is wide: arts, sci- to be identifiedin order,if the core conceptionof a virtueis ences, games, politics in the Aristoteliansense, the making to be understood,and each of these stages has its own con- and sustainingof family life, all fall underthe concept. But ceptual background.The first stage requiresa background the question of the precise range of practices is not at this account of what I shall call a practice, the second an ac- stage of the firstimportance. Instead let me explain some of count of what I have alreadycharacterized as the narrative the key termsinvolved in my definition,beginning with the orderof a single humanlife and the thirdan accounta good notion of goods internalto a practice. deal fuller thanI have given up to now of what constitutesa Considerthe examples of a highly intelligentseven-year- moraltradition. Each laterstage presupposesthe earlier,but old child whom I wish to teach to play chess, althoughthe not vice versa. Each earlier stage is both modified by and child has no particulardesire to learn the game. The child for and little reinterpretedin the light of, but also provides an essential does however have a very strongdesire candy constituentof each later stage. The progressin the develop- chance of obtainingit. I thereforetell the child that if the I will the ment of the concept is closely related to, althoughit does child will play chess with me once a week give I the child that I not recapitulatein any straightforwardway, the history of child 50? worth of candy; moreover tell the traditionof which it forms the core. will always play in such a way that it will be difficult, but In the Homeric account of the virtues-and in heroic so- not impossible, for the child to win and that, if the child worth of cieties more generally-the exercise of a virtue exhibits wins, the child will receive an extra 50? candy. to win. Notice qualitieswhich are requiredfor sustaininga social role and Thus motivated the child plays and plays alone which for exhibiting excellence in some well-markedarea of so- however that, so long as it is the candy pro- for the cial practice:to excel is to excel at war or in the games, as vides the child with a good reason playing chess, Achilles does, in sustaininga household, as Penelope does, child has no reason not to cheat and every reason to cheat, so we in giving counsel in the assembly, as Nestor does, in the providedhe or she can do so successfully. But, may will find in telling of a tale, as Homer himself does. When Aristotle hope, there will come a time when the child of a cer- speaks of excellence in human activity, he sometimes those goods specific to chess, in the achievement though not always, refers to some well-defined type of tain highly particularkind of analyticalskill, strategicimag- of human practice:flute-playing, or war, or geometry. I am ination and competitive intensity, a new set reasons, on a going to suggest that this notion of a particulartype of prac- reasons now not just for winning particularoccasion, of chess tice as providingthe arenain which the virtuesare exhibited but for trying to excel in whateverway the game and in terms of which they are to receive their primary,if demands. Now if the child cheats, he or she will be defeat- incomplete, definitionis crucial to the whole enterpriseof ing not me, but himself or herself. be identifyinga core concept of the virtues. I hastento add two There are thus two kinds of goods possibly to gained caveats however. by playing chess. On the one hand there are those goods to and to The first is to point out that my argumentwill not in any externallyand contingentlyattached chess-playing of social circumstance-in way imply that virtues are only exercised in the course of other practicesby the accidents in the case of real what I am calling practices. The second is to warn that I the case of the imaginarychild candy, status and There are shall be using the word 'practice'in a specially definedway adults such goods as prestige, money. and their which does not completely agree with current ordinary always alternativeways for achievingsuch goods, to be had in some usage, including my own previous use of that word. achievementis never only by engaging On the other hand there are the By a 'practice'I am going to mean any coherentand com- particularkind of practice. of chess which cannotbe had plex form of socially establishedcooperative human activ- goods internalto the practice chess or some other of that ity throughwhich goods internalto thatform of activity are in any way but by playing game as realizedin the course of tryingto achieve those standardsof specific kind. We call them internalfor two reasons:first, them excellence which are appropriateto, and partiallydefinitive I have alreadysuggested, because we can only specify of that kind of, that form of activity, with the result that humanpowers in terms of chess or some other game specific to achieve excellence, and human conceptions of the ends and by means of examples from such games (otherwisethe for of such and goods involved, are systematicallyextended. Tic-tac- meagernessof our vocabulary speaking goods to of 'a toe is not an example of a practice in this sense, nor is forces us into such devices as my own resort writing and because throwinga football with skill; but the game of football is, certain highly particularkind of'); secondly and so is chess. Bricklayingis not a practice;architecture is. they can only be identified and recognized by the experi-
Center 1981 30 The Hastings Report, April ence of participatingin the practicein question. Those who of good internalto the paintingof humanfaces and bodies lack the relevant experience are incompetent thereby as are achieved. judges of internalgoods. Thereis firstof all the excellence of the products,both the excellence in performanceby the paintersand that of each Whereverthere is and ambi- portraititself. This excellence-the very verb 'excel' sug- jealousy factious gests it-has to be understoodhistorically. The sequences tion, there is confusionand every evil deed. of developmentfind their point and purpose in a progress The wisdomfrom above is first pureand then towardsand beyond a variety of types and modes of excel- peace-making,intent on equity and open to lence. Thereare of course sequencesof decline as well as of progress,and progressis rarelyto be understoodas straight- reason, full of mercy and fruitful in good forwardlylinear. But it is in participationin the attemptsto consequences,not quibblingand not hypocriti- sustainprogress and to respondcreatively to moments that cal. The is the second kind of good internalto the practicesof portrait fruit of justice plantedpeacefully paintingis to be found. For what the artistdiscovers within by peacemakers. the pursuitof excellence in portraitpainting-and what is New Testament, Epistle of St. James, 3,16-18 true of portraitpainting is trueof the practiceof the fine arts in general-is the good of a certainkind of life. That life This is clearly the case with all the major examples of may not constitutethe whole of life for someone who is a practices:consider for example-even if briefly and inade- painterby a very long way or it may at least for a period, quately-the practiceof portraitpainting as it developed in Gaugin-like, absorb him or her at the expense of almost WesternEurope from the late middle ages to the eighteenth everythingelse. But it is the painter'sliving out of a greater century. The successful portraitpainter is able to achieve or lesser partof his or her life as a painter thatis the second many goods which are in the sense just defined externalto kind of good internalto painting.And judgmentupon these the practiceof portraitpainting-fame, wealth, social sta- goods requiresat the least the kind of competence that is tus, even a measureof power and influence at courts upon only to be acquiredeither as a painteror as someone willing occasion. But those externalgoods are not to be confused to learn systematicallywhat the painterhas to teach. with the goods which are internalto the practice.The inter- A practice involves standardsof excellence and obe- nal goods are those which result from an extended attempt dience to rules as well as the achievement of goods. To to show how Wittgenstein'sdictum 'The humanbody is the enterinto a practiceis to acceptthe authorityof those stand- best picture of the human soul' (Investigations, p. 178e) ards and the inadequacyof my own performanceas judged might be able to become true by teaching us 'to re- by them. It is to subjectmy own attitudes,choices, prefer- gard. . .the pictureon our wall as the object itself (the men, ences and tastes to the standardswhich currentlyand par- landscape and so on) depicted there' (p. 205e) in a quite tially define the practice. Practicesof course, as I have just new way. What is misleading about Wittgenstein'sdictum noticed, have a history; games, sciences and arts all have as it stands is its neglect of the truth in George Orwell's histories. Thus the standardsare not themselves immune thesis 'At 50 everyone has the face he deserves'. What from criticism,but none the less we cannotbe initiatedinto paintersfrom Giotto to Rembrandtlearnt to show was how a practicewithout accepting the authorityof the best stand- the face at any age may be revealed as the face that the ards realized so far. If, on startingto listen to music, I do subject of a portraitdeserves. not accept my own incapacity to judge correctly, I will Originallyin medievalpaintings of the saintsthe face was never learn to hear, let alone to appreciate, Bartok's last an icon; the questionof a resemblancebetween the depicted quartets.If, on startingto play baseball, I do not accept that face of Christor St. Peter and the face that Jesus or Peter others know better than I when to throw a fast ball and actuallypossessed at some particularage did not even arise. when not, I will never learn to appreciategood pitching let The antithesisto this iconographywas the relative natural- alone to pitch. In the realmof practicesthe authorityof both ism of certainfifteenth-century Flemish and Germanpaint- goods and standardsoperates in such a way as to rule out all ing. The heavy eyelids, the coifed hair, the lines aroundthe subjectivistand emotivist analyses of judgment. De gust- mouth undeniablyrepresent some particularwoman, either ibus est disputandum. actual or envisaged. Resemblance has usurped the iconic We are now in a position to notice an importantdifference relationship.But with Rembrandtthere is, so to speak, syn- between what I have called internaland what I have called thesis: the naturalisticportrait is now renderedas an icon, external goods. It is characteristicof what I have called but an icon of a new and hithertoinconceivable kind. Sim- external goods that when achieved they are always some ilarly in a very different kind of sequence mythological individual's property and possession. Moreover char- faces in a certainkind of seventeenth-centuryFrench paint- acteristicallythey are such that the more someone has of ing become aristocraticfaces in the eighteenth century. them, the less there is for other people. This is sometimes Within each of these sequences at least two differentkinds necessarily the case, as with power and fame, and some-
The HastingsCenter 31 I - ? I _
times the case by reason of contingentcircumstance as with her early days at chess, so far bars us from achieving the money. Externalgoods are thereforecharacteristically ob- standardsof excellence or the goods internalto the practice jects of competitionin which theremust be losers as well as that it rendersthe practicepointless except as a device for winners.Internal goods are indeed the outcome of competi- achieving externalgoods. tion to excel, but it is characteristicof them that their We can put the same point in anotherway. Everypractice achievementis a good for the whole communitywho partic- requiresa certain kind of relationshipbetween those who ipate in the practice. So when Turnertransformed the sea- participatein it. Now the virtues are those goods by refer- scape in paintingor W.G. Graceadvanced the artof batting ence to which, whether we like it or not, we define our in cricketin a quite new way theirachievement enriched the relationshipsto those otherpeople with whom we sharethe whole relevant community. kind of purposes and standardswhich inform practices. Consideran example of how referenceto the virtueshas to . it was my design to explainand enforce be made in certainkinds of human relationship. this doctrine:That vicious actions are not A, B, C, and D are friends in that sense of friendship which Aristotle takes to be primary:they share in the pur- hurtfulbecause they areforbidden, but forbid- suit of certaingoods. In my terms they share in a practice. den becausethey are hurtful, the nature of D dies in obscure circumstances,A discovers how D died man alone considered;that it was and tells the truthabout it to B while lying to C. C discovers therefore the lie. What A cannot then intelligibly claim is that he everyone'sinterest to be virtuouswho wished standsin the same relationshipof friendshipto both B and to be happyeven in this world. . .no qualities C. By telling the truthto one and lying to the other he has are so to makea man's as partiallydefined a differencein the relationship.Of course likely poor fortune it is open to A to explain this difference in a number of those of probityand integrity. ways; perhapshe was tryingto spareC pain or perhapshe is Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography simply cheating C. But some differencein the relationship now exists as a result of the lie. For their allegiance in the But what does all or any of this have to do with the con- pursuitof common goods has been put in question. cept of virtues?It turnsout that we are now in a position to Just as, so long as we share the standardsand purposes formulatea first, even if partialand tentativedefinition of a characteristicof practices, we define our relationshipsto virtue:A virtue is an acquired human quality the posses- each other, whetherwe acknowledgeit or not, by reference sion and exercise of which tends to enable us to achieve to standardsof truthfulnessand trust, so we define them too those goods which are internal to practices and the lack of by reference to standardsof justice and courage. If A, a which effectively prevents us from achieving any such professor, gives B and C the grades that their papers de- goods. Later this definition will need amplification and serve, but gradesD because he is attractedby D's blue eyes amendment. But as a first approximationto an adequate or is repelled by D's dandruff,he has defined his relation- definitionit already illuminatesthe place of the virtues in ship to D differentlyfrom his relationshipto the othermem- humanlife. For it is not difficultto show for a whole range bers of the class, whether he wishes it or not. Justice of key virtues that withoutthem the goods internalto prac- requires that we treat others in respect of merit or desert tices are barredto us, but in a very particularway. according to uniform and impersonal standards;to depart It belongs to the conceptof a practiceas I have outlined- from the standardsof justice in some particularinstance and as we are all familiarwith it alreadyin our actuallives, defines our relationshipwith the relevantperson as in some whetherwe are paintersor physicists or quarterbacksor in- way special or distinctive. deed just lovers of good paintingor first-rateexperiments or The case with courageis a little different. We hold cour- a well-thrownpass-that its goods can only be achievedby age to be a virtuebecause the care and concernfor individu- subordinatingourselves to the best standardso far achieved, als, communities and causes which are so crucial to so and that entails subordinatingourselves within the practice much in practicesrequire the existence of such a virtue. If in our relationshipto other practitioners.We have to learn someone says thathe cares for some individual,community to recognize what is due to whom; we have to be prepared or cause, but is unwilling to risk harmor dangeron his, her to take whateverself-endangering risks are demandedalong or its own behalf, he puts in questionthe genuinenessof his the way; and we have to listen carefullyto what we are told care and concern. Courage, the capacity to risk harm or about our own inadequacies and to reply with the same dangerto oneself, has its role in humanlife because of this carefulnessfor the facts. In other words we have to accept connection with care and concern. This is not to say that a as necessary components of any practice with internal man cannot genuinely care and also be a coward. It is in goods and standardsof excellence the virtues of justice, part to say that a man who genuinely cares and has not the courage and honesty. For not to accept these, to be willing capacity for risking harm or danger has to define himself, to cheat as our imaginedchild was willing to cheat in his or both to himself and to others, as a coward.
32 The Hastings Center Report,April 1981 I take it then that from the standpointof those types of achievementin the practicegives them an authorityto judge relationshipwithout which practices cannot be sustained which presupposesfairness and truthfulnessin those judg- truthfulness,justice and courage-and perhaps some oth- ments, and from time to time the taking of self-endanger- ers-are genuine excellences, are virtues in the light of ing, reputation-endangeringand even achievement-en- which we have to characterizeourselves and others, what- dangering risks. It is no part of my thesis that great ever our privatemoral standpointor our society's particular violinists cannot be vicious or great chess-players mean- codes may be. For this recognitionthat we cannot escape spirited.Where the virtues are required,the vices also may the definitionof our relationshipsin terms of such goods is flourish. It is just that the vicious and mean-spiritedneces- perfectly compatiblewith the acknowledgmentthat differ- sarily rely on the virtues of othersfor the practicesin which ent societies have and have had differentcodes of truthful- they engage to flourishand also deny themselvesthe experi- ness, justice and courage. Lutheranpietists broughtup their ence of achieving those internalgoods which may reward childrento believe that one ought to tell the truthto every- even not very good chess players and violinists. body at all times, whatever the circumstancesor conse- To situate the virtues any further within practices it is quences, and Kant was one of their children. Traditional necessarynow to clarify a little furtherthe natureof a prac- Bantu parentsbrought up their childrennot to tell the truth tice by drawingtwo importantcontrasts. The discussion so to unknown strangers,since they believed that this could far I hope makes it clear that a practice, in the sense in- render the family vulnerableto witchcraft. In our culture tended, is never just a set of technical skills, even when many of us have been brought up not to tell the truth to directedtowards some unifiedpurpose and even if the exer- elderly great-auntswho invite us to admiretheir new hats. cise of those skills can on occasion be valued or enjoyedfor But each of these codes embodies an acknowledgmentof their own sake. What is distinctive of a practice is in part the virtueof truthfulness.So it is also with varyingcodes of the way in which conceptions of the relevant goods and justice and of courage. ends which the technical skills serve-and every practice does require the exercise of technical skills-are trans- formed and enrichedby these extensions of humanpowers Thatdisgrace should in a just measureattend and by thatregard for its own internalgoods which are par- his share the offence,is, we know, not one tially definitive of each particularpractice or type of prac- of tice. Practices never have a goal or goals fixed for all of the barrierswhich societygives to virtue time-painting has no such goal nor has physics-but the but we may fairly considera man of sense, goals themselves are transmutedby the history of the activ- like to be him- ity. It turnsout not to be accidentalthat every practicehas HenryCrawford, providingfor its own history and a history which is more and other than self no smallportion of vexationand regretin that of the improvementof the relevant technical skills. havingso requitedhospitality, so injuredfam- This historicaldimension is crucialin relationto the virtues. and so lost the woman whom he To enter into a practiceis to enter into a relationshipnot ily peace, only with its contemporarypractitioners, but also with those had rationallyas well as passionatelyloved. who have preceded us in the practice, particularlythose Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, ch.48. whose achievementsextended the reach of the practiceto its presentpoint. It is thus the achievement,and a fortiori the authority, of a traditionwhich I then confront and from Practicesthen might flourishin societies with very differ- which I have to learn. And for this learningand the relation- ent codes; what they could not do is flourishin societies in ship to the past which it embodies the virtues of justice, which the virtueswere not valued, althoughinstitutions and courage and truthfulnessare prerequisitein precisely the technical skills serving unified purposes might well con- same way and for precisely the same reasons as they are in tinue to flourish.(I shall have more to say aboutthe contrast sustainingpresent relationshipswithin practices. between institutionsand technicalskills mobilizedfor a uni- It is not only of course with sets of technical skills that fied end, on the one hand, and practiceson the other, in a practicesought to be contrasted.Practices must not be con- moment.) For the kind of cooperation,the kind of recogni- fused with institutions. Chess, physics and medicine are tion of authorityand of achievement,the kind of respectfor practices;chess clubs, laboratories,universities and hospi- standards and the kind of risk-taking which are char- tals are institutions. Institutionsare characteristicallyand acteristicallyinvolved in practicesdemand for examplefair- necessarily concerned with what I have called external ness in judging oneself and others-the kind of fairness goods. They are involved in acquiringmoney and otherma- absent in my example of the professor, a ruthlesstruthful- terial goods; they are structuredin terms of power and sta- ness without which fairness cannot find application-the tus, and they distribute money, power and status as kind of truthfulnessabsent in my example of A, B, C and rewards.Nor could they do otherwiseif they are to sustain D-and willingness to trust the judgments of those whose not only themselves, but also the practicesof which they are
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the bearers. For no practicescan survive for any length of tutionsis correct,it follows that we shall be unableto write time unsustainedby institutions.Indeed so intimate is the a truehistory of practicesand institutionsunless thathistory relationshipof practices to institutions-and consequently is also one of the virtues and vices. For the ability of a of the goods externalto the goods internalto the practicesin practice to retain its integrity will depend on the way in question-that institutions and practices characteristically which the virtuescan be and are exercised in sustainingthe form a single causal orderin which the ideals and the crea- institutionalforms which are the social bearersof the prac- tivity of the practice are always vulnerableto the acquisi- tice. The integrityof a practice causally requiresthe exer- tiveness of the institution,in which the cooperativecare for cise of the virtues by at least some of the individualswho common goods of the practice is always vulnerableto the embody it in their activities;and conversely the corruption competitivenessof the institution.In this context the essen- of institutionsis always in partat least an effect of the vices. tial function of the virtues is clear. Withoutthem, without The virtues are of course themselves in turn fostered by justice, courage and truthfulness,practices could not resist certaintypes of social institutionand endangeredby others. the corruptingpower of institutions. Thomas Jefferson thought that only in a society of small Yet if institutionsdo have corruptingpower, the making farmerscould the virtues flourish;and Adam Fergusonwith of mod- and sustainingof forms of human community-and there- a good deal more sophisticationsaw the institutions fore of institutions itself has all the characteristicsof a ern commercialsociety as endangeringat least some tradi- of which is practice, and moreoverof a practice which standsin a pe- tional virtues. It is Ferguson's type sociology account of the culiarly close relationshipto the exercise of the virtues in the empiricalcounterpart of the conceptual which to two importantways. The exercise of the virtuesis itself apt virtueswhich I have given, a sociology aspires lay connectionbetween to requirea highly determinateattitude to social and politi- barethe empirical,causal virtues,prac- account cal issues; and it is always within some particularcommu- tices and institutions.For this kind of conceptual it an nity with its own specific institutionalforms thatwe learnor has strong empirical implications; provides explana- fail to learn to exercise the virtues. There is of course a tory scheme which can be tested in particularcases. More- crucialdifference between the way in which the relationship over my thesis has empiricalcontent in anotherway; it does a between moral characterand political community is en- entail that without the virtues there could be recognition and not at all of visaged from the standpointof liberalindividualist modern- only of what I have called externalgoods of And in soci- ity and the way in which that relationshipwas envisaged internalgoods in the context practices. any from the standpointof the type of ancient and medieval ety which recognized only external goods competitiveness traditionof the virtues which I have sketched. For liberal would be the dominant and even exclusive feature. We ac- individualisma communityis simply an arenain which in- have a brilliantportrait of such a society in Hobbes's Turnbull's dividuals each pursue their own self-chosen conception of count of the state of nature;and Professor report that social does in the the good life, and political institutionsexist to provide that of the fate of the Ik suggests reality both thesis and Hobbes's. degree of order which makes such self-determinedactivity most horrifyingway confirm my different to external possible. Governmentand law are, or ought to be, neutral Virtues then stand in a relationship virtues-and between rival conceptions of the good life for man, and and to internalgoods. The possession of the simulacra-are to hence, althoughit is the task of governmentto promotelaw- not only of theirsemblance and necessary of the virtues abidingness,it is on the liberalview no partof its legitimate achieve the latter;yet the possession may per- I need to function to inculcate any one moral outlook. fectly well hinderus in achieving externalgoods. are By contrast,on the particularancient and medieval view emphasize at this point that external goods genuinely of human which I have sketched political community not only re- goods. Not only are they characteristicobjects the exercise of the virtuesfor its own sustenance,but desire, whose allocationis what gives point to the virtuesof quires al- it is one of the tasks of governmentto make its citizens justice and of geometry, but no one can despise them Yet the virtuous,just as it is one of the tasks of parentalauthority to together without a certain hypocrisy. notoriously will make children grow up so as to be virtuous adults. The cultivationof truthfulness,justice and courage often, classical statement of this analogy is by Socrates in the the world being what it contingentlyis, bar us from being Crito. It does not of course follow from an acceptanceof rich or famous or powerful. Thus although we may hope and the Socratic view of political community and political that we can not only achieve the standardsof excellence the vir- authoritythat we ought to assign to the moder state the the internalgoods of certainpractices by possessing moral function which Socrates assigned to the city and its tues and become rich, famous and powerful, the virtues are to this comfortableam- laws. Indeed the power of the liberal individualiststand- always a potentialstumbling block if in a point partly derives from the evident fact that the moder bition. We should thereforeexpect that, particular domi- state is indeed totally unfittedto act as moral educatorof society the pursuitof externalgoods were to become virtues suffer first attrition any community. But the history of how the moder state nant, the concept of the might emergedis of course itself a moralhistory. If my accountof and then perhapssomething near total effacement, although the complex relationshipof virtues to practicesand to insti- simulacramight abound.
34 The Hastings Center Report,April 1981