Part One: on the universal principles of the science of ethics

Its First Chapter: on its preliminaries and its first principles

Know that man has three faculties. The first is the rational faculty, which apprehends universals primitively, and it is called the angelic soul (al-nafs al-malakīyah). The second is the irascible faculty, which impels to the repelling of harmful things, and it is called the predatory soul (al-nafs al-sabuʻīyah). The third is the appetitive faculty, which seeks the objects of sensory desire whereby the individual and the species are preserved, and it is called the bestial soul (al-nafs al-bahīmīyah). These three souls are mutually opposed and each overreaches the others, and in them man has free disposal by choice. If he wills, he goes down to the level of the predatory soul, obeying it, and becomes one beast of prey among beasts of prey. If he wills, he goes down to the station of the bestial soul, obeying it, and becomes one brute among brutes. And if he wills, he takes up his place at the rank of the angelic soul, rising above the other two souls, commanding them and disposing of them in accordance with intellect and the revealed law, so that in its spiritual substance it may strip itself bare of those bodily attachments that bring it to the brink, and pass to its holy first principles. For if one of the other two souls gains the upper hand over it, it tightens its attachment to the body and drags it toward the corporeal world; and then, when it parts from the body, it suffers pain in the utmost degree — at the loss of the body and of the sensory pleasures and bodily objects of desire that hang upon it, and because of the base bodily conditions and the ugly attributes that have settled in the soul and give it pain. The condition in which the rational soul (al-nafs al-nāṭiqah) has mastery over the other two souls is called virtue (faḍīlah); the condition in which they have mastery over the rational soul is called vice (radhīlah). When this condition becomes fixed and settled in the soul, it is called a settled disposition (malakah); when it occurs and then swiftly passes away, it is called a passing state (ḥāl). A character-trait (khulq), then, is a settled disposition from which voluntary actions issue without deliberation. Then, if the actions that issue from it are fine and praiseworthy in the judgement of intellect and of the revealed law, the trait is good; and if not, it is bad. Virtue is a middle between the two extremes of excess and deficiency, each of which is a vice — as has been said: both extremes of the mean (1) in affairs are blameworthy. The principal virtues are four: wisdom (ḥikmah), courage (shajāʻah), temperance (ʻiffah), and justice (ʻadālah). The principal vices are seven: craftiness (jarbazah) and stupidity (balah), which are the two extremes of wisdom; recklessness (tahawwur) and cowardice (jubn), which are the two extremes of courage; greed (sharah) and torpor (jumūd), which are the two extremes of temperance; and the seventh is injustice (jawr), which is the opposite of justice, because both extremes of justice are injustice (1). As for the branches of the virtues and their concomitants: the concomitants of wisdom are core-intelligence (lubb), penetration of judgement, excellence of mind, quickness of understanding, and their like; the concomitants of temperance are liberty of soul (ḥurrīyah), modesty (ḥayāʼ), benevolence (khayrīyah), open-handedness (sakhāʼ), and their like. The concomitants of justice are the whole sum of these concomitants, since justice is a virtue that comes about from the composition of these virtues which entail these concomitants; so its concomitants are whatever they entail. As for the concomitants of the vices, they are the opposites of these: the concomitants of craftiness are guile, devilry, and their like; the concomitants of stupidity are dullness, folly, and their like; the concomitants of recklessness are arrogance, self-exaltation, conceit (ṣalaf) (2), hardness of heart, and their like; the concomitants of greed are shamelessness, wickedness, and squandering; the concomitants of torpor are ingratiation, miserliness, and the likes of these; and the concomitants of injustice are the concomitants of all these vices together. As for the bounds of these virtues and vices and their definitions: in sum, it is a theoretical art by which man acquires knowledge of the existing things as they are, so far as human capacity allows. Courage is the compliance of the irascible faculty with the rational faculty in advancing and in holding back, as sound judgement requires. Temperance is the slightness of the appetitive faculty's longing for bodily pleasures, such that abstaining from what intellect and the revealed law blame comes easily to it. Justice is a condition that comes about from the coming together of these virtues in the soul. As for the bounds of the concomitants of the virtues: core-intelligence is a virtue by which a man is upright in judgement in affairs, able to elicit what is better and more salutary among great goods and noble ends. Penetration of judgement is a virtue by which a man is able to make himself fit for great affairs while holding them in small account. Clemency is a virtue by which a man is not so moved by provocations as to be carried to swift revenge. Generosity is a virtue by which a man takes pleasure in the good he expends. Mercy is a virtue by which a man suffers pain at an evil that befalls another. Modesty is a virtue by which a man guards himself against blameworthy matters. Liberty of soul is a virtue by which a man's attachment to corporeal things is weak, so that his passion at obtaining them and his grief at missing them are slight. Benevolence is a virtue by which a man takes pleasure and suffers pain at the good and the evil that befall another, as he takes pleasure and suffers pain for himself. Open-handedness is a virtue by which a man is a doer of what is fine with his wealth, so that it is done as it ought to be, at the time it ought, and in the measure it ought. As for the bounds of the principal vices: craftiness is the pressing of deliberation to its utmost in eliciting what is imagined to be good and is not good. Stupidity is the falling short of deliberation below the requisite measure in what serves the interests of this life and of the life to come. Recklessness is that the soul's compliance in advancing be stronger than its compliance in holding back, so that it advances upon what it is not permitted to advance upon by the revealed law or by intellect. Cowardice is that a man be such that he does not advance upon what he ought to advance upon. Greed is intensity of longing and of lust for bodily pleasures. Torpor is the absence of longing for what ought to be sought by intellect and by the revealed law. And injustice is the turning aside from the virtuous traits of character and the neglect of them, just as justice is being qualified by them.

As for the bounds of the concomitants of the vices, they are the opposites of the bounds of the concomitants of the virtues; so we shall not lengthen the book with their definitions, since they are known upon the slightest reflection.

As for the manner in which praiseworthy traits of character are acquired for the soul: Arisṭū and those who followed him held that this endures so long as one keeps to the use of the means, which are the virtues confined between the extremes. Know that the aim of the science of character is the treatment of corrupt traits of character and the preservation of virtuous ones, just as the aim of the science of bodily medicine is the treatment of disease and the preservation of health. For this reason the science of character has been called a spiritual medicine, since it is the counterpart of bodily medicine: as the body has health and disease, so too the soul has health and disease. Its health lies in the presence of the virtues, its disease in the presence of the vices; for the vices of character sicken the soul and make it wretched, just as the corruptions of the humours sicken the soul and bring it to ruin. And as medicine has canons by which the preservation of health and the removal of disease are known, so this science has canons by which the acquisition of the virtues and the removal of the vices are known. And as bodies must have physicians if they are to be sound and balanced in temperament, so souls must have physicians if they are to be virtuous and complete in their pleasures. The physicians of souls are the prophets — blessing and peace be upon them — by reason of the divine revealed laws they set forth, which comprise the ways of setting souls right and make plain what serves men's interests in this life and in the life to come; and after them those who followed them: the rightly guided caliphs, the perfected friends of God, and the God-devoted sages (1), who laid down the rules of the science of character. So I say, having put forward this preamble, that the canons of the medicine of bodies in treatment consist in this, that the disease, the cause, the symptom, and the treatment be distinguished; the disease and the cause are known by the symptom, and then treatment is by the contrary, so that the cause may be removed and with it the disease. Just so are the canons of the medicine of souls distinguished into the disease, the cause, and the treatment — a universal division that dispenses with particular division in teaching. As for the disease, it is the soul's intense inclination toward the body and its love for it; and this inclination and love is the root of all the other diseases of the soul, since from that inclination and love there follows the willing of what agrees with the body, namely the sensory pleasures; and from this willing there follows the willing of the means of what agrees with it, namely worldly circumstances; and from the willing of circumstances there follows the willing of what preserves circumstances, namely positions of authority; and then from these acts of willing there follow many acts of willing that rest upon the first ones, and these are the vices, which are the diseases of the soul. Then, when these acts of willing grow intense, they become longings and settled dispositions. So appetite arises, which is the intense willing of what agrees with the body, namely the sensibly pleasurable — food, drink, sexual union, clothing, mounts, and the likes of these among bodily pleasures. And anger arises, which is the intense willing to repel from the body what is contrary to it, namely the painful and the harmful — as in repelling enemies, defending friends, the pleasure of revenge and of rising above others, and the likes of these. And miserliness arises, which is withholding good from another for one's own sake. And envy arises, which is the will that good should belong to none but oneself; and so with the rest of the acts of willing that are diseases of the soul. As for the cause, it is first the apprehension and awareness of these acts of willing; then from the awareness there follows the soul's judgement that the thing is good, when it is not good. And this judgement follows either from his uncritical following of others, or from a corrupt opinion. Then, when this judgement becomes fixed in the soul, it becomes a settled belief; and when the belief is fixed, the character-trait follows from it. And when the trait is stirred, a passion (infiʻāl) follows from it, and from that the blameworthy actions issue. Take envy, for example: there is fixed in the envier's soul the belief that good ought not to belong to anyone else, and he is grieved when it comes to another; then, when one of the causes that move to action presents itself, the passion arises in the envier's soul, which is the act of envying, and from it there follows the deed, which is the turning toward another's good, the setting out to drive it away from him and to withhold it, by deeds blameworthy in the judgement of intellect and of the revealed law. This, then, is the establishing of the causes of the disease. As for the symptom, it is the signs that issue from those passions in the form of the blameworthy actions mentioned — such as exerting oneself to turn good away from another. The passions themselves are also faint symptoms within the soul, known to those who have them; while the actions are the outward symptoms issuing from the soul, corresponding to those passions, so that these actions are indications of the passions, and they are the marks by which corrupt traits of character and blameworthy settled dispositions are known. As for the treatment, it is by the employment of contraries, since a contrary is put down by its contrary; and this comes about only by fixing in the soul the judgements that follow from sound opinion — namely that the willing of the body, and of the body's appendages among sensibly agreeable things, are nothing but diseases of the soul, harmful to it both now and in the end. Now, because each one of them is painful: for the one who has it is forever in anxiety and grief, on account of good coming to another, on account of the difficulty of taking it away from him, and on account of the contention of adversaries and enviers and the contention of enemies and opponents. In the end, because of what has been established — at one time from the prophets, peace be upon them, by what they reported of the painful chastisement the wicked are to meet, they being the bearers of these diseases, as God (exalted be He) has said: 'As for him who was insolent and preferred the life of this world, the Fire shall be his refuge' — and at another time from the sages, by what they demonstrated of the great wretchedness of the souls of the wicked and the dissolute in the life to come, after their parting from bodies. Then, once it is established by sound opinion that these diseases are harmful in both abodes, it follows that the man of intellect must guard himself against them and not do what harms him in this world and the next, but must rather do what profits him in both; and that is the acquisition of the virtues, which are profitable now and in the end, since they stand opposite those vices in every one of the respects we have mentioned — as God (exalted be He) has said: 'The righteous are indeed in bliss, and the dissolute are indeed in a Fire.' And when these judgements, which follow from right opinion, are fixed in the soul, from that there follows the abandoning of the first act of willing, and from the abandoning of the first act of willing there follows the abandoning of the acts of willing dependent upon it, for when the cause is annulled the effect is annulled. Then, once these judgements are established in the soul, he must bring them to mind, confirm them, and repeat them in the soul continually, until they become settled dispositions; and the more their coming to mind is repeated, the more those acts of willing keep being undone until they grow weak; and the more those acts of willing, which are the vices, are undone, the more their opposites, which are the virtues, keep becoming fixed by degrees. This is the universal canon for removing the diseases of the soul. As for preserving its health, which is the guarding of the virtues: it is that a man tend his soul unceasingly by observing the virtuous traits of character and guarding them with sound opinions, and that he make these sound opinions, in the tending of character, a permanent settled disposition. And he must not be heedless of the shock of neglecting the two souls, for if they are neglected they return to the nature proper to each; and he must not stir them by imagining, reflecting on, or recalling any of the causes of their motion and agitation; and if it happens that something among the causes of their agitation comes to mind, he must bring their defects to mind, so that the soul comes to loathe them and leave them. Among the matters held in account and required for preserving the soul's health is perseverance in the practical and the theoretical offices; for neglecting the practical offices breeds an idleness that entails deprivation of felicity in this world and the next, and annulling the theoretical offices annuls the soul's readiness to receive the divine lights and the holy gifts. Among them, too, is sitting in the company of the righteous and listening to their counsels, and keeping clear of the dissolute and of listening to their talk; and it has been said: a dullard reared among the learned is better than a clever man reared among the ignorant. Among them is the setting right of the psychic spirit (al-rūḥ al-nafsānī) that is in the brain, in respect of its quality, its quantity, and its consistency, by the art of bodily medicine; for this has a great effect in preserving the virtues that lead to felicity, the near and the deferred alike. And know that the calling of the learned to the virtues of character is by demonstrations that show the obligation of forming one's character upon the noble traits and habituating it to their beauties; the calling of the middling sort to them is by dialectical and persuasive arguments showing the obligation of forming one's character upon them; and the calling of women and children and those of their rank, who do not grasp argument and demonstration, is by praising fine actions and making them seem good to them, and by blaming base actions, disparaging them and making them loathsome to them, and by recounting the fine qualities of the best of the righteous forebears, the excellence of their conduct and the fair outcomes they met, and the evil end of the wicked and the consequences of their deeds that overtake them in this world and the next. God (exalted be He) has gathered the calling of these three classes in His words: ( Call to the way of thy Lord with wisdom and with fair admonition, and dispute with them in the better way ). In sum, the fair felicities and the praiseworthy traits of character are attained only by abstaining from base actions and by repeating fine actions, growing accustomed to them, fixing them one time after another, going to lengths in them and guarding them, until the soul is made straight and even — like a crooked piece of wood which one wishes to straighten and set even, for it becomes even only when it is bent against the direction of its crookedness, until it comes to rest at the evenness and straightness that is the middle between the two directions. And know that the rational soul is like a king who governs and orders the city; the irascible faculty is like the soldiery by whose aid the king sets the subjects straight; and the appetitive faculty, together with the faculties that follow it, is like the subjects. And as the welfare of the city and the good order of its affairs come about only if the king is learned in the courses of governance, comprehends the modes of management, knows the outcomes of affairs, governs the soldiery and sets the subjects straight; and if his soldiers are strong, led by him and obedient to his command and his signal; and if the subjects are weak, susceptible of being set straight and brought into balance — so that, were the matter supposed otherwise than we have described, the welfare of the king and the soundness of the subjects' condition would be impossible — just so, justice of character is not ordered in the human world save by the rational soul's having mastery over the other two souls, disposing of them as right opinion requires, and the two souls being led by it and obedient to its command and its signal, not following what their own compliance requires in exacting to the full the pleasure of revenge

— Notes —

[23] « 1 » What is intended here by qaṣd is the middle between excess and deficiency, from their expression qaṣada fī al-amr qaṣdan, that is, he kept to the middle. End.

[24] ( 1 ) His words, 'because both extremes of justice,' and so forth. The explanation of it is this: justice is the making effectual of the legal or statutory rulings which men of discernment have laid down as befits the case and the age, applied to individuals with equality. So if it be supposed that the judge between two parties exceeded, in his ruling, the limit laid down by statute, he would be unjust toward the party ruled against; and if he did not reach the statutory limit, he would be unjust toward the party ruled for. It becomes clear then that the middle limit between these two extremes is justice, and that is the carrying out of the ruling in conformity with the statute. End.

[24] ( 2 ) Ṣalaf is going beyond the measure of one's refinement. End.

[28] ( 1 ) That is, those devoted to worship; taken from taʼallaha, in the sense of taʻabbada, to devote oneself to worship. End.