The Nicomachean Ethics (Classics of World Literature)

by Aristotle (Author), Aristotle (Author), Tom Griffith (Series Editor), Stephen Watt (Introduction)

• New

  Paperback
  1996

  $7.50

  Aristotle (384-322BC) is the philosopher who has most influence on the development of western culture, writing on a wide variety of subjects including the natural sciences as well as the more strictly philosophical topics of logic, metaphysics and ethics. To the poet Dante, he was simply 'the master of those who know'. The Ethics contains his views on what makes a good human life. While the work continues to stimulate and challenge modern philosophers, the general course of the argument is easily accessible to the non-specialist. Both as a key influence in the history of ideas and as a work containing unique insights into the human condition, this is a book that simply demands to be read.

• Used

  Paperback
  2004

  $5.44

  Previously published as Ethics, Aristotle's The Nicomachean Ethics addresses the question of how to live well, and originates the concept of cultivating a virtuous character as the basis of his ethical system. This Penguin Classics edition is translated from the Greek by J.A.K. Thomson with revisions and notes by Hugh Tredennick, and an introduction and bibliography by Jonathan Barnes. 'One swallow does not make a summer; neither does one day. Similarly neither can one day, or a brief space of time, make a man blessed and happy'. In The Nicomachean Ethics , Aristotle sets out to examine the nature of happiness. He argues that happiness consists in 'activity of the soul in accordance with virtue', for example with moral virtues, such as courage, generosity and justice, and intellectual virtues, such as knowledge, wisdom and insight. The Ethics also discusses the nature of practical reasoning, the value and the objects of pleasure, the different forms of friendship, and the relationship between individual virtue, society and the State. Aristotle's work has had a profound and lasting influence on all subsequent Western thought about ethical matters. Aristotle (384-22 BC) studied at the Academy of Plato for 20 years and then established his own school and research institute, The Lyceum . His writings, which were of extraordinary range, profoundly affected the whole course of ancient and medieval philosophy and are still eagerly studied and debated by philosophers today. If you enjoyed The Nicomachean Ethics , you might like Plato's The Symposium , also available in Penguin Classics .

• New

  Paperback
  1998

  $12.66