NOTES

He does refer to earlier ‘‘philosophers,’’ who have not dared explore the virtues of their great contemporaries (at e. g. 8), but by this he means orators. For the famous Isocratean identification of rhetoric with philosophy see recently Ober 2004: 26-7, with earlier bibliography cited at notes 8-9.

The most important general discussion of the Greek idea of virtue is Adkins 1960; cf. his succinct statement in Adkins 1989.

On the aretei-techne dichotomy, Adkins 1973. For the aretit-techne distinction as applied to military virtue see recently Lendon 2005: 109-14.

On Plato’s concept of virtue see e. g. Adkins 1989. It should be emphasized that the so-called ‘‘theory of ideas’’ at least has since the time of Aristotle generally been conceded to be a Platonic, not a Socratic, idea.

The classic example is the biblical story of Job; cf. too the discussion of God’s injustice in Romans 9.14 ff. For the fallibility of human justice, Augustine De civ. D. 19.6.

‘‘Amicus Platon, sed magis amica veritas.’’ The Latin proverb translates and adapts a line from this section of the Nicomachean Ethics.

The distinction between human and animal has been fundamental to philosophical thought since at least the time of the Greeks; recent blurring of the distinction will consequently require rethinking of many fundamental ideas, including ethical ideas.

For an interesting, though slightly different discussion of this connection, see Halliwell 1990: 45, 50.

Tellos dies at a moment of supreme happiness: his children and grandchildren are alive; he has died performing a glorious deed. In the context of the story, however, it is not that he has achieved his happiness through virtue. Solon is making the point that before death,

Fortune can strip a person of everything, regardless of deserts, and that it is only with the stability of death that one has the potential to achieve happiness. So Croesus, despite his wealth, will not end happily, but will succumb to fortune.

10  Of course, on occasion, as when dealing with Nicias (7.86) or Antiphon (8.68), he refers to their virtue: cf. Adkins 1975.

11  This was the traditional function of philosophy, before it became an academic discipline: see Hadot 1995, and more briefly, Hadot 1990.

12  For treatment of the point by ancient philosophers see e. g. Pl., Resp. 2-3; Arist., Pol. 8. The question is central to Rousseau’s writing: see e. g. his Discourse on the Arts and Sciences, or his book on education, Emile; cf. Froese 2001. Psychologists have also begun to make this claim: see Walker 2002. The relationship between narrative forms and human experience of time is the subject of Ricoeur 1984-90.

13  Cf. Dover 1974: 2-3 n3: ‘‘I cannot recall experiencing a temptation to use the word ‘duty’ in its Kantian sense (except, of course, when talking about Kant) and, at least in the course of the last five or six years, I do not think I have heard the word so used. Unless I am seriously deceiving myself, I and most of the people I know well find the Greeks of the Classical period easier to understand than the Kantians.’’

14  For example, Plutarch appeals to Aristotelian (or at least Peripatetic) ideas in espousing the importance of good examples in biography: see the beginning of his Life ofTimoleon; for the usefulness of bad examples, the beginning of his Life of Demetrius. The general influence of Aristotle on Plutarch, writing in the mid-second century ad, is patent. The clearest example is his De virtute, which relies in detail directly or indirectly on the Nicomachean Ethics: see e. g. Babut 1969. Of the general bibliography on Aristotle’s influence in antiquity, see e. g. Sandbach 1985; for an account of his influence on ancient historiography, von Fritz 1958.

15  The Romans rendered arete as virtus, a traditional word with religious and military connotations. Its use to translate arete goes back in my view to at least the third century and the Scipionic epitaphs - and is perhaps to be found even earlier, in the Twelve Tables. Generally on virtus in the Roman tradition, see Earl 1967 and McDonnell 2006. See further Cic., Rep. 1.1.5-1.2.1 (with the commentary provided by Zetzel 1995) and 5.9.

16  In this poem, Kipling alludes to the universality of the ‘‘competitive,’’ martial virtues, that is the point of the reference to ‘‘strong men.’’ This idea is developed in Alderman 1982; cf. particularly the example of Richard Burton’s experience in Dahome, discussed there at 140-2.