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For the priest must be experienced in the laws concerning sacrifices and
prayers and purifications and foundations and all such things, and in
addition he also needs ritual sanctity and piety and experience of service
to the gods and [needs] to be intimate with the nature of divinity. And
the base man has not one of these features, and that is why all imprudent
men are impious. For impiety, being a vice, is ignorance of the service
to the gods, while piety is, as we said, a knowledge of service to the gods.
Similarly they say that the base are not holy either; for holiness is
defined in outline as justice towards the gods, while the base deviate in
many respects from just action towards the gods, which is why they
are unholy and impure and unsanctified and defiled and to be barred
from festivals.
For they say that participating at a festival is a [prerogative] of the
virtuous man, a festival being a time in which one should be concerned
with the divine for the sake of honouring [the gods] and for the sake of
the appropriate observations; and that is why the participant in a festival
should accommodate [himself] to this sort of role with piety.
5b13. Again, they say that every base man is mad, being ignorant of
himself and his own concerns; and that is madness. And ignorance is the
vice opposite to prudence; and a certain relative disposition of this, which
makes one's impulses unstable and fluttery, is madness. That is why they
give an outline [definition] of madness as follows: a fluttery ignorance.
Sc. Again, of good things, some are attributes of all prudent men all
the time, and some are not. Every virtue and prudent sense-perception
and prudent impulse and the like are attributes of all prudent men on
every occasion; but joy and good spirits and prudent walking are not
attributes of all prudent men and not all the time. Analogously, of bad
things too, some are attributes of all imprudent men all the time, and
some are not. Every vice and imprudent sense-perception and imprudent
impulse and the like are attributes of all imprudent men all the time;
but pain and fear and imprudent answering are not attributes of all
imprudent men and not on every occasion.
Sd. All good things are beneficial and well-used and advantageous
and profitable and virtuous and fitting and honourable and congenial;
conversely, all bad things are harmful and ill-used and disadvantageous
and unprofitable and base and unfitting and shameful and uncongenial.
They say that 'good' is used in many senses; the primary sense, which
plays a role like that of a source [for the other senses], is that which
is stated as follows: that from which it characteristically results that one is
benefitted or he by whom [it results that one is benefitted] (and what is
good in the primary sense is the cause). The second sense is that in
accordance with which it characteristically results that one is benefitted.