Note 81 — Chapter VII · EGOISM AND SELF-LOVE

Aristotle’s selection of εὐδαιμονία to denote what he elsewhere calls “Human” or “Practicable” good, and the fact that, after all, we have no better rendering for εὐδαιμονία than “Happiness” or “Felicity,” has caused no little misunderstanding of his system. Thus when Stewart (Philosophy of the Active and Moral Powers, Book ii. chap. ii.) says that “by many of the best of the ancient moralists ... the whole of ethics was reduced to this question ... What is most conducive on the whole to our happiness?” the remark, if not exactly false, is certain to mislead his readers; since by Stewart, as by most English writers, “Happiness” is definitely conceived as consisting of “Pleasures” or “Enjoyments.”