(Previous: Eudemian Ethics II.3.)
Having grasped these things, next we must say that since there are two aspects of personhood, the excellences too are distinguished according to these: those of the aspect having thought are excellences of thinking things through, whose task is truth about how things are and how they come about, whereas those of the unthinking aspect that yearns after things (for not every aspect of personhood has yearning, if indeed personhood is divisible) determine whether character is worthless or outstanding by pursuing or avoiding certain pleasures and pains. This is clear from the distinctions among feelings, capacities, and traits, for capacities and traits are about feelings - and feelings are distinguished by being painful or pleasant. Thus from these things and from what we set down earlier, excellence of character is all about pleasures and pains, for all personhood naturally becomes worse or better through such things, and its pleasure and pain are oriented toward them and are all about them. And it is due to pleasures and pains that we say people are worthless by pursuing and avoiding either how they shouldn't or what they shouldn't. Hence also everyone declares in an offhand way that excellence is being unaffected or keeping one's equilibrium about pleasures and pains, and that deficiency comes from the opposite.
(Cross-posted at Beautiful Wisdom.)
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