Aristotle now seeks to relate his educational programme to the duties of citizenship. If the principle of continuous personal rule were to be accepted, and the conditions necessary for it were forthcoming, the education of the citizens would be quite different from that required in the kind of constitution favoured by Aristotle, under which they are expected to hold office by turns. In this consideration of the ideal state Aristotle does not altogether reject the former type of rule, any more than he did in III xvii–xviii, where he discussed absolute monarchical rule; but he lays it aside as not practicable. So he now asks how a man is to be educated for citizenship, i.e. how he is to be made morally and intellectually fit to hold office in his turn and to behave himself when it is not his turn. Such an alternation will satisfy the demand for equality, which it is dangerous to leave unsatisfied, and will at the same time do justice to merit and ability. Within the citizen or governing class only a distinction of age-group will operate, as in VII ix.
In the third paragraph Aristotle begins his description of the educational process by linking it with the psychology on which it is based. The soul has two ‘parts’, the rational and the irrational, and the aim of education affects mainly the former. The aim is ‘leisure’, scholē, i.e. not rest and recreation so much as the undistracted opportunity to devote oneself to something worth while: the pursuits of citizenship and ‘statesmanship’ in time of peace. Aristotle complains that these aims are not always recognized. Spartan education in particular he held at fault for being directed predominantly to the waging of war. Spartan militarism he criticized towards the end of II ix (cf. references there to Plato’s Laws), and he now renews the topic with more emphasis on the founder of the system (here unnamed, but presumably Lycurgus). However, the Spartan military supremacy had come to an end by the time this chapter was written.
1332b12 Since every association of persons forming a state1 consists of rulers and ruled, we must ask whether those who rule and those who are ruled ought to be different persons or the same throughout life; for the education which will be needed will depend upon which way we make this distinction.2 If one group of persons were as far superior to all the rest as we believe gods and heroes to be superior to men. and if they had both bodies and souls of such outstanding quality that the superiority of the rulers were indisputable and evident to those ruled by them, then it would obviously be better that the same set of persons should always rule and the others always be ruled, once and for all. But since this is not a condition that can easily be obtained, and since rulers are not so greatly superior to their subjects as Scylax3 says the kings are in India, it is clear that, for a variety of reasons, all must share alike in the business of ruling and being ruled by turns. For equality means giving the same to those who are alike, and the established constitution can hardly be long maintained if it is contrary to justice. Otherwise everyone all over the country combines with the ruled in a desire to introduce innovations, and it is quite impossible for even a numerous citizen-body to be strong enough to withstand such a combination.
1332b32 Yet it cannot be disputed that rulers have to be superior to those who are ruled. It therefore becomes the duty of the lawgiver to consider how this is to be brought about and how they shall do the sharing. We noted earlier4 that nature herself has provided one way to choose: that very element which in respect of birth is all the same she has divided into older and younger, the former being fit for ruling, the latter for being ruled. No one objects to being thus ruled on grounds of age, or thinks himself too good for it; after all, once he reaches the required age, he will get back his contribution to the pool.5 There is then a sense in which we must say the ‘same’ persons rule and are ruled, and a sense in which we must say that they are ‘different’ persons. So their education too must be in one sense the same, in another different; for, as is often said, one who is to become a good ruler must first himself be ruled. (Rule, as was said in our first discussions,6 is of two kinds, according as it is exercised for the sake of the ruler, which we say is master-like rule, or for the sake of the ruled, which we say is rule over free men; and some instructions that are given
differ not in the actual tasks to be performed, but in their purpose,7 which is why many jobs generally considered servile may be honourably8 performed even by free men, by the younger among them. For the question whether a job is honourable8 or not is to be decided less with reference to the actions themselves than in the light of their end and purpose.)7 But since we hold that the virtue of citizen and ruler is the same as that of the best man, and that the same man should be first ruled and later ruler, it immediately becomes an essential task of the lawgiver to ensure that they both may become good men, and to consider what practices will make them so, and what is the aim of the best life.
1333a16 Two parts of the soul are distinguished, one intrinsically possessing reason, the other not possessing reason intrinsically but capable of listening to it. To these belong, we think, the virtues which qualify a man to be called in some sense ‘good’. To those who accept our division of the soul there is no difficulty in answering the question ‘In which of the two parts, more than in the other, does the end lie?’ For what is inferior is always for the sake of what is superior; this is equally clear both in matters of skill and in those of nature; and the superior is that which is possessed of reason. There is a further two-fold division, which follows from our custom of making a distinction between practical reason and theoretical reason; so clearly we must divide this part9 similarly. Actions, we shall say, follow suit: those of that which is by nature better9 must be regarded as preferable by those who are in a position to attain all three10 or two of them. For each man, that which is the very highest that he can attain is the thing most to be preferred. 1333a30 Again, all of life can be divided into work and leisure, war and peace, and some things done have moral worth,11 while others are merely necessary and useful. In this connection the same principle of choice must be applied, both to the parts of the soul and to their respective actions – that is to say, we should choose war for the sake of peace, work for the sake of leisure, necessary and useful things for the sake of the noble.11 The statesman must therefore take into consideration the parts of the soul and their respective actions, and in making laws must have an eye to all those things,12 but more especially to the better ones and to the ends in view; and he must regard men’s lives and their choice of what they do in the same light. For one must be. able to work and to fight, but even more to be at peace and have leisure; to do the necessary and the useful things, yes, but still more those of moral worth.11 These then are the targets at which education should be aimed, whether children’s education or that of such later age-groups as require it.
1333b5 It is obvious however that those Greeks who have today a reputation for running the best constitutions, and the lawgivers who drew up those constitutions, did not in fact construct their constitutional plans with the best possible aim, and did not direct their laws and education towards producing all the virtues; but instead, following the vulgar way of thinking, they turned aside to pursue virtues that appeared to be useful and more lucrative. And in a similar manner to these some more recent writers have voiced the same opinion: they express their approval of the Lacedaemonians’ constitution and admire the aim of their lawgiver, because he ordered all his legislation with a view to war and conquest. This is a view which can easily be refuted by reasoning, and already in our own day has been refuted by the facts. Just as most men crave to be master of many others, because success in this brings an abundance of worldly goods, so the writer Thibron13 is clearly an admirer of the Laconian lawgiver, and so too is each of the others who, writing about the Spartan constitution, have stated that thanks to their being trained to face dangers they came to rule over many others. But since today the Spartan rule is no more, it is clear that they are not happy and their lawgiver was not a good one. There is also something laughable in the fact that, for all their keeping to his laws, and with no one to stop them from using those laws, they have lost the good life.14
1333b26 They are also wrong in their notion of the kind of rule for which a lawgiver ought to display admiration; for rule over free men is nobler15 than master-like rule, and more connected with virtue. To say that a state has trained itself in the acquisition of power with a view to ruling its neighbours – that is no ground for calling it happy or applauding its lawgiver. Such an argument may have dangerous consequences: its acceptance obviously requires any citizen who can to make it his ambition to be able to rule in his own city – the very thing that the Lacedaemonians accuse King Pausanias of seeking, and that too though he was already in a position of such high honour. So none of these theories or laws is of any value for a statesman, and they are neither useful nor true. The same things are best for a community and for individuals, and it is these that a lawgiver must instil into the souls of men.
1333b37 And as for military training, the object in practising it regularly is not to bring into subjection those not deserving of such treatment, but to enable men (a) to save themselves from becoming subject to others, (b) to win a position of leadership, exercised for the benefit of the ruled, not with a view to being the master of all, and (c) to exercise the rule of a master over those who deserve to be slaves. The lawgiver should make particularly sure that his aim both in his military legislation and in his legislation in general is to provide peace and leisure. And facts support theory here, for though most military states survive while they are fighting wars, they fall when they have established their rule. Like steel, they lose their fine temper when they are at peace; and the lawgiver who has not educated them to be able to employ their leisure is to blame.