JULY 15, 2018
Before the small-souled bugman, there was Aristotle’s small-souled person. In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle describes the small-souled person as someone a bit too weak, a bit too eager to self-depreciate. The kind of person who “seems to have something bad about him” (probably because he thinks something’s bad about him).
In contrast to this small-souled person is the highest type of person, the one who has greatness of soul. Aristotle says “Now a person is thought to be great-souled if he claims much and deserves much.” So he is a person who: 1) is worthy of great honor, and 2) acknowledges he’s worthy of great honor. Honor in ancient Greece meant you were worthy of respect from your peers due to having virtues like courage, temperance, wisdom, generosity, strength, and justice. So the great-souled person is one who has these traits, and takes a healthy pride in having cultivated them. It’s somewhat a foreign concept to current-year Western societies, where humility is admired (just look at the ridicule of President Trump for being so forthright in his achievements).
Before delving more into what constitutes greatness of soul, let’s further define the small-souled person for contrast. Aristotle says the “most small-souled of all would seem to be the man who claims less than he deserves when his deserts are great.” This is the person who blows off big achievements as no big deal. He who mumbles “sorry” when he’s not in the way and doesn’t know how to accept a compliment without contradictions. She apologizes for the state of her house, when no one would have noticed any untidiness. Whether his accomplishments are large or small, the small-souled person doesn’t have the confidence or perhaps good sense to own them. Being small-souled has another negative side effect: Their low self-opinion may cause them to pass up opportunities to be virtuous.
Defining Greatness of Soul
Aristotle called greatness of soul “a sort of crown of the virtues” (NE IV.3.1124a1–3), and it’s obvious he thought it one of, if not the most, important of all the virtues. It seems especially important to study this now, given how the Left attributes every success to privilege rather than someone’s own efforts. Actually, the Left’s whole agenda could be described as trying to convince whites to be small-souled.
Aristotle’s Golden Mean comes into play here. Roger Crisp, in his essay in The Blackwell Guide to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, reminds us that an emotion like anger “can be experienced too much or too little, and in both ways not well. But to have [it] at the right time, about the right things, toward the right people, for the right end, and in the right way, is the mean and best” (NE 1106b20–22). Likewise, he says, “the great-souled person will think himself worthy of great honor at the right times, for the right reasons, and so on.”
What about the person who claims much without deserving it? Aristotle calls him foolish, and remind us that “no one of moral excellence is foolish or senseless.” Later, he calls this type vain. Then, of course, there’s the person who deserves little and claims little; Aristotle calls him modest or temperate, but there’s nothing great about him.
One interesting characteristic of a great-souled person is little regard for possessions—whether those be money, good looks, a noble birth, noble children, good friends, or political power—viewing them as “instruments” to be used in the exercise of virtue. This doesn’t mean he doesn’t cultivate these things; in fact, greatness of soul is also called megalopsuchia, that is, magnanimity, in Aristotle’s earlier writings. Such generosity would certainly require some material wealth or leisure time. Crisp explains that while the great-souled person may possess “external goods,” they don’t occupy his thoughts in the same way as the average person:
Most people make a lot of emotional and practical investment, if they can, in acquiring and retaining wealth, to the point that wealth can become to them, at the very least, a quasi-end-in-itself. The great- souled person has no concern for wealth or even life as ends in themselves, and his thoughts will not be greatly occupied by them. Indeed, if he is required to give up all his money or even his life, for the sake of honor (or rather for the sake of virtue and the noble), he will do so, without any great sense of loss.
Of course, it takes more than wealth to make greatness of soul. Throughout his writings Aristotle is clear that “external goods” (money, friends, power) without virtue should not be honored. To the contrary, Crisp says, “they make their possessors viciously supercilious and arrogant.”
6 Characteristics of a Great-Souled Person
Here are the six main characteristics of the great-souled person. (The Aristotle quotes were taken from Crisp’s essay, though I’ve changed his category names.)
Avoids danger, except for the sake of great honor
The great-souled person, because he does not value anything highly, does not enjoy danger. He will avoid trivial dangers, but will face great ones, and, again because of his attitude to goods, will be unsparing even of his own life.
The great-souled person doesn’t enjoy danger for its own sake, since that could thwart his ability to do virtuous actions. And since a trivial danger is trivial, the great-souled won’t bother with it anyway. One cannnot imagine the great-souled person sky-diving, except to save the life of a friend. He does have courage, inspired by honor, and for honor he would face any danger.
Gives readily, but doesn’t take
The great-souled person is inclined to help others readily, but he is ashamed to be a beneficiary, since it is a sign of inferiority. If he is benefited, he will repay with interest, to ensure that his benefactor becomes a beneficiary. He will remember with pleasure benefits he has conferred, but will forget those he has received and feel pain on being reminded of them.
He doesn’t pay people back due to gratitude or needing to do “what’s right,” but to once again even the playing field and restore his position of superiority. He doesn’t reminisce about how nice others were to him, but how nice he was to others.
Proud, but not to those beneath him
The great-souled person will be proud [megas] in his behavior toward people of distinction, but unassuming toward others. For superiority over the former is difficult and impressive, while over the latter it is easy and vulgar.
For “people of distinction,” meaning those held in honor, the great-souled person maintains a healthy sense of pride. He may even come across as supercilious, but Crisp notes this is due to his virtue: “To someone to whom nothing much matters except virtue, the lives of those lacking virtue will seem not to matter much.” Others might consider him vain, an incorrect characterization because vanity implies excessive pride, whereas the great-souled person has just the right amount. But to people not of distinction—i.e., those beneath him—he will be modest, since lording one’s superiority over one’s inferiors is vulgar.
Crisp notes that this pagan morality isn’t in harmony with Christianity: “Also problematic within a Christian or post-Christian perspective is the great-souled person’s direction of attention toward himself rather than toward others. He is indeed especially concerned with the noble. But his concern is that nobility be instantiated in his life. Further, any concern he does have for others seems to consist largely in how he appears (albeit veridically) to them.”
Uninterested in activities and pursuits of the masses
The great-souled person avoids things usually honored, and activities in which others excel. He is slow to act except where there is great honor at stake, and he is inclined to perform only a few actions, though great and renowned ones.
The great-souled person is concerned with the greatest honor. Everything else is of little concern to him. As stated above, he cares little for the external goods and social niceties that engage the average person. He may not do a whole lot and be slow to start things, unless it’s related to great honor. He doesn’t take such mundane things seriously and isn’t anxious about them.
Frank and truthful in speech
Because the great-souled person cares little for what people think, he is open in his likes and dislikes. And because he is inclined to look down on people, he speaks and acts openly, except when using irony for the masses.
Because his only concern is honor, and thus truthfulness, the great-souled person speaks his mind. He has no concern for what others think of him, and certainly doesn’t put their opinions above his own, so he doesn’t censor his speech. Crisp said he lacks a sense that other people are automatically deserving of respect or concern. But to the masses, the great-souled person will use humor or irony to mask his meaning. This frankness extends to other areas of his life. He doesn’t act to suit others, but for himself, to avoid living life as a slave.
Independent, self-sufficient, and expects little from others
The great-souled person will not depend on another, unless he is a friend, because to do so would be servile. Because nothing matters to him, he is not inclined toward admiration, resentment, gossip, praise of others, or complaining. His possessions are noble rather than useful, because this is consistent with self-sufficiency. Again because nothing matters to him, he will not be rushed: His movements are slow, his voice is deep, and his speech is measured.
The great-souled person cares little for external goods and other people, except his friends. He cares so little about these things that he has no interest in gossip, doesn’t feel resentment, and doesn’t complain about trivialities. He doesn’t have high expectations for other people, so doesn’t bear grudges. He is also noble in his speech, movements, and mannerisms, avoiding the hastiness and shrillness caused by anxiety.
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Aristotle’s person with greatness of soul is someone concerned only with nobility who embodies a kind of tempered master morality. Why bother studying it today, or trying to embody it? Modern Western culture, due to a combination of Christian morality and liberalism, has forsworn such pride as vanity, and now its populations suffer from an epidemic of low self-esteem. This is reaching epic proportions as the people of Europe and America destroy their civilizations because the smallness of soul encouraged by the media and universities doesn’t allow them to feel pride in their nations’ achievements. Reviving an interest in greatness of soul can not only help you in business and your personal life, it has the potential to save civilizations.
http://aristocratsofthesoul.com/
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