Goodness is the property of being that draws the will. Everything is good insofar as it exists, and goodness is what makes things desirable, what pulls us toward them. It is the most intimate of the transcendentals because it touches not just what we think or what we see but what we love.
"πᾶσα τέχνη καὶ πᾶσα μέθοδος, ὁμοίως δὲ πρᾶξίς τε καὶ προαίρεσις, ἀγαθοῦ τινὸς ἐφίεσθαι δοκεῖ· διὸ καλῶς ἀπεφήναντο τἀγαθόν, οὗ πάντʼ ἐφίεται." (Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has been rightly declared to be that at which all things aim.)[1]
Aristotle wrote that in the first line of the Nicomachean Ethics, and Aquinas took it as the foundation for his entire treatment of goodness in the Summa Theologiae. What I find compelling is how quickly the argument deepens from this simple starting point: a thing is good so far as it is perfect, and perfect so far as it is actual, so far as it fully is. That means goodness isn't an added layer on top of reality; it's reality itself considered as desirable. What I actually desire, and whether what I desire is good, and how to tell the difference: that's the terrain ahead.
References
- Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics I.1 (1094a1-3)Source
No articles here yet.