Book 5
13
Now all the various pronouncements of the law aim either at the common interest of all, or at the interest of a ruling class determined either by excellence or in some other similar way; so that in one of its senses the term just is applied to anything that produces and preserves the happiness, or the component parts of the happiness, of the political community.
14
But the law also prescribes certain conduct: the conduct of a brave man, for example not to desert one’s post, not to run away, not to throw down one’s arms; that of a temperate man, for example not to commit adultery or outrage; that of a gentle man, for example not to strike, not to speak evil; and so with actions exemplifying the rest of the virtues and vices, commanding these and forbidding those—rightly if the law has been rightly enacted, not so well if it has been made at random.
