Kitap 4
3
We blame a man as ambitious if he seeks honor more than is right, or from wrong sources; we blame him as unambitious if he does not care about receiving honor even on noble grounds.
4
But at another time we praise the ambitious man as manly and a lover of what is noble, or praise the unambitious man as modest and temperate, as we said in the first part of this work.See 2.7.8. The fact is that the expression fond of so-and-so is ambiguous, and we do not always apply the word fond of honor (ambitious) to the same thing; when we use it as a term of praise, we mean more fond of honor than most men, but when as a reproach, more than is right. As the observance of the mean has no name, the two extremes dispute as it were for the unclaimed estate. But where there is excess and deficiency there must also be a mean.
5
Now men do seek honor both more and less than is right; it must therefore be possible also to do so rightly. It is therefore this nameless middle disposition in regard to honor that we really praise. Compared with ambition it appears unambitiousness, and compared with unambitiousness it appears ambition: compared with both, it a appears in a sense to be both.
6
This seems to be true of the other virtues also; but in the present case the extremes appear to be opposed only to one another, because the middle character has no name.
