Kitap 5
15
Justice then in this sense is perfect Virtue, though with a qualification, namely that it is displayed towards others. This is why Justice is often thought to be the chief of the virtues, and more sublime or than the evening or the morning starAccording to a scholiast, this is a quotation, slightly altered, from the lost play Melanippe of Euripides (fr. 490 Dindorf).; and we have the proverb— In Justice is all Virtue found in sum.Theog. 147. And Justice is perfect virtue because it is the practice of perfect virtue; and perfect in a special degree,In the mss. the words in a special degree follow perfect in the line before. because its possessor can practise his virtue towards others and not merely by himself; for there are many who can practise virtue in their own private affairs but cannot do so in their relations with another.
16
This is why we approve the saying of Bias, Office will show a man; for in office one is brought into relation with others and becomes a member of a community.
17
The same reason, namely that it involves relationship with someone else, accounts for the viewPut into the mouth of the sophist Thrasymachus in Plato’s Plat. Rep. 343c. that Justice alone of the virtues is the good of others, because it does what is for the advantage of another, either a ruler or an associate.
