Ἀρετή

[Arete is]¹ a harmonious disposition and it is choice-worthy in itself, not because of any fear, hope, or any external thing. And happiness lies in virtue, too, since it is a state of mind which is made for the harmony of one's whole life. But [when] the rational animal is perverted, [it is] sometimes because of the deceptiveness of external occupations, sometimes because of the insistence of companions. For nature provides uncorrupted inclinations. And virtue is something perfect,² such as a statue.³ Virtue is also either non-intellectual, like health, or intellectual, like prudence. And the virtues that are based on theoretical principles are both scientific and theoretical, like prudence and justice. But those virtues which are regarded as coextensive with those which are based on theoretical principles are nonintellectual, like health and strength. For it occurs that health follows on and is coextensive to imprudence, which is intellectual, as strength comes from the construction of a vault.⁴ Those virtues are called "non-intellectual" because they do not require assent but supervene, like health and courage.⁵ A proof that virtue exists is the fact that Diogenes and Antisthenes, Socrates, and their followers were able to make moral progress. And vice also exists, because it is the opposite to virtue; virtue is also teachable and this is obvious because of the fact that base people become good. There are two virtues, theoretical and practical.⁶ But some [say] three -- logical, physical, ethical -- and the followers of Posidonius [say] four, and others [say] more,⁷ and others [say] one: prudence.⁸ The primary virtues are courage, prudence, justice, temperance; and in addition to these, there are other virtues subordinated to them: magnanimity, continence, endurance, insight, soundness of judgment. It occurs analogously in the case of vices.
And the one who is virtuous must have both theory and practice of what should be done.⁹ And what should be done includes what should be chosen, endured, maintained, and distributed; so that if he does some things by way of choosing, and others by way of enduring, and others by way of maintaining, he is prudent and courageous and just and temperate. And each virtue is marked by reference to a particular subject; for instance, courage with regard to what should be endured, prudence with regard to what should be done, what not done and what is neither. Similarly the other virtues are concerned with the things which are appropriate to them.
Virtue is the best condition/state, or a condition/state out of which the very thing it is is [realized] best, and which provides the appropriate activities in the best way.¹⁰
Virtue [is] in accordance with nature, vice contrary to nature.
[Note] that not every virtue is knowledge. For one kind of virtue is intellectual, another ethical.¹¹ The ethical virtues do not have their essence in knowledge.¹²
The Stoics maintain that between virtue and vice there is no intermediate, but the Peripatetics say that moral progress is an intermediate. For the Stoics say that a piece of wood, for example, must be either straight or crooked, so a person is either just or unjust, not more just or more unjust. The same thing occurs in the case of the other virtues too.¹³
The political virtues set us in order and make us better people, for they delimit and measure our appetites and, in general, measure our emotional states and remove our false opinions. And generally they do so due to something better [contained in them], and because of limiting [our appetites] and being beyond what is without measure and limitless.
Plato elsewhere names the political virtues "purifications."¹⁴
[There are] 4 virtues. Soundness of judgment and sagacity follow on prudence, good order and decorum follow on temperance, equability and considerateness follow on justice, constancy and vigor follow on courage.¹⁵