Aristotle uses politics and ethics together to explain the good life. People generally disagree as to the nature and conditions of happiness. Some people believe that happiness is wealth, honor, pleasure, or virtue. Aristotle thinks that wealth is not happiness because wealth is just a monetary value, but can still be used to gain some happiness. Not directly of course, money can only buy a person objects that can bring them happiness for a short period of time. Just like wealth, honor is not happiness, because honor focuses more on the people, rather then the honoree. Pleasure is not happiness, because "the life of gratification" is "completely slavish", since most of the people in the polis decided to live their life based on the way animals live. The people are punished for things not accepted and reward for actions excepted. The last is virtue, and virtue is not happiness either, since one could be virtuous and not use it. Instead, Aristotle says that happiness is a combination of the four. Thus, Aristotle describes the good life by saying that, "the …show more content…
Intellectual virtues are the excellences proper only to the rational part of the soul. The work or function of the rational part of the soul is to use deep thinking in arriving at judgments about what to do or to believe. These excellences are those qualities that enable a person to think well about a various subject matter. This can be achieved through the teachings of the polis. Teaching is the main way citizens of the polis learn intellectual virtue. They do this by discussing their thoughts and ideas with other citizens of the polis and learning from their