Rhetoric

On the other hand, about accusation and defense, from how many and what kind of sources one ought to make their deductions, would be the next thing to speak of.

​We must then grasp three things: first, for the sake of what and how many things people commit injustice; second, how they themselves are disposed; third, what kind of people they wrong and in what state these people are.

​Having defined committing injustice, then, let us speak next. Let committing injustice, then, be defined as harming voluntarily contrary to the law. Law is on the one hand particular, on the other hand common. By particular I mean that written law according to which people govern themselves in a city, and by common I mean those unwritten rules which seem to be agreed upon among all people. And they act voluntarily in doing all those things which they do knowingly and not under compulsion. Thus, while they do not choose to do everything that they do knowingly, they know everything that they do by choice; for no one is ignorant of what they choose.

​The reasons why they choose to harm and do base things contrary to the law are vice and lack of self-control. For if some people possess wickedness either single or multiple, they are unjust with respect to that very thing in which they happen to be wicked. For instance, the illiberal person with respect to money, the licentious person with respect to the pleasures of the body, the soft person with respect to things of ease, the cowardly person with respect to dangers (for they desert those sharing the danger because of fear), the ambitious person because of honor, the quick-tempered person because of anger, the lover of victory because of victory, the bitter person because of revenge, the foolish person because of being deceived about what is just and unjust, and the shameless person because of disregard for reputation. And similarly, each of the others with respect to each of the underlying subject matters.

But about these matters, it is clear, partly from what has been said about the virtues, and partly from what will be said about the emotions. It remains to speak of for the sake of what, and in what state of mind people commit injustice, and against whom.

​First, then, let us distinguish what things people desire and what things they avoid when they undertake to commit injustice; for it is clear that the accuser must examine how many and what kind of these motives—which all people desire when they wrong their neighbors—belong to the opponent, and the defender must examine what kind and how many of these do not belong to him.

​Indeed, all people do all things either not because of themselves or because of themselves. Of those things done not because of themselves, they do some by chance and others of necessity; and of those done of necessity, some they do by force and others by nature; so that all things which they do not because of themselves are either from chance, or by nature, or by force. But of those things done because of themselves, and of which they are themselves the causes, some are due to habit and others to desire, and of those due to desire, some are due to rational desire and others to irrational desire.

​Wish is a desire for the good (for no one wishes for anything except when they think it is good), while irrational desires are anger and appetite. Consequently, all things that people do must of necessity be done due to seven causes: chance, nature, force, habit, reason, anger, appetite.

​To make further classifications of actions according to age or habits or other such things is superfluous. For if it happens to young people to be quick-tempered or subject to appetite, they do not do such things because of their youth, but because of anger and appetite. Nor is it because of wealth and poverty, but it happens that the poor desire money because of their need, and the rich desire non-essential pleasures because of their resources; but these too will act, not because of wealth and poverty, but because of appetite. Similarly, both the just and the unjust, and the others who are said to act according to their habits, will act because of these same causes, namely, either because of reason or because of emotion; though the former do so because of good characters and emotions, and the latter because of the opposites.