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4. Prudence and Pride
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4 Prudence a nd Pr ide This chapter begins to connect Aquinas’s notions more explicitly with contemporary considerations concerning self-governance. I start by turning to his treatment of prudence (prudentia), as this is his most detailed analysis of the nature and structure of each person ’s governance of himself. The second half sets forth what I think is the strongest argument against Aquinas having an account of selfgovernance that is substantively relevant to contemporary discussion : namely, his views on humility and pride, which involves the goodness of subjection to the will of another and the evil of complete independence of action. This chapter concludes with the first part of my response to this objection. The next chapter continues with my response in terms of the necessary abilities for self-governance and how they must be properly cultivated by the virtues. Prudence a nd P r act ica l R e a son We saw in the previous chapter that each person’s practical reason’s participation in the eternal reason is the key to Aquinas’s notions of 72 g Prudence and Pride 73 divine providence over human beings and human self-governance. Continuing with a more extensive analysis of practical reason, we turn to prudence. Prudence is the virtue that corresponds to and perfects practical reason. Practical reason works best or is most fully actualized by prudence; perhaps a better way of characterizing the relationship is to say that prudence simply is perfected practical reason . For Aquinas virtues are good-making qualities, following Aristotle ’s principle that “virtue is that which makes its possessor good, and his work good likewise.”1 The virtuous habit causes this goodness by enabling the capacity to which it pertains to operate in the best possible manner. Since the habit perfects the power in reference to act, then does the power need a habit perfecting it unto doing well, which habit is a virtue, which the power’s own proper nature does not suffice for the purpose.2 Hence, when Aquinas analyzes the virtue of prudence, he is simultaneously offering a detailed account of how practical reason best functions. Prudence is in the reason. Now ruling and governing belong properly to the reason; and therefore it is proper to a man to reason and be prudent in so far as he has a share in ruling and governing.... Since, however, every man, for as much as he is rational, has a share in ruling according to the judgment of reason, he is proportionately competent to have prudence.3 Since all people possess reason, it is appropriate that each and every person cultivate the virtue of prudence. Aquinas defines prudence as the virtue that perfects practical reason in matters of actions: “Prudence is right reason applied to action .”4 Prudence also functions as the key virtue among the remaining three cardinal virtues—justice, fortitude, and temperance—serving to perfect and unify them. Keenan offers a concise summary of the regulating role of prudence: 1. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, II, 6. 2. Aquinas, ST, I-II, 56, 6. 3. Aquinas, ST, II-II, 47, 12. 4. Aquinas, ST, II-II, 47, 8. [54.197.64.207] Project MUSE (2024-03-29 02:50 GMT) 74 Prudence and Pride Prudence has a privileged place among the cardinal virtues: it recognizes the ends to which a person is naturally inclined, it establishes the agenda by which one can pursue those ends, it directs the agent’s own performance of the pursued activity, and finally, it measures the rightness of the actions taken. Prudence, in short, guides the agent to living a self-directed life that seeks integration.5 Prudence allows for sustainable self-governance through an integration of all relevant aspects of action. We will address the role of the virtues of fortitude and temperance in the next chapter, but here I focus on prudence insofar it relates most directly to practical reason and, by extension, the activity of self-governance; Aquinas even characterizes it as “the government of oneself.”6 His treatment of prudence in the Summa Theologiae rivals and surpasses Plato’s analysis concerning the nature of and conditions for self-governance in books 8 and 9 of the Republic. Aquinas first gives a general overview of prudence, followed by an extensive consideration of the integral parts of prudence, which are the associated abilities necessary for its exercise. He then looks at the subjective parts of prudence, which are its particular species, and then the...