It would be odd, then,
to treat them as involuntary.
2
Both the voluntary and the involuntary having been delimited, we
must next discuss choice; for it is thought to be most closely bound
up with virtue and to discriminate characters better than actions do.
Choice, then, seems to be voluntary, but not the same thing as the
voluntary; the latter extends more widely. For both children and the
lower animals share in voluntary action, but not in choice, and acts
done on the spur of the moment we describe as voluntary, but not as
chosen.
Those who say it is appetite or anger or wish or a kind of opinion
do not seem to be right. For choice is not common to irrational
creatures as well, but appetite and anger are. Again, the
incontinent man acts with appetite, but not with choice; while the
continent man on the contrary acts with choice, but not with appetite.
Again, appetite is contrary to choice, but not appetite to appetite.
Again, appetite relates to the pleasant and the painful, choice
neither to the painful nor to the pleasant.
Still less is it anger; for acts due to anger are thought to be less
than any others objects of choice.
But neither is it wish, though it seems near to it; for choice
cannot relate to impossibles, and if any one said he chose them he
would be thought silly; but there may be a wish even for
impossibles, e.
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