Or does this statement too need qualification? For (a)
he perhaps gets more than his share of some other good, e.g. of honour
or of intrinsic nobility. (b) The question is solved by applying the
distinction we applied to unjust action; for he suffers nothing
contrary to his own wish, so that he is not unjustly treated as far as
this goes, but at most only suffers harm.
It is plain too that the distributor acts unjustly, but not always
the man who has the excessive share; for it is not he to whom what
is unjust appertains that acts unjustly, but he to whom it
appertains to do the unjust act voluntarily, i.e. the person in whom
lies the origin of the action, and this lies in the distributor, not
in the receiver. Again, since the word 'do' is ambiguous, and there is
a sense in which lifeless things, or a hand, or a servant who obeys an
order, may be said to slay, he who gets an excessive share does not
act unjustly, though he 'does' what is unjust.
Again, if the distributor gave his judgement in ignorance, he does
not act unjustly in respect of legal justice, and his judgement is not
unjust in this sense, but in a sense it is unjust (for legal justice
and primordial justice are different); but if with knowledge he judged
unjustly, he is himself aiming at an excessive share either of
gratitude or of revenge.
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