That it is those who
give themselves the preference in regard to objects of this sort
that most people usually call lovers of self is plain; for if a man
were always anxious that he himself, above all things, should act
justly, temperately, or in accordance with any other of the virtues,
and in general were always to try to secure for himself the honourable
course, no one will call such a man a lover of self or blame him.
But such a man would seem more than the other a lover of self; at
all events he assigns to himself the things that are noblest and best,
and gratifies the most authoritative element in and in all things
obeys this; and just as a city or any other systematic whole is most
properly identified with the most authoritative element in it, so is a
man; and therefore the man who loves this and gratifies it is most
of all a lover of self. Besides, a man is said to have or not to
have self-control according as his reason has or has not the
control, on the assumption that this is the man himself; and the
things men have done on a rational principle are thought most properly
their own acts and voluntary acts. That this is the man himself, then,
or is so more than anything else, is plain, and also that the good man
loves most this part of him.
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