athanatizein], and do all in our power to live by the best element in
our nature: for though that element be slight in quantity, in power
and in value it far outweighs all the rest of our being. A man may
well be reckoned to be that which is the ruling power and the better
part in him. . . . What is proper to each creature by nature, is best
and sweetest for each: such, then, is for man the life of the
understanding, if the understanding preeminently is man." (Ar.,
_Eth._, X., vii., 8, 9.)

8. But if happiness is an act in discharge of the function proper to
man as man (n. 3), how can it be happiness to lead a life which
Aristotle says is too good for man? The solution of this paradox is
partly contained in the concluding words of Aristotle above quoted,
and will still further appear presently (s. iv., n. I, p. 21), where
we shall argue that human life is a state of transition in preparation
for a higher life of the soul, to be lived, according to the natural
order, when the compound of soul and body would no longer exist.

9. _The act of contemplation, in which happiness consists, must rest
upon a habit of contemplation, which is intellectual virtue_. An act,
to be perfection and happiness, must be done easily, sweetly, and
constantly. But no act of the intellect can be so done, unless it
rests upon a corresponding habit. If the habit has not been acquired,
the act will be done fitfully, at random, and against the grain, like
the music of an untrained singer, or the composition of a schoolboy.
Painful study is not happiness, nor is any studied act. Happiness is
the play of a mind that is, if not master of, yet at home with its
subject. As the intellect is man's best and noblest power, so is
intellectual virtue, absolutely speaking, the best virtue of man.