When Lady Philosophy suggests that Boethius’ definition of himself as a rational mortal animal is inadequate, it implies that a superior self-understanding is contained within the Consolation. This chapter argues that this more adequate self-understanding – that Boethius, via participation in God, is himself divine – is implicit in the text and unpacks the profound implications and consolations of this interpretation of the self. Being a rational animal is more than being this specific living thing; it is also an opportunity to manifest divine intelligibility and goodness in the world. The chapter focuses on two perplexing arguments in Book IV that are unsatisfying without this interpretation of Boethius’ identity: that the punished are happier than those who escape punishment and that it is possible to attach ourselves to Providence and escape from Fate. The difficulties that most people will face in accepting these arguments are the direct result of the challenge of adopting this self-interpretation.

There is one fundamental argument in the Republic for the conclusion that justice is the greatest good. It begins in Book II; although adumbrated in Book IV, it is not completed until Book IX; and it draws essentially on material in Books VI and VII about Platonic forms, knowledge, and philosophical training. Justice consists in the rule of reason over spirit and appetite, but to understand the value of this state fully we must see how it is instantiated in the philosopher. Goodness consists in order, and by cognizing and loving forms (the most orderly objects there are) the philosopher possesses the highest goods. A fully just person is a creator and lover of orderly relationships among human beings. This condition exists to some degree in all just individuals, but it is most fully present in those who understand what justice is – philosophers.

Chapter 5 inquires with Augustine into the origins and metaphysics of humility and pride, and how we may come to know them. In books XI–XII of The City of God, Augustine explores this theme by reflecting on biblical and Platonic accounts of creation, especially of angels and human beings, and of the birth of Augustine’s famous “two cities” among them.

Why does Plato in the Republic attach such importance to mathematics? Not for its practical utility, nor for the transferable skills acquired by the mathematician, nor because of the rigour of the formal procedures of mathematical proof. It is rather that the five mathematical sciences described and explained in Book VII convert the soul from merely human perspective, and tell us how things are objectively speaking. Their content is what counts. They convey knowledge or understanding of the context-invariant truth of unqualified reality. In contrast with modern conceptions of mathematics and its relation to reality, these sciences are conceived as themselves sciences of value. Above all, they enlarge ethical understanding. Crucial here is harmonics, which incorporates principles first studied through the first four sciences that Plato specifies. Mathematical proportion is what underpins the musical structures – the concords – that form the subject matter of harmonics. Such mathematical structures, when internalised by the philosopher, function as abstract schemata for applying their knowledge of the Good in the social world. Plato values them so highly because they create and sustain unity: unity is for him the highest value.

Ethics, for Spinoza, is knowledge of “the right way of living.” That ethics is central to his philosophical project is unmistakable from the title of his most systematic presentation of his philosophy: Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order (Ethica, ordine geometrico demonstrata). While that work seeks to demonstrate a broad range of metaphysical, theological, epistemological, and psychological doctrines, they are selected for inclusion, at least in large measure, because of the support he takes them to provide for his ultimate ethical conclusions. Many of those conclusions are distinctive and provocative, and many of his reasons for them are innovative and intriguing. This chapter begins by providing an outline of Spinoza’s ethical theory, including is naturalistic foundations; its primary terms of ethical evaluation; the nature and causes of bondage to the passions; the prescriptions of reason; the way to freedom and autonomy; and eternity, intellectual love of God, and blessedness. It then considers four important questions for Spinoza’s ethical theory: the nature and motivational force of ethical judgments; the conditions for ethical responsibility; the role of altruism in ethics; and the value of life and the harmfulness of death.

What kind of economic goods are languages? They are “hypercollective” goods: the more people use them, the greater their use value to all users. People prefer to learn languages with more speakers and will abandon languages which are losing speakers. Culture, defined as the sum total of all texts recorded in a given language, becomes inaccessible if that language goes extinct. The conservation of language and culture thus raises dilemmas of collective action. The world’s thousands of language groups are linked by multilingual speakers. These links constitute a global language system. Exchange of texts between the major and minor language groups in this system proceeds on highly unequal terms.

In On the Citizen, Hobbes depends on the claim that right reason is a part of human nature. Right reason figures in definitions there of natural right and natural law, and Hobbes depends upon the fact that we each possess right reason in arguing that each of us can know the laws of nature. The theories of motivation, reason, and the good in On the Citizen share a great deal with their counterparts in the Elements of Law and Leviathan. In this respect, though, On the Citizen stands out. Hobbes does not depend upon right reason in a similar way in either of these other texts: in the Elements of Law he claims that right reason is “not existent,” and in Leviathan he contends that we lack a “right reason constituted by nature.” This essay describes Hobbes's accounts of motivation, reason, and the good in On the Citizen; documents this distinguishing feature of the text; and offers reasons for the conclusion that Hobbes's account of right reason there is not sincere.

Avishai Margalit argues in his chapter that it is more urgent and more important to prevent injustice than to promote justice. From his point of view, refraining from evil takes precedence over pursuing the good. As a way to illustrate this approach of questions of justice, both at the national and international levels, Margalit gives a number of examples taken from history.