Slide 1:The Virtues, the Emotions, and the Good Life. Emotional Stability and Happiness.


Slide 2:School of Positive Psychology Martin Seligman (former president of the APA) Conrad Baars M.D. …man’s emotions have an innate need to be guided and directed by reason.  That is to say that they need and desire to be guided by their very nature.  …When an emotion receives its proper guidance, it is satisfied and is now disposed to submit to the decision of the will as to what course of action shall be taken.


Slide 3:The Kalon (the morally beautiful) The morally right The noble The good The beautiful The happy man is the noble man. Noble (kalon): attractive, morally beautiful, virtuous. The noble man is beautiful. 384-322 BC Aristotle


Slide 4:Oscar Wilde 1854-1900 “Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man’s face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the moulding of his hands even.”


Socrates 469 - 399 B.C. :Socrates 469 - 399 B.C.


Slide 6:Socrates was able to divide people into three, on the basis of what each one regarded as happiness. Majority Second to majority Minority. The philosophers. Happiness: the perfection of the soul


Slide 7:Theoretical Contemplation Knowing the highest things ...the activity of our intelligence constitutes the complete happiness of man,...So if it is true that intelligence is divine in comparison with man, then a life guided by intelligence is divine in comparison with human life. We must not follow those who advise us to have human thoughts, since we are only men, and mortal thoughts, as mortals should; on the contrary, we should try to become immortal as far as that is possible and do our utmost to live in accordance with what is highest in us.


Slide 8:The human person must strive to know, to develop his mind, to enjoy the contemplation of truth. But man is not a “separate substance” (pure form). Man is a rational animal.


Slide 9:Sometimes the appetites rebel against reason I.e., The person who easily gives up when things become difficult. The person who runs when there is danger. The person who cannot hold a job because he has no self-control over alcoholic drink. The person who has no control over his sexual appetite, and so can think of nothing other than sex.


Slide 10:The good life begins by bringing order to one’s life.


Slide 11:Disorder Concupiscible appetite Irascible appetite Intellect Will Bestial


Slide 12:Ordered Life Concupiscible appetite Irascible appetite Will Reason Order is harmony, beauty, kaleo, kalon: noble


Slide 13:The Intellectual Virtues: Wisdom, Science, Understanding. The Intellect The Will The irascible appetite The concupiscible appetite Prudence Justice Fortitude Temperance The Moral Virtues Beautiful (Noble) Character


Slide 14:St. Augustine Man comes from God, and it is his destiny to return to God. It is through virtue that man achieves his destiny. “Oh Lord, you made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.”


Slide 15:God has revealed Himself in the Person of Christ, and it is revealed that we shall see God as He is: It is written (1 John 3:2): "When He shall appear, we shall be like to Him; and [Vulg.: 'because'] we shall see Him as He is." Perfect happiness is now a real possibility for everyone. Our destiny is to contemplate the Highest Being: Ipsum Esse Subsistens.