The Nicomachean Ethics. Aristotle

      PREFACE TO THE FIFTH EDITION.

      Many more or less important alterations have been made in this translation, which was first published in 1881, as new editions have from time to time been called for. The present edition in particular has been revised throughout, and brought into accordance with Bywater’s text (Oxford, 1890), Endnote 002 which is coming to be recognized, not in Oxford only, as the received text of the Nicomachean Ethics. I wish gratefully to acknowledge the debt which, in common with all lovers of Aristotle, I owe to Mr. Bywater, both for his edition and for his “Contributions to the Textual Criticism of the Nicomachean Ethics” (Oxford, 1892).

      To Mr. Stewart also I wish to express my gratitude, not only for much assistance derived from his admirable “Notes on the Nicomachean Ethics” (Oxford, 1892), but also for much kindly and helpful criticism in that work and in a review of my first edition (Mind, July, 1881). My old friends Mr. A. C. Bradley and Mr. J. Cook Wilson (Professors now at Glasgow and Oxford respectively) will allow me to repeat my thanks for the valuable help they gave me when the first edition was passing through the press. To Mr. F. H. Hall of Oriel, and Mr. L. A. Selby Bigge of my own College, I am indebted for some corrections in a subsequent edition. To other translators and commentators I am also under many obligations, which I can only acknowledge in general terms.

      When I have inserted in the text explanatory words of my own, I have enclosed them in square brackets thus [ ]. A short Index of leading terms and proper names has been added to this edition (in preparing which I have found Mr. Bywater’s Index of the greatest service). This Index makes no pretension to completeness or anything approaching to completeness (except in regard to proper names). Its aim is merely, in conjunction with the Table of Contents, to help the reader to find the more important passages bearing on the questions in which he may be specially interested.

      F. H. PETERS.

      Oxford, May, 1893.