In this essay I will be describing the virtue of bravery. I will first define whatAristotle thinks virtue is, explain the virtue of bravery, and then finally reflect this virtueon my personal experience in the Shaw neighborhood.Aristotle breaks down virtue into four aspects which are: a state that decides inmean, consisting in a mean, the mean relative to us, which is defined by reference toreason(1107a). He also states that there are two kinds of virtue: one of thought orintellect and one of character or actions. He also states that virtue is a state of characterand is achieved by habit. Aristotle uses several examples to define a the bravery virtue. He say that ashumans we fear all bad things such as, bad reputation, povery, sickness, friendlessness,and death. However he says that these things do not concern a brave person. Fearing thisthings are not all neccesarily bad though. Fearing something like a bad reputation is goodand shows that you are decent and properly prone to shame, unlike if you do not fear thisyou have no feeling of disgrace. Someone who has no fear of this might be consideredbrave by some people. However there are some things that are wrong to fear such aspoverty or sickness, things that are caused by ourselves, people who do not fear thesethings are not considered brave. Sometimes someone who is not fearful of things causedby ourselves may be considered brave when compared to someone who is cowardly inwartime or someone faced with losing money(1115a 10-25). Aristotle also comes to theconclusion that a brave person is only concerened with death in the finest conditions. These kind of deaths are found in war and circumstances when it is honored by cities andmonarchs. Aristotles next step is to define a brave persons state of character. He asks thequestion, What does a brave person find frightening? He answers with, a brave person isfrightened by the same things any human can find irrisistible, but...
