The most important ethical work of Aristotle. Books A'-D': Eudaimonia as the purpose of life and as the activity of the soul. Intellectual and moral virtues. Virtue as a habit that can choose and act. Virtue as a mean. Voluntary and involuntary moral action. Freedom of will and intention. Reference to specific moral virtues.

Aristotle, the son of the physician Nicomachus, was born in Stagira in 384 B.C. Information about the early years of his life is minimal. At the age of seventeen, he went to Athens to study at the Platonic Academy. He stayed there for twenty years, from 367 to 348 B.C., when Plato died. Then Aristotle left for Assos in Troas and after a three-year stay there went to Lesbos and subsequently to Macedonia, where he took on the education of the royal offspring Alexander.

When his student ascended to the throne, Aristotle settled in Athens and founded his school, the Lyceum. After the death of Alexander (323 B.C.), the philosopher's stay in Athens became difficult. He was forced to flee to Chalcis, his mother's homeland, where he died in 322.

A universal mind, Aristotle created a vast and valuable philosophical and scientific work. Epistemology, logic, theology, physics, biology, psychology, ethics, political philosophy, and aesthetics are the main cognitive areas he explored and studied. The Alexandrian Hermippus estimated Aristotle's works at 400. Lists have survived to us that include 143 titles of his works. Diogenes Laertius estimated the number of lines of Aristotle's writings at 440,000.

The impact of his work on the formation of global thought was, for centuries, and remains, strong.