Distinguishing between two phases of the intellect—­the theoretic and the practical—­in the one of which it is an end to itself, but in the other subordinated to an external aim, he places true happiness in acts of the self-sufficing theoretic intelligence.  In this life, however, such a constant exercise of the intellect is not possible, and accordingly what happiness there is, must be found, in great measure, in the exercise of the practical intellect, directing and governing the lower desires and passions.  This twofold conception of happiness is Aristotelian, even as expressed by Thomas under the distinction of perfect and imperfect happiness; but when he goes on to associate perfect happiness with the future life only, to found an argument for a future life from the desire of a happiness more perfect than can be found here, and to make the pure contemplation, in which consists highest bliss, a vision of the divine essence face to face, a direct cognition of Deity far surpassing demonstrative knowledge or mortal faith—­he is more theologian than philosopher, or if a philosopher, more Platonist than Aristotelian.

The condition of perfect happiness being a theoretic or intellectual state, the visio, and not the delectatio, is consistently given as its central fact; and when he proceeds to consider the other questions of Ethics, the same superiority is steadily ascribed to the intellectual function.  It is because we know a thing to be good that we wish it, and knowing it, we cannot help wishing.  Conscience, as the name implies, is allied to knowledge.  Reason gives the law to will.

After a long disquisition about the passions and the whole appetitive side of human nature, over which Reason is called to rule, he is brought to the subject of virtue.  He is Aristotelian enough to describe virtue as habitus—­a disposition or quality (like health) whereby a subject is more or less well disposed with reference to itself or something else; and he takes account of the acquisition of good moral habits (virtutes acquisitae) by practice.  But with this he couples, or tends to substitute for it, the definition of Augustin that virtue is a good quality of mind, quam Deus in nobis sine nobis operatur, as a ground for virtutes infusae, conferred as gifts upon man, or rather on certain men, by free grace from on high.  He wavers greatly at this stage, and in this respect his attitude is characteristic for all the schoolmen.

So again in passing from the general question of Virtue to the virtues, he puts several of the systems under contribution, as if not prepared to leave the guidance of Aristotle, but feeling at the same time the necessity of bridging over the distance between his position and Christian requirements.  Understanding Aristotle to make a co-ordinate division of virtues into Moral and Intellectual, he gives reasons for such a step.  Though virtue, he says, is not so much the perfecting