A question
may indeed be raised, whether there is any excellence at all in a
slave beyond and higher than merely instrumental and ministerial
qualities- whether he can have the virtues of temperance, courage,
justice, and the like; or whether slaves possess only bodily and
ministerial qualities. And, whichever way we answer the question, a
difficulty arises; for, if they have virtue, in what will they
differ from freemen? On the other hand, since they are men and share
in rational principle, it seems absurd to say that they have no
virtue. A similar question may be raised about women and children,
whether they too have virtues: ought a woman to be temperate and brave
and just, and is a child to be called temperate, and intemperate, or
note So in general we may ask about the natural ruler, and the natural
subject, whether they have the same or different virtues. For if a
noble nature is equally required in both, why should one of them
always rule, and the other always be ruled? Nor can we say that this
is a question of degree, for the difference between ruler and
subject is a difference of kind, which the difference of more and less
never is. Yet how strange is the supposition that the one ought, and
that the other ought not, to have virtue! For if the ruler is
intemperate and unjust, how can he rule well? If the subject, how
can he obey well? If he be licentious and cowardly, he will
certainly not do his duty.
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