When it proceeds to say, "Comes virtue from what's noble, as From
black comes violet," the text advances to the desired definition of
Nobility, by which one may see what this Nobility is of which so many
people speak erroneously. It says then, drawing a conclusion from that
which has been said before, that each Virtue, or rather its generator,
that is to say, the habit of right choice, which stands firm in due
moderation, will spring forth from this, that is, Nobility. And it
gives an example in the colours, saying, as from the black the violet,
so this Virtue springs from Nobility. The violet is a mixed colour of
purple and black, but the black prevails, and the colour is named from
it. And thus the Virtue is a mixed thing of Nobility and Passion; but,
because Nobility prevails, the Virtue takes its name from it, and is
called Goodness. Then afterwards it argues, by that which has been
said, that no man ought to say boastfully, "I am of such and such a
race or family;" nor ought he to believe that he is of this Nobility
unless the fruits of it are in him. And immediately it renders a
reason, saying that those who have this Grace, that is to say, this
Divine thing, are almost Gods as it were, without spot of vice, and no
one has the power to bestow this except God alone, with whom there is
no respect of persons, even as Divine Scripture makes manifest. And it
does not appear too extravagant when it says, "They are as Gods," for
as it is argued previously in the seventh chapter of the third
treatise, even as there are men most vile and bestial so are men most
Noble and Divine. And this Aristotle proves in the seventh chapter of
Ethics by the text of Homer the poet; therefore, let not those men who
are of the Uberti of Florence, nor those of the Visconti of Milan,
say, "Because I am of such a family or race, I am Noble," for the
Divine seed falls not into a race of men, that is, into a family; but
it falls into individual persons, and, as will be proved below, the
family does not make individual persons Noble, but the individual
persons make the family Noble.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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