the natural slave. He admits that nature does not always consummate her purpose; that the souls of freemen are sometimes found in the bodies of slaves, and vice versa;653 that it is difficult to distinguish the quality of the soul, in any event;654 that the claim that slavery is neither natural nor beneficial has in it a modicum of truth, as there are sometimes merely legal slaves, or slaves by convention;655 that slavery based on mere might without virtue is unjust;656 that captives of war may be wrongly enslaved;657 that only those who actually deserve it, should meet this fate;658 that the accidents of life may bring even the noblest of mankind into slavery;659 and that only non-Greeks are ignoble and worthy of it.660 He even insists that the terms “slave-master,” “freeman,” “slave,” when rightly used, imply a certain virtue or the lack of it, and therefore that to be justly a master, one must be morally superior.661
The question of the possession of the higher virtues by slaves is recognized by him to be a difficult problem, for an affirmative answer breaks down his distinction of “natural” slave, yet it seems paradoxical to deny these virtues to him as a human being.662
Nor can the difficulty be avoided by positing for the slave a mere difference in degree of virtue, for the distinction between ruler and subject must be one of kind.663
In any event, temperance and justice are necessary even for good slave service.664
Aristotle therefore evades the difficulty, and begs the question by concluding that both master and slave must share in virtue, but differently, in accord with their respective stations.665
With this admission, he places slaves on a higher plane than free artisans, in that he denies virtue to such classes, since it cannot be produced in them, except as they are brought into contact with a master.666