Virtue and Habits Defined

Virtue can be defined by any number of terms; right living, correct conduct, excellence, effectiveness, goodness, pure and true behaviour, moral excellence, a right and good disposition. Classical thinkers have defined virtue to mean the power to accomplish a specific and purposeful end; a quality, a character trait, a strength, an aspect, a force to produce a certain effect. At a fundamental level virtue is a good habit. Our characters are composed of habits, good and bad, strong and week, soft and hard. Virtues are habits that are good, strong and hard. Habits are a function of judgement (knowing what to do), knowledge (knowing how to do it), desire (wanting to do it) and discipline (control of one self to do it). We are creatures of our habits. Habits give us structure or framework for living like the body for life. Living is complex. Habits are the internalised, routines, operating scripts for handling this complexity. Virtue is a good habit but it is also more. We can gain a clearer understanding of virtue by it’s purpose and effect; the fruit of faith is virtuous works. The many effects of the virtuous life include; the most powerful means to influence others and the world (for virtues speak louder to the world then any other human endowment), finding happiness and being blessed, and living effectiveness. Personal effectiveness follows personal virtue, like day follows the rising dawn sun.  The ultimate purpose of the virtuous life is to be like God because Christ was perfectly virtuous. Being virtuous is man’s response to the stimulus of Faith. Virtue is a gift from God but it is also a responsibility, it must be worked on, cultivated and developed. We are not born with fully formed virtuous characters, but must grow in strength of one. Like an athlete we are born with certain level of capacities and endowments, but also like an athlete we must practice to realise the full potential of these gifts. A man born with the talents to run a 4 minute mile will never accomplish the feat if he lives his life on a sofa watching TV. Talents, endowments and gifts are meaningless if not expressed and developed.