Now that we have found the good name that springs from vir­tu­ous con­duct, let us praise its source! Vir­tue is the highest ideal, the under­ly­ing prin­ciple that moves all things, gives them life and keeps them alive. Vir­tue is noth­ing other than man's call­ing, the link between the order of the uni­verse and the deeds of man. When vir­tue is fol­lowed, the order of the uni­verse gleams even in the simplest deed.

The maxim calls us to a splen­did atti­tude. Accord­ing to Plato, philo­sophy is the sci­ence of won­der, but we do not stop at mar­vel­ling. Vir­tue is an ideal worthy of respect and a stand­ard to be fol­lowed, and by glor­i­fy­ing it we also feed it. In other words, it is not dis­hon­esty we should point to, nor faults we should expose, but vir­tue we should praise. It is the flick­er­ing embers that must be fed, and then the fire will blaze up. And in the fire of the vir­tues, let us hope, all the dross burns away and puri­fic­a­tion is accom­plished.

Asked why people behave wrongly, Plato replied that it must be because no one had told them what right con­duct was. If they came to know the right stand­ards, they would fol­low them. We might say Plato was a day­dream­ing ideal­ist, and in the present age people are will­ing, at most, to praise their own ‘vir­tues’. Prais­ing the vir­tues of oth­ers is not a com­mu­nic­a­tion strategy but a spir­itu­al trait.

If vir­tue is a noble ideal, then glor­i­fy­ing it is a nobler prac­tice still. Praise is esteem, is ser­vice, ser­vice to the ideal. It is, moreover, a dis­tinct­ive way of approach­ing real­ity, bey­ond inquiry, care, ana­lys­is, proof.

Reli­gion without mys­tery…

When med­it­at­ing on the divine mys­ter­ies, guard the humil­ity of your heart, the rev­er­ence of your thoughts and the holi­ness of your soul. Do not bring shame on philo­sophy by mud­dling things togeth­er, on logic by ground­less­ness, on com­mon sense by ignor­ing it! What you can­not prove, agree with; what you can­not under­stand, believe; and what you can­not even believe, mar­vel at, love and fol­low. Thus your ignor­ance will be dis­pelled by your faith, your doubts swal­lowed up by your rev­er­ence, and your faith will become cer­tainty, just like the sight of your eyes. Put out your own little lamp, and you will see the bright sun-disc of vir­tue. (Jeremy Taylor, Eng­lish bish­op, 1613–1667)

What a fant­ast­ic thought, to agree with what one can­not prove! For cen­tur­ies, with com­plete con­vic­tion, we have placed our trust in doubt, which we glor­i­fy as the only right meth­od of inquiry. Bey­ond under­stand­ing, how­ever, there is faith, as a way of spir­itu­al see­ing, and what one dares not even believe, let him mar­vel at, love and fol­low! A revolu­tion­ary approach. To love the unprov­able – what hori­zons for know­ledge! This is real philo­sophy, the true love of wis­dom. The thought, put into words nearly half a mil­len­ni­um ago, is sur­pris­ingly fresh even today.

The best praise of vir­tue is to prac­tise it. We can praise high ideals most elo­quently by prac­tising them. If our deeds have no audi­ence, the vir­tues must be prac­tised even so, and if they have one, then all the more, for the respons­ib­il­ity it brings. In this way vir­tue grows, and I grow too.

On the other hand, if you speak ill of the vir­tues, it does them no harm; if you speak ill of the vir­tu­ous, it does them no harm. If you do not praise the vir­tues and the vir­tu­ous, it does you no good. If you praise them, it does you good, it does the vir­tues good and it does good to who­ever hears it.