lligence. So consistently does Aristotle draw the line between
menial and liberal education that he puts what are now called the "fine"
arts, music, painting, sculpture, in the same class with menial arts
so far as their practice is concerned. They involve physical agencies,
assiduity of practice, and external results. In discussing, for example,
education in music he raises the question how far the young should
be practiced in the playing of instruments. His answer is that such
practice and proficiency may be tolerated as conduce to appreciation;
that is, to understanding and enjoyment of music when played by slaves
or professionals. When professional power is aimed at, music sinks from
the liberal to the professional level. One might then as well teach
cooking, says Aristotle. Even a liberal concern with the works of fine
art depends upon the existence of a hireling class of practitioners who
have subordinated the development of their own personality to attaining
skill in mechanical execution. The higher the activity the more purely
mental is it; the less does it have to do with physical things or
with the body. The more purely mental it is, the more independent or
self-sufficing is it.

These last words remind us that Aristotle again makes a distinction of
superior and inferior even within those living the life of reason. For
there is a distinction in ends and in free action, according as one's
life is merely accompanied by reason or as it makes reason its own
medium. That is to say, the free citizen who devotes himself to the
public life of his community, sharing in the management of its affairs
and winning personal honor and distinction, lives a life accompanied
by reason. But the thinker, the man who devotes himself to scientific
inquiry and philosophic speculation, works, so to speak, in reason, not
simply by *. Even the activity of the citizen in his civic relations,
in other words, retains some of the taint of practice, of external or
merely instrumental doing. This infection is shown by the fact that
civic activity and civic excellence need the help of others; one cannot
engage in public life all by himself. But all needs, all desires imply,
in the philosophy of Aristotle, a material factor; they involve lack,
privation; they are dependent upon something beyond themselves for
completion. A purely intellectual life, however, one carries on by
himself, in himself; such assistance as he may derive from others is