This conception of the best life is not forgotten in the _Politics_ The
end of life in the state is itself well-living and well-doing--a life
which helps to produce the best life The great agency in the production
of such life is the State operating through Law, which is Reason backed
by Force. For its greatest efficiency there is required the development
of a science of legislation. The main drift of what he says here is that
the most desirable thing would be that the best reason of the community
should be embodied in its laws. But so far as that is not possible, it
still is true that anyone who would make himself and others better must
become a miniature legislator--must study the general principles of law,
morality, and education. The conception of [Grek: politikae] with which
he opened the _Ethics_ would serve as a guide to a father educating his
children as well as to the legislator legislating for the state. Finding
in his predecessors no developed doctrine on this subject, Aristotle
proposes himself to undertake the construction of it, and sketches in
advance the programme of the _Politics_ in the concluding sentence of
the _Ethics_ His ultimate object is to answer the questions, What is the
best form of Polity, how should each be constituted, and what laws and
customs should it adopt and employ? Not till this answer is given will
"the philosophy of human affairs" be complete.

On looking back it will be seen that the discussion of the central topic
of the nature and formation of character has expanded into a Philosophy
of Human Conduct, merging at its beginning and end into metaphysics
The result is a Moral Philosophy set against a background of Political
Theory and general Philosophy. The most characteristic features of this
Moral Philosophy are due to the fact of its essentially teleological
view of human life and action: (1) Every human activity, but especially
every human practical activity, is directed towards a simple End