The Decision Allegory
The illustrations accompanying Book VII in A and C offer the first examples within the cycles of the representational mode of the decision allegory (Figs. 35, 35a and 36, 36a). Panofsky, who coins the term in his essay "Hercules Prodicius," defines the situation as the response of a central protagonist faced with a moral conflict. As was noted in Chapter 4, Panofsky emphasizes the unique character in medieval art of the representations in A and C as decision allegories based not on divine intervention but solely on an individual's voluntary action.[1]
The decision allegory, which occurs for a second time in the illustration of Book IX in C (Fig. 41), overlaps other representational modes in the A and C cycles. Personifications, as abstractions of good and evil forces or of psychological states, interact in ways similar to the personification allegories of Books II and V (Figs. 11, 12, 24, and 29). In these earlier examples the initiator of an action represents a transcendental spiritual force. In contrast, the protagonists in the illustrations of Book VII are distinctly mundane. Figures 35 and 36 also serve their customary function as subject guides to the contents of the book.
Why do the principal subjects of Book VII call for such a distinctive mode of illustration? In one sense, Aristotle continues his discussion from the preceding book of how a variety of intellectual virtues brings about morally positive or negative actions in human life. But Aristotle's focus in Book VII is not so much the rare, ideally virtuous man (or his entirely "vicious" opposite) but the more common human plight of exhibiting moral strength or weakness as reactions to the essential conflict between intellect and desire. The Greek terms for these concepts, Enkrateia and Akrasia , have a complex history in Greek and subsequent philosophy. Because of present-day medical usage, the customary translation of these terms as "continence" (Enkrateia ) and "incontinence" (Akrasia ) both in English and French is unfortunate.[2] In the Middle Ages, however, "continence" and "incontinence" referred to sexual chastity or the lack of it.[3] Moreover, Aristotle does not consider continence and incontinence virtues in themselves. Unlike a person who possesses the virtue of temperance or moderation without conflicts regarding sensory pleasures, the continent or morally strong person has a passionate nature, which he controls only after experiencing a struggle through which the voice of reason guides him.
Figure 35
From left: Raison, Le Continent, Concupiscence; Raison, L'Incontinent,
Concupiscence. Les éthiques d'Aristote, MS A.
Figure 35A
Detail of Fig. 35