Section 7.3: Recognition that the account of a happy life given so far is a rough outline

Let what we have said serve as an outline of the good. _[20]

For we must presumably first present a rough sketch, and then later fill in the details. But it would seem that anyone is capable of developing and articulating what has been outlined well, and that time is a good discoverer or partner in such a work. This is the source of many advances in the crafts, since anyone can add what is lacking. _[25]

And we must also remember what has been said before, and not look for precision in all things alike, but in each class of things such precision as accords with the subject-matter, and so much as is appropriate to the inquiry. For a carpenter and an expert in geometry inquire about the right angle in different ways: the carpenter does so insofar as the right angle is useful for his work, while the geometer asks what a right angle is or what sort of thing it is, since he contemplates the truth. We must act in the same way, then, in all cases, so that our main task may not be overwhelmed by minor questions.

_[1098b1] Nor must we demand the cause in all matters in a similar way. It is enough in some cases that the fact is correctly shown, as in the case of the starting-points of inquiry. For the fact that something is so is a primary thing and a starting-point.

Now when it comes to starting-points of an inquiry, we see some through induction, some through perception, some through a sort of habituation, and others in other ways. But we must try to follow out each starting-point in the natural way, and make a serious effort _[5] to define them well, since they have a great influence on what follows. For the starting-point and beginning is thought to be more than half of the whole, and many of the things we are investigating will become evident through it.