Temperance in its modern use is defined as moderation or voluntary self-restraint. It is typically described in terms of what a person voluntarily refrains from doing. This includes restraint from revenge by practicing mercy and forgiveness, restraint from arrogance by practicing humility and modesty, restraint from excesses such as extravagant luxury or splurging, restraint from overindulgence in food and drink, and restraint from rage or craving by practicing calmness and equanimity.
The distinction between temperance and self-control is subtle. A person who exhibits self-control wisely refrains from giving in to unwise desires. A person who exhibits temperance does not have unwise desires in the first place because they have wisely shaped their character in such a way that their desires are proper ones. Aristotle suggested this analogy: An intemperate person is like a city with bad laws; a person who lacks self control is like a city that has good laws on the books but doesn’t enforce them.
Temperance has been described as a virtue by religious thinkers, philosophers, and more recently, psychologists, particularly in the positive psychology movement. It has a long history in philosophical and religious thought.
It is generally characterized as the control over excess, and expressed through characteristics such as chastity, modesty, humility, self-regulation, hospitality, decorum, abstinence, and forgiveness; each of these involves restraining an excess of some impulse, such as sexual desire, vanity, or anger.
In classical iconography, the virtue is often depicted as a woman holding two vessels transferring water from one to another. It is one of the cardinal virtues in western thought, and is found in Greek philosophy and Christianity, as well as in Eastern traditions such as Buddhism and Hinduism.
Temperance is one of the six virtues in the Values in Action Inventory of Strengths, along with wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, and transcendence.
The term "temperance" can also refer to the abstention from alcohol (teetotalism), especially with reference to the temperance movement. It can also refer to alcohol moderation.
Philosophical perspectives
Greek civilization
There are two words in ancient Greek that have been translated to "temperance" in English. The first, , largely meant "self-restraint". The other, ', was a word coined during the time of Aristotle, to mean "control over oneself", or "self-discipline". appears three times in the Bible, where it was translated as "temperance" in the King James translation.
The modern meaning of temperance has evolved since its first usage. In Latin, means restraint (from force or anger), but also more broadly the proper balancing or mixing (particularly, of temperature, or compounds). Hence the phrase "to temper a sword", meaning the heating and cooling process of forging a metal blade. The Latin also referred to governing and control, likely in a moderate way (i.e. not with the use of excessive force).
Temperance is a major Athenian virtue, as advocated by Plato; self-restraint () is one of his four core virtues of the ideal city. In "Charmides", one of Plato's early dialogues, an attempt is made to describe temperance, but fails to reach an adequate definition.
Aristotle
Aristotle included discussions of both temperance and self-control in his pioneering system of virtue ethics.
Aristotle restricts the sphere of temperance to bodily pleasures, and defines temperance as "a mean with regard to pleasures," distinct from self-indulgence. Like courage, temperance is a virtue concerning our discipline of "the irrational parts of our nature" (fear, in the case of courage; desire, in the case of temperance).
His discussion is found in the Nicomachean Ethics Book III, chapters 10–12, and concludes in this way: And so the appetites of the temperate man should be in harmony with his reason; for the aim of both is that which is noble: the temperate man desires what he ought, and as he ought, and when he ought; and this again is what reason prescribes. This, then, may be taken as an account of temperance. As with virtue generally, temperance is a sort of habit, acquired by practice. It is a state of character, not a passion or a faculty, specifically a disposition to choose the mean between excess and defecit. The mean is hard to attain, and is grasped by perception, not by reasoning.
Pleasure in doing virtuous acts is a sign that one has attained a virtuous disposition. Temperance is the alignment of our desires with our enlightened self-interest, such that we desire to do what is best for our own flourishing.