ABSTRACT
Plato's failure to distinguish clearly the logical order from the real made it impossible for him to construct a truly practical science of politics. Having disengaged the logical order from the real, Aristotle was in position to distinguish the various kinds of knowledge within the real order: theoretic, practical, and productive. The profound difference between "art" and "prudence" in the fact that, as St. Thomas remarks, more praise is given to the craftsman who is at fault willingly, than to one who is unwillingly. This distinction between art and prudence entails other most important consequences for political science. If Plato's notion of the practical was at fault in supposing art and virtue to be identical in essence and definition, this error had its source in his failure to distinguish the logical order of things from the natural order. Aristotle's analysis of the most generally practicable State thus prescinds from the formal consideration of virtue.
