If then the qualities whereby we attain truth,3 and are never led into falsehood, whether about things invariable or things variable, are scientific Knowledge, Prudence, Wisdom, and Intelligence, and if the quality which enables us to apprehend first principles cannot be any one among three of these, namely Scientific Knowledge, Prudence, and Wisdom, it remains that first principles must be apprehended by Intelligence.4 7.
The term Wisdom is employed in the arts to denote those men who are the most perfect
masters of their art, for instance, it is applied to Pheidias as a sculptor and to
Polycleitus as a statuary. In this use then Wisdom merely signifies artistic excellence.
[2]
But we also think that some people are wise in general
and not in one department, not ‘wise in something else,’5
as Homer says in the Margites: “
Neither a delver nor a ploughman him
The Gods had made, nor wise in aught beside.
” Hence it is clear that Wisdom must be the most perfect of the modes of knowledge. [3] The wise man therefore must not only know the conclusions that follow from his first principles, but also have a true conception of those principles themselves. Hence Wisdom must be a combination of Intelligence and Scientific Knowledge6: it must be a consummated knowledge7