The Complete Aristotle (eng.)

start. When
the law speaks universally, then, and a case arises on it which is
not covered by the universal statement, then it is right, where the
legislator fails us and has erred by oversimplicity, to correct the
omission-to say what the legislator himself would have said had he
been present, and would have put into his law if he had known.
Hence the equitable is just, and better than one kind of
justice-not better than absolute justice but better than the error
that arises from the absoluteness of the statement. And this is the
nature of the equitable, a correction of law where it is defective
owing to its universality. In fact this is the reason why all
things are not determined by law, that about some things it is
impossible to lay down a law, so that a decree is needed. For when
the thing is indefinite the rule also is indefinite, like the
leaden rule used in making the Lesbian moulding; the rule adapts
itself to the shape of the stone and is not rigid, and so too the
decree is adapted to the facts.
    It is plain, then, what the equitable is, and that it is just
and is better than one kind of justice. It is evident also from
this who the equitable man is; the man who chooses and does such
acts, and is no stickler for his rights in a bad sense but tends to
take less than his share though he has the law oft his side, is
equitable, and this state of character is equity, which is a sort
of justice and not a different state of character.
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11
    Whether a man can treat himself unjustly or not, is evident from
what has been said. For (a) one class of just acts are those acts
in accordance with any virtue which are prescribed by the law; e.g.
the law does not expressly permit suicide, and what it does not
expressly permit it forbids. Again, when a man in violation of the
law harms another (otherwise than in retaliation) voluntarily, he
acts unjustly, and a voluntary agent is one who knows both the
person he is affecting by his action and the instrument he is
using; and he who through anger voluntarily stabs himself does this
contrary to the right rule of life, and this the law does not
allow; therefore he is acting unjustly. But towards whom? Surely
towards the state, not towards himself. For he suffers voluntarily,
but no one is voluntarily treated unjustly. This is also the reason
why the state punishes; a certain loss of civil rights attaches to
the man who destroys himself, on the ground that he is treating the
state unjustly.
    Further (b) in that sense of ‘acting unjustly’ in which the man
who ‘acts unjustly’ is unjust only and not bad all round, it is not
possible to treat oneself unjustly (this is different from the
former sense; the unjust man in one sense of the term is wicked in
a particularized way just as the coward is, not in the sense of
being wicked all round, so that his ‘unjust act’ does not manifest
wickedness in general). For (i) that would imply the possibility of
the same thing’s having been subtracted from and added to the same
thing at the same time; but this is impossible-the just and the
unjust always involve more than one person. Further, (ii) unjust
action is voluntary and done by choice, and takes the initiative
(for the man who because he has suffered does the same in return is
not thought to act unjustly); but if a man harms himself he suffers
and does the same things at the same time. Further, (iii) if a man
could treat himself unjustly, he could be voluntarily treated
unjustly. Besides, (iv) no one acts unjustly without committing
particular acts of injustice; but no one can commit adultery with
his own wife or housebreaking on his own house or theft on his own
property,
    In general, the question ‘can a man treat himself unjustly?’ is
solved also by the distinction we applied to the question ‘can a
man be voluntarily treated unjustly?’
    (It is evident too that both are bad, being unjustly treated and
acting unjustly; for the one means having less and the other having
more than the intermediate amount, which plays the part here that
the healthy does in the medical art, and that good condition does
in the art of bodily training. But still acting unjustly is the
worse, for it involves vice and is blameworthy-involves vice which
is either of the complete and unqualified kind or almost so (we
must admit the latter alternative, because not all voluntary unjust
action implies injustice as a state of character), while being
unjustly treated