The very fabric of the ethics of the actual, historical Aristotle, like that of his physics, is deeply imbued with a teleological conception of the world, in which each natural thing can be explained in terms of its final cause—the 'that for the sake of which'. Fact and value are inextricably intertwined here: the good for the acorn is to realise its potentialities, to grow into the healthy and flourishing oak-tree which represents the end-state towards which its nature tends. And so, mutatis mutandis, for human beings.
(John Cottingham, "The Ethical Credentials of Partiality," The Presidential Address, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, n.s., 98 [1997-98]: 1-21, at 14)
