No Alien Good: The Common Good and the Truth of Love
In Dante’s “Divine Comedy,” Virgil, the poet’s guide, says that in the highest spheres, “the more they are who say ‘ours,’ the more good does each possess.” Upon hearing these words, Dante is puzzled and asks a quite common-sense question that will guide the reflections of this article: “How can it be that a good distributed among a greater number of possessors makes them richer in it than if it were possessed by few?” In the tradition, the kinds of goods that meet this requirement have been given the name “common goods.” But what exactly is the meaning of “common good,” and what is its relation to the individual person? It will be argued that an appreciation of the common good opens up new perspectives on the question of what it means to love in truth.
