On Human Perfection

The word "regime," in its most popular sense, signifies a concurrence of actions which are directed toward a certain end. The word regime cannot, therefore, be applied to a single action, since it is used for a complex of actions, as military regime or political regime. Thus, we say that God governs and rules over the world. For this regime, according to vulgar opinion, is similar to that of the governments of states, though, from the philosophical point of view, these words are a simple homonym. This regulated concurrence of actions which demands reflection, cannot be formed but by a solitary man. The regime of the solitary man must be the image of the perfect government of a state, where judges and physicians are absent because they are useless. . . In a perfect state, every individual will have the highest degree of perfection of which man is capable. There, everyone thinks in accordance with the highest justice, and does not neglect, when he is acting, any law and custom. There will be no fault, no joke, no ruse.

In an imperfect state the solitary man shall become the element of the future perfect state.

He who acts under the influence of reflection and justice only, without regard to the animal soul, must be called divine rather than human. Such a man must excel in moral virtues so that when the rational soul decides in favor of a thing, the animal soul, far from objecting, decides in favor of the same thing. It is the nature of the animal soul to obey the rational soul. This is, however, not the case with men who are not in the natural state but who allow themselves to give way to rage. He who allows himself to give way to passions acts in accordance not with human but with animal nature. He is even worse than the animal which obeys its own nature.

... Regime of the Solitary Man, ibn Badjdja (Avenpace)