>>24509250
The whole idea, going back to Aristotle, is that the virtuous person enjoys virtue. The communication of goodness to others is "greatness of soul." We might begin in vice, or perhaps merely continent, doing some good but hating it. But the whole point is to develop towards loving the Good. This is true self-determining freedom. Using reason instrumentally to just pursue whatever desires you just so happen to have, even if you don't think they are good, isn't freedom. You are moved by a prior darkness. To be truly, fully free means to understand why one acts, and to have control over what one desires and feels. This is the ultimate fruit of blessed dispassion.

This is why St. Paul or St. Ignatius can write sublimely from prison cells, even awaiting gruesome deaths, or why Saint Francis can be sublime in the wilderness with nothing. They have move past dependence on external goods and movement by the passions, and so are more truly self-determining. You see this in Socrates as well, particularly in the Crito, or in Boethius' Consolation.

The goal is, as Dante (who also wrote sublimely after losing everything and being under death sentence) puts it, transhumanization.