I am not a good person. Or at least, I’m not always sure that I am: what is a good person, after all? In a sense, this question demands that I consider some of the qualities that I feel may be lacking in myself, and it has no easy answer. How can I make any such claim about myself if I can’t even describe what a good person is? Moreover, even if I were to attempt an answer, while there is some common agreement about what being a good person entails, there is no absolute consensus even among so-called good people. I say, “good people,” because, while we might not have any satisfactory answer, it’s possible for us to recognise the good when we see it. Sometimes a person’s goodness is undeniable. Not unlike Plato’s sophists, we grasp at examples, though we don’t understand the full picture. In some ways, then, it may be true that the laws are written on our hearts (cf. Heb 8:10) because we have this moral sense—a conscience, if you will—but even with that, are not our judgements arbitrary? The question remains to be answer: what does it mean for someone to be “good”?

In legal matters, people’s actions are evaluated by two categories: the actus reus and the mens rea. The actus reus concerns itself with the act itself—i.e., what a person did—and this is often how we speak about goodness. So-and-so, we say, is a good person because they gave money to the poor, or because they helped grandma cross the street. The same is true for evil people, so we’ll say that so-and-so is evil because they killed someone or blew up a building. One the one hand, this makes sense. Charity and helping your grandmother are laudable acts, while killing people and blowing up a building are reprehensible if not just wicked. So, in this area, perhaps we know something about what it is that a good person does.

On the other hand, it is a mistake to judge people entirely on their actions. Consider, for example, a billionaire who sets up a charitable foundation that, while giving something to the poor, is done primarily to launder money; or someone who helps their grandmother only because they’re pining after an inheritance. The movie Dirty Rotten Scoundrels will give you plenty more examples of people doing “good” things with an ulterior motive. This is the mens rea: the state of one’s mind as they do something. Usually it’s used to determine someone’s legal culpability, but in this case we might think of it as describing one’s inner disposition. Is this what goodness is, then? An inner disposition. Even good people make mistakes, after all.

The problem gets even hairier when one considers that someone might even be well-intentioned, acting rightly, but unconsciously acting for the wrong reason. We are often told that doing good feels good. (This is obviously untrue: sometimes it’s painful.) If someone is acting with that principle in mind, then is their well-intentioned, right action not an act of selfishness. Could it true that, as St Paul said, “There is no one who is righteous, not even one; there is no one who has understanding, there is no one who seeks God. All have turned aside, together they have become worthless; there is no one who shows kindness, there is not even one.’ (Rm 3:10–12)

I understand that Paul had his reasons for saying so, but this doesn’t seem to be the case at all when you go about daily life. Even if someone does good things for the wrong reasons some of the time, there are also times when it’s possible to see the good that is in them, which perhaps exists in every human being. I was struck, for example, the other day when I saw a young man crying at their grandmother’s grave: there was no opportunity for gain whatsoever, there was nothing but sincerity, and all the while, despite their obvious suffering, it was apparent how much they loved this person, though perhaps not perfectly, and that in itself is a very good thing. So, perhaps what’s needed is a better way of thinking about good: something beyond divisions into act and intent, something more holistic and dispositional.

In reflecting on this, one thought came to mind—not a complete definition, mind you—which, I think, serves us as an excellent starting point. Could it be true that a good person is someone whose goodness doesn’t need to be justified, not even to themselves? Perhaps this is why Marcus Aurelius, the quintessential philosopher king, once said, “Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.” Is it necessary to know the ins and outs of moral philosophy to be a good person? Quite honestly, some of the best people I’ve ever met haven’t bothered with any of that nonsense! Philosophy is a tool that’s sometimes used to justify anything, but to the good man, goodness isn’t something in need of being justified: it’s something to which he aspires for its own sake, whether or not he can explain why with any exactitude whatsoever.

Is the good man expected to calculate the utility of any good he does? Does he flip through a book of legalisms to discern what he ought to do? Or does a matter of conscience impose itself so forcefully over him that without any sense of self, he himself acts with the good in mind?

As I said, this thought is preliminary. I don’t mean to suggest at all that what someone does doesn’t matter. It does. But a good person is more than the sum of his actions because, to him, goodness isn’t even an aspiration. It’s not a conclusion in a series of arguments. It’s not a law to be followed. It is far more than himself or any justification he can muster. It is something that must be done, lived, or otherwise embodied for its own sake. So, perhaps the question of whether or not you or I or anyone else is a good person doesn’t matter as much as we thought. What’s the point in such questions anyhow? What seems to matter far more—to me, anyhow—is whether any of us are at least trying to be one.