The intellectual part of virtue comes from being taught, and the moral part comes from the habits that one has and shows throughout their life (Aristotle, 360).

             This would seem to make sense, since people' morals and ideals often change as they grow older, but many of the more ingrained habits that a specific person has seem to remain largely the same, whether they are moral or not. People can change somewhat, however, as they are taught new things and learn about life from both standard teaching, such as schooling, and the teaching that comes from simply being alive long enough to learn many things about the world and about people. Virtues often change somewhat as people grow older and find that life is not necessarily quite what they thought it was when they were younger (Aristotle, 360). These things can work to make someone more or less virtuous, depending on the kinds of lessons that they learn as they age.

             To sum up, it can be said that natural law (Dolhenty, 2003):.

             is not made by human beings; .

             is based on the structure of reality itself; .

             is the same for all human beings and at all times; .

             is an unchanging rule or pattern which is there for human beings to discover; .

             is the naturally knowable moral law; .

             is a means by which human beings can rationally guide themselves to their good. .

             (Source: Dolhenty, 2003).

             Despite all of the opinions that Aristotle held, however, and the fact that he saw many things as being a person's 'right by nature' he naturally did not address specifically the subject of gay marriage. It is important here, now that a basic understanding of natural law has been addressed, to discuss the subject of gay marriage and show how this fits into natural law based on the information above.

             Allowing gays to marry or not allowing them to marry is a social issue that is definitely one of the most relevant of any social issue with people today. Despite those who seem strongly opposed to gay marriage 52 percent of voters that were polled by CBS indicated that they would actually consider voting for a presidential candidate that they liked even if he did not share their specific views on gay marriage (Poll, 2004).