Ethics, Morale and Morality. Correlation between Ethics and Etiquette.

The words "morality", "moral" and "ethics" are close in the meaning. They evolved in three different languages. The word "ethics" comes from Greek ethos — temper, nature, custom. It was introduced into use 2300 years ago by Aristotle who called "ethical" virtues or merits of the person which are demonstrated in his behavior — such qualities as courage, prudence, honesty, and "ethics" — science about these qualities. The word "ethics" (from Greek ethos – custom, temper, nature) is understood in two meanings: first, as the philosophical discipline studying moral and morality; secondly, as set of standards of behavior, moral of a certain person or public group. As it has been already mentioned, the term "ethics" was introduced by Aristotle to designate set of ethical virtues and the science to answer the questions what is virtue and what the person should do to be virtuous. The most important categories of ethics are: "good", "evil", "justice", "benefit", "responsibility", "debt", "conscience", "honor" and some other. The overall tradition of ethics is to clarify the fact what is the must for the person, i.e. corresponds to the deep laws of human nature. Aiming to differentiate the good and evil, to determine what is virtue, people have developed regulations for moral behavior – complex system of the rules allowing people to coexist. Moral regulations are expressed in general ideas, precepts, the principles of how to behave.

The word "moral" is of Latin origin. It is originated from Latin “mos.” (plural from “mores”) that meant approximately the same as ethos in Greek — temper, custom. Cicero, following Aristotle's example, have created from this word the words moralis — moral as adjective and moralitas — moral as noun which became Latin equivalent of the Greek words ethical and ethics. The moral (morality) include three components: moral consciousness, moral relations, moral activity. In real life all components are in interpenetration and interaction. Most vividly the moral of the person is demonstrated in his behavior, actions where his moral consciousness and relations are realized. Two important conclusions come from such understanding of moral. The first is in the fact that in the assessment of moral qualities of the person is important to take into account not only his moral consciousness, ideas about good, the evil and the debt, etc., but also to take into account his real behavior, actions. The second lies in the fact that to form high moral qualities of people is possible and necessary through the use of all types of relations, all set of types and forms of activity.

The word "morality" is the Russian word and comes from the root "temper". It was for the first time included in the dictionary of Russian language in the XVIII century and started to be used along with the words "ethics" and "moral" as their synonym. So in Russian language there appear three words with approximately same meaning. Over the time they have got some semantic shades by which they were distinguished from each other. But in practice of the use of these words are almost interchangeable (and their semantic shades can almost always be picked up in the context).

Thus, etymologically the terms "ethics", "moral" and "morality" have evolved in different languages and at different times, but were meaning similar concept — "temper", "custom", "way", "order". During the use of these terms the word "ethics" began to designate science about moral and morality, and the words "moral" and "morality" began to designate the object of research of ethics as science. Instead of the expression "moral standards" expression "ethical standards" is used. The words "ethics", "moral", "morality" are often used as synonyms.