Prudence is wisdom in practice. It is the habit of discerning the “true good in every circumstance” and “the right means of achieving it.”1 In other words, it is “applied morality.”2 A person possesses the virtue of prudence when “the disposition to reason well about what courses of action and emotion will best bring about our own and others’ well-being” becomes an acquired habit.3 Perhaps Cicero puts it most clearly and succinctly in saying, “Prudence is the knowledge of things to be sought, and those to be shunned.”
