The article examines a dimension of ethics that Stanley Cavell names moral perfectionism, gathering under this label a host of different authors and philosophical lines, with Ludwig Wittgenstein holding the center stage. This dimension of ethics focuses on the mobility and transformation of the self, and in this light it is interesting to compare this approach with virtue ethics, given their shared emphasis on the self, its peculiar status, and the prospect of education. The idea of self-transformation informs Wittgenstein’s and Cavell’s philosophies in a number of ways.