Metaphysics
Book IV - Part 2
"There are many senses in which a thing may be said to 'be', but all that 'is' is
related
to one central point, one definite kind of thing, and is not said to 'be' by a mere
ambiguity. Everything which is healthy is related to health, one thing in the sense that
it preserves health, another in the sense that it produces it, another in the sense that
it
is a symptom of health, another because it is capable of it. And that which is medical
is relative to the medical art, one thing being called medical because it possesses it,
another because it is naturally adapted to it, another because it is a function of the
medical art. And we shall find other words used similarly to these. So, too, there are
many senses in which a thing is said to be, but all refer to one starting-point; some
things are said to be because they are substances, others because they are affections
of substance, others because they are a process towards substance, or destructions
or privations or qualities of substance, or productive or generative of substance, or
of things which are relative to substance, or negations of one of these thing of
substance itself. It is for this reason that we say even of non-being that it is nonbeing.
As, then, there is one science which deals with all healthy things, the same applies in
the other cases also. For not only in the case of things which have one common
notion does the investigation belong to one science, but also in the case of things
which are related to one common nature; for even these in a sense have one
common notion. It is clear then that it is the work of one science also to study the
things that are, qua being.-But everywhere science deals chiefly with that which is
primary, and on which the other things depend, and in virtue of which they get their
names. If, then, this is substance, it will be of substances that the philosopher must
grasp the principles and the causes.
4. Why does Aristotle think there should be one science devoted to the study of
being.
Why is being such an important, fundamental attribute?
"Now for each one class of things, as there is one perception, so there is one
science, as for instance grammar, being one science, investigates all articulate
sounds. Hence to investigate all the species of being qua being is the work of a
science which is generically one, and to investigate the several species is the work of
the specific parts of the science.
"If, now, being and unity are the same and are one thing in the sense that they are
implied in one another as principle and cause are, not in the sense that they are
explained by the same definition (though it makes no difference even if we suppose
them to be like that-in fact this would even strengthen our case); for 'one man' and
'man' are the same thing, and so are 'existent man' and 'man', and the doubling of the
words in 'one man and one existent man' does not express anything different (it is
clear that the two things are not separated either in coming to be or in ceasing to be);
and similarly 'one existent man' adds nothing to 'existent man', and that it is obvious
that the addition in these cases means the same thing, and unity is nothing apart from
being; and if, further, the substance of each thing is one in no merely accidental way,
and similarly is from its very nature something that is:-all this being so, there must be
exactly as many species of being as of unity. And to investigate the essence of these
is the work of a science which is generically one-I mean, for instance, the discussion
of the same and the similar and the other concepts of this sort; and nearly all
contraries may be referred to this origin; let us take them as having been investigated
in the 'Selection of Contraries'.
"And there are as many parts of philosophy as there are kinds of substance, so that
there must necessarily be among them a first philosophy and one which follows this.
For being falls immediately into genera; for which reason the sciences too will
correspond to these genera. For the philosopher is like the mathematician, as that
word is used; for mathematics also has parts, and there is a first and a second
science and other successive ones within the sphere of mathematics.
"Now since it is the work of one science to investigate opposites, and plurality is
opposed to unity-and it belongs to one science to investigate the negation and the
privation because in both cases we are really investigating the one thing of which the
negation or the privation is a negation or privation (for we either say simply that that
thing is not present, or that it is not present in some particular class; in the latter
case
difference is present over and above what is implied in negation; for negation means
just the absence of the thing in question, while in privation there is also employed an
underlying nature of which the privation is asserted):-in view of all these facts, the
contraries of the concepts we named above, the other and the dissimilar and the
unequal, and everything else which is derived either from these or from plurality and
unity, must fall within the province of the science above named. And contrariety is
one of these concepts; for contrariety is a kind of difference, and difference is a kind
of otherness. Therefore, since there are many senses in which a thing is said to be
one, these terms also will have many senses, but yet it belongs to one science to
know them all; for a term belongs to different sciences not if it has different senses,
but if it has not one meaning and its definitions cannot be referred to one central
meaning. And since all things are referred to that which is primary, as for instance all
things which are called one are referred to the primary one, we must say that this
holds good also of the same and the other and of contraries in general; so that after
distinguishing the various senses of each, we must then explain by reference to what
is primary in the case of each of the predicates in question, saying how they are
related to it; for some will be called what they are called because they possess it,
others because they produce it, and others in other such ways.
"It is evident, then, that it belongs to one science to be able to give an account of
these concepts as well as of substance (this was one of the questions in our book of
problems), and that it is the function of the philosopher to be able to investigate all
things. For if it is not the function of the philosopher, who is it who will inquire
whether Socrates and Socrates seated are the same thing, or whether one thing has
one contrary, or what contrariety is, or how many meanings it has? And similarly
with all other such questions. Since, then, these are essential modifications of unity
qua unity and of being qua being, not qua numbers or lines or fire, it is clear that it
belongs to this science to investigate both the essence of these concepts and their
properties. And those who study these properties err not by leaving the sphere of
philosophy, but by forgetting that substance, of which they have no correct idea, is
prior to these other things. For number qua number has peculiar attributes, such as
oddness and evenness, commensurability and equality, excess and defect, and these
belong to numbers either in themselves or in relation to one another. And similarly the
solid and the motionless and that which is in motion and the weightless and that
which has weight have other peculiar properties. So too there are certain properties
peculiar to being as such, and it is about these that the philosopher has to investigate
the truth.-An indication of this may be mentioned: dialecticians and sophists assume
the same guise as the philosopher, for sophistic is Wisdom which exists only in
semblance, and dialecticians embrace all things in their dialectic, and being is
common to all things; but evidently their dialectic embraces these subjects because
these are proper to philosophy.-For sophistic and dialectic turn on the same class of
things as philosophy, but this differs from dialectic in the nature of the faculty
required
and from sophistic in respect of the purpose of the philosophic life. Dialectic is
merely critical where philosophy claims to know, and sophistic is what appears to be
philosophy but is not.
Note- The word qua can be fairly confusing. It means simply, "in so far as it
is". When examining various terms, it is used to designate in what sense you are
using a word. If you were having a discussion about the high cost of clothes, you would be
discussing clothing qua price. If you were having discussion about the appearance of
clothes, you would be discussing clothes qua appearance. If you were discussing what the
fundamental nature of clothes are in themselves, you would be discussing clothes qua
clothes.
"Again, in the list of contraries one of the two columns is privative, and
all contraries
are reducible to being and non-being, and to unity and plurality, as for instance rest
belongs to unity and movement to plurality. And nearly all thinkers agree that being
and substance are composed of contraries; at least all name contraries as their first
principles-some name odd and even, some hot and cold, some limit and the
unlimited, some love and strife. And all the others as well are evidently reducible to
unity and plurality (this reduction we must take for granted), and the principles stated
by other thinkers fall entirely under these as their genera. It is obvious then from
these considerations too that it belongs to one science to examine being qua being.
For all things are either contraries or composed of contraries, and unity and plurality
are the starting-points of all contraries. And these belong to one science, whether
they have or have not one single meaning. Probably the truth is that they have not;
yet even if 'one' has several meanings, the other meanings will be related to the
primary meaning (and similarly in the case of the contraries), even if being or unity is
not a universal and the same in every instance or is not separable from the particular
instances (as in fact it probably is not; the unity is in some cases that of common
reference, in some cases that of serial succession). And for this reason it does not
belong to the geometer to inquire what is contrariety or completeness or unity or
being or the same or the other, but only to presuppose these concepts and reason
from this starting-point.--Obviously then it is the work of one science to examine
being qua being, and the attributes which belong to it qua being, and the same
science will examine not only substances but also their attributes, both those above
named and the concepts 'prior' and 'posterior', 'genus' and 'species', 'whole' and
'part', and the others of this sort.
Book IV - Part 3
"We must state whether it belongs to one or to different sciences to inquire into the
truths which are in mathematics called axioms, and into substance. Evidently, the
inquiry into these also belongs to one science, and that the science of the
philosopher; for these truths hold good for everything that is, and not for some
special genus apart from others. And all men use them, because they are true of
being qua being and each genus has being. But men use them just so far as to satisfy
their purposes; that is, as far as the genus to which their demonstrations refer
extends. Therefore since these truths clearly hold good for all things qua being (for
this is what is common to them), to him who studies being qua being belongs the
inquiry into these as well. And for this reason no one who is conducting a special
inquiry tries to say anything about their truth or falsity,-neither the geometer nor the
arithmetician. Some natural philosophers indeed have done so, and their procedure
was intelligible enough; for they thought that they alone were inquiring about the
whole of nature and about being. But since there is one kind of thinker who is above
even the natural philosopher (for nature is only one particular genus of being), the
discussion of these truths also will belong to him whose inquiry is universal and deals
with primary substance. Physics also is a kind of Wisdom, but it is not the first
kind.-And the attempts of some of those who discuss the terms on which truth
should be accepted, are due to a want of training in logic; for they should know these
things already when they come to a special study, and not be inquiring into them
while they are listening to lectures on it.
5. Aristotle says that "the most certain principle" of truth is that
contrary attributes cannot apply to the same subject at the same time and in the
same respect. Known as the Law of Non-Contradiction, this law of logic states
that "a statement cannot be both true and false." Accord
ing to Aristotle, why is the philosopher best qualified to understand and to use this
kind of principle?
"Evidently then it belongs to the philosopher, i.e. to him who is studying the
nature of
all substance, to inquire also into the principles of syllogism. But he who knows best
about each genus must be able to state the most certain principles of his subject, so
that he whose subject is existing things qua existing must be able to state the most
certain principles of all things. This is the philosopher, and the most certain principle
of all is that regarding which it is impossible to be mistaken; for such a principle must
be both the best known (for all men may be mistaken about things which they do not
know), and non-hypothetical. For a principle which every one must have who
understands anything that is, is not a hypothesis; and that which every one must
know who knows anything, he must already have when he comes to a special study.
Evidently then such a principle is the most certain of all; which principle this is, let
us
proceed to say. It is, that the same attribute cannot at the same time belong and
not
belong to the same subject and in the same respect; we must presuppose, to guard
against dialectical objections, any further qualifications which might be added.
6. How does Aristotle respond to Heraclitus about the possibility that someone may
"believe the same thing to be and not to be"?
This, then, is the most certain of all principles, since it answers to the
definition given
above. For it is impossible for any one to believe the same thing to be and not to be,
as some think Heraclitus says. For what a man says, he does not necessarily believe;
and if it is impossible that contrary attributes should belong at the same time to the
same subject (the usual qualifications must be presupposed in this premiss too), and
if an opinion which contradicts another is contrary to it, obviously it is impossible for
the same man at the same time to believe the same thing to be and not to be; for if a
man were mistaken on this point he would have contrary opinions at the same time.
It is for this reason that all who are carrying out a demonstration reduce it to this as
an ultimate belief; for this is naturally the starting-point even for all the other
axioms.
Book IV - Part 4
"There are some who, as we said, both themselves assert that it is possible for the
same thing to be and not to be, and say that people can judge this to be the case.
And among others many writers about nature use this language. But we have now
posited that it is impossible for anything at the same time to be and not to be, and by
this means have shown that this is the most indisputable of all principles.-Some
indeed demand that even this shall be demonstrated, but this they do through want of
education, for not to know of what things one should demand demonstration, and of
what one should not, argues want of education. For it is impossible that there should
be demonstration of absolutely everything (there would be an infinite regress, so that
there would still be no demonstration); but if there are things of which one should not
demand demonstration, these persons could not say what principle they maintain to
be more self-evident than the present one.
7. According to Aristotle, why is it that not every truth can be proven or demonstrated?
"We can, however, demonstrate negatively even that this view is impossible,
if our
opponent will only say something; and if he says nothing, it is absurd to seek to give
an account of our views to one who cannot give an account of anything, in so far as
he cannot do so. For such a man, as such, is from the start no better than a
vegetable. Now negative demonstration I distinguish from demonstration proper,
because in a demonstration one might be thought to be begging the question, but if
another person is responsible for the assumption we shall have negative proof, not
demonstration. The starting-point for all such arguments is not the demand that our
opponent shall say that something either is or is not (for this one might perhaps take
to be a begging of the question), but that he shall say something which is significant
both for himself and for another; for this is necessary, if he really is to say anything.
For, if he means nothing, such a man will not be capable of reasoning, either with
himself or with another. But if any one grants this, demonstration will be possible; for
we shall already have something definite. The person responsible for the proof,
however, is not he who demonstrates but he who listens; for while disowning reason
he listens to reason. And again he who admits this has admitted that something is true
apart from demonstration (so that not everything will be 'so and not so').
8. Why should you not argue with those who are not willing to accept the principle
of non-contradiction?
"First then this at least is obviously true, that the word 'be' or 'not be'
has a definite
meaning, so that not everything will be 'so and not so'. Again, if 'man' has one
meaning, let this be 'two-footed animal'; by having one meaning I understand this:-if
'man' means 'X', then if A is a man 'X' will be what 'being a man' means for him. (It
makes no difference even if one were to say a word has several meanings, if only
they are limited in number; for to each definition there might be assigned a different
word. For instance, we might say that 'man' has not one meaning but several, one of
which would have one definition, viz. 'two-footed animal', while there might be also
several other definitions if only they were limited in number; for a peculiar name might
be assigned to each of the definitions. If, however, they were not limited but one
were to say that the word has an infinite number of meanings, obviously reasoning
would be impossible; for not to have one meaning is to have no meaning, and if
words have no meaning our reasoning with one another, and indeed with ourselves,
has been annihilated; for it is impossible to think of anything if we do not think of one
thing; but if this is possible, one name might be assigned to this thing.)
9. Why cannot words have a infinite number of meanings?
"Let it be assumed then, as was said at the beginning, that the name has a
meaning
and has one meaning; it is impossible, then, that 'being a man' should mean precisely
'not being a man', if 'man' not only signifies something about one subject but also has
one significance (for we do not identify 'having one significance' with 'signifying
something about one subject', since on that assumption even 'musical' and 'white' and
'man' would have had one significance, so that all things would have been one; for
they would all have had the same significance).
"And it will not be possible to be and not to be the same thing, except in virtue of
an
ambiguity, just as if one whom we call 'man', others were to call 'not-man'; but the
point in question is not this, whether the same thing can at the same time be and not
be a man in name, but whether it can in fact. Now if 'man' and 'not-man' mean
nothing different, obviously 'not being a man' will mean nothing different from 'being a
man'; so that 'being a man' will be 'not being a man'; for they will be one. For being
one means this-being related as 'raiment' and 'dress' are, if their definition is one. And
if 'being a man' and 'being a not-man' are to be one, they must mean one thing. But it
was shown earlier' that they mean different things.-Therefore, if it is true to say of
anything that it is a man, it must be a two-footed animal (for this was what 'man'
meant); and if this is necessary, it is impossible that the same thing should not at that
time be a two-footed animal; for this is what 'being necessary' means-that it is
impossible for the thing not to be. It is, then, impossible that it should be at the same
time true to say the same thing is a man and is not a man.
"The same account holds good with regard to 'not being a man', for 'being a man'
and 'being a not-man' mean different things, since even 'being white' and 'being a
man' are different; for the former terms are much more different so that they must a
fortiori mean different things. And if any one says that 'white' means one and the
same thing as 'man', again we shall say the same as what was said before, that it
would follow that all things are one, and not only opposites. But if this is impossible,
then what we have maintained will follow, if our opponent will only answer our
question.
"And if, when one asks the question simply, he adds the contradictories, he is not
answering the question. For there is nothing to prevent the same thing from being
both a man and white and countless other things: but still, if one asks whether it is or
is not true to say that this is a man, our opponent must give an answer which means
one thing, and not add that 'it is also white and large'. For, besides other reasons, it
is
impossible to enumerate its accidental attributes, which are infinite in number; let him,
then, enumerate either all or none. Similarly, therefore, even if the same thing is a
thousand times a man and a not-man, he must not, in answering the question whether
this is a man, add that it is also at the same time a not-man, unless he is bound to add
also all the other accidents, all that the subject is or is not; and if he does this, he
is
not observing the rules of argument.
"And in general those who say this do away with substance and essence. For they
must say that all attributes are accidents, and that there is no such thing as 'being
essentially a man' or 'an animal'. For if there is to be any such thing as 'being
essentially a man' this will not be 'being a not-man' or 'not being a man' (yet these are
negations of it); for there was one thing which it meant, and this was the substance of
something. And denoting the substance of a thing means that the essence of the thing
is nothing else. But if its being essentially a man is to be the same as either being
essentially a not-man or essentially not being a man, then its essence will be
something else. Therefore our opponents must say that there cannot be such a
definition of anything, but that all attributes are accidental; for this is the
distinction
between substance and accident-'white' is accidental to man, because though he is
white, whiteness is not his essence. But if all statements are accidental, there will be
nothing primary about which they are made, if the accidental always implies
predication about a subject. The predication, then, must go on ad infinitum. But this
is impossible; for not even more than two terms can be combined in accidental
predication. For (1) an accident is not an accident of an accident, unless it be
because both are accidents of the same subject. I mean, for instance, that the white
is musical and the latter is white, only because both are accidental to man. But (2)
Socrates is musical, not in this sense, that both terms are accidental to something
else. Since then some predicates are accidental in this and some in that sense, (a)
those which are accidental in the latter sense, in which white is accidental to
Socrates, cannot form an infinite series in the upward direction; e.g. Socrates the
white has not yet another accident; for no unity can be got out of such a sum. Nor
again (b) will 'white' have another term accidental to it, e.g. 'musical'. For this is no
more accidental to that than that is to this; and at the same time we have drawn the
distinction, that while some predicates are accidental in this sense, others are so in
the sense in which 'musical' is accidental to Socrates; and the accident is an accident
of an accident not in cases of the latter kind, but only in cases of the other kind, so
that not all terms will be accidental. There must, then, even so be something which
denotes substance. And if this is so, it has been shown that contradictories cannot be
predicated at the same time.
10. Why must those who deny the law of non-contradiction also deny
essence and substance?
11. Why are some attributes accidental?
"Again, if all contradictory statements are true of the same subject at the
same time,
evidently all things will be one. For the same thing will be a trireme, a wall, and a
man, if of everything it is possible either to affirm or to deny anything (and this
premiss must be accepted by those who share the views of Protagoras). For if any
one thinks that the man is not a trireme, evidently he is not a trireme; so that he also
is a trireme, if, as they say, contradictory statements are both true. And we thus get
the doctrine of Anaxagoras, that all things are mixed together; so that nothing really
exists. They seem, then, to be speaking of the indeterminate, and, while fancying
themselves to be speaking of being, they are speaking about non-being; for it is that
which exists potentially and not in complete reality that is indeterminate. But they
must predicate of every subject the affirmation or the negation of every attribute. For
it is absurd if of each subject its own negation is to be predicable, while the negation
of something else which cannot be predicated of it is not to be predicable of it; for
instance, if it is true to say of a man that he is not a man, evidently it is also true to
say that he is either a trireme or not a trireme. If, then, the affirmative can be
predicated, the negative must be predicable too; and if the affirmative is not
predicable, the negative, at least, will be more predicable than the negative of the
subject itself. If, then, even the latter negative is predicable, the negative of
'trireme'
will be also predicable; and, if this is predicable, the affirmative will be so too.
"Those, then, who maintain this view are driven to this conclusion, and to the
further
conclusion that it is not necessary either to assert or to deny. For if it is true that a
thing is a man and a not-man, evidently also it will be neither a man nor a not-man.
For to the two assertions there answer two negations, and if the former is treated as
a single proposition compounded out of two, the latter also is a single proposition
opposite to the former.
"Again, either the theory is true in all cases, and a thing is both white and
not-white,
and existent and non-existent, and all other assertions and negations are similarly
compatible or the theory is true of some statements and not of others. And if not of
all, the exceptions will be contradictories of which admittedly only one is true; but if
of all, again either the negation will be true wherever the assertion is, and the
assertion true wherever the negation is, or the negation will be true where the
assertion is, but the assertion not always true where the negation is. And (a) in the
latter case there will be something which fixedly is not, and this will be an
indisputable belief; and if non-being is something indisputable and knowable, the
opposite assertion will be more knowable. But (b) if it is equally possible also to
assert all that it is possible to deny, one must either be saying what is true when one
separates the predicates (and says, for instance, that a thing is white, and again that it
is not-white), or not. And if (i) it is not true to apply the predicates separately, our
opponent is not saying what he professes to say, and also nothing at all exists; but
how could non-existent things speak or walk, as he does? Also all things would on
this view be one, as has been already said, and man and God and trireme and their
contradictories will be the same. For if contradictories can be predicated alike of
each subject, one thing will in no wise differ from another; for if it differ, this
difference will be something true and peculiar to it. And (ii) if one may with truth
apply the predicates separately, the above-mentioned result follows none the less,
and, further, it follows that all would then be right and all would be in error, and our
opponent himself confesses himself to be in error.-And at the same time our
discussion with him is evidently about nothing at all; for he says nothing. For he says
neither 'yes' nor 'no', but 'yes and no'; and again he denies both of these and says
'neither yes nor no'; for otherwise there would already be something definite.
"Again if when the assertion is true, the negation is false, and when this is true,
the
affirmation is false, it will not be possible to assert and deny the same thing truly at
the same time. But perhaps they might say this was the very question at issue.
"Again, is he in error who judges either that the thing is so or that it is not so,
and is
he right who judges both? If he is right, what can they mean by saying that the nature
of existing things is of this kind? And if he is not right, but more right than he who
judges in the other way, being will already be of a definite nature, and this will be
true, and not at the same time also not true. But if all are alike both wrong and right,
one who is in this condition will not be able either to speak or to say anything
intelligible; for he says at the same time both 'yes' and 'no.' And if he makes no
judgement but 'thinks' and 'does not think', indifferently, what difference will there be
between him and a vegetable?-Thus, then, it is in the highest degree evident that
neither any one of those who maintain this view nor any one else is really in this
position. For why does a man walk to Megara and not stay at home, when he thinks
he ought to be walking there? Why does he not walk early some morning into a well
or over a precipice, if one happens to be in his way? Why do we observe him
guarding against this, evidently because he does not think that falling in is alike good
and not good? Evidently, then, he judges one thing to be better and another worse.
And if this is so, he must also judge one thing to be a man and another to be
not-a-man, one thing to be sweet and another to be not-sweet. For he does not aim
at and judge all things alike, when, thinking it desirable to drink water or to see a
man, he proceeds to aim at these things; yet he ought, if the same thing were alike a
man and not-a-man. But, as was said, there is no one who does not obviously avoid
some things and not others. Therefore, as it seems, all men make unqualified
judgements, if not about all things, still about what is better and worse. And if this is
not knowledge but opinion, they should be all the more anxious about the truth, as a
sick man should be more anxious about his health than one who is healthy; for he
who has opinions is, in comparison with the man who knows, not in a healthy state
as far as the truth is concerned.
12. In what way(s) does our everyday life reveal the law of
non-contradiction?
"Again, however much all things may be 'so and not so', still there is a more
and a
less in the nature of things; for we should not say that two and three are equally even,
nor is he who thinks four things are five equally wrong with him who thinks they are a
thousand. If then they are not equally wrong, obviously one is less wrong and
therefore more right. If then that which has more of any quality is nearer the norm,
there must be some truth to which the more true is nearer. And even if there is not,
still there is already something better founded and liker the truth, and we shall have
got rid of the unqualified doctrine which would prevent us from determining anything
in our thought.
Book VI - Part 4
"Let us dismiss accidental being; for we have sufficiently determined its nature. But
since that which is in the sense of being true, or is not in the sense of being false,
depends on combination and separation, and truth and falsity together depend on the
allocation of a pair of contradictory judgements (for the true judgement affirms where
the subject and predicate really are combined, and denies where they are separated,
while the false judgement has the opposite of this allocation; it is another question,
how it happens that we think things together or apart; by 'together' and 'apart' I mean
thinking them so that there is no succession in the thoughts but they become a unity);
for falsity and truth are not in things-it is not as if the good were true, and the bad
were in itself false-but in thought; while with regard to simple concepts and 'whats'
falsity and truth do not exist even in thought--this being so, we must consider later
what has to be discussed with regard to that which is or is not in this sense. But since
the combination and the separation are in thought and not in the things, and that
which is in this sense is a different sort of 'being' from the things that are in the full
sense (for the thought attaches or removes either the subject's 'what' or its having a
certain quality or quantity or something else), that which is accidentally and that
which is in the sense of being true must be dismissed. For the cause of the former is
indeterminate, and that of the latter is some affection of the thought, and both are
related to the remaining genus of being, and do not indicate the existence of any
separate class of being. Therefore let these be dismissed, and let us consider the
causes and the principles of being itself, qua being. (It was clear in our discussion of
the various meanings of terms, that 'being' has several meanings.)
End of first reading.
_________________________________________________________________
Book VII - Part 1
1. Summarize the "several senses in which a thing may be said to be."
"THERE are several senses in which a thing may be said to 'be', as we pointed out
previously in our book on the various senses of words;' for in one sense the 'being'
meant is 'what a thing is' or a 'this', and in another sense it means a quality or
quantity or one of the other things that are predicated as these are. While 'being' has
all these senses, obviously that which 'is' primarily is the 'what', which indicates the
substance of the thing. For when we say of what quality a thing is, we say that it is
good or bad, not that it is three cubits long or that it is a man; but when we say what
it is, we do not say 'white' or 'hot' or 'three cubits long', but 'a man' or 'a 'god'. And
all other things are said to be because they are, some of them, quantities of that
which is in this primary sense, others qualities of it, others affections of it, and
others
some other determination of it. And so one might even raise the question whether
the words 'to walk', 'to be healthy', 'to sit' imply that each of these things is
existent,
and similarly in any other case of this sort; for none of them is either self-subsistent
or capable of being separated from substance, but rather, if anything, it is that which
walks or sits or is healthy that is an existent thing. Now these are seen to be more
real because there is something definite which underlies them (i.e. the substance or
individual), which is implied in such a predicate; for we never use the word 'good' or
'sitting' without implying this. Clearly then it is in virtue of this category that each
of
the others also is. Therefore that which is primarily, i.e. not in a qualified sense but
without qualification, must be substance.
"Now there are several senses in which a thing is said to be first; yet substance is
first in every sense-(1) in definition, (2) in order of knowledge, (3) in time. For (3) of
the other categories none can exist independently, but only substance. And (1) in
definition also this is first; for in the definition of each term the definition of its
substance must be present. And (2) we think we know each thing most fully, when
we know what it is, e.g. what man is or what fire is, rather than when we know its
quality, its quantity, or its place; since we know each of these predicates also, only
when we know what the quantity or the quality is.
"And indeed the question which was raised of old and is raised now and always,
and is always the subject of doubt, viz. what being is, is just the question, what is
substance? For it is this that some assert to be one, others more than one, and that
some assert to be limited in number, others unlimited. And so we also must consider
chiefly and primarily and almost exclusively what that is which is in this sense.
Book VII - Part 2
"Substance is thought to belong most obviously to bodies; and so we say that not
only animals and plants and their parts are substances, but also natural bodies such
as fire and water and earth and everything of the sort, and all things that are either
parts of these or composed of these (either of parts or of the whole bodies), e.g. the
physical universe and its parts, stars and moon and sun. But whether these alone are
substances, or there are also others, or only some of these, or others as well, or
none of these but only some other things, are substances, must be considered. Some
think the limits of body, i.e. surface, line, point, and unit, are substances, and more
so than body or the solid.
"Further, some do not think there is anything substantial besides sensible things,
but
others think there are eternal substances which are more in number and more real;
e.g. Plato posited two kinds of substance-the Forms and objects of mathematics-as
well as a third kind, viz. the substance of sensible bodies. And Speusippus made still
more kinds of substance, beginning with the One, and assuming principles for each
kind of substance, one for numbers, another for spatial magnitudes, and then another
for the soul; and by going on in this way he multiplies the kinds of substance. And
some say Forms and numbers have the same nature, and the other things come after
them-lines and planes-until we come to the substance of the material universe and to
sensible bodies.
"Regarding these matters, then, we must inquire which of the common statements
are right and which are not right, and what substances there are, and whether there
are or are not any besides sensible substances, and how sensible substances exist,
and whether there is a substance capable of separate existence (and if so why and
how) or no such substance, apart from sensible substances; and we must first sketch
the nature of substance.
2. What questions about "substance" does Aristotle hope to answer?
Book VII - Part 3
"The word 'substance' is applied, if not in more senses, still at least to four main
objects; for both the essence and the universal and the genus, are thought to be the
substance of each thing, and fourthly the substratum. Now the substratum is that of
which everything else is predicated, while it is itself not predicated of anything else.
And so we must first determine the nature of this; for that which underlies a thing
primarily is thought to be in the truest sense its substance. And in one sense matter is
said to be of the nature of substratum, in another, shape, and in a third, the
compound of these. (By the matter I mean, for instance, the bronze, by the shape
the pattern of its form, and by the compound of these the statue, the concrete
whole.) Therefore if the form is prior to the matter and more real, it will be prior also
to the compound of both, for the same reason.
"We have now outlined the nature of substance, showing that it is that which is not
predicated of a stratum, but of which all else is predicated. But we must not merely
state the matter thus; for this is not enough. The statement itself is obscure, and
further, on this view, matter becomes substance. For if this is not substance, it
baffles us to say what else is. When all else is stripped off evidently nothing but
matter remains. For while the rest are affections, products, and potencies of bodies,
length, breadth, and depth are quantities and not substances (for a quantity is not a
substance), but the substance is rather that to which these belong primarily. But
when length and breadth and depth are taken away we see nothing left unless there
is something that is bounded by these; so that to those who consider the question
thus matter alone must seem to be substance. By matter I mean that which in itself is
neither a particular thing nor of a certain quantity nor assigned to any other of the
categories by which being is determined. For there is something of which each of
these is predicated, whose being is different from that of each of the predicates (for
the predicates other than substance are predicated of substance, while substance is
predicated of matter). Therefore the ultimate substratum is of itself neither a
particular thing nor of a particular quantity nor otherwise positively characterized;
nor yet is it the negations of these, for negations also will belong to it only by
accident.
3. How does Aristotle distinguish between substance and matter?
"If we adopt this point of view, then, it follows that matter is substance. But this
is
impossible; for both separability and 'thisness' are thought to belong chiefly to
substance. And so form and the compound of form and matter would be thought to
be substance, rather than matter. The substance compounded of both, i.e. of matter
and shape, may be dismissed; for it is posterior and its nature is obvious. And matter
also is in a sense manifest. But we must inquire into the third kind of substance; for
this is the most perplexing.
"Some of the sensible substances are generally admitted to be substances, so that
we must look first among these. For it is an advantage to advance to that which is
more knowable. For learning proceeds for all in this way-through that which is less
knowable by nature to that which is more knowable; and just as in conduct our task
is to start from what is good for each and make what is without qualification good
good for each, so it is our task to start from what is more knowable to oneself and
make what is knowable by nature knowable to oneself. Now what is knowable and
primary for particular sets of people is often knowable to a very small extent, and
has little or nothing of reality. But yet one must start from that which is barely
knowable but knowable to oneself, and try to know what is knowable without
qualification, passing, as has been said, by way of those very things which one does
know.
Book VII - Part 4
"Since at the start we distinguished the various marks by which we determine
substance, and one of these was thought to be the essence, we must investigate this.
And first let us make some linguistic remarks about it. The essence of each thing is
what it is said to be propter se. For being you is not being musical, since you are not
by your very nature musical. What, then, you are by your very nature is your
essence.
"Propter se" means "for or on account of itself."
"Nor yet is the whole of this the essence of a thing; not that which is
propter se as
white is to a surface, because being a surface is not identical with being white. But
again the combination of both-'being a white surface'-is not the essence of surface,
because 'surface' itself is added. The formula, therefore, in which the term itself is
not present but its meaning is expressed, this is the formula of the essence of each
thing. Therefore if to be a white surface is to be a smooth surface, to be white and to
be smooth are one and the same.
"But since there are also compounds answering to the other categories (for there is a
substratum for each category, e.g. for quality, quantity, time, place, and motion), we
must inquire whether there is a formula of the essence of each of them, i.e. whether
to these compounds also there belongs an essence, e.g. 'white man'. Let the
compound be denoted by 'cloak'. What is the essence of cloak? But, it may be said,
this also is not a propter se expression. We reply that there are just two ways in
which a predicate may fail to be true of a subject propter se, and one of these
results from the addition, and the other from the omission, of a determinant. One
kind of predicate is not propter se because the term that is being defined is
combined with another determinant, e.g. if in defining the essence of white one were
to state the formula of white man; the other because in the subject another
determinant is combined with that which is expressed in the formula, e.g. if 'cloak'
meant 'white man', and one were to define cloak as white; white man is white
indeed, but its essence is not to be white.
"But is being-a-cloak an essence at all? Probably not. For the essence is precisely
what something is; but when an attribute is asserted of a subject other than itself, the
complex is not precisely what some 'this' is, e.g. white man is not precisely what
some 'this' is, since thisness belongs only to substances. Therefore there is an
essence only of those things whose formula is a definition. But we have a definition
not where we have a word and a formula identical in meaning (for in that case all
formulae or sets of words would be definitions; for there will be some name for any
set of words whatever, so that even the Iliad will be a definition), but where there is
a formula of something primary; and primary things are those which do not imply the
predication of one element in them of another element. Nothing, then, which is not a
species of a genus will have an essence-only species will have it, for these are
thought to imply not merely that the subject participates in the attribute and has it as
an affection, or has it by accident; but for ever thing else as well, if it has a name,
there be a formula of its meaning-viz. that this attribute belongs to this subject; or
instead of a simple formula we shall be able to give a more accurate one; but there
will be no definition nor essence.
"Or has 'definition', like 'what a thing is', several meanings? 'What a thing is' in
one
sense means substance and the 'this', in another one or other of the predicates,
quantity, quality, and the like. For as 'is' belongs to all things, not however in the
same sense, but to one sort of thing primarily and to others in a secondary way, so
too 'what a thing is' belongs in the simple sense to substance, but in a limited sense
to the other categories. For even of a quality we might ask what it is, so that quality
also is a 'what a thing is',-not in the simple sense, however, but just as, in the case of
that which is not, some say, emphasizing the linguistic form, that "that which is
not"
is- not is simply, but is non-existent; so too with quality.
4. In what sense does Aristotle think that qualities exist?
"We must no doubt inquire how we should express ourselves on each point, but
certainly not more than how the facts actually stand. And so now also, since it is
evident what language we use, essence will belong, just as 'what a thing is' does,
primarily and in the simple sense to substance, and in a secondary way to the other
categories also,-not essence in the simple sense, but the essence of a quality or of a
quantity. For it must be either by an equivocation that we say these are, or by
adding to and taking from the meaning of 'are' (in the way in which that which is not
known may be said to be known),-the truth being that we use the word neither
ambiguously nor in the same sense, but just as we apply the word 'medical' by virtue
of a reference to one and the same thing, not meaning one and the same thing, nor
yet speaking ambiguously; for a patient and an operation and an instrument are
called medical neither by an ambiguity nor with a single meaning, but with reference
to a common end. But it does not matter at all in which of the two ways one likes to
describe the facts; this is evident, that definition and essence in the primary and
simple sense belong to substances. Still they belong to other things as well, only not
in the primary sense. For if we suppose this it does not follow that there is a
definition of every word which means the same as any formula; it must mean the
same as a particular kind of formula; and this condition is satisfied if it is a formula
of
something which is one, not by continuity like the Iliad or the things that are one by
being bound together, but in one of the main senses of 'one', which answer to the
senses of 'is'; now 'that which is' in one sense denotes a 'this', in another a quantity,
in another a quality. And so there can be a formula or definition even of white man,
but not in the sense in which there is a definition either of white or of a substance.
Book VII - Part 16
"Evidently even of the things that are thought to be substances, most are only
potencies,-both the parts of animals (for none of them exists separately; and when
they are separated, then too they exist, all of them, merely as matter) and earth and
fire and air; for none of them is a unity, but as it were a mere heap, till they are
worked up and some unity is made out of them. One might most readily suppose the
parts of living things and the parts of the soul nearly related to them to turn out to be
both, i.e. existent in complete reality as well as in potency, because they have
sources of movement in something in their joints; for which reason some animals live
when divided. Yet all the parts must exist only potentially, when they are one and
continuous by nature,-not by force or by growing into one, for such a phenomenon
is an abnormality.
"Since the term 'unity' is used like the term 'being', and the substance of that
which is
one is one, and things whose substance is numerically one are numerically one,
evidently neither unity nor being can be the substance of things, just as being an
element or a principle cannot be the substance, but we ask what, then, the principle
is, that we may reduce the thing to something more knowable. Now of these
concepts 'being' and 'unity' are more substantial than 'principle' or 'element' or
'cause', but not even the former are substance, since in general nothing that is
common is substance; for substance does not belong to anything but to itself and to
that which has it, of which it is the substance. Further, that which is one cannot be in
many places at the same time, but that which is common is present in many places at
the same time; so that clearly no universal exists apart from its individuals.
"But those who say the Forms exist, in one respect are right, in giving the Forms
separate existence, if they are substances; but in another respect they are not right,
because they say the one over many is a Form. The reason for their doing this is that
they cannot declare what are the substances of this sort, the imperishable substances
which exist apart from the individual and sensible substances. They make them, then,
the same in kind as the perishable things (for this kind of substance we
know)--'man-himself' and 'horse-itself', adding to the sensible things the word 'itself'.
Yet even if we had not seen the stars, none the less, I suppose, would they have
been eternal substances apart from those which we knew; so that now also if we do
not know what non-sensible substances there are, yet it is doubtless necessary that
there should he some.-Clearly, then, no universal term is the name of a substance,
and no substance is composed of substances.
5. How does Aristotle disagreement with Plato's the theory of Forms?
Book VII - Part 17
"Let us state what, i.e. what kind of thing, substance should be said to be, taking
once more another starting-point; for perhaps from this we shall get a clear view
also of that substance which exists apart from sensible substances. Since, then,
substance is a principle and a cause, let us pursue it from this starting-point. The
'why' is always sought in this form--'why does one thing attach to some other?' For
to inquire why the musical man is a musical man, is either to inquire--as we have said
why the man is musical, or it is something else. Now 'why a thing is itself' is a
meaningless inquiry (for (to give meaning to the question 'why') the fact or the
existence of the thing must already be evident-e.g. that the moon is eclipsed-but the
fact that a thing is itself is the single reason and the single cause to be given in
answer
to all such questions as why the man is man, or the musician musical', unless one
were to answer 'because each thing is inseparable from itself, and its being one just
meant this'; this, however, is common to all things and is a short and easy way with
the question). But we can inquire why man is an animal of such and such a nature.
This, then, is plain, that we are not inquiring why he who is a man is a man. We are
inquiring, then, why something is predicable of something (that it is predicable must
be clear; for if not, the inquiry is an inquiry into nothing). E.g. why does it thunder?
This is the same as 'why is sound produced in the clouds?' Thus the inquiry is about
the predication of one thing of another. And why are these things, i.e. bricks and
stones, a house? Plainly we are seeking the cause. And this is the essence (to speak
abstractly), which in some cases is the end, e.g. perhaps in the case of a house or a
bed, and in some cases is the first mover; for this also is a cause. But while the
efficient cause is sought in the case of genesis and destruction, the final cause is
sought in the case of being also.
6. How/Why does Aristotle think that Platonists talk nonsense? Give an example.
"The object of the inquiry is most easily overlooked where one term is not expressly
predicated of another (e.g. when we inquire 'what man is'), because we do not
distinguish and do not say definitely that certain elements make up a certain whole.
But we must articulate our meaning before we begin to inquire; if not, the inquiry is
on the border-line between being a search for something and a search for nothing.
Since we must have the existence of the thing as something given, clearly the
question is why the matter is some definite thing; e.g. why are these materials a
house? Because that which was the essence of a house is present. And why is this
individual thing, or this body having this form, a man? Therefore what we seek is the
cause, i.e. the form, by reason of which the matter is some definite thing; and this is
the substance of the thing. Evidently, then, in the case of simple terms no inquiry nor
teaching is possible; our attitude towards such things is other than that of inquiry.
7. How would Aristotle answer differently than a Platonist: "Why are these materials
a house?"
"Since that which is compounded out of something so that the whole is one, not like
a heap but like a syllable-now the syllable is not its elements, ba is not the same as b
and a, nor is flesh fire and earth (for when these are separated the wholes, i.e. the
flesh and the syllable, no longer exist, but the elements of the syllable exist, and so
do fire and earth); the syllable, then, is something-not only its elements (the vowel
and the consonant) but also something else, and the flesh is not only fire and earth or
the hot and the cold, but also something else:-if, then, that something must itself be
either an element or composed of elements, (1) if it is an element the same argument
will again apply; for flesh will consist of this and fire and earth and something still
further, so that the process will go on to infinity. But (2) if it is a compound, clearly
it
will be a compound not of one but of more than one (or else that one will be the
thing itself), so that again in this case we can use the same argument as in the case of
flesh or of the syllable. But it would seem that this 'other' is something, and not an
element, and that it is the cause which makes this thing flesh and that a syllable. And
similarly in all other cases. And this is the substance of each thing (for this is the
primary cause of its being); and since, while some things are not substances, as
many as are substances are formed in accordance with a nature of their own and by
a process of nature, their substance would seem to be this kind of 'nature', which is
not an element but a principle. An element, on the other hand, is that into which a
thing is divided and which is present in it as matter; e.g. a and b are the elements of
the syllable.
Book VIII - Part 1
"WE must reckon up the results arising from what has been said, and compute the
sum of them, and put the finishing touch to our inquiry. We have said that the causes,
principles, and elements of substances are the object of our search. And some
substances are recognized by every one, but some have been advocated by
particular schools. Those generally recognized are the natural substances, i.e. fire,
earth, water, air, &c., the simple bodies; second plants and their parts, and animals
and the parts of animals; and finally the physical universe and its parts; while some
particular schools say that Forms and the objects of mathematics are substances.
But there are arguments which lead to the conclusion that there are other
substances, the essence and the substratum. Again, in another way the genus seems
more substantial than the various spccies, and the universal than the particulars. And
with the universal and the genus the Ideas are connected; it is in virtue of the same
argument that they are thought to be substances. And since the essence is substance,
and the definition is a formula of the essence, for this reason we have discussed
definition and essential predication. Since the definition is a formula, and a formula
has parts, we had to consider also with respect to the notion of 'part', what are parts
of the substance and what are not, and whether the parts of the substance are also
parts of the definition. Further, too, neither the universal nor the genus is a
substance; we must inquire later into the Ideas and the objects of mathematics; for
some say these are substances as well as the sensible substances.
"But now let us resume the discussion of the generally recognized substances. These
are the sensible substances, and sensible substances all have matter. The substratum
is substance, and this is in one sense the matter (and by matter I mean that which,
not being a 'this' actually, is potentially a 'this'), and in another sense the formula or
shape (that which being a 'this' can be separately formulated), and thirdly the
complex of these two, which alone is generated and destroyed, and is, without
qualification, capable of separate existence; for of substances completely expressible
in a formula some are separable and some are separable and some are not.
"But clearly matter also is substance; for in all the opposite changes that occur
there
is something which underlies the changes, e.g. in respect of place that which is now
here and again elsewhere, and in respect of increase that which is now of one size
and again less or greater, and in respect of alteration that which is now healthy and
again diseased; and similarly in respect of substance there is something that is now
being generated and again being destroyed, and now underlies the process as a 'this'
and again underlies it in respect of a privation of positive character. And in this
change the others are involved. But in either one or two of the others this is not
involved; for it is not necessary if a thing has matter for change of place that it should
also have matter for generation and destruction. The difference between becoming in
the full sense and becoming in a qualified sense has been stated in our physical works.
8. In what sense does Aristotle conclude that matter is also a substance?
Book VIII - Part 2
"Since the substance which exists as underlying and as matter is generally
recognized, and this that which exists potentially, it remains for us to say what is the
substance, in the sense of actuality, of sensible things. Democritus seems to think
there are three kinds of difference between things; the underlying body, the matter, is
one and the same, but they differ either in rhythm, i.e. shape, or in turning, i.e.
position, or in inter-contact, i.e. order. But evidently there are many differences; for
instance, some things are characterized by the mode of composition of their matter,
e.g. the things formed by blending, such as honey-water; and others by being bound
together, e.g. bundle; and others by being glued together, e.g. a book; and others by
being nailed together, e.g. a casket; and others in more than one of these ways; and
others by position, e.g. threshold and lintel (for these differ by being placed in a
certain way); and others by time, e.g. dinner and breakfast; and others by place, e.g.
the winds; and others by the affections proper to sensible things, e.g. hardness and
softness, density and rarity, dryness and wetness; and some things by some of these
qualities, others by them all, and in general some by excess and some by defect.
Clearly, then, the word 'is' has just as many meanings; a thing is a threshold because
it lies in such and such a position, and its being means its lying in that position, while
being ice means having been solidified in such and such a way. And the being of
some things will be defined by all these qualities, because some parts of them are
mixed, others are blended, others are bound together, others are solidified, and
others use the other differentiae; e.g. the hand or the foot requires such complex
definition. We must grasp, then, the kinds of differentiae (for these will be the
principles of the being of things), e.g. the things characterized by the more and the
less, or by the dense and the rare, and by other such qualities; for all these are forms
of excess and defect. And anything that is characterized by shape or by smoothness
and roughness is characterized by the straight and the curved. And for other things
their being will mean their being mixed, and their not being will mean the opposite.
"It is clear, then, from these facts that, since its substance is the cause of each
thing's
being, we must seek in these differentiae what is the cause of the being of each of
these things. Now none of these differentiae is substance, even when coupled with
matter, yet it is what is analogous to substance in each case; and as in substances
that which is predicated of the matter is the actuality itself, in all other definitions
also
it is what most resembles full actuality. E.g. if we had to define a threshold, we
should say 'wood or stone in such and such a position', and a house we should
define as 'bricks and timbers in such and such a position',(or a purpose may exist as
well in some cases), and if we had to define ice we should say 'water frozen or
solidified in such and such a way', and harmony is 'such and such a blending of high
and low'; and similarly in all other cases.
What are differentiae?
"Obviously, then, the actuality or the formula is different when the matter is
different;
for in some cases it is the composition, in others the mixing, and in others some other
of the attributes we have named. And so, of the people who go in for defining, those
who define a house as stones, bricks, and timbers are speaking of the potential
house, for these are the matter; but those who propose 'a receptacle to shelter
chattels and living beings', or something of the sort, speak of the actuality. Those
who combine both of these speak of the third kind of substance, which is composed
of matter and form (for the formula that gives the differentiae seems to be an account
of the form or actuality, while that which gives the components is rather an account
of the matter); and the same is true of the kind of definitions which Archytas used to
accept; they are accounts of the combined form and matter. E.g. what is still
weather? Absence of motion in a large expanse of air; air is the matter, and absence
of motion is the actuality and substance. What is a calm? Smoothness of sea; the
material substratum is the sea, and the actuality or shape is smoothness. It is obvious
then, from what has been said, what sensible substance is and how it exists-one kind
of it as matter, another as form or actuality, while the third kind is that which is
composed of these two.
9. What kind of definition does Aristotle think best describes what a house actually is?
(e.g. "3 tons of bricks, 750 ft of cooper pipe, 3000 board ft. of wood, 530 Pd of
metal
fixtures..." or "a receptacle to shelter chattel and living beings")
Book VIII - Part 6
"To return to the difficulty which has been stated with respect both to definitions
and
to numbers, what is the cause of their unity? In the case of all things which have
several parts and in which the totality is not, as it were, a mere heap, but the whole
is something beside the parts, there is a cause; for even in bodies contact is the
cause of unity in some cases, and in others viscosity or some other such quality. And
a definition is a set of words which is one not by being connected together, like the
Iliad, but by dealing with one object.-What then, is it that makes man one; why is he
one and not many, e.g. animal + biped, especially if there are, as some say, an
animal-itself and a biped-itself? Why are not those Forms themselves the man, so
that men would exist by participation not in man, nor in-one Form, but in two,
animal and biped, and in general man would be not one but more than one thing,
animal and biped?
10. What does the definition of man as "animal + biped" reveal to
Aristotle?
"Clearly, then, if people proceed thus in their usual manner of definition and
speech,
they cannot explain and solve the difficulty. But if, as we say, one element is matter
and another is form, and one is potentially and the other actually, the question will no
longer be thought a difficulty. For this difficulty is the same as would arise if 'round
bronze' were the definition of 'cloak'; for this word would be a sign of the definitory
formula, so that the question is, what is the cause of the unity of 'round' and
'bronze'? The difficulty disappears, because the one is matter, the other form. What,
then, causes this-that which was potentially to be actually-except, in the case of
things which are generated, the agent? For there is no other cause of the potential
sphere's becoming actually a sphere, but this was the essence of either. Of matter
some is intelligible, some perceptible, and in a formula there is always an element of
matter as well as one of actuality; e.g. the circle is 'a plane figure'. But of the things
which have no matter, either intelligible or perceptible, each is by its nature
essentially a kind of unity, as it is essentially a kind of being-individual substance,
quality, or quantity (and so neither 'existent' nor 'one' is present in their
definitions),
and the essence of each of them is by its very nature a kind of unity as it is a kind of
being-and so none of these has any reason outside itself, for being one, nor for being
a kind of being; for each is by its nature a kind of being and a kind of unity, not as
being in the genus 'being' or 'one' nor in the sense that being and unity can exist apart
from particulars.
"Owing to the difficulty about unity some speak of 'participation', and raise the
question, what is the cause of participation and what is it to participate; and others
speak of 'communion', as Lycophron says knowledge is a communion of knowing
with the soul; and others say life is a 'composition' or 'connexion' of soul with body.
Yet the same account applies to all cases; for being healthy, too, will on this showing
be either a 'communion' or a 'connexion' or a 'composition' of soul and health, and
the fact that the bronze is a triangle will be a 'composition' of bronze and triangle,
and the fact that a thing is white will be a 'composition' of surface and whiteness.
The reason is that people look for a unifying formula, and a difference, between
potency and complete reality. But, as has been said, the proximate matter and the
form are one and the same thing, the one potentially, and the other actually.
Therefore it is like asking what in general is the cause of unity and of a thing's being
one; for each thing is a unity, and the potential and the actual are somehow one.
Therefore there is no other cause here unless there is something which caused the
movement from potency into actuality. And all things which have no matter are
without qualification essentially unities.
Book IX - Part 6
"Since we have treated of the kind of potency which is related to movement, let us
discuss actuality-what, and what kind of thing, actuality is. For in the course of our
analysis it will also become clear, with regard to the potential, that we not only
ascribe potency to that whose nature it is to move something else, or to be moved
by something else, either without qualification or in some particular way, but also use
the word in another sense, which is the reason of the inquiry in the course of which
we have discussed these previous senses also. Actuality, then, is the existence of a
thing not in the way which we express by 'potentially'; we say that potentially, for
instance, a statue of Hermes is in the block of wood and the half-line is in the whole,
because it might be separated out, and we call even the man who is not studying a
man of science, if he is capable of studying; the thing that stands in contrast to each
of these exists actually. Our meaning can be seen in the particular cases by
induction, and we must not seek a definition of everything but be content to grasp
the analogy, that it is as that which is building is to that which is capable of building,
and the waking to the sleeping, and that which is seeing to that which has its eyes
shut but has sight, and that which has been shaped out of the matter to the matter,
and that which has been wrought up to the unwrought. Let actuality be defined by
one member of this antithesis, and the potential by the other. But all things are not
said in the same sense to exist actually, but only by analogy-as A is in B or to B, C
is in D or to D; for some are as movement to potency, and the others as substance
to some sort of matter.
"But also the infinite and the void and all similar things are said to exist
potentially
and actually in a different sense from that which applies to many other things, e.g. to
that which sees or walks or is seen. For of the latter class these predicates can at
some time be also truly asserted without qualification; for the seen is so called
sometimes because it is being seen, sometimes because it is capable of being seen.
But the infinite does not exist potentially in the sense that it will ever actually have
separate existence; it exists potentially only for knowledge. For the fact that the
process of dividing never comes to an end ensures that this activity exists potentially,
but not that the infinite exists separately.
"Since of the actions which have a limit none is an end but all are relative to the
end,
e.g. the removing of fat, or fat-removal, and the bodily parts themselves when one is
making them thin are in movement in this way (i.e. without being already that at
which the movement aims), this is not an action or at least not a complete one (for it
is not an end); but that movement in which the end is present is an action. E.g. at the
same time we are seeing and have seen, are understanding and have understood, are
thinking and have thought (while it is not true that at the same time we are learning
and have learnt, or are being cured and have been cured). At the same time we are
living well and have lived well, and are happy and have been happy. If not, the
process would have had sometime to cease, as the process of making thin ceases:
but, as things are, it does not cease; we are living and have lived. Of these
processes, then, we must call the one set movements, and the other actualities. For
every movement is incomplete-making thin, learning, walking, building; these are
movements, and incomplete at that. For it is not true that at the same time a thing is
walking and has walked, or is building and has built, or is coming to be and has
come to be, or is being moved and has been moved, but what is being moved is
different from what has been moved, and what is moving from what has moved. But
it is the same thing that at the same time has seen and is seeing, seeing, or is thinking
and has thought. The latter sort of process, then, I call an actuality, and the former a
movement.
Book IX - Part 8
"From our discussion of the various senses of 'prior', it is clear that actuality is
prior
to potency. And I mean by potency not only that definite kind which is said to be a
principle of change in another thing or in the thing itself regarded as other, but in
general every principle of movement or of rest. For nature also is in the same genus
as potency; for it is a principle of movement-not, however, in something else but in
the thing itself qua itself. To all such potency, then, actuality is prior both in formula
and in substantiality; and in time it is prior in one sense, and in another not.
"(1) Clearly it is prior in formula; for that which is in the primary sense potential
is
potential because it is possible for it to become active; e.g. I mean by 'capable of
building' that which can build, and by 'capable of seeing' that which can see, and by
'visible' that which can be seen. And the same account applies to all other cases, so
that the formula and the knowledge of the one must precede the knowledge of the
other.
"(2) In time it is prior in this sense: the actual which is identical in species
though not
in number with a potentially existing thing is to it. I mean that to this particular man
who now exists actually and to the corn and to the seeing subject the matter and the
seed and that which is capable of seeing, which are potentially a man and corn and
seeing, but not yet actually so, are prior in time; but prior in time to these are other
actually existing things, from which they were produced. For from the potentially
existing the actually existing is always produced by an actually existing thing, e.g.
man from man, musician by musician; there is always a first mover, and the mover
already exists actually. We have said in our account of substance that everything that
is produced is something produced from something and by something, and that the
same in species as it.
"This is why it is thought impossible to be a builder if one has built nothing or a
harper if one has never played the harp; for he who learns to play the harp learns to
play it by playing it, and all other learners do similarly. And thence arose the
sophistical quibble, that one who does not possess a science will be doing that
which is the object of the science; for he who is learning it does not possess it. But
since, of that which is coming to be, some part must have come to be, and, of that
which, in general, is changing, some part must have changed (this is shown in the
treatise on movement), he who is learning must, it would seem, possess some part of
the science. But here too, then, it is clear that actuality is in this sense also, viz. in
order of generation and of time, prior to potency.
"But (3) it is also prior in substantiality; firstly, (a) because the things that are
posterior in becoming are prior in form and in substantiality (e.g. man is prior to boy
and human being to seed; for the one already has its form, and the other has not),
and because everything that comes to be moves towards a principle, i.e. an end (for
that for the sake of which a thing is, is its principle, and the becoming is for the sake
of the end), and the actuality is the end, and it is for the sake of this that the potency
is acquired. For animals do not see in order that they may have sight, but they have
sight that they may see. And similarly men have the art of building that they may
build, and theoretical science that they may theorize; but they do not theorize that
they may have theoretical science, except those who are learning by practice; and
these do not theorize except in a limited sense, or because they have no need to
theorize. Further, matter exists in a potential state, just because it may come to its
form; and when it exists actually, then it is in its form. And the same holds good in all
cases, even those in which the end is a movement. And so, as teachers think they
have achieved their end when they have exhibited the pupil at work, nature does
likewise. For if this is not the case, we shall have Pauson's Hermes over again, since
it will be hard to say about the knowledge, as about the figure in the picture, whether
it is within or without. For the action is the end, and the actuality is the action. And
so even the word 'actuality' is derived from 'action', and points to the complete
reality.
"And while in some cases the exercise is the ultimate thing (e.g. in sight the
ultimate
thing is seeing, and no other product besides this results from sight), but from some
things a product follows (e.g. from the art of building there results a house as well as
the act of building), yet none the less the act is in the former case the end and in the
latter more of an end than the potency is. For the act of building is realized in the
thing that is being built, and comes to be, and is, at the same time as the house.
"Where, then, the result is something apart from the exercise, the actuality is in
the
thing that is being made, e.g. the act of building is in the thing that is being built and
that of weaving in the thing that is being woven, and similarly in all other cases, and
in general the movement is in the thing that is being moved; but where there is no
product apart from the actuality, the actuality is present in the agents, e.g. the act of
seeing is in the seeing subject and that of theorizing in the theorizing subject and the
life is in the soul (and therefore well-being also; for it is a certain kind of life).
"Obviously, therefore, the substance or form is actuality. According to this
argument,
then, it is obvious that actuality is prior in substantial being to potency; and as we
have said, one actuality always precedes another in time right back to the actuality of
the eternal prime mover.
"But (b) actuality is prior in a stricter sense also; for eternal things are prior in
substance to perishable things, and no eternal thing exists potentially. The reason is
this. Every potency is at one and the same time a potency of the opposite; for, while
that which is not capable of being present in a subject cannot be present, everything
that is capable of being may possibly not be actual. That, then, which is capable of
being may either be or not be; the same thing, then, is capable both of being and of
not being. And that which is capable of not being may possibly not be; and that
which may possibly not be is perishable, either in the full sense, or in the precise
sense in which it is said that it possibly may not be, i.e. in respect either of place or
of quantity or quality; 'in the full sense' means 'in respect of substance'. Nothing,
then, which is in the full sense imperishable is in the full sense potentially existent
(though there is nothing to prevent its being so in some respect, e.g. potentially of a
certain quality or in a certain place); all imperishable things, then, exist actually. Nor
can anything which is of necessity exist potentially; yet these things are primary; for if
these did not exist, nothing would exist. Nor does eternal movement, if there be
such, exist potentially; and, if there is an eternal mobile, it is not in motion in virtue
of
a potentiality, except in respect of 'whence' and 'whither' (there is nothing to prevent
its having matter which makes it capable of movement in various directions). And so
the sun and the stars and the whole heaven are ever active, and there is no fear that
they may sometime stand still, as the natural philosophers fear they may. Nor do
they tire in this activity; for movement is not for them, as it is for perishable things,
connected with the potentiality for opposites, so that the continuity of the movement
should be laborious; for it is that kind of substance which is matter and potency, not
actuality, that causes this.
"Imperishable things are imitated by those that are involved in change, e.g. earth
and
fire. For these also are ever active; for they have their movement of themselves and
in themselves. But the other potencies, according to our previous discussion, are all
potencies for opposites; for that which can move another in this way can also move
it not in this way, i.e. if it acts according to a rational formula; and the same
non-rational potencies will produce opposite results by their presence or absence.
"If, then, there are any entities or substances such as the dialecticians say the
Ideas
are, there must be something much more scientific than science-itself and something
more mobile than movement-itself; for these will be more of the nature of actualities,
while science-itself and movement-itself are potencies for these.
"Obviously, then, actuality is prior both to potency and to every principle of
change.
Challenge Question: Philosophers have always tried to explain how we can look
at two separate objects and identify them as the same thing. Plato explained this
phenomena with the doctrine of the Forms. Do you think that Aristotle has provided a
satisfactory substitute for this theory?
End of second reading.
_________________________________________________________________
Book I - Part 2
"Since we are seeking this knowledge, we must inquire of what kind are the causes
and the principles, the knowledge of which is Wisdom. If one were to take the
notions we have about the wise man, this might perhaps make the answer more
evident. We suppose first, then, that the wise man knows all things, as far as
possible, although he has not knowledge of each of them in detail; secondly, that he
who can learn things that are difficult, and not easy for man to know, is wise
(sense-perception is common to all, and therefore easy and no mark of Wisdom);
again, that he who is more exact and more capable of teaching the causes is wiser,
in every branch of knowledge; and that of the sciences, also, that which is desirable
on its own account and for the sake of knowing it is more of the nature of Wisdom
than that which is desirable on account of its results, and the superior science is
more of the nature of Wisdom than the ancillary; for the wise man must not be
ordered but must order, and he must not obey another, but the less wise must obey
him.
1. What, according to Aristotle, are the characteristics of a wise man?
"Such and so many are the notions, then, which we have about Wisdom and the
wise. Now of these characteristics that of knowing all things must belong to him who
has in the highest degree universal knowledge; for he knows in a sense all the
instances that fall under the universal. And these things, the most universal, are on
the whole the hardest for men to know; for they are farthest from the senses. And
the most exact of the sciences are those which deal most with first principles; for
those which involve fewer principles are more exact than those which involve
additional principles, e.g. arithmetic than geometry. But the science which
investigates causes is also instructive, in a higher degree, for the people who instruct
us are those who tell the causes of each thing. And understanding and knowledge
pursued for their own sake are found most in the knowledge of that which is most
knowable (for he who chooses to know for the sake of knowing will choose most
readily that which is most truly knowledge, and such is the knowledge of that which
is most knowable); and the first principles and the causes are most knowable; for by
reason of these, and from these, all other things come to be known, and not these by
means of the things subordinate to them. And the science which knows to what end
each thing must be done is the most authoritative of the sciences, and more
authoritative than any ancillary science; and this end is the good of that thing, and in
general the supreme good in the whole of nature. Judged by all the tests we have
mentioned, then, the name in question falls to the same science; this must be a
science that investigates the first principles and causes; for the good, i.e. the end, is
one of the causes.
"That it is not a science of production is clear even from the history of the
earliest
philosophers. For it is owing to their wonder that men both now begin and at first
began to philosophize; they wondered originally at the obvious difficulties, then
advanced little by little and stated difficulties about the greater matters, e.g. about
the
phenomena of the moon and those of the sun and of the stars, and about the genesis
of the universe. And a man who is puzzled and wonders thinks himself ignorant
(whence even the lover of myth is in a sense a lover of Wisdom, for the myth is
composed of wonders); therefore since they philosophized order to escape from
ignorance, evidently they were pursuing science in order to know, and not for any
utilitarian end. And this is confirmed by the facts; for it was when almost all the
necessities of life and the things that make for comfort and recreation had been
secured, that such knowledge began to be sought. Evidently then we do not seek it
for the sake of any other advantage; but as the man is free, we say, who exists for
his own sake and not for another's, so we pursue this as the only free science, for it
alone exists for its own sake.
"Hence also the possession of it might be justly regarded as beyond human power;
for in many ways human nature is in bondage, so that according to Simonides 'God
alone can have this privilege', and it is unfitting that man should not be content to
seek the knowledge that is suited to him. If, then, there is something in what the
poets say, and jealousy is natural to the divine power, it would probably occur in
this case above all, and all who excelled in this knowledge would be unfortunate.
But the divine power cannot be jealous (nay, according to the proverb, 'bards tell a
lie'), nor should any other science be thought more honourable than one of this sort.
For the most divine science is also most honourable; and this science alone must be,
in two ways, most divine. For the science which it would be most meet for God to
have is a divine science, and so is any science that deals with divine objects; and this
science alone has both these qualities; for (1) God is thought to be among the causes
of all things and to be a first principle, and (2) such a science either God alone can
have, or God above all others. All the sciences, indeed, are more necessary than
this, but none is better.
"Yet the acquisition of it must in a sense end in something which is the opposite of
our original inquiries. For all men begin, as we said, by wondering that things are as
they are, as they do about self-moving marionettes, or about the solstices or the
incommensurability of the diagonal of a square with the side; for it seems wonderful
to all who have not yet seen the reason, that there is a thing which cannot be
measured even by the smallest unit. But we must end in the contrary and, according
to the proverb, the better state, as is the case in these instances too when men learn
the cause; for there is nothing which would surprise a geometer so much as if the
diagonal turned out to be commensurable.
"We have stated, then, what is the nature of the science we are searching for, and
what is the mark which our search and our whole investigation must reach.
Book I - Part 3
"Evidently we have to acquire knowledge of the original causes (for we say we
know each thing only when we think we recognize its first cause), and causes are
spoken of in four senses. In one of these we mean the substance, i.e. the essence
(for the 'why' is reducible finally to the definition, and the ultimate 'why' is a cause
and principle); in another the matter or substratum, in a third the source of the
change, and in a fourth the cause opposed to this, the purpose and the good (for this
is the end of all generation and change). We have studied these causes sufficiently in
our work on nature, but yet let us call to our aid those who have attacked the
investigation of being and philosophized about reality before us. For obviously they
too speak of certain principles and causes; to go over their views, then, will be of
profit to the present inquiry, for we shall either find another kind of cause, or be
more convinced of the correctness of those which we now maintain.
"Of the first philosophers, then, most thought the principles which were of the
nature
of matter were the only principles of all things. That of which all things that are
consist, the first from which they come to be, the last into which they are resolved
(the substance remaining, but changing in its modifications), this they say is the
element and this the principle of things, and therefore they think nothing is either
generated or destroyed, since this sort of entity is always conserved, as we say
Socrates neither comes to be absolutely when he comes to be beautiful or musical,
nor ceases to be when loses these characteristics, because the substratum, Socrates
himself remains. just so they say nothing else comes to be or ceases to be; for there
must be some entity-either one or more than one-from which all other things come
to be, it being conserved.
"Yet they do not all agree as to the number and the nature of these principles.
Thales, the founder of this type of philosophy, says the principle is water (for which
reason he declared that the earth rests on water), getting the notion perhaps from
seeing that the nutriment of all things is moist, and that heat itself is generated from
the moist and kept alive by it (and that from which they come to be is a principle of
all things). He got his notion from this fact, and from the fact that the seeds of all
things have a moist nature, and that water is the origin of the nature of moist things.
"Some think that even the ancients who lived long before the present generation, and
first framed accounts of the gods, had a similar view of nature; for they made Ocean
and Tethys the parents of creation, and described the oath of the gods as being by
water, to which they give the name of Styx; for what is oldest is most honourable,
and the most honourable thing is that by which one swears. It may perhaps be
uncertain whether this opinion about nature is primitive and ancient, but Thales at
any rate is said to have declared himself thus about the first cause. Hippo no one
would think fit to include among these thinkers, because of the paltriness of his
thought.
"Anaximenes and Diogenes make air prior to water, and the most primary of the
simple bodies, while Hippasus of Metapontium and Heraclitus of Ephesus say this of
fire, and Empedocles says it of the four elements (adding a fourth-earth-to those
which have been named); for these, he says, always remain and do not come to be,
except that they come to be more or fewer, being aggregated into one and
segregated out of one.
"Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, who, though older than Empedocles, was later in his
philosophical activity, says the principles are infinite in number; for he says almost all
the things that are made of parts like themselves, in the manner of water or fire, are
generated and destroyed in this way, only by aggregation and segregation, and are
not in any other sense generated or destroyed, but remain eternally.
"From these facts one might think that the only cause is the so-called material
cause;
but as men thus advanced, the very facts opened the way for them and joined in
forcing them to investigate the subject. However true it may be that all generation
and destruction proceed from some one or (for that matter) from more elements,
why does this happen and what is the cause? For at least the substratum itself does
not make itself change; e.g. neither the wood nor the bronze causes the change of
either of them, nor does the wood manufacture a bed and the bronze a statue, but
something else is the cause of the change. And to seek this is to seek the second
cause, as we should say,-that from which comes the beginning of the movement.
Now those who at the very beginning set themselves to this kind of inquiry, and said
the substratum was one, were not at all dissatisfied with themselves; but some at
least of those who maintain it to be one-as though defeated by this search for the
second cause-say the one and nature as a whole is unchangeable not only in respect
of generation and destruction (for this is a primitive belief, and all agreed in it), but
also of all other change; and this view is peculiar to them. Of those who said the
universe was one, then none succeeded in discovering a cause of this sort, except
perhaps Parmenides, and he only inasmuch as he supposes that there is not only one
but also in some sense two causes. But for those who make more elements it is
more possible to state the second cause, e.g. for those who make hot and cold, or
fire and earth, the elements; for they treat fire as having a nature which fits it to move
things, and water and earth and such things they treat in the contrary way.
"When these men and the principles of this kind had had their day, as the latter were
found inadequate to generate the nature of things men were again forced by the truth
itself, as we said, to inquire into the next kind of cause. For it is not likely either
that
fire or earth or any such element should be the reason why things manifest goodness
and, beauty both in their being and in their coming to be, or that those thinkers
should have supposed it was; nor again could it be right to entrust so great a matter
to spontaneity and chance. When one man said, then, that reason was present-as in
animals, so throughout nature-as the cause of order and of all arrangement, he
seemed like a sober man in contrast with the random talk of his predecessors. We
know that Anaxagoras certainly adopted these views, but Hermotimus of
Clazomenae is credited with expressing them earlier. Those who thought thus stated
that there is a principle of things which is at the same time the cause of beauty, and
that sort of cause from which things acquire movement.
2. Why were the primal elements not a sufficient explanation for the nature of things?
Book I - Part 4
"One might suspect that Hesiod was the first to look for such a thing-or some one
else who put love or desire among existing things as a principle, as Parmenides, too,
does; for he, in constructing the genesis of the universe, says: ""Love first of
all the
Gods she planned. " "And Hesiod says:- ""First of all things was
chaos made, and
then "Broad-breasted earth... "And love, 'mid all the gods pre-eminent, "
which implies that among existing things there must be from the first a cause which
will move things and bring them together. How these thinkers should be arranged
with regard to priority of discovery let us be allowed to decide later; but since the
contraries of the various forms of good were also perceived to be present in
nature-not only order and the beautiful, but also disorder and the ugly, and bad
things in greater number than good, and ignoble things than beautiful-therefore
another thinker introduced friendship and strife, each of the two the cause of one of
these two sets of qualities. For if we were to follow out the view of Empedocles,
and interpret it according to its meaning and not to its lisping expression, we should
find that friendship is the cause of good things, and strife of bad. Therefore, if we
said that Empedocles in a sense both mentions, and is the first to mention, the bad
and the good as principles, we should perhaps be right, since the cause of all goods
is the good itself.
"These thinkers, as we say, evidently grasped, and to this extent, two of the causes
which we distinguished in our work on nature-the matter and the source of the
movement-vaguely, however, and with no clearness, but as untrained men behave in
fights; for they go round their opponents and often strike fine blows, but they do not
fight on scientific principles, and so too these thinkers do not seem to know what
they say; for it is evident that, as a rule, they make no use of their causes except to a
small extent. For Anaxagoras uses reason as a deus ex machina for the making of
the world, and when he is at a loss to tell from what cause something necessarily is,
then he drags reason in, but in all other cases ascribes events to anything rather than
to reason. And Empedocles, though he uses the causes to a greater extent than this,
neither does so sufficiently nor attains consistency in their use. At least, in many
cases he makes love segregate things, and strife aggregate them. For whenever the
universe is dissolved into its elements by strife, fire is aggregated into one, and so is
each of the other elements; but whenever again under the influence of love they
come together into one, the parts must again be segregated out of each element.
"Empedocles, then, in contrast with his precessors, was the first to introduce the
dividing of this cause, not positing one source of movement, but different and
contrary sources. Again, he was the first to speak of four material elements; yet he
does not use four, but treats them as two only; he treats fire by itself, and its
opposite-earth, air, and water-as one kind of thing. We may learn this by study of
his verses.
"This philosopher then, as we say, has spoken of the principles in this way, and
made them of this number. Leucippus and his associate Democritus say that the full
and the empty are the elements, calling the one being and the other non-being-the
full and solid being being, the empty non-being (whence they say being no more is
than non-being, because the solid no more is than the empty); and they make these
the material causes of things. And as those who make the underlying substance one
generate all other things by its modifications, supposing the rare and the dense to be
the sources of the modifications, in the same way these philosophers say the
differences in the elements are the causes of all other qualities. These differences,
they say, are three-shape and order and position. For they say the real is
differentiated only by 'rhythm and 'inter-contact' and 'turning'; and of these rhythm is
shape, inter-contact is order, and turning is position; for A differs from N in shape,
AN from NA in order, M from W in position. The question of movement-whence
or how it is to belong to things-these thinkers, like the others, lazily neglected.
"Regarding the two causes, then, as we say, the inquiry seems to have been pushed
thus far by the early philosophers.
Book I - Part 5
"Contemporaneously with these philosophers and before them, the so-called
Pythagoreans, who were the first to take up mathematics, not only advanced this
study, but also having been brought up in it they thought its principles were the
principles of all things. Since of these principles numbers are by nature the first, and
in numbers they seemed to see many resemblances to the things that exist and come
into being-more than in fire and earth and water (such and such a modification of
numbers being justice, another being soul and reason, another being opportunity-and
similarly almost all other things being numerically expressible); since, again, they saw
that the modifications and the ratios of the musical scales were expressible in
numbers;-since, then, all other things seemed in their whole nature to be modelled on
numbers, and numbers seemed to be the first things in the whole of nature, they
supposed the elements of numbers to be the elements of all things, and the whole
heaven to be a musical scale and a number. And all the properties of numbers and
scales which they could show to agree with the attributes and parts and the whole
arrangement of the heavens, they collected and fitted into their scheme; and if there
was a gap anywhere, they readily made additions so as to make their whole theory
coherent. E.g. as the number 10 is thought to be perfect and to comprise the whole
nature of numbers, they say that the bodies which move through the heavens are ten,
but as the visible bodies are only nine, to meet this they invent a tenth--the
'counter-earth'. We have discussed these matters more exactly elsewhere.
"But the object of our review is that we may learn from these philosophers also what
they suppose to be the principles and how these fall under the causes we have
named. Evidently, then, these thinkers also consider that number is the principle both
as matter for things and as forming both their modifications and their permanent
states, and hold that the elements of number are the even and the odd, and that of
these the latter is limited, and the former unlimited; and that the One proceeds from
both of these (for it is both even and odd), and number from the One; and that the
whole heaven, as has been said, is numbers.
"Other members of this same school say there are ten principles, which they arrange
in two columns of cognates-limit and unlimited, odd and even, one and plurality,
right and left, male and female, resting and moving, straight and curved, light and
darkness, good and bad, square and oblong. In this way Alcmaeon of Croton
seems also to have conceived the matter, and either he got this view from them or
they got it from him; for he expressed himself similarly to them. For he says most
human affairs go in pairs, meaning not definite contrarieties such as the Pythagoreans
speak of, but any chance contrarieties, e.g. white and black, sweet and bitter, good
and bad, great and small. He threw out indefinite suggestions about the other
contrarieties, but the Pythagoreans declared both how many and which their
contraricties are.
"From both these schools, then, we can learn this much, that the contraries are the
principles of things; and how many these principles are and which they are, we can
learn from one of the two schools. But how these principles can be brought together
under the causes we have named has not been clearly and articulately stated by
them; they seem, however, to range the elements under the head of matter; for out
of these as immanent parts they say substance is composed and moulded.
"From these facts we may sufficiently perceive the meaning of the ancients who said
the elements of nature were more than one; but there are some who spoke of the
universe as if it were one entity, though they were not all alike either in the excellence
of their statement or in its conformity to the facts of nature. The discussion of them is
in no way appropriate to our present investigation of causes, for. they do not, like
some of the natural philosophers, assume being to be one and yet generate it out of
the one as out of matter, but they speak in another way; those others add change,
since they generate the universe, but these thinkers say the universe is unchangeable.
Yet this much is germane to the present inquiry: Parmenides seems to fasten on that
which is one in definition, Melissus on that which is one in matter, for which reason
the former says that it is limited, the latter that it is unlimited; while Xenophanes, the
first of these partisans of the One (for Parmenides is said to have been his pupil),
gave no clear statement, nor does he seem to have grasped the nature of either of
these causes, but with reference to the whole material universe he says the One is
God. Now these thinkers, as we said, must be neglected for the purposes of the
present inquiry-two of them entirely, as being a little too naive, viz. Xenophanes and
Melissus; but Parmenides seems in places to speak with more insight. For, claiming
that, besides the existent, nothing non-existent exists, he thinks that of necessity one
thing exists, viz. the existent and nothing else (on this we have spoken more clearly in
our work on nature), but being forced to follow the observed facts, and supposing
the existence of that which is one in definition, but more than one according to our
sensations, he now posits two causes and two principles, calling them hot and cold,
i.e. fire and earth; and of these he ranges the hot with the existent, and the other with
the non-existent.
"From what has been said, then, and from the wise men who have now sat in council
with us, we have got thus much-on the one hand from the earliest philosophers, who
regard the first principle as corporeal (for water and fire and such things are bodies),
and of whom some suppose that there is one corporeal principle, others that there
are more than one, but both put these under the head of matter; and on the other
hand from some who posit both this cause and besides this the source of movement,
which we have got from some as single and from others as twofold.
"Down to the Italian school, then, and apart from it, philosophers have treated these
subjects rather obscurely, except that, as we said, they have in fact used two kinds
of cause, and one of these-the source of movement-some treat as one and others as
two. But the Pythagoreans have said in the same way that there are two principles,
but added this much, which is peculiar to them, that they thought that finitude and
infinity were not attributes of certain other things, e.g. of fire or earth or anything
else
of this kind, but that infinity itself and unity itself were the substance of the things
of
which they are predicated. This is why number was the substance of all things. On
this subject, then, they expressed themselves thus; and regarding the question of
essence they began to make statements and definitions, but treated the matter too
simply. For they both defined superficially and thought that the first subject of which
a given definition was predicable was the substance of the thing defined, as if one
supposed that 'double' and '2' were the same, because 2 is the first thing of which
'double' is predicable. But surely to be double and to be 2 are not the same; if they
are, one thing will be many-a consequence which they actually drew. From the
earlier philosophers, then, and from their successors we can learn thus much.
Book I - Part 6
"After the systems we have named came the philosophy of Plato, which in most
respects followed these thinkers, but had pecullarities that distinguished it from the
philosophy of the Italians. For, having in his youth first become familiar with Cratylus
and with the Heraclitean doctrines (that all sensible things are ever in a state of flux
and there is no knowledge about them), these views he held even in later years.
Socrates, however, was busying himself about ethical matters and neglecting the
world of nature as a whole but seeking the universal in these ethical matters, and
fixed thought for the first time on definitions; Plato accepted his teaching, but held
that the problem applied not to sensible things but to entities of another kind-for this
reason, that the common definition could not be a definition of any sensible thing, as
they were always changing. Things of this other sort, then, he called Ideas, and
sensible things, he said, were all named after these, and in virtue of a relation to
these; for the many existed by participation in the Ideas that have the same name as
they. Only the name 'participation' was new; for the Pythagoreans say that things
exist by 'imitation' of numbers, and Plato says they exist by participation, changing
the name. But what the participation or the imitation of the Forms could be they left
an open question.
"Further, besides sensible things and Forms he says there are the objects of
mathematics, which occupy an intermediate position, differing from sensible things in
being eternal and unchangeable, from Forms in that there are many alike, while the
Form itself is in each case unique.
"Since the Forms were the causes of all other things, he thought their elements were
the elements of all things. As matter, the great and the small were principles; as
essential reality, the One; for from the great and the small, by participation in the
One, come the Numbers.
"But he agreed with the Pythagoreans in saying that the One is substance and not a
predicate of something else; and in saying that the Numbers are the causes of the
reality of other things he agreed with them; but positing a dyad and constructing the
infinite out of great and small, instead of treating the infinite as one, is peculiar to
him;
and so is his view that the Numbers exist apart from sensible things, while they say
that the things themselves are Numbers, and do not place the objects of
mathematics between Forms and sensible things. His divergence from the
Pythagoreans in making the One and the Numbers separate from things, and his
introduction of the Forms, were due to his inquiries in the region of definitions (for
the earlier thinkers had no tincture of dialectic), and his making the other entity
besides the One a dyad was due to the belief that the numbers, except those which
were prime, could be neatly produced out of the dyad as out of some plastic
material. Yet what happens is the contrary; the theory is not a reasonable one. For
they make many things out of the matter, and the form generates only once, but what
we observe is that one table is made from one matter, while the man who applies the
form, though he is one, makes many tables. And the relation of the male to the
female is similar; for the latter is impregnated by one copulation, but the male
impregnates many females; yet these are analogues of those first principles.
"Plato, then, declared himself thus on the points in question; it is evident from
what
has been said that he has used only two causes, that of the essence and the material
cause (for the Forms are the causes of the essence of all other things, and the One is
the cause of the essence of the Forms); and it is evident what the underlying matter
is, of which the Forms are predicated in the case of sensible things, and the One in
the case of Forms, viz. that this is a dyad, the great and the small. Further, he has
assigned the cause of good and that of evil to the elements, one to each of the two,
as we say some of his predecessors sought to do, e.g. Empedocles and
Anaxagoras.
Book I - Part 7
"Our review of those who have spoken about first principles and reality and of the
way in which they have spoken, has been concise and summary; but yet we have
learnt this much from them, that of those who speak about 'principle' and 'cause' no
one has mentioned any principle except those which have been distinguished in our
work on nature, but all evidently have some inkling of them, though only vaguely.
For some speak of the first principle as matter, whether they suppose one or more
first principles, and whether they suppose this to be a body or to be incorporeal;
e.g. Plato spoke of the great and the small, the Italians of the infinite, Empedocles of
fire, earth, water, and air, Anaxagoras of the infinity of things composed of similar
parts. These, then, have all had a notion of this kind of cause, and so have all who
speak of air or fire or water, or something denser than fire and rarer than air; for
some have said the prime element is of this kind.
"These thinkers grasped this cause only; but certain others have mentioned the
source of movement, e.g. those who make friendship and strife, or reason, or love, a
principle.
"The essence, i.e. the substantial reality, no one has expressed distinctly. It is
hinted