is obvious that there must be some underlying subject which undergoes the change, since it is only a conerete something that can have that ‘ substantive existence,’ the characteristic of which is that it can itself be predicated of no other subject, but is itsclf the subject of which all the other categories are predicated; but on further consideration it will be equally obvious that a substance also, or anything, whether natural or artificial, thal exists independenily, proceeds from something that may be regarded as the subject of that change which results in its coming into being; for in every case there is something already there, out of which the resultant thing comes; for instance the + sperm of a plant or animal. ‘The processes by which things ‘come into existence ’ in this absolute sense may be divided into (1) change of shape, as with the statue made of bronze, or (2) additions, as in things that grow, or (8) subtractions, as when a block of marble is chipped into a Hermes, or (4) combination, as in, building a house, or (5) such modifications as affect the properties of the material itself. Clearly, then, all the processes that result in anything ‘coming to exist ' in this absolute sense start with some subject that is already there to undergo the process.
From all this it is clear that anything that ‘ be- comes’? is always complex: there is (1) something that begins to exist (the new element of form), and (2) something that ‘ comes to be this ’ (comes to have this form); and this second thing may be regarded under two aspects—as the subject which persists, or as the contrasted qualification (which the new form will replace). For instance, in the uncultivated man who becomes cultivated, ‘ uncultivated ’ is the con- trasted qualification, ‘man,’ the subject; or, when val ARISTOTLE 19013 dvOpwrov καὶ τὴν μὲν ἀσχημοσύνην καὶ τὴν ἀμορφίαν καὶ τὴν ἀταξίαν τὸ ἀντικείμενον, τὸν δὲ χαλκὸν ἢ τὸν λίθον ἢ τὸν χρυσὸν τὸ ὑποκείμενον. φανερὸν οὖν ὡς, εἴπερ εἰσὶν αἰτίαι καὶ ἀρχαὶ τῶν ἢ ΕΣ δ a a 2." ι fa ἧς φύσει ὄντων, ἐξ ὧν πρώτων εἰσὶ καὶ γεγόνασι μὴ “ κατὰ συμβεβηκὸς ἀλλ’ ἕκαστον ὃ λέγεται κατὰ 20 τὴν οὐσίαν, ὅτι γίγνεται πᾶν ἔκ τε τοῦ ὑποκειμένου καὶ τῆς μορφῆς" σύγκειται yap ὁ μουσικὸς ἄν- θρωπος ἐξ ἀνθρώπου καὶ μουσικοῦ τρόπον τινά' > διαλύσεις yap τοὺς λόγους εἰς τοὺς λόγους τοὺς 2 FA lal a. ς A 2 ON ‘ 7 ἐκείνων. δῆλον οὖν ὡς γίνοιτ᾽ ἂν τὰ γιγνόμενα ἐκ τούτων. Ἔστι δὲ τὸ μὲν ὑποκείμενον ἀριθμῷ μὲν ἕν οὐ εἴδει δὲ δύο--- μὲν yap ἄνθρωπος Kal 6 χρυσὸς καὶ ὅλως ἡ ὕλη ἀριθμητή" τόδε γάρ τι μᾶλλον, καὶ οὐ κατὰ συμβεβηκὸς ἐξ αὐτοῦ γίνεται τὸ γιγνόμενον, ἡ δὲ στέρησις καὶ ἡ ἐναντίωσις συμ- BeBnxds—év δὲ τὸ εἶδος, οἷον ἡ τάξις ἢ ἡ μουσικὴ sy a u lat 4 ra ἢ τῶν ἄλλων τι τῶν οὕτω κατηγορουμένων. 80 διὸ ἔστι μὲν ὡς δύο λεκτέον εἶναι τὰς ἀρχάς, ἔστι δ᾽ ς a Vo” A ε 3, ες ὡς τρεῖς" καὶ ἔστι μὲν ὡς τἀναντία---οἷον εἴ τις λέγοι τὸ μουσικὸν καὶ τὸ ἄμουσον, ἢ τὸ θερμὸν καὶ τὸ ψυχρόν, ἢ τὸ ἡρμοσμένον καὶ τὸ ἀνάρ- 78 PHYSICS, I. vit.
the sLatue is made, the contrasted qualification is the unshapeliness, formlessness, want of purposeful arrangement; the subject is the bronze or marble or gold. If, then, we grant that the things of Nature have ultimate determinants and principles which constitute them, and also that we can speak of them ‘coming to be ’ notin an incidental but in an essential sense—so as to come to be the things they are and which their names imply, not having been so before —then it 1s obvious that they are composed, in every case, of the underlying subject and the ‘ form ’ which their defining properties give toit; for the cultivated man is in a way ‘ compact’ of the subject ‘ man’ and the qualification ‘ cullivated,’ for the definition of such a compositum may always be resolved into the definitions of these two components. Clearly then these are the elements, or factors, oul of which things that ‘ come to be ’ arise.
Now the subject is numerically one thing, but has two conceptually distinct aspects, for the man, or the gold, or the material factor in general is a thing that can be counted, since it may almost be regarded as a concrete individual thing and is not an incidental factor in the generation of what comes into being; whereas the negation of the emergent qualification or the presence of its opposite is incidental. On the other hand, the furm—e.g. the‘ order ’ or the‘ culture’ or any other such predicable qualification—is also one thing. So there is a sense in which the ultimate principles of the sum of changing things are two, but asense in which they are three; for the actual change itself takes place between the terms of an antithesis, such as cultivated and uncultivated, hot and cold, articulated and unarticulated, and so forth; but from 79 ἢ 10 ARISTOTLE μοστον---ἔστι δ᾽ ὡς ot ὑπ᾽ ἀλλήλων γὰρ πάσχειν τἀναντία ἀδύνατον. λύεται δὲ καὶ τοῦτο διὰ τὸ ἄλλο εἶναι τὸ ὑποκείμενον' τοῦτο γὰρ οὐκ ἐναντίον. ὥστε οὔτε πλείους τῶν ἐναντίων αἱ ἀρχαὶ τρόπον τινά, ἀλλὰ δύο ὡς εἰπεῖν τῷ ἀριθμῷ, οὔτ᾽ αὖ παντελῶς δύο, διὰ τὸ ἕτερον ὑπάρχειν τὸ εἶναι αὐτοῖς, ἀλλὰ τρεῖς" ἕτερον γὰρ τὸ ἀνθρώπῳ καὶ τὸ ἀμούσῳ εἶναι, καὶ τὸ ἀσχηματίστῳ καὶ χαλκῷ.
Πόσαι μὲν οὖν αἱ ἀρχαὶ τῶν περὶ γένεσιν φυ- σικῶν, καὶ πῶς πόσαι, εἴρηται" καὶ δῆλόν ἐστιν ὅτι δεῖ ὑποκεῖσθαἑ τι τοῖς ἐναντίοις καὶ τἀναντία δύο εἶναι.
Τρ ὅπον δέ τινα ἄλλον οὐκ ἀναγκαῖον" ἱκανὸν γὰρ ἔσται τὸ ἕτερον τῶν ἐναντίων ποιεῖν τῇ ἀπουσίᾳ καὶ παρουσίᾳ τὴν μεταβολήν. ἡ δ᾽ ὑποκειμένη φύσις ἐπιστητὴ κατ᾽ ἀναλογίαν" ὡς γὰρ πρὸς ἀνδριάντα χαλκὸς ἢ πρὸς κλίνην ξύλον ἢ πρὸς ἄλλο' τι τῶν ἐχόντων μορφὴν ἡ ὕλη καὶ τὸ ἄμορφον ἔχει πρὶν λαβεῖν τὴν μορφήν, οὕτως αὕτη πρὸς οὐσίαν ἔχει καὶ τὸ τόδε τι καὶ τὸ ὄν. μία μὲν οὖν ἀρχὴ αὕτη (οὐχ οὕτω μία οὖσα οὐδὲ οὕτως ἕν ὡς 1 [ἄλλο Simplic. 996. 7: ἄλλων Fs τῶν ἄλλων cett.—C.]
α [Laterally, ‘and in a sense (we may describe these principles aay “the contraries””...in a sense, not’; 7.8. according as the ambiguous phrases τὸ μουσικόν, τὸ ἅμουσον, etc., mean (1) the subject with the (positive or negative) qualification—this is not really a ‘contrary ’—or (2) the (negative) qualification only—the contrary proper, which cannot be acted upon by its contrary (cf. 16εἰ. 1075 a > [Or (reading ὃν for ἔν with ἘΠ), ‘ not having the same sort of unity nar the same sort of existence as a concrete individual.'—C.} 80 PHYSICS, I. νη.
another point of view these two principles are in- adequate, for they cannot possibly act or be acted upon directly by each other." This difficulty, however, disappears if we admit, as a third principle, a nun- antithetical ‘ subject.’ So in a sense there are no principles except the Lerms of opposition, and it may be said that they are two in number and no more; but there 1s a sense also in which we cannot quite adimt this and imust go on to three, because of the conceptual distinction that exists in them; for instance in the uncultivated man, between Ins being aman and his being uncultivated, or in the unshaped bronze, between its being unshaped and its being bronze.
It is new clear, then, how many are the principles of things in the changing world of Nature, and in what sense; namely that there is something that underlies all opposites, and that opposition involves two terms.
But, if we take it another way, we may escape the duality of the opposition by considering one of its terms taken singly as competent, by its absence or presence, to accomplish the whole change. Then there will only be the ‘ ultimately underlying ’ factor in Nature m addition to this formal principle to reckon with. And of this ‘ undeilying’ factor we can form a conception by analogy; for it will bear the same relation to concrete things in general, or to any specific conerete thing, which the bronze bears to the statue before it has been founded, or the wood to the couch, or the crude material of any object that has determined form and quality to that object itself. This ultimate material will count as onc principle (not, of course, one ὃ im the sense of a conercic “ indi- VOL. I G 81 ARISTOTLE 1014 τὸ τόδε τὴ, μία δὲ ἡ ὁ λόγος, ἔτι δὲ τὸ ἐναντίον ~ on νὴ Φ τούτῳ ἡ στέρησις. Ταῦτα δὲ πῶς δύο καὶ πῶς πλείω, εἴρηται ἐν τοῖς ἄνω. πρῶτον μὲν οὖν ἐλέχθη ὅτι ἀρχαὶ τἀναντία μόνον, ὕστερον δ᾽ ὅτι ἀνάγκη καὶ ἄλλο τι ὑποκεῖσθαι καὶ εἶναι τρία: ἐκ δὲ τῶν νῦν φανερὸν τίς ἡ διαφορὰ τῶν ἐναντίων, καὶ πῶς ἔχουσιν al ἀρχαὶ πρὸς ἀλλήλας, καὶ τί τὸ ὑπο- κείμενον. πότερον δὲ οὐσία τὸ εἶδος ἢ τὸ ὑπο- κείμενον, οὔπω δῆλον' ἀλλ᾽ ὅτι αἱ ἀρχαὶ τρεῖς καὶ πῶς τρεῖς, καὶ τίς ὁ τρόπος αὐτῶν, δῆλον. ? Πόσαι μὲν οὖν καὶ τίνες εἰσὶν αἱ ἀρχαί, ἐκ τούτων θεωρείσθωσαν.. 1 [heoddl. (Torstrik, Philologus. aii, (1857) 520). Simplic. 933. 4, interprets ‘ and one the (principle, ἀρχ ἢ), “ the defini- tion.” Prof. Ross tells me he prefers this reading and interpretation to the editors’ corrections 7, 4, «τὸ eldosy ἢ, and compares ἡ τὸ AB, ‘the (lene) “ the AB.” ’—C.]
CHAPTER VIII ARGUMENT Absolute non-existence must be distinguished from in- cidental non-existence. (What Aristotle, in this chapter, calls ‘ shortage’ (steresis) is defined elsewhere us the ‘ negation af something within ὦ defined class, ie. * within an antithesis, Met. 1011 b19 ἡ δὲ στέρησις ἀπόφασίς ἐστιν ἀπό τινος ὠρισμένου yévous.) Non-euistence as such is absolute; but the negation of the Sor My ag incidental to the material, 1s an essential factor in the * becoming ᾿ of anything. And the non-existence of the ‘ shortage’ (itself 82 vidual’); and the collectivity of detemnining qualities implied by the thing’s definition is also one principle; and further there is the opposite of Uns, namely the ‘ being without ’ or ‘ shortage ’ of it.
How the principles, then, can be Laken as two, and how that enumeration appeais to need supplementing, has now been shown. First it appeared as though the “terms of an antithesis ’ constituted all the principles necessary; but then we saw that something must underlie them, constituting a third. And nuw we see that the two terms of the opposition itself stand on a different fooling from cach other; and we see how all the principles are related to each other, and what we are to understand by the ‘ underlying subject.’ It remains to consider whether the modifying ‘ form’ or the modified ‘ matter’ 1s to be regarded as the more ‘ essential’ factor of a thing; but that there ave three principles altogether, and in what sense they are three, has already been demonstrated.
Let this, then, suffice as to the number of the principles and as to what they are.
CHAPTER VIII ARGUMENT (continued) a negation) is incidentally necessary to the presence of the negated form in the thing that emerges from the change.
The impossibility of anything coming into or passing out of existence can only be maintained with respect to the absolutely, not with respect tu the incidentally, non-existent. This τὸ the root of the fallacy of Parmenides.
(με this critical point of Aristotle’s exposition the teat, as we have it, is elliptical almost to the point of unintedligi- bility, unless supplemented from other sources.)
ARISTOTLE 1911. Ὅτι δὲ μοναχῶς οὕτω λύεται καὶ ἡ τῶν ἀρχαίων ἀπορία, λέγωμεν μετὰ ταῦτα. ζητοῦντες γὰρ οἱ 2% κατὰ φιλοσοφίαν πρῶτοι τὴν ἀλήθειαν καὶ τὴν φύσιν τὴν τῶν ὄντων ἐξετράπησαν οἷον ὁδόν τινα ἄλλην ἀπωσθέντες ὑπὸ ἀπειρίας, καί φασιν οὔτε γίνεσθαι τῶν ὄντων οὐδὲν οὔτε φθείρεσθαι, διὰ τὸ ἀναγκαῖον μὲν εἶναι γίγνεσθαι τὸ γιγνόμενον ἢ ἐξ , ὄντος ἢ ἐκ μὴ ὄντος, ἐκ δὲ τούτων ἀμφοτέρων 80 LO a f ΕΣ A a“ é θ ἢ hi ἀδύνατον εἶναι" οὔτε yap τὸ dv γίνεσθαι (εἶναι γὰρ ἤδη), ἔκ τε μὴ ὄντος οὐδὲν ἂν γενέσθαι" ὑποκεῖσθαι yap τι δεῖ. καὶ οὕτω δὴ τὸ ἐφεξῆς συμβαῖνον αὔξοντες οὐδ᾽ εἶναι πολλά φασιν ἀλλὰ μόνον αὐτὸ τὸ Ov, Ἐκεῖνοι μὲν οὖν ταύτην ἔλαβον τὴν δόξαν διὰ 85 A 3,ὔ ε a δὲ λέ if \? vt av τὰ εἰρημένα: ἡμεῖς δὲ λέγομεν ὅτι τὸ ἐξ ὄντος ἢ ex μὴ ὄντος γίνεσθαι, ἢ τὸ μὴ ὃν ἢ τὸ ὃν ποιεῖν τι ἢ πάσχειν, ἢ ὁτιοῦν τόδε γίνεσθαι, ἕνα μὲν τρόπον 18th οὐδὲν διαφέρει ἢ τὸ τὸν ἰατρὸν ποιεῖν τι ἢ πάσχειν, an 4 3 > ~ ἢ ft δε i ω 3 δὴ ἢ τὸ ἐξ ἰατροῦ εἶναί τι ἣ γίγνεσθαι" ὥστε, ἐπειδὴ τοῦτο διχῶς λέγεται, δῆλον ὅτι καὶ τὸ ἐξ ὄντος καὶ τὸ ὃν ἢ ποιεῖν ἢ πάσχειν. οἰκοδομεῖ μὲν οὖν ὁ 9 (Cf. 187 ἃ 97 τὴν κοινὴν δόξαν τῶν φυσικῶν.---Ο.] ® [Literally, ‘ they denied even the existence of u plurality of things, and allowed existence only to ‘‘ Being itself” '— the inference drawn by Parmenides, frag. 8, though avoided later by the pluralist physicists.—C.
& [ἕνα μὲν τρόπον. This first explanation goes down to PHYSICS, [. vir.
Ir remains to show that the conclusion we have reached not only salves the problem of genesis, but furnishes the only escape from the blind alley into which the first speculations on the subject. led their authors. lor when first they began to reason on the truth of things and the nature of all that exists, pioneers as they were, they fell upon a false track for want of a clue, and mamtained that nothing at all could either come into existence or pass out of ἢ τ tor they argued that, if a thing comes into existence, it must proceed either oul of the existent or out of the non-existent, both of which were impossible; for how could anything ‘ come out of’ the existent, since itis already there δ᾽ and obviously it could not come out of the non-existent, for what it comes out of must be there for it to come out of, and the non-existent is not there ab all, And so, developing the logical con- sequences of this, they went on to say that the ac tually and verilably ‘existent ἡ is not many, but only one? Such then is their dogma; but, as for us, we maintain that when we speak of anything ‘ coming to be.’ whether out of existence or non- “existence, or of the non-existent or the existent acting. or being acted on in any Way, or of anything at all * be- coming this or that,’ one explanation is as follows τῇ It is much the same as saying that a ‘ physician ἢ does or experiences something, or that he has * be- come’ (and now is) something that he has ‘turned into,’ instead of remaining a physician. For all these expressions are ambiguous, and this ambiguity is clearly analogous to the ambiguity concealed under our language when we speak of what ° the existent has turned into,’ or of the existent ὁ doing’ this or ‘experiencing’ that. Tor if the physician builds a 85 10 15 ARISTOTLE ἰατρὸς οὐχ 4 ἰατρὸς ἀλλ᾽ 7 οἰκοδόμος, καὶ λευκὸς γίνεται οὐχ ἡ ἰατρὸς ἀλλ᾽ ἣ μέλας" ἰατρεύει δὲ καὶ ἀνίατρος γίνεται ἧ ἰατρός. ἐπεὶ δὲ μάλιστα λέγομεν κυρίως τὸν ἰατρὸν ποιεῖν τι ἢ πάσχειν ἢ γίγνεσθαι ἐξ ἰατροῦ, ἐὰν ἧ ἰατρὸς ταῦτα πάσχῃ ἢ mow ἢ γίνηται, δῆλον ὅτι καὶ τὸ ἐκ μὴ ὄντος γίγνεσθαι τοῦτο σημαίνει τὸ ἢ μὴ ὄν. ὅπερ ἐκεῖνοι Η μὲν οὐ διελόντες ἀπέστησαν, καὶ διὰ ταύτην τὴν ἄγνοιαν τοσοῦτον προσηγνόησαν ὥστε μηθὲν οἴε- σθαι γίγνεσθαι μηδὲ εἶναι τῶν ἄλλων, ἀλλ᾽ ἀνελεῖν πᾶσαν τὴν γένεσιν. ‘Hyets δὲ καὶ αὐτοί φαμεν γίγνεσθαι μὲν οὐδὲν ἁπλῶς ἐκ μὴ ὄντος, πὼς μέντοι γίγνεσθαι ἐκ μὴ A / na ὄντος, οἷον κατὰ συμβεβηκός" ee yap τῆς στερή- sews—d ἐστι καθ᾽ αὑτὸ μὴ ὄν---οὐκ ἐνυπάρχοντος Ψ 4 A nt > γίγνεταί ru (θαυμάζεται δὲ τοῦτο καὶ ἀδύνατον οὕτω δοκεῖ γίγνεσθαί τι ἐκ μὴ ὄντος)" ὡσαύτως δὲ οὐδ ΕἾ wy 3 A \ by rs hi 4 ἐξ ὄντος οὐδὲ τὸ ὃν γίγνεσθαι, πλὴν κατὰ συμ- 1 [πὼς scripsi; ef. 1080 a 99 τὸ τί ἐστιν ἀπλῶς μὲν τῇ οὐσίᾳ (ὑπάρχει), πὼς δὲ τοῖς ἄλλοις: ὅπως Τὸ: ὅμως cett—C,] * [More literally, ‘and since, when we speak of the physician doing or experiencing something or ceasing to be a physician and becoming something else, we are using the words in their most proper sense if all this happens to him qua physician, pein in the same way ‘ coming out of the non-existent’ properly means ‘coming out of the non- existent as such.—C.]
» (Literally, ‘ for out of (i.e. in place of) the shortage— a. thing which in itself “ is not ’—there comes to be some- thing, the shortage not being a factor that is retained in the result’ (as the matter is retained). See Ὁ. 68, Introd. Note.—C,] 86 PHYSICS, 1. vir.
house, it is not gua physician but que builder that he does so: or if he becomes light in complesion, it is qua dark in complexion not que physician that he changes; whereas if he exercises the healing art, or drops or loses that art, so as tu become a non-physician, it is gue physician that he does so. And so, just as strange conceptions might be formed as to what a physician could or could not do or suffer or become, if we were always thinking of him in lis primary and direct capacity as a physician. but applied our conclusions to him in all his actual or possible capacities, so, obviously, if we always argue from the non-existent gua non-existent, but apply our conclusions to the incidentally non-existent as well, we shall fall into analogous errors.? And it was just because the earlier thinkers failed to grasp this analytical distinction, that they piled nns- conception upon misconception to the pitch of actually concluding that there was no such thing as gencsis and that nothing at all ever came to be, or was, except the one and only ‘ existent,’ Now we, too (who recognize both ‘form’ and “lack of form,’ or ‘shortage,’ as factors in becoming), assert that nothing can ‘ come to be,’ in the absolute sense, out of the non-existent, but we declare never- theless that all things which come to be owe their existence to the incidental non- “existence of some- thing; for they owe it to the ‘shoitage ’ from which they started ‘ being no longer there. ® And if it seemis an amazing paradox to maintain that any thing derives in this way from the non-existent, yet it is really quite true. Moreover, it 1s equally true that it is only in this same incidental sense that anything can derive from the existent either, or ‘ what is δ᾽ ARISTOTLE δ᾽ ARISTOTLE 1910 βεβηκός" οὕτω δὲ καὶ τοῦτο γίγνεσθαι τὸν αὐτὸν 2 τρόπον οἷον εἰ ἐκ ζῴου ζῷον γίγνοιτο, καὶ ἐκ τινὸς ζῴου τὶ ζῷον (οἷον εἰ κύων ἐξ ἵππου γίγνοιτο). γίγνοιτο μὲν γὰρ ἂν οὐ μόνον ἐκ τινὸς ζῴου 6 κύων ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐκ ζῴου, ἀλλ᾽ οὐχ ἧ ζῷον (ὑπ- ἄρχει yap ἤδη τοῦτο) εἰ δέ τι μέλλει γίγνεσθαι ζῷον μὴ κατὰ συμβεβηκός, οὐκ ἐκ ζῴου ἔσται" ui καὶ εἴ τι ὄν, οὐκ ἐξ ὄντος,---οὐδ᾽ ἐκ μὴ ὄντος" τὸ a - τ in yap ἐκ μὴ ὄντος εἴρηται ἡμῖν τί σημαίνει, ὅτι ἧ μὴ ὄν. ἔτι δὲ καὶ τὸ εἶναι ἅπαν ἢ μὴ εἶναι οὐκ ἀναιροῦμεν. Eis μὲν δὴ τρόπος οὗτος, ἄλλος δ᾽ ὅτι ἐνδέχεται ταὐτὰ λέγειν κατὰ τὴν δύναμιν καὶ τὴν ἐνέργειαν' τοῦτο δ᾽ ἐν ἄλλοις διώρισται δι’ ἀκριβείας μᾶλλον. 8) “Ὥσθ᾽ (ὅπερ ἐλέγομεν) ai ἀπορίαι λύονται δι᾽ ἃς ἀναγκαζόμενοι ἀναιροῦσι τῶν εἰρημένων ἔνια" διὰ γὰρ τοῦτο τοσοῦτον καὶ οἱ πρότερον ἐξετρά- πῆσαν τῆς ὁδοῦ τῆς ἐπὶ τὴν γένεσιν καὶ φθορὰν \ ὡ a a δ μ᾿ > tal if kat ὅλως μεταβολήν: αὕτη yap ἂν ὀφθεῖσα ἡ φύσις ἔλυσεν αὐτῶν πᾶσαν τὴν ἄγνοιαν.
4 [ὑπάρχει γὰρ ἤδη τοῦτο scems to γοίδι lo an implied clause καὶ ζῷον ἂν γίγνοιτο, ἀλλ᾽ οὐχ ἣ ζῴον.--Ο,] " [1,6. εἴ τι (μέλλει γίγνεσθαι) ὃν (μὴ κατὰ συμβεβηκὸς) οὐκ ἐξ ὄντος (ἔσται).---(] 5 1ΟᾺ Met. Z, 7-9, and @. De gen. et corr. A 8, refers to our passage and admits that it leaves obscure the problem how there can be an ‘ unqualified coming-to-be’ of a substance.—C,] @ [If αὕτη is read (and no yariant is recorded), αὔτη ἡ φύσις means ‘this nature (entity),’ viz. matter qualified by 88 PHYSICS, I. vin.
can come into being. In this sense, however, this does occur in the same way as (for instance) if ‘an animal’ should turn into ‘ an animal,’ οὐ a particular animal—say, a horse—should turn into another particular anmmal—say,adog, The dog would come into being, not only ‘ out of’ a particular animal, but out of ‘an animal’ (and it would become ‘ an animal’), bul only incidentally, not gua animal, since it was already an animal and could not ‘tim into’ what 1t already was. If anything, then, is to ‘turn into’ an animal, otherwise than meidentully, it must be non-animal at the start and must come to be animal in the process. Similarly, if a thing 1s to become or turn into an existent otherwise than incidentally, it cannot start from what exists;’— though neither can it start from the non-existent, for we have explained that this means ‘ from the non- existent as such.’ At the same time we do not do away with the principle that everything must either be or not be.
This then is one way of formulating the solution of the problem. But there is also an alternative formula based on the distinction between existing as a potentiality and existing as an actuality. But this is developed more fully elsewhere.¢ It is thus (as I have said) that the difficulties are solved which led to the denial of some of the obvious facts that we have now discussed; for it was this fundamental misconception that threw the earlier thinkers so far off the track concerning ‘ coming into existence’ and ‘ passing out of it,’ and the nature of change in general. Had they detected the existence of the entity we have deseribed,? it would have released them from all the confusion.
89 a ARISTOTLE CHAPTER IX ARGUMENT The Platonists approached the true solution, though (in spite of their phraseology) they never really formulated the essentiul triad; for they confounded ‘ matter’ and ‘ short- age’ together (the positeve ‘seat’ and the prwwative ‘ empti- ness’), under one concept of ‘the non-existent’ ar ‘ not- The metaphors wn which they delight are quite intelligible, if we take them separately and apply them to the appropriate Ημμένοι μὲν οὖν καὶ ἕτεροί τινές εἰσιν αὐτῆς, ~ Fal A ~ ἀλλ᾽ οὐχ ἱκανῶς. πρῶτον μὲν γὰρ ὁμολογοῦσιν ἁπλῶς γίνεσθαι ἐκ μὴ ὄντος, ἣ Παρμενίδην ὀρθῶς λέγειν: εἶτα φαίνεται αὐτοῖς, εἴπερ ἐστὶν ἀριθμῷ μία, καὶ δυνάμει μία μόνον εἶναι. τοῦτο δὲ a τ a \ διαφέρει πλεῖστον. ἡμεῖς μὲν γὰρ ὕλην καὶ στέρησιν ἕτερόν φαμεν εἶναι, καὶ τούτων τὸ μὲν οὐκ ὃν εἶναι κατὰ συμβεβηκός---τὴν ὕλην---τὴν δὲ στέρησιν καθ᾽ αὑτήν, καὶ τὴν μὲν ἐγγὺς καὶ οὐσίαν πως---τὴν ὕλην---τὴν δὲ στέρησιν οὐδαμῶς" οἱ δὲ τὸ μὴ ὃν τὸ μέγα καὶ τὸ μικρὸν ὁμοίως, ἢ τὸ 4 aris refers to αὕτη ἡ φύσις (1. 33), i.e. matter qualified by shortage.—C,] δ (Of. 190 b 23. The subject (ὑποκείμενον) is numerically one thing (a piece of bronze), but conceptually two, as bronze qualified by the skortage of the form it will receive. This shortage was overlooked.—C.]
¢ [Simplicius understood ἐγγὺς to mean ἐγγὺς odslas: ‘comes near to being substance, and jn a Sense is substance.’ Cf. 190 Ὁ 25 γόδε γάρ τι μᾶλλον.---Ο,} 90 PHYSICS, 1. 1x CHAPTER IX ARGUMENT (continued) ‘matter’ or ‘ shortage’ as the case may be; but they become self-contradictory, if we apply them all to the un- differentiated ‘ negation ’ (a 18-25).
[Matier, properly distinguished from the shortage, is eternal. The nature of Form 1s a question that belongs to metaphysics, We are concerned only with natural and perishable forms (a 25-b 4).—C,] Certain other thinkers have approached the view we have now expounded,* but without effectively reaching it. For they began by accepting as true the conception of Parmenides that ‘ coming to be’ could mean nothmg but emerging from the non- existent. Then, under the one concept of the * non- existent,’ they united both the ‘ matter’ and the ‘ shortage ’ of our system, failing to distinguish between ‘ numerical unity’ of subject (which we admit) and ‘unanalysable unity’ of aspect or potentiality (which we deny).? But this distinction which they ignored makes all the difference, For we distinguish between ‘matter’ and ‘ shortage’ (or absence of form), and assert that the one, namely matter as such, represents the incidental non- existence of attributes, whereas the other, namely shorlage as such, is the direct negation or non- existence of the form of which it is the shortage. So that matter, though never existing in isolation, may be pretty well taken as constituting the ‘concrete being’ of which it is the basis, but shortage not in the Icast so." These pliilosophers, on the other hand, conccive of the non-existent as 91 ARISTOTLE 91 ARISTOTLE 182 ἃ συναμφότερον ἢ τὸ χωρὶς EKATEPOV. WOTE TAVTE- Ads ἕτερος 6 τρόπος οὗτος τῆς τριάδος κἀκεῖνος" lo μέχρι μὲν γὰρ δεῦρο προῆλθον, ὅτι δεῖ τινα ὑποκεῖσθαι φύσιν, ταύτην μέντοι μίαν ποιοῦσιν (καὶ γὰρ εἴ τις δυάδα ποιεῖ, λέγων μέγα καὶ μι- κρὸν αὐτήν, οὐθὲν ἧττον ταὐτὸ ποιεῖ' τὴν γὰρ ἑτέραν παρεῖδεν).
« Ἶ A ἣν ΄. ia ~ a a H μὲν yap ὑπομένουσα συναιτία τῇ μορφῇ τῶν γινομένων ἐστίν, ὥσπερ μήτηρ' ἡ δ᾽ ἑτέρα μοῖρα 16 τῆς ἐναντιώσεως πολλάκις ἂν φαντασθείη τῷ πρὸς τὸ κακοποιὸν αὐτῆς ἀτενίζοντι τὴν διάνοιαν οὐδ᾽ εἶναι τὸ παράπαν: ὄντος γάρ τινος θείου καὶ ἀγαθοῦ καὶ ἐφετοῦ, τὸ μὲν ἐναντίον αὐτῷ φαμεν εἶναι, τὸ δὲ ὃ πέφυκεν ἐφίεσθαι καὶ ὀρέγεσθαι αὐτοῦ κατὰ τὴν ἑαυτοῦ φύσιν. τοῖς δὲ συμβαίνει 30 τὸ ἐναντίον ὀρέγεσθαι τῆς ἑαυτοῦ φθορᾶς. καίτοι οὔτε αὐτὸ ἑαυτοῦ οἷόν τε ἐφίεσθαι τὸ εἶδος (διὰ τὸ μὴ εἶναι ἐνδεές) οὔτε τὸ ἐναντίον: φθαρτικὰ yap » (Literally, ‘none the less he makes (“ great’? and “ small ’*) the same (single) thing.’—-C.]
¢ [Plato, Timaeus, 50 c. ‘ We must conceive three kinds: {t) that which comes to be, (2) that in which it comes to be, (3) that from which it is copied when it is born into existence. And we may liken (2) the recipient to a mother, (3) the model to a father, and (1) that which is between them to a child” The matter to be moulded, he adds, must be entirely formless before the forms are impressed on it. —C.] 4 (Cf. Met. A 22, on meanings of ‘ privation,’—C.] 4 [Or, " since there is something divine, good, and desir- able,’ viz. either the God of Aristotle’s system, as Vinal Cause, or the principle of Form generally.—C.]
92 PHYSICS, I. τι.
92 PHYSICS, I. τι.
the ‘ great ’ and the ‘ small’ alike,* whether severally or conjomtly. So they too have a triad of the ‘ great,’ the ‘small,’ and the ‘Idea’ (or form), but this triad is really quite different from ours of ‘matter,’ ‘shortage,’ and ‘form’; for, although they go so far with us as to recognize the necessity of some underlying subject, yet in truth the ‘ great and small’ of which it consists can only be equated with our ‘matter,’ and is not a dyad at all. It is true indeed that you may now and again find it spoken of as the ‘dyad’ of great and small, but that makes no difference,® for the other member of our antithesis (shortage, namely) 1s systematically ignored.
Now we, who distinguish between matter and shortage, can very well see why matter, which co- operates with form in the genesis of things, may be conceived as their matrix or womb.¢ And we can also see how a man who concentrates his mind on the negative and defect-involving character of shortage ὁ may come to think of it as purely non- existent. Then, if we were to think of ‘ existence ’ as something august and good and desirable,’ we might think of shortage as the evil contradiction of this good, but of matter as a something the very nature of which is to desire and yearn towards the actually existent. But the school of thought we are examining, inasmuch as it identifies matter and shortage, falls into the position of representing the opposite of existence as yearning for its own destruc- tion, But how can either form or shortage really desire form? Not form itself, because it has no lack of it; and not shortage, which is the antithesis of form, because the terms of an antithesis, being 98 ARISTOTLE 1980 ἀλλήλων. τὰ ἐναντία. ἀλλὰ τοῦτ᾽ ἔστιν ἡ ὕλη--- ὥσπερ ἂν εἰ θῆλυ “ἄρρενος καὶ αἰσχρὸν καλοῦ" πλὴν οὐ καθ᾽ αὑτὸ αἰσχρὸν ἀλλὰ κατὰ ουμβεβηκός, .5 οὐδὲ θῆλυ ἀλλὰ κατὰ συμβεβηκός.
Φθείρεται δὲ καὶ γίνεται, ἔστι μὲν ὡς, ἔστι δ᾽ ὡς ov" ὡς μὲν yap τὸ ἐν ᾧ, καθ᾽ αὑτὸ φθείρεται (τὸ γὰρ φθειρόμενον ἐν τούτῳ ἐστίν, ἡ στέρησις), ὡς δὲ κατὰ τὴν δύναμιν, οὐ καθ᾽ αὑτό, ἀλλ᾽ ἄφθαρτον καὶ ἀγένητον ἀνάγκη αὐτὴν εἶναι. εἴτε 80 γὰρ ἐγίγνετο, ὑποκεῖσθαί τι δεῖ πρῶτον, τὸ ἐξ οὗ ἐνυπάρχοντος" τοῦτο δ᾽ ἐστὶν αὐτῆς ἡ φύσις, ὥστ᾽ ἔσται πρὶν γενέσθαι---λέγω γὰρ ὕλην τὸ πρῶτον ὑποκείμενον ἑκάστῳ, ἐξ οὗ γίνεταί τι ἐνυπάρχοντος μὴ κατὰ συμβεβηκός- εἴτε φθείρεται, εἰς τοῦτο ἀφίξεται ἔσχατον, ὥστε ἐφθαρμένη ἔσται πρὲν φθαρῆναι.
« (Or, ‘ But this (factor which desires form) 13 Matter...ἢ From this point onwards Aristotle 1s rather stating his own view than criticizing Plato’s.—C.]
> [Or Aristotle’s own matter + ‘shortage,’ to which the following statements are applicable.—C.]
ὁ [Or ‘ for the thing that perishes—the shortage—is in it,’ and so the matter, considered merely as what contains the shortage, ceases to be that, ‘ as such.’ — ὦ φθείρεται δὲ...ἀνάγκη αὐτὴν εἶναι. ‘The translation of this very perplexing passage must be regarded as no more than a suggestion. It puzzled Simphcius so much that he was driven to supposing that Aristotle misapplied (κατεχρή- σατο) the phrase τὸ ἐν ᾧ, and really meant the opposite, τὸ ἐν αὐτῇ by it.
6 [ἐξ of ἐνυπάρχοντος, some ‘matter’ from which it would arise but which would persist as a factor in it after it had come into being.—C.]
7 [Or, ‘ and if ie erishes, this (matter itself) will be what it is ultimately vedi eed to; so nee it will have to have perished already before perishing.’ In sum: if matter 94 PHYSICS, 1. rw.
mutually destructive, cannot desire each other. So that ¢ if (to borrow their own metaphors) we are Lo regard matter as the female desiring the male or the foul desiring the fair, the desire must be allri- buted not to the foulness itself, as such, but to a subject that is foul or female incidentally.
As for the undifferentiated matter-shortage of the school we have been discussing,’ it may be regarded as either perishable or imperishable; for if we think of it as the bare seat-of-shortage, it perishes, as such, for ‘ shortage ’ is exactly what does perish in it, on its receiving the form; but if we are considering it as the potentiality of receiving forms, it cannot perish, as such, but must necessarily be exempt both from destruction and genesis.“ For if it ‘came to be,’ there must have been some subject: already there for 1t to proceed from, and just ‘ being there as the subjecl’ is precisely what constitutes the nature of ‘ matter ’ itsclf, so that it unust have been before it came to be. Vor what 1 mean by matter is precisely the ultimate underlying subject, common to all the things of Nature, presupposed as their substantive, not incidental, constituent. And again, the destruction of a thing means the disappearance of everything that constitutes it except just that very underlying subject which its existence pre- supposes, and if this perished, then the thing that presupposes it would have perished with it by anticipation before it came into existence.
were to come into existence or perish, τὸ would have to come out of itself or perish into itself—matter being preeisely the starting-point of coming-to-be and the terminus of perishing. So matter would have to be, before 1t could come-to-be, and to have perished, before it could have anything to perish inlo.—C.]
05 ARISTOTLE 1988. Περὶ δὲ τῆς κατὰ τὸ εἶδος ἀρχῆς, πότερον μία ἣ πολλαί, καὶ τίς ἢ τίνες εἰσί, δι᾿ ἀκριβείας τῆς πρώτης φιλοσοφίας ἔργον» ἐστὶ διορίσαι, ὥστε 1925 εἰς ἐκεῖνον τὸν καιρὸν ἀποκείσθω. περὶ δὲ τῶν φυσικῶν καὶ φθαρτῶν εἰδῶν ἐν τοῖς ὕστερον δεικνυμένοις ἐροῦμεν.
Ὅτι μὲν οὖν εἰσὶν ἀρχαί, καὶ τίνες, καὶ πόσαι τὸν ἀριθμόν, διωρίσθω ἡμῖν οὕτως" πάλιν δὲ ἄλλην ἀρχὴν ἀρξάμενοι λέγωμεν.
α [See Met. Z-@; and A where the existence of eternal and immutable form without matter is specially discussed. ι PHYSICS, I, 1x, So much for ‘ matter’; but the detavled examina- tion and determination of ‘form’ as a principle, and the question of its unity or plurality, and its nature (singular or plural), is the business of Virst Philosophy; so let it be deferred till we come to that.¢ It is with natural and perishable forms only that we shall deal in the sequel of this treatise.
Let ihis suffice for the demonstration of the existence of principles in Nature and the detcrmina- tion of what they are and how many in number, In the next book we must make a fresh start with fresh questions, VOL. I u 97 EXCURSUS ON SQUARING THE CIRCLE