Aristotle
Points), it is impossible that all Contraries can be generated out of
each other, if every generation be both _aliquid_ and _ex aliquo_.
_Albus homo ex nigro homine_ must be generated in a different way
from _album ex nigro_. Now Matter is only to be found in those cases
where there is generation and change into each other; in other cases,
where no change takes place, there is no Matter. There is a
difficulty in understanding how the Matter of each substance stands
in regard to the contrary modifications of that substance (p. 1044,
b. 29). If the body is potentially healthy, and if disease is the
contrary of health, are we to say that both these states are
potential? Is water potentially both wine and vinegar? Or are we to
say rather that the body is the Matter of health, and that water is
the Matter of wine, in the way of acquisition by nature and by taking
on the Form to which it tends; and that the body is the Matter of
sickness, and wine the Matter of vinegar in the way of privation and
of destruction contrary to nature (b. 34)? However, there is here
some difficulty: Since vinegar is generated out of wine, why is not
wine the Matter of vinegar, and potentially vinegar? Why is not the
living man potentially a corpse? Is it not rather the truth, however,
that these are accidental or contra-natural destructions ([Greek:
kata\ sumbebêko\s ai( phthorai/]--b. 36, _i.e._, not in the regular
appetency and aspirations, according to which the destruction of one
Form gives place to a better); and that through such destruction the
same Matter which belonged to the living man becomes afterwards the
Matter of the corpse; likewise the Matter of wine becomes, through
the like destruction, Matter of vinegar--by a generation like that of
night out of day? Changes of this sort must take place by complete
resolution into the original Materia Prima ([Greek: ei)s tê\n u(/lên
dei= e)panelthei=n]--a. 3); thus, if a living animal comes out of a
dead one, the latter is first resolved into its elements, and then
out of them comes the living animal. So vinegar is first resolved
into water, then out of the water comes wine (a. 5).
We shall now revert to the difficulty recently noticed, about
Definitions and Numbers. What is the cause that each number and each
definition is One? In all cases where there are several parts not put
together as a mere heap, but where there is a Whole besides the
parts, there must be some cause of this kind. With some bodies,
contact is such cause; with others, viscosity ([Greek:
glischro/tês]--p. 1045, a. 12), or some other affection. But the
definition is one complex phrase, not by conjunction like the Iliad,
but One by being the definition of one subject (a. 14). Now what is
it which makes the subject man, One? Why is he One and not Many, say
animal and a biped--more especially if there exist, as the Platonists
say, a Self-animal and a Self-biped? Why are not these two [Greek:
au)ta/] the man ([Greek: dia\ ti/ ga\r ou)k e)kei=na au)ta\ o(
a)/nthrôpo/s e)sti?]--a. 17), so that individuals are men by
participation not of one Self-man, but of the two--Self-animal,
Self-biped? On this theory altogether, it would seem that a man
cannot be One, but must be Many--animal and biped. It is plain that
in this way of investigation the problem is insoluble.
But if, as _we_ say (p. 1045, a. 23), there be on one side Matter, on
the other side Form--on one side that which is in Potency, on the
other side that which is in Act (a. 24)--the problem ceases to be
difficult. The difficulty is the same as it would be if the
definition of _himation_ were, round brass: the word _himation_ would
be the sign of that definition, and the problem would be, What is the
Cause why round and brass are One? But the difficulty vanishes, when
we reply that one is Matter, the other Form. And, in cases where
generation intervenes, what is the Cause why the potential Ens is
actual Ens, except the Efficient ([Greek: para\ to\ poiê=san]--a.
31)? There is no other Cause why the sphere in potency is a sphere in
actuality: such was the [Greek: t.ê.e.] of each ([Greek: tou=t' ê)=n
to\ t.ê.e. e(kate/rô|]--a. 33). Of Matter there are two varieties,
the Cogitable and the Perceivable; and, in the Definition, a part is
always Matter, a part is Form or Energy; as when we define the
circle--a plane figure. (Aristotle argues:--On the Platonic theory
that Ideas or Forms are Entia, separate from particulars,
self-existent, and independent of each other, no cause can be assigned
for the coalescence of any two or more of them into one; _e.g._ animal
and biped, into man. But upon my theory, Form and Matter, Power and
Act, are in their own nature relative to each other. It is their own
inherent nature to coalesce into one, or for Power to pass into Act.
This is the cause of their unity: no other cause can be found or is
necessary. See Alexander, p. 531.)
In those cases where there is no Matter, either cogitable or
perceivable, as in the Categories, Hoc Aliquid, Quale, Quantum, &c.,
each of them is, in itself and at once, both Ens and Unum (p. 1045,
b. 2). Hence neither Ens nor Unum is included in the Definitions, and
the [Greek: t.ê.e.] is, in itself and at once, both Ens and Unum. No
other cause can be assigned why each of these is Ens and Unum; each
of them is so, at once and immediately; yet not as if they were all
included in Ens or Unum as common genera; nor as if they were apart
and separable from particulars (b. 7).
Philosophers, who do not adopt this opinion, resort to various
phrases, all unsatisfactory, to explain the coalescence or unity of
the elements included in the Definition. Some call it [Greek:
me/thexis], but they give no cause of the [Greek: me/thexis]; others
[Greek: sunousi/a], or [Greek: su/ndesmos], or [Greek:
su/nthesis]--of soul with body, as definition of life. But we might
just as well use these phrases on other occasions, and say that to
be well was a synthesis of the soul with health; that the brazen
triangle was a [Greek: su/ndesmos] of brass with triangle; that
white was a synthesis of superficies with whiteness (p. 1045, b. 15).
These phrases carry no explanation; and these philosophers get into
the difficulty by taking a wrong point of departure. They first lay
down Power as different from Entelechy, and then look for an
explanation which makes them one ([Greek: ai)/tion d' o(/ti duna/meôs
kai\ e)ntelechei/as zêtou=si lo/gon e(nopoio\n kai\ diaphora/n]--p.
1045, b. 16, Schwegler observes that the two last words are loosely
put, and that the clear words to express what Aristotle means would
be: [Greek: zêtou=si lo/gon e(nopoio\n u(potithe/ntes
diaphora/n]--Comm. II. p. 154.). But the truth is that Power and
Entelechy are not essentially two, but only different aspects of one
and the same. The Last Matter and the Form are the same; but the
first is in potency, the second in perfect actuality ("Stoff und
Form, Potenzielles und Actuelles, sind eins und dasselbe auf
verschiedenen Entwicklungsstufen"--Schwegler II. p. 151). To enquire
in any particular case what is the cause of this One, is the same as
to enquire generally the cause of Unity. Each thing is a certain One;
the Potential and the Actual are One, in a certain way (b. 20). So
that no other Cause can be found except the Movent or Efficient--that
which moved the matter out of Potency into Actuality. As to those
things which have no Matter, each of them is One immediately and _per
se_ (b. 23).
. . . . . .
Book [Greek: Th].
In discriminating the meanings of Ens, we noticed one [Greek: kata\
du/namin kai\ e)ne/rgeian] (apart from Ens according to the
Categories). We shall now proceed to discuss these two terms [Greek:
du/namis] and [Greek: e(ntele/cheia = e)ne/rgeia] (p. 1045, b. 35).
It is elsewhere mentioned ([Greek: D]. p. 1019) that [Greek:
du/namis] has many senses, of which some (like the geometrical, &c.)
are equivocal or metaphorical, so that we shall pass them over here
(p. 1046, a. 6). But there is one first and proper sense of [Greek:
du/namis], from which many others diverge in different directions of
relationship or analogy (a. 10). That first and proper sense is--a
principle of change _in alio vel quatenus aliud_, or a principle of
change _ab alio vel quatenus aliud_ ([Greek: a)rchê\ metabolê=s e)n
a)/llô| ê)\ ê(=| a)/llo--a)rchê\ metabolê=s u(p' a)/llou ê)\ ê(=|
a)/llo]--a. 11, 14. The same definition is given in terms somewhat
different at p. 1048, a. 28: [Greek: tou=to le/gomen dunato\n o(\
pe/phuke kinei=n a)/llo ê)\ kinei=sthai u(p' a)/llou, ê)\ a(plô=s ê)\
tro/pon tina/.] This Aristotle calls [Greek: ê( kata\ ki/nêsin
du/namis]--expressed by Bonitz, Comm., p. 379: "agendi patiendive
nisum quendam."). The notion of [Greek: du/namis] however extends
more widely than this first sense of [Greek: du/namis kata\
ki/nêsin]. It includes other cases, as where we say that Hermes is
[Greek: duna/mei] in the wood, and that the half foot is [Greek:
duna/mei] in the whole foot (p. 1048, a. 33; Bonitz distinguishes
this last sense as Möglichkeit, from the first sense as Vermögen, p.
379).
We begin by speaking about the first and proper sense--[Greek:
du/namis ê( kata\ ki/nêsin]. One variety thereof is, when a thing has
power of being passively affected so and so--when there resides in
the thing a principle of passive change ([Greek: a)rchê\ metabolê=s
pathêtikê=s]--p. 1046, a. 13) by something else or by itself
_quatenus_ something else. (These last words are added because a sick
man has the [Greek: du/namis] of being cured either by a physician,
or by himself if he be a physician; but then in this last case he is
to be looked upon in two different characters, as physician and as
patient: he cures himself as physician, he is cured as patient.)
Another variety of [Greek: du/namis kata\ ki/nêsin] is, when a thing
has power of resisting change for the worse or destruction by any
exterior principle of change (a. 14); as hardness in iron. Sometimes
this [Greek: du/namis] is restricted to the cases in which a person
can do the thing in question well: no man is said to have the power
of speaking or singing unless he can perform these functions pretty
well (a. 18).
In all these varieties, the general notion of [Greek: du/namis kata\
ki/nêsin] is included (p. 1046, a. 16). The active and passive
[Greek: du/namis] are, in one sense, one and the same; in another
sense, distinct and different. For one of them resides in the
patient, the other in the agent (a. 27): sometimes the two come by
nature together in the same thing; yet the patient does not suffer
from itself as patient, but from itself as agent. Impotence ([Greek:
a)dunami/a]) is the privation contrary to this [Greek:
**du/namis]. Privation has many different meanings (a. 32).
Among these principles of change, some reside in the inanimate
substances, others in the animated; not only in the soul generally,
but also in the rational branch of the soul (p. 1046, a. 38).
Accordingly some [Greek: duna/meis] are Rational, others Irrational.
All arts and constructive sciences are [Greek: duna/meis] (or [Greek:
a)rchai\ metablêtikai\ e)n a)/llô| ê)\ ê(=| a)/llo]--b. 3). In the
rational capacities, the same capacity covers both contraries; in the
irrational, each bears upon one of the two contraries exclusively;
thus, fire will only heat but not chill, while the medical art will
produce either sickness or health. The reason is, that Science is
based upon rational explanations or definitions; and the same
rational explanation declares both the thing itself and the privation
thereof; though not indeed in the same manner: it declares, in a
certain way, both together, and, in a certain way, chiefly the
positive side (b. 10). Accordingly these sciences are sciences of