Aristotle
Predicaments as independent heads, each the _Generalissimum_ of a
separate descending line of predicates, admitted at the same time
that various predicates did not of necessity belong to one of these
lines exclusively, but might take rank in more than one line. There
are some which he enumerates under all the different heads of
Quality, Relation, Action, Passion. The classification is evidently
recognized as one to which we may apply a remark which he makes
especially in regard to Quality and Relation, under both of which
heads (he says) the same predicates may sometimes be counted.[79] And
the observation is much more extensively true than he was aware; for
he both conceives and defines the Category of Relation or Relativity
(_Ad Aliquid_) in a way much narrower than really belongs to it. If
he had assigned to this Category its full and true comprehension, he
would have found it implicated with all the other nine. None of them
can be isolated from it in predication.
[Footnote 79: Aristot. Categ. p. 11, a. 37.
Simplikius says that what Aristotle admits about [Greek: poio/tês],
is true about all the other Categories also, viz.: that it is not a
strict and proper [Greek: ge/nos]. Each of the ten Categories is
(what Aristotle says about [Greek: to\ o(\n]) [Greek: me/son tô=n te
sunôno/môn kai\ o(mônu/môn.--ou)de\ ga\r e)kei=na kuri/ôs e)sti\
ge/nê, ou)de\ ô(s ge/nê tô=n u(p' au)ta\ katêgorei=tai, _ta/xeôs
ou)/sês pantachou= prô/tôn kai\ deute/rôn_.] (Scholia ad Categor. p.
69, b. 30, Br.) This is a remarkable observation, which has been
sufficiently adverted to, I think, by Brentano in his treatise on
Aristotle's Ontology.]
That _Agere_ and _Pati_ (with the illustrations which he himself
gives thereof--_urit_, _uritur_) may be ranked as varieties under the
generic Category of Relation or Relativity, can hardly be overlooked.
The like is seen to be true about _Ubi_ and _Quando_, when we advert
to any one of the predicates belonging to either; such as, _in the
market-place_, _yesterday_.[80] Moreover, not merely the last six of
the ten Categories, but also the second and fourth (_Quantum_ and
_Quale_) are implicated with and subordinated to Relation. If we look
at _Quantum_, we shall find that the example which Aristotle gives of
it is [Greek: tripê=chus], tricubital, or three cubits long; a term
quite as clearly relative as the term [Greek: dipla/sios] or double,
which he afterwards produces as instance of the Category _Ad
Aliquid_.[81] When we are asked the questions, How much is the
height? How large is the field? we cannot give the information
required except by a relative predicate--_it is three feet_--_it is
four acres_; we thereby carry back the mind of the questioner to some
unit of length or superficies already known to him, and we convey our
meaning by comparison with such unit. Again, if we turn from
_Quantum_ to _Quale_, we find the like Relativity implied in all the
predicates whereby answer is made to the question [Greek: Poio\s ti/s
e)sti?] _Qualis est_? What manner of man is he? _He is such as A, B,
C_--persons whom we have previously seen, or heard, or read of.[82]
[Footnote 80: The remarks of Plotinus upon these four last-mentioned
Categories are prolix and vague, but many of them go to shew how much
[Greek: to\ pro/s ti] is involved in all of the four (Ennead. vi. 1,
14-18).]
[Footnote 81: Trendelenburg (Kategorienlehre, p. 184) admits a
certain degree of interference and confusion between the Categories
of _Quantum_ and _Ad Aliquid_; but in very scanty measure, and much
beneath the reality.]
[Footnote 82: The following passages from Mr. James Mill (Analysis of
the Phenomena of the Human Mind, vol. ii. ch. xiv. sect. ii. pp. 48,
49, 56, 1st ed.) state very clearly the Relativity of the predicates
of Quantity and Quality:--
"It seems necessary that I should say something of the word
_Quantus_, from which the word Quantity is derived. _Quantus_ is the
correlate of _Tantus_. _Tantus_, _Quantus_, are relative terms,
applicable to all the objects to which we apply the terms Great,
Little."--"Of two lines, we call the one _tantus_, the other
_quantus_. The occasions on which we do so, are when the one is as
long as the other."--"When we say that one thing is _tantus_,
_quantus_ another, or one so great, as the other is great; the first
is referred to the last, the _tantus_ to the _quantus_. The first is
distinguished and named by the last. The _Quantus_ is the
standard."--"On what account, then, is it that we give to any thing
the name _Quantus_? As a standard by which to name another thing,
_Tantus_. The thing called _Quantus_ is the previously known thing,
the ascertained amount, by which we can mark and define the other
amount."
"_Talis_, _Qualis_, are applied to objects in the same way, on one
account, as _Tantus_, _Quantus_, on another; and the explanation we
gave of _Tantus_, _Quantus_, may be applied, _mutatis mutandis_, to
the pair of relatives which we have now named. _Tantus_, _Quantus_,
are names applied to objects on account of dimension. _Talis_,
_Qualis_, are names applied to objects on account of all other
sensations. We apply _Tantus_, _Quantus_, to a pair of objects when
they are equal; we apply _Talis_, _Qualis_, to a pair of objects when
they are alike. One of the objects is then the standard. The object
_Qualis_ is that to which the reference is made."
Compare the same work, vol. i. ch. ix. p. 225:--"The word _Such_ is a
relative term, and always connotes so much of the meaning of some
other term. When we call a thing _such_, it is always understood that
it is such _as_ some other thing. Corresponding with our words _such
as_, the Latins had _Talis_, _Qualis_."]
We thus see that all the predicates, not only under the Category
which Aristotle terms _Ad Aliquid_, but also under all the last nine
Categories, are relative. Indeed the work of predication is always
relative. The express purpose, as well as the practical usefulness,
of a significant predicate is, to carry the mind of the hearer either
to a comparison or to a general notion which is the result of past
comparisons. But though each predicate connotes Relation, each
connotes a certain _fundamentum_ besides, which gives to the Relation
its peculiar character. Relations of Quantity are not the same as
relations of Quality; the predicates of the former connote a
_fundamentum_ different from the predicates of the latter, though in
both the meaning conveyed is relative. In fact, every predicate or
concrete general name is relative, or connotes a Relation to
something else, actual or potential, beyond the thing named. The only
name not relative is the Proper name, which connotes no attributes,
and cannot properly be used as a predicate (so Aristotle remarks),
but only as a Subject.[83] Sokrates, Kallias, Bukephalus &c., denotes
the _Hoc Aliquid_ or _Unum Numero_, which, when pronounced alone,
indicates some concrete aggregate (as yet unknown) which may manifest
itself to my senses, but does not, so far as the name is concerned,
involve necessary reference to anything besides; though even these
names, when one and the same name continues to be applied to the same
object, may be held to connote a real or supposed continuity of past
or future existence, and become thus to a certain extent relative.
[Footnote 83: You may make Sokrates a predicate, in the proposition,
[Greek: to\ leuko\n e)kei=no Sôkra/tês e)sti/n], but Aristotle
dismisses this as an irregular or perverse manner of speaking (see
Analytic. Priora, i. p. 43, a. 35; Analyt. Poster. i. p. 83,
a. 2-16).
Alexander calls these propositions [Greek: ai( para\ phu/sin
prota/seis] (see Schol. ad Metaphys. [Greek: D]. p. 1017, a. 23).
Mr. James Harris observes (Philosophical Arrangements, ch. x. p. 214;
also 317, 348):--"Hence too we may see why Relation stands next to
Quantity; for in strictness the Predicaments which follow are but
different modes of Relation, marked by some peculiar character over
their own, over and above the relative character, which is common to
them all." To which I would add, that the first two Categories,
Substance and Quantity, are no less relative or correlative than the
eight later Categories; as indeed Harris himself thinks; see the same
work, pp. 90, 473: "Matter and Attribute are essentially distinct,
yet, like _convex_ and _concave_, they are by nature inseparable. We
have already spoken as to the inseparability of attributes; we now
speak as to that of matter. [Greek: Ê(mei=s de\ phame\n me\n ei)=nai/
tina u(/lên tô=n sôma/tôn tô=n ai)sthêtô=n, a)lla\ tau/tên ou)
chôristê\n a)ll' a)ei\ met' e)nantiô/seôs--u(/lên tê\n a)chô/riston
me\n, u(pokeime/nên de\ toi=s e)nanti/ois (Aristot. De Gen. et Corr.
p. 329, a. 24). By contraries, Aristotle means here the several
attributes of matter, hot, cold, &c.; from some one or other of which
matter is always inseparable."]
We must observe that what the proper name denotes is any certain
concrete One and individual,[84] with his attributes essential and
non-essential, whatever they may be, though as yet undeclared, and
with his capacity of receiving other attributes different and even
opposite. This is what Aristotle indicates as the most special
characteristic of Substance or Essence, that while it is _Unum et
Idem Numero_, it is capable of receiving contraries. This
potentiality of contraries, described as characterizing the _Unum et
Idem Numero_,[85] is relative to something about to come; the First
Essence is doubtless logically First, but it is just as much relative
to the Second, as the Second to the First. We know it only by two
negations and one affirmation, all of which are relative to
predications _in futuro_. It is neither in a Subject, nor predicable
of a Subject. It is itself the ultimate Subject of all predications
and all inherencies. Plainly, therefore, we know it only relatively
to these predications and inherencies. Aristotle says truly, that if
you take; away the First Essences, everything else, Second Essences
as well as Accidents, disappears along with them. But he might have
added with equal truth, that if you take away all Second Essences and
all Accidents, the First Essences will disappear equally. The
correlation and interdependence is reciprocal.[86] It may be
suitable, with a view to clear and retainable philosophical
explanation, to state the Subject first and the predicates
afterwards; so that the Subject may thus be considered as logically
_prius_. But in truth the Subject is only a _substratum_ for
predicates,[87] as much as the predicates are _superstrata_ upon the
Subject. The term _substratum_ designates not an absolute or a _per
se_, but a _Correlatum_ to certain _superstrata_, determined or
undetermined: now the _Correlatum_ is one of the pair implicated
directly or indirectly in all Relation; and it is in fact specified
by Aristotle as one variety of the Category _Ad Aliquid_.[88] We see
therefore that the idea of Relativity attaches to the first of the
ten Categories, as well as to the nine others. The inference from
these observations is, that Relation or Relativity, understood in the
large sense which really belongs to it, ought to be considered rather
as an Universal, comprehending and pervading all the Categories, than
as a separate Category in itself, co-ordinate with the other nine. It
is the condition and characteristic of the work of predication
generally; the last analysis of which is into Subject and Predicate,
in reciprocal implication with each other. I remark that this was the
view taken of it by some well-known Peripatetic commentators of
antiquity;[89] by Andronikus, for example, and by Ammonius after him.
Plato, though he makes no attempt to draw up a list of Categories,