The Basic Works of Aristotle (Modern Library Classics) (125 page)

1
     ‘Beginning’ means (1) that part of a thing from which one would start first,
(35)
e. g. a line or a road has a beginning in either of the contrary directions.
[1013a]
(2) That from which each thing would best be originated, e. g. even in learning we must sometimes begin not from the first point and the beginning of the subject, but from the point from which we should learn most easily. (3) That from which, as an immanent part, a thing first comes to be, e. g. as the keel of a ship and the foundation of a house,
(5)
while in animals some suppose the heart, others the brain, others some other part, to be of this nature. (4) That from which,
not
as an immanent part, a thing first comes to be, and from which the movement or the change naturally first begins, as a child comes from its father and its mother, and a fight from abusive language.
(10)
(5) That at whose will that which is moved is moved and that which changes changes, e. g. the magistracies in cities, and oligarchies and monarchies and tyrannies, are called
archai
and so are the arts, and of these especially the architectonic arts.
(15)
(6) That from which a thing can first be known—this also is called the beginning of the thing, e. g. the hypotheses are the beginnings of demonstrations. (Causes are spoken of in an equal number of senses; for all causes are beginnings.) It is common, then, to all beginnings to be the first point from which a thing either is or comes to be or is known; but of these some are immanent in the thing and others are outside.
(20)
Hence the nature of a thing is a beginning, and so is the element of a thing, and thought and will, and essence, and the final cause—for the good and the beautiful are the beginning both of the knowledge and of the movement of many things.

2
     ‘Cause’ means (1) that from which, as immanent material,
(25)
a thing comes into being, e. g. the bronze is the cause of the statue and the silver of the saucer, and so are the classes which include these. (2) The form or pattern, i. e. the definition of the essence, and the classes which include this (e. g. the ratio 2:1 and number in general are causes of the octave), and the parts included in the definition. (3) That from which the change or the resting from change first begins; e. g. the adviser is a cause of the action,
(30)
and the father a cause of the child, and in general the maker a cause of the thing made and the change-producing of the changing. (4) The end, i. e. that for the sake of which a thing is; e. g. health is the cause of walking. For ‘Why does one walk?’ we say; ‘that one may be healthy’; and in speaking thus we think we have given the cause.
(35)
The same is true of all the means that intervene before the end, when something else has put the process in motion, as e. g. thinning or purging or drugs or instruments intervene before health is reached; for all these are for the sake of the end, though they differ from one another in that some are instruments and others are actions.
[1013b]

These, then, are practically all the senses in which causes are spoken of, and as they are spoken of in several senses it follows both that there are several causes of the same thing,
(5)
and in no accidental sense (e. g. both the art of sculpture and the bronze are causes of the statue not in respect of anything else but
qua
statue; not, however, in the same way, but the one as matter and the other as source of the movement), and that things can be causes of one another (e. g. exercise of good condition, and the latter of exercise; not, however, in the same way, but the one as end and the other as source of movement).
(10)
—Again, the same thing is the cause of contraries; for that which when present causes a particular thing, we sometimes charge, when absent, with the contrary, e. g. we impute the shipwreck to the absence of the steersman, whose presence was the cause of safety; and both—the presence and the privation—are causes as sources of movement.
(15)

All the causes now mentioned fall under four senses which are the most obvious. For the letters are the cause of syllables, and the material is the cause of manufactured things, and fire and earth and all such things are the causes of bodies, and the parts are causes of the whole, and the hypotheses are causes of the conclusion,
(20)
in the sense that they are that out of which these respectively are made; but of these some are cause as the
substratum
(e. g. the parts), others as the
essence
(the whole, the synthesis, and the form). The semen, the physician, the adviser, and in general the agent, are all
sources of change
or of rest. The remainder are causes as the
end
and the good of the other things; for that for the sake of which other things are tends to be the best and the end of the other things; let us take it as making no difference whether we call it good or apparent good.
(25)

These, then, are the causes, and this is the number of their kinds, but the
varieties
of causes are many in number, though when summarized these also are comparatively few. Causes are spoken of in many senses,
(30)
and even of those which are of the same kind some are causes in a prior and others in a posterior sense, e. g. both ‘the physician’ and ‘the professional man’ are causes of health, and both ‘the ratio 2:1’ and ‘number’ are causes of the octave, and the classes that include any particular cause are always causes of the particular
effect. Again, there are accidental causes and the classes which include these; e. g. while in one sense ‘the sculptor’ causes the statue,
(35)
in another sense ‘Polyclitus’ causes it, because the sculptor happens to be Polyclitus; and the classes that include the accidental cause are also causes, e. g. ‘man’—or in general ‘animal’—is the cause of the statue, because Polyclitus is a man, and man is an animal.
[1014a]
(5)
Of accidental causes also some are more remote or nearer than others, as, for instance, if ‘the white’ and ‘the musical’ were called causes of the statue, and not only ‘Polyclitus’ or ‘man’. But besides all these varieties of causes, whether proper or accidental, some are called causes as being able to act, others as acting; e. g. the cause of the house’s being built is a builder, or a builder who is building.
(10)
—The same variety of language will be found with regard to the effects of causes; e. g. a thing may be called the cause of this statue or of a statue or in general of an image, and of this bronze or of bronze or of matter in general; and similarly in the case of accidental effects. Again, both accidental and proper causes may be spoken of in combination; e. g. we may say not ‘Polyclitus’ nor ‘the sculptor’, but ‘Polyclitus the sculptor’.

Yet all these are but six in number,
(15)
while each is spoken of in two ways; for (A) they are causes either as the individual, or as the genus, or as the accidental, or as the genus that includes the accidental, and these either as combined, or as taken simply; and (B) all may be taken as acting or as having a capacity.
(20)
But they differ inasmuch as the acting causes, i. e. the individuals, exist, or do not exist, simultaneously with the things of which they are causes, e. g. this particular man who is healing, with this particular man who is recovering health, and this particular builder with this particular thing that is being built; but the potential causes are not always in this case; for the house does not perish at the same time as the builder.
(25)

3
     ‘Element’ means (1) the primary component immanent in a thing, and indivisible in kind into other kinds; e. g. the elements of speech are the parts of which speech consists and into which it is ultimately divided, while
they
are no longer divided into other forms of speech different in kind from them.
(30)
If they
are
divided, their parts are of the same kind, as a part of water is water (while a part of the syllable is not a syllable). Similarly those who speak of the elements of bodies mean the things into which bodies are ultimately divided, while
they
are no longer divided into other things differing in kind; and whether the things of this sort are one or more,
(35)
they call these elements. The so-called
elements of geometrical proofs, and in general the elements of demonstrations, have a similar character; for the primary demonstrations, each of which is implied in many demonstrations, are called elements of demonstrations; and the primary syllogisms, which have three terms and proceed by means of one middle, are of this nature.
[1014b]
(2) People also transfer the word ‘element’ from this meaning and apply it to that which, being one and small, is useful for many purposes; for which reason what is small and simple and indivisible is called an element.
(5)
Hence come the facts that the most universal things are elements (because each of them being one and simple is present in a plurality of things, either in all or in as many as possible), and that unity and the point are thought by some to be first principles. Now, since the so-called genera are universal and indivisible (for there is no definition of them), some say the genera are elements,
(10)
and more so than the differentia, because the genus is more universal; for where the differentia is present, the genus accompanies it, but where the genus is present, the differentia is not always so. It is common to all the meanings that the element of each thing is the first component immanent in each.
(15)

4
     ‘Nature’ means (1) the genesis of growing things—the meaning which would be suggested if one were to pronounce the
y
in
physis
long.
¹
(2) That immanent part of a growing thing, from which its growth first proceeds. (3) The source from which the primary movement in each natural object is present in it in virtue of its own essence.
(20)
Those things are said to grow which derive increase from something else by contact and either by organic unity, or by organic adhesion as in the case of embryos. Organic unity differs from contact; for in the latter case there need not be anything besides the contact, but in organic unities there is something identical in both parts, which makes them grow together instead of merely touching,
(25)
and be one in respect of continuity and quantity, though not of quality.—(4) ‘Nature’ means the primary material of which any natural object consists or out of which it is made, which is relatively unshaped and cannot be changed from its own potency, as e. g. bronze is said to be the nature of a statue and of bronze utensils, and wood the nature of wooden things; and so in all other cases; for when a product is made out of these materials,
(30)
the first matter is preserved throughout. For it is in this way that people call the elements of
natural objects also their nature, some naming fire, others earth, others air, others water, others something else of the sort,
(35)
and some naming more than one of these, and others all of them.—(5) ‘Nature’ means the
essence
of natural objects, as with those who say the nature is the primary mode of composition, or as Empedocles says:—
[1015a]

Hence as regards the things that are or come to be by nature, though that
from which
they naturally come to be or are is already present, we say they have not their nature yet,
(5)
unless they have their form or shape. That which comprises both of these
²
exists
by
nature, e. g. the animals and their parts; and not only is the first matter nature (and this in two senses, either the first, counting from the thing, or the first in general; e. g. in the case of works in bronze, bronze is first with reference to them, but in general perhaps water is first, if all things that can be melted are water), but also the form or essence,
(10)
which is the end of the process of becoming.—(6) By an extension of meaning from this sense of ‘nature’ every essence in general has come to be called a ‘nature’, because the nature of a thing is one kind of essence.

From what has been said, then, it is plain that nature in the primary and strict sense is the essence of things which have in themselves,
(15)
as such, a source of movement; for the matter is called the nature because it is qualified to receive this, and processes of becoming and growing are called nature because they are movements proceeding from this. And nature in this sense is the source of the movement of natural objects, being present in them somehow, either potentially or in complete reality.

5
      We call ‘necessary’ (1) (
a
) that without which,
(20)
as a condition, a thing cannot live; e. g. breathing and food are necessary for an animal; for it is incapable of existing without these; (
b
) the conditions without which good cannot be or come to be, or without which we cannot get rid or be freed of evil; e. g. drinking the medicine is necessary in order that we may be cured of disease,
(25)
and a man’s sailing to Aegina is necessary in order that he may get his money.—(2) The compulsory and compulsion, i. e. that which impedes and tends to hinder, contrary
to impulse and purpose. For the compulsory is called necessary (whence the necessary is painful, as Evenus says: ‘For every necessary thing is ever irksome’), and compulsion is a form of necessity,
(30)
as Sophocles says: ‘But force necessitates me to this act.’ And necessity is held to be something that cannot be persuaded—and rightly, for it is contrary to the movement which accords with purpose and with reasoning.—(3) We say that that which cannot be otherwise is necessarily as it is. And from this sense of ‘necessary’ all the others are somehow derived; for a thing is said to do or suffer what is necessary in the sense of compulsory,
(35)
only when it cannot act according to its impulse because of the compelling force—which implies that necessity is that because of which a thing cannot be otherwise; and similarly as regards the conditions of life and of good; for when in the one case good, in the other life and being, are not possible without certain conditions,
(5)
these are necessary, and this kind of cause is a sort of necessity.
[1015b]
Again, demonstration is a necessary thing because the conclusion cannot be otherwise, if there has been demonstration in the unqualified sense; and the causes of this necessity are the first premisses, i. e. the fact that the propositions from which the syllogism proceeds cannot be otherwise.

Now some things owe their necessity to something other than themselves; others do not, but are themselves the source of necessity in other things.
(10)
Therefore the necessary in the primary and strict sense is the simple; for this does not admit of more states than one, so that it cannot even be in one state and also in another; for if it did it would already be in more than one. If, then, there are any things that are eternal and unmovable, nothing compulsory or against their nature attaches to them.
(15)