The Basic Works of Aristotle (Modern Library Classics) (137 page)

3
     We must not fail to notice that sometimes it is not clear whether a name means the composite substance,
(30)
or the actuality or form, e. g. whether ‘house’ is a sign for the composite thing, ‘a covering consisting of bricks and stones laid thus and thus’, or for the actuality or form, ‘a covering’, and whether a line is ‘twoness in length’ or ‘twoness’, and
whether an animal is ‘a soul in a body’ or ‘a soul’; for soul is the substance or actuality of some body.
(35)
‘Animal’ might even be applied to both, not as something definable by one formula, but as related to a single thing. But this question,
¹²
while important for another purpose, is of no importance for the inquiry into sensible substance; for the essence certainly attaches to the form and the actuality.
[1043b]
For ‘soul’ and ‘to be soul’ are the same, but ‘to be man’ and ‘man’ are not the same, unless even the bare soul is to be called man; and thus on one interpretation the thing is the same as its essence, and on another it is not.

If we examine
¹³
we find that the syllable does not consist of the letters + juxtaposition,
(5)
nor is the house bricks + juxtaposition. And this is right; for the juxtaposition or mixing does not consist of those things of which it is the juxtaposition or mixing. And the same is true in all other cases; e. g. if the threshold is characterized by its position, the position is not constituted by the threshold, but rather the latter is constituted by the former. Nor is man animal + biped,
(10)
but there must be something besides these, if these are matter—something which is neither an element in the whole nor a compound, but is the substance; but this people eliminate, and state only the matter. If, then, this is the cause of the thing’s being, and if the cause of its being is its substance,
¹⁴
they will not be stating the substance itself.

(This, then, must either be eternal or it must be destructible without being ever in course of being destroyed,
(15)
and must have come to be without ever being in course of coming to be. But it has been proved and explained elsewhere
¹⁵
that no one makes or begets the form, but it is the individual that is made, i. e. the complex of form and matter that is generated. Whether the substances of destructible things can exist apart, is not yet at all clear; except that obviously this is impossible in
some
cases—in the case of things which cannot exist apart from the individual instances,
(20)
e. g. house or utensil. Perhaps, indeed, neither these things themselves, nor any of the other things which are not formed by nature, are substances at all; for one might say that the nature in natural objects is the only substance to be found in destructible things.)

Therefore the difficulty which used to be raised by the school of Antisthenes and other such uneducated people has a certain timeliness. They said that the ‘what’ cannot be defined (for the definition so called is a ‘long rigmarole’
¹⁶
) but of what
sort
a thing,
(25)
e. g. silver, is, they
thought it possible actually to explain, not saying what it is, but that it is like tin. Therefore one kind of substance can be defined and formulated, i. e. the composite kind, whether it be perceptible or intelligible; but the primary parts of which this consists cannot be defined,
(30)
since a definitory formula predicates something of something, and one part of the definition must play the part of matter and the other that of form.

It is also obvious that, if substances are in a sense numbers, they are so in this sense and not, as some say,
¹⁷
as numbers of units.
(35)
For a definition is a sort of number; for (1) it is divisible, and into indivisible parts (for definitory formulae are not infinite), and number also is of this nature. And (2) as, when one of the parts of which a number consists has been taken from or added to the number, it is no longer the same number, but a different one, even if it is the very smallest part that has been taken away or added, so the definition and the essence will no longer remain when anything has been taken away or added.
[1044a]
And (3) the number must be something in virtue of which it is one, and this these thinkers cannot state, what makes it one, if it is one (for either it is not one but a sort of heap, or if it is,
(5)
we ought to say what it is that makes one out of many); and the definition is one, but similarly they cannot say what makes
it
one. And this is a natural result; for the same reason is applicable, and substance is one in the sense which we have explained, and not, as some say, by being a sort of unit or point; each is a complete reality and a definite nature.
(10)
And (4) as number does not admit of the more and the less, neither does substance, in the sense of form, but if any substance does, it is only the substance which involves matter. Let this, then, suffice for an account of the generation and destruction of so-called substances—in what sense it is possible and in what sense impossible—and of the reduction of things to number.

4
      Regarding material substance we must not forget that even if all things come from the same first cause
¹⁸
or have the same things for their first causes,
(15)
and if the same matter serves as starting-point for their generation, yet there is a matter proper to each, e. g. for phlegm the sweet or the fat, and for bile the bitter,
(20)
or something else; though perhaps these come from the same original matter. And there come to be several matters for the same thing, when the one matter is matter for the other; e. g. phlegm comes from the fat and from the sweet, if the fat comes from the sweet; and it comes from bile by analysis of
the bile into its ultimate matter. For one thing comes from another in two senses, either because it will be found at a later stage, or because it is produced if the other is analysed into its original constituents.
(25)
When the matter is one, different things may be produced owing to difference in the moving cause; e. g. from wood may be made both a chest and a bed. But
some
different things must have their matter different; e. g. a saw could not be made of wood, nor is this in the power of the moving cause; for it could not make a saw of wool or of wood. But if, as a matter of fact, the same thing can be made of different material, clearly the art, i. e. the moving principle,
(30)
is the same; for if both the matter and the moving cause were different, the product would be so too.

When one inquires into the cause of something, one should, since ‘causes’ are spoken of in several senses, state all the possible causes. e. g. what is the material cause of man? Shall we say ‘the menstrual fluid’? What is the moving cause? Shall we say ‘the seed’? The formal cause? His essence.
(35)
The final cause? His end. But perhaps the latter two are the same.—It is the proximate causes we must state.
[1044b]
What is the material cause? We must name not fire or earth, but the matter peculiar to the thing.

Regarding the substances that are natural and generable,
if
the causes are really these and of this number and we have to learn the causes, we must inquire thus, if we are to inquire rightly.
(5)
But in the case of natural but
eternal
substances another account must be given. For perhaps some have no matter, or not matter of this sort but only such as can be moved in respect of place. Nor does matter belong to those things which exist by nature but are not substances; their substratum is the
substance
. e. g. what is the cause of eclipse? What is its matter? There is none; the
moon
is that which suffers eclipse.
¹⁹
(10)
What is the moving cause which extinguished the light? The earth. The final cause perhaps does not exist. The formal principle is the definitory formula, but this is obscure if it does not include the cause.
²⁰
e. g. what is eclipse? Deprivation of light. But if we add ‘by the earth’s coming in between’, this is the formula which includes the cause.
(15)
In the case of sleep it is not clear what it is that proximately has this affection. Shall we say that it is the animal? Yes, but the animal in virtue of what, i. e. what is the proximate subject? The heart or some other part. Next, by what is it produced? Next, what is the affection—that of the proximate subject, not of the whole animal? Shall we say that
it is immobility of such and such a kind? Yes, but to what process in the proximate subject is this due?

5
     Since some things are and are not,
(20)
without coming to be and ceasing to be, e. g. points, if they can be said to
be
, and in general forms (for it is not ‘white’ that comes to be, but the wood comes to be white, if everything that comes to be comes from something and comes to be something),
(25)
not all contraries can come from one another, but it is in different senses that a pale man comes from a dark man, and pale comes from dark. Nor has everything matter, but only those things which come to be and change into one another. Those things which, without ever being in course of changing, are or are not, have no matter.

There is difficulty in the question how the matter of each thing is related to its contrary states.
(30)
e. g. if the body is potentially healthy, and disease is contrary to health, is it potentially both healthy and diseased? And is water potentially wine and vinegar? We answer that it is the matter of one in virtue of its positive state and its form, and of the other in virtue of the privation of its positive state and the corruption of it contrary to its nature. It is also hard to say why wine is not said to be the matter of vinegar nor potentially vinegar (though vinegar is produced from it),
(35)
and why a living man is not said to be potentially dead. In fact they are not, but the corruptions in question are accidental, and it is the
matter
of the animal that is itself in virtue of its corruption the potency and matter of a corpse, and it is water that is the matter of vinegar.
[1045a]
For the corpse comes from the animal, and vinegar from wine, as night from day. And
all
the things which change thus into one another must go back to their matter; e. g. if from a corpse is produced an animal, the corpse first goes back to its matter,
(5)
and only then becomes an animal; and vinegar first goes back to water, and only then becomes wine.

6
     To return to the difficulty which has been stated
²¹
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 besides the parts,
(10)
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,
(15)
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?

Clearly, then, if people proceed thus in their usual manner of definition and speech,
(20)
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.
(25)
For this difficulty is the same as would arise if ‘round bronze’ were the definition of ‘cloak’;
²²
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,
(30)
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.
²³
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’.
²⁴
(35)
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;
[1045b]
for each is by its nature a kind of being and a kind of unity,
(5)
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’,
(10)
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.
(15)
The reason is that
people look for a unifying formula, and a difference, between potency and complete reality. But, as has been said,
²⁵
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,
(20)
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.