105826. Contraries are other in form, and the perishable and the imperishable are contraries. They must therefore be other in kind. But so far we have spoken only of the universal terms, so that it would not follow that every imperishable thing is different in kind from every perishable, any more than every white thing is from every black. The same thing may be both white and black, and, if it is a universal, may be both at the same time.
36. But while some contraries such as white and black belong to certain subjects per accidens, perishable and imperishable do not. Nothing is perishable per accidens; if it could be so, the same thing might be both perishable and imperishable. Perishableness is either the essence, or included in the essence, of all perishables. So too with imperishableness. Therefore the essential natures in virtue of which things are perishable and imperishable are opposed, and there- fore are other in kind.
1059? 10. Therefore there cannot be Forms such as some thinkers maintain, for if there were there would be a perishable and an im- perishable man. The Forms are said to be the seme in species as the particulars, but things other in genus are further apart even than things other in species.
105827. otépnois yap dduvapia Siwpicpévn. ‘Perishable’ and imperishable’ are contraries, not contradictories, for a privative term
$T. Alberts Csutege Library
like ‘imperishable’ is not applicable to any and every thing that does not perish, but is limited to the class of things that might conceivably perish (cf. 1055) 8).
28. yéver. The premises only warrant the conclusion that the perishable and the imperishable are different in species, and there- fore Bz. reads eiSe. But this does not remove the difficulty, for in 10597 10 it is again stated, without any fresh grounds, that they differ yéve. It seems plain that cide and yéve are not here used in their technical sense. They may be translated ‘form’ and ‘kind’, In 1059214 on the other hand the technical distinction is found, and it seems probable that while the rest of the chapter was written before Aristotle had begun to use the words in their technical sense, ll. 10-14 were added later under the supposition that generic as opposed to specific difference between the perishable and the imperishable had been proved. These lines have the air of an afterthought; they use for the purpose of anti-Platonic polemic a result which in the rest of the chapter was established without any polemical motive.
For other instances of the non-technical use of the words cf. A. 10718 25 with 27, Caz. 8b 24 with 9214, An. Post. 97> 24 with 34, H. A. 490%16 with 17, 31 with 34, 55724 with 24, Pol. 1290 33 with 36. In Plato the words are often used indifferently.
1059*12. 6 pév, the sensible individual; 6 8, man-himself or the Idea of man.
BOOK kK
Book K consists of two very different parts, (1) 1059* 18—1065° 26, a shorter version of the contents of BIB, (2) 10654 26—1069° 4, a series of extracts from PAys, II, III, V. The two parts are in- geniously connected together by a transition from a discussion of the accidental to a discussion of chance. Jaeger has given (Arzsv. 216 ff.) strong reasons for holding that the first part is earlier than BIE, and was written when Aristotle was still much under the influence of Platonic presuppositions.
(1) While E has a section pointing forward to the discussion of substance and activity in ZH@ (1026 33-2), this is lacking in K (106415). I.e., while B has been worked up into a form which served to connect the original introduction ABIE. 1 with the later discussion of substance, ZH®, there is no trace of this in K,
(2) In K. 105939 Aristotle asks whether ‘the science we are looking for’ is concerned with sensible substances or with others, In the corresponding passage, B. 997° 34, he asks whether we must maintain the existence of sensible substances only or also of others.
306 Commentary
Jaeger argues (unsuccessfully, I think) that K here represents a more Platonic point of view.
(3) In K. 1060%7-13 the object of inquiry is said to be « tu xopiorov Kal! airs Kal pyderi rév aicOyrdv trdpxov. In B. 9997 24— 32 the language is much less strongly Platoni¢, K. 10604 21-27, » 1-3 reveal the same search for a transcendent object of knowledge.
(4) In K. 10638 10-17 Aristotle appeals from the changeableness of terrestrial things to the permanence of the celestial; in I’. roro® 15 ff., the appeal is to the permanent elements in the terrestrial world, and only incidentally (ib. 25-32) to the constancy of the heavens.
(5) The problem about the vAy tév pabyparixdy is peculiar to K. 1059 14-21. It is discussed in N. 1088? 14 ff., and N can on other grounds be shown to belong to the earliest draft of the Me/aphyszcs. The problem springs naturally out of Plato’s doctrine of the great-and-small.
(6) The one problem which is found in B (1002 32—1003* 5) and not in K is the question whether the elements exist potentially or actually—a question closely related to the contents of ZH®,
(7) K. 10593 presupposes the refutation of the ideal theory in A. 9; B. 99473 does not do this, and evidently belongs to the later period in which the attack on the ideal theory was removed from A and relegated to M. 4, 5.
Recapitulation of the problems stated in B. 2, 3 (ch. 1).
1059" 18. That wisdom is a science of first principles is clear from our examination of earlier thinkers, but the following questions arise :
20. (1) Is wisdom one science or more than one? If one, it should be of contraries, but the first principles are not contrary ; if more than one, which are these sciences ?
23. (2) Is it the business of one science to study the axioms? If of one, why of this more than of any other; if of more than one, which are these sciences ?
26. (3) Does it study all substances? If not all, then which; if all, how can one science study more than one subject ?
29. (4) Does it study attributes as well as substances? If it is a demonstration of attributes, it is not about substances; if a different science studies attributes, what is each and which is wisdom? Qua demonstrative, the science of attributes would be wisdom; gua about primaries, the science of substances.
34. The science we are looking for does not deal with the four causes ; it cannot deal with the final cause, i. e. the good, which is the first mover and is not presupposed by unmovable things.
Koer. TO5Q* 19-23 307
38. (5) Generally, is this science concerned with sensible substances or with others? If with others, then either with Forms or with mathe- matical objects. (a) The Forms do not exist; but, if we suppose them to exist, why is there not a third man, &c., just as mathematical objects are a ¢erfium quid between Forms and sensible things; on the other hand, if this er#um quid does not exist, what is mathematics about? Not about sensible things, which have not the required properties.
b 12. (4) Nor is the science we are looking for about mathematical objects, which have no separate existence, nor (c) about sensibles, which are perishable.
14. Which science should investigate the matter of mathematical objects? Not physics, which is occupied with things having a principle of motion and of rest in themselves ; nor logic, which is absorbed in the study of knowledge. This must therefore be a task for metaphysics.
» at. (6) Does metaphysics study the elements present in composite objects? It might seem to be rather concerned with universals (since all knowledge is of universals) and therefore with the summa genera, being and unity. These might seem most like first principles because if they are destroyed everything else perishes with them}; everything is existent and one.
gi. On the other hand, it would seem that these cannot be genera or first principles, because the differentiae must share in them, but no differentia shares in its genus, Further, what is simpler is more of a first principle than the less simple, and zmfimae species are simpler than their genera, being indivisible. But inasmuch as the destruction of the genus involves the destruction of its species, the genera are more like first principles.
K. 1, 2 covers the whole ground of B except the dopia stated in 996* 10, rr and discussed in 1002” 321003? s.
1059* 19-20. ék Tdv TpdTwY .. . TEpt TOY dpxay, i.e. A. 3-10.
20-23. This dzopia is that which is stated in B. 995» 5, 6 and dis- cussed in 996%18-5 26, The objection here urged against saying there is a single science of the dpyai is the objection stated jfirs¢ in B (996% 20, 21). The question here stated to arise if there be said to be more than one science of dpyai is different from that stated in B. 9961-24. The second objection stated in B (996% 21-» 1) against the first alternative is omitted here. The same point is made in 1059* 34-38, but in a different connexion.
22, at 8 dpxai odk évaytiat. By the dpyad are meant, as is evident from B. 996% 21-1, the four causes, which are evidently not contraries.
23. pia. We should perhaps follow I in reading péav, which gives the proper correspondence with «i pev yap play, |. 21.
308 Commentary
trotas Set Oeivar tadtas; ‘ what sort of sciences is it that must be held to make up codia?’
23-26. This problem answers to the problem stated in B. 995» 6- to and discussed in 996 26—997%15, but is not identical with it. The question there was whether the science which studies the dpxai of substance should also study the dpyai of demonstration ; here it is whether it is one or more than one science that studies the dpyai of demonstration. The objection here stated to the first alternative answers, mutatis mutandis, to that in 996 339947" 2. That to the second alternative answers to that in 997%14, 15. The second argument against the first alternative (997° 2-11) and the first against the second alternative (9978 11-13) are here omitted.
25. Ti paddov tavrns 7) Srovacody; i.e. since the demonstrative dpxai are the dpyad of all the sciences, how can it be the business of one and only one science to study them? The argument is purely dialectical.
26-29 answers to the problem stated in B. 995” 10-13 and discussed in 997% 15-25.
26. ert métepoy Tacdv Tay ovoLay 7 003 sc. brodaPetv clvar Set THY codiav érurtpuny (|. 21).
29-34 answers to the problem stated in 995» 18-27 and discussed in 997% 25-34.
30. A comparison with the corresponding passage in B shows that a7ddeis €orw is an intrusion from the next line. The question is whether co¢éa is concerned with substances only or also with attributes ; the reference to demonstration comes in only by way of showing the difficulty of supposing that it is concerned with both.
32-38. Christ has rightly found 4 dwoderixy codia impossible, and therefore brackets copia, but Luthe’s } pév .. . 9 dé for H wey. . .# de is manifestly a better alteration of the text. Qwa demonstrative, the knowledge of properties might be thought to be codia (since knowledge is often identified with demonstration) ; but gua dealing with 7& mpara, the knowledge of substances might seem to be 80. ‘Luthe’s reading is established by the parallel i in 996> 9-14 rive xp? kadety TOY eruory- pov copiar € EXEL Aoyor € exdorny Tporayopeveu” rl Bev yap apxicwrary mais 7, TOD Téhous kat rayabot TOLAUTY «+ «, 7) OF TOV TPTOY aitiov ...H THS ovoias ay etn TOLAVT.
34-38. This passage differs from the rest of the chapter in not propounding a problem but simply stating a fact about codia. Ina sense the passage connects with the first problem stated above, in ll. 20-23, viz. whether one science can study all the dpyaé; and the corresponding passage in B (996% 21-" 1) occurs in the discussion of the first problem. On the other hand it seems impossible to remove the passage from its present position, for ovre yap |. 35 is taken up by dAws & 1, 38, and the passage thus connected with the following problem. We may suppose that the notes on which this passage is based were in some confusion and have not been properly sorted out.
34. Tas ev Tols puctKois eipnpevas aitias, the four causes, Phys. ii. 3.
85. otre. Bz. conjectures ode, but it seems more likely that ote is resumed irregularly (as often) by dAws 6’ in 1. 38.
g8. 7o Bé . . . dkiwnros, ‘but a something that moved them first does not exist in the case of unchangeable things’.