2. 7 Siaipecis Syrot. Cf. ey TH diapered Trav évavtiov I. 1054 30, év TH éxAoyH TOV evavtiwy T. 100482. Phys. 194* 36 says the distinc- tion eipyrai év trois repli pirocodias, i.e. in Aristotle’s early work of that name. Alexander thinks the reference is to the dialogue De Bono, but elsewhere he refers to a separate "ExAoyy t&v évavriwv (cf. 250. 19, 262. 18, 23, 615. 14, 643. 2, 695. 26). The distinction here, however, is not a distinction of contraries, and it seems improbable that here 7 dvatpeois refers to a book at all. It probably means simply ‘the well-known distinction’.
g. The subject of xuvet is the ob évexa in the sense of ris, the ob- jective end.
4. Kivodpeva dé radda Kuvet. The manuscript reading xvoupeve, ‘and by something moved it moves all other things’, is hardly possible Greek, and xwovpevov, ‘while the other (the apres ovpavds) being moved moves all other things’, is little better. x:voveva gives the right sense, ‘it moves as being loved (sc. without itself being moved), while all other things move by being moved’, i.e. simply transmit the motion impressed on them. a and w are often confused in manuscripts (Bast 183, &c.).
5. Alexander’s commentary here says éév eorw % évéepyeia Tod ovpaved 7 mpatn dopa, which leaves it doubtful what he read, except that there is no trace of the xaé which the manuscripts have be- fore evépyew. I have adopted a reading which may have been that of Alexander, and which gives better sense than those of the manuscripts and, I think, than those of previous editors (ei pope 7 mparn evepyetd. eat, 7 KuvelTat Bz., ei 7) Popa 7 mpdry evepyea eorw 0 Kwvetrau Christ). Taking 7 «we?ra: with what follows, and reading tavTn ye, Which the sense requires, we get the following meaning for the sentence. Aristotle has said, with the heavenly spheres in mind, ‘the other things move only by being moved. Now if a thing is moved, it is capable of being otherwise than as it is’, He now continues ‘so that if its actual mode of existence is the primary kind of local movement (sc. circular movement), then in so far as it is subject to change, in this respect it is capable of being otherwise, i.e. in respect of place even if not in respect of substance’, i.e. even if it is not subject to generation or destruction. The words <i pév oty . ovoiay (Il. 4-7) are preparatory to the second part of the sentence, in which Aristotle points out that the prov xwodv, in contrast to the ™pOTov KivoupEvor, is in no respect subject to contingency.
Jaeger reads «i dopa 7 ia mparn kal évepyeud, corw 7 Kwelra, TadTy 8° evdexerar dAXws éxew Kara Térov, and interprets ‘thus if locomotion is the p primary kind of movement and if it has activity only in so far as it is moved (i.e. really occurs), yet just for that reason it can be other- wise in respect of place’. The use of 8¢ 2% apodos? might be justified by reference to B. 999% 27, T. 10035, A. 1075 ro, but the inter- pretation as a whole is hardly satisfactory.
378 Commentary
8-9. dopa yap... xikdw, For local movement as the primary movement, which a thing must have if it is to have movement or change at. all, cf. Phys. 260% 26—261* 26, and for circular movement as the primary local movement cf. 265% 13—-) 16.
g. tadtyy S€ todTo kwet. The argument is: ‘But the first mover ¢mparts the first or minimal movement, and therefore cannot be sup- posed itself subject to it, since then we should have to look for something which is prior to the first mover and imparts this motion to it.’
IO-II. €§ dvdyxys dpa... dpxyn. ‘Since it is not subject even to the minimal change (and therefore, @ /ortior’, is not subject to generation or destruction), it is a thing that exists of necessity; and inasmuch as it exists of necessity, its existence is good, and it is in this way (se. as good or object of desire) that it is a principle’, i.e. the principle of movement of the universe.
10. 7 dvdyxy, kadds. ‘This is to be explained by A. 1015 14 ei apa eorw atra didva kal axivyta, ovdev éxelvors éott Biavov odd Tapa pvow. That which admits of no contingency of any kind (10728) xadds éxer because nothing contrary to its nature can happen to it.
11. For the three senses of ‘necessary’ cf. A. 5. Alexander thinks that the prime mover is necessary in the sense of 76 od ov« dvev 76 ev. But it has expressly been said (1. 8) to be necessary in the sense of ro pa) evdeyopevov GAAwWS Exew: TO ov ovK dvev TO ed is simply the condition of the good, and may be a necessary evil, otov 7d mietvy TO Pdppakov avaykatov wva pa Kawvy (A. 1015224); it is evi- dently not in this sense that the life of God is necessary.
14-24. Having shown (® 25) that there is a prime mover which is substance and is pure activity or actuality, Aristotle assumes that it must be such as the highest actuality or activity that we know, viz. vonots, immediate or intuitive knowledge. Further (1. 18) this vénous, being xa atryv, i.e. unconnected with any lower function such as sense or imagination, must be vonors of what is in itself the best, and that which is in the fullest sense voyois must be vonors of that which is in the fullest sense best, i.e. of the rp&rov dpexrdv (#27), the prime — mover itself. Now yvots does know itself by sharing in the know- ability of its object ; for when it touches and knows it becomes know- able, so that it and its object are one. It is when it actually ‘ touches’ its object that this happens, for, while vods is that which is capable of receiving the knowable, i.e. essence, it is actual only when it actually possesses the object, so that actuality rather than potentiality is the divine thing in vods—actual contemplation is the pleasantest and best of all things.
14-15. Siayuy) & .. . Hptv, ‘it is a life such as the best that we live, and live for but a short time’. Or duaywyy may be used in the more pregnant sense in which it implies both noble activity and pleasure
(Pol. 133917). The primum movens is described not as having but as being a life, because it is pure évepyeua.
15. ola 4 dpiory pixpdv xpdvoy Hiv, i.e. when we are engaged in philosophic thought, cf. A. 982> 19—9837 10, L. V. 1177526. We can do this only for a short time because we are not all évépye and our dvvapus being finite is bound to tire (cf. ®. 1050» 24, £. NV. 1175? 3, De Somno 454? 8).
16. émei kat qdovt h evépyera tovtov. ydovn 7 evéepyeia is clearly preferable to the vulgate 4 dov7 évepyea. Aristotle uses here the language of L. JV. vii. 1153214, which identifies pleasure and activity. In the exacter language of Z. WV. x (1175?15), pleasure inevitably accompanies and completes activity.
17. 81d todto, because they are activities.
18. S14 tadta, because they are hopes and memories of these activities.
18-21. In order to find the connexion between these two sentences, it seems necessary to suppose that when Aristotle says that the divine vonors ) Ka? avrnv is of 70 Kal? attd dpucrov he means the conclusion to be drawn ‘and therefore of the divine vois itself’, which has been exhibited as the zprov dpexréy (* 27), in other words as the dpiorov (#35). He then goes on to show ow vods knows itself; he shows that it is only in the activity of véyots that vods becomes its object and so becomes knowable, and the distinction thus drawn between activity and potentiality leads him to the statement that the activity is better than the potentiality, that the actual exercise of Gewpia is the pleasantest and best thing in the world.
18. 4... vdnots 7 kad adtyy, thinking in itself as distinguished from the human thinking which depends on sense and imagination. Alexander interprets these words as meaning 6 kar’ évépyeay vods in distinction from 6 xa@ eéw and 6 duvdper, but it is difficult to get this out of xaf aurny.
19. aitdv S€ voet. Bz. is not justified in inferring from 1074) 33 that 67 should be read; the argument there is obviously different. 64 gives a good sense here, but so does de.
20. KaTa peTakay tod vontod. Cf. De An. 430°8 exeivw (vd) 7d vonrov brdp&e. vovs, as Alexander says (698. 7), knows primarily the intelligible form, and incidentally itself, through the fact that when it knows it becomes what it knows. Ch De An. 43072 Kal avros (6 vois) « ae voyros coTw domep TH vonta. emt pev yep TOV dvev vAys TO aire fore 70 voobv kal 70 voovievov" a] yap eTLOTH LN n GewpytiKkn Kal TO ovTWS emliaTyTOV TO aito éeorw. ‘The identity of actualized vods (voids actually engaged in voyors) with the actualized voyrov (which has been changed from a dvvdpe vonTov to an évepyeia voynrov by the action of vods in véyois on it) is parallel to the identity of actualized sensation with the actualized sensible object (De Ax. 424% 25, 425 »
The doctrine that the actual aic@avopevor is identical with the actual aicOyrov seems to be based on two grounds :—
380 Commentary
(1) The metaphorical description of the apprehension of the sen- sible form as 8éye6a, and the comparison of it with the reception of the shape of a seal by wax (424° 18), lead Aristotle to think of the percipient as becoming actually qualified by the form of the object.
(2) He interprets the inseparability of actual hearing from actual sound, of actual seeing from actual colour (425> 30), as implying that these are but two names for the same thing viewed from different standpoints.
The first of these grounds, at any rate, is also implied in his identification of vots and vontov (vots is Sextixdv Tod eldous Kal du- vape. Towodvtov GAAG pi TodTO 429%15). vods must have no character of its own, that it may be able to take the character of whatever it knows (429221). And doubtless the second ground is also implied in this case, though there is no passage so explicitly implying it as that referred to above with regard to sensation (425 30).
21. Qyydvey. For the metaphor cf. @, rog1> 24,
22. kal Tis odcias, i.e. ‘of substance’ in the sense of essence, cf. De An. 4292 15 dexrixov Tod etdous.
22-24. évepyet 8€... dpiotov. ‘ But vods is actual when it has its objects (instead of being merely capable of receiving them), so that (since actuality is better than potentiality, cf. ©. 8) having them rather than being capable of having them is the most divine thing in voids, and actual contemplation is the pleasantest and best thing.’ I follow Alexander (698. 29) in the interpretation of évepye? d€ éxwv; for the use of éywv cf. Bz. /ndex 305» 46. Bz.’s interpretation of éywv, guoniam ipse in se continet aiqgue tpse est 7d vonrov, is hard to get out of the Greek and seems less probable, the point being the contrast of actual with potential knowledge, without special reference at this stage of the argument to the identity of knowledge and its object.
Krische’s interpretation of éywv as = ‘having the potentiality of thought’ is rightly rejected by Bz.; the supposed parallels in Phys. 255*34, De An. 412% 26, 417 5, are not convincing. Dr. Jackson (Proc. Camb. Phil, Soc. cix-cxiv. 11 f.) translates évepye? 8& exwv ‘and it energizes continually’, comparing such phrases as ri xumrdGes éxwv; and éywv pdAvapeis. This idiom seems, however, to be some- what contemptuous and therefore out of place here ; cf. the instances quoted in L. and S.
Mr, A. J. Rahilly has an ingenious conjecture (Vew Jreland Review, October, 1909), évepyet dé éywv éxeivo waddov, dre TovTOV 6 KTX., ‘ but it is rather by possessing the former (the intelligible) that it (the intellect) _ becomes actualized. And so the contemplation of that which the intellect seems to have divine in it (i.e. self-consciousness) is its greatest enjoyment and good’. The transposition gives an excellent sense, but does not seem to be necessary.
23. dot ékeivou paddov todto is the reading implied by Alexander (698. 35). He interprets the clause as meaning ‘so that the divine thing in vois (i.e. its self-knowledge) belongs rather to the rpéros vois’ (than to the actual vods of mankind). 7 Qewpia will then mean not
‘contemplation in general but ‘God’s contemplation’. But it is difficult to supply 76 éavrév voety as the meaning of 6 doxel 6 vods Oetov éyew. We must, it seems, choose one of two interpretations :