Metaphysics
By Aristotle
Written 350 B.C.E
Translated by W. D. Ross
Part 1
"WE have treated of that which is primarily and to which all the
other categories of being are referred-i.e. of substance. For it is in
virtue of the concept of substance that the others also are said to be-quantity
and quality and the like; for all will be found to involve the concept
of substance, as we said in the first part of our work. And since 'being'
is in one way divided into individual thing, quality, and quantity, and
is in another way distinguished in respect of potency and complete reality,
and of function, let us now add a discussion of potency and complete reality.
And first let us explain potency in the strictest sense, which is, however,
not the most useful for our present purpose. For potency and actuality
extend beyond the cases that involve a reference to motion. But when we
have spoken of this first kind, we shall in our discussions of actuality'
explain the other kinds of potency as well.
"We have pointed out
elsewhere that 'potency' and the word 'can' have several senses. Of these
we may neglect all the potencies that are so called by an equivocation.
For some are called so by analogy, as in geometry we say one thing is or
is not a 'power' of another by virtue of the presence or absence of some
relation between them. But all potencies that conform to the same type
are originative sources of some kind, and are called potencies in reference
to one primary kind of potency, which is an originative source of change
in another thing or in the thing itself qua other. For one kind is a potency
of being acted on, i.e. the originative source, in the very thing acted
on, of its being passively changed by another thing or by itself qua other;
and another kind is a state of insusceptibility to change for the worse
and to destruction by another thing or by the thing itself qua other by
virtue of an originative source of change. In all these definitions is
implied the formula if potency in the primary sense.-And again these so-called
potencies are potencies either of merely acting or being acted on, or of
acting or being acted on well, so that even in the formulae of the latter
the formulae of the prior kinds of potency are somehow implied.
"Obviously,
then, in a sense the potency of acting and of being acted on is one (for
a thing may be 'capable' either because it can itself be acted on or because
something else can be acted on by it), but in a sense the potencies are
different. For the one is in the thing acted on; it is because it contains
a certain originative source, and because even the matter is an originative
source, that the thing acted on is acted on, and one thing by one, another
by another; for that which is oily can be burnt, and that which yields
in a particular way can be crushed; and similarly in all other cases. But
the other potency is in the agent, e.g. heat and the art of building are
present, one in that which can produce heat and the other in the man who
can build. And so, in so far as a thing is an organic unity, it cannot
be acted on by itself; for it is one and not two different things. And
'impotence'and 'impotent' stand for the privation which is contrary to
potency of this sort, so that every potency belongs to the same subject
and refers to the same process as a corresponding impotence. Privation
has several senses; for it means (1) that which has not a certain quality
and (2) that which might naturally have it but has not it, either (a) in
general or (b) when it might naturally have it, and either (a) in some
particular way, e.g. when it has not it completely, or (b) when it has
not it at all. And in certain cases if things which naturally have a quality
lose it by violence, we say they have suffered privation.
Part 2
"
"Since some such originative sources are present in soulless things,
and others in things possessed of soul, and in soul, and in the rational
part of the soul, clearly some potencies will, be non-rational and some
will be non-rational and some will be accompanied by a rational formula.
This is why all arts, i.e. all productive forms of knowledge, are potencies;
they are originative sources of change in another thing or in the artist
himself considered as other.
"And each of those which are accompanied
by a rational formula is alike capable of contrary effects, but one non-rational
power produces one effect; e.g. the hot is capable only of heating, but
the medical art can produce both disease and health. The reason is that
science is a rational formula, and the same rational formula explains a
thing and its privation, only not in the same way; and in a sense it applies
to both, but in a sense it applies rather to the positive fact. Therefore
such sciences must deal with contraries, but with one in virtue of their
own nature and with the other not in virtue of their nature; for the rational
formula applies to one object in virtue of that object's nature, and to
the other, in a sense, accidentally. For it is by denial and removal that
it exhibits the contrary; for the contrary is the primary privation, and
this is the removal of the positive term. Now since contraries do not occur
in the same thing, but science is a potency which depends on the possession
of a rational formula, and the soul possesses an originative source of
movement; therefore, while the wholesome produces only health and the calorific
only heat and the frigorific only cold, the scientific man produces both
the contrary effects. For the rational formula is one which applies to
both, though not in the same way, and it is in a soul which possesses an
originative source of movement; so that the soul will start both processes
from the same originative source, having linked them up with the same thing.
And so the things whose potency is according to a rational formula act
contrariwise to the things whose potency is non-rational; for the products
of the former are included under one originative source, the rational formula.
"It is obvious also that the potency of merely doing a thing or
having it done to one is implied in that of doing it or having it done
well, but the latter is not always implied in the former: for he who does
a thing well must also do it, but he who does it merely need not also do
it well.
Part 3
"
"There are some who say, as the Megaric school does, that a thing
'can' act only when it is acting, and when it is not acting it 'cannot'
act, e.g. that he who is not building cannot build, but only he who is
building, when he is building; and so in all other cases. It is not hard
to see the absurdities that attend this view.
"For it is clear
that on this view a man will not be a builder unless he is building (for
to be a builder is to be able to build), and so with the other arts. If,
then, it is impossible to have such arts if one has not at some time learnt
and acquired them, and it is then impossible not to have them if one has
not sometime lost them (either by forgetfulness or by some accident or
by time; for it cannot be by the destruction of the object, for that lasts
for ever), a man will not have the art when he has ceased to use it, and
yet he may immediately build again; how then will he have got the art?
And similarly with regard to lifeless things; nothing will be either cold
or hot or sweet or perceptible at all if people are not perceiving it;
so that the upholders of this view will have to maintain the doctrine of
Protagoras. But, indeed, nothing will even have perception if it is not
perceiving, i.e. exercising its perception. If, then, that is blind which
has not sight though it would naturally have it, when it would naturally
have it and when it still exists, the same people will be blind many times
in the day-and deaf too.
"Again, if that which is deprived of potency
is incapable, that which is not happening will be incapable of happening;
but he who says of that which is incapable of happening either that it
is or that it will be will say what is untrue; for this is what incapacity
meant. Therefore these views do away with both movement and becoming. For
that which stands will always stand, and that which sits will always sit,
since if it is sitting it will not get up; for that which, as we are told,
cannot get up will be incapable of getting up. But we cannot say this,
so that evidently potency and actuality are different (but these views
make potency and actuality the same, and so it is no small thing they are
seeking to annihilate), so that it is possible that a thing may be capable
of being and not he, and capable of not being and yet he, and similarly
with the other kinds of predicate; it may be capable of walking and yet
not walk, or capable of not walking and yet walk. And a thing is capable
of doing something if there will be nothing impossible in its having the
actuality of that of which it is said to have the capacity. I mean, for
instance, if a thing is capable of sitting and it is open to it to sit,
there will be nothing impossible in its actually sitting; and similarly
if it is capable of being moved or moving, or of standing or making to
stand, or of being or coming to be, or of not being or not coming to be.
"The word 'actuality', which we connect with 'complete reality',
has, in the main, been extended from movements to other things; for actuality
in the strict sense is thought to be identical with movement. And so people
do not assign movement to non-existent things, though they do assign some
other predicates. E.g. they say that non-existent things are objects of
thought and desire, but not that they are moved; and this because, while
ex hypothesi they do not actually exist, they would have to exist actually
if they were moved. For of non-existent things some exist potentially;
but they do not exist, because they do not exist in complete
reality.
Part 4
"
"If what we have described is identical with the capable or convertible
with it, evidently it cannot be true to say 'this is capable of being but
will not be', which would imply that the things incapable of being would
on this showing vanish. Suppose, for instance, that a man-one who did not
take account of that which is incapable of being-were to say that the diagonal
of the square is capable of being measured but will not be measured, because
a thing may well be capable of being or coming to be, and yet not be or
be about to be. But from the premisses this necessarily follows, that if
we actually supposed that which is not, but is capable of being, to be
or to have come to be, there will be nothing impossible in this; but the
result will be impossible, for the measuring of the diagonal is impossible.
For the false and the impossible are not the same; that you are standing
now is false, but that you should be standing is not impossible.
"At
the same time it is clear that if, when A is real, B must be real, then,
when A is possible, B also must be possible. For if B need not be possible,
there is nothing to prevent its not being possible. Now let A be supposed
possible. Then, when A was possible, we agreed that nothing impossible
followed if A were supposed to be real; and then B must of course be real.
But we supposed B to be impossible. Let it be impossible then. If, then,
B is impossible, A also must be so. But the first was supposed impossible;
therefore the second also is impossible. If, then, A is possible, B also
will be possible, if they were so related that if A,is real, B must be
real. If, then, A and B being thus related, B is not possible on this condition,
and B will not be related as was supposed. And if when A is possible, B
must be possible, then if A is real, B also must be real. For to say that
B must be possible, if A is possible, means this, that if A is real both
at the time when and in the way in which it was supposed capable of being
real, B also must then and in that way be real.
Part 5
"
"As all potencies are either innate, like the senses, or come by
practice, like the power of playing the flute, or by learning, like artistic
power, those which come by practice or by rational formula we must acquire
by previous exercise but this is not necessary with those which are not
of this nature and which imply passivity.
"Since that which is
'capable' is capable of something and at some time in some way (with all
the other qualifications which must be present in the definition), and
since some things can produce change according to a rational formula and
their potencies involve such a formula, while other things are nonrational
and their potencies are non-rational, and the former potencies must be
in a living thing, while the latter can be both in the living and in the
lifeless; as regards potencies of the latter kind, when the agent and the
patient meet in the way appropriate to the potency in question, the one
must act and the other be acted on, but with the former kind of potency
this is not necessary. For the nonrational potencies are all productive
of one effect each, but the rational produce contrary effects, so that
if they produced their effects necessarily they would produce contrary
effects at the same time; but this is impossible. There must, then, be
something else that decides; I mean by this, desire or will. For whichever
of two things the animal desires decisively, it will do, when it is present,
and meets the passive object, in the way appropriate to the potency in
question. Therefore everything which has a rational potency, when it desires
that for which it has a potency and in the circumstances in which it has
the potency, must do this. And it has the potency in question when the
passive object is present and is in a certain state; if not it will not
be able to act. (To add the qualification 'if nothing external prevents
it' is not further necessary; for it has the potency on the terms on which
this is a potency of acting, and it is this not in all circumstances but
on certain conditions, among which will be the exclusion of external hindrances;
for these are barred by some of the positive qualifications.) And so even
if one has a rational wish, or an appetite, to do two things or contrary
things at the same time, one will not do them; for it is not on these terms
that one has the potency for them, nor is it a potency of doing both at
the same time, since one will do the things which it is a potency of doing,
on the terms on which one has the potency.
Part 6
"
"Since we have treated of the kind of potency which is related
to movement, let us discuss actuality-what, and what kind of thing, actuality
is. For in the course of our analysis it will also become clear, with regard
to the potential, that we not only ascribe potency to that whose nature
it is to move something else, or to be moved by something else, either
without qualification or in some particular way, but also use the word
in another sense, which is the reason of the inquiry in the course of which
we have discussed these previous senses also. Actuality, then, is the existence
of a thing not in the way which we express by 'potentially'; we say that
potentially, for instance, a statue of Hermes is in the block of wood and
the half-line is in the whole, because it might be separated out, and we
call even the man who is not studying a man of science, if he is capable
of studying; the thing that stands in contrast to each of these exists
actually. Our meaning can be seen in the particular cases by induction,
and we must not seek a definition of everything but be content to grasp
the analogy, that it is as that which is building is to that which is capable
of building, and the waking to the sleeping, and that which is seeing to
that which has its eyes shut but has sight, and that which has been shaped
out of the matter to the matter, and that which has been wrought up to
the unwrought. Let actuality be defined by one member of this antithesis,
and the potential by the other. But all things are not said in the same
sense to exist actually, but only by analogy-as A is in B or to B, C is
in D or to D; for some are as movement to potency, and the others as substance
to some sort of matter.
"But also the infinite and the void and
all similar things are said to exist potentially and actually in a different
sense from that which applies to many other things, e.g. to that which
sees or walks or is seen. For of the latter class these predicates can
at some time be also truly asserted without qualification; for the seen
is so called sometimes because it is being seen, sometimes because it is
capable of being seen. But the infinite does not exist potentially in the
sense that it will ever actually have separate existence; it exists potentially
only for knowledge. For the fact that the process of dividing never comes
to an end ensures that this activity exists potentially, but not that the
infinite exists separately.
"Since of the actions which have a
limit none is an end but all are relative to the end, e.g. the removing
of fat, or fat-removal, and the bodily parts themselves when one is making
them thin are in movement in this way (i.e. without being already that
at which the movement aims), this is not an action or at least not a complete
one (for it is not an end); but that movement in which the end is present
is an action. E.g. at the same time we are seeing and have seen, are understanding
and have understood, are thinking and have thought (while it is not true
that at the same time we are learning and have learnt, or are being cured
and have been cured). At the same time we are living well and have lived
well, and are happy and have been happy. If not, the process would have
had sometime to cease, as the process of making thin ceases: but, as things
are, it does not cease; we are living and have lived. Of these processes,
then, we must call the one set movements, and the other actualities. For
every movement is incomplete-making thin, learning, walking, building;
these are movements, and incomplete at that. For it is not true that at
the same time a thing is walking and has walked, or is building and has
built, or is coming to be and has come to be, or is being moved and has
been moved, but what is being moved is different from what has been moved,
and what is moving from what has moved. But it is the same thing that at
the same time has seen and is seeing, seeing, or is thinking and has thought.
The latter sort of process, then, I call an actuality, and the former a
movement.
Part 7
"
"What, and what kind of thing, the actual is, may be taken as explained
by these and similar considerations. But we must distinguish when a thing
exists potentially and when it does not; for it is not at any and every
time. E.g. is earth potentially a man? No-but rather when it has already
become seed, and perhaps not even then. It is just as it is with being
healed; not everything can be healed by the medical art or by luck, but
there is a certain kind of thing which is capable of it, and only this
is potentially healthy. And (1) the delimiting mark of that which as a
result of thought comes to exist in complete reality from having existed
potentially is that if the agent has willed it it comes to pass if nothing
external hinders, while the condition on the other side-viz. in that which
is healed-is that nothing in it hinders the result. It is on similar terms
that we have what is potentially a house; if nothing in the thing acted
on-i.e. in the matter-prevents it from becoming a house, and if there is
nothing which must be added or taken away or changed, this is potentially
a house; and the same is true of all other things the source of whose becoming
is external. And (2) in the cases in which the source of the becoming is
in the very thing which comes to be, a thing is potentially all those things
which it will be of itself if nothing external hinders it. E.g. the seed
is not yet potentially a man; for it must be deposited in something other
than itself and undergo a change. But when through its own motive principle
it has already got such and such attributes, in this state it is already
potentially a man; while in the former state it needs another motive principle,
just as earth is not yet potentially a statue (for it must first change
in order to become brass.)
"It seems that when we call a thing
not something else but 'thaten'-e.g. a casket is not 'wood' but 'wooden',
and wood is not 'earth' but 'earthen', and again earth will illustrate
our point if it is similarly not something else but 'thaten'-that other
thing is always potentially (in the full sense of that word) the thing
which comes after it in this series. E.g. a casket is not 'earthen' nor
'earth', but 'wooden'; for this is potentially a casket and this is the
matter of a casket, wood in general of a casket in general, and this particular
wood of this particular casket. And if there is a first thing, which is
no longer, in reference to something else, called 'thaten', this is prime
matter; e.g. if earth is 'airy' and air is not 'fire' but 'fiery', fire
is prime matter, which is not a 'this'. For the subject or substratum is
differentiated by being a 'this' or not being one; i.e. the substratum
of modifications is, e.g. a man, i.e. a body and a soul, while the modification
is 'musical' or 'pale'. (The subject is called, when music comes to be
present in it, not 'music' but 'musical', and the man is not 'paleness'
but 'pale', and not 'ambulation' or 'movement' but 'walking' or 'moving',-which
is akin to the 'thaten'.) Wherever this is so, then, the ultimate subject
is a substance; but when this is not so but the predicate is a form and
a 'this', the ultimate subject is matter and material substance. And it
is only right that 'thaten' should be used with reference both to the matter
and to the accidents; for both are indeterminates.
"We have stated,
then, when a thing is to be said to exist potentially and when it is
not.
Part 8
"
"From our discussion of the various senses of 'prior', it is clear
that actuality is prior to potency. And I mean by potency not only that
definite kind which is said to be a principle of change in another thing
or in the thing itself regarded as other, but in general every principle
of movement or of rest. For nature also is in the same genus as potency;
for it is a principle of movement-not, however, in something else but in
the thing itself qua itself. To all such potency, then, actuality is prior
both in formula and in substantiality; and in time it is prior in one sense,
and in another not.
"(1) Clearly it is prior in formula; for that
which is in the primary sense potential is potential because it is possible
for it to become active; e.g. I mean by 'capable of building' that which
can build, and by 'capable of seeing' that which can see, and by 'visible'
that which can be seen. And the same account applies to all other cases,
so that the formula and the knowledge of the one must precede the knowledge
of the other.
"(2) In time it is prior in this sense: the actual
which is identical in species though not in number with a potentially existing
thing is to it. I mean that to this particular man who now exists actually
and to the corn and to the seeing subject the matter and the seed and that
which is capable of seeing, which are potentially a man and corn and seeing,
but not yet actually so, are prior in time; but prior in time to these
are other actually existing things, from which they were produced. For
from the potentially existing the actually existing is always produced
by an actually existing thing, e.g. man from man, musician by musician;
there is always a first mover, and the mover already exists actually. We
have said in our account of substance that everything that is produced
is something produced from something and by something, and that the same
in species as it.
"This is why it is thought impossible to be a
builder if one has built nothing or a harper if one has never played the
harp; for he who learns to play the harp learns to play it by playing it,
and all other learners do similarly. And thence arose the sophistical quibble,
that one who does not possess a science will be doing that which is the
object of the science; for he who is learning it does not possess it. But
since, of that which is coming to be, some part must have come to be, and,
of that which, in general, is changing, some part must have changed (this
is shown in the treatise on movement), he who is learning must, it would
seem, possess some part of the science. But here too, then, it is clear
that actuality is in this sense also, viz. in order of generation and of
time, prior to potency.
"But (3) it is also prior in substantiality;
firstly, (a) because the things that are posterior in becoming are prior
in form and in substantiality (e.g. man is prior to boy and human being
to seed; for the one already has its form, and the other has not), and
because everything that comes to be moves towards a principle, i.e. an
end (for that for the sake of which a thing is, is its principle, and the
becoming is for the sake of the end), and the actuality is the end, and
it is for the sake of this that the potency is acquired. For animals do
not see in order that they may have sight, but they have sight that they
may see. And similarly men have the art of building that they may build,
and theoretical science that they may theorize; but they do not theorize
that they may have theoretical science, except those who are learning by
practice; and these do not theorize except in a limited sense, or because
they have no need to theorize. Further, matter exists in a potential state,
just because it may come to its form; and when it exists actually, then
it is in its form. And the same holds good in all cases, even those in
which the end is a movement. And so, as teachers think they have achieved
their end when they have exhibited the pupil at work, nature does likewise.
For if this is not the case, we shall have Pauson's Hermes over again,
since it will be hard to say about the knowledge, as about the figure in
the picture, whether it is within or without. For the action is the end,
and the actuality is the action. And so even the word 'actuality' is derived
from 'action', and points to the complete reality.
"And while in
some cases the exercise is the ultimate thing (e.g. in sight the ultimate
thing is seeing, and no other product besides this results from sight),
but from some things a product follows (e.g. from the art of building there
results a house as well as the act of building), yet none the less the
act is in the former case the end and in the latter more of an end than
the potency is. For the act of building is realized in the thing that is
being built, and comes to be, and is, at the same time as the house.
"Where,
then, the result is something apart from the exercise, the actuality is
in the thing that is being made, e.g. the act of building is in the thing
that is being built and that of weaving in the thing that is being woven,
and similarly in all other cases, and in general the movement is in the
thing that is being moved; but where there is no product apart from the
actuality, the actuality is present in the agents, e.g. the act of seeing
is in the seeing subject and that of theorizing in the theorizing subject
and the life is in the soul (and therefore well-being also; for it is a
certain kind of life).
"Obviously, therefore, the substance or
form is actuality. According to this argument, then, it is obvious that
actuality is prior in substantial being to potency; and as we have said,
one actuality always precedes another in time right back to the actuality
of the eternal prime mover.
"But (b) actuality is prior in a stricter
sense also; for eternal things are prior in substance to perishable things,
and no eternal thing exists potentially. The reason is this. Every potency
is at one and the same time a potency of the opposite; for, while that
which is not capable of being present in a subject cannot be present, everything
that is capable of being may possibly not be actual. That, then, which
is capable of being may either be or not be; the same thing, then, is capable
both of being and of not being. And that which is capable of not being
may possibly not be; and that which may possibly not be is perishable,
either in the full sense, or in the precise sense in which it is said that
it possibly may not be, i.e. in respect either of place or of quantity
or quality; 'in the full sense' means 'in respect of substance'. Nothing,
then, which is in the full sense imperishable is in the full sense potentially
existent (though there is nothing to prevent its being so in some respect,
e.g. potentially of a certain quality or in a certain place); all imperishable
things, then, exist actually. Nor can anything which is of necessity exist
potentially; yet these things are primary; for if these did not exist,
nothing would exist. Nor does eternal movement, if there be such, exist
potentially; and, if there is an eternal mobile, it is not in motion in
virtue of a potentiality, except in respect of 'whence' and 'whither' (there
is nothing to prevent its having matter which makes it capable of movement
in various directions). And so the sun and the stars and the whole heaven
are ever active, and there is no fear that they may sometime stand still,
as the natural philosophers fear they may. Nor do they tire in this activity;
for movement is not for them, as it is for perishable things, connected
with the potentiality for opposites, so that the continuity of the movement
should be laborious; for it is that kind of substance which is matter and
potency, not actuality, that causes this.
"Imperishable things
are imitated by those that are involved in change, e.g. earth and fire.
For these also are ever active; for they have their movement of themselves
and in themselves. But the other potencies, according to our previous discussion,
are all potencies for opposites; for that which can move another in this
way can also move it not in this way, i.e. if it acts according to a rational
formula; and the same non-rational potencies will produce opposite results
by their presence or absence.
"If, then, there are any entities
or substances such as the dialecticians say the Ideas are, there must be
something much more scientific than science-itself and something more mobile
than movement-itself; for these will be more of the nature of actualities,
while science-itself and movement-itself are potencies for these.
"Obviously,
then, actuality is prior both to potency and to every principle of
change.
Part 9
"
"That the actuality is also better and more valuable than the good
potency is evident from the following argument. Everything of which we
say that it can do something, is alike capable of contraries, e.g. that
of which we say that it can be well is the same as that which can be ill,
and has both potencies at once; for the same potency is a potency of health
and illness, of rest and motion, of building and throwing down, of being
built and being thrown down. The capacity for contraries, then, is present
at the same time; but contraries cannot be present at the same time, and
the actualities also cannot be present at the same time, e.g. health and
illness. Therefore, while the good must be one of them, the capacity is
both alike, or neither; the actuality, then, is better. Also in the case
of bad things the end or actuality must be worse than the potency; for
that which 'can' is both contraries alike. Clearly, then, the bad does
not exist apart from bad things; for the bad is in its nature posterior
to the potency. And therefore we may also say that in the things which
are from the beginning, i.e. in eternal things, there is nothing bad, nothing
defective, nothing perverted (for perversion is something bad).
"It
is an activity also that geometrical constructions are discovered; for
we find them by dividing. If the figures had been already divided, the
constructions would have been obvious; but as it is they are present only
potentially. Why are the angles of the triangle equal to two right angles?
Because the angles about one point are equal to two right angles. If, then,
the line parallel to the side had been already drawn upwards, the reason
would have been evident to any one as soon as he saw the figure. Why is
the angle in a semicircle in all cases a right angle? If three lines are
equal the two which form the base, and the perpendicular from the centre-the
conclusion is evident at a glance to one who knows the former proposition.
Obviously, therefore, the potentially existing constructions are discovered
by being brought to actuality; the reason is that the geometer's thinking
is an actuality; so that the potency proceeds from an actuality; and therefore
it is by making constructions that people come to know them (though the
single actuality is later in generation than the corresponding potency).
(See diagram.)
Part 10
"
"The terms 'being' and 'non-being' are employed firstly with reference
to the categories, and secondly with reference to the potency or actuality
of these or their non-potency or nonactuality, and thirdly in the sense
of true and false. This depends, on the side of the objects, on their being
combined or separated, so that he who thinks the separated to be separated
and the combined to be combined has the truth, while he whose thought is
in a state contrary to that of the objects is in error. This being so,
when is what is called truth or falsity present, and when is it not? We
must consider what we mean by these terms. It is not because we think truly
that you are pale, that you are pale, but because you are pale we who say
this have the truth. If, then, some things are always combined and cannot
be separated, and others are always separated and cannot be combined, while
others are capable either of combination or of separation, 'being' is being
combined and one, and 'not being' is being not combined but more than one.
Regarding contingent facts, then, the same opinion or the same statement
comes to be false and true, and it is possible for it to be at one time
correct and at another erroneous; but regarding things that cannot be otherwise
opinions are not at one time true and at another false, but the same opinions
are always true or always false.
"But with regard to incomposites,
what is being or not being, and truth or falsity? A thing of this sort
is not composite, so as to 'be' when it is compounded, and not to 'be'
if it is separated, like 'that the wood is white' or 'that the diagonal
is incommensurable'; nor will truth and falsity be still present in the
same way as in the previous cases. In fact, as truth is not the same in
these cases, so also being is not the same; but (a) truth or falsity is
as follows--contact and assertion are truth (assertion not being the same
as affirmation), and ignorance is non-contact. For it is not possible to
be in error regarding the question what a thing is, save in an accidental
sense; and the same holds good regarding non-composite substances (for
it is not possible to be in error about them). And they all exist actually,
not potentially; for otherwise they would have come to be and ceased to
be; but, as it is, being itself does not come to be (nor cease to be);
for if it had done so it would have had to come out of something. About
the things, then, which are essences and actualities, it is not possible
to be in error, but only to know them or not to know them. But we do inquire
what they are, viz. whether they are of such and such a nature or not.
"(b) As regards the 'being' that answers to truth and the 'non-being'
that answers to falsity, in one case there is truth if the subject and
the attribute are really combined, and falsity if they are not combined;
in the other case, if the object is existent it exists in a particular
way, and if it does not exist in this way does not exist at all. And truth
means knowing these objects, and falsity does not exist, nor error, but
only ignorance-and not an ignorance which is like blindness; for blindness
is akin to a total absence of the faculty of thinking.
"It is evident
also that about unchangeable things there can be no error in respect of
time, if we assume them to be unchangeable. E.g. if we suppose that the
triangle does not change, we shall not suppose that at one time its angles
are equal to two right angles while at another time they are not (for that
would imply change). It is possible, however, to suppose that one member
of such a class has a certain attribute and another has not; e.g. while
we may suppose that no even number is prime, we may suppose that some are
and some are not. But regarding a numerically single number not even this
form of error is possible; for we cannot in this case suppose that one
instance has an attribute and another has not, but whether our judgement
be true or false, it is implied that the fact is eternal.
Chicago-North Shore Therapy.com
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