Aristotle

by Various Works [lit]

  attribute-plainly, I say, everything comes to be from both subject and

  form. For 'musical man' is composed (in a way) of 'man' and 'musical':

  you can analyse it into the definitions of its elements. It is clear

  then that what comes to be will come to be from these elements.

  Now the subject is one numerically, though it is two in form. (For

  it is the man, the gold-the 'matter' generally-that is counted, for it

  is more of the nature of a 'this', and what comes to be does not

  come from it in virtue of a concomitant attribute; the privation, on

  the other hand, and the contrary are incidental in the process.) And

  the positive form is one-the order, the acquired art of music, or

  any similar predicate.

  There is a sense, therefore, in which we must declare the principles

  to be two, and a sense in which they are three; a sense in which the

  contraries are the principles-say for example the musical and the

  unmusical, the hot and the cold, the tuned and the untuned-and a sense

  in which they are not, since it is impossible for the contraries to be

  acted on by each other. But this difficulty also is solved by the fact

  that the substratum is different from the contraries, for it is itself

  not a contrary. The principles therefore are, in a way, not more in

  number than the contraries, but as it were two, nor yet precisely two,

  since there is a difference of essential nature, but three. For 'to be

  man' is different from 'to be unmusical', and 'to be unformed' from

  'to be bronze'.

  We have now stated the number of the principles of natural objects

  which are subject to generation, and how the number is reached: and it

  is clear that there must be a substratum for the contraries, and

  that the contraries must be two. (Yet in another way of putting it

  this is not necessary, as one of the contraries will serve to effect

  the change by its successive absence and presence.)

  The underlying nature is an object of scientific knowledge, by an

  analogy. For as the bronze is to the statue, the wood to the bed, or

  the matter and the formless before receiving form to any thing which

  has form, so is the underlying nature to substance, i.e. the 'this' or

  existent.

  This then is one principle (though not one or existent in the same

  sense as the 'this'), and the definition was one as we agreed; then

  further there is its contrary, the privation. In what sense these

  are two, and in what sense more, has been stated above. Briefly, we

  explained first that only the contraries were principles, and later

  that a substratum was indispensable, and that the principles were

  three; our last statement has elucidated the difference between the

  contraries, the mutual relation of the principles, and the nature of

  the substratum. Whether the form or the substratum is the essential

  nature of a physical object is not yet clear. But that the

  principles are three, and in what sense, and the way in which each

  is a principle, is clear.

  So much then for the question of the number and the nature of the

  principles.

  8

  We will now proceed to show that the difficulty of the early

  thinkers, as well as our own, is solved in this way alone.

  The first of those who studied science were misled in their search

  for truth and the nature of things by their inexperience, which as

  it were thrust them into another path. So they say that none of the

  things that are either comes to be or passes out of existence, because

  what comes to be must do so either from what is or from what is not,

  both of which are impossible. For what is cannot come to be (because

  it is already), and from what is not nothing could have come to be

  (because something must be present as a substratum). So too they

  exaggerated the consequence of this, and went so far as to deny even

  the existence of a plurality of things, maintaining that only Being

  itself is. Such then was their opinion, and such the reason for its

  adoption.

  Our explanation on the other hand is that the phrases 'something

  comes to be from what is or from what is not', 'what is not or what is

  does something or has something done to it or becomes some

  particular thing', are to be taken (in the first way of putting our

  explanation) in the same sense as 'a doctor does something or has

  something done to him', 'is or becomes something from being a doctor.'

  These expressions may be taken in two senses, and so too, clearly, may

  'from being', and 'being acts or is acted on'. A doctor builds a

  house, not qua doctor, but qua housebuilder, and turns gray, not qua

  doctor, but qua dark-haired. On the other hand he doctors or fails

  to doctor qua doctor. But we are using words most appropriately when

  we say that a doctor does something or undergoes something, or becomes

  something from being a doctor, if he does, undergoes, or becomes qua

  doctor. Clearly then also 'to come to be so-and-so from not-being'

  means 'qua not-being'.

  It was through failure to make this distinction that those

  thinkers gave the matter up, and through this error that they went

  so much farther astray as to suppose that nothing else comes to be

  or exists apart from Being itself, thus doing away with all becoming.

  We ourselves are in agreement with them in holding that nothing

  can be said without qualification to come from what is not. But

  nevertheless we maintain that a thing may 'come to be from what is

  not'-that is, in a qualified sense. For a thing comes to be from the

  privation, which in its own nature is not-being,-this not surviving as

  a constituent of the result. Yet this causes surprise, and it is

  thought impossible that something should come to be in the way

  described from what is not.

  In the same way we maintain that nothing comes to be from being, and

  that being does not come to be except in a qualified sense. In that

  way, however, it does, just as animal might come to be from animal,

  and an animal of a certain kind from an animal of a certain kind.

  Thus, suppose a dog to come to be from a horse. The dog would then, it

  is true, come to be from animal (as well as from an animal of a

  certain kind) but not as animal, for that is already there. But if

  anything is to become an animal, not in a qualified sense, it will not

  be from animal: and if being, not from being-nor from not-being

  either, for it has been explained that by 'from not being' we mean

  from not-being qua not-being.

  Note further that we do not subvert the principle that everything

  either is or is not.

  This then is one way of solving the difficulty. Another consists

  in pointing out that the same things can be explained in terms of

  potentiality and actuality. But this has been done with greater

  precision elsewhere. So, as we said, the difficulties which

  constrain people to deny the existence of some of the things we

  mentioned are now solved. For it was this reason which also caused

  some of the earlier thinkers to turn so far aside from the road

  which leads to coming to be and passing aw
ay and change generally.

  If they had come in sight of this nature, all their ignorance would

  have been dispelled.

  9

  Others, indeed, have apprehended the nature in question, but not

  adequately.

  In the first place they allow that a thing may come to be without

  qualification from not being, accepting on this point the statement of

  Parmenides. Secondly, they think that if the substratum is one

  numerically, it must have also only a single potentiality-which is a

  very different thing.

  Now we distinguish matter and privation, and hold that one of these,

  namely the matter, is not-being only in virtue of an attribute which

  it has, while the privation in its own nature is not-being; and that

  the matter is nearly, in a sense is, substance, while the privation in

  no sense is. They, on the other hand, identify their Great and Small

  alike with not being, and that whether they are taken together as

  one or separately. Their triad is therefore of quite a different

  kind from ours. For they got so far as to see that there must be

  some underlying nature, but they make it one-for even if one

  philosopher makes a dyad of it, which he calls Great and Small, the

  effect is the same, for he overlooked the other nature. For the one

  which persists is a joint cause, with the form, of what comes to

  be-a mother, as it were. But the negative part of the contrariety

  may often seem, if you concentrate your attention on it as an evil

  agent, not to exist at all.

  For admitting with them that there is something divine, good, and

  desirable, we hold that there are two other principles, the one

  contrary to it, the other such as of its own nature to desire and

  yearn for it. But the consequence of their view is that the contrary

  desires its wtextinction. Yet the form cannot desire itself, for it is

  not defective; nor can the contrary desire it, for contraries are

  mutually destructive. The truth is that what desires the form is

  matter, as the female desires the male and the ugly the beautiful-only

  the ugly or the female not per se but per accidens.

  The matter comes to be and ceases to be in one sense, while in

  another it does not. As that which contains the privation, it ceases

  to be in its own nature, for what ceases to be-the privation-is

  contained within it. But as potentiality it does not cease to be in

  its own nature, but is necessarily outside the sphere of becoming

  and ceasing to be. For if it came to be, something must have existed

  as a primary substratum from which it should come and which should

  persist in it; but this is its own special nature, so that it will

  be before coming to be. (For my definition of matter is just

  this-the primary substratum of each thing, from which it comes to be

  without qualification, and which persists in the result.) And if it

  ceases to be it will pass into that at the last, so it will have

  ceased to be before ceasing to be.

  The accurate determination of the first principle in respect of

  form, whether it is one or many and what it is or what they are, is

  the province of the primary type of science; so these questions may

  stand over till then. But of the natural, i.e. perishable, forms we

  shall speak in the expositions which follow.

  The above, then, may be taken as sufficient to establish that

  there are principles and what they are and how many there are. Now let

  us make a fresh start and proceed.

  Book II

  1

  Of things that exist, some exist by nature, some from other causes.

  'By nature' the animals and their parts exist, and the plants and

  the simple bodies (earth, fire, air, water)-for we say that these

  and the like exist 'by nature'.

  All the things mentioned present a feature in which they differ from

  things which are not constituted by nature. Each of them has within

  itself a principle of motion and of stationariness (in respect of

  place, or of growth and decrease, or by way of alteration). On the

  other hand, a bed and a coat and anything else of that sort, qua

  receiving these designations i.e. in so far as they are products of

  art-have no innate impulse to change. But in so far as they happen

  to be composed of stone or of earth or of a mixture of the two, they

  do have such an impulse, and just to that extent which seems to

  indicate that nature is a source or cause of being moved and of

  being at rest in that to which it belongs primarily, in virtue of

  itself and not in virtue of a concomitant attribute.

  I say 'not in virtue of a concomitant attribute', because (for

  instance) a man who is a doctor might cure himself. Nevertheless it is

  not in so far as he is a patient that he possesses the art of

  medicine: it merely has happened that the same man is doctor and

  patient-and that is why these attributes are not always found

  together. So it is with all other artificial products. None of them

  has in itself the source of its own production. But while in some

  cases (for instance houses and the other products of manual labour)

  that principle is in something else external to the thing, in others

  those which may cause a change in themselves in virtue of a

  concomitant attribute-it lies in the things themselves (but not in

  virtue of what they are).

  'Nature' then is what has been stated. Things 'have a nature'which

  have a principle of this kind. Each of them is a substance; for it

  is a subject, and nature always implies a subject in which it inheres.

  The term 'according to nature' is applied to all these things and

  also to the attributes which belong to them in virtue of what they

  are, for instance the property of fire to be carried upwards-which

  is not a 'nature' nor 'has a nature' but is 'by nature' or

  'according to nature'.

  What nature is, then, and the meaning of the terms 'by nature' and

  'according to nature', has been stated. That nature exists, it would

  be absurd to try to prove; for it is obvious that there are many

  things of this kind, and to prove what is obvious by what is not is

  the mark of a man who is unable to distinguish what is self-evident

  from what is not. (This state of mind is clearly possible. A man blind

  from birth might reason about colours. Presumably therefore such

  persons must be talking about words without any thought to

  correspond.)

  Some identify the nature or substance of a natural object with

  that immediate constituent of it which taken by itself is without

  arrangement, e.g. the wood is the 'nature' of the bed, and the

  bronze the 'nature' of the statue.

  As an indication of this Antiphon points out that if you planted a

  bed and the rotting wood acquired the power of sending up a shoot,

  it would not be a bed that would come up, but wood-which shows that

  the arrangement in accordance with the rules of the art is merely an

  incidental attribute, whereas the real nature is the other, which,

  further, persists continuously through the process of making.

  But if the material of each of these objects has itself the same />
  relation to something else, say bronze (or gold) to water, bones (or

  wood) to earth and so on, that (they say) would be their nature and

  essence. Consequently some assert earth, others fire or air or water

  or some or all of these, to be the nature of the things that are.

  For whatever any one of them supposed to have this character-whether

  one thing or more than one thing-this or these he declared to be the

  whole of substance, all else being its affections, states, or

  dispositions. Every such thing they held to be eternal (for it could

  not pass into anything else), but other things to come into being

  and cease to be times without number.

  This then is one account of 'nature', namely that it is the

  immediate material substratum of things which have in themselves a

  principle of motion or change.

  Another account is that 'nature' is the shape or form which is

  specified in the definition of the thing.

  For the word 'nature' is applied to what is according to nature

  and the natural in the same way as 'art' is applied to what is

  artistic or a work of art. We should not say in the latter case that

  there is anything artistic about a thing, if it is a bed only

  potentially, not yet having the form of a bed; nor should we call it a

  work of art. The same is true of natural compounds. What is

  potentially flesh or bone has not yet its own 'nature', and does not

  exist until it receives the form specified in the definition, which we

  name in defining what flesh or bone is. Thus in the second sense of

  'nature' it would be the shape or form (not separable except in

  statement) of things which have in themselves a source of motion. (The

  combination of the two, e.g. man, is not 'nature' but 'by nature' or

  'natural'.)

  The form indeed is 'nature' rather than the matter; for a thing is

  more properly said to be what it is when it has attained to fulfilment