everything that exists (ἡ τῶν πρώτων ἀρχῶν καὶ αἰτιῶν θεωρητική).

There was no doubt in Aristotle's mind as to the pos sibility of science, which had been denied by the Sophists and the Sceptics. Man is the only being who partakes of the active intellect, that is, of God himself, and through him of the knowledge of the absolute; man alone is endowed with speech. By means of language, we designate (KaτηYoроûμev) things as we conceive them; by reason, we conceive them as they are. The general ways of designating things, or the parts of discourse (the categories of language and of grammar), correspond to the different forms according to which we conceive them, or to the categories of the understanding (substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, position, mode of being, activity, pas sivity), and these categories of the understanding in thei turn signify the modes of being of the things themselves (KaтηYoрíaι Tоû ovтos); that is, the things are in reality either substances or quantities or relations, etc., and are not merely conceived as such.2

1. FIRST PHILOSOPHY 3

The mathematical and physical sciences treat of the quantity, quality, and relations of things; the first philo

1 Met. I., 2, 14. Cf. I., 8; I., 10.

2 Met. V., 7; VI., 4.

For the Metaphysics, consult [Schwegler, Die Metaphysik des Aristoteles (text, translation, and commentary), 4 vols., Leipsic, 1847-49]; H. Bonitz, In Aristotelis Metaphysica, 2 vols., Berlin, 1848-49; C. L. Michelet, Examen critique de l'ouvrage d'Aristote intitulé Métaphysique, Paris, 1836; Vacherot, Théorie des premiers principes suivant Aristote, Paris, 1837; Félix Ravaisson, Essai sur la métaphysique d'Aristote, Paris, 1837; Jacques, Aristote considéré comme historien de la philosophie, Paris, 1837; Jules Simon, Études sur la théodicée de Platon et d'Aristote, Paris, 1810; [Glaser, Die Metaphysik des Aristoteles, Berlin, 1841; Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire, De la métaphysique, etc., Paris, 1879; Bullinger, Aristoteles' Metaphysik, Munich, 1892. —- TR.1.

sophy has as its object the queen of the categories, the category of substance (ovo ía), to which all the rest are related and on which they are based. It inquires into the nature of being as such, regardless of all relations of time, place, etc. (Tò Tí v elvat), that is, absolute and necessary being, the eternal essence of things as opposed to the relative, contingent, and accidental.1

Hence Plato is right in regarding it as the science of real being (Tò ovтws ov), as distinguished from that which appears to be, and is in reality but a passing relation. He' errs in conceiving the Ideas as real beings existing apart from the individuals which express them (idéal xwpioтaí). In vain do we search in Plato's writings for the proof that Ideas subsist apart from things. Moreover, it is hard to see what this theory accomplishes. It does not solve the metaphysical problem, but merely complicates it by adding to the real world a world of useless homonyms. The separate Ideas do not, in fact, contribute either towards the production, or the preservation, or the science of things (eis yvwow). We are at a loss to know what is the relation between things and Ideas (τρόπος καθ' ὃν τἄλλα ἐκ Twv eldwv éσTív). The assertion that the Ideas are patterns and that the things participate in them is to speak vain words, and to utter poetic metaphors (Tò dè λéyew παραδείγματα εἶναι καὶ μετέχειν αὐτῶν τἆλλα κενολογεῖν ἐστὶ καὶ μεταφορὰς λέγειν ποιητικάς). Besides, if the general Idea is the substance of the particulars or the essence of the things, how can it exist apart from that of which it is the substance and the essence (χωρὶς τὴν οὐσίαν καὶ οὗ ἡ ovoía)? The general cannot exist outside of and alongside of the particular (τὸ καθόλον μὴ ἔστι τι παρὰ τὰ καθ' ékаσта). Hence the Ideas or specific types, considered as such and apart from the things, are not real beings or substances (ovolai), if we understand by ovoía that which exists 1 Met. VI., 1; XI., 4, 7.

by itself. Aristotle does not, however, deny the objective existence of species. For him as well as for Plato, the general Idea is the essence of the particular, and may be called ovoía, in so far as this word signifies essence. What he denies is that Ideas exist apart from things (xopis). The Idea is inherent or immanent in the thing; it is its form, and cannot be separated from it except by abstraction. It is the essence of the particular and with it constitutes an indivisible whole. For the ἕν παρὰ τὰ

πολλά we must substitute the ἕν κατὰ τῶν πολλῶν or ἐν τοῖς πολλοῖς.2

On the other hand, the materialistic theory is equally untenable. Matter has no reality apart from the form (eidos, μopon, that is, not only the shape, length, breadth, and height of the thing, but all of its properties). Matter without the Idea is as much of an abstraction as the Idea apart from the particular object which realizes it. Nor does movement exist by itself; it presupposes a substratum. Hence, neither the Idea nor matter nor movement has real or substantial existence; reality consists of all these taken as a whole (ovvoλov), or of the particular (Tode Tí). Reality is a concrete thing (Tóv); it contains constitutive elements, which thought distinguishes, but which do not exist apart from each other. The most important (cupiάtepov) of these elements is the Idea or the form, which Aristotle conceives as identical with essence or soul. Matter is merely its support, but it is an indispensable support.

The next question is, What are the generative causes of real being? All things which are produced either by nature or art have a material cause (üλn, vπокeiμevov), a formal cause (τὸ εἶδος, τὸ τί ἐστι, τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι), an efficient or moving cause (ἀρχὴ τῆς γενέσεως, ἀρχὴ τῆς κινήσεως, τὸ ὅθεν ἡ κίνησις, τὸ ὅθεν ἡ ἀρχὴ τῆς κινήσεως, τὸ αἴτιον τῆς μετα·

1 Met., I., 9, 15, 16; V., 8, 14; XII., 10, 22; XIV., 3, 12, 4, 9. * Met., III., 4, 1; Analyt. post., I., li.

βολῆς, τὸ κινοῦν, τὸ κινητικόν), and a final cause (τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα, TÒ TÉλOS, TȧYaÐÓv).1 Thus, to take an example from art. A bed or a statue presupposes (1) matter: the wood or the marble or the brass of which the thing is made; (2) an Idea (a plan or a pattern) according to which it is made; the idea of the statue exists in the mind of the sculptor, the idea of the bed, in the mind of the joiner; (3) arms, hands, and tools, as motive forces and efficient causes, (4) a purpose or motive that sets these forces in action, and effects the transition from capacity or potentiality (δύναμις) to actuality ενέργεια). The same is true of nature and particularly of organic nature. A living organism, as, for example, a man, is the product of the following four causes: (1) the substance which forms the starting-point and substratum of the embryonic development; (2) the Idea or specific type according to which the embryo is developed, the form which it tends to assume; (3) the act of generation; (4) the (unconscious) purpose of this act, namely, the production of a new man. There are, then, for every fact and for the universal fact itself (the world), four kinds of causes: matter, Idea, force, and the final purpose. Through the coöperation of these four principles, the real being, be it an object of art or a living being, is produced. These principles, moreover, do not subsist as substances; they always inhere in a particular thing every natural product is preceded by an individual of the same species, from which it is generated. Similarly, every phenomenon in art and ethics presupposes an actual Each man is educated by another educated man ; the efficient cause is always a concrete being, and that which exists potentially becomes actual, only through the instrumentality of some actual thing.

cause.

Though philosophical reflection distinguishes four generative principles of things, three of them, the Idea, the

1 Met. I., 3. Cf. VII., 7, ff.

motive cause, and the final cause, are very often identified, and constitute but a single principle (ἔρχεται δὲ τὰ τρία εἰς Tò ÉV TOXλÁKIS). Thus, in art, the Idea of Hermes in the imagination of the sculptor, moves his nerves and muscles, and at the same time constitutes the end which he aims to realize by means of matter. Take an illustration from nature. A man is to be produced. Man is the Idea which is realized by generation; a man realizes it, and he realizes it in order to reproduce man (τὸ μὲν γὰρ τί ἐστι καὶ τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα ἕν ἐστι, τὸ δ' ὅθεν ἡ κίνησις τῷ εἴδει ταὐτὸ τούτοις 1). In both cases the Idea is the formal cause, the motive c.use, and the final cause.

There are then, ultimately, only two principles of things, -- the Idea or form which causes them and at which they aim, and the matter of which they are made: eidos and An. The former is essential and the cause proper; the latter is of secondary importance and a mere condition ovvaíTiov). Since these two principles are the necessary antecedents of all becoming, they cannot have been produced themselves; for in that case they would have had to exist even prior to being, which is impossible. They necessarily precede all generation, since generation is possible only through them.2 Both Aristotle and Plato regard matter and form as eternal; only, the Stagirite does not conceive the eternity of matter to mean absolute dualism. If matter and Idea are diametrically opposed to each other, as they seem to be in Plato, how can they ever be united, how can they co-operate and produce all things? Things that are diametrically opposed cannot be united (ἀπαθὴ γὰρ τὰ ἐναντία ὑπ' ἀλλήλων 3).

Plato's μǹ ov, that is to say, non-being or absolute privation (σTéρnois), and real matter are two entirely different things. Matter is accidental non-being (karà ovμßeßηкós), whereas privation is non-being as such. The conception of * Id., I., 10, 8.

1 Phys., II., 7.

Met., XII., 10, 7.