[1034a]
[1]
Thus obviously there is no need to set
up a form as a pattern (for we should have looked for Forms in these
cases especially, since living things are in a special sense
substances); the thing which generates is sufficient to produce, and
to be the cause of the form in the matter. The completed whole,
such-and-such a form induced in this flesh and these bones, is Callias
or Socrates. And it is
different from that which generated it, because the matter is
different but identical in form, because the form is
indivisible.The question might be raised why some
things are generated both artificially and
spontaneously—e.g. health—and others not; e.g. a
house. The reason is that in some cases the matter—which is
the starting-point of the process in the production and generation of
artificial things, and in which some part of the result is already
existent—is such that it can initiate its own motion, and in
other cases it is not; and of the former kind some can initiate motion
in a particular way, and some cannot. For many things can move
themselves, but not in a particular way, e.g. so as to
dance.It is
impossible, then, for any things whose matter is of this kind (e.g.
stones) to be moved in this particular way except by
something else; but in that particular way it is
possible. And it is so with fire.1 For this reason some things cannot exist
apart from the possessor of the art, and others can;
[20]
because the motion can be initiated by
those things which do not indeed possess the art, but can themselves
be moved either by other things which do not possess the art, or by
the motion from the part of the product which pre-exists in them.2It is clear also from what we have said
that in a sense all artificial things are generated either from
something which bears the same name (as is the case with natural
objects) or from a part of themselves which bears the same name as
themselves (e.g. a house from a house, inasmuch as it is generated by
mind; for the art is the form), or from something which contains some
part; that is if the generation is not accidental; for the direct and
independent cause of the production is a part of the
product.Heat in the
motion produces heat in the body; and either this is health or a part
of health, or a part of health or health accompanies it. And this is
why heat is said to produce health, because it produces that of which
health is a concomitant and consequence. Therefore as essence is the
starting-point of everything in syllogisms (because syllogisms start
from the "what" of a thing), so too generation proceeds from
it.And it is the same with natural formations as
it is with the products of art. For the seed produces just as do those
things which function by art. It contains the form potentially,
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