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[1037b] [1] as in the case of the primary substances; e.g. crookedness and "essence of crookedness," if this is primary.By primary I mean that which does not imply the presence of something in something else as a material substrate. But such things as are material or are compounded with matter are not the same as their essence; not even if they are accidentally one, e.g. Socrates and "cultured"; for these are only accidentally the same.

Now let us first deal with definition, in so far as it has not been dealt with in the Analytics; for the problem stated there1 has a bearing upon our discussion of substance. The problem I mean is this: what constitutes the unity of the thing of which we say that the formula is a definition? E.g., in the case of man, "two-footed animal"; for let us take this as the formula of "man."Why, then, is this a unity and not a plurality, "animal" and "two-footed"? For in the case of "man" and "white" we have a plurality when the latter does not refer to the former, but a unity when it does refer to it, and the subject, "man," has an attribute; for then they become a unity and we have "the white man."But in the case before us one term does not partake of the other; the genus is not considered to partake of its differentiae, for then the same thing would be partaking simultaneously of contraries, [20] since the differentiae by which the genus is distinguished are contrary. And even if it does partake of them, the same argument applies, since the differentiae are many; e.g. terrestrial, two-footed, wingless.Why is it that these are a unity and not a plurality? Not because they are present in one genus, for in that case all the differentiae of the genus will form a unity. But all the elements in the definition must form a unity, because the definition is a kind of formula which is one and defines substance, so that it must be a formula of one particular thing; because the substance denotes one thing and an individual, as we say.

We must first2 examine definitions which are reached by the process of division.For there is nothing else in the definition but the primary genus and the differentiae; the other genera consist of the primary genus together with the differentiae which are taken with it. E.g., the primary genus is "animal"; the next below it, "two-footed animal"; and again, "two-footed wingless animal"; and similarly also if the expression contains more terms still.

1 Aristot. An. Post. 92a 29.

2 The other type of definition, that which states the constituent parts of a thing, is not discussed here.

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