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but nothing that is incapable of being comes to be.
"(12) We must not only raise these questions about the first principles,
but also ask whether they are universal or what we call individuals.
If they are universal, they will not be substances; for everything
that is common indicates not a 'this' but a 'such', but substance
is a 'this'. And if we are to be allowed to lay it down that a common
predicate is a 'this' and a single thing, Socrates will be several
animals-himself and 'man' and 'animal', if each of these indicates
a 'this' and a single thing.
"If, then, the principles are universals, these universal. Therefore
if there is to be results follow; if they are not universals but of
knowledge of the principles there must be the nature of individuals,
they will not be other principles prior to them, namely those knowable;
for the knowledge of anything is that are universally predicated of
them.
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BOOK IV
Part 1
"
"THERE is a science which investigates being as being and the attributes
which belong to this in virtue of its own nature. Now this is not
the same as any of the so-called special sciences; for none of these
others treats universally of being as being. They cut off a part of
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METAPHYSICS 35
being and investigate the attribute of this part; this is what the
mathematical sciences for instance do. Now since we are seeking the
first principles and the highest causes, clearly there must be some
thing to which these belong in virtue of its own nature. If then those
who sought the elements of existing things were seeking these same
principles, it is necessary that the elements must be elements of
being not by accident but just because it is being. Therefore it is
of being as being that we also must grasp the first causes.
"
Part 2
"There are many senses in which a thing may be said to 'be', but all
that 'is' is related to one central point, one definite kind of thing,
and is not said to 'be' by a mere ambiguity. Everything which is healthy
is related to health, one thing in the sense that it preserves health,
another in the sense that it produces it, another in the sense that
it is a symptom of health, another because it is capable of it. And
that which is medical is relative to the medical art, one thing being
called medical because it possesses it, another because it is naturally
adapted to it, another because it is a function of the medical art.
And we shall find other words used similarly to these. So, too, there
are many senses in which a thing is said to be, but all refer to one
starting-point; some things are said to be because they are substances,
others because they are affections of substance, others because they
are a process towards substance, or destructions or privations or
qualities of substance, or productive or generative of substance,
or of things which are relative to substance, or negations of one
of these thing of substance itself. It is for this reason that we
say even of non-being that it is nonbeing. As, then, there is one
science which deals with all healthy things, the same applies in the
other cases also. For not only in the case of things which have one
common notion does the investigation belong to one science, but also
in the case of things which are related to one common nature; for
even these in a sense have one common notion. It is clear then that
it is the work of one science also to study the things that are, qua
being.-But everywhere science deals chiefly with that which is primary,
and on which the other things depend, and in virtue of which they
get their names. If, then, this is substance, it will be of substances
that the philosopher must grasp the principles and the causes.
"Now for each one class of things, as there is one perception, so
there is one science, as for instance grammar, being one science,
investigates all articulate sounds. Hence to investigate all the species
of being qua being is the work of a science which is generically one,
and to investigate the several species is the work of the specific
parts of the science.
"If, now, being and unity are the same and are one thing in the sense
that they are implied in one another as principle and cause are, not
in the sense that they are explained by the same definition (though
it makes no difference even if we suppose them to be like that-in
fact this would even strengthen our case); for 'one man' and 'man'
are the same thing, and so are 'existent man' and 'man', and the doubling
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