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the case of alteration it may be argued that the

process necessarily implies one or other of the other five sorts

of motion. This is not true, for we may say that all affections,

or nearly all, produce in us an alteration which is distinct from

all other sorts of motion, for that which is affected need not

suffer either increase or diminution or any of the other sorts of

motion. Thus alteration is a distinct sort of motion; for, if it

were not, the thing altered would not only be altered, but would

forthwith necessarily suffer increase or diminution or some one

of the other sorts of motion in addition; which as a matter of

fact is not the case. Similarly that which was undergoing the

process of increase or was subject to some other sort of motion

would, if alteration were not a distinct form of motion,

necessarily be subject to alteration also. But there are some

things which undergo increase but yet not alteration. The square,

for instance, if a gnomon is applied to it, undergoes increase

but not alteration, and so it is with all other figures of this

sort. Alteration and increase, therefore, are distinct.

 

Speaking generally, rest is the contrary of motion. But the

different forms of motion have their own contraries in other

forms; thus destruction is the contrary of generation, diminution

of increase, rest in a place, of change of place. As for this

last, change in the reverse direction would seem to be most truly

its contrary; thus motion upwards is the contrary of motion

downwards and vice versa.

 

In the case of that sort of motion which yet remains, of those

that have been enumerated, it is not easy to state what is its

contrary. It appears to have no contrary, unless one should

define the contrary here also either as ‘rest in its quality’ or

as ‘change in the direction of the contrary quality’, just as we

defined the contrary of change of place either as rest in a place

or as change in the reverse direction. For a thing is altered

when change of quality takes place; therefore either rest in its

quality or change in the direction of the contrary may be called

the contrary of this qualitative form of motion. In this way

becoming white is the contrary of becoming black; there is

alteration in the contrary direction, since a change of a

qualitative nature takes place.

Part 15

The term ‘to have’ is used in various senses. In the first place

it is used with reference to habit or disposition or any other

quality, for we are said to ‘have’ a piece of knowledge or a

virtue. Then, again, it has reference to quantity, as, for

instance, in the case of a man’s height; for he is said to ‘have’

a height of three or four cubits. It is used, moreover, with

regard to apparel, a man being said to ‘have’ a coat or tunic; or

in respect of something which we have on a part of ourselves, as

a ring on the hand: or in respect of something which is a part of

us, as hand or foot. The term refers also to content, as in the

case of a vessel and wheat, or of a jar and wine; a jar is said

to ‘have’ wine, and a corn-measure wheat. The expression in such

cases has reference to content. Or it refers to that which has

been acquired; we are said to ‘have’ a house or a field. A man is

also said to ‘have’ a wife, and a wife a husband, and this

appears to be the most remote meaning of the term, for by the use

of it we mean simply that the husband lives with the wife.

 

Other senses of the word might perhaps be found, but the most

ordinary ones have all been enumerated.

 

End of Project Gutenberg’s etext, The Categories, by Aristotle

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