122 Translation
think concerning colours), it clearly follows that separately from the other four are terms too. For each of them is a simple word, and
imagination intellect does not act.
That, with God's help, completes the lecture.
[LECTURE4]
20 430a26-7 Thinking indivisible"' things is where there is no
falsehood
After potential intellect containing four points and actual intellect
containing the ten points we have stated, he comes next to objects of
intellect. And it should be known that in the case of the rational soul
one should start from the intellect because that is clearer than the
objects of intellect, whereas in the case of the non-rational soul one
25 should start from sense-objects because they are clearer. For every-
where in teaching it is good to make one's start from what is clearer.
So having taught about intellect, he comes to the objects of intellect.
He says that the object of intellect is indivisible. But do not think
from this that he means intellect knows only indivisible things. It
knows both indivisible and divided things, but it knows the divided
30 in an indivisible and pointlike way. For the central point also contains
the circle seminally. Intellect, then, knows all things in an indivisible
way. For this is proper to intellect, to collect together and unite
divided things and think them indivisibly. And that it knows even
543,1 divided things indivisibly is shown by his saying in the treatise on
Proof" that that by which terms are known is not merely knowledge
but the source of knowledge, using 'source of knowledge' for intellect
and 'knowledge' for thought. And see! He says that intellect knows
things termwise and indivisibly. 258
5 But since the discussion is of that which is indivisible, it should be
known that 'indivisible' is used in five ways. 259 A term is called
'indivisible'. For we know that a proposition has two terms, the
subject and the predicate, for instance 'Plato walks' is a proposition,
'Plato' is a term and 'walks' is a term and, to put it simply, a term is,
as we learn in the de Interpretatione, 260 a simple spoken sound. That
10 is the first thing signified by 'indivisible', a term. A second thing
signified is a continuous magnitude. This is divided potentially but
actually undivided. A third thing signified is that in quantity which
is without parts, such as a point, a unit, a now. These are the
indivisibles in quantity. A fourth thing signified by 'indivisible' is a
15 form in matter. It is not this that is divided but its subject. The fifth
thing signified is a non-material form. These are the five things
signified by 'indivisible'.
There are two difficulties we can raise from this. One is how he can
contradistinguish the other four indivisibles from a term, seeing that
Translation 123
therefore a term. It is not a proposition to say 'continuous magnitude', 20
neither, again, is it a proposition to say 'non-material form'. 261 For
each of these is one term only) and a proposition does not arise from
one term only. If that is so, how can he contradistinguish them from
a term, seeing that they are terms too? That is the first problem. To
it we reply that it is one thing to say simply 'term' and another to say
'term of a certain sort'. The first thing signified by 'indivisible' 25
intimates simply a term, and the other four, terms of particular sorts.
So it is not unreasonable but with good reason that he contradistin-
gnishes what is simply a term from what is a term of a certain sort.
That is the solution.
The second problem people raise goes like this. Why does he
contradistinguish a form in matter from a magnitude? For a magni-
tude is itself a form in matter. For this thing, magnitude, is the first
form that comes along before all other forms to formless matter: first 30
it is made quantitative and then after that it is made qualitative. If,
therefore, magnitude is a form in matter, why does he contradistin-
guish it from form in matter, seeing that magnitude is subsumed
under form in matter? That is the problem. To itwe reply that he does
not contradistinguish every form in matter from magnitude, but that
[only] which comes upon matter after it has been given magnitude. 35
For matter when it has received the form of magnitude remains [an
object only] for conception, but when it has received the other forms
it becomes a sense-object. So he contradistinguishes actual form from
form in conception, that is, from the form of magnitude. For this, when
it has come to matter, delivers it to conception; for it is not possible
to see matter that has been given magnitude all by itself without any 544, 1
other form, except by conception alone. So magnitude may be a form
in matter; but then he contradistinguishes it not from every form in
matter, as I have just said, but from that which is actual and reveals
matter as a sense-object.
So these five things signified by 'indivisible' can be brought under 5
a kind of division. The division is this. A term is either simply a term
or a term of a certain sort. If it is simply a term it makes one thing
signified by 'indivisible': a term. If it is a term of a certain sort, it is
either potentially divided into parts but actually without parts or
<both potentially and actually without parts>. 262 If it is potentially in
parts but actually without parts, either it is of itself in parts or 10
incidentally. Ifit is of itself in parts, it makes continuous magnitude.
If it is incidentally in parts it makes form in matter. That, then, is
how it is if it is potentially in parts but actually without parts. If,
however, it is both potentially and actually without parts, either it is
with matter, and makes the indivisible in quantity, such as a unit, a
point, a now; or it is non-material and makes a non-material form. 15
 124 Translation
Since, then, we have learnt from the division that there are five things
signified by 'indivisible', let us next see how intellect thinks each of
them.
It should be known that it, a thing without parts, thinks a term
which is without parts as a simple spoken sound, and so neither as
20 false nor as true. For truth and falsity are not to be seen in connection
with simple spoken sounds, but in connection with composites. And
why, I ask, in the text does he mention only falsehood and not also
truth? For he says that thinking in the case of indivisibles is about
things where there is no falsehood, and does not add 'and where there
is no truth'. We have come to know in the de Interpretatione 2' ' that
25 not only falsehood but also truth is absent from simple spoken sounds.
So why in the text does he mention only falsehood? We reply that his
opinion in the Metaphysics is contrary to his opinion in the de
Interpretatione. In the de Interpretatione he says that neither truth
nor falsehood is to be seen in connection with simple spoken sounds,
that is, in terms; it is in propositions that he says the true and
30 falsehood appear. But in the Metaphysics 264 he says that in simple
words, that is, in terms, falsehood is not to be seen, but truth is to be
seen. For when intellect with a simple intuition intuits each simple
spoken sound, that is to say, each term, and thinks it on its own and
of itself, adding nothing else, it thinks truly. For instance in saying
35 'walks' forthwith intellect thinks walking, itself alone, not adding
anything else. Again, in 'to eat' it immediately thinks chewing, that
545,1 is, the teeth moving up and down, without any addition. That is what
he says in the Metaphysics. And now he follows that treatise and for
that reason does not deny truth to simple words, but only falsehood;
because intellect never runs into falsehood but always attains truth,
5 according to the saying of Plotinus, 'either intellect makes contact or
it does not, so it is inerrant'. 26 !i
But it should be known that there are two kinds of truth, substan-
tive and that which is contradistinguished from falsehood. An exam-
ple of substantive is when I say 'This is genuinely a man': I say this
in contrast to a man in a painting, for the latter is not genuinely a
man. So simply because he really exists he is said to be truly a man.
10 In a term too, therefore, we say that there is substantive truth
because inasmuch as it is a term, it is true that it is, and we do not
say this by way of contradistinction from the false.
Having said this about intellect, that it knows terms truly, he turns
to thought, and says that it not only attains truth but also runs into
falsehood. And another thing: the form in which intellect knows all
things is as being each one, whereas thought knows things as being
15 composite, which is not the same. For intellect knows a thing as
continuous and one, whereas thought knows a thing as composed of
many things, like a door, for that is composed of many pieces of wood.
Translation 125
Thought is like Empedoclean Friendship, which brings together
things divided by Strife. And indeed it is said in Empedocles that if
there were not Friendship, 'many neckless heads would have
grown' 266 - that is, there would have arisen heads without necks if 20
there were not Friendship to join them together.
A third property of thought which he states in addition to these is
that it runs into falsehood either through the predicate or through
the tense,267 For if I say that man is winged, or will be or was, the
proposition is false because of the predicate term, 1 mean 'winged'.
But ifI say that the Trojan War was yesterday, then the proposition
is false because of the tense. 268 In the case of eternal things, falsehood 25
comes only from the predicate, not from the tense as well. For if I say
that God was or is or will be I always speak truly, for I speak of what
always is. But in the case of things that are not eternal, propositions
come to be false both from the tense and from the predicate. From the
predicate, as when I say a goat-stag now exists. The falsehood arises 30
not from 'now', the tense, but from 'exists', the predicate. And again,
if I say 'A shadow is now a body' the falsehood comes not from 'now'
(for not only is it not now a body but it was not and will not be either),
but from saying it is a body. So in the case of things that come to be,
falsehood arises in thought in two ways, either from the predicate or 35
from the tense, whereas in the case of eternal things it comes only
from the predicate. But none of these things belongs to intellect. For
it thinks all things always and has no falsehood either from the
predicate or from the tense.
He states a fourth property of thought in addition to these, that it 546,l
is occupied with propositions, whereas intellect is occupied with
terms. And when I say 'propositions', do not think I say this in the
way stated in the Logic, 269 that it i.s occupied with assertion as
composition, since assertion puts together the subject with the predi-
cate, and with denial as division, since denial denies the predicate of 5
the subject and divides it from it. Man, it says, is not white. For now
we say that thought is occupied both with assertion as division and
composition and with denial as division and composition. For asser-
tion, insofar as it joins together, is called 'composition', but insofar as
it consists in two things that can be taken apart, it is division. And 10
denial, even if it says 'Socrates is not pale', joins dark to him and is
again composition, but it -is also division inasmuch as it separates
pale from him. That is how thought is now said to be concerned with
propositions.
Having said these things by way of an excursus, since he has said
how intellect thinks terms, he next enquires how it thinks undivided
magnitudes, which were the second thing signified by 'indivisible'. 15
These are threefold, for magnitude is threefold. It is a whole, and has
parts, and is composite. Intellect thinks it as a whole atemporally and
 126 Translation
at a now. For it is not possible for intellect to think it in a time. For
every time is divisible. Ifit thinks it, then, in something divisible, the
20 thing thought too, the magnitude, will be divisible; for as it is with
the time, so it is with the magnitude. But it is actually undivided. For
it thinks it as a whole, and a whole is undivided. It thinks it, then,
not in a time but at a now. And also because ifit did not knowthem 270
atemporally and at a now, it would no longer think the whole in the
same time, and it would be found that at some time it does not know
25 it. 271 But thought gets to know it in a time. But intellect also thinks
the magnitude as a thing which has parts, thinking the different parts
at different nows, and thinking each part actually at a now. But as a
composite thing it is no longer thought by intellect but by thought. So
a magnitude is thought in these three ways, as a whole, as something
that has parts, and as a composite; and in two of them intellect thinks
30 it, as a whole and as something that has parts, but as a composite is
it thought by thought.
But intellect knows the form in matter no longer of itself but
through imagination as an intermediary. For intellect cannot think
sense-objects of itself; it has need of imagination. So it thinks them
through imagination as an intermediary. But it is not the case that,
because intellect thinks through imagination as an intermediary, it
therefore also thinks in parts. For even in imagination there is
35 something indivisible. That this is true is clear from the fact that the
first imprints are not made to disappear by the later: it is clear from
this that there is something without parts in it. And it is in virtue of
this thing without parts that intellect thinks. So again it thinks in a
partless way.
547,l Again, intellect thinks that which is partless in quantity by denial.
For just as we think darkness by denial oflight, so also by denial of
number we think the unit, by denial of time the now, and by denial
of magnitude the point. So it is by denial that we think that which is
5 partless in quantity. But if anyone says that black also is known by
denial of white he speaks falsely. For both are made to have form and
both act, the one compacting, the other forcing apart, and of them-
selves both are known positively. Unless you use 'black' in place of
'dark', as in 'black death'-" 2
These things are known by our intellect negatively; but the Divine
10 Intellect knows all things positively and intuitively, apart from evil.
That, it does not know. Otherwise it would make it. For whatever it
knows, it also makes. Its cognition is subsistence-giving. That is why
it is said 'He said, and it came to be'. 27 :1 But this saying may be
interpreted in two ways: what he knows and says, this also comes
about;274 or because his activity is all at once, and that is why it is
15 said, 'He said, and it came to be'. And there is a corollary you can
Translation 127
derive from this. Ifhe [Aristotle] says that intellect acts negatively,
he cannot be speaking about the Divine Intellect.
That is how intellect in us knows what is partless in quantity.
Non-material forms it knows in the following five respects. Either as
cause, and that either as efficient or as perfective 275 - for it does not
know it only as final cause, as some people think. And it knows it as
having nothing contrary to it (for it may be contrary in some way to 20
our good and to the light in us, but in itself it is not).'" And it knows
it as thinker and thing thought. For having that which is divine
within, that which is cognitive also thinks itself.
That having been said, that, with God's help, completes the con-
tinuous exposition.
430a28 [But in things in which there is false and true, there is
some composition of thoughts] as though being one [-just as
Empedocles said 'whence in many cases sprouted neckless
heads' that were then put together by Friendship]
See what he is saying: that intellect knows truth only, and where 25
there is falsity and truth, that belongs to thought. And where there
is composition, again that belongs to thought. And see: he has already
stated the [first] two properties of thought. And thought thinks this
composition, he says, as one thing. He does well to say 'as though'.
For it does not know the composition as something genuinely one, for
to know what is genuinely one belongs to intellect, but thought knows 30
it as one by juxtaposition. That is why it has something in common
with Empedocles' Friendship, in that it unites by juxtaposition and
not genuinely.
430a31 [So these separated things too are put together] for
instance incommensurable and diagonal
What does he want to say? That it is also from the predicate that
thought attains truth and runs into falsehood. If it says that the 35
diagonal is commensurable it speaks falsely on account of the predi- 548,1
cate, for it is always incommensurable with the side. <And if it says
it is incommensurable with the side> 277 it speaks truly because of the
predicate.
430a31-bl And if they are things that have been or will be, it
thinks the tense in addition and adds it
What does he intend to say by this? That it is also through tense being 5
well or ill added that truth and falsity arise in things. If you say 'The
Trojan War will take place' you speak falsely because of the future
 128 Translation
tense; but if you say 'it took place' you speak truly because of the past
tense. Truth and falsity, he says, are 'always in a composition'
10 [430b2], not in simple things. For if you say that the pale thing
Socratesz7B is not pale, you speak falsely, and if you say that what is
not pale is pale you speak falsely because the composition does not
fit. 279 And see that he calls both the assertion and the denial 'compo-
sition'. It is also possible, he says [430b3], to call both 'division',
because they consist of things that are different, and it is possible to
divide them into the terms out of which they were put together. He does
15 well to say 'it is possible' [b3]. For, if you care about the logical sequence,
it is possible to call assertion 'division' because it is divided clearly into
subject and predicate, and to call denial 'composition' because it is
composed of subject and predicate. 280 And that is how he speaks here,
20 but in his Logic he calls only assertion 'composition' and denial 'division'.
430b5 [But in any case what is false or true is not only that
Cleon is white,] but also that he was or will be 281
What is he saying? That if the predicate is false, it is falsely said in
every tense, for instance if you call Cleon white and he is not white,
whether you say that he is white or was or will be, you speak falsely
because of the predicate. The tense does not introduce a difference
25 here. And see the two further properties of thought, that it is occupied
with denial and assertion, which he calls 'composition', and he says
it runs into falsehood either through the predicate or through the
tense.
430b5-6 That which makes one is intellect in each case
This is what was said also above. Read the sentence as having its
words out oforder:"' 'That which makes each of these one is intellect'.
30 For we said that intellect thinks even divided things in an indivisible
way. And see that instead of 'thinks' he says 'makes'. That is alto-
gether remarkable. Just as that which is, gives to all things a share
of being, and that which is beautiful, a share of beauty, so also
549,1 intellect, in virtue of its own simplicity and unitivity, makes compos-
ite things simple. For intellect thinks them as simple and not as
composite.
430b6-7 But since the undivided is twofold, the potentially and
the actually, [nothing prevents it from thinking the undivided
when it thinks length (for it is undivided in actuality) and in an
indivisible time]
He comes to the second thing signified by 'indivisible', which is
Translation 129
magnitude or the continuous. Either this is potentially divided but 5
actually undivided, like a magnitude, or actually divided but poten-
tially undivided, like water. Intellect, then, he says, knows what is
potentially divided as actually undivided, and what is actually di-
vided as potentially undivided. And it knows these things, he says,
'in an indivisible time' also; otherwise in half it would know half. By 10
an 'indivisible time' [b8-9] he means a now, speaking ill. For a now is
not a time but a beginning of time. 2 83 By a 'now) I mean an instant.
But if you take the now that has duration,284 that has a beginning and
a limit and is a time. But now we are speaking of the instantaneous
now. It is not only because the undivided is twofold that he says the
undivided is twofold, but because it is only when there is an actual
cutting of a magnitude into two parts that it is divided.285 For a 15
magnitude is either potentially or actually undivided. A length is
actually continuous but potentially divided. Understand 'length' here
[b8, blO] as being in place of'continuous'. He says, then, that nothing
hinders intellect from thinking a length not insofar as it is divided
but insofar as it is continuous. For it is continuous in actuality. This
is to be taken as establishing what was said above, that intellect lays 20
hold of composites as simples.
430b9 For the time is divided and undivided in the same way
[as the length]
He says that it thinks in an indivisible time; and lest anyone should
say that time is not indivisible, he says that time is divided and
undivided, speaking ill. For he used 'now' in place of'undivided time' 25
ignoring the fact that the beginnings of quantities are not quanti-
ties.286 So the beginning of a time is not a time.
430b10 So it is impossible to say what it thinks in each half
This again is establishing what was said above, that ifit is insofar as
the time is divisible, and not insofar as it is undivided, that we think 30
a ten foot plank, then in half the time, say, we should think half the
plank, that is, five feet, andin the other half of the time the other five 550,1
feet. But plainly that is not how it is. For the magnitude, he says, is
not actually divided [sc. in thought] so that you can say that it thinks
half in half the time, but is divided only in potentiality. Intellect
thinks it as actually undivided.
430bll-12 But if it thinks each of the halves separately [it 5
divides the time also at the same time]
He uses 'thinking' [noein] loosely in place of 'exercising thought'
 130 Translation
[dianoeisthai]. For he is talking now about thought. Having said that
intellect thinks undividedly he says that thought knows each [part]
separately in a divided way. And even when it knows them united
10 and together it knows them as lengths composed of two components,
'out of both' as he puts it [b13], and it knows them 'in the time that is
for both' [b13-14], that is, dividedly, and no longer as a length but as
different lengths. For that is the meaning of 'as if lengths' [b 13]. He
does well to add 'as iflengths'. For only one length is the subject, and
ifintellect thinks it at different times, what is one length in actuality
15 will be [a plurality of1 lengths, which is absurd.
430bl4-15 But that which is indivisible not in respect of quan-
tity but in form [it thinks in an indivisible time and with an
indivisible part of the soul] 287
The third thing signified by 'indivisible'. It is as ifhe said that there
is nothing to hinder thinking even the continuous as undivided,
because there is something undivided in it, and if something is one
in form and indivisible it is agreed that it is known in an indivisible
20 time and with an indivisible power of the soul. What is the indivisible
power of the soul? Clearly intellect.
430b16 But it is incidentally, and not insofar as those things
are divisible, [but insofar as they are undivided,] that by which
it thinks 288 and the time in which [sc. it thinks] [are indivisible]
Forms in matter, he says, that intellect thinks are indivisible inciden-
25 tally. In itself a form in matter is divisible, which is why even with a
certain [finite] extension we can see the division of the continuum
going on to infinity. But they are said to be indivisible incidentally
because their unification comes to them from without. This, then, is
what he is saying. It is not insofar as these forms in matter are
divisible ('insofar as' in place of'by virtue of being'), it is not in that
30 way that intellect thinks them; but even if they are divisible, intellect
thinks them in an undivided way, because the soul thinks them with
an undivisible part ofitself(the indivisible part of the soul is intellect)
and at an indivisible time.
551,1 Interpret also as follows. Intellect knows lengths and shapes at an
indivisible time and in an indivisible power of the soul incidentally,
since those things are not indivisible of themselves but have their
unification incidentally. What? Is anything that intellect thinks indi-
5 visible incidentally? We say that it is its nature to think in an
indivisible way, but it thinks what is undivided incidentally because
being undivided supervenes incidentally on these objects of intellect.
Some people 289 say that by 'soul' [at b15] he means imagination.
Translation 131
Meaning to say what? That it is by using imagination that intellect
gets to know forms in matter. It uses, he says, the indivisible part of
imagination. For it has an indivisible part, as is shown by the fact 10
that later imprints do not make the first ones disappear. But imagi-
nation too, he says, is divided incidentally because it is in a divisible
subject. For form too is divided in this way. So the tool by using which
intellect thinks, namely imagination, is divisible incidentally and not
as imagination.
And the 'time at which' intellect thinks is indivisible. Again, he 15
calls a now a 'time'. And the now, it too is divisible incidentally
because it is in a time that is divisible. So we may conclude that he
means here that even if imagination and the now in time are divisible
incidentally, still, it is taking these things as indivisible and as one
that intellect thinks forms in matter. And perhaps it is possible to say
that he wanted to bring out something imagination and forms in 20
matter have in common, that both are divisible incidentally.
430bl 7-18 For there is something indivisible in them too, but
perhaps not separable [which makes one the time and the
length]290
There is, he says, both something indivisible in time, the now (again
he uses words loosely) and also something indivisible in imagination
which intellect uses. Why does he say 'perhaps' and make it question-
able? Is it not agreed that imagination is not separable but destruc- 25
tible? Perhaps, then, we may say: since he calls it 'passive intellect'
and says it acts with intellect, for this reason he could not say that it,
as intellect, is inseparable. That is why he makes it questionable. [But
whether it is separable or not separable, by this''1l all things, both
length and time, are thought as one. For this separable thing is in
every length or time or continuum as in one. That is why intellect too 30
being separable, knows all things as one. '
430bl9 And this is likewise in every continuum [both time and
length]
This what? It is in place of: 'The form that is without parts and
inseparable is in every time and length.'292
430b20 A point and.every division... 552,1
Here is another thing signified by 'indivisible', that which is indivis-
ible in quantity; that is to say, things in every way indivisible. But
since of things in every way indivisible some are known by privation'"
and some of themselves, he speaks first of those [known by] privation, 5
 132 Translation
because they are more easily known by us, like, he says, a point. This,
as was said in the continuous exposition, is known by denial of the
continuum. And after the point he brings in 'things indivisible in that
way' so as to say line and surface. For these are the limits of other
things. And perhaps it may be said: 'What? Are lines and planes
10 indivisible?' We say: insofar as they are limits of other things they
are indivisible. He mentions these things at all because not only is a
point a division of a line, but also a line is a division of a surface and
a surface of a solid.
430b20-l and what is indivisible in this way is shown as is
privation
'And what is indivisible', he says, 'in this way', that is, like a point, is
15 shown, it too, by 'privation'. He says this because of incorporeal things
and the divine, which are not known by privation. Surface is known
by privation of depth, line by privation of depth and width, and point
by privation of depth, width and length. He calls these 'divisions'
20 [b20], and plausibly. For a point divides a line, a line a surface and a
surface a body. In themselves they are indivisible.
430b22-3 [And a similar account holds for other things, such as]
how it comes to know evil or black
That evil is privation of fair 294 is agreed. But that black is privation
of white is false. Black is made to have form, as we said [54 7,5-6].
25 Perhaps, then, he says 'black' in place of 'dark', so that dark is
privation of white, and by 'white' you understand light. Dark is a
privation of that.
430b23 But that which comes to know must be potentially, and
it must be in it. 295 [But if to some one of the causes 296 nothing is
contrary, it gets to know itself and is in actuality297 and is
separable]
He says 'be in' in place of 'be present in'. He is now enquiring how we
must think what is divine, and he makes two preliminary assump-
30 tions. First, that the thinker must be potentially as is the thing
553,1 thought. By 'potentially' he means by suitability. For Aristotle does
not want there to be accounts of things in the soul. As the thing
thought, then, is potentially, so must the thinker be too.29s For that
which comes to know must in this way become completely like the
thing to be known and be like it and be potentially it. And the thing
5 known, in turn, must be present in the knower itself when it gets to
know it - that is the second [preliminary assumption]. When the
Translation 133
thinker is so disposed it knows the divine in the five respects stated
[547,17-22]. He states all of them except [that it knows it] as cause.
He says it has no contrary, for it has no linkage with anything or
opposition at all because of its transcendence. That it is also 'in
actuality' is Clear, because it also knows itself. And please, as Plutarch 10
says, do not think that 'separable' [b26] means [separable] only from
the matter of bodies; it means also from psychical powers. He says
'separable' from them but he should have said 'separated'; for the
divine has been separated. So according to Aristotle's statement
[430b24-6], if a thing which is a cause299 has no contrary, that thing
'knows itself and is in actuality and is separable', and [this is true] 15
not only [of] intellect but [of] anything else there may be of this kind.
That, with God's help, completes the lecture.
[LECTURE 5]
430b26-7 Saying is [sc. saying] one thing of another, as is
assertion300 [and is always true or false. But not all intellect is;
but that which is of what a thing is in respect of essence is true,
and is not [sc. thinking] one thing of another]
Having shown that intellect is eternal and that it differs from sense
and shown how thinking comes about and how objects of intellect 20
differ, he does not pass on from the intellect before stating the
differentiation concerning it in a wholly complete way. His differen-
tiation concerning intellect is threefold. He differentiates intellect
occupied with simples from that which is occupied with composites
that is, from thought; potential intellect from actual; and practical
intellect from contemplative. He does the first with one differentia- 25
tion, the second with two and the third with three.
Intellect, he says, which is occupied with simples differs from
intellect which is occupied with composites, that is, from thought (for
it is that which is occupied with composites) in that intellect always
attains truth while thought both attains truth and runs into false-
hood, and the true for intellect is not even like the true for thought.
For the true for intellect is substantive truth, whereas that for 30
thought is in a composition of one thing [thought] of another. Intellect
is like sense occupied with its own sense-objects, which always attains
truth. Thought is like sense occupied with incidental sense-objects;
for that sometimes runs into falsehood and sometimes attains truth
and involves composition. It knows one thing by another, for instance 554, 1
man by pale. So simple thoughts, analogous to sense attending to its
own business and always attaining truth, always attain truth,
whereas composite thoughts, analogous to sense attending to the
business of another and sometimes attaining truth but sometimes
 134 Translation
5 running into falsehood because of this - they too sometimes attain
truth and sometimes run into falsehood. That is how he differentiates
intellect occupied with simples from intellect occupied with compos-
ites.
Then next he differentiates potential intellect from actual, first
because actual intellect is the things themselves, whereas potential
10 intellect is not things unless it thinks them. Secondly, because poten-
tial intellect comes before actual in time in the one person, though in
the whole [cosmos] it does not come before; for there are always both
the potential and the actual. For there must always be the actual to
lead the potential to being actual.
And having made this differentiation in this way he also differen-
tiates contemplative intellect from practical. The first differentiation
15 he gives is this, that practical intellect is occupied always with
particulars whereas contemplative is occupied also with universals.
He gives a second differentiation: practical intellect always uses
imagination, and contemplative does not. Third differentiation: in
contemplative intellect there are true and false, whereas in practical
there are good and bad. And this differentiation is rather to be
preferred. For the second does not altogether carry necessity. For
20 contemplative intellect too always uses imagination.
And it should be known that contemplative intellect is not other
than practical [intellect] in subject. For just as potential intellect is
not other than actual [intellect] in subject (for it is the same), but
differs only in time, so too practical intellect stands to contemplative:
25 in subject it is the same, but different in how it is related. Contem-
plative intellect is analogous to sight discerning only the forms of
colours and coming to know that this is white and that black. Practical
intellect is analogous to sight not only knowing the forms of colours
but also making the pleasant its own and turning away from the
distressing. For like sight when besides the white and black it gets to
30 know also the pleasant and the unpleasant, so too practical intellect
knows not only the true and the false but also the good and bad; and
the pleasant to sight is analogous to the good, and the unpleasant to
sight is analogous to the bad. But intellect often chooses the unpleas-
ant in place of the pleasant, because the unpleasant is good and the
35 pleasant, sometimes, also bad. So this is the difference, that contem-
plative intellect acts without appetition, knowing only truth and
falsity, whereas practical intellect acts with appetition, by knowing
what is good and what bad.
After taking the differentiation of the contemplative from the
practical intellect this far, he provides us with yet another differen-
40 tiation of intellect from sense. For since both in differentiating intel-
lect from thought and again in differentiating contemplative intellect
551,l from practical he has likened intellect to sense, lest anyone should
Translation 135
think that intellect is like sense in every way, for that reason he now
provides a differentiation of intellect from sense and says that a
particular sense, like sight, knows white and black, and sight is the
common lodging for white and black, while for white and sweet the 5
common sense is the common lodging. <For> it is not sight but the
common sense that knows the difference there is between white and
sweet. As the common sense, then, is the termination of the particular
senses, so also intellectual cognition is the common lodging of objects
of contemplative intellect and intellectual action is [the common
lodging] of objects of practical intellect such as good and bad. But of 10
both, of objects both of contemplative and of practical intellect, the
lodging is intellect.
Plato used to call intellectual cognition 'attentive''Ol and intellec-
tual action 'conscious'. He said that they are the same in subject. For
it is the one who knows that acts: life is linked to cognition, and it is
one thing that says 'I thought' and 'I fed'. 302 If that were not so, it may 15
reasonably be said it would be as if I perceived this and you that. But
they differ in account in that one acts and the other knows. Aristotle
too is of this opinion. And they have something in common in respect
of their very subjects. 303 What is good is also true, and what is bad is
false. But they differ in that 'good' is said relatively to something (for
what is good in virtues relatively to the soul is bad for the body); 20
whereas 'true' is not said relatively to anything, but true is always
the same and fair. For Plato's statement is not to be accepted, that to
concede to the maniac the pledge of the sword is true but bad. 304
According to Aristotle, the true as such is always fair.
It should be known that even if we say that the common sense is 25
like intellect because as the common sense is the termination of all
the particular senses, so also intellect is the termination of all objects
of intellect, objects of thought and objects of opinion, still, there is a
difference. In the case of the senses, the common sense is another one
additional to the five, whereas in the case of objects of intellect, that
which knows the difference is not something over and above the three, 30
but one of the three. For intellect, which is part of the three- I mean
opinion, thought and intellect - itself knows how objects of intellect
differ from objects of thought and objects of thought from objects of
opinion. That is how intellect is different from the common sense.
And it should be known that just as common sense knows not only
the things that the particular senses know, but other things in 35
addition (for the common sense knows how the sense-objects that fall
under sense differ, whereas the senses, as we have already said, do
not know this: the particular senses know only sweet and white, but
the common sense knows not only these things but that they are
different), so too, then, intellect knows not only the objects ofintellect, 40
thought and opinion, but also how they differ. For what is known by 556,1
 136 Translation
the worse is known by the better too, but what is known by the better
is not known by the worse. The difference, at least, between objects
of thought, intellect and opinion is not known to either thought or
opinion, but intellect knows it, being better than both, both thought
5 and opinion. So there is an analogy like this. As black is to its proper
thought, so is white to its proper thought, and alternando as black is
to white, .so is thought [of] white to thought [of] black.
That, with God's help, completes the continuous exposition.
430b26-7 Saying is [saying] one thing of another, as is asser-
tion.3os
What does he want to say? That intellect occupied with simples is
10 different from intellect occupied with composites; for it is occupied,
he says, with assertion in the mind. This is as it were simple in the
mental state and always true; whereas intellect occupied with com-
posites is occupied with expressed assertion, which admits of true and
false and involves composition because of the expression. His saying,
then, that in all cases it is true or false [b27] must be taken as
15 referring to expressed assertion, not to assertion in the mind. For 'not
all intellect runs into falsehood''°' in place of 'attains truth or runs
into falsehood'. [For intellect of simple thoughts attains truth only, it
does not also run into falsehood; so not all intellect attains truth or
runs into falsehood.] ... [Falsehood]30 7 is mentioned, he says, because
of practical intellect. For contemplative intellect, in that it lays hold
of simple and pure thoughts, does not run into falsehood, but practical
20 intellect, because it combines forms in matter with itself and with one
another, exercises thought, he says, in this ahd runs into falsehood
on this account. So again, falsehood follows upon thought.
430b28-9 But that which is of what a thing is in respect of
essence is true, and is not [sc. thinking] one thing of another
25 It is as ifhe said that that kind of intellect alone [always] thinks truly
which is in respect of what a thing is and of essence. 'What a thing is'
indicates substance, and 'essence' indicates form. So what is said is
something like this, that that intellect attains truth which lays hold
of substance with respect to form, that is, which lays hold of form by
30 itself. This is contemplative intellect, which always attains truth and
is not [thinking] 'one thing of another' [b28-9], that is, which is not
occupied with composites. Being occupied with composites belongs
not to what is genuinely intellect but to thought. And do not think
that intellect is the same in subject as thought but different in
account, as was said in the continuous exposition;::i 08 for intellect is
different from thought in subject too.
Translation 137
430b29-30 But just as the seeing of what is proper'°' is true, but 557,1
whether what is white is or is not a man, that is not always seen
truly
What is 'the seeing what is proper'? [This is] in place of: 'seeing what
is proper and attending to its own business, for example seeing white
and no more, not also seeing the substance to which this white 5
belongs', for that is not always true. For there are times when sense
runs into falsehood about things that are sense-objects incidentally,
as was said above.
430b30 so it is with such things as are without matter
What is he saying? That as sense stands to objects that are its bwn
or not its own, so things without matter stand to objects of intellect.
By 'things without matter' he means thought and intellect. For these 10
are non-material powers. And object of thought and of intellect, on
their side, are things without matter. Objects of intellect, which he
also calls 'simples', are analogous, he says, to sight seeing what is
proper to it; but objects of thought, which he also calls 'composites',
he says are analogous to sight attending to the business of another,
and wanting to know not only that the thing is white, but that it is a
white man or a white horse. 15
43lal-2 Actual knowledge is the same as the thing, [but poten-
tial is prior in time in the one]
By 'thing' he means the object of knowledge. He says that actual
knowledge is the same as its object. For knowledge does not come to
know its object unless it has been made completely like it and become 20
as it is. This [remark] is not put ih to no purpose, but since the
discussion is about objects of intellect, anti objects of intellect become
actual objects of intellect and are known by intellect through system-
atic knowledge as an intermediary, for that reason he makes mention
of systematic knowledge and says that when it is actual it is like the
object of knowledge. 'But potential knowledge is prior to actual in the 25
one' ihdividual [a2].
43la2-3 but with regard to the whole, not even in time, [for all
things that come into being are from what is in actuality]
Some books have 'with regard to the whole' and some 'simply'. 31 ' What
he means is that to speak silnply, and with a view to the whole, in
the whole cosmos the potential is not prior to the actual because all
 138 Translation
30 things are advanced to actuality by311 what is in actuality through
what is able to advance [them]. Some people say that 'what is in
actuality' need not be taken to refer to the Creator; the point is that
558, 1 what is potentially one thing is always something that is actually
something else, for instance the semen that is potentially an embryo
is actually semen, and the bread which is potentially blood is actually
bread. But I think that they do not say well. For there is nothing which
is always actuality alone and by which all things are advanced, except
only the Creator.
5 When he gets here Alexander says that the argument is disordered,
since he [Aristotle] discriminated potential from actual intellect
above, and he now does the same thing. To this we reply that the
argument is repetitive, not disordered. For he does this now in order
to give the whole differentiation at once.
10 43la4-5 The sense-object plainly makes that which perceives,
from being potential, to be actual; for it is not affected or altered.
[Hence this is another species of change. For change is the
actuality of what is incomplete, and what is actuality without
qualification is something else, [sc. the actuality] of what has
been completed]
What is the meaning of this text? He wants to differentiate practical
intellect from contemplative. But before coming to the differentiation
he wants to speak about sense for [one of] two reasons: either because
intellect has something in common with sense inasmuch as it acts
without an intermediary, or because he has a passion for using sense
15 as a model in this differentiation, and that is why he says something
about sense that he has said already, that sense is in potentiality
when it is not acting by virtue of having the disposition and not, like
thought, by virtue of suitability. And whenever the sense-object is
present and the sense acts, the sense is brought to actuality by the
presence of the sense-object. It is not through change that it comes to
20 be actual. Sense is not affected or altered when it is brought from
potentiality of the second kind to being actual. For Aristotle does not
want what is brought from the second sort of potentiality to the second
sort of actuality to be altered nor to be affected, so it is either not
change or another species of change. For if anyone wants to call this
'change' let him call it another species of change over and above those
25 mentioned in the Physics, 312 and introduce a new classification of
nature. Then he [Aristotle] also establishes that the advance from the
second kind of potentiality to the second kind of actuality is not
change. For he says that 'change is the actuality of what is incom-
plete'313 (for change moves from incomplete to complete, and it [the
incomplete thing] is affected and altered), but what is potential in the
Translation 139
second way is complete. The activity of things that are complete is
not change but something else besides change. So the passage from 30
the second sort of potentiality to the second sort of actuality is not a
change but a switch.s14
43la8 Perceiving is like mere saying and thinking [but when
[sc. the soul perceives something to be] pleasant or distressing,
as through asserting or denying it pursues or avoids]
He is still differentiating contemplative intellect from practical. What
does he say? That if, like sense, it has mere saying, that is, mere 35
cognising and thinking, it is called 'contemplative'. But ifit includes 559,1
experiencing pain and pleasure he says it asserts and pursues since
we welcome it [sc. what gives us pleasure] and go for it. He calls
welcoming it 'asserting', and what is painful we deny: we do not
welcome it but actually avoid it. As though, he says, with the discern- 5
ing power of practical intellect we discern good and evil. Do not, then,
take everything to refer to the same thing.s15 Then, since it has been
shown above that sense and appetition are the same in subject, and
he has to say that practical intellect acts with appetition, he says it
acts with sense, sense and appetition being the same in subject.
43lall [And to experience pleasure and distress is to be active
with the perceiving mean] in relation to the good or bad as 10
such316
He does well to add 'as such'. For things are not good or bad in
themselves, but in relation to the animal, what conserves being called
'good' and what destroys 'bad'.
43lal2-13 And avoidance and appetition are thisrn when in
actuality, and that which is appetitive and that which avoids
are not other [either than one another or than that which
perceives; but their being is other]
What is he saying? Comparing the actually distressing and actual 15
pleasure he says the.Y differ in account. He calls the distressing 'that
which is avoided' and the pleasant 'appetition'. Then, lest someone
should think that we reach for something pleasant with one power
and avoid what is distressing with another, he now says that pleasure
and distresss1s do not differ except in account. They do not differ in
subject. For the subject of both is the non-rational part of the soul. 20
But why do I say this, when there is no difference in subject even
between perceiving and experiencing pleasure? The subject of these
also is the non-rational. But they differ 'in being' [a14], that is, in
 140 Translation
account. He says this to show that contemplative intellect too differs
from practical only in account.
25 43lal4-15 But to the thinking soul, phantasms stand in the
same way as perceptions
He uses 'thinking soul' loosely for contemplative intellect. What is he
saying? That it too sometimes uses imagination as also does practical
intellect. But even if it uses imagination, he says, to it phantasms are
30 like perceptions, that is, like sense alone without pain or pleasure.
But to practical intellect, which has good and bad as its subjects, they
are, he says, as it were assertions and denials, and it then uses
pleasure and distress, and pursues the pleasant and avoids the
560,1 distressing. And this intellect always uses imagination because it
always experiences pleasure and distress, which is not possible
separately from imagination, but the first intellect [i.e. contempla-
tive intellect] sometimes does not. It does not think any particulars
without imagination, but it thinks universals even separately from
imagination. But do not think that the good is the same as the
5 pleasant or the bad as the painful. Sexual indulgence is a pleasant
evil, and to control oneself about all things is a painful good. So do
not think that the pleasant for practical intellect is the same as the
good for it.
43lal 7-18 Just as the air makes the pupil to be of a certain
quality, [and this something else, and hearing similarly, but the
last thing is one, and one mean, though it is many in being ....
But what it is by which it discerns how sweet and hot differ has
been said, indeed, before, but may also be said thus. There is
one thing, but [sc. one] as a boundary mark]
He is speaking of the common lodging. And what does he say? That
10 as the air alters the pupil, and the pupil the pneuma, and that the
power of crystalline form,'ll' and this [power] is roused and sees, and
it is one and insofar as it discerns it is a mean, but in another respect
it is different-that is, in account- from the other things that discern
(for hearing too in the same way has some one thing that discerns),
- as it is, then, in those cases, so also in intellect there is a common
15 lodging which is a last thing and a discerning middle. The text says
the first part of this, the part about sight and hearing, but it does not
say 'so also intellect has a lodging'. But having said the first, the
Philosopher leaves us to understand the rest along with it, the part
about intellect, and turns to other things.
A particular sense, he says, discerns in this way,'l2° but it does not
discern white and sweet, but there is something else which we
Translation 141
mentioned above, he says [a21], and will mention also now, the 20
common sense. This is the common lodging for these and is one like
a boundary mark. By 'a boundary mark' he here means the centre of
a circle, from which many straight lines issue forth.
431a22-3 And these, being one by analogy and in number, stand
to each321 as those things to one another
What is he saying? That as the 'boundary mark' that is the centre 25
[stands to the radii] so the common sense stands lto the other sensesJ
both by analogy and in number. In analogy, because just as the centre
stands to each of the lines from it, so the common sense stands to each
of its senses; and as the lines have a certain analogy to each other,
so, he says, have the particular senses a certain analogy to one 30
another. That is how it is one by analogy. How is it one in number?
Because just as there is one centre which has a relationship to
many lines, so the common sense, itself one, has a relation to many
senses.
431a24 For how is wondering how it discerns heterogeneous 561,1
objects different from wondering how it discerns contraries, like
white and black?
Having said that as the common sense stands to the proper
objects ... 322 do not, he says, wonder how a particular sense
knows objects of the same kind, if you do not wonder how the 5
common sense knows heterogeneous objects; for it is the same.a2:3
By 'objects of the same kind' he means black and white, for both
fall under colour. By 'heterogeneous' he means white and sweet,
for these, in that they fall under different senses, are in fact
heterogeneous.
43la25-7 As the first [A324 ], white, is to the second [BJ, black, as
they are to each other3 25 so let the third [CJ be to the fourth [DJ; 10
[so that also alternando]326
He uses the letters here to indicate, A, white, B, black or sometimes
sweet, and C and D for objects of intellect, so that C would be the
account of white and D the account of black. And what does he say?
That as the common sense knows the first and second (you may take
the first still to signify white, the second sweet) so also intellect knows 15
the third and fourth, that is, the accounts of these things. And
intellect, he says, also knows 'alternando'"' AC and BD, that is, both
the sense-objects and the objects of intellect.
 142 Translation
431a28-9 [If, then, C and D should belong to one thing, it will
be thus, as also A and B:] one and the same, but the being not
the same, and that one likewise; 328 [and the same account even
if A should be sweet and B white] 329
20 In subject, he says, they are the same - I mean the form of white or
black or white or black - but they are different in account. For we
see whlte and black differently and we think them differently.
431b2 That which thinks, then, thinks the forms in phantasms
What is he saying? That practical intellect thinks the forms of things
using imagination; and as in that, he says, there are pursuit ar:d
25 avoidance, since it is appetition, so also there are these things m
intellect when it experiences pleasure and distress. Either say that
or this other thing, that above he calls sense-objects 'phantasms' and
below he calls them 'imagination'. And what is he saying? That
intellect sometimes acts along with sense-objects and experiences
pleasure and pain, and sometimes acts without sense, making use of
30 imagination. When it sees torchlight and thinks it is an enemy's, it
acts with perception. But when deliberating where it should make
war, then it uses imagination.
43lb5-6 For instance, perceiving torchlight, that it is fire it gets
to know by that which is common330
What is [the meaning of] 'it gets to know by that which is common'?
Some say [that it gets to know] by the change [sc. in respect of place]
562,1 of the fire. For change is a common sense-object. But it is absurd to
say of what gets to know ... ss1 for he spoke of that which gets to know.
Say, then, that he says this because we get to know the fire by .the
common sense. He says this because he knows that whatever is a
subject of a particular sense is also a subject of the common sense.
5 43lb6-7 But sometimes by the phantasms in the soul [it reasons
and deliberates what is future in relation to what is present]
What is he saying? That when someone has imagined and deliberates
on where to make war, and deliberates about what is present on the
basis of what is past, and chooses the place that is pleasant and avoids
that which is painful, then he uses imagination. It should be known,
he says, that pleasant and distressing are always in [the sphere of]
10 practical intellect, whereas the true or the false that is without action
is in contemplative intellect. And this, he says, is in the same intellect
Translation 143
as good and bad. They differ as absolute and relative, since the true
is so called absolutely and is always the same, whereas the good is
worthless and charming in relation to something. For what is good in
relation to one thing, say the soul, is not good in relation to the body.
That, with God's help, completes the lecture. 15
[LECTURE6]
43lbl2-14 But abstract things, as they are called, it thinks,-
just as, if [someone thought] snubnosed not as snubnosed but
separately, as curved, [he would think it without the flesh in
which the curved is, so it thinks objects of mathematics, which
are not separated, as separated when it thinks them]"'
Having differentiated simple intellect from composite, practical from
contemplative and potential from actual, he returns to the object of
intellect and now teaches about that. The object of intellect is form, 20
and form is threefold: what is altogether in matter, like physical
forms, what is entirely non-material, and what is in one way in matter
and in another non-material, like objects of mathematics. Above'" he
has examined form in matter, when he spoke of what is this particular
thing, and also non-material form, when he enquired into being this.
So now he comes to objects of mathematics and enquires how intellect
thinks them. And he says that it thinks them not as forms in matter 25
but as non-material. It does not know them in the same way as
snubnosed, which it has to think in matter, in the nose, but it knows
them like curved. For that is thought without matter.
And intellect thinks objects of mathematics using imagination
without parts as an instrument. For imagination is without parts: for
when it conceives Socrates running, it conceives him as one thing,
and not as something different from, and over and above, the running. 30
For if imagination comes from sense, since that is not transition-mak-
ing, it is clear that it too is without parts, and does not make
transitions from one thing to another, but imagines all at once. From
this what does he infer? That imagination, like intellect and sense, 563,1
only attains truth and does not also run into falsehood, because
imagining does not involve composition. And from this the soul is
shown to be separable, since things that cannot be separated, I mean
objects of mathematics, are separated by it in conception because it
has separability in its substance. 5
Having said this he enquires whether or not, if actual intellect is
[identical with] things, and if it is in coming to be, it is able to know
non-material things. He raises the problem, but for the moment he
does not solve it. In regard to this Plato says that intellect, when it is
in coming to be, can be a citizen of Heaven, and act in connection with