Page:Aristotelous peri psuxes.djvu/239

CH. III.] maker or creator, whether it be mind, or art, or a special faculty—it is an abstraction that is; but, whatever is practical is dependent only on an agent, or his choice, for the act is identical with what is chosen. Thus, thoughts are confined to the particular faculties and organs which are required for securing what may have been chosen.

Note 7, p. 33. Terminated by a syllogism.] The syllogism is an argument, in which, from given premises, something different from the terms laid down results, necessarily, from their admission. Modern definition is much like this—the syllogism is said to be an argument of three propositions, having the property, that the necessarily follows from the two premises; so that if the premises be true, the conclusion must be true; and a conclusion is the proposition which is inferred from certain former propositions, termed the premises of the argument.

Note 8, p. 34. The same incongruity.] This is an objection by Aristotle to the doctrine of metempsychosis, adopted by the Pythagoreans, and, being placed upon obvious physical relations, it may be considered as. Thus, philosophers held numbers to be elements, and perceived in them and their combinations to, or types of faculties and sentient properties, as has been observed. Their doctrine was, "that man consists of an elementary nature, and a rational or divine