Page:Aristotelous peri psuxes.djvu/322

312 practical thoughts must be derived from the senses, and, therefore, through a sensorium; and as impressions may be genial or otherwise, the faculties suggest pursuit or flight. The practical mind, in fact, never thinks without an image which acts, in its turn, so to say, upon it, as the air, which has been impressed by colour, does upon the pupil and the pupil upon something else (that is, the retina), and so sound upon the hearing; but the last term, that is, the visual or auditory sense, is one, as the mean or medium, however modified in condition, is one. It will be evident, with but little consideration, that the obscurity which is palpable in the succeeding passages is occasioned by the absence of the brain, and can be cleared away only by its introduction; and that, with it, the analogies of unit and limit acquire some kind of signification.

Note 2, p. 166. Thus the cogitative faculty dwells, &c.] Aristotle seems here to consider images or thoughts, present in memory, as necessary to ratiocination, and he has elsewhere said that an individual without senses could neither learn nor understand; but he is evidently alluding to a higher faculty than the sensibility, and which is able, by abstract reasoning, to draw, from present appearances or images, conclusions as to future occurrences, and, by that prevision, to determine what should or should not be done.

Note 3, p. 166. And with respect to all which, &c.] This passage seems, although obscure from its brevity, to