Page:Ferrier Works vol 2 1888 LECTURES IN GREEK PHILOSOPHY.pdf/196

Rh that it puts off A. Is it now in the state B? has it put on B or any other state? It certainly has not; for you will observe that, just as the Being of A is a separate conception from the not-Being of A, so the not-Being of A is a separate conception from the Being of B—that is, of any other state. The thing, on the terms of this philosophy, is in no state at all. It has ceased to be A, but it has not got into B. It is an intermediate predicament of pure negation or nonentity, a predicament which we can only characterise by calling it the not-Being of A, and the not-Being of B; B standing for any other positive state. In short, the thing, as I said, is in no state at all, and that is an absurd supposition, an absolute inconceivability. Such is the perplexity in which we are landed if we hold asunder Being and not-Being, and fix them as two separate conceptions. Indeed, so sensible were the Eleatics of the force of such reasonings as that which I have placed before you, that, instead of attempting to explain change, they boldly denied its possibility. They saw that it could not be explained on their principles, and therefore they maintained that all change was mere illusion; that, in fact, there was properly no such thing, and that the universe, according to reason, and in its truth, was immutable and uniform. I have stated that the Eleatics constituted Being and not-Being into two separate conceptions, and that the difficulties which beset their philosophy had their origin in this separation. This statement I