Page:O. F. Owen's Organon of Aristotle Vol. 1 (1853).djvu/366

 the middle. We may also show that the vine has broad leaves, from its shedding them, for if D be what has broad leaves, E to shed the leaf, F a vine, E then is present with F, (for every vine sheds its leaf,) but D with E, (for every thing which sheds its leaf, has broad leaves,) every vine then has broad leaves, the cause is, its shedding them. Nevertheless if they cannot be the cause of each other, (since cause is prior to that of which it is the cause,) the cause of an eclipse indeed is the interposition of the earth, but an eclipse is not the cause of the earth interposing. If then the demonstration by cause (shows) why a thing is, but that which is not through cause, that it is, one knows indeed that the earth is interposed, but why it is, he does not know. Yet that an eclipse is not the cause of the interposition, but this of an eclipse, is plain, since in the definition of an eclipse, the interposition of the earth is inherent, so that evidently that is known through this, but not this through that.

Or may there be many causes of one thing? for if the same thing may be predicated of many primary, let A be present with B a first, and with C another first, and these with D E, A then will be present with D E, but the cause why it is with D will be B, and C the cause why it is with E, hence from the existence of the cause there is necessarily the