Aristotle ON GENERATION AND CORRUPTION Complete

Translated by H. Joachim.

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66 pages - You are on Page 23

We have now developed the difficulties sufficiently and must therefore try to find a solution of the problem. Our solution must preserve intact the three characteristics of growth-that the growing thing persists, that it grows by the accession (and diminishes by the departure) of something, and further that every perceptible particle of it has become either larger or smaller. We must recognize also (a) that the growing body is not 'void' and that yet there are not two magnitudes in the same place, and (b) that it does not grow by the accession of something incorporeal.

Two preliminary distinctions will prepare us to grasp the cause of growth. We must note (i) that the organic parts grow by the growth of the tissues (for every organ is composed of these as its constituents); and (ii) that flesh, bone, and every such part-like every other thing which has its form immersed in matter-has a twofold nature: for the form as well as the matter is called 'flesh' or 'bone'.

Now, that any and every part of the tissue qua form should grow-and grow by the accession of something-is possible, but not that any and every part of the tissue qua matter should do so. For we must think of the tissue after the image of flowing water that is measured by one and the same measure: particle after particle comes-to-be, and each successive particle is different. And it is in this sense that the matter of the flesh grows, some flowing out and some flowing in fresh; not in the sense that fresh matter accedes to every particle of it. There is, however, an accession to every part of its figure or 'form'.

That growth has taken place proportionally, is more manifest in the organic parts-e.g. in the hand. For there the fact that the matter is distinct from the form is more manifest than in flesh, i.e. than in the tissues. That is why there is a greater tendency to suppose that a corpse still possesses flesh and bone than that it still has a hand or an arm.

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