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Translated by W. Ogle.
144 pages - You are on Page 28
Heat appears to cause both coagulation and melting. Now such things as are formed merely of water are solidified by cold, while such as are formed of nothing but earth are solidified by fire. Hot substances again are solidified by cold, and, when they consist chiefly of earth, the process of solidification is rapid, and the resulting substance is insoluble; but, when their main constituent is water, the solid matter is again soluble. What kinds of substances, however, admit of being solidified, and what are the causes of solidification, are questions that have already been dealt with more precisely in another treatise.
In conclusion, then, seeing that the terms hot and hotter are used in many different senses, and that no one substance can be hotter than others in all these senses, we must, when we attribute this character to an object, add such further statements as that this substance is hotter per se, though that other is often hotter per accidens; or again, that this substance is potentially hot, that other actually so; or again, that this substance is hotter in the sense of causing a greater feeling of heat when touched, while that other is hotter in the sense of producing flame and burning. The term hot being used in all these various senses, it plainly follows that the term cold will also be used with like ambiguity.
So much then as to the signification of the terms hot and cold, hotter and colder.
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