Aristotle ON THE PARTS OF ANIMALS Complete

Translated by W. Ogle.

Aristotle Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Aristotle in Print

144 pages - You are on Page 43

Very nearly resembling the bones to the touch are such parts as nails, hoofs, whether solid or cloven, horns, and the beaks of birds, all of which are intended to serve as means of defence. For the organs which are made out of these substances, and which are called by the same names as the substances themselves, the organ hoof, for instance, and the organ horn, are contrivances to ensure the preservation of the animals to which they severally belong. In this class too must be reckoned the teeth, which in some animals have but a single function, namely the mastication of the food, while in others they have an additional office, namely to serve as weapons; as is the case with all animals that have sharp interfitting teeth or that have tusks. All these parts are necessarily of solid and earthy character; for the value of a weapon depends on such properties. Their earthy character explains how it is that all such parts are more developed in four-footed vivipara than in man. For there is always more earth in the composition of these animals than in that of the human body. However, not only all these parts but such others as are nearly connected with them, skin for instance, bladder, membrane, hairs, feathers, and their analogues, and any other similar parts that there may be, will be considered farther on with the heterogeneous parts. There we shall inquire into the causes which produce them, and into the objects of their presence severally in the bodies of animals. For, as with the heterogeneous parts, so with these, it is from a consideration of their functions that alone we can derive any knowledge of them. The reason for dealing with them at all in this part of the treatise, and classifying them with the homogeneous parts, is that under one and the same name are confounded the entire organs and the substances of which they are composed. But of all these substances flesh and bone form the basis. Semen and milk were also passed over when we were considering the homogeneous fluids. For the treatise on Generation will afford a more suitable place for their examination, seeing that the former of the two is the very foundation of the thing generated, while the latter is its nourishment.

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