MEDICINE AND PHILOSOPHY 11TH AND 12TH CENTURIES 99 



it is not necessary." ** His claim for his treatment is that 

 nothing more probable will be found in the works of " modern 

 physicists." Since things which are and are seen are bodies, 

 and since all bodies are composed of elements, his starting point 

 is with elements as Constantine defines them. " An element, 

 therefore, as Constantine says in the Pantechne, is a simple 

 and minimum part of any body, simple with respect to quality, 

 minimum with respect to quantity." *^ William interprets this 

 to mean that an element is " a simple part, which has no 

 contrary qualities," which Constantine expands, in order to 

 exclude homogeneous wholes, like bones, by adding " a mini- 

 mum part, which is a part of something in such wise that 

 nothing of the same sort is part of it." Letters are elements 

 in like fashion because they are parts of syllables in a way in 

 which nothing is part of them. Constantine undertook to derive 

 humors from the composition of the four elements, then homo- 

 eomeries or " consimilar parts," like flesh and bone, as well as 

 organic or " instrumental parts," like hands and feet, from 

 humors, and finally, the human body from these two kinds 

 of parts. Consequently, the elements are not " things which 

 are seen," the earth, water, air, and fire, which are commonly 

 called elements, for those are not simple in quality or minimum 

 in quantity, but each is seen to contain all the qualities, as 

 there is in earth, for example, something of hot, of cold, of dry, 

 and of moist. 



William argues therefore that the elements of corporeal things 

 or things which are seen are incorporeal or things which are 

 not seen. Division is of two sorts: the human body can be 

 divided into members and homoeomeries actually, but only the 

 understanding divides homoeomeries into humors and into 

 elements. The power of the understanding, as Boethius points 

 out, is to disjoin the conjunct and to conjoin the disjunct. If it 

 is asked where the elements are, the answer is that they are in 

 composition of bodies as the letter is in the composition of 

 syllables but not in itself {per se) . Some thinkers, like simple 



"■'Ibid., I, 20, PL 172, 48C-D. "/6«Z., 21, 48D-9A. 



