180 AKISTOTLE S ANHOMCEOMEBIA 



He often discusses the question of the nature and position 

 of the organ of touch, but nowhere does he seem to arrive at 

 a definite conclusion. Flesh or something analogous to it 

 is, he says, the chief organ of touch, either in the same way 

 as the eye is the organ of sight or else it corresponds with 

 the eye together with some transparent medium.* He 

 prefers to believe that touch does not act by direct contact, 

 that the true organ of touch is not the flesh, but some 

 thing internal to this, and he instances what happens when 

 the hand, covered by a stretched membrane, touches some 

 object ; in this case, the object is felt, but the membrane is 

 not, on that account, the organ of touch, but is merely a 

 medium, t He also points out that, in other respects, there 

 is not necessarily direct contact between the flesh and the 

 object any more than there is contact between water and a 

 body immersed therein, for a film of air may be between 

 the water and the body.t 



According to Aristotle, the sense of touch is closely 

 connected with the heart. It has already been explained 

 that he did not believe that the brain was the sensory centre, 

 and that he had no knowledge of the functions of nerves. 

 From the modern views on the dependence of sensations of 

 touch on the presence of tactile organs beneath the skin and 

 in communication with the central nervous system Aristotle s 

 views were very far removed. 



Taste is, according to Aristotle, a kind of touch, for, 

 like touch, it does not require the interposition of a medium 

 such as is necessary between a coloured body and the eye.|| 

 He also considered the heart or the region of the heart to 

 be the chief sensory organ both of taste and touch. II 



There is a close relationship, it is true, between taste 

 and touch, which Aristotle could not have known. This 

 relationship is that shown by the fact that the sensory 

 nerves of the tongue are both gustatory and tactile. 



He says that while, in some animals, there are two eyes, 

 two ears, and two nostrils symmetrically placed, this double 

 nature of the sense organs is not evident in the case of touch, 

 but is indicated in the case of taste, for some animals, e.g., 

 snakes, lizards, and seals have a forked tongue.** 



* P. A. ii. c. 8, 6536. f De Anima, ii. c. 11, 423& and b. j Ibid. 



De Sensu, dc., c. 2, 439a ; P. A. ii. c. 10, 656. 



j| P. A. ii. c. 10, 657&amp;lt;x ; De Anima, ii. c. 10, 422a. 



H De Sensu, tc., c. 2, 439a ; P. A. ii. c. 10, 65C. 



** P. A. ii. c. 10, 657a, ii. c. 17, 6606, iv. c. 11, G9la. 



