LAW OF CAUSATION. 401 



principle of life and activity in all things, men and gods inclusive. If 

 this be not representing it as the Efficient Cause, the dispute altogether has 

 no meaning. 



If either Anaximenes, or Thales, or any of their cotemporaries, had held the 

 doctrine thai vovc; was the Efficient Cause, that doctrine could not have been 

 reputed, as it was throughout antiquity, to have originated with Anaxagoras. 

 The testimony of Aristotle, in the first book of his Metaphysics, is perfectly 

 decisive with respect to these early speculations. After enumerating four kinds 

 of causes, or rather four different meanings of the word Cause, viz. the 

 Essence of a thing, the Matter of it, the Origin of Motion (Efficient Cause), 

 and the End or Final Cause, he proceeds to say, that most of the early philo 

 sophers recognised only the second kind of Cause, the Matter of a thing, TO.Q iv 

 v\r] ilSti /novae yriOijaav apxC tlvai iravTW. As his first example he 

 specifies Thales, whom he describes as taking the lead in this view of the sub 

 ject, 6 Djf ToiavTtji; ap%r)ybc; QiXouotyiaG, and goes on to Hippon, Anaximenes, 

 Diogenes (of Apollonia), Hippasus of Metapontum, Heraclitus, and Empe- 

 docles. Anaxagoras, however, (he proceeds to say,) taught a different i!octrine, 

 as we know, and it is alleged that Hermotimus of Clazomense taught it before 

 him. Anaxagoras represented, that even if these various theories of the uni 

 versal material were true, there would be need of some other cause to account 

 for the transformations of the material, since the material cannot originate its own 

 changes : ov yap df) TO yt vTroKsijjivov avrb iroitl fitTafidXXtiv iavro Xsyw 

 &amp;lt;T olov ovTt TO ZvXov ovTt o ^aX/coc, amoc, TOV [itTafiaXXeiv ticaTtpov avTwv, 

 oiiCi trottl TO /j.fv %uXov K\ivt]v o Ss ^aXfcog dvBpiavTa, d\\ trtpov TL Trjg 

 (iiiTafioXrjf; atTiov, viz., the other kind of cause, oOtv rj d(&amp;gt;\rj r/}&amp;lt;; Kivi iatdtQ an 

 Efficient Cause. Aristotle expresses great approbation of this doctrine (which 

 he says made its author appear the only sober man among persons raving, 

 olov vrjipwv itpdvri Trap tltcfj Xsyoirac; rcv TrpoTipov); but while describing the 

 influence which it exercised over subsequent speculation, he remarks that the 

 philosophers against whom this, as he thinks, insuperable difficulty was urged, 

 had not felt it to be any difficulty : ouStv tSva^pdvav iv tavToiQ. It is surely 

 unnecessary to say more in proof of the matter of fact which Dr. Tulloch and 

 his reviewer deny. 



Having pointed out what he thinks the error of these early speculators in 

 not recognising the need of an efficient cause, Aristotle goes on to mention two 

 other efficient causes to which they might have had recourse, instead of intel 

 ligence : ri\r), chance, and TO avTOftaTov, spontaneity. He indeed puts these 

 aside as not sufficiently worthy causes for the order in the universe, oi d&quot; av Tip 

 ai/TOfjidTy Kai TJJ Tvxy ToffoiJTov iiriTptyai Trpay/j.a KaXwf tl^tv: but he does 

 not reject them as incapable of producing any effect, but only as incapable of 

 producing that effect. He himself recognises Tv%t) and TO avropaTov as co 

 ordinate agents with Mind in producing the phenomena of the universe ; the de 

 partment allotted to them being composed of all the classes of phenomena which 

 are not supposed to follow any uniform law. By thus including Chance among 

 efficient causes, Aristotle fell into an error which philosophy has now outgrown 

 but which is by no means so alien to the spirit even of modem speculation as 

 it may at, first sight appear. Up to quite a recent period philosophers went on 

 ascribing, and many of them have not yet ceased to ascribe, a real existence to 



VOL. i. 26 



