46 THE GREEK SCHOOL PHILOSOPHY. 



and pressing down an inverted vessel in the water ; 

 on the other hand, it was alleged that a vessel full 

 of fine ashes held as much water as if the ashes 

 were not there, which could only be explained by 

 supposing void spaces among the ashes. Aristotle 

 decides that there is no void, on such arguments as 

 this 6 : In a void there could be no difference of up 

 and down; for as in nothing there are no differences, 

 so there are none in a privation or negation ; but a 

 void is merely a privation or negation of matter; 

 therefore, in a void, bodies could not move up and 

 down, which it is in their nature to do. It is easily 

 seen that such a mode of reasoning elevates the 

 familiar forms of language and the intellectual con- 

 nexions of terms, to a supremacy over facts ; making 

 truth depend upon whether terms are or are not 

 privative, and whether we say that bodies fall na- 

 turally. In such a philosophy every new result of 

 observation would be compelled to conform to the 

 usual combinations of phrases, as these had become 

 associated by the modes of apprehension previously 

 familiar. 



It is not intended here to intimate that the com- 

 mon modes of apprehension, which are the basis of 

 common language, are limited and casual. They 

 imply, on the contrary, universal and necessary con- 

 ditions of our perceptions and conceptions : thus all 

 things are necessarily apprehended as existing in 

 Time and Space, and as connected by relations of 



6 Physic. Ausc. iv. 7- P- 215. 



