GENERATION OF ANIMALS, II. i. 



proximate motive cause," to which belong the logos 

 and the Form, is better and more divine in its nature 

 than the Matter,** it is better also that the superior one 

 should be separate from the inferior one. That 

 is why wherever possible and so far as possible the 

 male is separate from the female, since it is some- 

 thing better and more divine in that it is the principle 

 of movement '^ for generated things, while the female 

 serves as their matter. The male, however, comes 

 together with the female and mingles \\ith it for the 

 business of generation, because this is something that 

 concerns both of them. 



'^ [Thus things are alive in \irtue of having in them 

 a share of the male and of the female, and that is why 

 even plants have life. The class of animals, however, 

 is <what it is) in virtue of its power of sense-per- 

 ception.^ In practically all animals which can move 

 about the male and the female are found separate, 

 and the causes are the ones which have been stated ; 

 and, as was said,^ some of them emit semen during 

 copulation, some do not. The reason for this is that 

 the higher animals are more self-sufficient in then- 

 nature, and so are large in size : this cannot be so 

 ^^'ithout heat of Soul, since of necessity the larger a 

 thing is, the greater the power required to move it, 

 and heat acts as a motive power. Hence, if we take 



' Cf. P. A. 666 a 34 to fj.ev yap l^wov aladTJaei (Lpiarai, and 

 651 b 4, 653 b 22. Aristotle seems to have perceived early 

 the importance of this point, as it occurred in his early work 

 Protrepfiriis. See lamblichus, Protreptleus 7 (44. 9 Pistelli; 

 37. 9 Walzer, .Iristof. Dial. Frag.), a passage which accord- 

 ing to Jaeger (Aristotle, 69) comes from Aristotle's Profrep- 

 ticus : aXXa fMrjv to ye i,TJv tJj aiaddvfoBai SiaKpiverai tov (it} t,fiv, 

 and with that whole passage cf. 731 a 29-b 3 above. 



* Bk. I, ch. 17. 



133 



