PARTS OF ANIMALS, I. i. 



any rate, the matter, if described, would be described 

 as belonging to the concrete whole. For example, 

 " a bed " is a certain form in certain matter, or, 

 alternatively, certain matter that has a certain form ; 

 so Λve should have to include its shape and the manner 

 of its form in our description of it — because the 

 " formal " nature is of more fundamental importance 

 than the " material " nature. 



If, then, each animal and each of its parts is what it 

 is in virtue of its shape and its colour, what Demo- 

 critus says will be correct, since that Avas apparently 

 his vicAv, if one understands him aright when he says 

 that it is evident to everyone Avhat " man " is like as 

 touching his shape, for it is by his- shape and his 

 colour that a man may be told,^ < Now a corpse has 

 the same shape and fashion as a living body ; and 

 yet it is not a man. Again, a hand constituted in 

 any and every manner, e.g., a bronze or wooden 

 one, is not a hand except in name ; and the same 

 applies to a physician depicted on canvas, or a flute 

 carved in stone. None of these can perform the 

 functions appropriate^o the things that bear those 

 names. Likewise, the eye or the hand (or any other 

 part) of a corpse is not really an eye or a hand. 

 Democritus's statement, therefore, needs to be quali- 

 fied, or a carpenter might as Λνεΐΐ claim that a hand 

 made of Λvood really was a hand. The physiologers,* 

 however, Avhen they describe the formation and the 

 causes of the shape of animal bodies, talk in this 

 selfsame vein. Suppose Ave ask the carver " By what 

 agency was this hand fashioned ? " Perhaps his 

 ansAver will be " By my axe " or " By my auger," 

 just as if we ask the physiologer " By Avhat agency 

 was this body fashioned } "he will say " By air " and 



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