DISTINCTION BETWEEN ESSENCE AND BEING.
1. Is "essence" something different from "being"? Does essence indicate an abstraction of the other (four categories), and is being, on the contrary, essence with the other (four categories), motion and rest, identity and difference? Are these the elements of being? Yes: "being" is the totality of these things, of which one is essence, the other is motion, and so forth. Motion, therefore, is accidental essence. Is it also accidental "being?" Or is it being completely? Motion is being, because all intelligible things are beings. But why is not each of the sense-things a being? The reason is, that on high all things form only a single group of totality, while here below they are distinct one from another because they are images that have been distinguished. Likewise, in a seminal (reason), all things are together, and each of them is all the others; the hand is not distinct from the head; while, on the contrary, in a body all the organs are separate, because they are images instead of being genuine beings.