NUMBERS ARE NOT QUANTITY IN ITSELF.
Shall we then say that numbers alone are quantity? Shall we attribute this privilege to Numbers in themselves, which are beings, because they exist in themselves?[250] Shall we grant the same privilege to numbers existing in things which participate in them, and which serve to number, not unities, but ten oxen, for example, or ten horses? First, it would seem absurd that these numbers should not be beings, if the former ones be such. Then, it will seem equally absurd that they should exist within the things they measure, without existing outside them,[251] as the rules and instruments which serve to measure exist outside of the objects they measure. On the other hand, if these numbers that exist in themselves serve to measure, and nevertheless do not exist within the objects that they measure, the result will be that these objects will not be quantities since they will not participate in quantity itself.