[Footnote 720: ][ (return) ] "Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. iii.
Causes are, therefore, the elements into which the mind resolves its first rough conception of an object. That object is what it is, by reason of the matter out of which it sprang, the moving cause which gave it birth, the idea or form which it realizes, and the end or object which it attains. The knowledge of a thing implies knowing it from these four points of view--that is, knowing its four causes or principles.
These four determinations of being are, on a further and closer analysis, resolved into the fundamental antithesis of MATTER and FORM.
"All things that are produced," says Aristotle, [721] "are produced from something (that is, from matter), by something (that is, form), and become something (the totality--τὸ σύνολον);" as, for example, a statue, a plant, a man. To every subject there belongs, therefore, first, matter (ὕλη); secondly, form (µορφή). The synthesis of these two produces and constitutes substance, or οὐσία. Matter and form are thus the two grand causes or principles whence proceed all things. The formative cause is, at the same time, the moving cause and the final cause; for it is evidently the element of determination which impresses movement upon matter whilst determining it; and it is also the end of being, since being only really exists when it has passed from an indeterminate to a determinate state.
[Footnote 721: ][ (return) ] "Metaphysics," bk. vi. ch. vii.
In proof that the εἶδος or form is an efficient principle operating in every object, which makes it, to our conception, what it is, Aristotle brings forward the subject of generation or production. [722] There are three modes of production--natural, artificial, and automatic. In natural production we discern at once a matter; indeed Nature, in the largest sense, may be defined as "that out of which things are produced." Now the result formed out of this matter or nature is a given substance--a vegetable, a beast, or a man. But what is the producing cause in each case? Clearly something akin to the result. A man generates a man, a plant produces another plant like to itself. There is, therefore, implied in the resulting thing a productive force distinct from matter, upon which it works. And this is the εἶδος, or form. Let us now consider artificial production. Here again the form is the producing power. And this is in the soul. The art of the physician is the εἶδος, which produces actual health; the plan of the architect is the conception, which produces an actual house. Here, however, a distinction arises. In these artificial productions there is supposed a νόησις and a ποίησις. The νόησις is the previous conception which the architect forms in his own mind; the ποίησις is the actual creation of the house out of the given matter. In this case the conception is the moving cause of the production. The form of the statue in the mind of the artist is the motive or cause of the movement by which the statue is produced; and health must be in the thought of the physician before it can become the moving cause of the healing art. Moreover, that which is true of artificial production or change is also true of spontaneous production. For example, a cure may take place by the application of warmth, and this result is accomplished by means of friction. This warmth in the body is either itself a portion of health, or something is consequent upon it which is like itself, which is a portion of health. Evidently this implies the previous presence either of nature or of an artificer. It is also clearly evident that this kind of generating influence (the automatic) should combine with another. There must be a productive power, and there must be something out of which it is produced. In this case, then, there will be a ὕλη and an εἶδος. [723]
[Footnote 723: ][ (return) ] Maurice's "Ancient Philosophy," pp. 205, 206.
From the above it appears that the efficient cause is regarded by Aristotle as identical with the formal cause. So also the final cause--the end for the sake of which any thing exists--can hardly be separated from the perfection of that thing, that is, from its conception or form. The desire for the end gives the first impulse of motion; thus the final cause of any thing becomes identical with the good of that thing. "The moving cause of the house is the builder, but the moving cause of the builder is the end to be attained--that is, the house." From such examples as these it would seem that the determinations of form and end are considered by Aristotle as one, in so far as both are merged in the conception of actuality; for he regarded the end of every thing to be its completed being--the perfect realization of its idea or form. The only fundamental determinations, therefore, which can not be wholly resolved into each other are matter and form. [724]