“Veluti si probemus grammaticum esse aptum ad ridendum, quia homo est aptus ad ridendum.� (Julius Pacius, p. 514.)
[60] Analyt. Post. II. xvii. p. 99, a. 8-16.
The major term of the syllogism will in point of extension be larger than any particular minor, but equal or co-extensive with the sum total of the particulars. Thus the predicate deciduous, affirmable of all plants with broad leaves, is greater in extension than the subject vines, also than the subject fig-trees; but it is equal in extension to the sum total of vines and fig-trees (the other particular broad-leaved plant). The middle also, in an universal demonstration, reciprocates with the major, being its definition. Here the true middle or cause of the effect that vines and fig-trees shed their leaves, is not that they are broad-leaved plants, but rather a coagulation of sap or some such fact.[61]
[61] Ibid. a. 16 seq.
The last chapter of the present treatise is announced by Aristotle as the appendix and completion of his entire theory of Demonstrative Science, contained in the Analytica Priora, which treats of Syllogism, and the Analytica Posteriora, which treats of Demonstration. After formally winding up the whole enquiry, he proceeds to ask regarding the principia of Demonstrative Science: What are they? How do they become known? What is the mental habit or condition that is cognizant of them?[62]
[62] Analyt. Post. II. xix. p. 99, b. 15-19: περὶ μὲν οὖν συλλογισμοῦ καὶ ἀποδείξεως, τί τε ἑκάτερόν ἐστι καὶ πῶς γίνεται, φανερόν, ἅμα δὲ καὶ περὶ ἐπιστήμης ἀποδεικτικῆς· ταὐτὸν γάρ ἐστιν. περὶ δὲ τῶν ἀρχῶν, πῶς τε γίνονται γνώριμοι, καὶ τίς ἡ γνωρίζουσα ἕξις, ἐντεῦθέν ἐστι δῆλον προαπορήσασι πρῶτον.
Bekker and Waitz, in their editions, include all these words in ch. xix.: the older editions placed the words preceding περὶ δὲ in ch. xviii. Zabarella observes the transition to a new subject (Comm. ad Analyt. Post. II. ch. xv. p. 640):— “Postremum hoc caput (beginning at περὶ δὲ) extra primariam tractationem positum esse manifestum est: quum præcesserit epilogus respondens proÅ“mio quod legitur in initio primi libri Priorum Analyticorum.â€�
Aristotle has already laid down that there can be no Demonstration without certain præcognita to start from; and that these præcognita must, in the last resort, be principia undemonstrable, immediately known, and known even more accurately than the conclusions deduced from them. Are they then cognitions, or cognizant habits and possessions, born along with us, and complete from the first? This is impossible (Aristotle declares); we cannot have such valuable and accurate cognitions from the first moments of childhood, and yet not be at all aware of them. They must therefore be acquired; yet how is it possible for us to acquire them?[63] The fact is, that, though we do not from the first possess any such complete and accurate cognitions as these, we have from the first an inborn capacity or potentiality of arriving at them. And something of the same kind belongs to all animals.[64] All of them possess an apprehending and discriminating power born with them, called Sensible Perception; but, though all possess such power, there is this difference, that with some the act of perception dwells for a longer or shorter time in the mind; with others it does not. In animals with whom it does not dwell, there can be no knowledge beyond perception, at least as to all those matters wherein perception is evanescent; but with those that both perceive and retain perceptions in their minds, ulterior knowledge grows up.[65] There are many such retentive animals, and they differ among themselves: with some of them reason or rational notions arise out of the perceptions retained; with others, it is not so. First, out of perception arises memory; next, out of memory of the same often repeated, arises experience, since many remembrances numerically distinct are summed up into one experience. Lastly, out of experience, or out of the universal notion, the unum et idem which pervades and characterizes a multitude of particulars, when it has taken rest and root in the mind, there arises the principium of art and science: of science, in respect to objects existent; of art, in respect to things generable.[66] And thus these mental habits or acquirements neither exist in our minds determined from the beginning, nor do they spring from other acquirements of greater cognitive efficacy. They spring from sensible perception; and we may illustrate their growth by what happens in the panic of a terrified host, where first one runaway stops in his flight, then a second, then a third, until at last a number docile to command is collected. One characteristic feature of the mind is to be capable of this process.[67]
[63] Analyt. Post. II. xix. p. 99, b. 25-30: πότερον οὐκ ἐνοῦσαι αἱ ἕξεις ἐγγίνονται, ἢ ἐνοῦσαι λελήθασιν. εἰ μὲν δὴ ἔχομεν αὐτάς, ἄτοπον· συμβαίνει γὰρ ἀκριβεστέρας ἔχοντας γνώσεις ἀποδείξεως λανθάνειν· εἰ δὲ λαμβάνομεν μὴ ἔχοντες πρότερον, πῶς ἂν γνωρίζοιμεν καὶ μανθάνοιμεν ἐκ μὴ προϋπαρχούσης γνώσεως; Compare, supra, Analyt. Post. I. iii. p. 72, b. 20-30; Metaphys. A. ix. p. 993, a. 1, with the Comment. of Alexander, p. 96, Bonitz.
[64] Analyt. Post. II. xix. p. 99, b. 30: φανερὸν τοίνυν οὔτ’ ἔχειν οἷόν τε, οὔτ’ ἀγνοοῦσι καὶ μηδεμίαν ἔχουσιν ἕξιν ἐγγίνεσθαι· ἀνάγκη ἄρα ἔχειν μέν τινα δύναμιν, μὴ τοιαύτην δ’ ἔχειν ἢ ἔσται τούτων τιμιωτέρα κατ’ ἀκρίβειαν. φαίνεται δὲ τοῦτό γε πᾶσιν ὑπάρχον τοῖς ζῴοις.