But the essence, also, cannot be reduced to another definition
which is fuller in expression. For the original definition is always
more of a definition, and not the later one; and in a series in
which the first term has not the required character, the next has
not it either. Further, those who speak thus destroy science; for it
is not possible to have this till one comes to the unanalysable terms.
And knowledge becomes impossible; for how can one apprehend things
that are infinite in this way? For this is not like the case of the
line, to whose divisibility there is no stop, but which we cannot
think if we do not make a stop (for which reason one who is tracing
the infinitely divisible line cannot be counting the possibilities
of section), but the whole line also must be apprehended by
something in us that does not move from part to part.-Again, nothing
infinite can exist; and if it could, at least the notion of infinity
is not infinite.
But if the kinds of causes had been infinite in number, then
also knowledge would have been impossible; for we think we know,
only when we have ascertained the causes, that but that which is
infinite by addition cannot be gone through in a finite time.
3
The effect which lectures produce on a hearer depends on his
habits; for we demand the language we are accustomed to, and that
which is different from this seems not in keeping but somewhat
unintelligible and foreign because of its unwontedness.
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