And so Plato was not far wrong when he said that there are as
many Forms as there are kinds of natural object (if there are Forms
distinct from the things of this earth). The moving causes exist as
things preceding the effects, but causes in the sense of definitions
are simultaneous with their effects. For when a man is healthy, then
health also exists; and the shape of a bronze sphere exists at the
same time as the bronze sphere. (But we must examine whether any
form also survives afterwards. For in some cases there is nothing to
prevent this; e.g. the soul may be of this sort-not all soul but the
reason; for presumably it is impossible that all soul should survive.)
Evidently then there is no necessity, on this ground at least, for the
existence of the Ideas. For man is begotten by man, a given man by
an individual father; and similarly in the arts; for the medical art
is the formal cause of health.
4
The causes and the principles of different things are in a sense
different, but in a sense, if one speaks universally and analogically,
they are the same for all. For one might raise the question whether
the principles and elements are different or the same for substances
and for relative terms, and similarly in the case of each of the
categories. But it would be paradoxical if they were the same for all.
For then from the same elements will proceed relative terms and
substances. What then will this common element be? For (1) (a) there
is nothing common to and distinct from substance and the other
categories, viz.
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