Section 1

Beginning 1 means: (a) That part of a thing from which one may first move; eg., a line or a journey has one beginning here , and another at the opposite extremity. (b) The point from which each thing may best come into being; e.g., a course of study should sometimes be begun not from what is primary or from the starting-point of the subject, but from the point from which it is easiest to learn. (c) That thing as a result of whose presence something first comes into being; e.g., as the keel is the beginning of a ship, and the foundation that of a house, and as in the case of animals some thinkers suppose the heart 2 to be the beginning, others the brain, 3 and others something similar, whatever it may be. (d) That from which, although not present in it, a thing first comes into being, and that from which motion and change naturally first begin, as the child comes from the father and mother, and fighting from abuse. (e) That in accordance with whose deliberate choice that which is moved is moved, and that which is changed is changed; such as magistracies, authorities, monarchies and despotisms.

(f) Arts are also called beginnings, 4 especially the architectonic arts. (g) Again, beginning means the point from which a thing is first comprehensible, this too is called the beginning of the thing; e.g. the hypotheses of demonstrations. (Cause can have a similar number of different senses, for all causes are beginnings. )

It is a common property, then, of all beginnings to be the first thing from which something either exists or comes into being or becomes known; and some beginnings are originally inherent in things, while others are not. Hence nature is a beginning, and so is element and understanding and choice and essence and final cause—for in many cases the Good and the Beautiful are the beginning both of knowledge and of motion.