But since the simple term being
is used in various senses, of which we saw that one was accidental , and another true (not-being being used in the sense of false
); and since besides these there are the categories, e.g. the what,
quality, quantity, place, time, and any other similar meanings; and further besides all these the potential and actual : since the term being
has various senses, it must first be said of what is
accidentally, that there can be no speculation about it.
This is shown by the fact that no science, whether practical, productive or speculative, concerns itself with it. The man who produces a house does not produce all the attributes which are accidental to the house in its construction; for they are infinite in number. There is no reason why the house so produced should not be agreeable to some, injurious to others, and beneficial to others, and different perhaps from every other existing thing; but the act of building is productive of none of these results.
In the same way the geometrician does not study the accidental attributes of his figures, nor whether a triangle is different from a triangle the sum of whose angles is equal to two right angles. And this accords with what we should reasonably expect, because accident
is only, as it were, a sort of name. Hence in a way Plato Footnote 1Cf. Plat. Soph. 254a. was not far wrong in making sophistry deal with what is nonexistent;
because the sophists discuss the accident more, perhaps, than any other people—whether cultured
and grammatical,
Footnote 2i.e. able to read and write. The sophistic argument is given by Alexander as follows: A is grammatical; therefore grammatical A=A. A is cultured; therefore cultured A=A. Therefore grammatical=cultured, and he who is grammatical must be cultured. But B, though grammatical, is not cultured. Therefore the grammatical is not the same as the cultured. and cultured Coriscus
and Coriscus,
Footnote 3If Coriscus is the same as cultured Coriscus, he is the same as cultured cultured Coriscus, and soad infinitum. Cf. Soph. Elench. 173a 34. are the same or different; and whether everything that is, but has not always been, has come into being, so that if a man who is cultured has become grammatical, he has also, being grammatical, become cultured Footnote 4If A, being cultured, has become grammatical, then being cultured he is grammatical. Then being grammatical he is cultured. But he has not always, being grammatical, been cultured. So if that which is but has not always been must have come to be, then being grammatical he has become cultured; i.e., he must have been both grammatical before he was cultured and cultured before he was grammatical; which is absurd ( Ross). ; and all other such discussions. Indeed it seems that the accidental is something closely akin to the nonexistent.
This is clear too from such considerations as the following: of things which are in other senses there is generation and destruction, but of things which are accidentally there is not. Footnote 5i.e., the process of becoming or change takes place in the subject—the man , who is accidentally cultured, becomes grammatical, and when the process is complete the cultured
is accidentally grammatical; but it does not become so. Nevertheless we must state further, so far as it is possible, with regard to the accidental, what its nature is and through what cause it exists. At the same time it will doubtless also appear why there is no science of it.
Since, then, there are among existing things some which are invariable and of necessity (not necessity in the sense of compulsion, Footnote 6Cf. Aristot. Met. 5.5.2. but that by which we mean that it cannot be otherwise Footnote 7Aristot. Met. 5.5.3 ), and some which are not necessarily so, nor always, but usually: this is the principle and this the cause of the accidental. For whatever is neither always nor usually so, we call an accident.
E.g., if in the dog-days Footnote 8The period from July 3 to August 11, during which the dog-star Sirius rises and sets with the sun. we have storm and cold, we call it an accident; but not if we have stifling and intense heat, because the latter always or usually comes at this time, but not the former. It is accidental for a man to be white (since this is neither always nor usually so), but it is not accidental for him to be an animal.
It is by accident that a builder restores to health, because it is not a builder but a doctor who naturally does this; but the builder happened accidentally to be a doctor. A confectioner, aiming at producing enjoyment, may produce something health-giving; but not in virtue of his confectioner’s art. Hence, we say, it was accidental; and he produces it in a sense, but not in an unqualified sense.
For there are potencies which produce other things, but there is no art or determinate potency of accidents, since the cause of things which exist or come to be by accident is also accidental.
Hence, since not everything is or comes to be of necessity and always, but most things happen usually, the accidental must exist. E.g., the white man is neither always nor usually cultured; but since this sometimes happens, it must be regarded as accidental. Otherwise, everything must be regarded as of necessity.
Therefore the cause of the accidental is the matter, which admits of variation from the usual.
We must take this as our starting-point: Is everything either always
or usually
? This is surely impossible. Then besides these alternatives there is something else: the fortuitous and accidental. But again, are things usually so, but nothing always , or are there things which are eternal? These questions must be inquired into later Footnote 9Cf. Aristot. Met. 12.6-8. ; but it is clear that there is no science of the accidental—because all scientific knowledge is of that which is always or usually so. How else indeed can one learn it or teach it to another? For a fact must be defined by being so always or usually; e.g., honey-water is usually beneficial in case of fever.
But science will not be able to state the exception to the rule: when it is not beneficial—e.g. at the new moon; because that which happens at the new moon also happens either always or usually; but the accidental is contrary to this. We have now explained the nature and cause of the accidental, and that there is no science of it.