Note 90 — B. Aristotle.

As this explanation by Hegel of Aristotle’s celebrated passage has so many authorities to support it, the editor cannot here, as frequently elsewhere in these lectures, remain faithful to the directions of his colleagues, quietly to set right anything that is incorrect. It is, nevertheless, clear that Aristotle is speaking of three substances: a sublunar world, which the heavens move; the heavens as the centre which is both mover and moved; and God, the unmoved Mover. The passage must therefore, on the authority of Alexander of Aphrodisias (Schol. in Arist. ed. Brandis, p. 804 b), of Cardinal Bessarion (Aristoteles lat. ed. Bekk. p. 525 b) and others, be thus read: ἔστι τοίνυν τι καὶ ὃ κινεῖ (sc. ὁ οὐρανός)· ἐπεὶ δε τὸ κινούμενον καὶ κινοῦν καὶ μέσον τοίνυν, ἔυτι τι ὃ οὐ κινούμενον κινεῖ. The translation, if this reading be adopted, would be as follows: Besides the heavens in perpetual motion “there is something which the heavens move. But since that which at the same time is moved and causes movement cannot be other than a centre, there is also a mover that is unmoved.” (Cf. Michelet: Examen critique, etc., p. 192; Jahrbücher für wisseuschaftliche Kritik, November, 1841, No. 84, pp. 668, 669). [Editor’s note]