Note 65 — Chapter III · * OTHER COMPANIONS OF SOKRATES.

Aristot. Metaph. E. 1027, a. 13; A. 1071, a. 10.

ὥστε ἡ ὕλη ἔσται αἰτία, ἡ ἐνδεχομέν ἠ παρὰ τὸ ὡς ἐπὶ το πολὺ ἄλλως τοῦ συμβεβηκότος.

Matter is represented as the principle of irregularity, of τὸ ὁπότερ’ ἔτυχε — as the δύναμις τῶν ἐναντίων.

In the explanation given by Alexander of Aphrodisias of the Peripatetic doctrine respecting chance — free-will, the principle of irregularity — τύχη is no longer assigned to the material cause, but is treated as an αἰτία κατὰ συμβεβηκός, distinguished from αἰτία προηγούμενα or καθ’ αὑτά. The exposition given of the doctrine by Alexander is valuable and interesting. See his treatise De Fato, addressed to the Emperor Severus, in the edition of Orelli, Zurich. 1824 (a very useful volume, containing treatises of Ammonius, Plotinus, Bardesanes, &c., on the same subject); also several sections of his Quæstiones Naturales et Morales, ed. Spengel, Munich, 1842, pp. 22-61-65-123, &c. He gives, however, a different explanation of τὸ δυνατὸν and τὸ ἀδύνατον in pp. 62-63, which would not be at variance with the doctrine of Diodorus. We may remark that Alexander puts the antithesis of the two doctrines differently from Aristotle, — in this way. 1. Either all events happen καθ’ εἱμαρμένην. 2. Or all events do not happen καθ’ εἱμαρμένην, but some events are ἐφ’ ἡμῖν. See De Fato, p. 14 seq. This way of putting the question is directed more against the Stoics, who were the great advocates of εἱμαρμένη, than against the Megaric Diodorus. The treatises of Chrysippus and the other Stoics alter both the wording and the putting of the thesis. We know that Chrysippus impugned the doctrine of Diodorus, but I do not see how.

The Stoic antithesis of τα καθ’ εἱμαρμένην — τὰ ἐφ’ ἡμῖν is different from the antithesis conceived by Aristotle and does not touch the question about the universality of regular sequence. Τὰ ἐφ’ ἡμῖν describes those sequences in which human volition forms one among the appreciable conditions determining or modifying the result; τὰ καθ’ εἱμαρμένην includes all the other sequences wherein human volition has no appreciable influence. But the sequence τῶν ἐφ’ ἡμῖν is just as regular as the sequence τῶν καθ’ εἱμαρμένην: both the one and the other are often imperfectly predictable, because our knowledge of facts and power of comparison is so imperfect.

Theophrastus discussed τὸ καθ’ εἱμαρμένην, and explained it to mean the same as τὸ κατὰ φύσιν. φανερώτατα δὲ Θεόφραστος δείκνυσι ταὐτὸν ὃν τὸ καθ’ εἱμαρμένην τῷ κατὰ φύσιν (Alexander Aphrodisias ad Aristot. De Animâ, ii.).