Note 64 — Chapter XXVII · PARMENIDES.

Among the commentators on the Categories of Aristotle, there were several whose principal object it was to propound all the most grave and troublesome difficulties which they could think of. Simplikius does not commend the style of these men, but he expresses his gratitude to them for the pains which they had taken in the exposition of the negative case, and for the stimulus and opportunity which they had thus administered to the work of affirmative exposition (Simplikius, Schol. ad Categ. Aristot. p. 40, a. 22-30; Schol. Brandis). David the Armenian, in his Scholia on the Categories (p. 27, b. 41, Brandis), defends the Topica of Aristotle as having been composed γυμνασίας χάριν, ἵνα θλιβομένη ἡ ψυχὴ ἐκ τῶν ἐφ’ ἑκάτερα ἐπιχειρημάτων ἀπογεννήσῃ τὸ τῆς ἀληθείας φῶς.