ARISTOTLE AND THE EARLIER PERIPATETICS vol.I by Eduard Zeller, B.F.C.Costelloe 1897

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tract cited in the Be Ccelo '
ARISTOTLE'S WHITINGS 125
was written later than that
work. 2 The Meteorology refers to the Be Sensu
yet in its own preamble it
3
and
described itself as the close
of the series of investigations as to inorganic nature, after
which the works on Animals and Plants were to be taken
up. The Natural History quotes the book on Plants,
which is spoken of in texts that are demonstrably later
as being still unwritten. 4 The same treatise on Plants
is referred to in an early section of the Hepl £mcov
yeveasas as already existing, and in a later one as yet
to come. 6 The lost book on Pood is quoted in the
Be Somno ;
6
in the later works on the Parts and
Generation of Animals, it is promised as in the future. 7
There is a similar relation of cross reference between
these same tracts and one of the lesser physiological
126 ARISTOTLE
texts, 1 making it impossible to say which comes before
the other. The tract on the Parts of Animals is cited
once in that on the Motion of Animals, which it cites
three times itself. 2
How are we to treat this peculiarity ?
Are we so to
pervert the formulae of reference in all these cases as to
read what ostensibly refers to an earlier writing as if it
were only an indication of something intended in a later
one ?
This would be negatived by the number of cases in
which the phenomenon recurs—itself a notable fact— and
also by the circumstance that in several cases the assumption
of the later treatise as a thing already in existence is
too intimately interwoven with the tenor of the passage
to allow the change. 3 The like reasons stand equally
against the theory that these abnormal references crept
into the text after Aristotle's death. 4 But there is a far
1
Be Ccelo, ii. 2, 284, b, 13
if the world had a right and left
side, it would also be obliged to
have an above and below, a before
and behind ; SubpiOTai piv oZv irepl
roiruv iv rois trepl rks twv £(po>v
Kivfiacts (Ingr. An. 2, 704, b, 18,
sqq., ibid, c, 4 sq.) Sm -rb rrjs
tptiffeas oiKeta rqs ineiva>v elvat.
- This is proved not only from
Meteorol. i. 1 fin. but also because
the History of Animals and n.
%4 av p-optuv are quoted ; see Iml.
Arist. 100, a, 55 sq.
3 III. 2 fin.
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