Page:Aristotelous peri psuxes.djvu/153

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CH. III.]
ARISTOTLE ON THE THE VITAL PRINCIPLE.
[143

those writers maintain, necessarily, true, or else error is caused by contact of the unlike, which is the opposite of the opinion, that like is recognised by like; and the error from contraries seems to be identical with the knowledge of contraries. It is manifest that feeling is not identical with reflexion; for, while the former belongs to all creatures, the latter has been imparted only to a few. Neither is thinking, that faculty to which belongs the sense of right and wrong, (the right comprehending judgment, knowledge, and sound opinion, the wrong comprehending their contraries,) to be confounded with feeling—for sensation, being derived from particulars, is ever true, and belongs to all animals; but the judgment may be wrong, and is imparted only to such as have reason. Imagination, in fact, is neither sensation nor judgment, and yet it is not called up without sensation, just as, without sensation, there can be no conception; but it is manifest that imagination is not conception. Imagination depends, in fact, but upon ourselves, as we can, at will, call it up (since it is in our own power to place images before the eyes, as do they who, for mnemonic aids, by laying down objects, form symbols); but to form an opinion does not depend upon ourselves, and then every opinion is, of necessity, either true or false. Whenever, besides, we may have an opinion upon any terrible and fearful incident, we are straightway affected as if it were a reality, just as