Page:Aristotelous peri psuxes.djvu/197

As to creatures which are fixed, they obtain their nourishment on the spot where they have been produced. It is not possible then, that a body which is not fixed to one spot and which has been generated, should have living principle and judging faculties without being sentient. Nor can a creature spontaneously generated be sentient; Why, let us ask, should it be so? The sensibility is for the greater good either of the Vital Principle or the body; but neither of these can, in the case supposed, be effected by it, as the one will not through it think the better, nor the other be better fitted for its offices. Thus, there is no living body free to move which is not sentient. But if a body be sentient, it must necessarily be either homogeneous or compound—Now, homogeneous it cannot be, as in that case it would be without Touch, and Touch it must of necessity have. All which is proved thus—Since an animal is a living body, and all bodies are tangible, and tangible implies whatever is perceptible to Touch, it follows that the body of an animal must be sensible to Touch, if the animal is to preserve its existence. The other senses, as the sight, smell, hearing, perceive through other media; but if an animal when touching were without sensation, it could have no guide for avoiding some things or seizing others, and so circumstanced, it would not be possible for it to preserve its existence. The taste, therefore, is a kind of Touch, for taste is the