This is further shewn in the formation of bone, as given
in the verse quoted from Empedocles, and which, besides
proportion, admits heat as an agent in combination. The
epithets employed by that eminent writer are not so pre-
cise as might be desired, and it cannot now be determined
what was meant by the words "liquid light," or fire,
(νήστις αἴγλη) (was it phosphorus, in some form?); but yet
proportion and combination, under high temperature, are
quite apparent—the Latin version of the quotation is:
- "Cœperat ante duas tellus justissima vasis
- Aeris ac fontis partes: Vulcanus et ipse
- Quatuor ex octo adjunxit, quis candida magna
- Vis fœcundaque naturae confecerat ossa."
Note 3, p. 49. It is absurd to maintain, &c.] We have had handed down, by the earliest writers, differences of opinion, Aristotle[1] says, upon "action and impression;" but most of them agree in making like unimpressionable by like, (since the one is not more active or passive than the other,) and the unlike and different alone to have been so constituted as to act and re-act upon one another. Democritus stood alone in maintaining that the selfsame like can be, at once, active and passive; for he would not grant that things which are, essentially, different, can mutually act and re-act upon one another. And even though things should seem to be different, there is ever something like, he maintains, by which the impression is made. The difference between these opinions, however,
- ↑ De Gen. et Corr. i. 7. i.
