the matter and principle is then advanced to refute the doctrine of metempsychosis maintained by the followers of Pythagoras; as the active and passive, the agent and subject, cannot possibly be mere casual associations. The subject is further exemplified, in the closing paragraphs, by those two conditions which pervade all Aristotle's writings—the body while yet in potentiality is, by the Vital Principle, realised, converted, that is into reality; for Vital Principle can act only upon what is in potentiality, and capable, under its influence, with form, of becoming a specific creature.
Note 1, p. 71. And all animals, without exception, have the sense of Touch, &c.] Aristotle, having observed that plants have only the function of nutrition, that is, are not sentient, proceeds to the first and, therefore, most universal of the senses—that which may, as he assumed, be present without any other, although there can be no other without it. Thus, the Touch, as perceptive of food, was supposed to be subservient to the appetite, and the Taste, as discriminating, by tangible qualities, what in food may be genial or otherwise, was held to be a modification of the Touch; but the Touch alone was by Aristotle regarded as distinctive of animal in contrast
