more distinct from them all than they are distinct from one another. It therefore marks a new crisis in the development of philosophy; so that while we may class the previous systems together under the general title of the philosophy of Being, inasmuch as they all deal in some way or other with Being, we place the system of Heraclitus under a different head, and designate it as the philosophy of Becoming. This is the only word in our language which corresponds to the γιγνόμενον of the Greeks; but it is an unfortunate word in being both inexpressive and ambiguous. It often stands for the proper, the decent. Of course that is not the sense in which it is here used. It is used in some sort of antithetical relation to Being, a relation which we must endeavour to determine. For in these two words, ἔστι and γίγνεται, ὂν and γιγνόμενον, centres the most cardinal distinction in the Greek philosophy, a distinction corresponding in some degree to our substantial and phenomenal. This distinction was mainly due to Heraclitus.
3. It is quite true that in previous systems we frequently encounter the conception of change, or of becoming, so that Heraclitus cannot be said to have been the first who entertained the conception. He was the first, however, who elevated change to the rank of a principle, who made it in fact the principle, the universal in all things. Previous philosophers had made change derivative, and had attempted to
