For early thinkers, untrained in the methods and unaware of the limits of thought, even for the great and free thinkers of Greece, a cap- tivating analogy was irresistible'; while inventing schemes of thought they believed themselves to be describing the processes of nature. Moreover it has been the temptation of philosophers of all times, and even of Harvey himself than whom none had put better the conditions of scientific method, to suppose that by means of abstraction kinds may be apprehended; that thus they may get nearer to the inmost core of things; that by purging away the characters of individuals they may detect the essence and cause of individuation
St Thomas it was matter. For all "vitalists" the identity of form, soul and life is essential; thus Stahl regarded soul as bestowing on body all activity, as determining all vital functions. In Aristotle xń is untranslatable-anima and animus-soul and vital principle. Ivevpa again in various writers may mean anything, from air to spirit or other essence; cf. Arist. De Generat. An. II. 3, and the "aura" of Harvey, and even of Haller in the same connexiou as the fertilising element.
¹ Not for all, not for the greatest of them! Aristotle, in vain, warned later generations against prophesying what seems likely, instead of looking to see how things come about our dann déyovres, λdà partevóuevos To ovμßoó- LEVOV ÉK TÁV Fikótov, kai mpooλaµßávoures as ouras exor mpiv pivópevov otros idei." (De Gen. Auim. IV. i.) "Croire tout ce qu'on rêve," if useful and possibly admirable in its day, in "neo-Hegelians" is a little stale.
